“If he cared a little less for the Pharaohs and a little more for Alex—” suggested Miss Craven, blowing smoke rings thoughtfully. Peters shook his head.
“He did care—that’s the pity of it,” he said slowly, “but what can you expect?—you know how it was. Alex was a child married when she should have been in the schoolroom, without a voice in the matter. Horringford was nearly twenty years her senior, always reserved and absorbed in his Egyptian researches. Alex hadn’t an idea in the world outside the stables. Horringford bored her infinitely, and with Alex-like honesty she did not hesitate to tell him so. They hadn’t a thought in common. She couldn’t see the sterling worth of the man, so they drifted apart and Horringford retired more than ever into his shell.”
“And what do you propose to do, Peter?” Craven’s sudden question was startling, for he had not appeared to be listening to the conversation.
Peters lit a cigarette and smoked for a few moments before answering. “I shall listen to all Alex has to say,” he said at last, “then I shall tell her a few things I think she ought to know, and I shall persuade her to ask Horringford to take her with him to Egypt next winter.”
“Why?”
“Because Horringford in Egypt and Horringford in England are two very different people. I know—because I have seen. It’s an idea, it may work. Anyhow it’s worth trying.”
“But suppose her ladyship does not succumb to your persuasive tongue?”
“She will—before I’ve done with her,” replied Peters grimly, and then he laughed. “I guessed from what she said this morning that she was a little frightened at the hornet’s nest she had raised. I imagine she won’t be sorry to run away for a while and let things settle down. She can ease off gently in the meantime and give Egypt as an excuse for finally withdrawing.”
“You think Alex is more to blame than Horringford?” said Miss Craven, with a note of challenge in her voice.
Peters shrugged. “I blame them both. But above all I blame the system that has been responsible for the trouble.”
“You mean that Alex should have been allowed to choose her own husband? She was such a child—”
“And Horringford was such a devil of a good match,” interposed Craven cynically, moving from his chair to the padded fireguard. Gillian was sitting on the arm of Miss Craven’s chair, sorting the patience cards into a leather case. She looked up quickly. “I thought that in England all girls choose their own husbands, that they marry to please themselves, I mean,” she said in a puzzled voice.
“Theoretically they do, my dear,” replied Miss Craven, “in practice numbers do not. The generality of girls settle their own futures and choose their own husbands. But there are still many old-fashioned people who arrogate to themselves the right of settling their daughters’ lives, who have so trained them that resistance to family wishes becomes almost an impossibility. A good suitor presents himself, parental pressure is brought to bear—and the deed is done. Witness the case of Alex. In a few years she probably would have chosen for herself, wisely. As it was, marriage had never entered her head.”
“She couldn’t have chosen a better man,” said Peters warmly, “if he had only been content to wait a year or two—”
“Alex would probably have eloped with a groom or a circus rider before she reached years of discretion!” laughed Miss Craven. “But it’s a difficult question, the problem of husband choosing,” she went on thoughtfully. “Being a bachelor I can discuss it with perfect equanimity. But if in a moment of madness I had married and acquired a houseful of daughters, I should have nervous prostration every time a strange man showed his nose inside the door.”
“You don’t set us on a very high plane, dear lady,” said Peters reproachfully.
“My good soul, I set you on no plane at all—know too much about you!” she smiled. Peters laughed. “What’s your opinion, Barry?”
Since his one interruption Craven had been silent, as if the discussion had ceased to interest him. He did not answer Peters’ question for some time and when at last he spoke his voice was curiously strained. “I don’t think my opinion counts for very much, but it seems to me that the woman takes a big risk either way. A man never knows what kind of a blackguard he may prove in circumstances that may arise.”
An awkward pause followed. Miss Craven kept her eyes fixed on the card table with a feeling of nervous apprehension that was new to her. Her nephew’s words and the bitterness of his tone seemed fraught with hidden meaning, and she racked her brains to find a topic that would lessen the tension that seemed to have fallen on the room. But Peters broke the silence before it became noticeable. “The one person present whom it most nearly concerns has not given us her view. What do you say, Miss Locke?”
Gillian flushed faintly. It was still difficult to join in a general conversation, to remember that she might at any moment be called upon to put forward ideas of her own.
“I am afraid I am prejudiced. I was brought up in a convent—in France,” she said hesitatingly. “Then you hold with the French custom of arranged marriages?” suggested Peters. Her dark eyes looked seriously into his. “I think it is—safer,” she said slowly.
“And consequently, happier?” The colour deepened in her face. “Oh, I don’t know. I do not understand English ways. I can speak only of France. We talked of it in the convent—naturally, since it was forbidden, que voulez vous?” she smiled. “Some of my friends were married. Their parents arranged the marriages. It seems that—” she stammered and went on hurriedly—“that there is much to be considered in choosing a husband, much that—girls do not understand, that only older people know. So it is perhaps better that they should arrange a matter which is so serious and so—so lasting. They must know more than we do,” she added quietly.
“And are your friends happy?” asked Miss Craven bluntly.
“They are content.”
Miss Craven snorted. “Content!” she said scornfully. “Marriage should bring more than contentment. It’s a meagre basis on which to found a life partnership.”
A shadow flitted across the girl’s face.
“I had a friend who married for love,” she said slowly. “She belonged to the old noblesse, and her family wished her to make a great marriage. But she loved an artist and married him in spite of all opposition. For six months she was the happiest girl in France—then she found out that her husband was unfaithful. Does it shock you that I speak of it—we all knew in the convent. She went to Capri soon afterwards, to a villa her father had given her, and one morning she went out to swim—it was a daily habit, she could do anything in the water. But that morning she swam out to sea—and she did not come back.” The low voice sank almost to a whisper. Miss Craven looked up incredulously. “Do you mean she deliberately drowned herself?” Gillian made a little gesture of evasion. “She was very unhappy,” she said softly. And in the silence that followed her troubled gaze turned almost unconsciously to her guardian. He had risen and was standing with his hands in his pockets staring straight in front of him, rigidly still. His attitude suggested complete detachment from those about him, as if his spirit was ranging far afield leaving the big frame empty, impenetrable as a figure of stone. She was sensitive to his lack of interest. She regretted having expressed opinions that she feared were immature and valueless. A quick sigh escaped her, and Miss Craven, misunderstanding, patted her shoulder gently. “It’s a very sad little story, my dear.”
“And one that serves to confirm your opinion that a girl does well to accept the husband who is chosen for her, Miss Locke?” asked Peters abruptly, as he glanced at his watch and rose to his feet.
Gillian joined in the general move.
“I think it is—safer,” she said, as she had said before, and stooped to rouse the sleeping poodle.
CHAPTER V
Miss Craven was sitting alone in the library at the Towers. She had been reading, but the book had failed to hold her attention and lay unheeded on her lap while she was plunged in a profound reverie.
She sat very still, her usually serene face clouded, and once or twice a heavy sigh escaped her.
The short November day was drawing in and though still early afternoon it was already growing dark. The declining light was more noticeable in the library than elsewhere in the house—a sombre room once the morning sun had passed; long and narrow and panelled in oak to a height of about twelve feet, above which ran a gallery reached by a hammered iron stairway, it housed a collection of calf and vellum bound books which clothed the walls from the floor of the gallery to within a few feet of the lofty ceiling. On the fourth side of the room, whither the gallery did not extend, three tall narrow windows overlooked the drive. The furniture was scanty and severely Jacobean, having for more than two hundred years remained practically intact; a ponderous writing table, a couple of long low cabinets, and half a dozen cavernous armchairs recushioned to suit modern requirements of ease. Some fine old bronzes stood against the panelled walls. There was about the room a settled peacefulness. The old furniture had a stately air of permanence. The polished panels, and, above, the orderly ranks of ancient books suggested durability; they remained—while generations of men came and passed, transient figures reflected in the shining oak, handling for a few brief years the printed treasures that would still be read centuries after they had returned to their dust.
The spirit of the house seemed embodied in this big silent room that was spacious and yet intimate, formal and yet friendly.
It was Miss Craven’s favourite retreat. The atmosphere was sympathetic. Here she seemed more particularly in touch with the subtle influence of family that seemed to pervade the whole house. In most of the rooms it was perceptible, but in the library it was forceful.
The house and the family—they were bound up inseparably.
For hundreds of years, in an unbroken line, from father to son … from father to son.... Miss Craven sat bolt upright to the sound of an unmistakable sob. She looked with amazement at two tears blistering the page of the open book on her knee. She had not knowingly cried since childhood. It was a good thing that she was alone she thought, with a startled glance round the empty room. She would have to keep a firmer hold over herself than that. She laughed a little shakily, choked, blew her nose vigorously, and walked to the middle window. Outside was stark November. The wind swept round the house in fierce gusts before which the big bare-branched trees in the park swayed and bowed, and trains of late fallen leaves caught in a whirlwind eddied skyward to scatter widely down again.
Rain lashed the window panes. Yet even when storm-tossed the scene had its own peculiar charm. At all seasons it was lovely.
Miss Craven looked at the massive trees, beautiful in their clean nakedness, and wondered how often she would see them bud again. Frowning, she smothered a rising sigh and pressing closer to the window peered out more attentively. Eastward and westward stretched long avenues that curved and receded soon from sight. The gravelled space before the house was wide; from it two shorter avenues encircling a large oval paddock led to the stables, built at some distance facing the house, but hidden by a belt of firs.
For some time Miss Craven watched, but only a game-keeper passed, a drenched setter at his heels, and with a little shiver she turned back to the room. She moved about restlessly, lifting books to lay them down immediately, ransacking the cabinets for prints that at a second glance failed to interest, and examining the bronzes that she had known from childhood with lengthy intentness as if she saw them now for the first time.
A footman came and silently replenished the fire. Her thoughts, interrupted, swung into a new channel. She sat down at the writing table and drawing toward her a sheet of paper slowly wrote the date. Beyond that she did not get. The ink dried on the pen as she stared at the blank sheet, unable to express as she wished the letter she had intended to write.
She laid the silver holder down at last with a hopeless gesture and her eyes turned to a bronze figure that served as a paper weight. It was a piece of her own work and she handled it lovingly with a curiously sad smile until a second hard sob broke from her and pushing it away she covered her face with her hands.
“Not for myself, God knows it’s not for myself,” she whispered, as if in extenuation. And mastering herself with an effort she made a second attempt to write but at the end of half a dozen words rose impatiently, crumpled the paper in her hand and walking to the fireplace threw it among the blazing logs.
She watched it curl and discolour, the writing blackly distinct, and crumble into ashes. Then from force of habit she searched for a cigarette in a box on the mantelpiece, but as she lit it a sudden thought arrested her and after a moment’s hesitation the cigarette followed the half—written letter into the fire.
With an impatient shrug she went back to an arm chair and again tried to read, but though her eyes mechanically followed the words on the printed page she did not notice what she was reading and laying the book down she gave up all further endeavour to distract her wandering thoughts. They were not pleasant and when, a little later, the door opened she turned her head expectantly with a sigh of relief. Peters came in briskly.
“I’ve come to inquire,” he said laughing, “the family pew held me in solitary state this morning. Time was when I never minded, but this last year has spoiled me. I was booked for lunch but I came as soon as I could. Nobody ill, I hope?”
Miss Craven looked at him for a moment before answering as he stood with his back to the fire, his hands clasped behind him, his face ruddy with the wind and rain, his keen blue eyes on hers, reliable, unchanging. It was a curious chance that had brought him—just at that moment. The temptation to make an unusual confidence rose strongly. She had known him and trusted him for more years than she cared to remember. How much to say? Indecision held her.
“You are always thoughtful, Peter,” she temporised. “I am afraid there is no excuse,” with a little smile; “Barry rode off somewhere quite early this morning and Gillian went yesterday to the Horringfords. I expect her back to-day in time for tea. For myself, I had gout or rheumatism or the black dog on my back, I forget which! Anyhow, I stayed at home.” She laughed and pointed to the cigarettes. He took one, tapping it on his thumbnail.
“You were alone. Why didn’t you ‘phone? I should have been glad to escape the Australians. They are enormously kind, but somewhat—er—overwhelming,” he added with a quick laugh.
“My dear man, be thankful I never thought of it. I’ve been like a bear with a sore head all day.” She looked past him into the fire, and struck by a new note in her voice he refrained from comment, smoking slowly and luxuriating in the warmth after a cold wet drive in an open motor. He never used a closed car. But some words she had used struck him. “Barry is riding—?” with a glance at the storm raging outside.
“Yes. He had breakfast at an unearthly hour and went off early. Weather seems to make no difference to him, but he will be soaked to the skin.”
“He’s tough,” replied Peters shortly. “I thought he must be out. As I came in just now Yoshio was hanging about the hall, watching the drive. Waiting for him, I suppose,” he added, flicking a curl of ash into the fire. “He’s a treasure of a valet,” he supplemented conversationally. But Miss Craven let the observation pass. She was still staring into the leaping flames, drumming with her fingers on the arms of the chair. Once she tried to speak but no words came. Peters waited. He felt unaccountably but definitely that she wished him to wait, that what was evidently on her mind would come with no prompting from him. He felt in her attitude a tension that was unusual—to-day she was totally unlike herself. Once or twice only in the course of a lifelong friendship she had shown him her serious side. She had turned to him for help then—he seemed presciently aware that she was turning to him for help now. He prided himself that he knew her as well as she knew herself and he understood the effort it would cost her to speak. That he guessed the cause of her trouble was no short cut to getting that trouble uttered. She would take her own time, he could not go half-way to meet her. He must stand by and wait. When had he ever done anything else at Craven Towers? His eyes glistened curiously in the firelight, and he rammed his hands down into his jacket pockets with abrupt jerkiness. Suddenly Miss Craven broke the silence.
“Peter—I’m horribly worried about Barry,” the words came with a rush. He understood her too well to cavil.
“Dear lady, so am I,” he replied with a promptness that did not console.
“Peter, what is it?” she went on breathlessly. “Barry is utterly changed. You see it as well as I. I don’t understand—I’m all at sea—I want your help. I couldn’t discuss him with anybody else, but you—you are one of us, you’ve always been one of us. Fair weather or foul, you’ve stood by us. What we should have done without you God only knows. You care for Barry, he’s as dear to you as he is to me, can’t you do something? The suffering in his face—the tragedy in his eyes—I wake up in the night seeing them! Peter, can’t you do something?” She was beside him, clutching at the mantel-shelf, shaking with emotion. The sight of her unnerved, almost incoherent, shocked him. He realised the depth of the impression that had been made upon her—deep indeed to produce such a result. But what she asked was impossible. He made a little negative gesture and shook his head.
“Dear lady, I can’t do anything. And I wonder whether you know how it hurts to have to say so? No son could be dearer to me than Barry—for the sake of his mother—” his voice faltered momentarily, “but the fact remains—he is not my son. I am only his agent. There are certain things I cannot do and say, no matter how great the wish,” he added with a twisted smile.
Miss Craven seemed scarcely to be listening. “It happened in Japan,” she asserted in fierce low tones. “Japan! Japan!” she continued vehemently, “how much more sorrow is that country to bring to our family! It happened in Japan and whatever it was—Yoshio knows! You spoke of him just now. You said he was hanging about—waiting—watching. Peter, he’s doing it all the time! He watches continually. Barry never has to send for him—he’s always there, waiting to be called. When Barry goes out the man is restless until he comes in again—haunting the hall—it gets on my nerves. Yet there is nothing I can actually complain of. He doesn’t intrude, he is as noiseless as a cat and vanishes if he sees you, but you know that just out of sight he’s still there—waiting—listening. Peter, what is he waiting for? I don’t think that it is apparent to the rest of the household, I didn’t notice it myself at first. But a few months ago something happened and since then I don’t seem able to get away from it. It was in the night, about two o’clock; I was wakeful and couldn’t sleep. I thought if I read I might read myself sleepy. I hadn’t a book in my room that pleased me and I remembered a half-finished novel I had left in the library. I didn’t take a light—I know every turn in the Towers blindfold. As you know, to reach the staircase from my room I have to pass Barry’s door, and at Barry’s door I fell over something in the darkness—something with hands of steel that saved me from an awkward tumble and hurried me down the passage and into the moonlit gallery before I could find a word of expostulation. Yoshio of course. I was naturally startled and angry in consequence. I demanded an explanation and after a great deal of hesitation he muttered something about Barry wanting him—which is ridiculous on the face of it. If Barry had really wanted him he would have been inside the room, not crouched outside on the door mat. He seemed very upset and kept begging me to say nothing about it. I don’t remember how he put it but he certainly conveyed the impression that it would not be good for Barry to know. I don’t understand it—Barry trusts him implicitly—and yet this.... I’m afraid, and I’ve never been afraid in my life before.” The little break in her voice hurt him. He felt curiously unable to cope with the situation. Her story disturbed him more than he cared to let her see in her present condition of unwonted agitation. Twice in the past they had stood shoulder to shoulder through a crisis of sufficient magnitude and she had showed then a cautious judgment, a reliability of purpose that had been purely masculine in its strength and sanity. She had been wholly matter-of-fact and unimaginative, unswayed by petty trivialities and broad in her decision. She had displayed a levelness of mind which had almost excluded feeling and which had enabled him to deal with her as with another man, confident of her understanding and the unlikelihood of her succumbing unexpectedly to ordinary womanly weaknesses. He had thought that he knew her thoroughly, that no circumstance that might arise could alter characteristics so set and inherent. But to-day her present emotion which had come perilously near hysteria, showed her in a new light that made her almost a stranger. He was a little bewildered with the discovery. It was incredible after all these years, just as if an edifice that he had thought strongly built of stone had tumbled about his ears like a pack of cards. He could hardly grasp it. He felt that there was something behind it all—something more than she admitted. He was tempted to ask definitely but second reflection brought the conviction that it would be a mistake, that it would be taking an unfair advantage. Sufficient unto the day—his present concern was to help her regain a normal mental poise. And to do that he must ignore half of what her suggestions seemed to imply. He felt her breakdown acutely, he must say nothing that would add to her distress of mind. It was better to appear obtuse than to concur too heartily in fears, a recollection of which in a saner moment he knew would be distasteful to her. She would never forgive herself—the less she had to forget the better. She trusted him or she would never have spoken at all. That he knew and he was honoured by her confidence. They had always been friends, but in her weakness he felt nearer to her than ever before. She was waiting for him to speak. He chose the line that seemed the least open to argument. He spoke at last, evenly, unwilling alike to seem incredulous or overanxious, his big steady hand closing warmly over her twitching fingers.
“I don’t think there is any cause—any reason to doubt Yoshio’s fidelity. The man is devoted to Barry. His behaviour certainly sounds—curious, but can be attributed I am convinced to over-zealousness. He is an alien in a strange land, cut off from his own natural distractions and amusements, and with time on his hands his devotion to his master takes a more noticeable form than is usual with an ordinary English man-servant. That he designs any harm I cannot believe. He has been with Barry a long time—on the several occasions when he stayed with him at your house in London did you notice anything in his behaviour then similar to the attitude you have observed recently? No? Then I take it that it is due to the same anxiety that we ourselves have felt since Barry’s return. Only in Yoshio’s case it is probably based on definite knowledge, whereas ours is pure conjecture. Barry has undoubtedly been up against something—momentous. Between ourselves we can admit the fact frankly. It is a different man who has come back to us—and we can only carry on and notice nothing. He is trying to forget something. He has worked like a nigger since he came home, slogging away down at the estate office as if he had his bread to earn. He does the work of two men—and he hates it. I see him sometimes, forgetful of his surroundings, staring out of the window, and the look on his face brings a confounded lump into my throat. Thank God he’s young—perhaps in time—” he shrugged and broke off inconclusively, conscious of the futility of platitudes. And they were all he had to offer. There was no suggestion he could make, nothing he could do. It was repetition of history, again he had to stand by and watch suffering he was powerless to aid, powerless to relieve. The mother first and now the son—it would seem almost as if he had failed both. The sense of helplessness was bitter and his face was drawn with pain as he stared dumbly at the window against which the storm was beating with renewed violence. The sight of the angry elements brought almost a feeling of relief; it would be something that he could contend with and overcome, something that would go towards mitigating the galling sense of impotence that chafed him. He felt the room suddenly stifling, he wanted the cold sting of the rain against his face, the roar of the wind in the trees above his head. Abruptly he buttoned his jacket in preparation for departure. Miss Craven pulled herself together. She laid a detaining hand on his arm. “Peter,” she said slowly, “do you think that Barry’s trouble has any connection with—my brother? The change of pictures in the dining-room—it was so strange. He said it was a reparation. Do you think Barry—found out something in Japan?”
Peter shook his head. “God knows,” he said gruffly. For a moment there was silence, then with a sigh Miss Craven moved towards a bell.
“You’ll stay for tea?”
“Thanks, no. I’ve got a man coming over, I’ll have to go. Give my love to Gillian and tell her I shall not, forgive her soon for deserting me this morning. Has she lost that nasty cough yet?”
“Almost. I didn’t want her to go to the Horringfords, but she promised to be careful.” Miss Craven paused, then:
“What did we do without Gillian, Peter?” she said with an odd little laugh.
“‘You’ve got me guessing,’ as Atherton says. She’s a witch, bless her!” he replied, holding out his hands. Miss Craven took them and held them for a moment.
“You’re the best pal I ever had, Peter,” she said unsteadily, “and you’ve given all your life to us Cravens.”
The sudden gripping of his hands was painful, then he bent his head and unexpectedly put his lips to the fingers he held so closely.
“I’m always here—when you want me,” he said huskily, and was gone.
Miss Craven stood still looking after him with a curious smile.
“Thank God for Peter,” she said fervently, and went back to her station by the window. It was considerably darker than before, but for some distance the double avenue leading to the stables was visible. As she watched, playing absently with the blind-cord, her mind dwelt on the long connection between Peter Peters and her family. Thirty years—the best of his life. And in exchange sorrow and an undying memory. The woman he loved had chosen not him but handsome inconsequent Barry Craven and, for her choice, had reaped misery and loneliness. And because he had known that inevitably a day would come when she would need assistance and support he had sunk his own feelings and retained his post. Her brief happiness had been hard to watch—the subsequent long years of her desertion a protracted torture. He had raged at his own helplessness. And ignorant of his love and the motive that kept him at Craven Towers she had come to lean on him and refer all to him. But for his care the Craven properties would have been ruined, and the Craven interests neglected beyond repair.
For some time before her sister-in-law’s death Miss Craven had known, as only a woman can know, but now for the first time she had heard from his lips a half-confession of the love that he had guarded jealously for thirty years.
The unusual tears that to-day seemed so curiously near the surface rose despite her and she blinked the moisture from her eyes with a feeling of irritated shame.
Then a figure, almost indistinguishable in the gloom, coming from the stables, caught her eye and she gave a sharp sigh of relief.
He was walking slowly, his hands deep in his pockets, his shoulders hunched against the storm of wind and rain that beat on his broad back. His movements suggested intense weariness, yet nearing the house his step lagged even more as if, despite physical fatigue and the inclement weather, he was rather forcing himself to return than showing a natural desire for shelter.
There was in his tread a heaviness that contrasted forcibly with the elasticity that had formerly been characteristic. As he passed close by the window where Miss Craven was standing she saw that he was splashed from head to foot. She thought with sudden compassion of the horse that he had ridden. She had been in the stables only a few weeks before when he had handed over another jaded mud-caked brute trembling in every limb and showing signs of merciless riding to the old head groom who had maintained a stony silence as was his duty but whose grim face was eloquent of all he might not say. It was so unlike Barry to be inconsiderate, toward animals he had been always peculiarly tender-hearted.
She hurried out to the hall, almost cannoning with a little dark-clad figure who gave way with a deep Oriental reverence. “Master very wet,” he murmured, and vanished.
“There’s some sense in him,” she muttered grudgingly. And quite suddenly a wholly unexpected sympathy dawned for the inscrutable Japanese whom she had hitherto disliked. But she had no time to dwell on her unaccountable change of feeling for through the glass of the inner door she saw Craven in the vestibule struggling stiffly to rid himself of a dripping mackintosh. It had been no protection for the driving rain had penetrated freely, and as he fumbled at the buttons with slow cold fingers the water ran off him in little trickling streams on to the mat.