"AM I HIS KEEPER?"
Before the sun had gone down upon the second day after Geoffrey's
return, his engagement to Miss Vincent had become known to almost
every member of Matcham society who had any right to be posted in the
proceedings of the _élite_.
Mrs. Mornington, dropping in at her brother's house after breakfast,
and before her daily excursion to the village, was transformed into
a statue of surprise on the very threshold of the hall at hearing
fiddling in her brother's drawing-room, unmistakably fiddling of a
superior order; a fiddle whose grandiose chords rose loud and strong
above the rippling notes of a piano--a quaint old melody of Porpora's,
in strongly marked common time--a fairy-like accompaniment of delicate
treble runs, light as a gauzy veil flung over the severe outlines of a
bronze statue.
"She must be having accompanying lessons," thought Mrs. Mornington.
"Some fiddler from Salisbury, I suppose."
She marched into the drawing-room with the privileged unceremoniousness
of an aunt, and found Geoffrey Wornock standing beside the piano, at
which Suzette was sitting fresh as a rose, in a pale green frock, that
looked like the calix of a living flower.
"Home!" cried Mrs. Mornington, with a step backward, and again becoming
statuesque; "and I have been picturing you as eaten by tigers, or
tomahawked by savages!"
"The African tiger is only a panther, and there are no tomahawks,"
answered Geoffrey, laying down his bow, and going across the room to
shake hands with Mrs. Mornington, the Amati still under his chin.
"And Allan? Where is Allan?"
"I left him on his way to the Congo."
"You left him!--came back without him?"
"Yes. He wanted to extend his travels--to cross Africa. I was not so
ambitious. I only wanted to come home."
His smile, as he turned to look at Suzette, told the astute matron all
she desired to know.
"So," she exclaimed, "is the weathercock nailed to the vane at last?"
"The ship which has been tossing so long upon a sunless sea, is safe in
her haven," answered Geoffrey.
Mrs. Mornington's keen perceptions took a swift review of the position.
A much better match than poor Allan! Discombe, with revenues that had
accumulated at compound interest during a long minority, must be better
than Beechhurst, a mere villa, and an estate in Suffolk of which Mrs.
Mornington knew very little except that it was hedged in and its glory
overshadowed by the lands of a Most Noble and a Right Honourable or
two. Discombe! The Squire of Discombe was a personage in that little
world of Matcham; and the world of Matcham was all on the earthward
side of the universe for which Miss Mornington cared.
Suzette's shilly-shallying little ways had answered admirably, it
seemed, after all. How wisely Providence orders things, if we will only
fold our hand and wait.
"Don't let me interrupt your musical studies, young people," exclaimed
the good lady. "I only came to know if Suzette was going to the
golf-ground."
"Of course I am going, auntie, if you are walking that way and want
company."
It was the kind of day on which only hat and gloves are needed for
outdoor toilette; and Suzette's neat little hat was ready for her in
the hall. They all three went off to the links together, along the
dusty road and through the busy little village--busy just for one
morning hour--and to the common beyond, the long stretch of common
that skirted the high-road, and which everybody declared to have been
created on purpose for golf.
Mrs. Mornington talked about Allan nearly all the way--her regret that
he had extended his travels, regret felt mostly on his mother's account.
"I think he always meant to cross from sea to sea," Geoffrey answered
carelessly. "His mother ought to have been prepared for that. He read
Trivier's book, and that inspired him. And really crossing Africa means
very little nowadays. One's people at home needn't worry about it."
"Mr. Patrington did not find it so easy."
"Poor Patrington! No; he was unlucky. There is no reckoning with fever.
That is the worst enemy."
"Did you bring home a letter for Lady Emily?"
"No. Allan wrote from Ujiji. That letter would reach England much
quicker than I could."
"But you will go to see her, I dare say. No doubt it would be a comfort
to her to talk to you about her son--to hear all those details which
letters so seldom give."
"I will go if she ask me. Suzette has written to tell her of my return."
"She will ask you, I am sure. Or she may come to Beechhurst, as she
came only a month ago, in the hope of hearing of Allan's movements from
your letters to your mother."
"I was never so good a correspondent, or so good a son, as Allan."
They were at the golf-ground by this time, and here Mrs. Mornington
left them; and meeting five of her particular friends on the way, told
them how a strange thing had happened, and that Geoffrey Wornock, who
had left England broken-hearted because Suzette had rejected him, had
come back suddenly from Africa, and had been accepted.
"He took her by storm, poor child! But, after all, I believe she always
preferred him to poor Allan."
* * * * *
There seemed nothing wanting now to Mrs. Wornock's happiness. Her son
had returned, not to restlessness and impatience, not to weary again
of his beautiful home, but to settle down soberly with a wife he adored.
His mother was to live with him always. The Manor House was still
to be her home, the music-room her room, the organ hers. In all
things she was to be as she had been--plus the son she loved, and
the daughter-in-law she would have chosen for herself from all the
daughters of earth.
"If it were not that I am sorry for Allan, there would not be a cloud
in my sky," she told her son, on the second night after his return,
when he had quieted down a little from that fever of triumphant
gladness which had possessed him after his conquest of Suzette.
"Dear mother, there is no use in being sorry for Allan. We could not
both be winners. To be sorry for him is to grudge me my delight; and I
could easily come to believe that you are fonder of Allan than of me."
"Geoffrey!"
"Well, I'll never say so again if you'll only leave off lamenting about
Allan. He will have all the world before him when he comes back to
England. Somewhere, no doubt there are love and sympathy, and beauty
and youth waiting for him. When he knows that Suzette has made her
choice, he will accept the inevitable, and fall in love with somebody
else--not at Matcham."
There was the faintest touch of irritation in his reply. That incessant
reference to Allan began to jar upon his nerves. Wherever he went, he
had to answer the same questions--to explain how he wanted to come home
and Allan wanted to go further away; and how for that reason only they
had parted. He began to feel like Cain, and to sympathize with the
first murderer.
But the worst was still to come. In the midst of a sonata of De
Beriot's--long, brilliant, difficult--a _tour de force_ for Suzette,
whose fingers had not grappled with such music within the last two
years, the door of the music-room was opened, and Lady Emily Carew was
announced, just as upon that grey afternoon a month ago.
"Forgive me for descending upon you again in this way," she said
hurriedly to Mrs. Wornock, who came from her seat by the window to
receive the uninvited guest. "I couldn't rest after I received Miss
Vincent's letter."
Nothing could have been colder than the "Miss Vincent," except the
stately recognition of Suzette with which it was accompanied. "Mr.
Wornock"--turning to Geoffrey, without even noticing his mother's
outstretched hand--"why did you leave my son?"
"I thought Suzette had told you why we parted. He wished to go on. I
wanted to come home. Is there anything extraordinary in that?"
"Yes. When two men go to an uncivilized country, full of dangers and
difficulties, and when the third, their guide and leader, has been
snatched away--surely it is very strange that they should part; very
cruel of the one whose stronger will insisted upon parting."
"If you mean to imply that I had no right to come back to England
without your son, I can only answer that you are very unjust. If you
were a man, Lady Emily, I might be tempted to express my meaning in
stronger language."
"Oh, it is easy enough for you to answer me, if you can satisfy your
own conscience; if you can answer to yourself for leaving your friend
and comrade helpless and alone."
"Was he more helpless than I? We parted in the centre of Africa. If I
chose the easier and shorter route homeward, that route was just as
open to him as to me. It was his own choice to go down the Congo River.
No doubt his next letter, whenever it may reach you, will tell you all
you can want to know as to his reasons for taking that route. When I
offered myself as your son's companion, I accepted no apprenticeship. I
was tired of Africa; he wasn't. There was no compact between us. I was
under no bond to stay with him. He may choose to spend his life there,
as Cecil Patrington chose, practically. I wanted to come home."
"Yes, to be first; to steal my son's sweetheart!" said Lady Emily, pale
with anger, looking from Geoffrey to Suzette.
"Lady Emily, you are unreasonable."
"I am a mother, and I love my son. Till I see him, till I hear from
his own lips that you were not a traitor--that you did not abandon him
in danger or distress, for your own selfish ends; till then I shall
not cease to think of you as I think now. Your mother will, of course,
believe whatever you tell her; and Miss Vincent, no doubt, was easily
satisfied; but I am not to be put off so lightly--nor your conscience,
as your face tells me."
She was gone before any one could answer her. She waited for no
courtesy of leave-taking, for no servant to lead the way. Her own
resolute hand opened and shut the door, before Mrs. Wornock could
recover from the shock of her onslaught. Indeed, in those few moments,
Mrs. Wornock had only eyes or apprehension for one thing, and that was
Geoffrey's white face. Was it anger or remorse that made him so deadly
pale?
While his mother watched him wonderingly, filled with a growing fear,
his sweetheart was too deeply wounded by Lady Emily's scornful speech
to be conscious of anything but her own pain. She went back to her
place at the piano, and bent her head over a page of music, pretending
to study an intricate passage, but unable to read a single bar through
her thickly gathering tears.