BAD NEWS.
It was Christmas week, and Mrs. Langton and her daughters were
sitting, late one afternoon, in the drawing-room where we saw them
first. Dolly was on a low stool at her mother's feet, submitting, not
too willingly, to have the bow in her hair smoothed and arranged for
her. 'It _must_ be all right now, mother!' she said, breaking away
rebelliously at last.
'It's worse than ever, Dolly,' said Mrs. Langton plaintively; 'it's
slipped over to the left now!'
'But it doesn't matter, it never will keep straight long.'
'Well, if you _like_ to run about like a little wild child,' was the
resigned answer.
'Little wild children don't wear bows in their hair; they wear--well,
they don't wear anything they've got to be careful and tidy about. I
think that must be rather nice,' said Dolly, turning round from where
she knelt on the hearthrug. 'Wake up, Frisk, and be good-tempered
directly. Mother, on Christmas Day I'm going to tie a Christmas card
round Frisk's neck, and send him into papa's dressing-room to wish him
a Merry Christmas, the first thing in the morning--you won't tell him
before the time, will you?'
'Not if you don't wish it, darling,' said Mrs. Langton, placidly.
'I mightn't have had him to tie a card to,' said Dolly, taking the dog
up and hugging him fondly, 'if that gentleman had not fetched him out
of the train for me; and I never said "thank you" to him either. I
forgot somehow, and when I remembered he was gone. Should you think he
will come to see me, Mabel; you told him that mother would be glad to
thank him some time, didn't you, on the paper you gave the guard for
him?'
'Yes, Dolly,' said Mabel, turning her head a little away; 'but you see
he hasn't come yet.'
'My dear,' said her mother, 'really I think he shows better taste in
keeping away; there was no necessity to send him a message at all, and
I hope he won't take any advantage of it. Thanking people is so
tiresome and, after all, they never think you have said enough about
it. It was very kind of the young man, of course, very--though I can't
say I ever quite understood what it was he did--it was something in a
fog, I know,' she concluded vaguely.
'We told you all about it, mother,' explained Dolly; 'I'll tell you
all over again. There was a fog and our train stopped, and we all got
out, and I left Frisk behind, and there he was in the carriage all
alone, and then the gentleman ran back and got him out and brought him
to me. And another train came up behind and stopped too.'
'Dolly tells it rather tamely,' said Mabel, her cheeks flushing again.
'At the time he ran back for the dog, we could all hear the other
train rushing up in the fog, mamma, and nobody knew whether there
might not be a frightful collision in another minute.'
'Then I think it was an extremely rash thing for him to do, my dear;
and if I were his mother I should be very angry with him.'
'He was very good-looking, wasn't he, Mabel?' said Dolly,
irrelevantly.
'Was he, Dolly? Well, yes, I suppose he was, rather,' said Mabel, with
much outward indifference, and an inward and very vivid picture of
Mark's face as he leaned by the stile, his fine eyes imploring her not
to leave him.
'Well, perhaps, he doesn't care about being thanked, or doesn't want
to see us again,' said Dolly; 'if he did, he'd call, you know; you
wrote the address on the paper.'
Mabel had already arrived at the same conclusion, and was secretly a
little piqued and hurt by it; she had gone slightly out of her way to
give him an opportunity of seeing her again if he wished, and he had
not chosen to take advantage of it; it had not seriously disturbed her
peace of mind, but her pride was wounded notwithstanding. At times she
was ready to believe that there had been some mistake or miscarriage
with her message, otherwise it was strange that the admiration which
it had not been difficult to read in his eyes should have evaporated
in this way.
'Why, here's papa--home already!' cried Dolly, as the door opened and
a tall man entered. 'How do you do, papa? you've rumpled my bow--you
didn't think I _meant_ it, did you? you can do it again if you
like--_I_ don't mind a bit; mother does.'
He had duly returned the affectionate hug with which Dolly had greeted
him, but now he put her aside with a rather preoccupied air, and went
to his wife's chair, kissing the smooth forehead she presented, still
absently.
'You are early, Gerald,' she said; 'did the courts rise sooner
to-day?'
'No,' he said conscientiously, 'it's the Vacation now--I left chambers
as soon as I could get away,' and he was folding and unfolding the
evening paper he had brought in with him, as he stood silent before
the fire.
Mr. Langton was not much over fifty, and a handsome man still, with
full clear eyes, a well-cut chin and mouth, iron-grey whiskers, and a
florid complexion which years spent in stifling law-courts and dust
and black laden chambers had not done much to tone down. Young
barristers and solicitors' clerks were apt to consider him rather a
formidable personage in Lincoln's Inn; and he was certainly imposing
as he rustled along New Square or Chancery Lane, his brows knitted, a
look of solemn importance about his tightly-closed lips, and his silk
gown curving out behind him like a great black sail. He had little
imperious ways in court, too, of beckoning a client to come to him
from the well, or of waving back a timid junior who had plucked his
gown to draw his attention to some suggestion with a brusque 'Not
now--I can't hear that now!' which suggested immeasurable gulfs
between himself and them. But at home he unbent, a little consciously,
perhaps, but he did unbend--being proud and fond of his children, who
at least stood in no fear of him. Long years of successful practice
had had a certain narrowing effect upon him; the things of his
profession were almost foremost in his mind now, and when he travelled
away from them he was duller than he once promised to be--his humour
had slowly dwindled down until he had just sufficient for ordinary
professional purposes, and none at all for private consumption.
In his favour it may be added that he was genial to all whom he did
not consider his inferiors, a good though not a demonstrative husband;
that as a lawyer he was learned without the least pedantry; and that
he was a Bencher of his Inn, where he frequently dined, and a Member
of Parliament, where he never spoke, even on legal matters.
Mabel's quick eyes were the first to notice a shade on his face and a
constraint in his manner; she went to his side and said in an
undertone, 'You are not feeling ill, papa, are you, or has anything
worried you to-day?'
'I am quite well. I have news to tell you presently,' he said in the
same tone.
'Come and see my Christmas cards before I do them up,' said Dolly from
a side-table; 'I'm going to send one to each of my friends, except
Clara Haycraft, or if I _do_ send her one,' she added thoughtfully,
'it will be only a penny one, and I shall write her name on the back
so that she can't use it again. Clara has not behaved at all well to
me lately. If I sent one to Vincent now, papa, would he get it in
time?'
'No--no,' said her father, a little sharply, 'and look here, Pussy,
run away now and see how Colin is getting on.'
'And come back and tell you?' inquired Dolly; 'very well, papa.'
'Don't come back till I send for you,' he said. 'Mind that now, Dolly,
stay in the schoolroom.'
He shut the door carefully after her, and then, turning to his wife
and daughter, he said, 'You haven't either of you seen the papers
to-day, I suppose?'
'No,' said Mrs. Langton; 'you know I never read daily papers. Gerald,'
she cried suddenly, with a light coming into her eyes, 'is another
judge dead?' Visions of her husband on the Bench, a town-house in a
more central part of London, an increase of social consideration for
herself and daughters, began to float into her brain.
* * * * *
'It's not that--if there was, I'm not likely to be offered a judgeship
just yet; it's not good news, Belle, I'm afraid it's very bad,' he
said warningly, 'very bad indeed.'
'Oh, papa,' cried Mabel, 'please don't break it to us--tell it at
once, whatever it is!'
'You must let me choose my own course, my dear; I am coming to the
point at once. The "Globe" has a telegram from Lloyd's agent reporting
the total loss of the "Mangalore."'
'Vincent's ship!' said Mabel. 'Is--is he saved?'
'We cannot be certain of anything just yet--and--and these disasters
are generally exaggerated in the first accounts, but I'm afraid there
is very grave reason to fear that the poor boy went down with her--not
many passengers were on board at the time, and only four or five of
them were saved, and they are women. We can hope for the best still,
but I cannot after reading the particulars feel any confidence myself.
I made inquiries at the owners' offices this afternoon, but they could
tell me very little just yet, though they will have fuller information
by to-morrow--but from what they did say I cannot feel very hopeful.'
Mabel hid her face, trying to realise that the man who had sat
opposite to her there scarcely a month ago, with the strange, almost
prophetic, sadness in his eyes, was lying somewhere still and white,
fathoms deep under the sea--she was too stunned for tears just yet.
'Gerald,' said Mrs. Langton, 'Vincent is drowned--I'm sure of it. I
feel this will be a terrible shock to me by-and-by; I don't know when
I shall get over it--poor, poor dear fellow! To think that the last
time I saw him was that evening we dined at the Gordons'--you
remember, Gerald, a dull dinner--and he saw me into the carriage, and
stood there on the pavement saying good-bye!' Mrs. Langton seemed to
consider that these circumstances had a deep pathos of their own; she
pressed her eyes daintily with her handkerchief before she could go
on. 'Why didn't he sail by one of the safe lines?' she murmured; 'the
P. and O. never lost a single life; he might have gone in one of them
and been alive now!'
'My dear Belle,' said her husband, 'we can't foresee these things,
it--it _was_ to be, I suppose.'
'Is nothing more known?' said Mabel, with a strong effort to control
her voice.
'Here is the account--stay, I can give you the effect of it. It was in
the Indian Ocean, not long after leaving Bombay, somewhere off the
Malabar coast; and the ship seems to have grazed a sunken reef, which
ripped a fearful hole in her side, without stopping her course. They
were not near enough to the land to hope to reverse the engines and
back her on shore at full speed. She began to settle down fast by the
head, and their only chance was in the boats, which unfortunately had
nearly all become jammed in the davits. Every one appears to have
behaved admirably. They managed at last to launch one of the boats,
and to put the women into it; and they were trying to get out the
others, when the vessel went down suddenly, not a quarter of an hour
after striking the reef.'
'Vincent could swim, papa,' said Mabel, with gleaming eyes.
'He was not a first-rate swimmer,' said Mr. Langton, 'I remember that,
and even a first-rate swimmer would have found it hard work to reach
the shore, if he had not been drawn down with the ship, as seems to
have been the fate of most of the poor fellows. Still of course there
is always hope.'
'And he is dead! Vincent dead! It seems so hard, so very, very sad,'
said Mabel, and began to cry softly.
'Cry, darling,' said Mrs. Langton, 'it will do you good. I'm sure I
wish _I_ could cry like that, it would be such a relief. But you know
papa says we may hope yet; we won't give up all hope till we're
obliged to; we must be brave. You really don't care about coming in to
dinner? You won't have a little something sent up to your room? Well,
I feel as if food would choke me myself, but I must go in to keep papa
company. Will you tell this sad news to Dolly and Colin, and ask
Fräulein to keep them with her till bedtime? I can't bear to see them
just yet.'
Mr. Langton's decorous concern did not interfere with his appetite,
and Mrs. Langton seemed rather relieved at being able to postpone her
grief for the present, and so Mabel was left to break the disaster,
and the fate there was too much reason to fear for Vincent, to her
younger brother and sister--a painful task, for Holroyd had been very
dear to all three of them. Fräulein Mozer, too, wept with a more than
sentimental sorrow for the young man she had tried to help, who would
need her assistance never again.
The tidings had reached Mark early that same afternoon. He was walking
home through the City from some 'holiday-classes' he had been
superintending at St. Peter's, when the heading 'Loss of a passenger
steamer with ---- lives' on the contents-sheets of the evening papers
caught his eye, and led him, when established with a 'Globe' in one of
the Underground Railway carriages, to turn with a languid interest to
the details. He started when he saw the name of the vessel, and all
his indifference left him as he hurriedly read the various accounts of
the disaster, and looked in vain for Vincent's name amongst the
survivors.
The next day he, too, went up to the owners' offices to make
inquiries, and by that time full information had come in, which left
it impossible that any but those who had come ashore in the long-boat
could have escaped from the ship. They had remained near the scene of
the wreck for some time, but without picking up more than one or two
of the crew; the rest must all have been sucked down with the ship,
which sank with terrible suddenness at the last.
Vincent was certainly not amongst those in the boat, while, as
appeared from the agent's list, he was evidently on board when the
ship left Bombay. It was possible to hope no longer after that, and
Mark left the offices with the knowledge that Holroyd and he had
indeed taken their last walk together; that he would see his face and
take his hand no more.
It came to him with a shock, the unavoidable shock which a man feels
when he has suddenly to associate the idea of death with one with whom
he has had any intimacy. He told himself he was sorry, and for a
moment Vincent's fate seemed somehow to throw a sort of halo round his
memory, but very soon the sorrow faded, until at last it became little
more than an uneasy consciousness that he ought to be miserable and
was not.
Genuine grief will no more come at command than genuine joy, and so
Mark found, not without some self-reproach; he even began to read 'In
Memoriam' again with the idea of making that the keynote for his
emotions, but the passionate yearning of that lament was pitched too
high for him, and he never finished it. He recognised that he could
not think of his lost friend in the way their long intimacy seemed to
demand, and solved the difficulty by not thinking of him at all,
compounding for his debt of inward mourning by wearing a black tie,
which, as he was fond of a touch of colour in his costume, and as the
emblem in question was not strictly required of him, he looked upon
as, so to speak, a fairly respectable dividend.
Caffyn heard the news with a certain satisfaction. A formidable rival
had been swept out of his path, and he could speak of him now without
any temptation to depreciate his merits, so much so that when he took
an opportunity one day of referring to his loss, he did it so
delicately that Mabel was touched, and liked him better for this
indication of feeling than she had ever been able to do before.
Her own sorrow was genuine enough, requiring no artificial stimulus
and no outward tokens to keep it alive, and if Vincent could have been
assured of this it would have reconciled him to all else. No
callousness nor forgetfulness on the part of others could have had
power to wound him so long as he should live on in the memory of the
girl he had loved.
But it is better far for those who are gone that they should be
impervious alike to our indifference and our grief, for the truest
grief will be insensibly deadened by time, and could not long console
the least exacting for the ever-widening oblivion.