THE END OF IT ALL.
All through the rough autumn, and on into midwinter, Plevna held out.
All the world waited and watched, sympathizing, as is its way, with
the side where sheer pluck seems predominant.
At Wyl's Hall, Mrs. Wylie and Brenda lived on in their quiet way;
and, to these two, life soon assumed a calm, unruffled regularity.
Small local incidents took to themselves a greater importance, and
the larger events of the world reached them only as an echo.
As Winter laid its hand with increasing power over the land, so
Wyvenwich found itself day by day more isolated from the world, until
one morning in the middle of December the last link was severed. A
great fall of snow, driven across the North Sea, besieged the Eastern
counties, and for a time paralyzed all workers. The coastguards
could do nothing, for they were hemmed in by great drifts on
Mizzenheath Moor. The boats were full of snow, the roads impassable,
and the small branch railroad hopelessly blocked by drifts, sixteen
feet deep in parts.
During five days, no news of the outer world reached Wyvenwich, until
at last a signalman, whose occupation was gone by reason of the
snowed-up railway, made his way on foot from the junction on the
main-line, carrying the mail-bag on his shoulders.
This man brought the five-days-old news of the fall of Plevna.
It was almost mid-day before the post-bag was delivered at Wyl's
Hall, and the two ladies were sitting in the broad-windowed library
when the servant brought it to them. There was a heap of unfinished
needlework upon the table, for it will be easily understood that such
a woman as the widow would be able to find good work to do in a hard
winter.
'Ah!' exclaimed the good lady, throwing her work aside--'letters at
last!'
The servant smiled sympathetically, and left the room. The key of
the bag was soon taken from its hiding-place in an ornament on the
mantelpiece, and Mrs. Wylie shook out the letters upon the table.
'It is delightful,' she exclaimed, 'to be in communication with the
outer...'
Suddenly she stopped, and laid the old leather bag aside slowly.
There were two thin brown envelopes among the white ones; also a
larger one bearing a foreign stamp, and carrying evident marks of a
long journey. This was addressed to Brenda, as were the two
telegrams.
'... Outer world,' said Mrs. Wylie, in a peculiar breathless way,
finishing her interrupted remark with determination. 'There are ...
two telegrams ... for you, Brenda.'
The girl took the envelopes without comment, and opened one, dropping
it subsequently upon the floor while unfolding the pink paper. She
read the message without a change of countenance, while Mrs. Wylie
made a brave pretence of being interested in her own letters. In the
same manner Brenda opened the second telegram.
After she had read it, there was a horrible silence in the room,
while the elder woman stood nervously reading the address of a letter
to herself over and over again.
Then Brenda spoke in a clear voice, which bore no resemblance to her
usual tones at all.
'Theo Trist is dead,' she said. 'He was killed on the twelfth of
September at Plevna!'
The widow held out her hand, and took the two telegrams. They were
from the great London editor--one telling of a rumour, the second
confirming it. Brenda had read the confirmation first.
At last Mrs. Wylie raised her eyes to her companion's face, and
following the direction of the girl's gaze, she remembered the large,
ill-used envelope bearing a foreign stamp.
'That letter,' she whispered, trembling with downright fear.
'Yes,' answered Brenda, with the same sickening composure. 'It is
from him.'
Then she took it and turned away to the window.
Without exactly knowing what she was doing, Mrs. Wylie sat down again
in the chair she had vacated on the advent of the post-bag. Her lips
moved as she stared stupidly at the work tossed aside on the table.
'O God!' she was whispering, 'give her strength!'
It seemed hours that she sat there without daring to raise her eyes.
She heard Brenda break open the envelope and unfold the paper, which
crackled loudly. Then there came no sound at all except at times a
suppressed rustle as a page was turned.
At last the girl moved, turning and coming towards her companion.
'There...' she said gently, 'you may as well read it.'
She laid the closely written sheets upon the table, for Mrs. Wylie
did not hold out her hand, and turned again towards the window, where
she stood looking out upon the gleaming snow.
After a space, Mrs. Wylie took up the letter and read it dreamily,
without comprehending its full meaning--without realizing that the
hand which had directed the clear, firm pen would never write another
word. It ran as follows:
'DEAR BRENDA,
'It may be that the long confinement in this grim slaughter-house has
upset my nerve, or it may, perhaps, be that I am not so hard or so
plucky as I was. Be that as it may, I am going to break through a
resolution to which I have held ever since I took to the war-path.
It was my intention to wait until the end of this campaign before
telling you that I have always loved you--that I have always looked
up to you as my ideal of a brave, true woman. I never doubted,
darling, that my love for you was and is a strong, firm reality, as
all the factors in my life have been. I never doubted its truth, its
honesty, and its permanency--but these very qualities held it back.
If I had loved you less, I could have asked you to be the wife of a
war-correspondent (and one whose reputation was such that he could
not afford to be found in the background). This, Brenda, has been my
secret ever since I left college--ever since I followed the
irresistible inclination which led me on to the battlefield. It is
unnecessary to dwell now upon the effort that I have had to make a
thousand times to conceal my feelings. I used to think (and tried to
persuade myself that I hoped) that you would marry someone infinitely
worthier of you--someone who was richer, and wiser, and cleverer, and
someone whose profession was less hazardous; but in the last year or
two I have conceived the wild notion that there was a reason in your
persistent blindness to the merits of men calculated in every way to
make you happy. Gradually I came round to the belief that you
understood, in some subtle feminine way, the policy I was pursuing,
and in this belief Mrs. Wylie persistently encouraged me in that
cheery, inimitable way of hers. If I have made a gross mistake, you
and Mrs. Wylie must let me know as mercifully as you can. I leave my
case in your little hands, darling. But I feel confident that I am
right. Rashness of conclusion, hastiness of action, has never been
ascribed to me, and it is only after long consideration--after
placing the circumstances persistently before myself in their very
worst light--that I have taken to myself the comforting thought that
I can make your life a happy one (as lives go) if you will trust it
to me. We are not strangers, Brenda, but have known each other since
we could first stand, and we have always been good friends. As I
have grown from youth to manhood, my love for you has grown also in
strength and sureness. I have never doubted it for a moment, though
I may have hesitated as to its wisdom. Perhaps I may have caught
from you a habit of setting both sides of a question upon a footing
inconveniently similar, and the result has been an honest conviction
that you could do better than marry me. Now that conviction has
given way to another--namely, that I simply cannot do without
you--cannot get on at all, except it be at your own express wish that
I should. Circumstances have now changed. I have been fortunate in
making a name, and in escaping many risks to which others have fallen
victims. I can command my own price, and make my own conditions.
Altogether, I am now in a position such as an honourable man could
ask his wife to share. As soon as this campaign (my last) is over, I
shall hurry home to you. After all, my resolution has not collapsed
entirely, for this letter cannot leave here until an end of some sort
come upon us. We are like rats in a trap, but the pluck of these
fellows is something wonderful. I shall have much to tell you when I
get back, for I am the sole historian of events inside Plevna. In
the meantime, darling, I dare to call myself
'Your lover,
'THEODORE TRIST.
'Plevna, 7th September, 1877.'
Mrs. Wylie looked again at the signature in a curious, mechanical
way, as if verifying it. 'Theodore Trist.' Two simple words in bold
abruptness without flourish, scroll, or ornament. A clear running
caligraphy, strong and plain, rapid, legible, straightforward and
purposeful, fresh from the fingers now still in death.
The last time the name was ever written by its possessor was at the
foot of that letter to Brenda.
The girl herself stood at the window, looking over the snow-clad
moorland to the gray sea. Her back was turned towards the room; her
white hands hung motionless at her side. Near to her the telegrams
lay on a small table, half unfolded, disclosing their short brutality
of diction.
Outside, the sun shone down on the glancing sea. The waves gleamed
white, and on the shingle sang their everlasting song. All the world
was lovely. The sea-birds whirled in mid-air, and shrieked
fantastically for very joy. They had no thought of their own
end---no doubts as to the purpose of their creation--no question as
to the wisdom of their Creator. Only man--the lord of all the
earth--has these!
THE END.
BILLING AND SONS, PRINTERS, GUILDFORD.