A Life For a Love: A Novel

"What an extraordinary noise the children are making on the lawn," said Lilias to Marjory. "I hear Gerald's name. What can they be saying about Gerald? One would almost think he was coming down the avenue to see the state of excitement they are in! Do look, Meg, do."

"It's only one of Gussie's storms in a tea-cup," responded Marjory, cheerfully. "I am so glad, Lil, that you found Gerald and Val hitting it off so nicely. You consider them quite a model pair for affection and all that, don't you, pet?"

"Quite," said Lilias. "My mind is absolutely at rest. One night Val puzzled me a little. Oh, nothing to speak of – nothing came of it, I mean. Yes, my mind is absolutely at rest, thank God! What are all the children doing. Maggie? They are flying in a body to the house. What can it mean?"

"We'll know in less than no time," responded Marjory, calmly. And they did.

Four little girls, all out of breath, all dressed alike, all looking alike, dashed into the drawing-room, and in one breath poured out the direful intelligence that Augusta had mutinied.

"Mr. Carr forbade her to give away the library books," they said, "and she has gone up now to the school-room in spite of him. She's off; she said Gerry said she might do it, long ago. Isn't it awful of her? She says beauty's nothing, and she's only going to obey Gerry," continued Betty. "What shall we do? She'll give all the books away wrong, and Mr. Carr will be angry."

They all paused for want of breath. Rosie went up and laid her fat red hand on Lilias' knee.

"I said it was you he stared at," she remarked. "You wouldn't like him to be vexed, would you?"

The words had scarcely passed her lips before the door was opened, and the object of the children's universal commiseration entered. A deep and awful silence took possession of them. Lilias clutched Rosie's hand, and felt an inane desire to rush from the room with her.

Too late. The terrible infant flew to Adrian Carr, and clasping her arms around his legs, looked up into his face.

"Never mind," she said, "it is wrong of Gussie, but it isn't Lilias' fault. She wouldn't like to vex you, 'cause you stare so at her."

"Nursie says that you admire Lilias; do you?" asked Betty.

"Oh, poor Gussie!" exclaimed the others, their interest in Lilias and Carr being after all but a very secondary matter. "We all do hope you won't do anything dreadful to her. You can, you know. You can excommunicate her, can't you?"

"But what has Augusta done?" exclaimed Carr, turning a somewhat flushed face in the direction not of Lilias, but of Marjory. "What a frightful confusion – and what does it mean?"

Marjory explained as well as she was able. Carr had lately taken upon himself to overhaul the books of the lending library. He believed in literature as a very elevating lever, but he thought that books should not only be carefully selected in the mass, but in lending should be given with a special view to the needs of the individual who borrowed. Before Gerald's marriage Marjory had given away the books, but since then, for various reasons, they had drifted into Augusta's hands, and through their means this rather spirited and daring young lady had been able to inflict a small succession of mild tyrannies. For instance, poor Miss Yates, the weak-eyed and weak-spirited village dressmaker, was dosed with a series of profound and dull theology; and Macallister, the sexton and shoemaker, a canny Scot, who looked upon all fiction as the "work of the de'il," was put into a weekly passion with the novels of Charles Reade and Wilkie Collins.

These were extreme cases, but Augusta certainly had the knack of giving the wrong book to the wrong person. Carr heard mutterings and grumbling. The yearly subscriptions of a shilling a piece diminished, and he thought it full time to take the matter in hand. He himself would distribute the village literature every Saturday, at twelve o'clock.

The day and the hour arrived, and behold Miss Augusta Wyndham had forestalled him, and was probably at this very moment putting "The Woman in White" into the enraged Macallister's hand. Carr's temper was not altogether immaculate; he detached the children's clinging hands from his person, and said he would pursue the truant, publicly take the reins of authority from her, and send her home humiliated. He left the rectory, walking fast, and letting his annoyance rather increase than diminish, for few young men care to be placed in a ridiculous situation, and he could not but feel that such was his in the present instance.

The school-house was nearly half a mile from the rectory, along a straight and dusty piece of road; very dusty it was to-day, and a cutting March east wind blew in Carr's face and stung it. He approached the school-house – no, what a relief – the patient aspirants after literature were most of them waiting outside. Augusta, then, could not have gone into the school-room.

"Has Miss Augusta Wyndham gone upstairs?" he asked of a rosy-cheeked girl who adored the "Sunday At Home."

"No, please, sir. Mr. Gerald's come, please, Mr. Carr, sir," raising two eyes which nearly blazed with excitement. "He shook 'ands with me, he did, and with Old Ben, there; and Miss Augusta, she give a sort of a whoop, and she had her arms round his neck, and was a-hugging of him before us all, and they has gone down through the fields to the rectory."

"About the books," said Carr; "has Miss Augusta given you the books?"

"Bless your 'eart, sir," here interrupted Old Ben, "we ain't of a mind for books to-day. Mr. Gerald said he'd come up this evening to the Club, and have a chat with us all, and Sue and me, we was waiting here to tell the news. Litteratoor ain't in our line to-day, thank you, sir."

"Here's Mr. Macallister," said Sue. "Mr. Macallister. Mr. Gerald's back. He is, truly. I seen him, and so did Old Ben."

"And he'll be at the Club to-night," said Ben, turning his wrinkled face upwards towards the elongated visage of the canny Scot.

"The Lord be praised for a' His mercies," pronounced Macallister, slowly, with an upward wave of his hand, as if he were returning thanks for a satisfying meal. "Na, na. Mr. Carr, na books the day."

Finding that his services were really useless, Carr went away. The villagers were slowly collecting from different quarters, and all faces were broadening into smiles, and all the somewhat indifferent sleepy tones becoming perceptibly brighter, and Gerald Wyndham's name was passed from lip to lip. Old Miss Bates wiped her tearful eyes, as she hurried home to put on her best cap. Widow Simpkins determined to make up a good fire in her cottage, and not to spare the coals; the festive air was unmistakeable. Carr felt smitten with a kind of envy. What wonders could not Wyndham have effected in this place, he commented, as he walked slowly back to his lodgings. Later in the day he called at the rectory to find the hero surrounded by his adoring family, and bearing his honors gracefully.

Gerald was talking rather more than his wont; for some reason or other his face had more color than usual, his eyes were bright, he smiled, and even laughed. Lilias ceased to watch him anxiously, a sense of jubilation filled the breast of every worshipping sister, and no one thought of parting or sorrow.

Perhaps even Gerald himself forgot the bitterness which lay before him just then; perhaps his efforts were not all efforts, and that he really felt some of the old home peace and rest with its sustaining power.

You can know a thing and yet not always realize it. Gerald knew that he should never spend another Saturday in the old rectory of Jewsbury-on-the-Wold. That Lilias' bright head and Lilias' tender, steadfast earnest eyes would be in future only a memory. He could never hope again to touch that hair, or answer back the smile on that beloved and happy face. The others, too – but Lilias, after his wife, was most dear of all living creatures to Gerald. Well, he must not think; he resolved to take all the sweetness, if possible, out of this Saturday and Sunday. He resolved not to tell any of his people of the coming parting until just before he left.

The small sisters squatted in a semicircle on the floor round their hero; Augusta, as usual, stood behind him, keeping religious guard of the back of his head.

"If there is a thing I simply adore," that vigorous young lady was often heard to say, "it's the back of Gerry's head."

Lilias sat at his feet, her slim hand and arm lying across his knee; Marjory flitted about, too restless and happy to be quiet, and the tall rector stood on the hearthrug with his back to the fire.

"It is good to be home again," said Gerald. Whereupon a sigh of content echoed from all the other throats, and it was at this moment that Carr came into the room.

"Come in, Carr, come in," said the rector. "There's a place for you, too. You're quite like one of the family, you know. Oh, of course you are, my dear fellow, of course you are. We have got my son back, unexpectedly. Gerald, you know Carr, don't you."

Gerald stood up, gave Carr's hand a hearty grip, and offered him his chair.

"Oh, not that seat, Gerry," groaned Augusta, "it's the only one in the room I can stand at comfortably. I can't fiddle with your curls if I stand at the back of any other chair."

Gerald patted her cheek.

"Then perhaps, Carr, you'll oblige Augusta by occupying another chair. I am sorry that I am obliged to withhold the most comfortable from you."

Carr was very much at home with the Wyndhams by now. He pulled forward a cane chair, shook his head at Augusta, and glanced almost timidly at Lilias. He feared the eight sharp eyes of the younger children if he did more than look very furtively, but she made such a sweet picture just then that his eyes sought hers by a sort of fascination. For the first time, too, he noticed that she had a look of Gerald. Her face lacked the almost spiritualized expression of his, but undoubtedly there was a likeness.

The voices, interrupted for a moment by the curate's entrance, soon resumed their vigorous flow.

"Why didn't you bring my dear little sister Valentine down, Gerald?" It was Lilias who spoke.

He rewarded her loving speech by a flash, half of pleasure, half of pain in his eyes. Aloud he said: —

"We thought it scarcely worth while for both of us to come. I must go away again on Monday."

A sepulchral groan from Augusta. Rosie, Betty and Joan exclaimed almost in a breath: —

"And we like you much better by yourself."

"Oh, hush, children," said Marjory. "We are all very fond of Val."

"You have brought a great deal of delight into the village. Wyndham," said Carr, and he related the little scene which had taken place around the school-house. "I'd give a good deal to be even half as popular," he said with a sigh.

"You might give all you possessed in all the world, and you wouldn't succeed," snapped Gussie.

"Augusta, you really are too rude," said Lilias with a flush on her face.

"No, I'm not, Lil. Oh, you needn't stare at me. I like him, and he knows it," nodding with her head in the direction of Adrian Carr; "but you have to be born in a place, and taught to walk in it, and you have had to steal apples in it and eggs out of birds' nests, and to get nearly drowned when fishing, and to get some shot in your ankle, and you've got to know every soul in all the country round, and to come back from school to them in the holidays, and for them first to see your moustache coming; and then, beyond and above all that, you've got just to be Gerry, to have his way of looking, and his way of walking, and his way of shaking your hand, and to have his voice and his heart, to be loved as well. So how could Mr. Carr expect it?"

"Bravo, Augusta," said Adrian Carr. "I'd like you for a friend better than any girl I know."

"Please, Gerry, tell us a story," exclaimed the younger children. They did not want Augusta to have all the talking.

"Let it be about a mouse, and a cricket on the hearth, and a white elephant, and a roaring bull, and a grizzly bear."

"And let the ten little nigger-boys come into it," said Betty.

"And Bo-Peep," said Rosie.

"And the Old Man who wouldn't say his prayers," exclaimed Joan.

"And let it last for hours," exclaimed they all.

Gerald begged the rest of the audience to go away, but they refused to budge an inch. So the story began. All the characters appeared in due order; it lasted a long time, and everybody was delighted.

CHAPTER XXVI

Lilias Wyndham never forgot that last Sunday with Gerald spent at Jewsbury-on-the-Wold. The day in itself was perfect, the air blew softly from the west, the sun shone in a nearly cloudless heaven; the gentle breezes, the opening flowers, the first faint buds of spring on tree and hedge-row seemed all to give a foretaste of summer. Nobody knew, none could guess, that in one sense they foretold the desolation of dark winter.

It was in this light that Wyndham himself regarded the lovely day.

"I leap from calm to storm," he said to himself. "Never mind, I will enjoy the present bliss!"

He did enjoy it, really, not seemingly. He took every scrap of sweetness out of it, almost forgetting Valentine for the time being, and living over again the days when he was a light-hearted boy.

He went to church twice, and sat in the corner of the square family pew which had always been reserved for him. As of old, Lilias sat by his side, and when the sermon came he lifted little Joan into his arms, and she fell asleep with her golden head on his breast. The rector preached and Gerald listened. It was an old-fashioned sermon, somewhat long for the taste of the present day. It had been carefully prepared, and was read aloud, for the benefit of the congregation, in a clear, gentlemanly voice.

Gerald almost forgot that he was a man with an unusual load of suffering upon him, as he listened to the time-honored softly-flowing sentences.

"Blessed are the pure in heart," was the rector's text, and it seemed to more than one of that little village congregation that he was describing his own son when he drew his picture of the man of purity.

In the evening Carr preached. He was as modern as the rector was the reverse. He used neither M.S. nor notes, and his sermon scarcely occupied ten minutes.

"To die is gain" was his text. There were some in the congregation who scarcely understood the vigorous words, but they seemed to one weary man like the first trumpet notes of coming battle. They spoke of a fight which led to a victory. Wyndham remembered them by-and-bye.

It was the custom at the rectory to have a kind of open house on Sunday evening, and to-night many of Gerald's friends dropped in. The large party seemed a happy one. The merriment of the night before had deepened into something better. Lilias spoke of it afterwards as bliss.

"Do you remember," she said to Marjory, in the desolate days which followed, "how Gerald looked when he played the organ in the hall? Do you remember his face when we sang 'Sun of my soul?'"

The happiest days come to an end. The children went to bed, the friends one by one departed. Even Lilias and Marjory kissed their brother and bade him good-night. He was to leave before they were up in the morning. This he insisted on, against their will.

"But we shall see you soon in London," they both said, for they were coming up in a few weeks to stay with an aunt. Then they told him to kiss Valentine for them, and went upstairs, chatting lightly to one another.

The rector and his son were alone.

"We have had a happy day," said Gerald, abruptly.

"We have, my son. It does us all good to have you with us, Gerald. I could have wished – but there's no good regretting now. Each man must choose his own path, and you seem happy, my dear son; that is the main thing."

"I never thought primarily of happiness," responded Gerald. "Did you listen to Carr's sermon to-night? He proved his case well. To die is sometimes gain."

The rector, who was seated by the fire, softly patted his knee with one hand.

"Yes, yes," he said, "Carr proved his case ably. He's a good fellow. A little inclined to the broad church, don't you think?"

"Perhaps so."

Gerald stood up. His face had suddenly grown deadly white.

"Father, I kept a secret from you all day. I did not wish to do anything to mar the bliss of this perfect Sunday. You – you'll break it to Lilias and Maggie, and the younger children. I'm going to Sydney on Wednesday. I came down to say good-bye."

He held out his hand. The rector stood up and grasped it.

"My dear lad – my boy. Well – well – you'll come back again. Of course, I did know that you expected to go abroad on business for your firm. My dear son. Yes, my boy – aye – you'll come back again soon. How queer you look, Gerald. Sit down. I'm afraid you're a little overdone."

"Good-bye, father. You're an old man, and Sydney is a long way off. Good-bye. I have a queer request to make. Grant it, and don't think me weak or foolish. Give me your blessing before I go."

Suddenly Wyndham fell on his knees, and taking his father's hand laid it on his head.

"I am like Esau," he said. "Is there not one blessing left for me?"

The rector was deeply moved.

"Heaven above bless you, my boy," he said. "Your mother's God go with you. There, Gerald, you are mor bid. You will be back with me before the snows of next winter fall. But God bless you, my boy, wherever you are and whatever you do!"

CHAPTER XXVII

Valentine was sitting in her pretty drawing-room. It was dinner time, but she had not changed her dress. She was too young, too fresh, and unused to trouble, for it yet to leave any strong marks on her face. The delicate color in her cheeks had slightly paled, it is true, her bright hair was in confusion, and her eyes looked larger and more wistful than their wont, but otherwise no one could tell that her heart was beating heavily and that she was listening eagerly for a footstep.

Seven o'clock came – half-past seven. This was Gerald's last night at home; he was to sail in the Esperance for Sydney to-morrow. Valentine felt stunned and cold, though she kept on repeating to herself over and over: —

"This parting is nothing. He's sure to be home in six months at the latest. Six months at the very latest. In these days there is really no such thing as distance. What is a six months' parting? Besides, it is not as if I were really in love with him. Father asked me the question direct last night, and I said I wasn't. How could I love him with all my heart when I remember that scene at the Gaiety? Oh, that scene! It burns into me like fire, and father's look – I almost hated father that night. I did really. Fancy, Valentine hating her father! Oh, of course it passed. There is no one like my father. Husbands aren't like fathers, not in the long run. Oh, Gerald, you might have told me the truth? I'd have forgiven you, I would really, if you had told me the truth. Oh, why don't you come? Why don't you come? You might be in time this last evening. It is a quarter to eight now. I am impatient – I am frightened. Oh, there's a ring at the hall door. Oh, thank God. No, of course, Gerald, I don't love you – not as I could have loved – and yet I do – I do love you – I do!"

She clasped her hands – a footstep was on the stairs. The door was opened, Masters brought her a thick letter on a salver.

"Has not Mr. Wyndham come? Was not that ring Mr. Wyndham's?"

"No, madam, a messenger brought this letter. He said there was no answer."

The page withdrew, and Valentine tore open the envelope. A letter somewhat blotted, bearing strong marks of agitation, but in her husband's writing, lay in her hand. Her eager eyes devoured the contents.

"I can't say good-bye, my darling – there are limits even to my endurance – I can't look at you and hear you say 'Good-bye, Gerald.' I bade you farewell this morning when you were asleep. I am not coming home to-night, but your father will spend the evening with you. You love him better than me, and I pray the God of all mercy that he may soften any little pang that may come to you in this separation. When you are reading this I shall be on my way to Southampton. I have bid your father good-bye, and he will tell you everything there is to tell about me. The Esperance sails at noon to-morrow, and it is a good plan to be on board in good time. I cannot tell you. Valentine, what my own feelings are. I cannot gauge my love for you. I don't think anything could probe it to its depths. I am a sinful man, but I sometimes hope that God will forgive me, because I have loved as much as the human heart is capable of loving. You must remember that, dear. You must always know that you have inspired in one man's breast the extreme of love!

"Good-bye, my darling. It is my comfort to know that the bitterness of this six months' separation falls on me. If I thought otherwise, if I thought even for a moment that you cared more for your husband than you do for the world's opinion, or for riches, or for honor, that you would rather have him with poverty and shame, that he was more to you even than the father who gave you your being, then I would say even now, at the eleventh hour, 'fly to me, Valentine. Let us go away together on board the Esperance, and forget all promises and all honor, and all truth.' Yes, I would say it. But that is a mad dream. Forget this part of my letter. Valentine. It has been wrung from a tortured and almost maddened heart. Good-bye, my wife. Be thankful that you have not it in you to love recklessly.

"Your husband,"Gerald Wyndham."

"But I have!" said Valentine. She raised her eyes. Her father was in the room.

"Yes, I can love – I too can give back the extreme of love. Father, I am going to my husband. I am going to Southampton. What's the matter? What are you looking at me like that for? Why did you send Gerald away without letting him come to say good-bye? Not that it matters, for I am going to him. I shall take the very next train to Southampton."

"My darling," began Mr. Paget.

"Oh, yes, father, yes. But there's no time for loving words just now. I've had a letter from my husband, and I'm going to him. I'm going to Sydney with him. Yes – you can't prevent me!"

"You are talking folly, Valentine," said Mr. Paget. "You are excited, my child; you are talking wildly. Going with your husband? My poor little girl. There, dear, there. He'll soon be back. You can't go with him, you know, my love. Show me his letter. What has he dared to say to excite you like this?"

"No, you shan't see a word of his dear letter. No, not for all the world. I understand him at last, and I love him with all my heart and soul. Yes, I do. Oh, no, I don't love you as I love my husband."

Mr. Paget stepped back a pace or two. There was no doubting Valentine's words, no doubting the look on her face. She was no longer a child. She was a woman, a woman aroused to passion, almost to fury.

"I am going to my husband," she said. And she took no notice of her father when he sank into the nearest chair and pressed his hand to his heart.

"I have got a blow," he said. "I have got an awful blow."

But Valentine did not heed him.

CHAPTER XXVIII

"Yes, my darling," said Mr. Paget, two hours later; his arms were round his daughter, and her head was on his shoulder. "Oh, yes, my dear one, certainly, if you wish it."

"And you'll go with me, father? Father, couldn't you come too? Couldn't we three go? Yes, that would be nice, that would be happiness."

"A good idea," said Mr. Paget, reflectively. "But really, Val, really now, don't you think Wyndham and I rather spoil you? You discover at the eleventh hour that you can't live without your husband, that as he must cross to the other side of the world, you must go there too. And now in addition I have to accompany you. Do you think you are worth all this? That any girl in the world is worth all this?"

"Perhaps not, father."

Valentine was strangely subdued and quiet.

"I suppose it would be selfish to bring you," she said; "and we shall be back in six months."

"True," said Mr. Paget in a thoughtful voice; "and even for my daughter's sake my business must not go absolutely to the dogs. Well, child, a wilful woman – you know the proverb – a wilful woman must have her way. I own I'm disappointed. I looked forward to six months all alone with you. Six months with my own child – a last six months, for of course I always guessed that when Wyndham came back you'd give yourself up to him body and soul. Oh, no, my dear, I'm not going to disappoint you. A wife fretting and mourning for her husband is the last person I should consider a desirable companion. Run upstairs now and get your maid to put your things together. I shall take you down to Southampton by an early train in the morning, and in the meantime, if you'll excuse me. Valentine, I'll go out and send a telegram to your husband."