The Affair at the Inn

'Sir Archibald,' I said, returning to the parlour, where they all sat, 'if you had seen the business I had to get Greytoria down that hill, you would hesitate more about getting her up it. But the landlady here tells us that if you go round by the lower road you avoid the hill, and it is only a little longer.'

'I don't believe in country people's distances,' he said, 'but I'll inquire.'

I turned back, as if by accident, into the bar, and leaned across the counter towards the landlady. She was a genial-looking old woman with a rollicking eye.

'The young people wish to go round by the low road,' I said, 'but I'm afraid there may be some difficulties made about it.' I hesitated and smiled at her, adding, 'It's not much farther, is it?'

'Happen four mile or so, ma'am,' she said, looking hard at me.

'Four? As much as that?' I asked.

'Happen three mile, maybe,' she corrected; 'no, two and a half.'

Here Sir Archibald came out to inquire about the distance. He looked up at the grey skies first, and seemed uncertain.

'How much farther do you call it by the low road to Grey Tor?' he asked.

'Close on two mile, sir,' she mumbled shamelessly, and Sir Archibald hesitated no longer.

'Two miles of level are better than half a mile of precipice. I vote for the longer road, Miss Pomeroy,' he said, on going back into the parlour.

Virginia nodded and smiled. She was sitting at the old, tinny-sounding spinet, singing the most beautiful little wandering airs that might have been learned in fairyland.

Suddenly she drifted into a plaintive melody we had not heard before, and when we had succumbed to its spell she began singing some words I had found in my dear mother's diary. I had given the verses to Virginia, and she had set them to an air of her own. It is a part of her charm that she sings sad songs as if she had never felt joy, and gay ones as if she had never known care or sorrow.

''Tis I am a lady, now that I'm old;I'm sheltered from hunger and want and cold,In a wonderful country that's rich in gold,(And life to the last is sweet).Now in the doorway I sit at my ease,And my son's son he plays at my kneesOn little stumbling feet.But my heart goes back to the days of old,To a barren country where gorse is gold,For oh! it was there that my love was told,'Twas there we used to meet!'They may think I've forgotten the land forlorn,In the happy valleys covered with corn;They may lay me down with my face to the morn,A stone at my head and feet;But I know that before the break o' the dayMy soul will arise and be far away(The spirits travel fleet), —Away from the valleys covered with corn,Back again to the land forlorn,For oh! it was there that my Love was born,'Twas there we used to meet!'1

Sir Archibald, Mr. Willoughby, and I could have listened for an hour, but I felt that it was time to hurry off the elders of the party, so made dark allusions to the weather. These were sufficient to rouse Mrs. MacGill and Mrs. Pomeroy, who were in a semi-comatose condition induced by copious draughts of tea.

We all went to the door of the inn, and Mr. Willoughby came and helped me to my seat in the motor.

'I am coming across to Grey Tor on Saturday,' he said. 'I have some sketches to take over that way. Shall you still be at the inn?'

'Probably,' I answered evasively.

'I hope so,' said he; 'perhaps we may have another talk such as we have had this afternoon.'

'Who knows? Talk is a fugitive pleasure,' I replied. 'Some days it will be good, and others it can't be captured at any price.'

'I'll come in the chance of catching some,' he whispered. And at this moment Mrs. MacGill interrupted us and insisted that I should tie on her shawl. The homeward drive was begun, but it would be too long a story to describe its miseries. Imagination must do its work here.

VII

VIRGINIA POMEROY

I woke this morning neither rested nor refreshed. I was determined not to stay in bed, for I wanted to show Sir Archibald by my calm and natural demeanour that I was unconscious of anything embarrassing in our relations. For that matter I am not sure that there is. I wore my pink linen, and looked paler instead of gayer, as I intended. Breakfast was quiet, though mamma had borne the picnic wonderfully and Miss Evesham was brighter than usual. Sir Archibald was baffling. He met my eye as seldom as possible, but I am glad to say, though he was absent-minded, he was not grumpy. Why do I care whether he is grumpy or not? Why do I like to see him come out sunny and warm and genial, and relax his severe face into an unexpected laugh? And why do I feel pleased when he melts under my particular coaxing? I have deliberately tried to disparage him to myself and compare him with other men, especially with Breck Calhoun, always to his disadvantage. He is not a bit handsomer than Breck, though mere beauty after all counts for almost nothing in a man. He hasn't, on the whole, as good manners as Breck, and doesn't begin to understand me as well. He is an ordinary, straight, simple, intelligent but not intellectual Anglo-Saxon. I have assured myself of this dozens of times, and having treated him as a kind of snow image, merely for the satisfaction of throwing disparaging epithets at him, and demolishing his outline, I look at him next morning only to find that he has put himself together again and made himself, somehow, into the semblance of the man I love.

There are plenty of men who can manage their own moods, without a woman's kind offices, so why should I bother about his? If it were Breck Calhoun, now, he would be bothering about mine! It is just the time of year when dear old Breck makes the annual offer of his heart and hand – more, as he says, as a matter of habit than anything else, and simply to remind me that there is an excellent husband waiting for me at home when I cease running after strange hearts. That is his expression.

I think some of the marriages between persons of different nationality must come off because of the fascination and mystery that each has for the other, – the same sort of fascination, but a still stronger one, that is exerted by an opposite temperament. In the friendship of a man of Sir Archibald's type I feel a sense of being steadied and strengthened, simplified and balanced. And there ought to be something in the vivacity of the American girl – the result of climate and circumstances and condition, I suppose – which should enliven and stimulate these grave 'children of the mist.' The feeling I have lately had for Archibald Mackenzie (he would frown if he could hear me leave out the Maxwell and the Kindarroch) is just the basis I need for love, but my liking would never go so far as that, unless it were compelled by a still stronger feeling on the man's part. I am not going to do any of the wooing, that is certain. If a man chose to give me his very best I would try to deserve it and keep it and cherish it, but I have no desire to fan his inward fires beforehand. After he is once kindled, if he hasn't heat enough to burn of his own free will, then let him go out! Sir Archibald is afraid of himself and afraid of love. Well, he need not worry about me! I might like to see the delightfully incongruous spectacle of a man of his type honestly and heartily in love, and (in passing) it would be of inestimable benefit to his character; but I want no panic-stricken lovers in my company. Haven't I enough fears of my own, about wet climates and cold houses and monarchical governments and tin bath-tubs and porridge and my mother's preference for American husbands? But I should despise myself if I didn't feel capable of throwing all these, and more, overboard if the right time ever comes.

I haven't been downstairs either to luncheon or tea, but I looked from mamma's window and chanced to see Johnson putting Sir Archibald's portmanteau into the motor. I thought this morning that he intended to run away. And that is the stuff they make soldiers of in Scotland! Afraid of love! Fie! Sir Archibald!

I cannot succeed in feeling like the 'maiden all forlorn.' It impresses me somehow that he has gone away to think it over. Well, that is reasonable; I don't suppose to a man of Sir Archibald's temperament two weeks seems an extreme length of time in which to choose a wife; and as I need considerable reflection on my part I'll go away too, presently, and take mamma to Torquay, as was our original intention. Torquay is relaxing, and I think I have been a trifle too much stimulated by this bracing moorland air. I hope for his own comfort that Sir Archibald will do his thinking in a warmer clime; and when (or if) he returns to acquaint Virginia with the result of his meditations, he will learn that she also is thinking – but in a place unknown!

MRS. MACGILL

It is just as I feared. The trouble is in my right knee, so stiff that I can scarcely bend it, and exceedingly painful. Cecilia calls it 'a touch of rheumatism.'

'Indeed,' I said, 'it's a pretty secure grasp, not a touch; were I what is called a danseuse, my livelihood would be gone, but mercifully I don't need to dance.'

Cecilia laughed; she thinks nothing of any illness but neuralgia.

'We must leave this place very soon,' said I, 'and return to Tunbridge Wells; life here is fit only for cannibals.'

In the morning it was impossible for me to come down to breakfast, but with great difficulty I dragged myself downstairs about eleven. I felt it my duty to the son of an old friend to seek an opportunity for quietly speaking my mind to Sir Archibald about Miss Pomeroy, so decided to do it at once. I found them together, as usual, in the coffee-room. The girl was looking pale; she is beginning to be afraid that her arts are in vain.

Sir Archibald was standing beside her, looking very much bored. She made some excuse, and left the room soon after I had come in.

'I hope you are not the worse of your adventure in the motor, Mrs. MacGill,' Sir Archibald began.

'Thank you,' said I, sitting down close to him. 'I am, a good deal. My right knee is excessively painful, and I have a very strange buzzing in the head.'

'Ah, you are not accustomed to the motor; it's all habit.'

'I am not accustomed to a motor, Sir Archibald,' said I, 'nor am I accustomed to the ways of young women nowadays, —young ladies we used to be called when I was a girl, but I feel that the phrase is quite inapplicable to a person like Miss Pomeroy.'

'"Young woman" is better, perhaps,' he said, I thought with a smile.

'No lady,' I continued, 'when I was young, would talk like that or act like that.' 'A sweet face shrinking under a cottage bonnet' (as Mr. MacGill used to say) 'is better than any tulip.'

Sir Archibald smiled again, and seemed about to leave the room, but I asked him to be so good as to hold a skein of wool for me. I had brought down my knitting, so he sat down to hold it, looking rather annoyed.

I continued firmly, 'There is a freedom – I should almost say a licence – about American women and their ways – '

'You have dropped your ball,' he said; and when he had returned it to me, he began to try to change the subject by remarking about the weather.

'It is,' I said, 'extremely cold, as it has always been ever since I came here, but, as I was saying, there is something about Miss Pomeroy's singing – '

Here he bent his head so low that I was unable to see his face, and stretched my wool so tight that I fear my next socks will be spoiled; it was three-ply merino, and very soft.

'She sings,' I went on without taking any notice of the wool, 'in a way that I feel sure poor Mr. MacGill would have considered indecorous. I was a musician myself as a girl, and used to sing with much expression. "She Wore a Wreath of Roses" was a great favourite. I always expected to be asked to repeat it. I remember on one occasion when I came to —

"A sombre widow's cap adorns

Her once luxuriant hair,"

a gentleman who stood by the piano – he was a widower – was obliged to turn away. But that was quite a different matter from the kind of expression that Miss Pomeroy puts into things. It's not proper. I must speak plainly to you, and say it is almost passionate, though I dislike to use the word.

"When I am dead, my dearest – "

Are these words for the drawing-room? You are pulling my skein rather tight, Sir Archibald. It stretches so easily, and these light wools require such care.

"And dreaming through the twilight

Haply I may remember, and haply may forget."

Remember what? forget what? The inquiry rises unbidden. Just ask yourself if these are words for the lips of any young woman – far less a young lady.'

Here Sir Archibald coughed so violently that he had to let go my wool (which got all tangled) and stand up.

'Excuse me,' he interrupted, 'but I have promised to speak with Johnson about something – '

'I won't detain you more than a minute,' I interrupted, 'only just to say a word of warning to the son of an old friend. Foreigners who speak our own language are the worst of all. O Sir Archibald, your grandmother was Scotch, your mother was Scotch before you were born, and all your good aunts too. I must warn you that if you let this American girl, this Miss Pomeroy, succeed in her attempt – '

'Mrs. MacGill,' he exclaimed, 'I cannot allow you to use Miss Pomeroy's name to me in this way.'

'Very well,' said I, 'but if you do not take my advice and beware, Miss Pomeroy will have no name to mention, for she will be Lady Maxwell Mackenzie, and you will be a miserable man with an American wife.'

He muttered something, I couldn't say what; the word 'Jove' was mentioned, and there was some allusion to 'an old cat.' I failed to see the connection, for no one could call Miss Pomeroy 'old,' whatever she is; then without a word of apology he left the room. Young men, even baronets, have no manners nowadays. Mr. MacGill's were courtly; he never used one word where two would do, and bowed frequently to every lady, often apologising most profusely when there was no occasion for it.

SIR ARCHIBALD MAXWELL MACKENZIE

Carleton Hotel, London

I came down late, the morning after that drive, having spent a bad night. In spite of the fact that Johnson had been out with the motor and the old ladies till nearly midnight, I never thought of going down to look at the car. It had lost interest in a way I didn't like. To tell the truth, I was thinking of nothing at all except of that girl. I had made up my mind that this was not to be endured. Since I kissed her – it is awful to confess it – I have wished for nothing so much as to kiss her again, and before I become the sort of blithering idiot that a man is when in love, I must and shall be off. It is not the girl I funk; she is a nice girl; I never wish to see a nicer, and I know I never shall. It is the feeling I am beginning to have about her. When she is not there I feel as if something necessary to my existence were wanting, – as if I had come off without a pocket-handkerchief or gone out in a top-hat and frock-coat without an umbrella on a showery day in town. When a man gets to feel this about another human being it is time he was off. I have sent orders to Johnson to be ready to start at any moment.

I wish I had not seen Miss Virginia, though, before going. She looked so pale and done up. Mrs. MacGill came into the room before I had time to speak to her, even to tell her I was going away, though I somehow think she guessed it. As to that old frump, that harpy in black velvet and beads, Mrs. MacGill, I will not write down the things she elected to say to me about Virginia, when she had got me tied to her apron-string with her confounded skein of wool. I wish I had chucked it in her face and told her to go to the devil. If I'd had the spirit of half a man, I would have done it, and gone straight to Virginia. Virginia! This gave me a feeling about her that I can't describe, – much, much worse than the handkerchief-and-umbrella feeling, – a feeling that seemed to tweak and pull at something inside me that I had never been conscious of before. But I had an obstinate fit on, that I'm subject to, like other men, I suppose. I had said I would go, and I have gone, leaving a card of good-bye for the Pomeroys, and making straight for town.

It is no use; for after a few days of struggle and doubt and misery, I have got to go back to that girl – if I can find her. What a wretched time I have had! If this is being in love I hope it won't last. I'm told it doesn't usually, after marriage. Perhaps it settles down into something more comfortable, that does not interfere with a man's meals or destroy his sleep. It is awful to think that your whole life may or may not be changed, according to the fancy of a girl whose existence you weren't aware of a fortnight ago! I have told Johnson we are going straight back to Dartmoor, and he grinned – the wretch! Of course he knows why.

CECILIA EVESHAM

Grey Tor InnThursday morning

Ended the Dartmoor drama! Gone Sir Archibald! Vanished the motor! Gone too, dear Virginia and Mrs. Pomeroy! only Mrs. MacGill and I are left! He went on Wednesday, the Pomeroys on Thursday, and I now await events. Virginia tells me she has taken her mother to Torquay, but that is a wide word!

Saturday

I thought it would be so: a week without her was enough. Yesterday Sir Archibald, or what used to be Sir Archibald, appeared at the inn again.

But what a change was here! Shall I put down our conversation without comment?

Cecilia. So you have come back, Sir Archibald?

Sir A. Yes.

Cecilia. I hope you had a pleasant run to town, or wherever you went.

Sir A. Beastly.

Cecilia. What? Did the motor break down, or the weather?

Sir A. Neither.

Cecilia. What was wrong, then?

Sir A. Everything. (Then suddenly) Where have the Pomeroys gone to, Miss Evesham?

Cecilia. To Torquay, I understand.

Sir A. Do you know their address?

Cecilia. I do not. I suppose they will be at one of the hotels.

Sir A. You are making fun of me. Tell me where they are. I am in earnest.

Cecilia. So am I. I do not know their address.

He started up, wrung my hand without a word, and hurried out of the room. I looked after him in the hall, but he was so intent on the Torquay Guide that he never noticed me.

He steamed off Torquay-wards half an hour later.

I have had a pleasant chat with Mr. Willoughby, who appeared this afternoon. He looks at life and all things much as I do. He is a distinct relief from Mrs. MacGill, a distinct relief; and though he has made no special reputation as yet, he is bound to succeed, for he has decided talent.

VIII

MRS. MACGILL

My words have taken effect; it is often disagreeable to have to give unasked advice, but one should always do it. Sir Archibald has gone. It is a pleasant thought that any simple words of mine may have been the means of saving the young man from that designing person.

She conceals her disappointment as well as she can, and is doing her best to look as if nothing had happened in one way or another; but I can see below the surface of that new hat. She has taken her mother off to Torquay for a few days. It is a large town seemingly, though I have heard that there are no men there; but as the guide-book says the population is twenty-five thousand, that is probably an exaggeration. However, Miss Pomeroy won't stay long in Torquay in that case, but will return to New York, where she would fain make us believe they are as plentiful as in a harem. They cannot all be millionaires at least, for she says that many American writers live on what they make by their books.

Cecilia would like to stay on here, I think. She has been up to the top of a quarry looking at gorse along with that so-called artist, Mr. Willoughby.

Miss Pomeroy has infected her, I am afraid, and the bad example is telling, even at that age.

We have had several nice quiet days here alone since the Pomeroys left. There has scarcely been a sound in the hotel, except when the wind pounces upon the window-frames in the sudden, annoying way that it has here. Twice I have got up, to endeavour to fasten the window, and each time have lost a toothbrush. It shakes my nerves completely when the windows clatter suddenly through the night. Yesterday as we sat in the dining-room I heard a crunching noise.

'Can that be another motor?' I exclaimed. 'I hope not. It is a class of people I do not wish to associate with any further.'

'It is a motor,' called Cecilia, who sat next the window. 'A scarlet motor, too.'

In another moment the door opened, and Sir Archibald Maxwell Mackenzie came in.

'Dear me, Sir Archibald,' said I, 'what has brought you back again so soon? You will have a nice quiet time here now, for we are the only people in the hotel.'

He seemed strangely put out and unlike himself, and passed my chair without even replying to my speech. I could see that he was thoroughly unnerved, very much in the same state that I was when we came back from that terrible drive. It is no wonder; motoring must tell on the strongest nerves in time.

Later in the day Cecilia came in smiling. 'Sir Archibald has gone away again,' she said. 'He has not made a long stay this time!'

'No,' I observed, 'that sort of nervous excitement grows on people. I know myself that if I once begin to get excited over a bazaar, for instance, I get off my sleep, and worn out in no time. I suppose he has rushed off farther into the moor.'

'He has gone to Torquay,' remarked Cecilia, 'quite an easy run from here.'

I was much annoyed. It seemed probable that he would meet Miss Pomeroy again there, though possible that among twenty-five thousand women he might fail to recognise her. I think Cecilia and I must take a day or two at Torquay on our way home. It would soothe me after this mountain air and the desolation of Grey Tor, and I could get some fresh bead trimming for my velvet mantle, which has been much destroyed by all that I have come through in this place. Our packing will be very easily done. Poor Mr. MacGill used always to say, in his playful manner, that he could stand anything except a woman's luggage, which is the reason that I always try to travel with as little as possible. So there will be only our two large boxes and the holdall and my black bag and the split cane basket and the Holland umbrella-case, with two straps of rugs and the small brown box, and the two hat-boxes, and a basket with some food. Miss Pomeroy's boxes were like arks. I'm sure if she succeeds in her design, I pity the man that has to take them back to Scotland; they would never go in the motor. I think Greytoria and the pony chaise will manage all our little things quite nicely. She seems the quietest animal in the stables, so I must just trust myself in it once more.

There goes Cecilia again, walking on the gravel at the door with that Mr. Willoughby. We must certainly leave to-morrow morning.

One affair such as that of Miss Pomeroy and Sir Archibald is enough for me to endure without being witness of another.

One would suppose common modesty would prevent a young gentleman and lady from indulging in a love-affair whilst inhabiting an ordinary country inn; but there is no limit to the boldness of these Americans. I sometimes think it is a pity that they were discovered, for they have been a bad example to more retiring and respectable nations.

SIR ARCHIBALD MAXWELL MACKENZIE

Torquay

That dreary week of uncertainty in London seemed more foolish than ever, when Johnson and I struck the familiar road from Stoke Babbage to the moor. What a silly ass I was, I thought, to kick my heels at the Carleton all those tiresome days when I might have been with Virginia!

It all looked exactly the same as we came up the hill from the little town, – the bare walls of the hotel, Grey Tor with a row of tourists on the top, moor ponies feeding all over the place, with their tiny foals running after them. It was a lovely, cloudless day, with 'blue distances' enough to please all the artists in creation, and the hot air quivered over the heath as I've seen it do at home on an August afternoon. I seemed to hear Virginia's voice already, to see her standing on the step in one of her pretty new frocks, and my spirits went up with a bound. But when I got to the door there was no one there. I went into the dining-room; the tables were changed; the one at which we all used to sit together in the window was pushed into the middle of the room. At a small table on the side were seated Mrs. MacGill and Miss Evesham, while the Exeter artist was at another one not far off. Miss Evesham and he seemed to be having a pretty lively conversation, while Mrs. MacGill looked thoroughly out of it and decidedly sulky.