He snatched his hand away, stood upright, and looked at me.
"What! you went to Hawtrey – to his house?"
"Yes. I found his address on a visiting card. I went there in a taxi-cab; he was out, but I waited for him – he came in presently, he was very nice – oh, yes! I saw him for a minute or two. I said I wanted to speak to him; he told me he could not attend to me then or in his own house, but he would send his sister to me."
"Thank goodness!" said my father.
"Her name was Lady Mary Percy. She was a nice woman; she came and she took me to her house, and there and then I told her everything. I told her about Vernon and about – about her brother, and what her brother had said to me. She was kind, although she said one or two strange things. I could not quite understand her, and some of the things she said stuck in my mind. She seemed to think that I had refused the greatest match in England."
"And so you have, you most silly of all little Heathers."
"Oh, no, Daddy! The greatest match in all England I have not refused; I have accepted Vernon Carbury. He is the best husband in all the world for me."
"It is amazing what love will do," said my father then. "I felt something like that for your mother – eh! but that was a long time ago!"
"Then, of course, you understand," I said, nestling up to him, "you are my darling old Dad, and you quite understand."
"I don't, not a bit; and yet, at the same time, I do. Well, go on. You were at Lady Mary Percy's when you left off talking. How, in the name of fortune, did you get here?"
"I left her after a bit. I would not go back to you, so I came to Aunt Penelope. I took the train here; I had money; and it was quite simple. I found my darling auntie very ill, but the sight of me has made her better. The doctor was so glad when I came back, and so was poor little Jonas – the Buttons, you know, Dad – you remember the Buttons?"
"Yes, yes; of course, I remember him."
"Auntie is in bed, very weak."
"Then she won't want to see me," said my father, restlessly.
"Yes; of course she will; she is expecting you. But now, I want to say something to you. I must say it; oh, Daddy, I must."
His face turned white. He pulled his soft hat a little over his eyes and looked fixedly at me.
"Well, Heather, speak. You – you're no coward."
"I don't think I am. It began first in this way," I said. "It was something Lady Mary said; these were her words. She said: 'You are, of course, aware of the fact that Hawtrey must have loved you beyond the ordinary love of an ordinary man when he made up his mind to take as a wife the daughter of Major Grayson?'"
"So he must; that's true enough, Heather."
"Father, oh, father! Do you think I listened to those words tamely? I said: 'My father is the best man in all the world.' Lady Mary looked at me; at first she was angry, then a softened expression came over her face. She said: 'You poor little girl!' and then she said: 'Have you never suspected why he married Lady Helen Dalrymple?' Oh, father, it was after those words I came here, for I was determined to find out, and to-day – oh, my own Daddy, I did find out! I asked Aunt Penelope."
"She told you – my God! she told you!"
"She did, but I don't believe it – it isn't true."
"Give me your hand, Heather."
I gave it. I had some little difficulty in doing so, for a cold, icy, terrible doubt was flooding my mind, flooding my reason, flooding my powers of thought.
"Keep it up," said my father to me. "Be brave, right on to the end. Tell me what she said. You are my daughter and – once I was a soldier; tell your soldier father what she said."
"Oh, Daddy, Daddy, she said that you, you, my father – had – oh, it's so awful! – that you were arrested in India on a charge of forgery – you had made away with a lot of money – you were cashiered from the army and – you were imprisoned. All the time while I was picturing you a brave soldier, filling your post with distinction and pride, you were only – only – in prison! Oh, Daddy, it isn't true – it could not have been true; she said it was true, she said that your term was over last autumn, and that you came straight here to see me, and that, in some extraordinary way, you had money, and you carried everything off with a high hand, and insisted on taking me away with you, and the next thing she heard was that you had married Lady Helen Dalrymple. She says, Daddy, that you will never outlive your disgrace, and there isn't a soldier in the length and breadth of the land who will speak to you!"
I laid my head down on his coat sleeve. Sobs rent my frame. There was an absolute silence on his part. He did not interrupt my tears for a moment, nor did he say one single word of contradiction. After a minute or so he remarked, very quietly:
"Now, you will stop crying and listen."
I sat upright. I looked at him out of glassy eyes; he gazed straight back at me; there was not a scrap of shame about his face; I wondered very much at that, and then a wild, joyful thought visited me. He could clear himself, he could show me that this disgraceful story was all a lie.
"Now, stop crying," he said again. "Whatever I did or did not do, I was a soldier and fought the Queen's battles when she was alive – God bless her! – and I was accounted a brave man."
"You were never a forger – you never saw the inside of a prison?"
"Those are your two charges against me, Heather?"
"Not mine, not mine," I said; "I just want you to tell me the truth."
"Well, as a matter of fact, I was accused of forgery."
My eyes fell, I trembled all over.
"I was had up for trial; I stood in the prisoner's dock. I was convicted by jurymen, and a judge of our criminal courts proclaimed my sentence. The case was a particularly aggravated one, and my sentence was severe – I was sentenced to ten years' penal servitude – I lived all that time in prison. Not a pleasant life. Ah! it's spoiled my hands a good bit – have you never remarked it?"
"Now that you speak, I – do remark it," I said.
"And of course I was cashiered," he continued.
I nodded.
"Well, I have answered you."
"You have," I said.
"Is there anything else you'd like to know?"
"Yes. Why did you marry Lady Helen?"
"Why, that was part of the bond."
"The bond?" I said.
"The fact is, we understood each other. She had been very fond of me, poor woman, and she stuck to me through my disgrace, and when I came out of prison she was willing to do the best possible for me and for you. Of course, you can understand that without marriage I could not accept her services, so – I married her. I don't go about with her a great deal, you will have observed that?"
"Yes, and I have wondered," I said.
"But she has been good to you. She has taken you about."
"Oh, yes. I hated going about with her."
"She was anxious, and so was I, that you should marry well. She held out to me as the bait – your salvation."
"What do you mean?"
"Exactly what I say. When I entered into that worst prison of all, it was for your sake."
"Father – oh, father!"
"It is true, child. There, it's out. It is the worst prison of all – God help me! And now, at the end, you desert me!"
"No, I won't," I said, flinging my arms round his neck; "no, I never will! It doesn't matter what you did, I'll stick to you – I will, I will, I will!"
"My little girl, my own little girl! But she won't have you back except on her own terms; she only wants you in order to get you well married, to have the éclat and fuss and glory of a great marriage; that's her object. You have refused Hawtrey; I doubt if she'll forgive that."
I was clinging close to him, I was holding his hand.
"Can't we both leave her?" I whispered. "Can't we go away and be very poor together, and forget the world?"
"Child, there is your lover, Carbury."
I gave a quick, sharp sigh.
"I can't think of him now," I said.
"Oh, child, he proposed for you, knowing everything."
"I won't marry him," I said, "I am going to stay with you in that worst prison."
CHAPTER XVIII
My father kept on holding my hand. We neither of us spoke; there are moments when words fail us, and these happened to be some. The sun crept higher and higher in the heavens, it beat down on us, but it was tempered by the pleasant, cool sea breezes. We were both looking into the future, and, truth to tell, our hearts were sad. I was making up my mind, and father was making up his mind. At last I, being the younger and more impulsive, spoke:
"It is all right, Daddy," I said. "It was a bit of a dreadful shock; I don't pretend it was anything else. I have always put you – oh, on such a pedestal! But I'll get used to it. You were tempted awfully, or you would never have done it. I am certain of that, and – I have never been tempted at all, so, of course, I can't understand. You were tempted, poor darling, and it – it happened. It is hateful of people to stamp on you, and crush you when you're down; but I suppose it is something horrid inside of them makes them do it. Daddy, I'm not made like that. I couldn't stamp on you – I couldn't crush you. On the contrary, I have made up my mind. You and I against the world, Daddy mine, against the whole wide world. You won't return to London to-night; you'll stay here, and you'll write to Lady Helen, and you'll tell her that you and I have escaped from the worst prison, and are going to live always together, and that we aren't a bit afraid of poverty, and that, in short, we've made up our minds. We've cut the Gordian knot. We'll be happy together, and we don't care a scrap about poverty."
"That's your firm resolve, is it, Heather?" said my father.
"It is. I have been thinking it out – I can't get away from it."
"All right. Give me a kiss, child."
I put my arms round him, and kissed him many times. Again I noticed that there wasn't a bit of shame in his eyes; they looked quite clear, and steadfast, and blue, with that wonderful blue light which I think only comes into the eyes of men who are accustomed to face the sea and the wind, and who have lived a great deal out of doors.
"So that is your final decision?" he repeated. "I like to feel your kisses on my cheek, Heather."
I kissed him again.
"It is," I said.
"Well, now you've to hear mine."
"Oh, yours," I said; "you won't go away from your own Heather – you couldn't – you love her too well."
"God knows I love you, pretty one. You are the only creature on earth I do love. I love you with all my heart and soul, and that's saying a great deal. For the ten long years I was in prison I kept thinking and thinking of you, child. But for you I might have lost my reason; but your little face, and your ways, and your love for me kept me – well, all right. And now I am a free man again – I mean, I am free to claim your love. But you haven't decided what part Carbury is to play in this."
I shivered very slightly.
"I have told you," I said. "He won't play any part. I – I'm going to write to him. We need not talk about him any more. Yesterday you and my stepmother were opposed to my marrying him; now I also am opposed. There will be no marriage between us. I am all yours."
"Oh, you best child in all the world!"
"Then it's settled, isn't it, Daddy?"
"My little girl, I can't tell. It rests with Carbury himself. But my part – you've got to hear my part now."
I felt very, very sad when he said this. I seemed to guess in advance that a great strain and trial was about to be put upon me. My father looked at me, and then he looked away. Again he took up some great, full bells of heather and crushed them in his hand; he threw them away and turned and faced me.
"There! The worst is out. I have got to stay with her ladyship."
"Father!"
"Yes. I can't get away from it, Heather child. I can't live on nothing, nor, my little girl, can you. We are both dependent on Lady Helen for our daily bread."
"I am not – I won't be," I said.
"But you are," he answered, "and you must be; that's just it. You can't get away from it. She holds the purse. Do you think she will unfasten those purse strings to give you and me an allowance to live away from her?"
"But we can live on so little," I said; "and I can work. I should love to work."
"Well, now, Heather," said my father, "you are no fool."
"I hope I am not," I said.
"You're a very wise girl for your age."
"I hope so," I replied.
"I have watched you, and I know you are wise for your age – very. Being so, therefore, what can you do to earn a living? Just tell me."
I sat very quiet and still. I thought over my different accomplishments. I could play a little, I could sing a little; I had a smattering of French – a very slight smattering – and I was fond of good English books, history books, and books of travel, and I adored books of adventure, and I could recite a good many pieces from our best poets. But all these things did not form much of a cargo to take on board my ship of life. My father kept looking at me, with that whimsical light in his blue eyes.
"Eh, little woman? Suppose I take you at your word, how do you propose to support yourself and me? There would be, first of all, our lodgings. We might go to Plymouth, or some other place, not too dear. We might find rooms – kind of country cottage rooms – by the sea, and pay, say, six shillings a week each. It is very unlikely we'd get them for that, but I really want to bring you down as lightly as possible. Well, six shillings a week for you and six shillings for me means twelve shillings, and that would mean, probably, a tiny, tiny sitting-room, and two of the wee-est bedrooms in all the world. Still, it might be done for the price of twelve shillings a week. There would be extras, of course – landladies greatly live by extras – and we should have to put them down, counting coal and light, one part of the year with another, at about three shillings a week, which mounts up, our lodging and our light and coal, to fifteen shillings a week.
"Then, my dear little Heather, there comes that important thing, food, for the bravest of all little girls would get very hungry at times, and if she didn't get hungry she wouldn't be worth her salt. There'd be your breakfast, my dear, and my breakfast, and your snack in the middle of the day, and your tea in the afternoon, and your dinner in the evening; and I don't think the shopkeepers would give us bread, and butter, and milk, and beef, and mutton, and vegetables, and all those sort of things for nothing – I have an impression that they wouldn't. Of course I may be wrong, but that is my impression, and I have a pretty good knowledge of the world. I don't think, dear, that even at starvation price we could be fed under something like another fifteen shillings to a pound a week. Now, my little Heather, how are you to earn, say, one pound fifteen shillings a week – to say nothing of the expense of note-paper, and stamps, and envelopes, and dress?"
"Oh, I have heaps of dress," I said. "There are a great many dresses of mine at the house in London."
"Which have been supplied to you by Lady Helen. I don't really know, if we made this great severance from her, whether we should have any right to take those dresses from her or not – I am inclined to think not, if you ask me. However, suppose you don't want dress for the time being, at least you will want shoe leather, and gloves, and trifles of that sort. My dear, we can't put down our living, between us, however hard we try, at less than two pounds a week, and that means over a hundred pounds a year. Now, Heather child, I have nothing a year – nothing!"
He stretched out both his arms as he spoke.
"Oh, yes; I am supposed to be one of the richest of old men. I can drive in my motor-car, and I can have a horse, and I can go here, there, and everywhere. I can live in the softest rooms, and I can eat the most dainty food, and I can curse luxury in my heart as you curse it in yours; but I haven't a penny piece to get away from it – not a penny piece; and, as far as I can tell, no more have you."
"Couldn't we live here with Aunt Penelope?" I said.
My voice was very weak and faint. A good deal of my courage was being taken out of me.
"As if we would, Heather! Think how that brave woman supported you during the long years when I was in prison, and could not earn a halfpenny! No, no, Heather; no, no! It was partly to relieve your aunt that I married her ladyship, and, Heather child, I can't get away from her now – I can't – and I am greatly afraid you can't either."
"But she won't have me," I said; "she'll have you back, of course, but not me; and, father, darling, I can't go back!"
"She would have you if I pleaded," said my father, "and if I could tell her you had quite given up young Carbury. She has taken a dislike to that poor boy, God alone knows why – but I think I can manage it. You see, it's this way. Her ladyship has a great horror of anything approaching a scandal; I never knew anyone with such a downright horror of it; upon my word, in her case it amounts to a downright sin – it does, really. Well, there she is, hating scandal, and if you left her there'd be no end of talk, for in your way you have paid her well for all the luxuries she has showered upon you. People have been civil to her, not for her sake – who would look at a frowzy old woman like her? – yes, child, I say it; I don't mind what I say to you – but a great many people would want to look at your dear, fresh little face; and it is just because of that same dear little face that so many people have come to her ladyship's 'At Homes'; and it is because of that same little face that you and Lady Helen have been asked out so much. She knows it well enough; she knows why she's popular. I can easily get her to let the old life go on, and you shan't be worried with – with that poor fellow Hawtrey. I said to myself, when she was so full of it, 'I don't believe the child will consent,' but there, she told me I was wrong. She said there wasn't a girl in England who'd refuse a match like that; and even I allowed myself to be persuaded that that was the case."
"But, oh, father, wouldn't you have hated it?"
"No, child, not altogether; there might have been worse fates for you. He's a good man, is Hawtrey; he'd have treated you well; he'd have been very kind to you. I have heard before of girls marrying men old enough to be their fathers, and being happy with them. I dare say if young Carbury had not come in the way you'd have taken him, for there isn't his like in England for chivalry and kindness of heart."
"But he did come," I said.
"Yes; youth naturally mates with youth – it's the true story of life. I'm not blaming you a bit, Heather – not in my heart, I mean. I had to pretend to blame you, of course, the other day."
Here my father rose to his feet.
"You shan't be worried about Hawtrey," he said, "and I'll promise that Carbury shall not cross your path. But I don't think there is any help for it; you'll have to come back with me. I'll stay here to-night; I'll telegraph to her ladyship again, and tell her that you are all right, and that we are coming back to-morrow morning. I'd rather have you in the house than not in the house, for even though we can't often talk to each other we can at least understand each other."
"But Aunt Penelope is ill; even if I could agree to what you wish, Aunt Penelope is very ill. I ought not to leave her now."
"Well, perhaps not; perhaps your aunt ought to be considered. In that case I would go back myself to-night – it would be best for me to do so; her ladyship might want me, and I know I'd be in the right to go back, and as quickly as possible. Well, we'll go and see your aunt now; only, before we visit her, I want you to make me a promise. You will come to London – you will take up the old life for my sake?"
I looked him in the eyes.
"Do you want this very, very badly?" I said.
"I want it more than anything on earth."
"And wanting it so badly," I said very sadly, "you yet would have pretended to be glad if I had said 'Yes' to Lord Hawtrey?"
"I might have, there's no saying. I'd have had your house to come to then; but that's out of the question, and needn't be thought of. You'll come back to me, Heather, when your aunt can spare you?"
"Yes, I will come," I said, and then I kissed him, and we walked slowly back from the Downs, my hand clasped in his.
Aunt Penelope was better; the doctor had been again, and was pleased with her. Jonas, in his very best suit, his face shining with soap and water, gave us the good news on our arrival. There was a nice little lunch waiting for us in the tiny dining-room, and my father, as he expressed it, was "downright hungry."
"Delicious, this cold beef and salad tastes," he said. "Upon my word, there's nothing like plain food; one does get sick to death of made-up dishes."
I helped him to the best that my aunt's little table could afford, and then I ran softly up to her room. She was lying high up in bed, her eyes were bright, and she was watching for me.
"Well, child; well?"
"You are better, aren't you, auntie?"
"Better? I am all right, child; what about yourself?"
"I am quite well, of course."
"Heather, is that poor man, your father, downstairs?"
"He is."
"Has he expressed a wish to see me?"
"He has come back for the purpose."
"I will see him; only he must be quiet, in order to prevent my coughing. If I start coughing again I may get really bad; you tell him that. Heather, my love, you're not going to leave me, are you?"
"Not at present, at any rate," I said.
"Kiss me, dear. You are a very good girl; you take after your mother. You have got her patient, steadfast light in your eyes. Now send that father of yours up, and tell him, whatever he does, to be careful that he doesn't set me coughing."
I ran downstairs, and gave my father Aunt Penelope's message. He said:
"Poor old girl! I'll be careful, right enough," and then he went softly and slowly upstairs. I watched until he was out of sight; then I ran quickly into the little drawing-room. I had not a minute to lose, and I would not delay. I would not postpone setting a seal on my own fate for a single moment.
There was the little room, looking just as of old. I had dusted it and tidied it that morning, and put a few fresh flowers in one or two vases, and made it look quite gay and pretty. I knew where Aunt Penelope kept her note-paper; I opened her Davenport and took out a sheet now and began to write. I wrote straight to Vernon Carbury. My letter was very short.
"I have to give you up, Vernon," I wrote; "there is no other way out. My father, Major Grayson, has told me his true story. I never heard it until to-day. I understand everything now, and I wish you, Vernon, clearly to understand that I, Major Grayson's daughter, take his shame, and bind it on me, and not for all the world will I loosen that badge of shame from my heart. So, because of this very thing, I can never be your true wife. You are a brave soldier of the King, and my father has been cashiered, because of a crime, from the King's Army. Is it likely that you and I can be husband and wife? Good-bye, dear. It gives me dreadful pain to write this letter, but all the same, I am glad we have met, and that you have put me into your gallery of heroines, as I have put you into my gallery of heroes. Forget me soon – find a girl who has no shame to bind round her heart, and be happy. Dearest darling, best beloved, – Your little
"HEATHER."
I knew his address, and put it on the letter. I stamped it, and ran out with it myself. Jonas saw me going, and called after me:
"Miss Heather, I'll post that for you."
"No, thank you," I answered; "I'd like to go."
The letter was dropped into the post-box before my father came downstairs again after his interview with Aunt Penelope. His face was pale, and he looked tired.
"Upon my word, this has been a trying day to me. She's the best of women, Heather; I don't wonder you're proud of her. She reminds me wonderfully of your poor mother; not in appearance, of course, for I never saw your mother except with the glint and the glamour of youth on her face; but she's what your poor mother would have been had she lived. She's a right-down good woman. She wants you to go on living with her, but I have got her to see reason, and she is satisfied that you shall return to me as soon as she is well. Take care of her, child – here's a ten-pound note to spend on her, and when you want more money you have only to write to me."
"But – but I thought you had no money?" I answered.
"I have, and I haven't. As long as I live with Lady Helen I have more money than I know what to do with. Don't take that little drop of honey out of my cup. I can spend that money as I please, and no questions asked; and now, my child, I'm going back to London. I'll write to you in a day or two; you needn't fear her ladyship, she'll go on giving you a good time, and some day perhaps you'll marry."
"No," I said. "You know that – father – you know that I won't."
"Well, well, there's no saying, and a girl of your age can't prophesy with regard to the future. Good-bye, little girl. God bless you! You have comforted me as you alone could to-day."