JOAN WENT DOWN ON HER KNEES BEFORE HER MOTHER
IMPULSIVELY, AND TOOK HER HANDS IN HERS.
"Oh, Mother!"
Joan's exclamation was involuntary.
Mrs. Adair pulled herself up.
"I have no business to speak so. I don't know why I chafe under the masculine rule. Your father would cut off his right hand for me, but to him the limits of a woman's wants and desires are astoundingly infinitesimal, and his estimate of her capacity in life is what any upper servant would fulfil."
"Yes," murmured Joan; "but he never interferes or tries to dictate to one."
"Well, all this is beside the mark. Cecil's health is the main question. I will not see her droop and die in uncongenial soil if I can prevent it. You are strong, Joan, and cannot understand how the aggressive biting cold of this village can shrivel up the low vitality of a delicate organisation. Your father accepted this living without any reference to me. He wrote of it as a godsend; and yet he must have known that the seeds of disease were sown in both our boys in this neighbourhood."
Joan looked at her mother with startled eyes.
"I did not know," she murmured.
"You were born," Mrs. Adair continued, "when I was a happy girl living in close touch with my old friends and old life. Poverty and privation were unknown to me, for my father's cheque-book was continually supplying extra comforts for us. When we came here, I began to experience the humiliation and misery of a narrow income. Both boys were born when I was least able to mother and nurse them. They and Cecil never had a chance. You take after your father's family, they took after mine, and the cold, biting winters here aggravated their delicacy. I could not rear them in comfort, as they should have been reared, and my handsome boys were taken from me before they had seen anything of life."
She paused. She could not even now mention the loss of her sons with composure.
"I suppose I was ambitious," she went on. "As you know, I come from a race of soldiers who have all earned their country's gratitude for their achievements. Do you think it is nothing to me to have no sons to follow in their grandfather's footsteps, to leave a name behind them, to bequeath in their turn sons to serve our Empire?"
There was such passion in Mrs. Adair's tone that Joan was speechless. The mother had never confided in her daughter so fully before. And Joan understood for the first time that it was the want of resignation to her loss that was the canker eating away at her heart, and marring much in her strong and purposeful character. After a few minutes' silence, Joan said softly:
"Perhaps you may yet have grandsons to serve their country. Cecil is most attractive. She will marry."
Mrs. Adair heaved a deep sigh.
"She has nothing of a constitution. I feel she may slip away from me as the boys did."
This little talk with her mother made Joan sympathise with her more than she had ever done before. She had always known that she occupied a very small place in her mother's affections. Her very health and strength were almost an offence.
"Like Father's family," said Joan to herself later that day. "Well, I will not wish myself otherwise. I would not have a Lovell's nervous, high-strung organisation, in spite of their aristocratic refinement and dainty graces, because someone must be strong and uniformly cheerful in the house; someone must shoulder the daily vexations and worries, and my shoulders are strong enough and broad enough to bear them. Poor Mother! She lives in haunting dread that death may snatch away her last treasure from her. And poor Father! To be so delighted with this living, and to imagine that Mother has no remembrances of the past! How I wish I had known more about those early struggling days here. I think I should have persuaded him to stay where he was. There is no possible hope now of her ever becoming reconciled to living here."
She made these reflections in her own room after returning from the drive. And when tea was over she took her organ key and slipped over to the church to have a practice by herself. She was just summoning a small boy from a cottage near to come and blow for her, when she heard strains of music coming from the church. She abandoned her intention and crept softly up into the old porch. There was no doubt that a master hand was upon the keys of her beloved organ. She held her breath, entranced, and then very noiselessly slipped inside and sat down upon a seat behind a big pillar, which effectually concealed her from view. Only two candles were lighted; Major Armitage was seated on her stool and was pouring out his soul in a flood of passionate, vibrating melody, though there was a hush and a sense of restrained force through every note he touched.
Joan had an intense love for music, and her ears quickly perceived that a strain of unfulfilled desire and expectation was in his music, and it made her heart ache to hear it. She almost felt that she was intruding upon a sacred time, when a soul was baring its griefs and longings, and for one moment she felt inclined to leave.
Then the music died away. A short silence fell, and then suddenly, in a soft, mellow tenor, he began to sing. The words were familiar, but Joan had never heard such an exquisite setting to them. She concluded it was an anthem, and yet from the harmony, it seemed more fitted for a solo.
"I wait for the Lord, my soul doth wait, and in his word
do I hope.
My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch
for the morning; I say more than they that watch
for the morning."
As he played, the darkness of the night seemed to loom around them, and then the first faint light of dawn took its place.
The triumphant emphasis of the first words, the assurance that waiting was the soul's steadfast and hopeful attitude, imprinted itself upon Joan's soul. When the Major came to a pause, she stole out of the church, and her eyes were moist with emotion.
"No wonder Maria said he played like an angel! How I long to have his gift! I wish I knew him!"
Then she shook her head with a little smile.
"There are other people in the world who are practising patience like myself."
When she joined the others, she found that her father was giving them an account of his visit to the Major.
"A very pleasant and well-informed man. He has been through deep waters. He just touched upon his profession. I should like you to have heard the way he spoke of it, Cecilia, and the grief it was to him when he left it. But he told me his father had a place in Yorkshire with a private chapel attached—it has gone to his eldest brother now—and from quite a youngster he spent all his spare time at the organ. Music is his hobby. He sometimes plays the organ at Queen's Hall, in town, for the weekly popular concerts. And I believe he composes and publishes. He told me if his blindness had continued, he would have become an organist somewhere. This place belonged to his mother, and she left it to him. He thought he ought to come down and live here, he said; but I think his heart is in town. I begged him to dine with us, but he asked me to excuse him. He walked back with me, and then went into the church to try the organ."
"I have just heard him playing there," said Joan.
"It is a treat to listen to him," said Cecil. "But it is very surly of him to shut himself away from society."
"He may have reasons for it," said Joan. In her mind's eye, Sophia's graphic picture came before her—the lonely man in the empty room, playing to somebody unseen.
There was a good deal of bustle in the rectory for the next few days. Mrs. Adair and Cecil were packing and getting ready for their Edinburgh visit. Cecil had plenty of mending, which she laughingly turned over to Joan.
"You are a born needlewoman; I am not. Oh, how I wish I could afford to have a maid of my own!"
Mr. Adair did not approve of this visit.
"You say this place is cold for Cecil; why, Edinburgh will be a hundred times as cold. It is the wrong time of year to go up to Scotland."
This remark was made to his wife.
She answered him impatiently.
"My brother's house is rather different from ours. It is heated with radiators, and has every comfort. Cecil will be in the lap of luxury."
He sighed.
"I am afraid it will be an expensive visit for so short a time."
His wife did not reply. She had made up her mind to go, and nothing would prevent her. She was not entirely heartless or indifferent to her husband's struggles to make both ends meet; but she had never been able to economise, and money seemed to leak away through her finger ends. She had periodical fits of retrenchment, but after making herself and everyone around her perfectly miserable by knocking off real necessities, she would relapse into her old happy-go-lucky way and spend as if she were a wealthy woman.
"I shall be thankful to get to a house with the 'Times' in it," she said to Joan that evening, as she turned over the local paper rather impatiently. "It is no wonder everyone is so sleepy in these parts. You have not even a magazine club going."
"We are starting one," said Joan quickly. "I suggested it, and if everyone will join, there will be no difficulty. I felt the dearth of books when I came here. Mr. Wilmot Gascoigne is taking the matter up, and they say what he does at all he does thoroughly."
"It is strange that he has not called," Mrs. Adair said. "He told me he quite intended to do so."
The very next day, he was announced about tea-time. When tea was over, he sat and talked to Mrs. Adair. Cecil yawned, and finally took up her novel, saying audaciously:
"I hate listening to other people's talk. And I cannot join in myself, for you are flying from one subject to another, and each one is deeper than the last. I'll leave the listening to Joan, who appreciates it."
"But we want Miss Adair to be more than a listener," said Wilmot, turning to Joan as he spoke.
Joan was too interested to remain silent. Wilmot Gascoigne was a good talker, and, what was rarer still, he liked to listen to others. Mrs. Adair and he had many things in common; but when they touched on politics, Joan became silent.
"I am no politician," she said, when Wilmot asked her opinion upon a certain statesman. "Everybody always believes in himself or his party, and seldom credits those who disagree with him with either principles or common sense. I should like the party spirit ousted from our Government."
Wilmot shook his head.
"It sounds simple, but it would be inextricably involved. If there were no longer two parties, the balance of power would be lost. And would measures ever be passed? Imagine the length of discussion when every member would have his individual idea, and each and all have a different scheme to propose."
"Everything is sacrificed to party now," said Joan; and then she was called out of the room by Sophia, who had someone from the village waiting to see her.
When she came back, her mother and Wilmot were discussing Venetian history. He stayed for a couple of hours, but before going told Joan he would like to send her down a couple of new books on Constitutional History, and she accepted the offer with much pleasure.
"I quite agree with Derrick," said Cecil, when he had gone away; "he is as dogmatic and book-musty as all such bookworms are. He is the kind of man who thinks any book above criticism, just because it is a book."
"Now, Cecil, you are talking nonsense," said her mother. "He is a man who has learnt as well as read. You can feel it in every word he says."
The next day they went. And Joan felt at first a terrible blank in the house, though she had infinite more leisure, which she occupied by visiting the parishioners.
Derrick met her coming home very tired one afternoon, after a long round.
"Take my arm," he said.
Joan looked at him with laughing eyes.
"The village would see us, and say we were courting," she said.
"It is a capital suggestion," said Derrick eagerly. "Let us begin at once."
Joan rebuked this levity.
He heaved a sigh.
"I'm going back to town to-morrow, and to work. Joan, don't you think, as an old pupil of the Dominie's, and an attached and grateful friend, I might be asked to spend Christmas at the rectory?"
Joan looked grave and considered.
"I don't think so, Derrick. We expect Mother and Cecil back, and our house is small. It sounds inhospitable—"
"Oh, I'll wait till Easter. You and the Dominie will be alone then. And, look here, Joan, let me advise you for your good. Don't be getting too thick with Motty. He's easily flattered, poor brute, and he really isn't the sort of fellow who will do you any good. What do you think he told me this morning? He said the annals of his family ought to be kept in the Zoo, for, as far as he could see, they had never got beyond their animal powers. Fighting, eating, drinking composed their lives, and that in no record since the Conquest could he find a Gascoigne who was a scholar and had used and cultivated the brains which had been given to him.
"'But you're a Gascoigne,' I said.
"You should have seen him rise to the bait. He simply swelled visibly."
"Derrick, I will not listen to you," said Joan, half laughing, half vexed. "I thought men's natures were too big to allow of backbiting. Why do you dislike Wilmot Gascoigne so?"
"Because you like him," said Derrick manfully and promptly. "And I know he will be your undoing."
"You are talking nonsense."
"So I am. Now, look here, Joan, I mean to talk good, sound, honest, sober sense with you now. My life and yours have always run together. But since I have lived in town, we've drifted a wee bit apart, and I want to remedy this. Will you let me do it in my own way?"
"No," said Joan quickly, and edging a little away from him. "I have my life here; you have yours in town. If we meet occasionally as old friends, it is very pleasant. Don't let anything spoil our friendship. And, oh, please, Derrick, be merciful this afternoon, for I am very tired."
Derrick took her hand and tucked it in his arm. "It is dark," he said. "Confound convention! Well, I will be patient, but you must realise, and I don't want you to forget it, that you have a very patient waiting friend in town. And his determination and patience are vying with each other in strength and—and in endurance. He will wait till he gets what he wants, but he will get it in the end."
Joan's hand trembled a little. She tried to withdraw it, but Derrick had captured it, and though he felt the quiver of it, he would not let it go.
When they were at the rectory gate, he said:
"This is my good-bye. I leave to-morrow."
Then his stern gravity melted, and it was in his most coaxing boyish tone that he said:
"Oh, Joan, my heart's dearest, do let me kiss your dimple!"
"You are preposterous, Derrick!"
Joan fled from him. Half-way up the drive, she turned. He was leaning his arms on the gate looking after her.
"Good-bye," she waved. "And work hard for your country, and think of your party last."
"I shall come back here for Easter," he said defiantly; "so mind you keep a spare room ready for me."
She laughed light-heartedly, and Derrick turned away with her sweet laugh ringing in his ears, not altogether dissatisfied with his parting talk with her.
CHAPTER VII
THE MAJOR'S HOSPITALITY
JOAN was making apple jam in the kitchen. Jenny was attending on her, for Sophia had gone to the dentist's in Coppleton; she very seldom had an afternoon out, and would not have gone now unless Joan had insisted and had promised to make the jam instead of her. Poor Sophia had had three days and nights of raging toothache, and Joan bundled her up in wraps, seated her in the jingle, and the odd man drove her in.
It was a cold grey afternoon in November. The wind soughed in the old rectory chimneys, and the sky had that peculiar metallic blue-grey hue which betokens the coming of snow. Joan looked out of the cosy kitchen through the window.
"I would rather be in than out to-day, Jenny, wouldn't you? I hope Sophia won't be caught in a storm."
"The master be out too," said Jenny. "Old Dan'l Tucker be taken very bad and sent for him."
Joan looked anxious as she turned to her jam and stirred it.
"I did not know he was going there. It is quite three miles off. I thought he was only going his round in the village."
Jam making continued, she could not leave it, but when dusk began to gather, and neither Sophia nor the rector was back, Joan began to worry. Snowflakes appeared, not very large at first, but growing bigger and thicker as time went on.
At last sounds of wheels across the yard were heard, and Sophia staggered into the kitchen.
"Oh, Miss Joan, glad I am to be back. 'Tis blowing a blizzard. I can't feel my hands or feet."
"Have you seen Father? He has actually gone across the heath to the Tuckers. I am quite nervous about him."
Sophia looked horrified, then she spoke in a reassuring tone.
"They'll keep him over the night. The Tuckers be superior folk, and their farm be as big and comfortable as any gentlefolk's. Don't you fret, Miss Joan. They'll keep him there sure enough."
"I don't think Father would stay. He would know that I should be anxious."
She left the kitchen and went into the dining-room, which gave her a glimpse of the road for some distance. Mr. Adair had a slight cold, and Joan remembered now that he had complained of oppression on his chest that morning.
"I ought to have looked after him. I was too engrossed in my jam, and in Sophia's toothache. I ought not to have let him go out at all this afternoon."
As she watched at the window, she saw a man in the distance making his way down the street. For one instant she thought it was her father, and heaved a sigh of relief, then she saw the figure was taller and more erect than the old rector was, and she waited to see him approach. He came in at the rectory gate and up the drive.
Joan impulsively dashed out into the porch. "Have you come from my father? Do you know where he is?"
"Safe in bed at my house, and I hope he will stay there."
It was Major Armitage who spoke, and in her anxiety, Joan drew him into the hall.
"Has he met with an accident? Is he ill?"
"Well, Miss Adair, the fact is, I came across him leaning up against my fence a couple of hundred yards from the house. He was panting for breath, and pretty well exhausted by his tramp across the heath. I took him straight in and gave him some brandy. It did him good. I consulted my housekeeper, and she thought that bed was the best place for him. And then to ease his mind, I came off to tell you where he was. And on the way, I met the doctor and sent him to have a look at him, for I think he has some kind of bronchial attack."
"Come in where there is a fire," said Joan, opening the door of her father's study. "How kind of you to keep him. But I must go to him; I understand him. Is he not well enough to come back here to-night?"
"I shouldn't advise it. By all means come back with me now. Perhaps we shall find the doctor still there."
Without a word more, Joan left the room. She called Sophia to her and told her what had happened, whilst she got ready to go out.
"Aye, dear Miss Joan, here's trouble. But Maria will know what to do. She be a first-rate nurse, and maybe to-morrow will find him quite himself again. 'Tis no use to drag upon our heads the burdens of the morrow, so we'll just leave it at that. And if it will ease your mind, just tell Maria to make you up a bed in his room and stay the night. If you don't come back in the hour, that's what I know you'll do. And remember, a good mustard poultice will ease his chest!"
Major Armitage looked about him when he was left alone. He noted the comfortable chair drawn up to the fire, the warm slippers on the fender, the dainty little tea-table awaiting the rector's return. And he muttered to himself:
"A woman's care."
Joan was back almost directly. She said very little, but outside, her swift strides had no trouble in keeping pace with the Major's.
"It was you who befriended my small dog," said Major Armitage in a friendly tone.
"And now you have befriended my father," replied Joan quickly. "I believe I have been most ungrateful, for I have never expressed my thanks. I was so anxious at Father's non-appearance that I could think of no one else."
"Don't worry over him. A few days' rest and warmth will set him all right again; but it is not pleasant weather to be out."
They were met here by a sharp squall of snow and wind. Talking was impossible. They could hardly keep their footing, and for the rest of the way they reserved their breath for battling with the elements. He did not take Joan to the front entrance, but turned in by a side door and ushered her into a comfortable smoking-room.
"I hope you don't mind the smell of smoke," he said, drawing up a chair to the fire for her. "I will send my housekeeper to you, and she will take you to your father. May I relieve you of your cloak?"
He helped her out of her snow-covered garment, but as he did so, his lips snapped together like steel, and a hard stern look came into his eyes.
Joan, glancing up at a mirror in front of her, caught sight of the frowning face behind her. She wondered at it, and then remembered some of the talk about him, and spoke in her impulsive fashion.
"I am afraid this is all most unpleasant to you, Major Armitage. Don't think of entertaining me or coming near me. It is only my father I want to see."
He gave a little courteous bow.
"I hope I know my duties as your host. I assure you I am not a misanthrope, though I know I do bear a bad character in the village."
Joan's cheeks grew hot. She felt she had blundered, and then she said in her natural tone:
"Oh, dear, I always do say the awkward thing if I can manage it."
He gave a short laugh.
"We won't stand upon ceremony with each other. Do sit down and warm yourself."
He left the room, and the next moment Maria appeared.
"Ah, dear Miss Adair. Your pore dear father, there! When I saw him staggerin' in with the master, I thought he was struck for death! I assure you his face were a dark purple, and he were gaspin' like a dyin' fish! But we got him some spirit and put him to bed, and he have had hot bottles to his feet, and he be now lyin' in a heavy doze, and his breathin' raucous—well, I must say it is that, but not worse than to be expected."
"Take me to him," said Joan as soon as she could get in a word. "Has the doctor gone?"
"Yes, has ordered a steam kettle, says it's a sharp attack of bronchitis, and he mustn't be moved. Come you this way."
She went upstairs, and Joan followed her, hardly noticing where she was going, until she found herself in a big comfortable-looking room with a blazing fire. Her father lying back upon the pillows in an old-fashioned tester bed recognised her, and smiled but could not speak.
Joan went up, and stooping down spoke in her cheeriest tone:
"Well, Dad, dear, this is unlucky, isn't it? I'm so thankful Major Armitage took you in. Now don't try to speak. You'll be better to-morrow, and you must just stop here till you're fit to be moved. I shall look after you to-night. Try to go to sleep."
Relief and comfort was expressed at once in Mr. Adair's troubled face.
"Now, you know, you'll do everything that is right," he murmured, and then he closed his eyes.
JOAN AND BANTY CHATTED TOGETHER IN LIGHT-HEARTED FASHION
WHEN THEY WERE SITTING DOWN WATCHING FOR THE KETTLE TO BOIL.
Maria appeared, but Joan drew her out of the room, where they arranged everything for the invalid's comfort. Joan said she would sit up in the big easy chair by the fire all night.
"I shall have a nap when I can, but I will keep the fire in and the kettle going, and give him what he needs."
She heard all the directions that the doctor had given and promised to carry them out. The master of the house was of no account in her eyes, nor did she think of him again until she was sitting up awake in the silent hours of the night. Then she began to wonder about the life that he led in this lonely house, and who was the lady of his choice, whether she were but a sweet memory or a living reality.
Mr. Adair slept a good deal, and by the time the dawn broke his breathing was considerably easier. When Maria appeared, Joan smiled up at her.
"We have had a good night, and he is not worse, but better I should say."
Maria brought her a cup of tea, then persuaded her to go into an adjoining bedroom and have a bath, so as to refresh herself.
An hour later she was downstairs in the hall just in the act of going out of the door, when Major Armitage appeared from the dining-room and stopped her.
"You are not going off without any breakfast? I could not allow you to do that. I am glad to hear good accounts of your father."
"Yes, I'm so thankful. I must get home to ease our old servant's mind. I thought I might run up again to see the doctor when he comes, and to ask him how Father can be moved."
"I have already sent a message down to the rectory. I am not going to let you go till you have had something to eat. Come in here."
Joan could not resist his pleasant peremptoriness. She followed him into the dining-room. It was a large comfortable room, with a broad bay window overlooking the garden. The expanse of dazzling snow outside gave a reflected light into the room. Joan was conscious as she looked at the smart soldier-like neatness of the Major, that she herself was tired and unrefreshed by the night's watch. But he was thinking as he took her in with one swift glance that he had seldom seen a woman with a sweeter, fresher countenance.
Breakfast was laid on a small round table near the fire. The long dining-table in the middle of the room was evidently not used.
Major Armitage presided over the coffee and tea himself. He waited on Joan with cheerful alacrity. There was nothing in his manner to prove that he disliked women guests. Their talk was, of course, about the invalid.
"I dread my father getting bronchitis at the beginning of the winter. He has had it before, but I am so immensely thankful and grateful to you for finding him. How did you manage it?"
"I heard one of my dogs barking outside. I'm afraid he took the rector for an intruder. It is my dog you have to thank for telling me of your father's whereabouts."
"But you offered him shelter and hospitality."
"Who would not? If I had been in a similar case, would you not have taken me in and nursed me?"
"I hope I should," said Joan with a smile; "which reminds me of an old man in the village—do you know him? A superannuated postman, Dicky Grubb. He called me in to take shelter from the rain, and when I thanked him, he said:
"'Why, that be all right. I do reckon I'd have asked the evil one hisself in if I'd seen 'im. I do be just desperate for a talk wi' somebody.'"
"These country folk have a great belief in the personality of the evil one," said Major Armitage with an amused smile.
"I must rank myself amongst them," said Joan, a soft grave light coming into her eyes at once. "If we believe our Bibles, we must, but the comfort is to feel that the Power above him is greater."
"Do you believe in a gracious providence overlooking our lives and ordering all things for our eternal good?" questioned the Major abruptly.
"Yes, I do," said Joan simply. "I believe it with all my heart. I always have liked that verse in Job. Do you know it?—
"'For He performeth the thing that is appointed for me.'
"It takes the sting out of so much if we can feel it is His hand behind."
"Life has a good deal of bitterness in it," said Major Armitage, "but I think if I hadn't believed in that Hand, I should have blown my brains out long ago. As one lives on, though, one's patience gets exhausted."
Then he pulled himself together, as if he had said too much. "What a beautiful little organ you have."
"Yes, isn't it? I have been wondering if you would ever like to take our services for us. We should enjoy it so much if you did."
"Would you? I always think organists are tenacious of their position and resent any amateurs touching their beloved instrument."
"But I am much more of an amateur than you are," said Joan, smiling. "And I have heard your playing once, and I long to hear it again."
"Music is the comfort of my life," said Major Armitage. "I have only a piano here, but I am thinking of building an organ. Meanwhile, I tell you that I have very happy times in your little church."
Then he began to talk over organ music with her. The personal note in his conversation disappeared, and Joan was rather glad of it. He was as yet too great a stranger for her to touch upon the deep things of life with ease in her talk with him. She was always shy of mentioning them herself; and he had surprised her by his words. Yet as they talked there over their comfortable meal, Joan felt an increasing liking for this man. He seemed so frank and straightforward that she could not reconcile the account of him which Maria had given to her sister with her actual experience now.
When breakfast was over and she was about to depart again, Major Armitage stopped her.
"You have a mile and a quarter to walk to the rectory through the fresh snow. If you want to see the doctor, he will most likely be here in an hour's time. What is the good of rushing home and back again before his visit? Stay with the rector till he comes, and write a note to your old servant. I will send my groom over with it at once."
Joan considered a moment and then agreed. He took her across the hall to his smoking-room, and left her at the writing-table there. She wrote her note, gave it to the groom, who was waiting in the hall for it, and then with rapid steps went upstairs to her father. Maria was superintending one of the housemaids, who was tidying up the room.
"I'm glad you haven't gone, miss. The rector has been asking for you."
Joan went up to the bedside. Her father was awake and feverishly anxious to get up.
"I have been told by this good woman, my dear, where I am. I could hardly remember how I came here. I must go home, Joan. If I am ill, I must be in my own house; and there is Sunday coming. To-morrow is Saturday. If I cannot take the service, we must get someone else to do it. There are a lot of things to arrange. I must—"
"Now, Father, dear, I will see to everything. We are only waiting till the doctor has been. You must not worry, and you must not talk."
Joan was very firm. She sat down by the bed and began telling her father of some funny experiences she had had the previous morning in the village. His attention was diverted from himself; he smiled, then became sleepy again, and had a good half-hour's nap before the doctor arrived. Dr. Blount gave a good report of his patient.
"I believe he has just staved off an attack of pneumonia. You must not attempt to move him to-day. Send over your old servant; she and her sister here will manage him nicely, and you can ease his mind best by running his business."
For practical common sense Dr. Blount had no equal. When Joan was once convinced that her father was in no danger, and only required rest and care for a few days, she went straight down and interviewed Major Armitage again.
She found him out in the garden directing a lad how to sweep the snow off the paths.
He anticipated her in what she was about to say. "I am not going to let your father go to-day or to-morrow, whatever the doctor says."
"It is most kind of you," Joan said; and then she told him what the doctor wished.
"If you do not mind Sophia coming up, she will be a great comfort to Father; and I have really so many things to see to in the parish that I shall be quite content with Sophia's reports once a day."
"I'll do anything you like to suggest; but I hope you will feel free to run up whenever you have time. I am going up to town to-morrow for the night, but I'll come down to you myself on the way to the station, if I may, to tell you how I leave him."
Joan thanked him with a lightened heart. Then, looking round her, she could not help exclaiming:
"What a beautiful old home you have! Isn't it wonderful how grand and majestic a heavy fall of snow makes its surroundings? We might be now in the depths of a huge forest. Your trees and snow glades through them are magnificent."
Major Armitage turned with her to face his old, weather-beaten, ivy-covered house. The wind had gone down, and there was that peculiar silence and stillness that fallen snow always brings.
"It is a waiting house," he said, somewhat dreamily. "It has always borne that characteristic on its walls to me."
Joan hardly knew what to say. He turned to her with a slow smile upon his face.
"Do you know any of its history, Miss Adair? For over a hundred years it has been the abode of lonely souls. No children's voices or steps have ever brightened its rooms. Three old bachelor brothers succeeded each other, then a childless couple, then two single women, and each heir was well over fifty before taking possession. My mother was the first who broke the chain, but she died six months after it had been bequeathed to her. And she told me that it had always been considered an unlucky legacy."
"Has that any foundation?" Joan asked with interest.
"There is a saying that until it reverts to the old family to whom it originally belonged, there will be no luck to its possessor."
Joan was about to ask the name of that family, but such a stern shadow came over the Major's face that she refrained, and he turned almost abruptly away from her for a moment. Then, as she moved away from him, the smile came back to his lips again.
"My house and I wait," he said.
Joan went home that morning with much food for thought, and though her father figured foremost in her mind, there was another who figured in it too.
CHAPTER VIII
AN ENCOUNTER WITH WILMOT
IN three days' time, the rector was moved home, and in a fortnight he was going about much as usual; but the result of his sojourn with Major Armitage was a distinct friendship with the lonely man. He often dropped in to see the rector and have a chat with him; he exchanged organ voluntaries with Joan, took the service himself one Sunday night, and fascinated everyone there by the beautiful music he gave them after the service was over.
But though to Joan and her father he was always genial and pleasant, he refused to extend his friendship to society in general. And whispers were still circulated that he was queer, and had "a bee in his bonnet." Joan contradicted these rumours with much warmth, but the gossips shook their heads and retained their own opinions.
A little incident that occurred made her realise that perhaps they had some foundation for their circulation, and yet, understanding a little better, as she did now, the working of an artistic nature, and withal an intensely dreamy one, she felt more distressed than ever that gossip should ferret out the secrets of an upright, honourable gentleman.
One afternoon, after a visit to the rector, Major Armitage promised to send Joan a Christmas carol of his own composition. She had been planning some carol practices for Christmas, and he had told her of some with which she had never become acquainted. And then he had added:
"With an author's egotism, I am wondering if you would like to have a look at a carol which was sung in Ely Cathedral one year. The organist was a great friend of mine, and got me to compose the music for some old words he had found in an antiquated history of Cambridgeshire."
Joan accepted his offer with delight, and the roll of music came. As she was unrolling it, a rough sheet of manuscript tumbled out of it. It had evidently slipped in by mistake. She glanced at the words, and then with caught breath and tearful eyes she read them through again, and then an overwhelming feeling of shame took possession of her for reading them at all.
"Sweet of my heart, we are quite alone,
Alone in the twilight grey;
Eyes are not needed, only our souls
Touch in an exquisite way.
"Do I not see thee? I close my eyes,
I need not the light of day;
My lady sits here by the flickering fire—
I know she has come to stay.
"How can I paint the sweet face that is mine,
The face so purely serene;
The eyes that are softly searching my soul
With their glance so bright and keen;
"The proud little head, with its poise half gay,
Yet so bewitchingly shy;
The lips that quiver, that open to speak,
Then close with a pensive sigh?
"Heart of my heart, and queen of my love,
I gaze on thee, full of bliss,
The ache of a lonely hearth is worth while
To give a moment like this."
R. A.
It was the key to the Major's silent hour by the fireside of the room which was full of his music and poetry; the room which was closed against outsiders and strangers, but which was a hallowed spot to his soul.
Joan comprehended in a flash as she read, and for some minutes she stood wrapped in thought with the paper in her hand. Then she wondered what she had better do. She dreaded letting Major Armitage know that she had seen and read it. She felt she could not tell him; she could not write to him. Finally she rolled up the little song and sent it back to him by post, writing across the wrapper:
"Found inside the carol."
By neither word nor sign did the Major ever let her know that he had received it.
Mrs. Adair and Cecil still stayed away. They wrote occasionally, and one morning the rector looked up from his wife's letter with disappointment in his face.
"I was hoping they would come home for Christmas, Joan, but your mother says they are going to spend it in Cheshire with a cousin of hers. We shall not see much of them, I am afraid. Your mother wants to go abroad again in January."
"I think," said Joan gravely, "that you and I, Dad, dear, had better make up our minds to run this parish without them. When they come home, we will welcome them gladly, but we won't keep on expecting them; their visits will be always short, I know."
"But why?" Mr. Adair demanded rather impatiently. "Why should they not stay in their own comfortable home when they are in England? I can imagine Cecil's delicacy necessitating a warmer climate, but Edinburgh and Cheshire are colder climates than ours? It is not right; your mother ought to be here."
Joan was silent. She knew her father had never grasped and would never grasp the fact that Mrs. Adair had a real distaste for her clerical home. After a few minutes she said gently:
"Cecil can have a good many more luxuries away than she can at home, and at less expense."
"Yes, yes. I know that. But these visits seem to cost a good deal. I must send your mother another cheque this morning, and a bill has come in from some London shop. I suppose it is for clothes; you will understand the items, but it is for a big amount, seventeen pounds!"
Joan took the bill, a dressmaker's, and then she said:
"I think I should forward this to mother. She settles for these."
But she doubted in her heart as she said so whether Mrs. Adair would do so. She never could cut down her private expenses to her private income, and her husband had to pay for a good deal.
It was one of those days when clouds seemed heavy overhead. Some quarrel amongst the bell-ringers had to be inquired into and set straight; then Jenny was sent for from home to attend to her mother, who had scalded her leg badly, and Joan had to get another village girl to take her place.
Miss Borfield called, and poured out a grievance which she had been nursing in private for some considerable time. The last rector had always consulted her over various village matters. She was being shown now that her services were not valued or needed. She had not been asked to tea at the rectory for over two months; Joan never came to see her, and so on.
Joan listened, sympathised, apologised, explained, and promised that things would be different for the future. At half-past three in the afternoon she had found herself feeling so irritable and impatient with everybody, indoors and out, that she ran up to her room, flung on her hat and coat, and started out to walk off her bad feelings.
The air and solitude were a certain cure with Joan for depression, for she held communion then with One Who was able to rest and calm the turbulent waters.
She walked to her favourite pine wood. It was a cold but bright afternoon. The words that she had quoted to Major Armitage a short time ago came into her mind:
"For He performeth the thing that is appointed for me."
And as she thought upon it, peace came into her soul. Amongst the silent pines, looking down upon a vista of valley and clustering cottages round the old grey church, she lifted her heart heavenwards.
"Just the cutting and shaping and friction that I need," she said to herself, "as Major Armitage said, 'I believe in the Hand behind.'"
Her thoughts turned to him as she retraced her steps homeward, and then suddenly she met Wilmot Gascoigne. He had been supplying her with books of late, but though he had called several times upon her father, Joan happened to have missed him.
"What a walker you are!" he said, as he shook hands with her. "I always find you out, but have never had the luck to meet you before. Have you been on one of your usual errands of mercy?"
"No," said Joan, smiling. "I have simply and solely walked out to please myself; in fact, I have been walking off bad temper."
"I wish I could do that. But I don't believe in your black words. You are always the personification of radiant cheerfulness. I am, or have been, in the devil of a temper all day, when every living human creature is an annoyance to me. I am going to chuck up the Gascoigne Chronicles for a time. They have got on my nerves. I am going up to town for a few weeks. I want to have a look at some books in the British Museum. Do you know what I am thinking of doing?"
"No—what?"
"Taking a tour in America, and lecturing on the Ancient Homes of Britain. Nothing takes over there like the histories and legends of the aristocracy. And I want a wider sphere and a change of work."
"I thought you were always content and happy amongst your books."
"Yes," he said, with a bitter smile, "that is what my good relatives think; they are continually flinging it in my teeth. Books are my food, my meat and drink, and my life; but I have other aims in life, and just now I need money. My American tour will bring me in a golden harvest."
"I should like to hear you lecture," said Joan, thoughtfully. "Why won't you give us a village lecture one day? Take some subject that will suit our villagers. One of the greatest pleasures in life must be to impart the knowledge which we have."
"I know that is your creed. You inspire me to try. Now what possible subject could interest the intellects of your villagers?"
"It requires consideration," said Joan.
"Will you think it out, and I will do the same, and I'll drop in on Saturday afternoon to compare notes. I know the rector is always in then; he told me so."
"Very well. I'm sure my father will be pleased at the idea. We were wishing we could give the men some kind of entertainment."
"I am not a village entertainer," said Wilmot, with a laugh, "and it is the most difficult thing in the world to talk down to such an audience. But I'll have a try at it to please you. How have you got on with Miller's 'Indian Philosophy'?"
"I am afraid I have had little time for reading lately," said Joan.
"It's an awful waste of a cultivated intellect to be placed where you are," said Wilmot, with earnestness. "Why don't you strike?"
"No," said Joan, with a shake of her head. "My circumstances necessitate it. I am trying to be content."
"Any fool could run a country parish!" said Wilmot hotly.
"Thank you, but I disagree. My father is no fool, and he cannot do it single-handed and alone."
"There's a paper I want you to read in the 'National Review,'" Wilmot went on. "I want a woman's view on it. I left it at the rectory just now. Will you make time to read it?"
"Yes, I will try. I shall enjoy it, I expect. Magazine articles do not want the leisure that philosophical treatises do."
He turned to another subject which was then filling his mind, the dawning of the Renaissance Period, and he talked fast and furiously over it. When he lost himself in his subject, he was intensely brilliant and interesting. Joan listened entranced, and when they reached the rectory gates, she heaved a sigh of regret.
"Oh," she said impulsively, "I could listen to you all night; you have taken me right out of myself and my surroundings!"
"It is a treat to meet with a kindred soul," said Wilmot, enthusiastically. "Look here, Miss Adair; we must see more of each other. I assure you I haven't a single person in this neighbourhood with whom I can exchange a few ideas."
"Do you know Major Armitage?"
"No. He's a musical genius, I hear, and a crank. I should say he never opens a book."
"I believe he has a very good library."
"Has he? If I thought that, I would look him up. Well, then, Saturday you will see me again. Au revoir!"
Joan turned indoors. She liked Wilmot Gascoigne, and she did not like him. Her intellect appreciated his; her spirit clashed with his, and her instinct told her that his influence was not wholly uplifting.
"I like and admire him as a teacher," she said to herself, "but I would not have him as a friend."
Saturday came, and he turned up to tea full of the village lecture he proposed to give.
Joan suggested a lecture on the historical events that had happened in the county, with special reference to those of local interest. Mr. Adair thought a talk about drink and politics would suit the labouring men. Wilmot himself proposed a lecture on political economy. They finally settled that he should give a lecture on "Country versus Town Life," and he and Joan had a very long and animated discussion upon that theme.
She broke away from him at last. "You must excuse me. Do stay and talk to my father. This is his free evening. But I have a Sunday school lesson to prepare and some mark books to make up, and it is half-past ten."
Wilmot did not stay. He liked the rector, but it was his daughter he came to see.
And for the next ten days before the lecture came off, he was continually at the rectory.
Banty arrived one afternoon, and found Joan sweeping the garden paths.
"What are you doing?" she asked.
"I'm getting some leaves together to go on our bonfire. I'm tired of the untidiness of the garden, so I'm making a clearance of a lot of rubbish. Come into the orchard and see it burn."
"I always like you so much better out of doors," Banty remarked; "you're so much more like an ordinary human being then."
Joan laughed. "What am I indoors?"
"A very superior rector's daughter."
"Oh, I don't think I deserve that. I assure you don't feel so."
"What have you been doing to Motty? He has left the seclusion of the library, and is for ever coming down here. He told Father to-day that he must have a holiday; and we hear he is going to give a village lecture. I warn you, they won't understand one word of it. Have you bewitched him?"
Joan was busy stacking up her bonfire. She did not answer for a moment; then she said lightly:
"Father and your cousin like a smoke and chat together. I don't think you give Mr. Wilmot much of your company as a rule."
"I should think not. Can't stand his stilted talk. But why is he so keen on coming here to talk to you? That's what I want to know!"
"I suppose we have tastes in common," said Joan, a little indifferently. "I am very fond of books, and so is he."
Banty looked at her in silence; then she said abruptly: "I believe everybody likes to talk to you; I do."
"Now that is nice of you," said Joan, turning a smiling face towards her. "I thought you were going to be disagreeable a few minutes ago."
"I meant to be. Motty provoked me by singing your praises and saying that you were wasted upon us. 'A village of clodhoppers,' he called us; and I know he meant to include the Hall in that disparaging epithet. We are not clever—I know we aren't—but we are happy and contented with our country life, and Motty spends his time in abusing it and sneering at all our neighbours. He tells me he is going to speak about country and town life to the villagers. I suppose you know what he will do? He will make London a paradise, and set every young man by the ears to go there. He'll stir up discontent and restlessness, and make them all hate their country lives. You see if you don't bring a hornet's nest into our village schoolroom when he gets up on his hind legs to speak."
Joan had never heard Banty speak at such length before. She looked dismayed at the picture which was painted.
"I don't think he will do that. I will talk to him about it."
"I suppose you are infatuated with him," said Banty, a little rudely, "just as my cousins are in town. Motty is full of himself. I wish he didn't live with us. He always makes us uncomfortable by his airs of superiority. Now, Derrick Colleton is quite different. It is a pleasure to have him in the house."
"Derrick is a dear," assented Joan, warmly.
"What I like about you is your variety," pursued Banty, watching Joan feeding the bonfire with critical eyes. "You may be a bookworm at heart, but you don't mind painting a jingle, or mending a gate, or making a bonfire—versatility is the word I want!"
"It's just necessity," laughed Joan; "but I enjoy it all, and any fire in the open exhilarates me—doesn't it you? I made a fire up in the pine woods the other afternoon, and sat by it, and had an hour's reading. It was delicious!"
"I'll come up and join you one day, if I may. I want to talk to you, only, when hunting is on, I haven't much time."
"All right," said Joan, feeling rather sorry that she had given her quiet retreat away. "But will you join me in reading or do you want to talk?"
"To talk," said Banty, frankly and unfeelingly. "I can't talk indoors—I never could. Out of doors I feel at ease. Let us meet in the pine woods to-morrow. I can't hunt till next Monday. I've knocked up two hunters this week, and father has got riled and says I must give them a rest."
"To-morrow afternoon?" said Joan, dubiously. "Well, I will try."
"Let us boil a kettle and have tea out there," suggested Banty, with alacrity.
Joan agreed, for she wanted to win the confidence of Banty, and knew it would not do to damp her friendliness.
"Then I think I'll go now," said Banty. "You'll get sick of me if I give you too much of my company."
Joan laughed again as she shook hands with her. "You have a very humble opinion of your own powers of attractiveness."
"I'm not attractive to women," said Banty, bluntly; "never can understand them. I always vote them a bore, and they vote me one. Good-bye."
Joan looked after her. She swung away with a boyish stride, and was soon out of sight.
"Oh, dear! What waste of time it will be. Why should she fix upon me to beguile her dull hours? And what can she have to say to me?"
Joan poked away at the bonfire rather fiercely. Banty was quite right in her estimate of herself. She was not an attractive personality to any of her own sex, for she never troubled to make herself pleasant to them, and Joan did not look forward with any pleasure to the appointment made.
CHAPTER IX
JOAN'S GODMOTHER
JOAN nearly forgot to meet Banty as arranged, for a letter in the morning absorbed her thoughts. It was from her godmother, Lady Alicia, saying she was coming down into their neighbourhood for a week's visit to some old friends, and would much like to spend a few days at the rectory and see her goddaughter. Lady Alicia had been to Joan from the time she was a tiny child the embodiment of all that was enchanting and delightful. Joan had almost worshipped her, though the times in which she had seen her were very few and far between. They had corresponded for many years. Lady Alicia had refused to lose touch with her even after her confirmation, and Joan felt that she could never express her gratitude sufficiently for having been enabled to go to Girton by her godmother's generous help.
Never before had Joan entertained Lady Alicia in her mother's absence, and it was five years since her godmother had come to see them. When Mr. Adair was told, he became rather flustered.
"My dear Joan, your mother ought to be here. You must tell her. Perhaps it will bring her back. Lady Alicia is one of your mother's greatest friends. I should not like to have her here when your mother is away. I don't think she would care about it either."
"She has seen Mother in Edinburgh, Father. She tells me so, and Mother knows she is coming, for she told her she would like to do it. She is coming to see me, for she is my godmother, remember. I am delighted."
"She is a very pleasant woman," said Mr. Adair; "but I hope she is not going to persuade you to leave your work here and take up teaching. I know she is a clever woman herself, and learning of any sort is her hobby."
"I am not going to leave you, Dad," said Joan gently.
Then she went out to tell Sophia, and that worthy was as pleased as Joan.
"We shall be very pleased to see her ladyship, of course, and I'll have the best spare bedroom aired at once; and we must just plan out some tasty little dinners. How many days do you say, Miss Joan? A few? Then we'll say four dinners at the most, and I'll think them out and let you know what we shall be wanting. She's a real nice lady, is her ladyship, and I'm glad to think you'll be here alone, for the last time she were with us 'twas your holidays, and you were sent out of doors whiles the mistress talked and talked and talked! Oh, how she talked! And when her ladyship went, she says to me, whiles I were strapping her box:
"'Sophia, my little goddaughter will grow up a fine woman. I'm sorry to have seen so little of her.'
"And a fine young woman you be, Miss Joan, and I'm sure her ladyship will think so when she looks at you. I often think in the present time that we shan't have their lordships and ladyships with us much longer. So we must make the most of them when we can get them. Now the House of Lords is humbled and made nought of, and these dreadful agitating strikers and social ruffians are for destroying their houses and lands, well, the poor things will be driven out of the country; and then it's the ones who've driven them will wish them back again!"
"Oh, Sophia!" said Joan, putting her hands to her ears. "For mercy's sake stop. Thank goodness Lady Alicia has no houses or land to be taken from her!"
She left the kitchen, wrote to her godmother, and went about her daily duties as if in a dream.
It was not till late in the afternoon that she remembered Banty; and it was not in the best of humours that she got her tea basket and started out for the pine woods. But a walk across the heath restored her equanimity. It was a soft, mild day, with a wild-looking sky; the sun shone out between masses of grey, scudding clouds; the west wind soughed in the pines. The distances were blue and clear, here and there on far-away hills were wonderful effects of sunshine and shadow.
Joan found Banty first at their trysting place, and she was building a fire in a very business-like manner. For a little while they chatted together in a light-hearted fashion, then, when they were sitting down watching for the kettle to boil, Banty began:
"I want to talk to you. You're not an old frump, and I'm sure you have plenty of common sense. Do you think girls nowadays are better unmarried?"
Joan had hoped for some better subject for conversation than this; but she checked her momentary feeling of impatience and answered:
"Certainly not. If they meet the right man, it is in every respect good to marry."
"Yes; but how does any girl know that the man who proposes to her is the right man?"
"I think her heart will tell her. Are you wanting to be married?"
"Me? Rather not! But Mother wants me to think about it. She told me this morning that if anything happened to Father, I should lose my home and hunting. I could do without a home, but to give up hunting! Why, I think I would die! You see Father's heir is a distant cousin, a married man with a family, and Mother and I would have to promptly clear out. But, of course, Father may outlive us—at least he may live many years. I've always felt I'm not made for a wife. I have no domesticities about me, and men like and expect that, don't they?"
"You will not always be able to hunt," said Joan slowly. "What will you do when you get rheumaticky and old?"
"I mean to live and die in the hunting-field," said Banty firmly.
"It means a very sudden death, then. Do you wish for that?"
Banty stared at Joan with big eyes.
"Why, no; it would be terrible, awful!" She shuddered. "Don't let us talk about death; it seems so gruesome. It is such an appalling upheaval, isn't it, of our very pleasant matter-of-fact lives."
"You 'do' think sometimes." Joan said this almost to herself.
Banty laughed a little awkwardly, then shied some fir cones into the fire.
"I was wondering the other day," she said, "whether I had better say 'yes' to a man who is pestering me with his attentions. And I thought I would ask you. For I assure you, I can't make up my mind. Mother wants me to have him, because he has lots of tin, and I'd have a jolly good time if I married him. But I'm not so keen on money as on good company, and he's the dullest man in the whole field—rides well, but nothing else. If I got bored after I had married him, what should I do?"
"If you don't love him, don't marry him," said Joan quickly.
"Well then, supposing I don't get another offer, and Mother's gloomy forecast comes true?"
"But, Miss Gascoigne, there really are other enjoyments in life besides hunting."
"There isn't one to me."
"What do you do in the summer?"
"I have a vile time."
Joan looked at the girl softly and seriously, then she put out her hand and laid it on her arm.
"Wake up!" she said. "You're half asleep. Somewhere inside you, you have a spirit, a soul. There are tremendous possibilities for that soul of yours, and an awfully happy life for you if you can only get it to stir and prove that it is alive. Happiness all the year round, and not only in the winter!"
Banty stared at her again, but Joan did not say another word. She occupied herself in making two very good cups of tea, and brought the conversation into lighter channels. Banty was led to talk of otters and of their habits, and then she gave Joan a lot of interesting information about the different birds in their locality. She did not mention the subject of marriage again; but when they at last rose to go their different ways, she said with emphasis:
"I'm not quite the sleepy fool you take me to be."
Joan walked home wondering if she had wasted the hour in the woods or not. She had a very small opinion of her own powers in influencing anyone for good, which was rather strange, as she had a wild enthusiasm for imparting all other knowledge to those who were without it. Outside her own gate, she stood gazing at the distant hills; the sun was sending long, crimson streaks across the sky as he sank behind the pines. She lifted up her face to inhale the soft west breeze which seemed to be bringing her the aromatic scent of the heather and pines.
"Oh," she murmured to herself, "it's good to be alive in this beautiful world—and I've a delicious bit in front of me. How I shall love to have Lady Alicia all to myself!"
The following evening, Wilmot Gascoigne gave his village lecture. Lady Gascoigne insisted upon coming to it herself, and persuaded Sir Joseph to accompany her. Banty refused to be present. The village schoolroom was crowded. Joan was rather nervous when Wilmot opened his lecture by a comparison between a town and country boy at fourteen. He gave an imaginary conversation between them which tickled and delighted his audience, but which showed the country boy at a great disadvantage. Then, as he talked on, he forgot his class of audience, and his talk became absolutely unintelligible. He drifted into political economy, he quoted various authors with whom, of course, nobody was acquainted; he grew more and more rapid and enthusiastic in his talk, and finally ended his lecture by declaring that the country bred flourishing bodies, but that town produced, and could only produce, brains.
"Bosh!" exclaimed the squire in audible tones.
Joan felt a great inclination to laugh. Her father, who was taking the chair, got up in his genial and good-natured way and tried to stand up for his parishioners.
"I think the lecturer is hard upon the countryfolk," he said smiling. "I am not very learned myself, but I do remember several authors and poets who have done all their best work in the country, and some of them were country bred."
"The Brontës!" prompted Joan.
The rector did not hear her. The gaping audience had hardly taken in any of the lecture. They clapped when their rector proposed the vote of thanks to the lecturer, and went to their homes declaring that it was the "finest performance" they had ever heard, and Mr. Wilmot was just a "speakin' dictionary."
Wilmot did not seem so pleased with himself as Joan expected him to be. He turned into the rectory to have some supper.
"Well," he said a little defiantly to Joan, "my role is not that of a village lecturer, is it?"
"No," said Joan, laughing. "I don't think it is; but I am sure you gave a great deal of pleasure. One old woman said to me coming out: 'Ay, me dear, he ought to be a parson, sure enough! That's the style of praychin for we—a reg'lar clap-up style with plenty of noise with it!'"
Wilmot tried to smile.
"Oh," he groaned, "it was like talking to rows of stolid cows. There wasn't one spark of life amongst them. Their eyes were as thick and vacant as a fish's! How can you peg away at them, rector?"
Mr. Adair looked at Wilmot rather gravely.
"'Line upon line—here a little—there a little,' They are not so stupid as they look."
"You had some interested listeners," said Joan. "Major Armitage was at the back. He slipped in late and went away early."
"He's a crank," said Wilmot shortly. "I'm much more interested in his house than himself. It has a curious record."
"Yes; I know about it," said Joan. "To whom did it originally belong?"
"To the Rollestons. They sold the property about a hundred years ago, and the Armitages bought it. Don't let us talk about that fellow. Do you ever go up to town, Miss Adair?"
"No, never. We are expecting a visitor, an old friend of my mother's, so my time will be taken up."
"Does that mean you will have no time for me? I am going to get you to read up that book on the Renaissance. I shall expect to hear how you like it when I come back from town."
"How long will you be away? You seem to have no idea of the life I lead. I cannot have infinite leisure for reading; I wish I could."
"I shall be away about ten days or a fortnight. Don't let your mind rust. We are told to use our talents. Your most important duty is to cultivate the intellect that has been given you."
Joan smiled at these platitudes, but the earnestness of Wilmot's tones made her reply:
"The difficulty with me is to refrain from reading. It is not a duty, but a real pleasure."
She was relieved that Wilmot was going up to town. She found his constant visits rather a detriment to her parish work.
The next day Lady Alicia arrived. Joan met her at the station with the one shabby fly that Old Bellerton possessed.
Lady Alicia was of medium height and rather slender. She was always extremely well dressed in a quiet style of her own. Her white hair and delicately-cut features, with a pair of brilliant, dark eyes, gave her a remarkable and attractive look.