TWO VISITORS
BUT in a day or two, Tomina was quite herself again, and Harry stayed
on. Everything that was softest and best in her came to the surface
when she had him by her side. Miss Merryweather called one afternoon,
and found her seated on the floor with a pack of cards. Harry and she
were erecting towers, to be demolished with a pop-gun as soon as they
were erected.
Tomina rose from the floor with reluctance.
"I have always enjoyed a game of cards, but I think this is the most
engrossing one I have ever played," she said. "Now, Harry, I am going
to rest for a little. Will you run out into the garden and tell Thor,
with my love, that he must take his turn at amusing you now?"
"And he'll shake his head and say, 'No.' Susan says he likes an
afternoon nap. But I'll tell him what you say, and if he doesn't do it,
I'll—I'll make him!"
He trotted away with flying curls; and Miss Merryweather looked her
astonishment.
"I have heard about your 'protégé.' You are rather a marvel to me!"
"Am I? I think you would have acted in the same way had you been in my
shoes."
Alice Merryweather shook her head.
"No, I should know I could not make him happy. You told me you had come
down here to get away from your fellow-creatures, but on all sides I
hear of the friends you are making. Allow me to congratulate you upon
your enterprise. You are turning into a successful philanthropist."
"You mean my van? My dear Miss Merryweather, that is pure amusement and
delight to me, and so is Harry. I have never done anything yet that I
dislike doing."
"But did I not tell you when you talked about my work that I found work
a pleasure. All people do who throw their hearts into it. You have
turned into the busy bee down here, I into the drone."
Tomina looked at her keenly.
"You are really ill," she said.
"I'm never without a headache," confessed Alice; "and my very limbs
seem powerless. You don't know what a helpless wretched creature I have
become. The only solace to me is my books, and those are a forbidden
indulgence."
"Forbidden by our tyrant the doctor, I suppose? Oh, I would snap my
fingers at him! Doesn't he interfere in everybody's concerns? Even
Harry here may be at any moment snatched away by him. He wants him now,
but I want him too, so our wills are in conflict."
Alice laughed.
"I think your will will come uppermost," she said. "Dr. Merton is very
kind at heart. Tell me about your carrier's cart. I feel inclined to
come with you one day."
"Do; it is most entertaining! Do you know two old ladies called Seaton?
I had such a quaint old-fashioned note from one of them this morning.
"'The Misses Seaton will be much obliged if Miss Gavin will kindly
reserve two seats together for them in her van next Friday when she
goes to Damerton. They are obliged to go into Damerton on business,
otherwise they would not trouble her, and will she kindly see that the
two seats are under cover, and out of the draught. If very wet, they
will not attempt the journey; but if fine, D.V., * they would like her
to stop at their gate as she passes.'
"They are such old dears! But they told me, with heads in the air, that
they had never used a carrier's cart for their personal convenience."
* D.V.—Deo Volente ["God willing."]
"Oh, I know them well," said Alice, smiling; "they are awfully afraid
of letting themselves slip down from the station in life to which they
were called, and most of their conversations are sandwiched with, 'Our
late father, the Rector of Twistham,' or, 'When we lived in Twistham
Rectory.' You cannot get them off it.
"I asked them once if they would like the post of librarians in a
country town not far from London. They are fond of books, and are
well-read women. I could have got it for them, and as they're so very
badly off, I thought they would have jumped at it, but they were quite
shocked at the idea. They are very early Victorian, and think women
ought never to work out of their homes."
"I don't like the type of working women I have met in town," said
Tomina, "they're so sure of themselves, and so argumentative and
dictatorial!"
"What class of woman have you met?"
"A lady doctor or two, and some Poor Law Guardians, and an American
barrister; she was the best of the lot, she knew how to dress herself!"
Alice laughed.
And Tomina joined her, adding—
"I don't care; women have no business to make themselves into seedy
caricatures of men. They generally despise them; why should they ape
their dress and manners?"
"You are talking of the aggressive style of woman. The hardest workers
are not that sort."
"Don't let us talk of women," said Tomina. "I'm not very fond of my
own sex. Men are, as a rule, bigger-minded and more interesting. I see
rather a scornful glint in your eye? The person I like best in the
world is a man who is now in Australia."
"I suppose you are engaged to him?"
"Indeed I am not, nor shall I ever be. He is my twin brother, and his
name is Tom. I have to thank him for my ridiculous name. He is the
elder by an hour, and he had to be a Thomas. His godfather insisted on
it. And then they named me Tomina. We grew up together, and I don't
think I could have had a nicer brother. If I could, I would follow him
round the world; but he is in the Navy, and they won't have women on
men-of-war."
"I should think not, indeed," said Alice, laughing. "I am afraid you
won't have much men's society here. You will soon be wanting to go back
to town."
"No, I feel as if I never wish to see it again. You forget that I have
entered another life—or world is it? And I am getting keenly interested
in the villagers. They are quite a new experience to me. You should
hear the conversations in my van! They're as good, and better than a
play. Five women were made to thrill last Friday by the description of
a neighbour who went to church in her weekday clothes! And they're so
good and generous to each other, much more so than we are! Oh, I'm in
love with my burial place. I shall never want to leave it."
"I came to ask you if you would do a commission for me when next you go
to Damerton. Will you bring me back a parcel of books, and let me call
for them here the next day?"
"With pleasure. Oh! Who is this? Not a visitor?"
A carriage was stopping at the gate. Alice Merryweather looked out.
"Why, it is Mrs. Norman! It is not often she comes this way."
"Oh dear! I don't want visitors. I'm not at home! That wretch Susan is
already at the door. Do go out and say I can't see her!"
Alice laughed.
"My dear Miss Gavin, you had better go through it with a good grace.
Mrs. Norman would have forced her way in, for she saw us at the window.
Nothing escapes her eyes. I am sorry for that nice son of hers who
has come home to look after her. She leads him a dreadful life. She
is one of those people who can never keep still; her energy is almost
superhuman."
The next moment, Susan ushered in a very animated little lady dressed
in the height of fashion.
She greeted Tomina almost affectionately.
"We cannot be strangers, though I have not been in town for years. We
were abroad for five years before my husband died, but your stepmother
and I are old friends. I am so pleased that you have come to live in
this part of the world. Why did you not let me know before? You are
down here for health, are you not? Leading the simple life, and so on.
"Well, we have all had our turn at that. Before we went abroad, I
got my husband to rent a small cottage for week-ends, and I tried
my best to adapt myself to it. But mice and earwigs conquered me,
and I fled. As I say, our life at Yockley Court is a simple one, and
for the present I am tied there. Between ourselves, our agent was
a gentlemanly loafer, and has let the whole place go to ruin, and
through mismanagement—I won't hint at any possible want of honesty—a
few thousands of ours have disappeared, and we have to economise. This
is what brought Gerald home. He has come to look after his mother, and
bring order out of chaos. You know my son, Miss Gavin, do you not?"
Tomina's face during this long speech was a study. Alice sat still, and
quite enjoyed it.
Then Tomina spoke, with her head thrown back, her eyes partly closed,
and her voice very sweet, but very remote in tone.
"It is kind of you to come to see me, but I am not to have visitors, my
doctor says. I am to enjoy absolute quiet. You see I am doing a rest
cure. I have shed my fashionable friends with my fashionable clothes,
and hours, like a skin! You will understand that as an invalid, I
cannot return this kind visit. I want to regain my health, and so I am
determined to follow my doctor's orders."
"My dear girl, I am indeed sorry for you! I did not know you were in
such delicate health, but I see Miss Merryweather has discovered you."
"Yes," said Alice, "our doctor introduced us. We are supposed to be
two invalids, and he thought we might like to discuss our respective
symptoms."
"I am so thankful for my superb health," said Mrs. Norman, with pride.
"I never have had a day's illness for years. I am up every morning at
half-past five, and in my garden at seven. I have just started a water
garden at the end of my rock garden, and it is most fascinating. Do you
know any rare water plants, Miss Merryweather? I know you are a very
encyclopædia for knowledge of all kinds."
Alice began telling her of a few plants by name, and it was Tomina's
turn to sit silent and listen. She could not reconcile this youthful
energetic mother with her stern determined son. She wondered how they
got on together, whether the son or mother ruled the house.
And in a very few minutes, Mrs. Norman rose to go.
"Well, I am glad to have found you at home, my dear, and I will send
the carriage over to bring you to lunch with us one day. You must not
mope here. I am glad I have seen you. I heard a most ridiculous story
afloat, about a young lady running a carrier's cart, and somebody said
it was you. Now I have seen you, I can contradict the story. You do not
look as if that 'rôle' would suit you. Do you know of any girl about
here who is doing such a thing? Some farmer's daughter, I suppose.
Girls will do anything nowadays! And the more unfeminine a pursuit may
be, the more it appeals to them."
Tomina, lying back in her chair in a daintily embroidered muslin frock
and looking a picture of fragile porcelain femininity, gazed at Mrs.
Norman languidly through her long eyelashes.
"Is driving not a feminine pursuit? My carrier's cart is the only thing
I really enjoy."
Mrs. Norman gazed at her with horrified eyes.
"Then the report is true? My dear girl, does your stepmother know about
it? You must have far more energy than your appearance credits you
with. Well, good-bye; you have astonished me! I wish I had time to ask
for details, but I am due at the rectory for a committee meeting. Dear
me! What a tangled medley is the composition of a modern girl!"
She bustled out of the room. Alice Merryweather accompanied her to the
gate, then returned to Tomina.
"You are a tangled medley," she said. "Mrs. Norman spoke truly there."
"And I seem to myself so simple!" said Tomina. "Life must be so here.
I am not at all tangled in my mind. I only do the things I want to do,
and leave the rest."
"You have no high ideals," said Alice, musingly. "Those are what
require effort and produce restlessness and discontent."
"What are your ideals?"
"To cultivate to the fullest extent every fraction of my brain. I would
not have an ounce of me lying fallow. To do work in the world that
will last. Not to stagnate, and be a source of danger to others by
stagnation!"
Alice spoke in a low voice, but her tone vibrated with earnest passion.
Tomina looked at her and smiled, then she sighed.
"I don't know whether I am so simple after all," she said. "I am
playing a game, trying to match my environment, but simplicity means
goodness, and I am not good. And I never wished to be good till—Shall I
make you my father confessor? Why am I talking like this, I wonder!"
She stopped abruptly.
But Alice looked interested and sympathetic, so Tomina went on—
"Till I met an absurd little book pedlar, and he gave me a lesson on
limes coming into leaf, and every time I pass those limes, they repeat
his words to me. I sometimes think that unseen forces are surrounding
me, making me think of religion, and compelling me to be religious. I
bought a Bible the other day. Harry forced me to. He wanted some of his
Bible stories. I think if I have an ideal at all, it is to have the
faith of a little child. I told the quaint pedlar that I came down here
to bury myself, and that eventually I meant to emerge a new creature.
He at once began to talk about a new Birth, and the sap rising in the
dead trees of winter. He told me I wanted the sap to rise in me.
"I laughed at his little parable, but this morning I was hunting about
for a fresh Bible story and I came across this verse. Do you know it? I
never remember having heard it before—
"'If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed
away; behold, all things are become new.'
"You see, a part of that is my experience. Old things are passed away.
I did away with them when I came down here. I don't want them back
again. I'm sick of my town friends and gaieties. And I'm wondering, if
I want to resurrect myself properly, whether I had not better take my
soul into account, and get made a new kind of person altogether!"
Tomina paused. A wistful look was in her eyes.
For a moment Alice was speechless, then she said gently—
"Well, have a try. I'm busy cultivating my intellect; you cultivate
your spiritual part. We are all of us a medley of parts, you know."
"How can I set about it?" asked Tomina.
Alice's early training saved her from making a flippant reply. After
all, she argued to herself, Tomina was not a clever individual, so why
should she not get the comfort of religion if she chose? She would not
be the one to prevent her.
"I suppose," she said slowly, "the Bible will show you. I believe the
study of it feeds the spiritual part of you. I used to be told so, I
remember."
Then she got up to go. And as she shook hands, a smile flashed over her
face.
"You are a tangled medley. Mrs. Norman was quite right."
"I hope something or somebody will untangle me before long," retorted
Tomina. "But one thing I know, and that is that Mrs. Norman is not
going to trot me out to luncheon parties, and I don't mean to return
her call."
"You cannot avoid doing that."
"Oh yes; an invalid can avoid anything."
"But not an invalid who drives a carrier's cart."
Tomina laughed gaily.
"I am the queen of my van. I can sit for hours in silence if I choose.
Conversation at lunch or dinner bores me to distraction. It must
necessarily be so forced and artificial."
"Oh, I don't agree. Think of Dr. Johnson's breakfast table, and—"
Tomina waved her hand.
"Good-bye. Of all things, I hate a literary meal. I believe half the
speeches are made up beforehand. Each one vies with the other in making
the most brilliant sallies. I have been to one or two of those edifying
repasts, so I know what I am talking about."
When Alice had gone, she went out into the garden.
"And now I shall refresh myself with Harry."