CHAPTER XXV
Five quiet weeks slipped by--weeks full of outward, as well as ofinward, happiness at The Chase and at Freshley.
Katty Winslow had come back to Rosedean, and then, without even seeingLaura, had gone away again almost at once. She was still away when theretook place early in December the gathering together, for the first timefor many years, of a big shooting party at Knowlton Abbey.
Just before joining that pleasant party, Mrs. Pavely spent a week inLondon, and certain Pewsbury gossips, of whose very existence she wasunaware, opined that she had gone up to town to buy clothes! In a littleover a month, Godfrey Pavely would have been dead a year, and some ofthese same gossips thought it rather strange that Mrs. Pavely should begoing to stay at the Abbey before her first year of widowhood was over.But the kinder of the busybodies reminded one another that Lord St.Amant had known the mistress of The Chase from childhood, and being, ashe was, a very good-natured man, no doubt he had thought it would cheerup the poor lady to have a little change.
Yes, Laura, to Mrs. Tropenell's surprise, had gone up alone to London,and Oliver, after two days, followed her. But he had not waited toescort her back, as his mother expected him to do. He returned the daybefore Laura--in fact she was away a week, he only four days.
The gossips of Pewsbury had been right. Laura had gone up to town to geta few new clothes, but she was still wearing unrelieved black, if notexactly conventional widow's mourning, when she arrived at KnowltonAbbey.
Lord St. Amant's shooting party was a great success--a success from thepoint of view of the guests, and from that of the host. For the firsttime for many years, in fact for the first time since the death of LadySt. Amant, the house was quite full, for in addition to the neighbourswhom the host specially wished to honour, there had come down certainmore sophisticated folk from London. Among others asked had been SirAngus Kinross; but Sir Angus, to his own and Lord St. Amant's regret,had had to decline. The two men had become intimate since lastwinter--each had a real respect, a cordial liking, for the other.
The housekeeper at the Abbey had been surprised to note his lordship'sinterest in every detail. He had himself seen, and at considerablelength, the _chef_ who had come down from London for the week; he hadeven glanced over the bedroom list, making certain suggestions as towhere his various guests should sleep. Thus it was by his desire thatMrs. Tropenell had been given the largest bed-chamber in the house, onewhich had never been, in the present housekeeper's reign, occupied by avisitor. It had been, in the long, long ago, the room of his mother, theroom in fact where his lordship himself had been born some seventy oddyears ago. By his wish, also, there had been arranged for Mrs.Tropenell's occupation the old-fashioned sitting-room into which thebedroom opened.
Mr. Oliver Tropenell had been put nearly opposite Lord St. Amant's ownsleeping apartment, in that portion of the house which was known as "hislordship's wing." And Mrs. Pavely had been given, in the same part ofthe house, but at the further end of the corridor, the room which hadbeen always occupied, during her infrequent sojourns at the Abbey, bythe late Lady St. Amant.
* * * * *
And now the long, though also the all too short, week-end, which hadlasted from Thursday to Tuesday, was over, and all the guests haddeparted, with the exception of Lord St. Amant's three intimatefriends--Mrs. Tropenell, that lady's son, and Mrs. Pavely. This smallerparty was staying on for two more days, and then it would break up--Mrs.Tropenell and Mrs. Pavely returning in the morning to Freshley Manor andThe Chase, while Mr. Tropenell stayed on to accompany his host toanother big shoot in the neighbourhood.
Though all three had professed sincere regret at the departure of theirfellow guests, each of them felt a certain sense of relief, and yes, ofmore than relief, of considerable satisfaction, when they foundthemselves alone together.
There is always plenty to talk about after the breakup of a countryhouse party, and when at last the four of them found themselves togetherat dinner, they all did talk--even Laura, who was generally so silent,talked and laughed, and exchanged quick, rather shy jests with Oliver.
Laura and Oliver? Lord St. Amant had of course very soon discoveredtheir innocent secret. He had taxed Mrs. Tropenell with the truth, andshe had admitted it, while explaining that they desired theirengagement, for obvious reasons, to remain secret for a while.
During these last few days their host had admired, with a touch ofwhimsical surprise, Laura's dignity, and Oliver's self-restraint. Ofcourse they had managed to be a good deal together, aided by Lord St.Amant's unobtrusive efforts, and owing to the fact that Mrs. Tropenell'scharming sitting-room upstairs was always at their disposal.
But no one in the cheerful, light-hearted company had come within milesof guessing the truth; and Oliver Tropenell had done his full share inhelping Lord St. Amant in the entertainment of his guests. He had alsomade himself duly agreeable to the ladies--indeed, Oliver, in a sense,had been the success of the party, partly because the way of his life inMexico enabled him to bring a larger, freer air into the discussionswhich had taken place after dinner and in the smoking-room, and alsobecause of his vitality--a vitality which just now burned with abrighter glow....
Lord St. Amant and Oliver only stayed on at the dining-table a very fewminutes after Mrs. Tropenell and Laura had gone off into thedrawing-room.
Though now on very cordial terms, the two men never had very much to sayto one another. Yet Lord St. Amant had always been fond of Oliver. Beingthe manner of man he was, he could not but feel attached to LettyTropenell's child. Still, there had been a time, now many long yearsago, just after the death of his wife, when he had been acutely jealousof Oliver--jealous, that is, of Mrs. Tropenell's absorption, love, andpride, in her son. She had made it so very clear that she desired nocloser tie to her old friend--and this had shrewdly hurt hisself-esteem. But he had been too much of a philosopher to bear_rancune_, and such a friendship as theirs soon became had, after all,its compensations.
When Oliver settled in Mexico the time had passed by for a renewal ofthe old relations, and for a while the tie which had lasted for so long,and survived so many secret vicissitudes, appeared to loosen....
But now, again, all that was changed. Lord St. Amant had given up hiswanderings on the Continent, and he had come once more very near to Mrs.Tropenell, during this last year. He and Oliver were also better friendsthan they had ever been; this state of things dated from last winter,for, oddly enough, what had brought them in sympathy had been the deathof Godfrey Pavely. They had been constantly together during the dayswhich had followed the banker's mysterious disappearance, and they hadworked in close union, each, in a sense, representing Laura, and havinga dual authority from her to do what seemed best.
Still, to-night, excellent as were the terms on which each man felt withthe other, neither had anything to say that could not be said better inthe company of the ladies. And when in the drawing-room, which nowlooked so large and empty with only two, where last night there had beentwelve, women gathered together about the fireplace, the four talked on,pleasantly, cheerfully, intimately, as they had done at dinner.
After a while Laura and Oliver slipped away into the smallerdrawing-room, and Lord St. Amant and Mrs. Tropenell, hardly aware thatthe other two had left them, went on gossiping--harking back, as theynow so often did, to the old stories, the old human tragedies andcomedies, of the neighbourhood.
Soon after ten Laura and Oliver came back, walking side by side, andOliver's mother looked up with a proud, fond glance.
They were a striking, well-matched couple--Laura looking more beautifulthan ever to-night, perhaps because she seemed a thought more animatedthan usual.
"I've come to say good-night," she exclaimed. "I feel so sleepy! Oliverand I had such a glorious walk this afternoon."
She bent down and kissed Mrs. Tropenell. And then, unexpectedly, sheturned to Lord St. Amant, and put up her face as if she expected himalso to kiss her.
Amused and touche
d, he bent and brushed his old lips against her softcheek: "My dear," he exclaimed, "this is very kind of you!"
And then Oliver stepped forward into the circle of light thrown by thebig wood fire.
He said a little huskily, "My turn next, Laura----" And to the infinitesurprise of his mother and of his host, Laura, with an impulsive, tendergesture, reached up towards him, and he, too, brushed her soft face withhis lips.
Then he took her hand, and led her to the door. And Lord St. Amant,quoting Champmele, turned to his old love: "'Ah! Madame--quelle joliechose qu'un baiser!'" he murmured, and ere the door had quite closedbehind Oliver he, too, had put his arm with a caressing gesture roundher shoulder, and drawn her to him, with the whispered words,"Letty--don't think me an old fool!" And then, "Oh, Letty! Do youremember the first time----" And though she made no answer, he knew shedid remember, like himself only too well, the wild, winter afternoon,nearer forty than thirty years ago, when they two had been caught alone,far from home, in a great storm--the wild weather responding to theirwild mood. They had taken shelter in a deserted, half-ruined barn, asurvival of the days when England had still great granaries. And there,throwing everything aside--the insistent promptings of honour, and theless insistent promptings of prudence--St. Amant had kissed Letty....
He remembered, even now, the thrill of mingled rapture, shame,gratitude, triumph, and stinging self-rebuke, which had accompanied thatfirst long clinging kiss.
The next day he had left the Abbey for the Continent, and when, at last,he had come back, he had himself again well in hand....
Only yesterday the shooters had gone by that old seventeenth-centurybarn, of which nothing now remained but thick low walls, and as he hadtramped by the spot, so alone with his memories, if outwardly socompanioned, there had swept over his heart, that heart which was stillsusceptible to every keen emotion, a feeling of agonised regret for whathad--and what had not been.
"Ah, Letty," he said huskily, "you've been the best friend man ever had!Don't you think the time has come for two such old friends as you and Ihave been never to part? It isn't as if I had a great deal of timeleft."
* * * * *
An hour later Lord St. Amant was sitting up in bed, reading the fourthvolume of a certain delightful edition of the Memoirs of the Duc deSaint Simon. He was feeling happier than he had felt for a very longtime--stirred and touched too, as he had not thought to be again.
Complacently he reminded himself of the successful, the brilliantlysuccessful, elderly marriages he had known in his time. 'Twas odd whenone came to think of it, but he couldn't remember one such which hadturned out a failure!
Dear Letty--who had known how to pass imperceptibly from youth to agewith such a fine, measured dignity, while retaining so much which hadmade her as a girl and as an older woman the most delightful andstimulating of companions. What an agreeable difference her presencewould make to his existence as he went slowly down into the shadows! Heshuddered a little--the thought of old age, of real old age, becomingsuddenly, vividly repugnant.
Thank God, Letty was very much younger than himself. When he was eightyshe would be sixty-three. He tried to put away that thought, the thoughtthat some day he would be infirm, as well as old.
He looked up from his book.
How odd to think that Letty had never been in this room, where he hadspent so much of his life from boyhood onwards! He longed to show hersome of the things he had here--family miniatures, old politicalcaricatures, some of his favourite books--they would all interest her.
He was glad he had arranged that she should have, on this visit, hisdear mother's room. When he had married--close on fifty years ago--hisparents had been alive, and later his wife, as the new Lady St. Amant,had not cared to take over her predecessor's apartments. She had beenvery little here, for soon, poor woman, she had become an invalid--amost disagreeable, selfish invalid. He told himself that after all hehad had a certain amount of excuse for--well, for the sort of existencehe had led so long. If poor Adelaide had only died twenty years earlier,and he had married Letty--ah, _then_, he would indeed have become anexemplary character! Yet he had been faithful to Letty--in hisfashion....
No other woman had even approached near the sanctuary where the woman ofwhom now, to-night, he was able to think as his future wife, had at oncebecome so securely enthroned. It had first been a delicious, if adangerous, relationship, and, later, a most agreeable friendship. Duringthe last few months she had become rather to his surprise very necessaryto him, and these last few days he had felt how pleasant it would be tohave Letty always here, at the Abbey, either in his company, or resting,reading, or writing in the room where everything still spoke to him ofthe long-dead mother who had been so dear to him.
Of course they would wait till Oliver and Laura were married--say, tillsome time in February or March: and then, when those two rather tiresomeyounger people were disposed of, they, he and Letty, would slip upquietly to London, and, in the presence of perhaps two or three oldfriends, they would be made man and wife.
He reflected complacently that nothing in his life would be changed,save that Letty would be there, at the Abbey, as she had been the lastfew days, always ready to hear with eager interest anything he had tosay, always with her point of view sufficiently unlike his own to giveflavour, even sometimes a touch of the unexpected, to theirconversation.
* * * * *
A knock at the door, and his valet came in, and walked close up to thebed.
"It's a telephone message, my lord. From Sir Angus Kinross--private toyour lordship."
"Yes. What is the message?"
Lord St. Amant felt a slight tremor of discomfort sweep over him. Whatan odd time to send a trunk-call through--at close on midnight.
"Sir Angus has been trying to get on for some time, my lord; there was afault on the line. Sir Angus would be much obliged if you would meet himat your lordship's rooms at one o'clock to-morrow. He says he's sorry totrouble your lordship to come up to London, but it's very important. Hecame himself to the telephone, my lord. He asked who I was. I did offerto fetch your lordship, but he said there was no occasion for that--if Iwould deliver the message myself."
"All right, Barrett."
"Sir Angus begs your lordship not to tell any one that your businessto-morrow is with him."
"I quite understand that."