The Wellfields: A novel. Vol. 2 of 3

CHAPTER VIII.

THE FIRST OF BRENTWOOD.

The following day was Sunday, and on the arrival of the letters, Jerome found two for himself, one bearing the Elberthal post-mark, the sight of which made his heart beat. The other was directed in a hand he did not know, but turning it over, he saw printed on the flap of the envelope ‘Brentwood.’

‘It must be from Somerville, of course,’ he thought, opening it quickly, and his conjecture was right.

This invitation gave him a sense of relief, inexplicable, but strong. With Father Somerville he felt entirely at his ease; felt that he was understood, was not taken to be a hero, or anything else that he really was not. Here, at the Abbey, he had the very opposite sensation. He knew that he was looked upon in the light of an unusual and remarkable phenomenon. He knew, for he had a keen, sympathetic intuition in such matters, that Mr. Bolton treated him with a respect he was not wont to show to strangers—especially penniless ones—that even Miss Shuttleworth’s pointed and elaborate incivility arose chiefly from a feeling she had that he was dangerous. John Leyburn alone appeared to preserve his natural, deliberate, unembarrassed manner.

Nita—Jerome felt very uncomfortable when he thought of Nita—very uncomfortable as his eyes wandered from Sara Ford’s handwriting to Anita Bolton’s face, which face he saw was pale, and the reason of which pallor he knew as well as if some one had arisen and proclaimed it aloud to him. They were all, without exception, under a false impression in regard to him. How easy, exclaims a devoted adherent of right-doing, to remove that false impression! How very easy casually to let them all know that he was promised and vowed to another woman! Was not the excuse there in the shape of Sara’s letter? Why not mention that it was from the girl he was engaged to? What easier? Ah! what to some natures? And to others what more difficult? Unfortunately it was difficult to Jerome. He did resolve, as he looked at Nita that morning, and saw the difficulty she had in meeting his eyes, that he would not make love to her any more; that he would be cold to her even. Such natures as his are given to making such resolutions in momentary silence and reflectiveness; and when the moment comes for not making love, for displaying coldness, they never recognise it; it is always ‘not now, another time!’ And this, not for fear of hurting a woman’s feelings, though they would say so, even to themselves, but because the flattery of a woman’s love is too sweet a dram to be forborne. It was easy for Jerome Wellfield as he sat exchanging commonplaces at the breakfast-table with Nita—and Nita’s father—to swear to himself that such commonplaces alone should be the yea, yea, and the nay, nay, of his entire conversation with her. When the moment came, in which he found himself alone with her, or apart with her, the old trick of the eyes, the old smoothness of the tongue slips back again, as if by some fatality. So long as she believes him he will make love to her; so long as she will worship him, he will accept the worship, and will delight in it—and could not refuse it when it was offered, were the alternative a plunge into the nethermost abyss of remorse—into the scorching flames of discovery. Therefore, it may be predicted with mathematical certainty that he will read that letter that lies before him; that it will both charm and distress him—the first by its worship of himself; the next by making him see that the writer believes him as single-hearted as she is herself. After reading it, he will vow to himself, much and more, ‘I must tell her—I will tell her.’ And he will go to her, and will tell her—how precious her sympathy is to him, and how perfect is her nature, and he will look love, if he does not speak it.

While he was longing to open Sara’s letter, and vowing great vows to undeceive Nita as early as might be, she said:

‘We are going to church this morning, Mr. Wellfield. Will you come too, or would you prefer to stay at home?’

‘I will go with pleasure,’ he answered. Be it observed that in Wellfield’s nature there was not, and never had been, one grain of scepticism in matters religious. It is true he was utterly indifferent so far as practice was concerned, and that, according to the company he happened to be in, he would, for weeks or months at a time, either go diligently to some place of worship once, or even twice each Sunday, or never enter one at all, or even think of the matter. Where he went was also almost entirely a matter of indifference, except that he never frequented conventicles, not at all because he disapproved of the tenets held by their supporters, of which he knew nothing, or less than nothing, but because the services held in them were so bald and tame, so ugly and ascetic; they appealed in no way to his æsthetic sense, but rather repelled it. Anywhere where he could have a fine service, hear fine voices read or intoned, and where there was good music in which he could join, was acceptable to him, and all his life he had wandered indifferently whither friends or fancy led him, to services and churches of all kinds, but perhaps more to Roman Catholic ones than to any others. As a small child he had always attended mass with his mother, had learnt to say his Ave Maria and his Pater Noster; and these remembrances remained with him; part of the influences of Italy. He remembered them as he remembered his mother’s dark eyes, and gem-like brilliance of beauty—like a delicious dream of another world.

All this, however, did not prevent his putting on his hat and walking with Nita and her father down the river walk, across the field to the church. They sat in the stalls, one row of which ‘went’ with the Abbey property. How well he remembered it all. If the service were not of the most elaborate or beautiful, there were other objects in Wellfield Church which made up for a somewhat bald ritual. There was for instance, much charm for an æsthetic soul in the magnificent carved work of the splendid old black-oak stalls in which they sat, and in the many other odd old pews and strange devices dotted up and down. The singing was of a nature to make the blood freeze in the veins of him who had any pretence to being a musician. The choir consisted of a number of young men and women accommodated with seats in the west gallery, a conspicuous position, close to the organ; and to do justice to their exalted places, no doubt, they were in the habit of attiring themselves in the very height of the Wellfield fashion, which fashion, for brilliance of hue and boldness of contrast, would have put to shame Solomon in all his glory. Jerome found himself seated next to Miss Margaret Shuttleworth, who looked uncompromising. In the dim distance he saw John Leyburn, alone in a great square carved oak pew, the pew that belonged to his house, Abbot’s Knoll, for free and open benches were as yet unheard of in Wellfield.

The service over, they nearly all met at the door, as is the fashion with country congregations. Jerome, having ascertained that the family dinner did not come off for the space of an hour and a half, or more, said he was going for a walk, and wandered off in the direction of the wooded hill, the Nab, there to read his letter, and make good resolutions with regard to Nita, with an undercurrent of wonder, all the time, as to what Father Somerville would tell him he ought to do, if he knew all the circumstances of the case.

Nita and John Leyburn, not noticing where Jerome went, presently strolled off in the same direction. Mr. Bolton remained with his cousin, Miss Shuttleworth, patiently waiting till she had finished her discourse with an odd-looking character, no less a personage than the sexton of Wellfield church.

‘I’m sorry to hear, Robert, that you got too much on Monday.’

‘I fear I did, Miss Shuttleworth,’ he said, looking rather sheepish.

‘It is deplorable,’ said Miss Margaret, shaking her head. ‘How was it? for your wife could give me no proper account of it, and unless you can clearly prove that you were led away, I shall be obliged to show my displeasure this time. I shall have to withdraw my allowance to Mary.’

Mary was his sick daughter.

‘It were aw along o’ th’ brass band contest, Miss Margit; ’twere, for sure.’

‘The brass band contest, Robert? I don’t see how the brass band contest could make you get tipsy and tumble into the grave you were digging, as I heard you did. Is it true?’

‘Ay, every word on ’t’s true, Miss Margit—more’s th’ pity.’

‘Shame on you! But how did it happen?’

He twirled his hat round by the brim, and a lurking smile and twinkle of the eye betrayed his inner consciousness that the affair had a ludicrous as well as a ‘deplorable’ side.

‘Well, Miss Margit, I’d getten th’ grave above half-finished, when I yeard th’ brass bands comin’ along to th’ Plough Inn, and it were th’ middle o’ th’ arternoon, and I were summan (some and) dry, and I were vary anxious for to hear who’d won, yo’ know, so I flings down my spade, and I went off to th’ Plough, and theer I found ’em all—every man on ’em. And we geet to talkin’, and first one offert me a drop, and then another, till I geet to’ much—I’m free to confess it. I remembered o’ of a suddent as th’ grave were to be ready again th’ mornin’, and I jumped up, and ran to th’ churchyard, and set to work to dig wi’ a will. And whether it was th’ heat—it were gradely hot—or whether I were fuddled, I know nowt about it, but I turned dizzy all of a moment, and I tummled down, and fell fast asleep. Th’ graves were o’er yonder, at th’ fur end o’ th’ yard, and mappen that were why no one seed me, and wakkened me oop, but when I did awake, it were well-nigh dark, and I couldna tell for t’ life of me, where I were. So I sets oop and looks around, and there in the far distance I yeard th’ sound of a trumpet. My heart louped to my mouth, and I thowt, “Robert Stott, it’s last trump; up wi’ thee!” and I ups and clambers out, and stands still. Ne’er a soul could I see, and aw’ were as still as death. Findin’ mysel’ alone, I took courage, for I knew as the more part should be o’ th’ wrong side i’ th’ day o’ judgment—our parson’s olez said so, and I’ve a feelin’ as he’s reet. Then again I yeard th’ trumpet-blast, and I looked around again. “What, no more righteous?” I said to mysel’. “Eh, but it’s a poor show for Wellfield.”’

‘Robert!’ was all that Miss Shuttleworth could ejaculate, horror-struck.

‘Yes, Miss Margit?’

‘What you say proves you to be in a very unsatisfactory frame of mind as regards religion.’

‘Well, ma’am, I’ve olez agreed gradely well with th’ owd vicar. It’s a grand thing to be reet, Miss Margit—a grand thing it is—and we’re reet. I see my son-in-law a-calling to me, so I’ll say good-mornin’.’

With which, before she could stop him, Robert Stott had made good his escape.

‘Now, perhaps you’ll allow us to go to the Abbey, cousin,’ observed Mr. Bolton, shaking in a volley of silent chuckles.

‘I am astonished at you, cousin,’ was all the answer he received, as Miss Margaret, with her head in the air, floated towards the wicket leading to the Abbey.

But her head suddenly went down again as she recalled her niece’s words yesterday, ‘Don’t you see when you are being laughed at, aunt?’

‘Is it possible that Stott was laughing at me? Surely he would not have such insolence!’

Pondering upon this tremendous topic, she had eyes and ears for nothing else until Mr. Bolton observed:

‘You’ll walk into the river, cousin, directly. Would you like to go in, or shall we walk about till the young ones come back?’

‘Oh, they are all off, are they?’ she said, raising her head, and collecting her faculties again. ‘That gives me just the opportunity I wish for. Do you know what you are doing, Stephen?’

‘Doing? As how?’

‘In harbouring that young Wellfield in your house?’

‘I invited him to stay a few days, if that’s what you call “harbouring,” cousin.’

‘Pooh! You know what I mean. Had you no thought for the probable consequences when you committed that rash act?’

‘What do you mean by the probable consequences? At present they seem to me to consist in my having become better acquainted with Mr. Wellfield, and feeling considerable respect for him.’

‘Respect! respect for a Wellfield! I am astonished at you. You have become better acquainted with him; but not so well acquainted with him as your daughter.’

‘My daughter—you mean that Nita admires him—or that he is likely to fall in love with her?’

A fine sneer played about Miss Shuttleworth’s lips.

‘He is very likely to fall in love with Nita’s money. As for herself, no Wellfield ever cared for any person but his own.’

‘You are prejudiced, cousin, as we all know.’

‘Will you deny that when two people are thrown together as Nita and that young man are likely to be, it is probable that nothing will come of it on either side?’

‘It is not probable,’ he returned, quietly.

‘Do you mean to say that you will allow Nita to fall in love with him, and do nothing to prevent it?’

‘It is a matter I do not choose to discuss. There are other probabilities on the cards besides the probability of Nita’s falling in love with him.’

‘If that’s your way of looking at it, I’ve done,’ replied Miss Margaret, mightily offended, and prancing onwards with her head higher than ever. ‘Indeed, I think I will go into the house.’

‘As you please,’ he returned. ‘I am going to stroll about here for a short time.’

Miss Shuttleworth stalked onwards in dudgeon. Mr. Bolton was left pacing by the river walk.

‘It is an odd complication,’ he was reflecting, ‘and it would be an odd result if I should have toiled all these years to place my child and this place into the hands of one of the old stock once more. But it must be as will make the child most happy. As for him, he may make an admirable gentleman of property and an excellent husband, but he will never make money. He may learn sufficient of business habits to be able to keep it together when it is there, but the business he conducted would soon stand still. Still, if he is honest, and honourable, and a gentleman in thought and feeling, as he appears to be, and the man who will make my little girl happy—which I begin to think is the case—there seems a sort of appropriateness in his being a Wellfield. It was through no sin of his that he lost the place, and from all I can hear he has been perfectly well-conducted. At least, I can see no reason for forcibly separating them, and why should not my daughter marry a high-born gentleman? She is worthy the best in the land.’

More meditations, all tending in the same direction—more pacing to and fro, until, raising his eyes, he saw his daughter approaching, accompanied by Jerome Wellfield. Nita’s eyes were bright, and there was a soft flush upon her cheeks. She looked undeniably pretty. Wellfield looked as he always did—handsome with a beauty which is given to few men to wear, stately and high-bred more than most men.

‘They make a goodly couple,’ thought the fond father. ‘She is a winsome lass, and he—yes, by gad, there is something in birth and breeding. He looks the right master for a place like this.’

With which jumble of fatherly pride, commercial astuteness, and prudent calculation, he advanced to meet them.

‘John has gone home to dinner,’ said Nita; ‘he’s coming down in the evening.’

Wellfield’s reflections, as he walked towards Brentwood, were far from being agreeable. He had Sara’s letter, with its calm acceptance of the fact that he loved her as she loved him—she spoke of it as if it had been one of the ordinances of nature—unalterable as the laws of the Medes and Persians. She showed him at the same time how very much she loved him, and that stroked his self-complacency the right way; but the other feeling chafed him. Inevitably, from his character, from the inborn, inherited tendencies of his nature, he asked himself, ‘What right had she to accept so unquestioningly his love—to assume that nothing could change it—nothing shake it?’ She little knew the temptations that were cast in his way—temptations from which she was free. He forgot how persistently he had pressed the point upon her. What would she do in case some other man were to fall in love with her, as he was almost sure to do? Yet, as he remembered her few strong simple expressions of devotion to himself, the whole extent of his love for her rushed over him; he seemed to be once more under the potent spell of her individuality—of her noble, upright, simple nature; to feel once more the magic of her beauty, which answered so harmoniously to her nature, as some Beethoven symphony answers in the grand and original carving of its outward form to the grand and original fire of the thoughts which gave it birth—as the greatest poems take the most perfect shape, and are written in the most melodiously arranged words. Yes, he knew he loved her—he knew that all the higher part of his nature loved and worshipped her; but he knew that she had clear eyes, and that oppressed him; and he knew that had those eyes beheld him, as he sat alone with Nita Bolton by the river that afternoon, they would have scorched him; had they seen Nita’s downcast face, and watched her embarrassed replies to some of his questions, or beheld the still more embarrassed silence which had been to him so eloquent, they would—how would they have looked? Never at him again with the light of love in them. He no longer said to himself that he would tell Nita to-morrow: he had gone too far for that. All he could do now was to drift.

In this uncomfortable frame of mind he ascended the slope which led to the gates of the drive through the park at Brentwood. Right before him stretched a perfectly straight road, some quarter of a mile in length, between two green meadows, each of which meadows was bordered by a belt of dark firs. Many persons were, like himself, wending towards the mass of grey buildings, and the great stone gate-posts, and the two huge square fish-ponds, which lay at the end of this long road. A bell, too, was tolling somewhere amongst the mass of buildings—some old, some new, some not yet finished, which form the outward portion of the great Jesuit College of Brentwood. Arrived at the entrance, between the two fish-ponds, he inquired his way to the church, and was directed where to go. Entering by a side-door, by some mistake, he found himself in that portion of the church reserved for the students of the college. Pausing, and looking round, he was accosted by a tall, grave-looking ‘philosopher’—a Spaniard, evidently—and, to judge from outward appearances, no small personage by birth and breeding. Accepting his offer of a place, Jerome found himself between the Spanish youth and another foreigner in one of the front benches facing the high altar. There was a dreamy calm over everything until the service began. The congregation came slowly dropping in, chiefly rustics, countrymen, women, and children, and here and there some group or isolated figure of unquestionably higher rank and station.

With the different stages of the service Wellfield forgot his troubles. It brought back associations of youth and pleasure, of music and student-days—associations in nowise connected with Wellfield, with his present life and surroundings—rather it led him to forget them, which he was only too willing to do. The ritual was gorgeous, the music magnificent, the choir and the organist first-rate. It soothed him, calmed him, eased him, as all such observances must soothe and ease those who can accept the principles which give rise to them. On their knees they knelt, and again and again sounded, in strains of exquisite supplication, the great cry, common to all humanity— Dona nobis pacem! Ay! give us peace; though every moment we are off our knees we may be doing, thinking, planning, hoping that which will destroy peace, yet, Power that we invoke, heed not that, but, since we fall on our knees, and set it to music, and are for the moment in earnest—‘Give us peace!’ It is a cry common to all; and those who pin their faith on creeds imagine that it will be answered. Perhaps the conviction saves some from madness, and others from blank despair—lulls some consciences, shoots a ray of hope into some hearts—makes their lives bearable to those who believe that peace comes from a source outside themselves—but remains a delusion all the same. To-night, it had the effect of a drug upon Jerome Wellfield’s conscience. Dona nobis pacem! Surely there would be some way ‘shown’ to him out of it all. Dona nobis pacem! This strife could not be meant to go on for ever. For once in his life, he prayed—prayed from his very heart—‘Give us peace!’

Somerville, who took no part in the service, watched him curiously from his place, in a somewhat retired corner. The keen-eyed, quick-witted priest rapidly noted the points of resemblance between Jerome Wellfield and his two companions. Both the latter belonged to old Roman Catholic families, and bore names of world-wide celebrity; both were amongst the eldest and most advanced of the students, and already showing signs of manhood, in deep voices and a dark line on the upper lip; they might, therefore, justly be compared with Wellfield. All three had the same high-bred pride of bearing, the pale, rather disdainful, features; the same distinctly haughty carriage of head and shoulders—to each and all was common a certain dreamy schwärmerisch expression, indefinable, but palpable—an expression which any acute observer must have noted.

‘Anyone coming in, and not knowing the circumstances,’ thought Somerville; ‘knowing only that this is a Jesuit seminary, and that over there the students sit, would inevitably say, “What a thoroughly Roman Catholic-looking trio—especially that eldest one in the middle!”’ He watched with more intentness still. Father Somerville was zealous for his faith—he was ambitious too; he knew that in his Church services of a tangible kind met with tangible rewards. To say that he then and there formed a scheme, which he decided at all hazards to carry out, would be to do a clever man egregious injustice. Simply, he had a subtle brain and a natural turn for intrigue, which of course his education and career had fostered. He saw possibilities—possibilities which excited his active brain, and kindled his ambition and imagination.

‘They were Catholics before—till not more than a hundred years ago,’ he thought. ‘His mother was Catholic of the Catholic. Why not Catholics again, if anything? Who knows? Time will show.’

The service over, there was a sermon, and presently the congregation broke up, and streamed out into the open air. The students marched off in procession, and departed by a side-door. Somerville just paused as he passed, to whisper to Jerome:

‘If you will wait in the garden or on the playground, I will join you in a few moments.’

And following this direction, Wellfield went out by the west-door, and took his way to the broad space on the brow of the hill, which seemed to form quite a little tableland in itself, and which was the playground of Brentwood College. He paced about there, and watched the crimson and purple pomp of the August sunset. It was a scene such as one rarely beholds, rendered remarkable, too, by ancient historical associations, and by the present fact, that, though within twenty or thirty miles of all the great manufacturing towns and most powerful radical centres of Lancashire, it was a Roman Catholic strong-hold; in matters of religion a conservative nook, where change crept on leaden foot. From this elevated vantage-ground Wellfield saw many things associated with his own family and its history. There was the ancient grey manor-house and church of Millholm; in which church was a ‘Wellfield chapel,’ where ancestors of his had their marble tombs, including that of the boy, the last direct heir male to Brentwood, who had come to his death by eating poisonous berries in a wood. It was after his death that Brentwood had passed into the hands of the Jesuits. From his present standpoint he could see the three rivers, each more beautiful than the other, which came very near to meeting, and which had given rise to the old rhyme which Nita had repeated to him yesterday:

To his right, eastwards, the immense bulk of Penhull closed up all prospect beyond. Northwards were bleak Yorkshire moors. At the foot of Penhull was the little conical mound on which stood all that was left of old Clyderhow Castle. Southwards, the smoke-bedimmed moors round Burnham, and Black Hambledon, showing out grimly against a background of sky that mingled hues of copper and flame and smoke. And by scanning intently the ground just below Wellfield Nab, and the course of its river, he could discern where the village and Monk’s Gate stood. A fair heritage, and it might have been his again, but for——

‘I am very sorry to have kept you waiting, Mr. Wellfield,’ said Somerville’s voice at his elbow. ‘Will you not come into the house?’

‘Thank you. What a prospect this is!’ said Jerome, pausing, ‘and what a phenomenon this place of yours, too; in this district of all others.’

‘Within call, you are thinking, of those centres of civilisation and cultivation, Blackburn, Burnley, “proud Preston,” and even the monarch of them all, Manchester,’ chimed in Somerville, a tinge of sarcasm in his tones. ‘Yes, it is a phenomenon, I admit. I hope it did not bore you to come to our service.’

‘Bore me? On the contrary, I have enjoyed it exceedingly.’

‘Won’t you come into the house? I want to present you to the Superior, and you will remain to supper with us. Come and look at our libraries; it will pass away an hour until we can see the Superior.’

Jerome followed him, and the hour that Somerville had spoken of was passed agreeably enough, in wandering through all the wonderful rooms full of wonderful things which the priest showed him. There was a quiet stillness over everything—a Sabbath calm. The rays of the setting sun made beautiful the great banqueting-hall of the old mansion, which was now the principal refectory for a hundred and sixty students and their accompanying tutors, priests, and professors. They wandered through the libraries, whose cedar-wood bookcases filled the air with a pleasant aromatic smell; and where one saw here and there a figure in a square cap and a long cassock standing silent amongst the wilderness of theology and black-letter in the one room—of patristic lore in the second—of miscellaneous modern thought in the third. But to those who know Brentwood, the repetition of its wonders waxes tedious—to those who know it not, it must be tedious also. Wellfield did not know it, and the charm which, when it was shown to him by so skilful an exponent as Father Somerville, it was sure to cast over him, was a strong one.

Indeed, it is a place which cannot fail to impress all who see it with a sense of wonder and admiration—it is a little town in itself—a centre of learned leisure, of Jesuit subtilty, of refined cultivation, of courtly hospitality towards those admitted within its precincts, and all this planted upon the slope of a bleak Lancashire ridge of hill, facing another bare hill which divides it from one of the most radical of radical boroughs. It was, as Wellfield had said, a remarkable phenomenon.

He was presented to the Very Reverend Father Superior. He was courteously and graciously entertained at the simple but abundant Sunday evening supper, and he heard and shared in conversation in which he felt thoroughly at home—conversation adapted with skill and tact to his own tastes and habits. He forgot his dilemma, until, when it was almost ten o’clock, he rose to take his departure.

‘I will accompany you for a part of the way,’ said Somerville, and after wishing his hosts good-night, Jerome set out with the companion whose influence he felt already to be strong, but which was in fact far stronger than he knew, or would have liked to know—strong because it was the influence of a calm, concentrated, yet flexible nature upon one which, though variable was not flexible; though passionate, was not strong.

Still broad moonlight, they had no difficulty in making their way through the scented lanes and between the tangled hedgerows. They walked onwards, discoursing of different things, until they had left Brentwood more than a mile behind, and found themselves at the top of a hill, from which, looking down, they could see all the village of Wellfield; its old church; the winding river, and the Abbey walls and gates slumbering in the moonlight. They paused, and looked down upon it.

‘It is very beautiful,’ observed the priest at last.

‘God knows it is,’ responded Wellfield.

Another pause, when Somerville laid his hand upon the other’s shoulder, and said, in a slow, reflective, earnest voice:

‘I wish to heaven that you were master there!’

Wellfield laughed a short, mirthless laugh. He knew what was meant, and the impulse to speak freely was strong—so strong that he followed it.

‘That will never be. You have some power of divination, I am certain. Since your conversation with me yesterday morning, I have been convinced that what you said is true. I might be master there if I—chose.’

‘Then why not?’

‘Because to do it, I must sell myself body and soul. It would be hell upon earth for her—and for me too.’

‘But she is not a woman with whom it would be hell-upon-earth to live,’ began Somerville, as if surprised.

‘Heavens! no. She is all that a girl ought to be, I think, and good as only such girls can be. It is not that.’

‘Surely you don’t stick at the fact that you are not desperately in love with her? In your position that would be a folly of which I cannot believe you capable.’

‘No; such an idea never entered my mind.’

‘Then, since we are speaking upon the matter—since you broached it yourself, let me tell you seriously, that, if there is not any real tangible impediment in the way, I think you do wrong in every way not to take the goods the gods offer you.’

Wellfield was silent for a prolonged space, till at last he said, slowly, reluctantly, as if the words were wrung from him:

‘Honour binds me elsewhere.’

‘So! Another lady in the case!’ was the reply, given with a lightness of tone, an absolute approach to a laugh, which surprised Wellfield, and almost gave him a shock. He had expected his words to reduce Somerville to silence to produce an apology for indiscretion. The fact that nothing of the kind happened, had a subtle effect upon his own mental attitude. Somerville went on, with a tact and an audacity combined which were certainly remarkable:

‘Pardon me, I ask no names—indeed, I would rather you mentioned none; but tell me, if you do not very much mind, this lady to whom honour binds you—is she rich?’

‘No.’

‘Is she likely to be?’

‘Not unless she becomes so by her own exertions.’

‘And there is no definite prospect of marriage for you?’

‘As you may suppose, none—not even an indefinite one.’

‘I could suppose so. Well ... remember I speak quite without knowledge of the circumstances, but knowing exactly what I do—no more and no less, I should say, I hope that lady is aware of what is being sacrificed for her sake.’

Jerome was perfectly silent. Perhaps he was not conscious of acting like a cowardly hound. He did not realise, for Father Somerville was too clever to allow him to do so—he did not then realise that the woman who was his promised wife had been lightly spoken of—to him—and he had lifted neither hand nor voice in protest.

‘That is my feeling,’ repeated Somerville; ‘but after this, I have no right to urge you. But I repeat my words—I would to heaven that you, Jerome Wellfield, were master here! Good-night!’

Wellfield wrung his hand, and took his homeward way. Somerville passed slowly back towards the Brentwood Park, his hands clasped behind his back, pondering, lost in thought, till at last he gave a sudden start and stop.

‘Fool that I am!’ he murmured. ‘Instead of giving up the marriage, I should do all in my power to urge it on. This woman in the background is——I wish she were out of the way. And yet, if I could marry them in spite of her.... A man and wife who live together in a hell-upon-earth must have resort to a third person for help, and it should go hard if I were not that third person. Upon my soul, I like the scheme. If Wellfield Abbey and the money of that insolent heretic who lives there now were once more under the control of the Church—it would be a meritorious act in whoever had brought it about—another jewel in Our Lady’s shrine, and,’ with a faint, sarcastic smile, ‘a step upwards for Pablo Somerville. The young man himself is a Wellfield. If I can make him act for our advantage, by playing upon that self of his, it is easy to bring out the whip afterwards, when he has gone too far to retreat.’