XXIV

Quite a number of people had come to luncheon. Quite a number still

remained, though it was past four o'clock, upon the great, deep-eaved

verandah, in attendance on Virginia. There was a babel of clear,

penetrating voices, occasionally an outbreak of laughter, though, in

point of fact, notwithstanding its ready verbal wit, the New World is

less addicted to laughter than the Old. Laurence had listened, had put

in a lazy sentence here and there; but now the entertainment began to

pall on him slightly. It was too continuous. They were all so young, so

emphatic, so tireless in the business of pleasure, these bright,

clear-cut, young people. He remembered it was mail day. The English

letters and newspapers should have arrived by now. He got up and

sauntered, cigarette in mouth, into the great, pale living-room. The

Venetian shutters were closed, and the room, with its spare though

elegant furniture, and butter-coloured, parquet floor, was full of a

clear, green light, quiet, and excellently cool. Sure enough, on one of

the tables lay, in goodly array, lately arrived letters and papers.

Laurence began opening these in desultory fashion. The glass doors,

standing wide on to the verandah, framed Virginia's perfectly finished

person lying back in a rocking-chair. Her profile was outlined against a

soft, sea-green cushion. She was talking, others were listening, as was

usually the case in respect of Virginia. Beyond the hand-rail and

uprights of the verandah, could be seen a long sweep of rather coarse

grass, and the waters of the river, white in the brilliant, afternoon

light, whereon lay some trim rowing-boats and smart pleasure-yachts at

anchor. The water was absolutely still, even and gleaming as the surface

of a silver mirror; yet it lapped with a just audible gurgle and suck

against the indentations of the low, green banks. And this cool, liquid

sound formed an agreeable undertone to those clear, penetrating voices,

the ceaseless chirrup of crickets and strident fiddlings of countless

grasshoppers.

Behind the ample, wide-ranging, wooden house--spotless in its purity of

white paint, dignified by its ranges of dark-green, slatted shutters,

its grey-brown, shingled roofs, and many gables--a certain puritan

simplicity pervading it, somewhat quaintly at variance with its

highly-developed appliances of modern comfort, and the almost

surprisingly civilised examples of modern humanity now domiciled within

it--behind it the ground trended upward, through pleasant orchards of

apple, pear, and peach trees, past commodious wooden barns and stables,

long, grey snake-fences, and corn patches, where the pumpkins began to

grow golden beneath the wide, glistening leaves, the giant cobs and

silken tassels of the maize. Down to meet this spacious foreground

unencumbered by superfluous detail, wandered the sparse, untamed,

ubiquitous woodland of the New England States. Everywhere slender,

long-limbed trees, endless scrub, festooning vines, heavy with bunches

of little fox-grapes, and below outcroppings of grey rock. Some two

months hence, the edge of the woodland would be fringed by spires of

golden-rod and processions of purple asters, while the maples set forth

an amazement of verdigris green, lemon-colour, and all manner of radiant

pinks and scarlets, and sumach dyed the hollows blood-red; but as yet

the woods retained their summer tints. There was a slight want of

atmosphere no doubt. The landscape was oddly lacking in values of

distance; while the sky was blue to the point of crudity, and the sun

blazed, had blazed, would blaze, with a youthful and tireless

energy--not unsuggestive of the conversation of Virginia and all those

friends of hers--throughout the unshadowed and unmitigated day.

To right and left were other hospitable mansions, the limits of their

private grounds unmarked by jealous wall or paling. A wide-ranging

spirit of good-nature and confidence appeared to reign; yet, in point of

fact, the inhabitants of these agreeable country houses formed a

distinctly close corporation. The Van Reenan property had been broken up

into building lots on the death of its first owner, old Erasmus Van

Reenan, merchant and financier of New York, nearly seventy years ago.

But the said lots had been acquired by members of his numerous family;

and still Van Reenans, direct and collateral, their children and their

children's children, found relaxation at times in this amiable, American

Capua. But woe to any intruder from the outer world, unless furnished

with irreproachable passport and the very highest of high-class

references, who should venture to set sacrilegious foot on this thrice

sacred ground! For, as Laurence had frequently reflected--not without a

measure of amusement--nothing is so essentially aristocratic as a

democratic country, nothing so socially exclusive as an immature

civilisation.

It was the first time since her marriage that Virginia had honoured the

Van Reenan property with her presence; but being debarred, by the fact

of her mourning for her husband's uncle, from participation in the gay

life of those summer resorts where the _elite_ of the smart world do

mostly congregate, she had elected to retire upon one of these

many-gabled, ancestral mansions. She was explaining all this--and really

it appeared to require a surprising amount of explanation--to Mr. Horace

Greener, a young man of distinguished, social pretensions, the constant

frequenter of her entertainments both in Newport and New York, who,

finding himself obliged to visit the city on business, had sought at

once physical refreshment and satisfaction of the emotion of friendship

by running out by train, to-day, to visit her.

Virginia's clear intonations rose superior to the chorus of feminine

voices around her, their singular vivacity and singular composure alike

offering an unconscious challenge to Laurence's mental attitude as he

lazily tore open his English letters and newspapers. He had left Stoke

Rivers just three weeks, and all that time he had been a prey to

vacuity, to a sort of gnawing emptiness. At moments a blind rage took

him, but only at moments. In the main his attitude was cynical.

Disappointment had embittered him. Nothing mattered much, nothing ever

would matter much again. He had had his great chance and lost it,

muddled it somehow. A bigger man would have over-ridden the difficulties

of the affair. But he was a bungler, a poor creature. He was profoundly

contemptuous of himself, and not a little contemptuous also of men and

things.

But here was a thick packet from Armstrong, and that awoke an unexpected

interest in him. It would be quite pleasant to have news of the light

railway, and the gypsum quarries.--Nice fellow, that young engineer,

and not at all conceited. Most experts have such a confoundedly good

opinion of themselves!--Laurence fell to whistling softly, and

involuntarily he recalled the slender, courtly music of a certain

eighteenth century minuet. Then he stopped suddenly, an immense

nostalgia taking him for a very different scene and place, and--well, a

general outlook less secure and circumscribed, and, he had almost said,

trivial. He didn't want to be censorious--who was he, after all, in good

truth, to be that?--but Horace Greener's trim, light-clad person,

leaning against a pillar of the verandah close to Virginia's

rocking-chair, caught his eye. The young man was excellently got up, he

was well-bred, agreeable, would pass muster in any society; yet Laurence

wearied mightily of him just then--of his neatly handsome features,

which would photograph so well and paint so poorly, and of his alert and

civil manner.

"No, I imagined you would be surprised to find me so at home in this

idyllic and patriarchal _milieu_, Mr. Greener," Virginia was saying. "I

rather counted upon that. You did not accredit me with so much

adaptability. Some other of my friends have observed upon that also. And

I assure you I am rewarded; for I find it the most recuperative process

a woman can go through to retire upon herself and upon nature in this

way. My parents had been anxious to come out here all summer this year,

and when I concluded to join them we worked out a regular scheme. I

assure you it has called forth a quite affecting display of family

affection. There are nine houses on the place. They are all full. We all

meet daily. Even my cousin, Mrs. Bellingham, has come over with her

children from Europe.--Yes, I am very glad you should have met Louise

again, Mr. Greener. The English life does not altogether suit her. I

observed she was wanting at first in animation. It does her good to see

old friends. I apprehend she feels rather exiled. I wonder if I shall

feel rather exiled? But I don't propose to take it that way. I propose

every one there shall feel exiled because they have not had the

inestimable advantage of being born on this side. Do you not think that

is the true patriotic platform, now, Mr. Greener?"--

There was another letter. Laurence knew the handwriting, but he could

couple no name with it. Yet certainly he knew it, and the sight of it

conveyed to him an impression vaguely amusing. He laid aside the agent's

voluminous packet and opened the envelope.

"Why, the poor little Padre Sahib, to be sure," he exclaimed, half

aloud. "Have they been tripping him up with strings again across the

school door?"

But as he read, amusement gave place to quite other sentiments. His

eyebrows drew together, and his face, for all its healthy sunburn,

blanched to the indistinct, dusty grey of his well-cut flannels.

"This very shocking discovery has, as you will, I feel sure, readily

conceive, quite unnerved me," wrote Walter Samuel Beal. "But for the

support and invaluable advice of the Archdeacon I should have sunk under

the burden of responsibility thrown upon me. A case so extraordinary has

rarely, if ever, arisen, I should suppose, during the whole history of

the Christian ministry. I should add that the oak coffin was so charred

at one corner as to reveal a second coffin, composed of lead, within. As

the inscription upon the coffin plate was quite legible, and as Mr.

Armstrong was in possession of information bearing upon this very

painful matter, I abstained from further investigation myself and

entreated others also to do so."

"Thank God for that," Laurence muttered.

There was a drawing back of chairs upon the verandah, an outbreak of

rapid question and answer, of laughter, reiterated and extensive

farewells. Virginia's clear voice still rose dominant. She was

marshalling her forces, arranging future meetings, making appointments,

ordering her plan of campaign--and outside, all the while, the sun

blazed on the surface of the white waters of the river, the ripple

lapped against the green, indented banks, the crickets and grasshoppers

kept up their strident serenade.

"I felt that neither my courage nor my judgment was equal to the

ordeal," wrote the worthy young clergyman. "I dreaded to entangle myself

in legal questions of which I virtually know nothing. I can never

express the gratitude I owe to the Archdeacon. He advised that the

coffin should be placed provisionally in the plot of ground reserved by

you in our parish churchyard. He even came over the considerable

distance from Bishop's Pudbury, and himself read the shortened form

which he had selected from the burial service. For this I was deeply

thankful, as agitation might, I fear, have prevented my performing the

last solemn rites in a suitably impressive manner--"

"Why, certainly, Mr. Greener, I will go and put on my golfing suit,"

this vivaciously from Virginia. "It will be cooler in an hour. We shall

have the wind off the river.--Willie Van Reenan's theatricals? Yes, I

know it, Louise; I am coming to that directly. Now, Mr. Greener, if you

will walk over to her house with Mrs. Bellingham, I will drive around

and take you on to the links. I will arrange to have Laurence meet us at

the club pavilion. And, Louise, when you see Willie tell him he can come

right on here after dinner, and I will cast the play with him. We can

count on you for Lord Follington, Mr. Greener? Yes--you really are very

kind."

Laurence still stood by the table littered with envelopes and papers. He

was reading the agent's missive, or rather trying to do so, for the

words were not wholly easy to focus. His eyes had a mist before them,

and a singular sensation gained upon him--that of the inherent duality

of his being. For some time now he had only been conscious of the

existence of the modern Laurence Rivers, wholly and solely the modern

Laurence Rivers, and he, baffled and discomfited, by no means at his

best. Now that earlier life, the strong emotions and steady purposes of

it, crowded in on him calling to and claiming him, until his actual

circumstances and surroundings became singularly incredible. The heels

of Virginia's very pretty shoes tapped lightly upon the butter-coloured

boards of the verandah. She straightened a chair or two, replaced some

magazines which slipped from a basket-work lounge on to the floor. Her

movements were direct and deliberate; and all the while her trailing

skirts made a dragging sound like the wheels of a little cart. In a

moment more she would come into the house. The young man tried to pull

himself together; but it was so unbelievable to him, just now, this

whole matter of Virginia.

He looked across at her, as he might have looked at the merest

acquaintance, and found her extremely effective as she came through the

cool, green light of the great living-room, her tall, slight, yet

rounded figure backed by the untempered brightness of sky and water. Her

transparent, black muslin dress was thick with beautiful hand-embroidery

upon the tight-fitting sleeves and the shoulders of the bodice. It was

girt with a soft, black, chiffon girdle, knotted low down, emphasising

the length of the waist, and the spring of the hips--around which her

dress fitted very closely. Below the knees her skirts stood away

fanwise, over a bewildering arrangement of white, silk kiltings and

flounces, which hid her feet and gave a slightly Japanese effect to her

costume. Her fair, brown hair was loosely waved and puffed out over the

ears. Her eyes, a light hazel, harmonized charmingly with the even tint

of her rather sallow skin. Her neck was noticeably long, and her face in

shape, colouring, and feature bore an arresting resemblance to that of

certain of Botticelli's Madonnas. This, taken in connection with her

extremely fashionable attire and her otherwise declared and complete

modernity, had in it great piquancy, an element trenching on actual,

though unconscious profanity.

To Laurence, looking at her through the eyes of that elder personality

of his, these details and these suggestions were conspicuous. She

presented a perfect example of an immensely effective type. He

recognised that; yet he stared at it in almost desperate wonder, and

something approaching hopelessness.

"Why, you are there!" she exclaimed. "I am glad. I wanted you."

"Your people have all cleared out, haven't they?"

"Yes, they have gone. They had a grand time, I believe. I really think

it was very well your uncle's death put me into mourning. It has

afforded me the opportunity of giving my family a lovely summer. It

might have been a catastrophe; I have made it into an occasion. They

appreciate that."

Virginia made these statements with evident self-complacency.

"Of course," Laurence said. He still stared at her. She placed her

hands on her hips, smoothing down her close-fitting skirt. Her hands

were very small. Much art had been expended upon the finger nails.

"I think it was perfectly sweet of Horace Greener to come right on and

see me," she continued. "It was like a breath of air from the outside.

And I was glad he should know how finely everything was going. I think

they all thought I might feel a little left over. He knows now it is

they who are left over.--Laurence, you must hurry. I arranged you should

be at the club pavilion in an hour. I have to change my dress; but if it

should still be very hot I will not play. I will have you take my

place."

"Horace Greener is a charming fellow," he answered, "all the same I'm

afraid I can't play golf with him this afternoon."

"But I told him you would do so," Virginia rejoined, with absolute

assurance. "It is settled. I never go back on an engagement."

"Ah! but I'm afraid I do," Laurence said. "Specially in the case of

engagements about the making of which I have not been consulted."

So far the young lady had been occupied with her own conversation and

her own person to the exclusion of any particular observation of her

companion. Now she deigned to regard him more closely.

"Dear me!" she exclaimed, "you appear to me to be looking pretty

wretched."

"Upon my word I believe I am pretty wretched," Laurence answered,

smiling. "My home letters have brought me some news I don't in the very

least like. It entails a journey to England. And instead of playing golf

with Horace Greener, I must take the seven o'clock train to New York,

and see if there is a decent state-room vacant on any of the

outward-bound liners."

It was, in a way, characteristic of Virginia that her face,

notwithstanding her natural vivacity, possessed no great mobility or

range of expression. There were such a number of emotions she had never

been called upon to entertain. And now no movement of appeal or regret

crossed it. It merely hardened a little, becoming as serenely obstinate

as heretofore it had been serenely complacent. She spoke with exactly

the same conviction and assurance.

"But you cannot do that," she said.

"Oh, yes, but indeed I can," Laurence replied quite good-temperedly. He

felt so singularly unrelated to her, that assertion was sufficient. It

did not enter his head to protest or argue.

"You misunderstand," she said; "it is that I do not intend to have you

do it."

He paused a moment, making an honest effort to range himself in line

with her thought.

"Oh, come along," he began. But the young lady interrupted him with the

same unwavering composure--

"You place me in an objectionable position," she declared, "by forcing

me to explain. That is not considerate. You should meet me half-way; you

should be beforehand so as to secure me against the annoyance of

referring to all that. I had determined to sink it. But you make that

impossible. It is derogatory to me to explain."

Laurence sat down on the arm of the nearest chair. He felt curiously

helpless, and yet all the while he was getting the bit between his

teeth. If obstinacy was about, well, he had his share of it. Across the

Atlantic matters of such profound moment were awaiting him. It was

difficult to reckon seriously and courteously with this unlooked-for

opposition, and not to brush it impatiently aside. It seemed little

short of ridiculous.

"I give you my word, Virginia, I don't know what you are talking about,"

he said. "I have the most cogent reasons for going over--you haven't

given me an opportunity of stating them yet, but that doesn't alter the

fact. It is necessary I should go; and after all, you know, I am not

such a conceited ass as to imagine you can't do without me for three

weeks or so."

"I am not thinking of myself, I am thinking of others," she remarked,

with a certain _naivete_.

Laurence smiled.

"Oh, in that case I can book my passage with a clear conscience," he

said.