CHAPTER VII
The terraced garden at Garth rested to the south and east on asustaining wall so high that to build it to-day would tax theresources of three Squires. Unfortunately, either for defence orprotection from the weather, the wall rose high on the inner sidealso, so that he who walked in the garden might enjoy the mellow tintsof the old brickwork, but had no view of the country except throughcertain loop-holes, gable-shaped, which pierced the wall at intervals,like the port-holes of a battleship. If the lover of landscape wantedmore, he must climb half a dozen steps to a raised walk which ranalong the south side. Thence he could look, as from an eyrie, on thegreen meadows below him, or away to the line of hills to westward, orturning about he could overlook the operations of the gardener at hisfeet.
More, if it rained or blew there was at the south-west corner, andentered from the raised walk, an ancient Dutch summer-house of brick,with a pyramidal roof. It had large windows and, with much at Garththat served for ornament rather than utility, it was decayed, time anddamp having almost effaced its dim frescoes. But tradition hallowedit, for it was said that William of Orange, after dining in the hallat the oaken table which still bore the date 1691, had smoked his pipeand drunk his Schnapps in this summer-house; and thence had watchedthe roll of the bowls and the play of the bias on the turf below. Forin those days the garden had been a bowling green.
There on summer evenings the Squire would still drink his port, but inwinter the place was little used, tools desecrated it, and tubers tookrefuge in it. So when Josina began about this time to frequent it,and, as winter yielded to the first breath of spring, began to carryher work thither of an afternoon, Miss Peacock should have had hersuspicions. But the good lady saw nothing, being a busy woman. Thomasthe groom did remark the fact, for idle hands make watchful eyes, butfor a time he was none the wiser.
"What's young Miss doing up there?" he asked himself. "Must betarnation cold! And her look's fine, too! Ay, 'tis well to be them ashas nought to do but traipse up and down and sniff the air!"
Naturally it did not at once occur to him that the summer-housecommanded a view of the path which ran along the brook side; nor didhe suppose that Miss had any purpose, when, as might happen perhapsonce a week, she would leave her station at the window and in anaimless fashion wander down to the mill--and beyond it. She might befollowing a duck inclined to sit, or later--for turkeys will stray--besearching for a turkey's nest. She might be doing fifty things,indeed--she was sometimes so long away. But the time did come when,being by chance at the mill, Thomas saw a second figure on the pathbeside the water, and he laid by the knowledge for future use. He wasa sly fellow, not much in favor with the other servants.
Presently there came a cold Saturday in March, a wet, windy day, whento saunter by the brook would have too odd an air. But would it havean odd look, Josina wondered, standing before the glass in her room,if she ran across to the Cottage for ten minutes about sunset? Thebank closed early on Saturdays, and men were not subject to theweather as women were. Twice she put on her bonnet, and twice she tookit off and put it back in its box--she could not make up her mind. Hemight think that she followed him. He might think her bold. Or supposethat when they met before others, she blushed; or that they thoughtthe meeting strange? And, after all, he might not be there--he was nofavorite with Mrs. Bourdillon, and his heart might fail him. In theend the bonnet was put away, but it is to be feared that that eveningJos was a little snappish with Miss Peacock when arraigned for someact of forgetfulness.
Had she gone she might have come off no better than Clement, who,braving all things, did go. Mrs. Bourdillon did not, indeed, say whenhe entered, "What, here again?" but her manner spoke for her, andArthur, who had arrived before his time, received the visitor withless than his usual good humor. Clement's explanation, that he hadleft his gun, fell flat, and so chilly were the two that he stayed buttwenty minutes, then faltered an excuse, and went off with his tailbetween his legs.
He did not guess that he had intruded on a family difference, atrouble of some standing, which the passage of weeks had butaggravated. It turned on Ovington's offer, which Arthur, pluminghimself on his success and proud of his prospects, had lost no time inconveying to his mother. He had supposed that she would see the thingwith his eyes, and be as highly delighted. To become a partner soearly, to share at his age in the rising fortunes of the house! Surelyshe would believe in him now, if she had never believed in him before.
But Mrs. Bourdillon had been imbued by her husband with one fixedidea--that whatever happened she must never touch her capital; thatunder no circumstances must she spend it, or transfer it or alienateit. That way lay ruin. No sooner, therefore, had Arthur come to thatpart of his story than she had taken fright; and nothing that he hadbeen able to say, no assurance that he had been able to give, nogilded future that he had been able to paint, had sufficed to move thegood woman from her position.
"Of course," she said, looking at him piteously, for she hated tooppose him, "I'm not saying that it does not sound nice, dear."
"It is nice! Very nice!"
"But I'm older than you, and oh, dear, dear, I've known whatdisappointment is! I remember when your father thought that hehad the promise of the Benthall living and we bought the drawing-roomcarpet, though it was blue and buff and your father did not like thecolor--something to do with a fox, I remember, though to be sure a foxis red! Well, my dear," drumming with her fingers on her lap in aplacid way that maddened her listener, "he was just as confident asyou are, and after all the Bishop gave the living to his own cousin,and the money thrown clean away, and the carpet too large for any roomwe had, and woven of one piece so that we couldn't cut it! I'm surethat was a lesson to me that there's many a slip between the cup andthe lip. Believe me, a bird in the hand----"
"But this is in the hand!" Arthur cried, restraining himself withdifficulty. "This is in the hand!"
"Well, I don't know how that may be. I never was a business woman,whatever your uncle may say when he is in his tantrums. But I do knowthat your father told me, nine or ten times----"
"And you've told me a hundred times!"
"Well, and I'm sure your uncle would say the same! But, indeed, Idon't know what he wouldn't say if he knew what we were thinking of!"
"The truth is, mother, you are afraid of the Squire."
"And if I am," plaintively, "it is all very well for you, Arthur, whoare away six days out of seven. But I'm here and he's here. And I haveto listen to him. And if this money is lost----"
"But it cannot be lost, I tell you!"
"Well, if it is lost, we shall both be beggars! Oh, dear, dear, I'msure if your father told me once he told me a hundred times----"
"Damn!" Arthur cried, fairly losing his temper at last. "The truth is,mother, that my father knew nothing about money."
At that, however, Mrs. Bourdillon began to cry and Arthur foundhimself obliged to drop the matter for the time. He saw, too, that hewas on the wrong tack, and a few days later, under pressure ofnecessity, he tried another. He humbled himself, he wheedled, hecajoled; and when he had by this means got on the right side of hismother he spoke of Ovington's success.
"In a few years he will be worth a quarter of a million," he said.
The figure flustered her. "Why, that's----"
"A quarter of a million," he repeated impressively. "And that's why Iconsider this the chance of my life, mother. It is such an opportunityas I shall never have again. It is within my reach now, and surely,surely," his voice shook with the fervor of his pleading, "you willnot be the one to dash it from my lips?" He laid his hand upon herwrist. "And ruin your son's life, mother?"
She was shaken. "You know, if I thought it was for your good!"
"It is! It is, mother!"
"I'd do anything to make you happy, Arthur! But I don't believe," witha sigh, "that whatever I did your uncle would pay the money."
"Is it his money or yours?"
"Why, of course, Arthur, I
thought that you knew that it was yourfather's." She was very simple, and her pride was touched.
"And now it is yours. And I suppose that some day--I hope it will be along day, mother--it will be mine. Believe me, you've only to write tomy uncle and tell him that you have decided to call it up, and he willpay it as a matter of course. Shall I write the letter for you tosign?"
Mrs. Bourdillon looked piteously at him. She was very, very unwillingto comply, but what was she to do? Between love of him and fear of theSquire, what was she to do? Poor woman, she did not know. But he waswith her, the Squire was absent, and she was about to acquiesce when alast argument occurred to her. "But you are forgetting," she said, "ifyour uncle takes offence, and I'm sure he will, he'll come between youand Josina."
"Well, that is his look-out."
"Arthur! You don't mean that you've changed your mind, and you sofond of her? And the girl heir to Garth and all her father's money!"
"I say nothing about it," Arthur declared. "If he chooses to comebetween us that will be his doing, not mine."
"But Garth!" Mrs. Bourdillon was altogether at sea. "My dear boy, youare not thinking! Why, Lord ha' mercy on us, where would you find suchanother, young and pretty and all, and Garth in her pocket? Why, if itwere only on Jos's account you'd be mad to quarrel with him."
"I'm not going to quarrel with him," Arthur replied sullenly. "If hechooses to quarrel with me, well, she's not the only heiress in theworld."
His mother held up her hands. "Oh dear me," she said wearily. "I giveit up, I don't understand you. But I'm only a woman and I suppose Idon't understand anything."
He was accustomed to command and she to be guided. He saw that she waswavering, and he plied her afresh, and in the end, though not withoutanother outburst of tears, he succeeded. He fetched the pen, hesmoothed the paper, and before he handed his mother her bed-candle hehad got the fateful letter written, and had even by lavishing on herunusual signs of affection brought a smile to her face. "It will beall right, mother, you'll see," he urged as he watched her mount thestairs. "It will be all right! You'll see me a millionaire yet."
And then he made a mistake which was to cost him dearly. He left theletter on the mantel-shelf. An hour later, when he had been some timein bed, he heard a door open and he sat up and listened. Even then,had he acted on the instant, it might have availed. But he hesitated,arguing down his misgivings, and it was only when he caught the soundof footsteps stealthily re-ascending that he jumped out of bed and lita candle. He slipped downstairs, but he was too late. The letter wasgone.
He went up to bed again, and though he wondered at the queer ways ofwomen he did not as yet doubt the issue. He would recover the letterin the morning and send it. The end would be the same.
There, however, he was wrong. Mrs. Bourdillon was a weak woman, butweakness has its own obstinacy, and by the morning she had reflected.The sum charged on Garth was her whole fortune, her sole support, andwere it lost she would be penniless, with no one to look to except theSquire, whom she would have offended beyond forgiveness. True, Arthurlaughed at the idea of loss, and he was clever. But he was young andsanguine, and before now she had heard of mothers beggared through theill-fortune or the errors of their children. What if that should beher lot!
Nor was this the only thought which pressed upon her mind. That Arthurshould marry Josina and succeed to Garth had been for years herdarling scheme, and she could not, in spite of the hopes with which hehad for the moment dazzled her, imagine any future for him comparableto that. But if he would marry Josina and succeed to Garth he must notoffend his uncle.
So, when Arthur came down in the morning, and with assumedcarelessness asked for the letter she put him off. It was Sunday. Shewould not discuss business on Sunday, it would not be lucky. OnMonday, when, determined to stand no more nonsense, he returned to thesubject, she took refuge in tears. It was cruel of him to press herso, when--when she was not well! She had not made up her mind. She didnot know what she should do. To tears there is no answer, and, angryas he was, he had to start for Aldersbury, leaving the matterunsettled, much to his disgust and alarm, for the time was running on.
And that was the beginning of a tragedy in the little house underGarthmyle. It was a struggle between strength and weakness, andweakness, as usual, sought shelter in subterfuge. When Arthur camehome at the end of the week his mother took care to have company, andhe could not get a word with her. She had no time for business--itmust wait. On the next Saturday she was not well, and kept her bed,and on the Sunday met him with the same fretful plea--she would do nobusiness on Sunday! Then, convinced at last that she had made up hermind to thwart him, he hardened his heart. He loved his mother, and togo beyond a certain point did not consort with his easy nature, but hehad no option; the thing must be done if his prospects were not to bewrecked. He became hard, cruel, almost brutal; threatening to leaveher, threatening to take himself off altogether, harassing her weekafter week, in what should have been her happiest hours, with picturesof the poverty, the obscurity, the hopelessness to which she wascondemning him! And, worst of all, torturing her with doubts thatafter all he might be right.
And still she resisted, and weak, foolish woman as she was, resistedwith an obstinacy that was infinitely provoking. Meanwhile only twothings supported her: her love for him, and the belief that she wasdefending his best interests and that some day he would thank her. Shewas saving him from himself. The odds were great, she was unaccustomedto oppose him, and still she withstood him. She would not sign theletter. But she suffered, and suffered terribly.
She took to bringing in guests as buffers between them, and once ortwice she brought in Josina. The girl, who knew them both so well,could not fail to see that there was something wrong, that somethingmarred the relations between mother and son. Arthur's moody brow, hissilence, or his snappish answers, no less than Mrs. Bourdillon'sscared manner, left her in no doubt of that. But she fancied that thiswas only another instance of the law of man's temper and woman'sendurance--that law to which she knew but one exception. And if thegirl hugged that exception, trembling and hoping, to her breast, ifArthur's coldness was a relief to her, if she cared little for anysecret but her own, she was no more of a mystery to them than theywere to her. When the door closed behind her, and, accompanied by amaid, she crossed the dark fields, she thought no more about them. Thetwo ceased--such is the selfishness of love--to exist for her. Herthoughts were engrossed by another, by one who until lately had been astranger, but whose figure now excluded the world from her view. Hersecret monopolized her, closed her heart, blinded her eyes. Such isthe law of love--at a certain stage in its growth.
Meanwhile life at the Cottage went on in this miserable fashion untilApril had come in and the daffodils were in full bloom in the meadowsbeside the river. And still Arthur could not succeed in his object,and wondering what the banker thought of the delay and his silence,was almost beside himself with chagrin. Then there came a welcomebreathing space. Ovington despatched him to London on an important andconfidential mission. He was to be away rather more than a fortnight,and the relief was much even to him. To his mother it had been more,if he had not, with politic cruelty, kept from her the cause of hisabsence. She feared that he was about to carry out his threat and tomake a home elsewhere--that this was the end, that he was going toleave her. And perhaps, she thought, she had been wrong. Perhaps,after all, she had sacrificed his love and lost his dear presence fornothing! It was a sad Easter that she passed, lonely and anxious, inthe little house.