Then, suddenly, a face, a woman's pretty face, in the benches of the north transept, caught his eye, and with a leap, as of something unchained, the beast within him awoke. It had reminded him of Rachel; and therewith the decent memories of the distant past disappeared, engulfed by the seething, ugly, mud-stained present. He was again crouching on the hill-side, in the shelter of the holly, watching the scene within: Rachel in that man's arms! Had the American seen him? He remembered his own backward start of alarm, as Ellesborough suddenly turned and walked towards the window. He had allowed himself, in his eagerness to see, to press too near. He had exposed himself? He did not really believe that he had been discovered—unless the American was an uncommonly cool hand! Any way, his retreat to the wooded cover of the hill had been prompt. Once arrived in the thick plantation on the crest, he had thrown himself down exhausted. But as he sat panting there, on the fringe of the wood, he had fancied voices and the flash of a light in the hollow beneath him. These slight signs of movement, however, had quickly disappeared. Darkness and silence resumed possession of the farm, and he had had no difficulty in finding his way unmolested through the trees to the main road, and to the little town, five miles nearer to London than Millsborough, at which he had taken a room, under his present name of Wilson.
The wooded common, indeed, with its high, withered bracken, together with the hills encircling the farm, had been the cover from which he had carried out his prying campaign upon his former wife. As he sat or knelt, mechanically, under the high and shadowy spaces of the Abbey, his mind filled with excited recollections of that other evening when, after tearing his hand badly on some barbed wire surrounding one of Colonel Shepherd's game preserves, so that it bled profusely, and he had nothing to bandage it with, he had suddenly become aware of voices behind him, and of a large party of men in khaki—Canadian foresters, by the look of them, from the Ralstone timber camp, advancing, at some distance, in a long extended line through the trees; so that they were bound to come upon him if he remained in the wood. He turned back at once, faced the barbed wire again, with renewed damage both to clothes and hands, and ran, crouching, down the green road leading to the farm, his wound bleeding as he ran. Then he had perceived an old labourer making for him with shouts. But under the shelter of the cart-shed, he had first succeeded in tying his handkerchief so tightly round his wrist, with his teeth and one hand, as to check the bleeding, which was beginning to make him feel faint. Then, creeping round the back of the farm, he saw that the upper half of the stable door was open, and leaping over it, he had hidden among the horses, just as Halsey came past in pursuit. The old man—confound him!—had made the circuit of the farm, and had then gone up the grass road to the hill. Delane, looking out from the dark stable, had been able to watch him through the dusk, keeping an eye the while to the opposite door opening on the farm-yard. But the labourer disappeared, and in the dark roomy stable, with its beamed roof, nothing could be heard but the champing and slow tramping movements of the splendid cart-horses. Rachel's horses! Delane passed his free hand over two of them, and they turned their stately heads and nosed him in a quiet way. Then he vaulted again over the half door, and hurried up the hill, in the gathering darkness.
He was aware of the ghost-story. He had heard it and the story of the murder from a man cutting bracken on the common; and he had already formed some vague notions of making use of it for the blackmailing of Rachel. It amused him to think that perhaps his sudden disappearance would lead to a new chapter of the old tale.
Then at the recollection of Rachel's prosperity and peace, of her sleek horses and cows, her huge hay and corn stacks, her comfortable home, and her new lover, a fresh shudder of rage and hatred gripped him. She had once been his thing—his chattel; he seemed to see her white neck and breast, her unbound hair on the pillow beside him—and she had escaped him, and danced on him.
Of course she had betrayed him—of course she had had a lover! What other explanation was there of her turning against him?—of her flight from his house? But she had been clever enough to hide all the traces of it. He recalled his own lame and baffled attempts to get hold of some evidence against her, with gnashing of teeth….
* * * * *
"For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal!"
He caught the words staring at him from the page of the open prayer book beside him, and automatically the Greek equivalent suggested itself. He had always done well in "divinners"! Then he became aware that the blessing had been given, that the organ was playing, and the congregation was breaking up.
* * * * *
Twenty-four hours later, Delane found himself on a road leading up from the town where he was lodging to the summit of the wide stretch of common land on the western side of which lay Great End Farm. Half way up a long hill, he came upon a young man in uniform, disconsolately kneeling beside a bicycle which he seemed to be vainly trying to mend. As Delane came up with him, he looked up and asked for a light. Delane produced a match, and the young man, by the help of it, inspected his broken machine.
"No go!" he said with a shrug, "I shall have to walk."
He rose from the ground, put up the tool he had been using, and buttoned up his coat. Then he asked Delane where he was going. Delane named a little village on the farther edge of the common.
"Oh, well, that's straight ahead. I turn off to the right," said the young soldier, "at the cross road."
They walked on together, Delane rather unwillingly submitting to the companionship thus sprung upon him. He saw from the badge on the man's shoulder that he belonged to one of the Canadian Forestry Corps in the district, and was at once on his guard. They started in silence, till Delane, pulling his mind back with a jerk, asked his companion if he was going to Ipscombe.
"No—only to Great End Farm."
Darkness hid the sudden change in Delane's countenance.
"You know some one there?"
"No, but I want to see one of the ladies about something. There's two of them running the farm. But Miss Henderson's the boss."
Cautiously, with assumed indifference, Delane began to ask questions.
He discovered that his companion's name was Dempsey; and before many minutes had passed the murderer's grandson was in the full swing of his story. Delane, despising the young man for a chattering fool, listened, nevertheless, with absorbed attention to every item of his tale. Presently Dempsey said with a laugh,—
"There's been people in Ipscombe all these years as always would have it old Watson walked. I know the names of three people at least as have sworn to seein' 'im. And there's an old fellow in Ipscombe now that declares he's seen him, only t'ther day."
Delane lit his pipe, and nonchalantly inquired particulars.
Dempsey gave a mocking account of Halsey's story.
"He's an old fool! Did you ever hear of a ghost bleedin' before!" The speaker threw back his head and laughed. "That's all rot! Besides, I don't believe in ghosts—never did. But as Miss Henderson's farmin' the very land where old Watson was done in, I thought she'd like to have the true story and first hand. And there's no one but me knows it—not first hand. So I wrote to her, and said as I would call at six o'clock this evening."
"You know her?"
"No—o," said the young man, hesitating. "But I somehow fancy as I may have seen her before."
"Where?"
"Why, in Canada. I was living on a farm, not far from Winnipeg"—he named the place. Delane suddenly dropped his pipe, and stooped to pick it up.
"All right," he said, "go on."
"And there was a man—a sort of gentleman—his name was Delane—on another farm about ten miles from where I was working. People talked of him no end—he was a precious bad lot! I never saw him that I know of—but I saw his wife twice. They say he was a brute to her. And she was awfully handsome. You couldn't forget her when you'd once come across her. And when I saw Miss Henderson drivin' one of the wagons in the Millsborough Harvest Festival, a fortnight ago, I could have sworn it was Mrs. Delane. But, of course, it was my mistake."
"Where did you see Mrs. Delane?"
"Once at her own place. I was delivering some poultry food that Delane had bought of my employer—and once at a place belongin' to a man called Tanner."
"Tanner?"
"Tanner. He was somethin' the same sort as Delane. We've a lot of them in Canada—remittance men, we call them—men as can't get on in the old country—and their relations pay 'em to go—and pay 'em to keep away. But Tanner was a nice sort of fellow—quite different from Delane. He painted pictures. I remember his showin' some o' them in Winnipeg. But he was always down on his luck. He couldn't make any money, and he couldn't keep it."
"You saw Miss Henderson there?"
Dempsey gave a guffaw.
"Oh, Lor, no! I don't say that. Why, I'd get into trouble—shouldn't I? But I saw Mrs. Delane. I was driving past Tanner's place, with two horses, and a heavy load, November two years ago—just before we passed our Military Service Act, and I joined up. And an awful storm came on—a regular blizzard. Before I got to Tanner's I was nearly wore out, an' the horses, too. So I stopped to ask for a hot drink or somethin'. You couldn't see the horses' heads for the snow. And Tanner brought me out some hot coffee—I'm a teetotaller, you see—an' a woman stood at the door, and handed it to him. She was holdin' a lamp, so I saw her quite plain. And I knew her at once, though she was only there a minute. It was Mrs. Roger Delane."
He stopped to light a cigarette. No sound came from his companion. All round them spread the great common, with its old thorns, its clumps of fir, its hollows and girdling woods, faintly lit by a ghostly moonlight that was just beginning to penetrate the misty November dusk. The cheerful light of Dempsey's cigarette shone a moment in the gloom. Delane was conscious of an excitement which it took all his will to master. But he spoke carelessly.
"And what was Mrs. Delane doing there?"
Dempsey chuckled.
"How should I know? Tanner used to have a sister staying with him sometimes. Perhaps she and Mrs. Delane were friends. But I saw that woman quite plain. It was Mrs. Delane—that I'll swear. And Miss Henderson is as like her as two peas. It might have been her sister. Miss Henderson's very uncommon-looking. You don't often see that complexion and that hair. And she has lived in Canada."
"How do you know?"
"She told old Halsey. Well, there's my road, just ahead. And if you're going to Moor End, you keep straight on. The moon's coming up. It won't be very dark." And with a careless good-night, the Canadian turned a corner, and disappeared along a road which diverged at a right angle from the main road, and led, as Delane knew, direct to Ipscombe.
He himself walked on, till he found a lane tunnelled through one of the deep woods that on their western side ran down to Great End Farm. In the heart of that wood there was a keeper's hut, disused entirely since the war. Delane had discovered it, and was quite prepared to spend a night there at a pinch. There was a rude fireplace in it, and some old sacks. With some of the fallen wood lying about, a man could make a fire, and pass a winter night in very tolerable comfort.
He made his way in, managed to prop a sack against the small cobwebbed window, fastened the door with a rusty bolt, and brought out an electric torch he always carried in his pocket.
There was not a house within a long distance. There were no keepers now on Colonel Shepherd's estate. Darkness—the woods—and the wild creatures in them—were his only companions. Half a mile away, no doubt, Rachel in her smart new parlour was talking to the Canadian fellow.
Tanner! Ye gods! At last he had the clue to it all.
X
Dempsey did not find Rachel Henderson at home when he called at Great End
Farm, after his meeting with his unknown companion on the common.
Ellesborough and Rachel had gone to London for the day. Ellesborough's duties at the Ralstone camp were in a state of suspended animation, since, in these expectant days before the signing of the armistice, there had been a general slackening, as though by silent and general consent, in the timber felling due to the war throughout the beautiful district in which Millsborough lay. Enough damage had been done already to the great wood-sanctuaries. On one pretext or another men held their hands.
Ellesborough then was free to take time off when he would, and to spend it in love-making. The engagement had been announced, and Ellesborough believed himself a very happy man—with the slight drawbacks that may be imagined.
In the first place—although, as he became better acquainted with Rachel's varying moods and aspects, he fell more and more deeply under the charm of her temperament—a temperament at once passionate and childish, crude, and subtle, with many signs, fugitive and surprising, of a deep and tragic reflectiveness; he became also more and more conscious of what seemed to him the lasting effects upon her of her miserable marriage. The nervous effects above all; shown by the vague "fears" of which she had spoken to him, on one of their early walks together; and by the gulfs of depression and silence into which she would often fall, after periods of high, even wild spirits.
It was this constant perception of a state of nervous suffering and irritability in this splendid physical creature—a state explained, as he thought, by her story, which had put him instantly on his guard, when that sinister vision at the window had sprung for a moment out of the darkness. Before almost he could move towards it, it had gone. And with a farewell smile at the woman he had just been holding in his arms, a smile which betrayed nothing, he had hurried away from her to investigate the mystery. A hasty word to Janet Leighton in the kitchen, and he was making a rapid circuit of the farm, and searching the farm-yard; with no results whatever.
Then he, Janet, and Hastings had held a hurried and secret colloquy in a corner of the great cow-shed, as far from Rachel's sight and hearing as possible. Clearly some one was haunting the farm for some malicious purpose. Hastings, for the first time, told the story of the blood-marks, and of two or three other supposed visions of a man, tall and stooping, with a dark sallow face, which persons working on the farm, or walking near it on the hill, had either seen or imagined. Ellesborough finally had jumped on his motor-bicycle and ridden off to the police depot at Millsborough. Some wind of the happenings at Great End Farm had already reached the police, but they could throw no light on them. They arranged, however, with Ellesborough to patrol the farm and the neighbourhood after dark as often as their diminished force would allow.
They were inclined to believe that some half-witted person was concerned, drawn, perhaps, from the alien population which had been floating through the district, and bent on mischief or robbery—or a mixture of both.
Rachel meanwhile knew nothing of these consultations. After her engagement was made public, she began to look so white, so tired and tremulous, that both Ellesborough and Janet were alarmed. Overwork, according to Janet, with the threshing, and in the potato-fields. Never had Rachel worked with such a feverish energy as in these autumn weeks. Add the excitement of an engagement, said Janet, and you see the result.
She would have prescribed bed and rest; but Rachel scouted the advice. The alternative was amusement—change of scene—in Ellesborough's company. Here she was more docile, feverishly submissive and happy, indeed, so long as Ellesborough made the plans, and Ellesborough watched over her. Janet wondered at certain profound changes in her. It was, she saw, the first real passion of Rachel's life.
* * * * *
So Dempsey called in vain. Miss Henderson was in town for a theatre and shopping. But he saw Janet Leighton, to whom with all the dramatic additions and flourishes he had now bestowed upon it, he told his story. Janet, who, on a hint from Hastings, had expected the visitation, was at any rate glad that Rachel was out of the way, seeing what a strong and curious dislike she had to the ghost-story, and also to any talk of the murder from which it originated.
Janet, however, listened, and with a growing and fascinated attention, to the old tale. Was there some real connection, she wondered, between it and the creature who had been prowling round the farm? Was some one personating the ghost, and for what reason? The same queries were ardently in the mind of Dempsey. He reported Halsey's adventure, commenting on it indignantly.
"It's some one as knows the story, and is playin' the fool with it. It's a very impudent thing to do! It's not playing fair, that's what it isn't; and I'd like to get hold of him."
Janet's mouth twitched. The young man's proprietorial interest in his grandfather's crime, and annoyance that any one should interfere with it, turned the whole thing to comedy. Moreover, his fatuous absorption in that side of the matter made him useless for any other purpose: so that she soon ceased from cross-examining him, and he rose to go.
"Well, I'm sorry not to have seen Miss Henderson," he said awkwardly, twisting his cap. "I'd like to have had a talk with her about Canada. It was old Halsey told me she'd lived in Canada."
"Yes," said Janet irresponsively.
Dempsey smiled broadly and seemed embarrassed. At last he said with a jerk:—
"I wonder if Miss Henderson ever knew a man called Tanner—who lived near
Winnipeg?"
"I never heard her speak of him."
"Because"—he still twirled—"when I saw Miss Henderson at Millsborough that day of the rally, I thought as I'd seen her before."
"Oh?" said Janet ardently. But some instinct put her on her guard.
"Dick Tanner, they called him, was a man—an artist chap—who lived not far from the man I was with—and I once saw a lady there just like Miss Henderson."
"Did you?"
Dempsey grew bolder.
"Only it couldn't have been Miss Henderson, you see—because this lady I saw was a Mrs. Delane. But was Mrs. Delane perhaps a relation of Miss Henderson? She was just like Miss Henderson."
"I'll ask Miss Henderson," said Janet, moving towards the door, as a signal to him to take his leave. "But I expect you're confusing her with some one else."
Dempsey, however, began rather eagerly to dot the i's. The picture of the snowstorm, of the woman at the door, various points in his description of her, and of the solitary—apparently bachelor—owner of the farm, began to affect Janet uncomfortably. She got rid of the chatter-box as soon as possible, and went slowly to the kitchen, to get supper ready. As she fried the bacon, and took some vegetables out of the hay-box, she was thinking fast.
Tanner? No—she had never heard Rachel mention the name. But it happened that Dempsey had given a precise date. It was in the "November before they Passed Conscription" in Canada, i.e. before he himself was called up—that he saw Mrs. Delane, at night, in Dick Tanner's house. And Janet remembered that, according to the story which as they two sat by the fire alone at night, when the girls were gone to bed, Rachel had gradually built up before her. It was in that same month that Rachel had been deserted by Delane; who had gone off to British Columbia with the Italian girl, as his wife afterwards knew, leaving Rachel alone on the farm—with one Japanese servant.
Why shouldn't she have been staying on Mr. Tanner's farm? There was no doubt some one else there—whom the boy didn't see. Perhaps she had herself taken refuge there during the storm. But all the same Janet felt vaguely troubled.
* * * * *
It was nearly seven o'clock, and the moon, now at the full, was rising over the eastern hill, and balancing the stubbles and the new-turned plough-lands in the upland cup to a pearly whiteness as they lay under the dark woods and a fleecy sky. There was a sound of a motor in the lane—the village taxi bringing the travellers home.
In a few more minutes they were in the sitting-room, Rachel throwing off her thick coat with Ellesborough's help, and declaring that she was not the least tired.
"Don't believe her!" said Ellesborough, smiling at Janet. "She is not a truthful woman!"
And his proud eyes returned to Rachel as though now that there was light to see her by he had no other use for them.
Rachel, indeed, was in a radiant mood. Pallor and depression had vanished; she was full of chatter about the streets, the crowds, the shops.
"But it's hopeless to go shopping with a man! He can't make up his mind one bit!"
"He hadn't a mind to make up!" murmured Ellesborough, looking up at her as she perched above him on a corner of the table.
She laughed.
"That, I suppose, was what made him want to buy the whole place! If I'd taken his advice, Janet, I should have been just cleaned out!"
"What's the good of being economical when one's going to be married!" said Ellesborough, joyously. "Why—"
Rachel interrupted him—with a hand on his shoulder.
"And we've settled our plans, Janet—that is, if you're agreeable. Will you mind looking after the farm for six months?"
"You see, if the armistice is signed—and we shall know to-morrow," said Ellesborough, "I shall be free in a month or so, and then we propose to marry and get a passage before Christmas. I must go home, and she says she'll come with me!"
A shadow had fallen suddenly, it seemed to Janet, over Rachel's aspect, but she at once endorsed what Ellesborough had said.
"We can't settle things—can we?—till we've seen his people. We've got to decide whether I'll go to America, or he'll come here."
"But we want to say"—Ellesborough turned gravely to Janet—"that first and foremost, we wish to do the best for you."
The sudden tears came into Janet's eyes. But they did not show.
"Oh, that'll be all right. Don't bother about me."
"We shall bother!" said Rachel with energy, "but I'll tell you all about it presently. He won't stay to supper."
She descended from the table, and Ellesborough rose. After a little more chat about the day and its doings, he said good-night to Janet.
"How do you get back?"
"Oh, I left my bike in the village. I shall walk and pick it up there."
Rachel took up her thick coat and slipped it on again. She would walk with him to the road, she said—there were some more things to say.
Janet watched them go out into the wide frosty night, where the sky was shedding its clouds, and the temperature was falling rapidly. She realized that they were in that stage of passion when everything is unreal outside the one supreme thing, and all other life passes like a show half-seen. And all the while the name Tanner—Dick Tanner—echoed in her mind. Such a simple thing to put a careless question to Rachel! Yet perhaps—after all—not so simple.
Meanwhile the two lovers were together on the path through the stubbles, walking hand-in-hand through the magic of the moonlight.
"Will you write a little line to my mother to-morrow?"
"Yes, of course. But—"
He caught her long breath.
"I have prepared the way, darling. I promise you—it will be all right."
"But why—why—didn't I see you first?" It was a stifled cry, which seemed somehow to speak for them both. And she added, bitterly, "It's no good talking—it can't ever be the same—to you, or to your people."
"It shall be the same! Or rather, we shall owe you a double share of love to make up to you—for that horrible time. Forget it, dear—make yourself forget it. My mother would tell you so at once."
"Isn't she—very strict about divorce?"
Ellesborough hesitated—just a moment.
"She couldn't have any doubts about your case—dearest—who could? You fell among thieves, and—"
"And you're picking me up, and taking me to the inn?"
He pressed her hand passionately. They walked in silence till the gate appeared.
"Go back, dearest. I shall be over on Sunday."
"Not till then?"
"I'm afraid not. If the peace news comes tomorrow, the camp'll go mad, and I shall have to look after them."
They paused at the gate, and he kissed her. She lay passive in his arms, the moonlight touched her brown hair, and the beautiful curves of her cheek and throat.
"Wasn't it heavenly to-day?" she whispered.
"Heavenly! Go home!"
She turned back towards the farm, drawing her cloak and its fur collar close round her, against the cold. And indeed Ellesborough was no sooner gone, the rush of the motor cycle along the distant road had no sooner died away, than a shiver ran through her which was more than physical. So long as he was there, she was happy, excited, hopeful. And when he was not there, the protecting screen had fallen, and she was exposed to all the stress and terror of the storm raging in her own mind.
"Why can't I forget it all—everything! It's dead—it's dead!" she said to herself again and again in an anguish, as she walked back through the broad open field where the winter-sown corn was just springing in the furrows—the moon was so bright that she could see the tiny green spears of it.
And yet in reality she perfectly understood why it was that, instead of forgetting, memory was becoming more and more poignant, more and more persecuting. It was because the searching processes of love were going deeper and deeper into her inmost soul. This good man who loved her, who was going to take her injured life into his keeping, to devote to her all his future, and all the harvest of his upright and hard-working past—she was going to marry him with a lie between them, so that she could never look him straight in the face, never be certain that, sometime or other, something would not emerge like a drowned face from the dark, and ruin all their happiness. It had seemed, at the beginning, so easy to keep silence, to tell everything but the one miserable fact that she couldn't tell! And now it was getting intolerably hard, just because she knew for the first time what love really meant, with its ardour for self-revelation, for an absolute union with the beloved. By marrying him without confession, she would not only be wronging him, she would be laying up probable misery for herself—and him—through the mere action of her own temperament.
For she knew herself. Among the girls and women she had been thrown with during the preceding year and a half, there were some moral anarchists, with whose views she had become strikingly familiar. Why, they said, make so much of these physical facts? Accept them, and the incidents that spring from them. Why all this weeping and wailing over supposed shames and disgraces? The sex-life of the present is making its own new codes. Who knows what they will ultimately be? And as for the indelible traces and effects of an act of weakness or passion that the sentimental and goody-goody people talk of, in the majority of cases they don't exist. After it, the human being concerned may be just the same as before.
Rachel was quite aware of this modern gospel. Only she was shut out from adopting it in her own case by an invincible heredity, by the spirit of her father in her, the saintly old preacher, whose uncompromising faith she had witnessed and shared through all her young years. She might and did protest that the faith was no longer hers. But it had stamped her. She could never be wholly rid of its prejudices and repulsions. What would her father have said to her divorce?—he with his mystical conception of marriage? She dreaded to think. And as to that other fact which weighed on her conscience, she seemed to hear herself pleading—with tears!—"Father!—it wasn't my will—it was my weakness!—Don't look at me so!"
And now, in addition, there was the pressure upon her of Ellesborough's own high ideals and religious temper; of the ideals, also, of his family, as he was tenderly and unconsciously revealing them. And, finally, there was the daily influence of Janet's neighbourhood—Janet, so austere for herself, so pitiful for others: Janet, so like Ellesborough in the unconscious sternness of her moral outlook, so full, besides, of an infinite sorrow for the sinner.
And between these two stood this variable, sensuous, woman's nature, so capable both of good and evil. Rachel felt the burden of their virtues too much for her, together with the sting of her own secret knowledge.
In some moments, even, she rebelled against her own passion. She had such a moment of revolt, in this moonlit dark, as her eyes took in the farm, the dim outlines of the farm buildings, the stacks, the new-ploughed furrows. Two months earlier her life had been absorbed in simple, clear, practical ambitions: how to improve her stock—how to grow another bushel to the acre—how and when to build a silo—whether to try electrification: a score of pleasant riddles that made the hours fly. And now this old fever had crept again into her blood, and everything had lost its savour. There were times when she bitterly, childishly, regretted it. She could almost have hated Ellesborough, because she loved him so well; and because of the terror, the ceaseless preoccupation that her love had begun to impose upon her.
Janet, watching her come in, saw that the radiance had departed, and that she crept about again like a tired woman. When, after nine o'clock, they were alone by the fire, again and again it was on the tip of Janet's tongue to say, "Tell me, who was Dick Tanner?" Then, in a sudden panic fear, lest the words should slip out, and bring something irreparable, she would get up, and make a restless pretence of some household work or other, only to sit down and begin the same inward debate once more. But she said nothing, and Rachel, too, was silent. She sat over the fire, apparently half asleep. Neither of them moved to go to bed till nearly midnight.
Then they kissed each other, and Janet raked out the fire.
"To-morrow!" she said, her eyes on the red glow of the embers, "to-morrow!—Will it be peace?"
And then Rachel remembered that all the civilized world was waiting for the words that would end the war. Somewhere in a French château there was a group of men conferring, and on the issue of this night depended the lives of thousands, and the peace of Europe.
Janet raised her clasped hands, and her plain, quiet face shone in the candle-light. She murmured something. Rachel guessed it was a prayer. But her own heart seemed dead and dumb. She could not free it from its load of personal care; she could not feel the patriotic emotion which had suddenly seized on Janet.
The morning broke grey and misty. The two labourers and the girls went about their work—raising their heads now and then to listen. And at eleven came the signal. Out rang the bells from Ipscombe Church tower. Labourers and girls threw down what they were doing, and gathered in the farm-yard round Janet and Rachel, who were waving flags on the steps of the farm-house. Then Rachel gave them all a holiday for the rest of the day, and very soon there was no one left on the farm premises but the two women and the bailiff.
"Don't stay, Hastings," said Rachel. "I'll get the horse and cart myself."
For it was market day at Millsborough, and peace or no peace, she had some business that must be done there.
"Oh, I've no call to go, Miss," said Hastings. "I'd rather stay and look after things."
His eyes met Janet's, and she nodded imperceptibly. She was relieved to think of Hastings—good, faithful, unassuming creature!—remaining on guard. The very desertion of the farm-houses on this great day might tempt marauders—especially that thief or madman who had been haunting their own premises. She hoped the police would not forget them either. But Hastings' offer to stay till the girls came back from the Millsborough crowds and bands at about nine o'clock quite eased her mind. And meanwhile she and Hastings, as had been agreed, kept their anxieties from Rachel.
Rachel went off at twelve o'clock in her khaki suit, driving a spirited young horse in a high cart, which was filled with farm produce. She was to take early dinner with some new friends, and then to go and look at a Jersey cow which Janet coveted, in a farm on the other side of Millsborough.
"Don't wait tea for me," she said to Janet, "I shall get some somewhere." And then with a smile to them both she was off. Janet stood looking after her, lost in a painful uncertainty. "Can't you let it alone?" Lord Melbourne was accustomed to say suavely to those members of the Cabinet who brought him grievances or scandals that wanted seeing to. One half of Janet's mind was saying, "Can't you let it alone?" to the other half.
XI
The daylight had all gone when Rachel at last got into her cart in the yard of the Rose and Thistle at Millsborough and took the reins. But there was a faint moonrise struggling through the mist in which the little town and countryside were shrouded. And in the town, with its laughing and singing crowds, its bright shop windows, its moist, straggling flags, the mist, lying gently over the old houses, the moving people, the flashes and streamers of light, was extraordinarily romantic and beautifying.
Rachel drove slowly through the streets, delighting in the noise and excitement, in the sheer new pleasure of everything, the world—human beings—living—the end of the war. And out among the fields, and in the country road, the November sun was still beautiful; what with the pearly mist, and the purple shapes of the forest-covered hills. She had been much made of in Millsborough. People were anxious to talk to her, to invite her, to do business with her. Her engagement, she perceived, had made her doubly interesting. She was going to be prosperous, to succeed—and all the world smiled upon her.
So that her pulses were running fast as she reached Ipscombe, where, in the mild fog, a few groups were standing about, and a few doors were open. And now—there was home!—in front of her. And—Heavens! what had Janet done? Rachel pulled up the horse, and sat enchanted, looking at the farm. For there it lay, pricked out in light, its old Georgian lines against the background of the hill. Every window had a light in it—every blind was drawn up—it was Janet's illumination for the peace. She had made of the old house "an insubstantial faery place," and Rachel laughed for pleasure.
Then she drove eagerly on into the dark tunnel of trees that lay between her and the house.
Suddenly a shape rushed out of the hedge into the light of the lamps, and a man laid a violent hand upon the horse's reins. The horse reared, and Rachel cried out,—
"What are you doing? Let go!"
But the man held the struggling horse, at once coercing and taming it, with an expert hand. A voice!—that sent a sudden horror through Rachel,—
"Sit where you are—hold tight!—don't be a fool!—he'll quiet down."
She sat paralysed; and, still holding the reins, though the trembling horse was now quiet, a man advanced into the light of the left-hand lamp.
"Well—do you know me?" he said quietly.
She struggled for breath and self-control.
"Let those reins alone!—what are you doing here?"
And snatching up her whip, she bent forward. But he made a spring at it, snatched it easily with a laugh, and broke it.
"You know you never were strong enough to get the better of me. Why do you try? Don't be an idiot. I want to make an appointment with you. You can't escape me. I've watched you for weeks. And see you alone, too. Without that fellow you're engaged to."
Her passion rose, in spite of her deadly fear.
"He'll take care of that," she said, "and the police. I'm not helpless now—as I used to be."
"Ah, but you'd better see me. I've got a great deal to say that concerns you. I suppose you've told that American chap a very pretty story about our divorce? Well, it took me a long time to get to the bottom of it myself. But now I'm—well, disillusioned!"
He came closer, close to the rail of the cart and the lamp, so that she saw clearly the haggard wreck of what once had been Roger Delane, and the evil triumph in his eyes.
"Who stayed the night alone, with Dick Tanner, on his place, when I was safely got rid of?" he said, in a low but clear voice. "And then who played the innocent—who did?"
"Liar!"
"Not at all. I've got some new evidence now—some quite fresh light on the scene—which may be useful to me. I want money. You seem to have a lot. And I want to be paid back a little of what I'm owed. Oh, I can hold my tongue, if it's made worth my while. I don't suppose you've told your American young man anything about Dick Tanner—eh?"
"Let go the horse!" she said fiercely, trying to recapture the reins.
"You've nothing to do with me any more."
"Haven't I? Oh, by all means tell your Yankee that I've waylaid you. I shouldn't at all object to an interview with him. In fact, I rather think of asking for it. But if you want to prevent it, you've got to do what you're told."
He came closer, and spoke with slow emphasis. "You've got to arrange a time—when I can see you—alone? When shall it be?"
Silence. But far ahead there were sounds as of some one approaching.
Delane leapt on the step of the cart.
"This is Monday. Wednesday night—get rid of everybody! You can do it if you like. I shall come at nine. You've got to let me in."
Her white, quivering face was all his answer.
"Don't forget," he said, jumping down. "Good-night!"
And in a second he was gone, where, she could not tell.
The reins fell from her grasp. She leant back in the cart, half fainting. The horse, finding the reins on his neck, strayed to the grassy side of the road, and began grazing. A short time passed. In another minute or two the left wheel would have gone done into a deep ditch.
"Hallo!" cried a man's voice. "What the matter?"
Rachel tried to rouse herself, but could only murmur inarticulately. The man jumped off his bicycle, propped it against a tree, and came running to her.
He saw a woman, in a khaki felt hat and khaki dress, sitting hunched up in a fainting state on the seat of a light cart. He was just in time to catch the horse and turn it back to the road. Then in his astonishment John Dempsey altogether forgot himself.
"Don't be frightened, Mrs. Delane! Why, you've had a faint. But never mind. Cheer up! I'll get you home safe."
And Rachel, reviving, opened her heavy eyes to see stooping over her the face of the lad in the hooded cart whom she had last seen in the night of that November snowstorm, two years before.
"What did you say?" she asked stupidly. Then, raising herself, with an instinctive gesture she smoothed back her hair from her face, and straightened her hat. "Thank you, I'm all right."
Dempsey's mouth as he retreated from her shaped itself to an involuntary grin.
"I beg your pardon, ma'am—but I think I've seen you in Canada. Didn't I once come to your place, with a parcel from Mr. Grimes—that was my employer—of Redminster? I remember you had a Jap servant. And there was another time, I think"—the lad's eyes fixed her, contracted a little, and sharp with curiosity—"when you and Mr. Dick Tanner gave me that fizzling hot coffee—don't you remember?—in that awful blizzard two years ago? And Mr. Tanner gave the horses a feed, too. Awfully good chap, Mr. Tanner. I don't know what I should have done without that coffee."
Rachel was still deathly white, but she had recovered possession of herself, and her mind was working madly through a score of possibilities.
"You're quite mistaken," she said coldly, "I never saw you before that I am aware of. Please let go the reins. I can manage now quite well. I don't know what made me feel ill. I'm all right now."
"You've got the reins twisted round the shaft, miss," said Dempsey officiously. "You'd better let me put 'em right."
And without waiting for a reply, he began to disentangle them, not without a good deal of fidgeting from the horse, which delayed him. His mouth twitched with laughter as he bent over the shaft. Deny that she was Mrs. Delane! That was a good one. Why, now that he had seen her close, he could swear to her anywhere.
Rachel watched him, her senses sharpening rapidly. Only a few minutes since Roger had been there—and now, this man. Had they met? Was there collusion between them? There must be. How else could Roger know? No one else in the world but this youth could have given him the information. She recalled the utter solitude of the snow-bound farm—the heavy drifts—no human being but Dick and herself—till that evening when the new snow was all hard frozen, and they two had sleighed back under the moon to her own door.
What to do? She seemed to see her course.
"What is your name?" she asked him, endeavouring to speak in her ordinary voice, and bending over the front of the cart, she spoke to the horse, "Quiet, Jack, quiet!"
"My name's John Dempsey, ma'am." He looked up, and then quickly withdrew his eyes. She saw the twitching smile that he now could hardly restrain. By this time he had straightened the reins, which she gathered up.
"It's curious," she said, "but you're not the first person who's mistaken me for that Mrs. Delane. I knew something about her. I don't want to be mistaken for her."
"I see," said Dempsey.
"I would rather you didn't speak about it in the village—or anywhere.
You see, one doesn't like to be confused with some people. I didn't like
Mrs. Delane."
The lad looked up grinning.
"She got divorced, didn't she?"
"I dare say. I knew very little about her. But, as I said, I don't want to be mistaken for her."
Then, tying the reins to the cart, she jumped down and stood beside him.
His hand went instinctively to the horse's mouth, holding the restive animal still.
"And I should be very much obliged to you if you would keep what you thought about me to yourself. I don't want you to talk about it in the village or anywhere. Come up and see me—at the farm—and I'll tell you why I dislike being mixed up with that woman—why, in fact, I should mind it dreadfully. I can't explain now, but—"
The young man was fairly dazzled by the beauty of the sudden flush on her pale cheeks, of her large pleading eyes, her soft voice. And this—as old Betts had only that afternoon told him—was the lady engaged to his own superior officer, Captain Ellesborough, the Commandant of Ralstone Camp, whom he heartily admired, and stood in considerable awe of! His vanity, of which he possessed so large a share, was much tickled; but, also, his feelings were touched.
"Why, of course, ma'am, won't say anything. I didn't mean any harm."
"All right," said Rachel, scrambling back to her seat. "If you like to come up to-morrow morning, I shall be pleased to see you. It's a bargain, mind!"
He saluted, smiling. She nodded to him, and drove off.
"Well, that's the rummiest go!" said the bewildered Dempsey to himself, as he walked towards his bicycle. "Mistake be damned! She was Mrs. Delane, and what's she up to now with my captain? And what the deuce was she doing at Tanner's?"
Never did a person feel himself more vastly important than Dempsey as he bicycled back to the Ralstone camp, whence he had started in the morning, after the peace news, to go and see a cousin living some distance beyond Great End Farm. To be his grandfather's grandson was much—but this!
Rachel drove, with hands unconscious of the reins, along the road and up the farm lane leading through her own fields. The world swam around her in the mist, but there, still in front of her, lay the illuminated farm, a house of light standing in air. As she neared it, the front door opened and sounds of singing and laughter came out.
The "Marseillaise"! Allons, enfants de la patrie!—Janet was playing it, singing vigorously herself, and trying to teach the two girls the French words, a performance which broke down every other minute in helpless laughter from all three. Meanwhile, Hastings, who had been standing behind the singers, his hands in his pockets, a rare and shamefaced pleasure shining from his care-worn face, thought he heard the cart, and looked out. Yes, it was the Missis, as he liked to call Miss Henderson, and he ran down to meet her.
"Well, I suppose there were fine doings at Millsborough, Miss," he said, as he held the horse for her to get down.
"Yes—there were a lot of people. It was very noisy."
"We thought you'd hear our noise, Miss, as far as the road! Miss Leighton, she's been keeping us all alive. She took the girls to church—to the Thanksgiving Service, while I looked after things."
"All right, Hastings," said Miss Henderson, in a voice that struck his ear strangely. "Thank you. Will you take the cart?"
He thought as he led the horse away, "She's been overdoin' it again. The
Cap'n will tell her so."
Rachel climbed the little slope to the front door. It seemed an Alp. Presently she stood on the threshold of the sitting-room, in her thick fur coat, looking at the group round the piano. Janet glanced round, laughing. "Come and join in!" And they all struck up "God Save the King"—a comely group in the lamplight, Jenny and Betty lifting their voices lustily. But they seemed to Rachel to be playing some silly game which she did not understand. She closed the door and went upstairs to her own room. It was cold and dark. She lit a candle, and her own face, transformed, looked at her from the glass on the dressing-table. She gave a weary, half-reflective sigh. "Shall I be like that when I'm old?"
She took off her things, and changed mechanically into an afternoon dress, her mind, like a hunted thing, running hither and thither all the time.
Presently she got up and locked the door. She must think—think—by herself.
It would be quite easy to defy Roger—quite easy to lie, and lie successfully, if only she was sure of herself, and her own will to carry things through. Roger could prove nothing—or that vulgar boy—or anybody. She had only to say, "I went to find Lucy Tanner, who was my friend—she wasn't there—I was overtaken by the storm—and Dick Tanner looked after me till I could get home."
It was the most natural—the most plausible story. If Delane forced himself on George with any vile tale, Ellesborough would probably give him in charge for molesting his former wife. There was absolutely nothing to fear, if she handled the thing in a bold, common-sense way, and told a consistent and clever lie.
And yet, she had weakly made appointments with both her tormentors!—made it plain to them that she was afraid! She called herself a coward, and a fool—and then as she leant her head against the side of her bed, the tears ran down her face, and her heart cried out for Ellesborough.
"How can I go on lying to him—now—and all my life?" It was the same cry as before, but more intense, more passionate with every day's living. The need for lying had now doubled; yet her will could less and less steel itself to it, because of sheer love and remorse towards the man who loved her.
"He would forgive me. I know he would—I know he would!" she kept on murmuring to herself, while her eyes rained in the semi-darkness.
Yes, but it would change everything! Their love—his feeling towards her—could never be the same again. After Roger Delane—Dick Tanner. Why not another—and another? Would he not always be watching her, dreading some new discovery! Suspecting her, even while he loved her?
No. She must choke off Delane—with money—the only way. And invent some story—some bribe, too—for that odious young man who had caught her unawares.
So again she hardened herself, despairingly. It could not be allowed her—the balm and luxury of confession! It was too dangerous. Her all was in it.
Meanwhile, the singing continued below. Janet had struck up "Tipperary," and the small flute-like voices of the girls, supported by her harsher one, mounted joyously through every crevice of the slightly-built house.
"It's a long, long way to Tipperary,
And my heart's right there."
The beautiful tune, interwoven for our generation with all that is most poignant in its life, beat on Rachel's nerves. It was being sung all over England that Armistice Day, as it had been sung in the first days of the war, joyously, exultingly, yet with catching breath. There was in it more than thousands of men and women dared to probe, whether of joy or sorrow. They sang it, with a sob in the throat. To Rachel, also, sunk in her own terrors, it was almost unbearable. The pure unspoilt passion of it—the careless, confident joy—seemed to make an outcast of her, as she sat there in the dark, dragged back by the shock and horror of Delane's appearance into the slime and slough of old memories, and struggling with them in vain. Yes, she was "damaged goods"—she was unfit to marry George Ellesborough. But she would marry him! She set her teeth—clinging to him with all the energy of a woman's deepening and maturing consciousness. She had been a weak and self-willed child when she married Delane—when she spent those half miserable, half wild days and nights with Dick Tanner. Now she trusted a good man—now she looked up and adored. Her weakness was safe in the care of George Ellesborough's strength. Well, then, let her fight for her love.
Presently Janet knocked at the door. The singing downstairs had ceased.
"Are you tired, Rachel? Can't I help you?"
"Just a bit tired. I'm resting. I'll be down directly."
* * * * *
But the interruption had started fresh anxieties in her mind. She had paid the most perfunctory attention to the few words Janet had said about Dempsey's call at the farm, two nights before. She understood at the time that he had come to chatter about the murder, and was very glad that she had been out of the way.
But now—what was it that he had said to Janet—and why had Janet said so little about his visit?
Instead of resting she walked incessantly up and down. This uncertainty about Janet teased her; but after all it was nothing to that other mystery—how did Roger know?—and to the strange and bewildering effect of the juxtaposition of the two men—their successive appearance in the darkness within—what?—ten minutes?—a quarter of an hour?—while the cloud was on her own brain—without apparently any connection between them—and relevance to each other. There must have been some connection! And yet there had been no sign of any personal knowledge of Roger Delane in Dempsey's talk; and no reference whatever to Dempsey in Delane's.
She went down to supper, very flushed and on edge. Little Jenny eyed her surreptitiously. For the first time the child's raw innocence was disturbed or jealous. What did John Dempsey want with calling on Miss Henderson—and why had he made a rather teasing mystery of it to her, Jenny? "Wouldn't you like to know, Miss Inquisitive?" Yes, Jenny would like to know. Of course Miss Henderson was engaged to Captain Ellesborough, and all that. But that was no reason why she should carry off Jenny's "friend," as well as her own. Jenny's heart swelled within her as she watched Miss Henderson from the other end of the table. Yes, of course, she was nice-looking, and her clothes were nice. Jenny thought that she would get a new best dress soon, now that peace was come; and a new hat with a high silk crown to match the dress. Dempsey had admired a hat like that on a girl in the village. He had said it was "real smart." And to be "smart" Jenny thought was to be happy.
After supper, Janet and the girls washed up and put all tidy for the night. Rachel worked at accounts in the sitting-room. She had sold the last hay she had to spare wonderfully well, and potatoes showed a good profit. Threshing charges were very high, and wages—appalling! But on the whole, they were doing very well. Janet's Jersey cow had been expensive, but they could afford her.
They had never yet drawn out so good an interim balance sheet without delight, and rosy dreams for the future. Now her mood was leaden, and she pushed the papers aside impatiently. As she was sitting with her hands round her knees, staring into the fire, or at the chair where Ellesborough had sat while she told her story, Janet came into the room. She paused at the door, and Rachel did not see her look of sudden alarm as she perceived Rachel's attitude of depression. Then she came up to the fire. The two girls could be heard laughing overhead.
"So my cow's a good one?" she said, with her pleasant voice and smile.
"A beauty," said Rachel, looking up, and recapitulating the points and yield of the Jersey.
Janet gave a shrug—implying a proper scepticism.
"It doesn't seem to be quite as easy to tell lies about cows as about horses," she said, laughing; "that's about all one can say. We'll hope for the best." Then—after a moment,—
"I never told you much about that man Dempsey's visit. Of course he came to see you. He thought when he saw you at Millsborough that you were a Mrs. Delane he had seen in Canada. Were you perhaps a relation of hers? I said I would ask you. Then I inquired how often he had seen Mrs. Delane. He said twice—perhaps three times—at her home—at a railway station—and at a farm belonging to a man called Tanner."
"Yes," said Rachel, indifferently. "I knew Lucy Tanner, his sister. She was an artist like him. I liked them both."
There was silence. In Rachel's breast there was beating a painful tide of speech that longed to find its way to freedom—but it was gripped and thrust back by her will. There was something in Janet as in Ellesborough that wooed her heart, that seemed to promise help.
But nothing more passed, of importance. Janet, possessed by vague, yet, as they seemed to herself, quite unreasonable anxieties, gave some further scornful account of Dempsey's murder talk, to which Rachel scarcely listened; then she said, as she turned to take up her knitting,—
"I'm going over to-morrow to a little service—a Thanksgiving service—at Millsborough. I took the girls to church to-day—but I love my own people!" Her face glowed a little.
"Unitarian service, you mean?"
"Yes—we've got a little 'cause' there, and a minister. The service will be about six, I think. The girls will manage. The minister and his wife want me to stay to supper—but I shall be back in good time."
"About ten?"
"Oh, yes—quite by then. I shall bicycle."
Through Rachel's mind there passed a thrill of relief. So Janet would be out of the way. One difficulty removed. Now, to get rid of the girls?
* * * * *
Rachel scarcely slept, and the November day broke grey and misty as before. After breakfast she went out into the fields. Old Halsey was mole-catching in one of them. But instead of going to inspect him and his results, she slipped through a tall hedge, and paced the road under its shelter, looking for Dempsey.
On the stroke of eleven she saw him in the distance. He came up with the same look, half embarrassed, half inclining to laugh, that he had worn the day before. Rachel, on the other hand, was entirely at her ease, and the young man felt her at once his intellectual and social superior.
"You seem to have saved me and my horse from a tumble into that ditch last night," she said, with a laugh, as she greeted him. "Why I turned faint like that I can't imagine. I do sometimes when I'm tired. Well, now then—let us walk up the road a little."
With her hands in her pockets she led the way. In her neat serge suit and cap, she was the woman-farmer—prosperous and competent—all over. Dempsey's thoughts threw back in bewilderment to the fainting figure of the night before. He walked on beside her in silence.
"I wanted to tell you," said Miss Henderson calmly—"because I'm sure you're a nice fellow, and don't want to hurt anybody's feelings—why I asked you to hold your tongue about Mrs. Delane. In the first place, you're quite mistaken about myself. I was never at Mr. Tanner's farm—never in that part of Canada; and the person you saw there—Mrs. Delane—was a very favourite cousin of mine, and extraordinarily like me. When we were children everybody talked of the likeness. She had a very sad story, and now—she's dead." The speaker's voice dropped. "I've been confused with her before—and it's a great trouble to me. The confusion has done me harm, more than once, and I'm very sensitive about it. So, as I said last night, I should be greatly obliged if you would not only not spread the story, but deny it, whenever you can."
She looked at him sharply, and he coloured crimson.
"Of course," he stammered, "I should like to do anything you wish."
"I do wish it, and—" she paused a moment, as though to think—"and Captain Ellesborough wishes it. I would not advise you, however, to say anything at all about it to him. But if you do what we ask you, you may be sure we shall find some way—some substantial way—of showing that we appreciate it."
They walked on, she with her eyes on the ground as though she were thinking out some plan for his benefit—he puzzled and speechless.
"What do you want to do, now the war's over?" she said at last, with a smile, looking up.
"I suppose I want to settle down—somewhere—on land, if I had the money."
"Here?—or in Canada?"
"Oh, at home."
"I thought so. Well, Mr. Dempsey, Captain Ellesborough and I shall be quite ready to help you in any scheme you take up. You understand?"
"That's awfully kind of you—but—"
"Quite ready," she repeated. "Let me know what your plans are when you've worked them out—and I'll see what can be done." Then she stopped. There was a gate near into one of her own fields. Their eyes met—hers absolutely cool and smiling—his wavering and excited.
"You understand?" she repeated.
"Oh, yes—I understand."
"And you agree?" she added, emphasizing the words.
"Oh, yes, I—I—agree."
"Well, then, that's all right—that's understood. A letter will always find me here. And now I must get back to my work. Good-morning."
And with a nod, she slipped through the gate, and was half way across the fallow on the other side of it before he had realized that their strange conversation was at an end.