"'I want no dinner, and no disturbance,' he said, or words similar.
"M'ria goes away, and she said her knees were trembling all the evening. The house was silent as a grave. And then, about ten o'clock, when the other maids had gone off to bed, to M'ria's great relief she heard the piano playing in the music-room. She slipped upstairs to listen, for she hoped now he'd got to his music he'd be feeling better; and she was keeping a basin of soup hot against the time when he came out. And what do you think he was playing, Miss Joan? M'ria said in the empty, silent house it gave her the curdles all over. Nothing but that awful rumbling funeral march for the dead!"
Joan could say nothing. She only gazed at Sophia in silence.
"Well, M'ria waited, all of a shiver, for him to stop; and when he stopped there was silence, and still M'ria waited. And then at last, the Major came out, and he walked straight for the stairs. Then she made bold to speak.
"'Please, sir,' she began, but he stopped her with a little wave of his hand.
"'Don't speak to me,' he said; 'I've been burying my dead.'
"With that, he goes straight up the stairs and locks himself in his room, and M'ria said she was so overcome with tears, she just had to go back to the kitchen and drink up the hot soup herself."
Joan was too miserable to smile.
"Poor Major Armitage! I hope no very near relation has died."
Sophia shook her head gloomily and mysteriously. "There's no mistake, Miss Joan, in who it was. This morning, M'ria says, he's pulled down the blinds of the boudoir and locked and bolted the door, and told M'ria that nobody is ever to go near that room again. M'ria says he's like a tomb, stony and dead like. It's his lady which is dead, sure enough. In fact, he kind of apologised for wasting a good dinner last night. He said to M'ria:
"'I had had bad news, and I couldn't eat.'
"Then M'ria asked, gentle like, if the household were to be in mourning; and he looked at her as if he didn't understand her meaning. But his look so awed her that she daren't say one word more, and that's how it stands with him. I thought you'd be interested. I feel full up of it myself."
"But Maria and you will keep this to yourselves?" said Joan, almost imploringly. "You won't let the village gossip over it?"
"Miss Joan, M'ria and me know our duty towards them we serves," said Sophia loftily.
And then Joan slipped quietly away.
Her heart ached for the lonely man; she almost felt as if his grief were hers.
CHAPTER XIII
A FATEFUL TELEGRAM
"YOU cannot walk so far."
"Indeed I can. It is only four miles there. I shall rest when I get there, and have my lunch and walk back. It is nothing for a strong and hearty female like myself."
"I hope Toby is not really ill?"
"No; it's only a slight swelling on his hock. He is being bandaged, and only wants a few days' rest. Don't worry, dear. I must see this woman. I have promised her husband I will, and if I cannot drive, I must walk. It's a lovely afternoon. I shall enjoy it."
Joan and her father were talking together at lunch. She was taking advantage of a birthday holiday given to her small pupils to go to see one of the parishioners who had been taken to the infirmary in the neighbouring market town; and owing to the indisposition of the pony she could not use the little jingle.
"You could hire a trap from the inn," her father suggested.
Joan shook her head.
"That would be reckless expense. Have your tea, for I shall be late, as I have a good deal of shopping to get through; but I am perfectly equal to the walk."
She started in good spirits, taking Bob, her little terrier, with her. Spring was in the air; there was blue sky and bright sun shining overhead. She crossed the heath, and the fresh, pungent scent of the pines and peat refreshed and delighted her. Joan often said she could walk her worries away, and to-day was no exception to the rule. She did not feel tired when she arrived in Coppleton. She saw the sick woman, did her shopping, and had her lunch at a small confectioner's.
Then, at three o'clock, she started homewards. The blue sky was gone now, and heavy black clouds were rolling up. Joan began to wish she had brought an umbrella. Before she had gone a mile from the town, rain descended in torrents. It was a lonely road, and there was no shelter of any sort near. She buttoned her coat up to her chin and pressed steadily on; but wind and rain beat her back, and she began to feel quite exhausted. Suddenly she heard quick-trotting hoofs behind her, and a high dog-cart overtook her. She glanced up and saw it was Major Armitage. He did not seem to see her; his face was stern and set, and he was about to pass her, when in desperation she called to him. He pulled up at once.
"Oh! It's you, Miss Adair, what are you doing out in this storm so far from home? I can offer you a seat, but not an umbrella, I'm afraid."
"Thank you. I shall be delighted to get a lift."
She climbed in and told him where she had been. She had not seen him since Sophia had told her what had happened, and as she glanced up at him she saw a great change in his face. The dreamy wistfulness had departed; his profile might have been carved in granite, so stern and immovable it was.
He was very silent, and so was she, for a few minutes. Then she said:
"You promised to play at our evening service last Sunday, but as you did not turn up, I suppose something prevented your doing so?"
He looked down at her quickly.
"I did not know I had. My promise must have been made in another life. I seem in a new era now. I'm sorry if I inconvenienced you; but the fact is I cancelled all my engagements. I—I have been through a—a good deal since I saw you last."
"I am so sorry. I am afraid you have been in trouble."
There was another silence. Then he gave a short laugh.
"My house has asserted itself. I was a fool to think I could break the long chain of ill-luck. I am thinking of shutting it up and going over to Ireland."
"So soon? We shall be sorry to lose you."
"It isn't that I run away from it," he went on slowly; "but it will never fulfil its purpose to me now, and so it is useless to me."
"But your tenants will miss you."
"Oh, no, they will not; my bailiff will look after them."
Joan hardly knew what to say.
"I have been living at the gate of paradise," he continued, "expecting and glorying in the hope that it would soon be opened to me. I have been shown that it will always remain bolted and barred to me. I have been wasting my life, my time and thoughts, Miss Adair, over an illusion. Yet some words you uttered once have continually come to my mind: 'He performeth the thing that is appointed for me.' Do you believe it?"
"In my own experience I try to do so," said Joan thoughtfully.
Major Armitage said no more for some time. The rain and wind beat in their faces and made conversation difficult. But when they came into Old Bellerton village, Joan spoke:
"I am very grateful to you for driving me home, and, if I may say so, still more for what you have told me. I am sure none of us ought to believe in ill-luck, and you are strong enough to rise above it."
"No, I am not," said Major Armitage; "but I suppose I can live doggedly on. Do you know Dr. Sewell's couplet?
"'When all the blandishments of life are gone,
The coward sneaks to death; the brave live on.'"
Joan's eyes brightened.
"I like that. And life is a wonderful thing, is it not? Our own lives are so small compared with many others; it is the lives of those around us that really matter, and what we can be to them."
"You think we ought to be entirely detached from ourselves? That would make us mere mechanical machines."
She was silent. Then, as he reached the rectory gate, he pulled up his horse and held out his hand to her.
"Good-night, Miss Adair. You have done me good, and I promise to play for you next Sunday evening. I shan't be leaving just yet. But I tell you in confidence that my house now is an utter despair to me!"
She looked up at him when she was turning in at the gate. Her eyes were shining.
"'He performeth the thing that is appointed for me,'" she repeated with emphasis.
And then the Major drove off and she went in to change her wet clothes, and to think much of the blow that had befallen her friend.
Before the following Sunday came round, she had a great many other matters that demanded all her time and attention. Wilmot Gascoigne had cajoled her into co-operating with him over his book, and she found it extremely difficult to give up the necessary time to it. She finally arranged that upon every day on which he could come over, they should work together between tea and dinner. Very often he asked if he might stay to dinner, so as to continue the work immediately afterwards, and not "break the thread" of their thoughts.
Joan was so carried away with his enthusiasm, with his flow of ideas, with his many problems needing deep discussion, that for some days she was merely a listener, offering a few feeble and inadequate suggestions; but as time went on she began to criticise, protest, and utterly disagree with Wilmot's plot and principles. To her, his moral instincts seemed warped; his conceptions of right and wrong confusing and shadowy. But he had the gift of eloquent persuasion, and often stopped her objections with a torrent of clever talk. Then he would listen to her alternative course of reasoning, sometimes apparently falling in with her views, but never eventually swerving from his point.
She, on her part, gave him fresh ideas and thoughts, which he seized with approval. But after a very few days of talking and working with him, Joan had to acknowledge to herself that it was most fatiguing and unsatisfactory. In addition to this, her father's affairs seemed more and more involved. Letters came from his wife and daughter with demands for money, which was simply not forthcoming. Every penny that could be scraped together was sent out to them; but it was not sufficient, and Mrs. Adair could not, or would not, understand her husband's difficulties. Joan and her father grew to dread the sight of a foreign letter lying on the breakfast-table.
Joan at last quietly went into Coppleton and parted with an old necklace of amethysts which had been given to her some years before by Lady Alicia. But the task of cheering her father, teaching her small pupils, working in the parish, helping in household duties, and trying to keep her head and brains clear and bright for Wilmot's hours, proved almost too much for her, and she found it quite impossible to continue her own writing. She had neither the time nor the ideas. She told Wilmot once that she had been forced to stop writing. He did not seem much impressed.
"Those short articles don't pay well, do they? And I want you to do better work. You will. This book of ours is going to be a success. I feel it is. We have got the right atmosphere, but it needs all our concentration and purpose. We will put our best and strongest into it. We must."
So Joan braced herself afresh, but she felt strangely exhausted at night; and could not feel assured that her help was as much as Wilmot seemed to require and demand.
On Sunday evening Major Armitage played the organ, and came into supper at the rectory afterwards. Joan thought him looking worn and ill, and there were grim fixed lines about his face that used not to be there. He seemed very distrait, as if conversation were an effort. Only once he roused himself, and that was when he asked Joan to sing some of her sacred songs. Mr. Adair remarked when he left that he must be in some kind of trouble.
"Of course, they say in the village he has lost someone dear to him. Do you know anything about it, Joan? He has not gone into mourning."
"Men don't," said Joan briefly.
"They usually wear a black tie, not a coloured one."
"We won't trouble about the village gossip, Father dear. If he had wanted us to know, he would have told us."
But the very next day, Joan wrote to Lady Alicia asking her if she could tell her whether Irene Denbury was dead.
Lady Alicia wrote promptly back.
"MY DEAREST JOAN,—So you have not heard the news! Frank Denbury turned
up after all these years perfectly safe and sound. It is like a book.
I hear he is much improved; but he was wounded and ill, and tied by
the leg in some out-of-the-way place, and his letters never reached
home. You must forget the story I told you. Bury it deep. But how wise
and right Irene was to wait! What disaster she would have brought upon
herself if she had not. She goes out with him to America the end of
this month. She seems as if she wants to get away from England, and I
think it will be best for her. I am so interested in hearing about your
writing, dear, but don't forget that it is a trust and talent given to
you to develop and to use for eternity. I have heard from your mother.
She seems very happy and well. Much love,—
"Yours lovingly,
"ALICIA.
"P.S.—Frank Denbury has quietly been adding to his fortune. I fancy his
wife might have been in the way; and, of course, he had no idea that
she thought him dead. But I consider him much to blame for his long
silence. It was not fair to any girl."
Joan pondered long and deeply over this letter. She felt unreasonably angry with Irene for having inspired Major Armitage with such love and hope.
"If she really loves him, how can she go off with her husband so easily and happily? I couldn't have done it. And yet I suppose religion and convention would say it was her duty to do so. She will most likely settle down very comfortably with her husband, and forget the man who is suffering tortures at present, and will never get over the blow."
She pictured him in his music-room playing the "Dead March" and burying deep for ever in the grave of his heart his first and only love.
"A man of that age and temperament will never get over it," she said to herself. "I wonder if he has enough religion to keep him sweet and tender! His music is still his solace. I'm glad to think it is, for no musician can get bitter and hard."
Lady Alicia's letter gave her food for thought, and doubts again assailed her as to whether Wilmot's book was a suitable one for her to help to produce. When next he and she were working together he propounded a certain situation from which her soul shrank.
"No, that is blasphemous," she said hastily. "I will not be a party to it."
"My dear girl, don't be a prude. What is blasphemy? We must move with the times, and we are not invoking the Deity in any way, or infringing upon His prerogative."
Joan looked at him with grave, sweet eyes.
"Mr. Gascoigne, you and I can never work together. I see this more and more. It was a mistake our making the attempt."
"I have frightened you. We will leave this situation. I will work it in so that it cannot possibly offend your principles. My dear partner, we have gone along too far to dissolve our partnership. Now take these sheets, and make a statement of our heroine's thoughts on this fatal night. Put your soul into it, and let your words scorch and burn. Be strong. Put yourself in her place, and write your thoughts as they would have been in her circumstances."
Joan gave a little sigh, but set to work; and the interest of her theme took hold of and engrossed her. Afterwards, when Wilmot was taking his leave, she strove to speak again.
"I don't agree with so much that you write. We shall never see things from the same standpoint. Don't you think you would get on quite as well without me?"
"No, I am not going to release you. Do you think I would take the trouble to come out all weathers and spend the best part of my day down here if I did not mean business? And think of the chance you would miss. Fame is in this book—I feel it—and money, and you and I will be partners in it."
It was always the way. He would not take her objections seriously, and Joan's conscience was uneasy and troubled in consequence.
Banty could not understand the situation. She remonstrated with Joan one afternoon when she called.
"I warned you of Motty. He has got hold of you, and will suck your blood to nourish himself. Don't look shocked! I mean it. He has done it with other women, and he thinks you very promising material."
Joan would not listen to her; but in her heart she sometimes longed that she had never given him her promise to help him.
And then one day it was all stopped—for the time.
"A letter from Cecil," said Joan in the morning, as she poured out a cup of tea for her father at the breakfast-table. "I have not read it yet. I hope it is not for more money. She wrote to me only a few days ago."
"It is to tell us when they are coming home, perhaps," said Mr. Adair cheerfully. "I am setting my hopes on having your mother here for Easter, Joan."
"But, Father dear, it wants only a fortnight to Easter, and they have not talked of a move yet."
"Read her letter and see."
So Joan in a leisurely way opened the envelope, and the next minute looked up with startled eyes.
"Father dear, Mother is not at all well. She has caught a bad chill and has an attack of pneumonia. Cecil is quite anxious and has called in a nurse."
Mr. Adair started to his feet.
"Let me see what she says. Cecilia ill? I must go to her."
Joan put the letter into his hand, and gazed out of the window with troubled eyes. Riviera doctors and nurses meant heavy additional expenses. How were they to be met, she wondered? And then she took herself to task for grudging her mother anything. Was she really seriously ill? Cecil seemed to think so, and Mrs. Adair was not one to succumb easily. She had always had good health, and made light of ordinary ailments. But this letter was three days old, surely if she had been worse, Cecil would have wired?
As if in answer to her conjecture, she saw a village lad come up the drive, and recognising him as the postmistress's son, Joan dashed out into the garden.
When he produced a yellow envelope, her heart sank. She tore it open.
"Mother died last night. Come at once.—CECIL."
She could not believe it. She dismissed the boy and took the telegram with trembling fingers to her father. She hardly knew how she told him, but from her face he guessed the worst. And sinking down upon a chair, he buried his face in his hands. Joan stood by his side white and immovable. The awful shock of it had stunned her. Presently heartbroken sobs came from her father. To Joan, who had never in her life seen her father shed a tear, it was an awful experience. She touched him on the shoulder.
"Dad, dear, we must do something. There is no time to lose."
"Time!" sobbed the rector. "What does time matter now? Everything is at an end for me."
The intense pathos of his tone brought the tears with a rush to Joan's eyes. She let herself weep unrestrainedly for some moments, and Sophia found them both unable to regain their composure. She herself was terribly shocked, but said in her practical way:
"There's Miss Cecil to be thought of."
Joan dried her tears at once. Her self-control was restored to her.
"Dad dear, what must be done?"
The rector lifted his head.
"I must go to them."
Even now he could not separate Cecil from her mother.
"Can I catch the morning train to town?"
He stood up. Like his daughter, he put his grief aside for the time.
"I must go at once," he repeated dully.
"You can catch the twelve-twenty. But what about money?"
Mr. Adair looked at her rather helplessly.
"How much shall I want?"
"You can cash a cheque at the bank before you start. We have twenty pounds in our current account. Take it all. I suppose I cannot come with you? I know I can't."
Joan was now perfectly composed. She packed his things, looked up his route in the foreign Bradshaw, listened to his directions for supplying his place on the following Sunday, then went out and ordered the jingle to be brought round. She drove him to the station, and it was not till he was actually in the railway carriage that father and daughter had courage to look into each other's eyes.
Mr. Adair's composure almost went again. "My darling wife," he murmured; "oh, Joan, pray that resignation to God will may be given to me."
Joan nodded.
"I can't yet take it in," she said brokenly; "I feel almost stunned, but I know that God will be with you and comfort you, Father dear."
The train went out, and Joan drove slowly home, trying to bring her practical common sense to the surface, but all her heart crying out for her brilliant, beautiful mother. Perhaps it was fortunate that she had so much to do and think about.
For the next day or two she had not a moment for quiet thought until she went to bed. She had many anxious fears about her father, who had never in his life been abroad, and who was apt to be rather absentminded in travelling. But a wire announcing his safe arrival, on the second morning after his departure, eased her mind. She had many notes of condolence and of sympathy, but saw only one of her friends, and that was Major Armitage. He called one morning and told Sophia he was going away that day. Joan came down into her father's study to see him.
"I felt I must wish you good-bye," he said, "and tell you that you have my deep sympathy in your loss. I am going over to Ireland to be with my sister, and have shut up the house for the present, but I shall not easily forget the warm welcome I have received in this house."
"Oh," said Joan, looking up at him with misty eyes, "my father and I will miss you! We have learnt to count upon you as a friend. Will you never come back to this part again?"
"I was going to say I hope not," he said gravely; "but I will add, not to the ill-fated house I inherited. Every room is a torture to me now. I never told you, Miss Adair, but I expect you guessed. I came down here to wait patiently for a woman to come to me, and now that is over. She will never come. And I have been wasting my time in useless dreams. Now, as you said the other day, my life is going to revolve round others. It has no centre in itself. And I think my sister needs me most. Perhaps we may come to England one day, but till then, good-bye."
He held out his hand. Joan took it, and felt tongue-tied for a moment or two, then she said softly:
"Thank you for giving me your confidence. I knew you had been going through deep waters, but when you say your life has no centre, you do not mean to leave out the One who is our centre? The One in Whom 'we move, and have our being.'"
He looked at her with sombre eyes.
"I have believed all my life in the Hand behind," he said; "I suppose I still believe in it."
He shook hands and went. Joan watched him disappear down the road from the study window.
"And so he goes away out of my life," she murmured to herself. "The only one I have really liked in this part of the world."
She gave a heavy sigh. Life was inexpressibly sad, and it seemed to her to get more and more difficult as time slipped by.
CHAPTER XIV
STRUGGLING IN THE NET
A WEEK later Mr. Adair returned, bringing Cecil with him. The meeting between the sisters was a very sad one. Cecil for the first time had been brought face to face with life's greatest reality. All her gaiety had left her for the time; she looked scared and miserable. And Mr. Adair seemed ten years older, the stoop in his shoulders was intensified, and his whole demeanour was listless and dejected. Yet he gave Joan quite simply every detail of the quiet funeral amongst the olive trees in the little English cemetery. And with many sobs and tears Cecil told her of the sudden illness and the last four days.
"She stayed out too late one evening and caught a chill; but never told me that she felt much pain until the next day, and then her temperature went up suddenly, and she hardly knew me again. The only thing she was anxious about was the book she has been writing. She told me to take it back to England with me. She seemed to know she would not come herself. It seems like a nightmare. How shall I live without her?"
Even in her grief, Cecil thought first of herself; Joan's greatest sympathy was with her father. She went into his study late that evening and found him sitting at his writing-table, his head bowed in his hands. When he looked up at her, his eyes were dim and lifeless.
"Oh, Joan, my dear, we must comfort each other," he said, as she impulsively knelt by his side and put her hand lovingly on his shoulder. "The centre of my being seems to have disappeared. I have been counting the days to having her back again with us. The coming summer has only held her to me. I hoped she would love sitting out in the garden and orchard, and become so fond of it here that she would never want to leave us again. And I feel I have not been half tender and sympathetic enough with her. I have kept her short of money, though God knows I could not help it. It is so strange that she, so beautiful, so strong, and in the prime of her life, should be taken and I left!"
"We could not do without you, Father dear," murmured Joan, tears starting to her eyes in spite of her efforts to keep them back.
"She always was so much more clever than I was," went on Mr. Adair; "but I loved to have her so. And your mother was a good woman, Joan. She never talked much, but she never missed her daily Bible reading, and I have found her Bible marked and worn from constant reading."
"Yes," Joan assented softly.
"So we have the hope of seeing her again," went on Mr. Adair in a more cheerful tone; "but the blank will never be filled in my heart. Pray for me to-morrow, Joan. I must preach, and I feel unfit for it."
"Don't try, Father dear, let Mr. Rushbrooke come over and take the services for you, as he did when you were away."
Mr. Adair shook his head, and as he looked at Joan, there was something in his attitude that made Joan steal away and leave him.
And the message was given with singular power on the following morning.
"'For He maketh sore, and bindeth up; He woundeth, and His hands make whole.'"
The rector touched very little upon his own trouble, except to say: "I have been through deep waters, and I want to pass on to you what has been a comfort and help to myself."
His people listened with softened hearts; and even Banty went home saying to herself, "There must be 'something' in Mr. Adair's religion!"
Cecil would not go to church. She shut herself up in her room and stayed in bed for most of the day.
On Monday, as she did not come down to breakfast, Joan went up to her. She found her very busy ordering herself mourning from a Bond Street dressmaker whom her mother had patronised. Joan's little pupils were waiting for her; so she thought that it was no propitious time for discussion, and she only tried to persuade her to come down to lunch.
Cecil allowed herself to be persuaded, and after it was over wandered into the drawing-room disconsolately. Joan followed her. She felt if she did not speak now, she never should, and wanted to get it over.
"What has possessed you to have those noisy spoilt boys here every morning?" said Cecil crossly. "I hear you teach them in the dining-room, and Sophia calmly told me the drawing-room fire was never lighted till after lunch. You complain that I shut myself up in my bedroom, but where am I supposed to sit?"
"There's always a fire in Father's study, and he is usually out in the morning. I want to talk with you about ways and means, Cecil. I have had to do some teaching. I am most grateful for the money it brings me. You know we are not yet clear of debt. And Father and I do dislike it so. I always think a clergyman ought to be extra careful in money matters. I think I mentioned in my letters that I have been writing a few simple articles for a magazine. I have a little literary experience. I want you to let me see mother's book. Don't you think it would be a good plan for me to look over her notes and see if I could not finish them, and offer it to some publisher? If it sold, it would be a tremendous help to Father Just now."
Cecil did not answer. She seated herself in an easy chair by the fire, and her brows were furrowed with thought.
"I can't conceive why Father is always so behind-hand with his bills. He simply cleared out the small balance we kept in our bank abroad, and brought me home literally without a penny in my pocket!"
"I don't think you realise what his income really is. I want to talk to you about it. You must not order expensive clothes from London, Cecil, you really must not. We cannot afford it. There is a very good little dressmaker in Coppleton who will come out and do anything that you want. Father and I have strained every nerve to pay the many bills for clothes which have come in; but we can't do more, and I'm sure you will help us now by trying to be economical."
"Don't mention the word 'economy' to me," flashed out Cecil passionately. "I hate the sound of it, and so did darling Mother. It has been the curse of our lives, and if you think that now she has gone, you can bully me over clothes you are mistaken. You grudge me my mourning for her Father has stripped me of every penny I possess. You are going to try to make me as great a fright as yourself in your country bumpkin clothes. But you won't do it. I give you fair warning! Mother's money is as much mine as yours. If she had known, she would have made a will and left it to me. She meant to do it—I know she did. And as for taking her book and making money out of it for yourself and Father, you shall not do it. It is in my keeping and belongs to me!"
Joan was absolutely dumbfounded by this outburst. Cecil ended it by a passionate burst of tears. Joan instantly was on her knees beside her, putting her arms tenderly round her.
"Oh, Cecil dearest, what cruel things to say! You are miserable, and so am I. We are both Mother's daughters, we both love her, and are mourning together for her loss. Don't let us hurt each other by unkind words and thoughts!"
"Oh," sobbed Cecil, "you never understood her. You never loved her as I did. I am left alone. Nobody cares for me!"
Joan assured her of her affection; she felt as if she were talking to a passionate, unreasonable child. It was absolutely impossible at present to convince her of the need of carefulness over money. Joan's one desire was to gain her love and keep it, so she gradually soothed her into quietness again, and Cecil went so far as to own that she did not mean all she said.
"I feel beside myself with misery," she confessed. "It is an awful, a terrible thing—death. I can't get over it. Why, only a fortnight ago Mother was talking and laughing with me, now we have buried her under tons of earth—glad to get rid of her!"
She gave a shudder.
"No, no," protested Joan. "Her self, her spirit is not there, only her worn-out body."
"It was not worn-out—that's the—the cruelty of it! Oh, I know that shocks you. But if I do believe in God, I shall never love Him. He does such terribly cruel things or allows them to be done."
"God sees farther than we do, and from the other side," said Joan firmly and gravely. "He sees both sides. We only see one, so how can we judge correctly? I wish you had heard Father's sermon yesterday."
Cecil gave a little snort.
"Father! Well, he is my father, but nobody can say his sermons are anything but the simplest platitudes!"
"Our Lord's words were very simple sometimes," said Joan with flushed cheeks. "It is heartfelt experience that impresses me, more than any amount of head knowledge and clever theories."
Cecil shrugged her shoulders, but relapsed into silence. She had recovered her temper, and peace was restored, but she quietly went on her way, and ordered London clothes at very high prices.
Joan said no more. She felt she could not. She was intensely desirous of winning Cecil's affection, and she had a tremendous pity for her, as she knew the loss of the mother who was always so devoted to her and to her interests would be felt by her very deeply.
She herself could not adjust her life to her fresh circumstances. She foresaw trouble in the future, for Cecil was more than ever determined not to adapt herself to her home environment, and Mr. Adair had said sadly but quite decidedly to Joan the day after he returned:
"We must be very patient with poor Cecil, as she must be content to stay at home now. Her days of going abroad are over. I know our doctor here thought it quite unnecessary."
After a week or two of quiet seclusion, when Cecil tried everyone in the house by her exacting demands and fretful complaints, life slipped back into the usual grooves.
Wilmot Gascoigne had purposely abstained from troubling Joan about their book, but now he appeared again and made great demands, as before, on her time and attention. She could not give them to him in the same way now that Cecil was in the house; and she had been having great heart searchings with herself about the book since her mother's death. Joan was conscious that her work with him was not uplifting. She had often gone to bed in such weariness of body and such mental confusion that her peace of mind had suffered; she had become irritably impatient under the daily difficulties and trials, and she was conscious that her soul was drifting from its sure and certain anchorage. She had tried to break away from her writing, but Wilmot, with his insistent pertinacity, had refused to let her go. And the fascination of creating had taken possession of her. She had been pleased when she had influenced Wilmot to omit questionable passages and insert something that was really good. She had thrown a sop to her conscience by asserting to herself that she was improving the tone of his writing; but all the time she knew too well that if she did raise his standard a tiny bit, she lowered her own a great deal. Her mother's sudden illness and death had brought the unseen world very near to her, and the realities of life and death impressed her deeply.
One afternoon Wilmot left her hastily. She had ventured to disagree with much warmth with him over a vexed question of moral perception, and she refused to give way or allow herself to be outtalked.
He gathered up his papers.
"Very well. I have no time or use for such unprofitable discussion, and must work on by myself till you come to a reasonable mind."
Without another word he marched out of the house. Joan watched him go with hot cheeks and ruffled feelings. Her father was visiting in the village; Cecil was lying on her bed with a novel. The house was quiet. Tea was over, and there was a good hour and a half before dinner. Joan betook herself to the orchard, to a secluded spot under the pink and white apple blossoms, where she could remain unseen.
There was a low bench, on which she seated herself.
"I am caught in a net," she told herself, as, resting her chin in her hands, she determined to wrestle out things with herself. "I am wasting my talents and time on gathering straws on a muck heap! Oh, how angry Mr. Gascoigne would be to hear me say it! If his work is strong and goes down to posterity, will it be for the real welfare of those who read it? What will be my share in it? Am I not denying my faith and creed to please Mr. Gascoigne, and stifling my conscientious scruples? Am I not aiding and abetting him in his absolutely irreligious views of life?"
She covered her face with her hands. A rush of conviction of failure came over her, and tears crept to her eyes. The sweet spring air, the twittering of birds getting ready for their nightly rest, the cooing of wood pigeons in the distance seemed to be purifying and cleansing her befogged brain. Nature always drew her to Nature's God.
She had for a long while denied herself time to think, and her quiet time of thought now showed her where she was wrong. How long she sat there she did not know; she was deep in thought and prayer when a well-known voice made her start and rise to her feet.
"Here's the bad penny again! Good luck to you, Joan, my darlint!"
It was Derrick, standing within a few feet of her, looking very handsome and very mischievous.
He took off his soft felt hat with a flourishing bow.
"I told you I would be down for Easter. I couldn't get an invite out of old Jossy, and I knew—" here his face grew grave—"I knew your trouble, and I have written my sympathy, so I won't repeat it; but I could not quarter myself upon you in your circumstances; and I was determined to come, so I've settled myself at the Colleton Arms, where I arrived last night. Now, then, we're chums, remember; tell me how things are going."
He sat down on the bench by her side. Joan heaved a sigh, half of pleasure and relief at seeing him, half of regret and remorse for her actions in the past.
"Oh, things are going badly," she said with a smile; "but they never do go very well with us, you know, only I am, as a rule, loath to acknowledge it. Don't let us talk of ourselves; tell me of your doings."
"What are you crying about?" Derrick demanded gravely. "I don't think I have ever seen you with tear-stained cheeks before. How you used to rush away, as a small child, and hide yourself till all traces of them were removed."
"You have taken me at a disadvantage," said Joan, trying to speak lightly. "I was really taking myself to task for my own sins and shortcomings. You mustn't pose as my father confessor, Derrick. Hasn't it been a lovely day? Shall we come indoors? Cecil will be so pleased to see you."
"No, we will stay here. Now, then, start away. Tell me your trouble."
Joan at first resented his determined tone, then the longing to get somebody's advice about her literary efforts made her plunge into her difficulties. She told him that she wanted to earn money, that she had been doing so before she began to help Wilmot in his book, that his scheme was taking all her time and strength, and that now she felt it was even taking her religion from her.
"I suppose I am tired, but I look upon it as a huge octopus fastening itself upon me and draining me of all that is best in life. It fascinates me when I am at work, but I want to break away from it, and I can't. I hoped it would not be such a long business, but, of course, a big book can't be written in a couple of months or so, and we have not been at it much longer than that. And I am really longing to put Mother's notes in order and bring out her book. She has done about half of it, and I am persuading Cecil to let me undertake it. I feel I can do it, and I shall love to do it. It is so pure, so—so cultured and interesting."
"And what is Motty going to pay you for helping him?"
Joan coloured.
"Oh, there has never been any question of payment. I suppose when the book is published, he will let me have some share in it."
"If you haven't had an agreement in black and white, Motty won't give you one penny! I know him. And I question whether it will ever get into print. Motty is no good as a novelist. He is too heavy and dogmatical, and hasn't any sense of humour. You have been wasting your goods, my dear Joan. Don't look so downhearted. I'll get you out of his clutches. Fancy stopping off your own compositions when you can get them placed in a good magazine! It's high time I came down here to look after you, but I warned you against that chap, now didn't I?"
Joan tried to laugh.
"You talk like an old grandfather! I can't give you leave to interfere between Mr. Gascoigne and myself. I must get out of my own difficulties, but I am glad of your counsel."
There was a little silence. Derrick was scanning her from head to foot. Joan always felt that he had a possessive way of talking to her, and she did not want to encourage it.
"You are worried and thin, and Motty ought to be horsewhipped. He has taken advantage of your sweet good nature to benefit himself, and he does not intend that you shall have any reward for so doing."
"Don't let us talk any more about it," said Joan, sitting up briskly. "Tell me about your political doings. I love to have a good talk with anyone who is in the know in politics."
Derrick complied with her request. He could be very patient as well as very pertinacious when he liked, and he had registered a vow in his heart that Wilmot should hear his views very soon on the subject of his novel.
He and Joan sat on till dusk enveloped them, and then Joan took him into the house. Cecil came out of the drawing-room to greet them.
"I couldn't think where you had gone," she said to Joan, extending her hand to Derrick.
She looked very fragile and graceful in her long, trailing, thin, black gown.
"It's good to see you, Derrick," she went on; "but I would welcome any village lout, I do believe! I am so sick of my own society."
"Why don't you take brisk constitutionals this fine weather?" demanded Derrick. "Women have no sense. You and Banty go to extremes; she is never indoors, you are never out. One is just as bad as the other."
"Oh, don't preach! Joan is given to that. What are you doing down here?"
Derrick laughed in his open, happy way.
"I've just come down for an Easter rest. Have clapped my papers and pens together, and fastened them down under lock and key, and I'm out for a spree. I'm going to make things hum for you here, and also make it hot—oh, very hot—for a gentleman of my acquaintance. Yes, Miss Joan, I am. Now, sweet Malingerer, you and I must plan out some Easter dissipation. What shall it be?"
He seized hold of Cecil by the arm and marched her back into the drawing-room. Joan smiled as she watched them settle themselves into two very comfortable chairs. She was quite content that Cecil should enjoy his stimulating society for a little time, and she went to tell her father of his arrival, and then out into the kitchen to consult with Sophia about the dinner, for she knew that Derrick would stay for the rest of the evening.
CHAPTER XV
DERRICK TO THE RESCUE
EASTER, on the top of their trouble, was a trying time to the Adairs, but Derrick helped them very much by his sunshiny optimism. Joan's creases smoothed out of her brows; she gave herself up to the enjoyment of his society. Cecil grew more cheerful and less exacting, and though, of course, they were very quiet owing to their deep mourning, he insisted on hiring a motor from the neighbouring town and taking them out for long days in the sweet spring sunshine.
Wilmot went away to friends for Easter. He had been down to the rectory once, but had found everyone out, and Joan felt that he was deeply annoyed by their last interview.
The Gascoignes had a house party, but though Derrick dined with them twice, he was quite content to spend most of his time at the rectory.
"It is home in a double sense to me," he confided to Cecil. "This house was my boyhood's home, and now you are all in it, I feel quite a member of your family."
He chaffed and laughed with her a good deal, but it was to Joan that he showed the tender protectiveness of his nature; and she was so unaccustomed to be shielded and waited upon that she hardly knew how to take it. Her small pupils went away with their mother to the sea for their holidays, so her time was much more her own.
One morning Derrick came in early and asked her to come for a long walk with him.
"Let us take some lunch with us, and then we need not hurry back."
Joan's eyes danced, then she shook her head.
"Don't tempt me. I had determined to mend some of the Sunday school library books this morning, and Sophia is at this moment making some paste for me. What a pity Cecil does not care for walking! You could take her if she did. It would do her such a lot of good."
"I don't want Cecil, I want you; and the school books can wait. Now hurry up! I will give you half an hour to get ready. I shall go and get Dominie to support me if you are still obdurate."
There was no gainsaying him. Cecil was still in her bedroom; she rarely came down before lunch, and always breakfasted in continental fashion by herself. Joan told her that she might be out to luncheon, then she went out to the kitchen, and Sophia and she soon packed a small basket of food. In a very short time she was stepping across the heath with a light heart, and Derrick was well satisfied with the success of his move.
"Motty is back again," he informed her. "I met Banty in the village this morning. She's like a fish out of water when the hunting's over—asked me to come up this evening to dinner, so I'm going. I mean to have it out with Motty."
"Now look here, Derrick, you must promise me not to discuss our book. It is our private business, and nobody else's. We don't want it to be made public property."
"My dear child, everyone at the Hall knows about it. Old Jossy told me Motty was down at the rectory every night of his life, and it seems he taxed him with trying to win your affections. Jossy is never delicate in his speeches. Then Motty told him all about it. Banty considers he is doing you! She and I know him for a fraud! You haven't altered your mind about bringing it to an end, have you?"
"I would prefer to settle it myself with him."
"You're afraid I shall be nasty."
"Perhaps I am," said Joan, laughing. "Mr. Gascoigne has been very kind to me. I think the fact is that two people cannot write a book together unless they are absolutely of the same mind about certain things. At first I was diffident and inexperienced. I wrote as he wished; but now I find my principles are involved, and I will not sacrifice them to the public taste or demands. I do not think I should ever be a successful novelist. I am out of my element In tragedy and sensation."
"You keep to your nature studies," said Derrick; "they are first-rate. Now let us change the subject. Now that the Malingerer has come home—and I hope she has come back to stay—you will be able to leave, will you not? I want you to come up to town. You have met my cousin, Mrs. Denby; she will be delighted to take you about, and I'll get you into the House to hear some of the debates. Can't you manage to come back with me when my holiday is up?"
"Oh, Derrick, you are too absurd!" said Joan, laughing gaily. "I shall never be able to leave home. And as to a visit to town, I shall be as likely to go up there as to Timbuctoo! No; my place is here, and here I shall stay. It's waste of words to suggest anything else."
Derrick was silent for a short time; he put back what he was longing to say, for he did not want to spoil their day out. They tramped over the dead heather and bracken, and his natural good spirits asserted themselves. He and Joan were like a boy and girl together, and when they sat down on the top of a heather-covered hill and looked over a vast extent of fresh green country with purple distances, Joan exclaimed:
"I haven't a care in the world at this moment! Isn't it funny how one's senses minister to one's soul? My mouth and eyes and nose are enjoying this to distraction, so my soul follows suit. Did you ever smell such fragrant, delicious air? I want to inhale it as much as I can. I want to bottle it up and take it back with me. And isn't that stretch of country in front of us a sight for sore eyes? Did you ever see such pure, deep blue hills?"
"Don't you understand the tramps' and the gipsies' hatred of towns? I say, Joan, when the summer comes shall we do a tramp together? We might go down to Hampshire and start on the edge of the New Forest."
"There is a Mrs. Grundy still," said Joan.
"I thought she was dead long ago. There's safety in numbers. I could get another fellow to join us, and Banty might come. You could chaperon her, or she could chaperon you. She's improving. This time I've quite liked her, and she worships you. I'm all for getting you out of your rut now that the Malingerer is at home."
"It's no good planning such things," said Joan with a laughing shake of her head. "They make my mouth water, but you and I know they are impossible. I am not to be moved out of my rut. I am going to settle into it very snugly; I shall end by liking ruts. Now shall we attack our lunch? I am voraciously hungry!"
It was when their walk was nearly over that Derrick spoke his mind:
"Joan, do you realise that I'm still waiting for you?"
Joan looked at him reproachfully.
"Oh, Derrick, I hoped you were growing wiser."
"Don't talk like a grandmother. There's only one woman filling my heart. I've been waiting all my life for you, and you know it. I want to settle down like other men. This is my side of it. But I also want to have a right to take care of you, to give you pleasure, to put you in a better atmosphere than you have at present. You would do us a lot of good if you came to town. We get so cynical and worldly, and grub so for money and position and power that you'd act as a splendid check, and also as an exhilarating tonic."
Then, seeing Joan's eyes twinkle, he added hastily: "I only say this because you're so strong on influence and that sort of thing. And you're wasted here. But, of course, the real truth is I want you. I'm your devoted slave now as I always have been; but I'm getting tired of waiting. Oh, Joan, do listen! Give yourself right away to me now and for ever. Let us walk the world together, oblivious of anyone else. Won't you take me on trial?"
"How? One can't marry on trial, and, Derrick, dear, I hate to say it, but I couldn't risk it. You're a faithful chum and a staunch comrade—I'm always happy with you—but—and I think this is a test of love—I would not be as happy if we were in closer relationship. I never want to get nearer to you. Do you understand? Our present friendship satisfies me completely. I do see this is selfishness on my part. You deserve to receive more, and this is the reason I did not want you to come down this Easter. I want you to forget me, and learn to care for some nice girl who will be as much in love with you as you are with her. I believe real love is the only foundation for a happy married life. And you are too good to waste your best on one who never can return it. You think I do not know my own mind, but I do; and I wish you would let this talk between us be the final one on this subject. I shall never alter. I always have looked upon you as a brother, and I always shall."
The earnestness and force with which she spoke crushed Derrick's budding hopes. He was absolutely silent, fighting down his deep disappointment, and Joan felt almost as miserable as he did. She hated to have hurt him, and yet she felt it was necessary. He walked up to the rectory gate with her, then held out his hand.
"I'll try to get over it," he said huskily. "I'm at last convinced that it's no good to hope any longer."
Joan looked rather wistfully at him.
"Do you want my friendship still," she asked him, "or do you feel it must be all or nothing?"
"I don't know what I feel at present. A crushed, battered piece of pulp, I think. I suppose I had better get back to town to-morrow. I did promise Dominie to drive him into Coppleton, but I'll send him a line."
Joan said nothing. She gripped his hand and smiled at him, but her eyes were misty, and she fled into the house. It was a comfort to her to get inside her bedroom and relieve her feelings by a flood of tears.
"I shall lose the only friend I have," she thought, "and I have brought wretchedness instead of happiness into his life."
She had not been in her bedroom for half an hour before Cecil came to the door asking for admission. After a little hesitation, Joan let her in, and Cecil was too absorbed in her own thoughts to notice anything the matter with her sister.
She seated herself in Joan's low chair by the window.
"Wilmot Gascoigne has been here most of the afternoon," she announced. "He said he could not stay to tea. I don't think there is much love lost between him and Derrick. Why hasn't Derrick come in? I thought he would be sure to have tea with us."