Afterwards Part 13

Anstice, on arrival, soon had the small arm set and comfortably bandaged; and once safely in bed, although more upset than she wished anyone to imagine, Cherry regained her usual half-affectionate half-patronizing manner, and insisted upon Anstice sitting down beside her "for at least five minutes, my dear!"

With a smile, Anstice sat down as requested; and Cherry instantly began to question him on the subject of Greengates.

"Isn't it a fa.s.synating house, my dear?" Cherry never employed a short word when she thought a long one fairly appropriate. "Have you seen Iris' bedroom?--all done in white and purple and green--and irises everywhere--on the walls and the curtains--just like a gorjus purple iris what grows in the garden?"

"No, I've not seen Miss Wayne's bedroom," owned Anstice rather hastily.

"But it couldn't be prettier than this--why, those bunches of cherries on the wall are so life-like that I wonder the birds don't come in to make a meal of them!"

"Do you like them?" Cherry was openly gratified by his approval. "But I wish you could see Iris' room. She always takes me there to wash my hands and face, and the basin is all over irises too."

"Fa.s.synating" as these details of Miss Wayne's domestic arrangements might be, Anstice judged it safer to switch his small patient on to another topic; and in an animated discussion as to the proper age at which a young lady might begin to ride a motor-bicycle--Cherry inclining to seven, Anstice to seventeen years--the promised five minutes flew swiftly away.

"You'll come again, my dear?" Cherry's anxiety to ensure his attendance was flattering, and he laughed and a.s.sured her he would visit her every day if she desired it.

As a matter of fact he did visit her with some regularity; for she managed, with a perversity known only to imps of a like nature, to catch a severe chill which puzzled her attendants, none of them knowing of a certain feverishly delightful ten minutes spent in hanging out of the window holding an interesting conversation with the gardener's boy below on the subject of broken bones. In any case, Anstice found it necessary to call at Cherry Orchard on several consecutive days; and during the child's illness and subsequent convalescence he was perforce obliged to come into contact with Mrs. Carstairs herself.

As a physiological study Chloe interested him strongly. Although she appeared genuinely fond of her little daughter and waited on her night and day with a solicitude which never varied, there was nothing in her manner to denote pa.s.sionate affection, nor did the child appear to desire it. Even to Cherry her voice, rich and deep as it was, never softened; and she rarely used an endearing term. Yet Cherry appeared to be quite satisfied; and Anstice came to the conclusion that the child's fine instinct was able to pierce behind this apparent coldness to the warm human love which doubtless lay beneath.

One fact about Mrs. Carstairs he was not slow in discovering. With the exception of Iris Wayne and her father, Chloe appeared to be absolutely devoid of friends, even of casual acquaintances. The Littlefield people, who had been first surprised, then outraged, by her reappearance among them, had long since decided that for them Cherry Orchard was _tabu_; and although the Vicar, Mr. Carey, successor to the man whose wife had raised the storm in which Chloe Carstairs' barque had come to shipwreck, had called upon her, and endeavoured, in his gentle, courtly fashion, to make her welcome, his parishioners had no intention of following his example.

That Mrs. Carstairs felt her isolation in a social sense Anstice did not believe; but that she must feel very lonely at times, find the days very long and empty, he felt pretty well a.s.sured. She was not an accomplished woman in the usual sense of the word. He never found her playing the piano, or painting water-colour pictures as did so many of the women ha visited. She did not appear to care for needlework, and in spite of the books scattered about the house, he rarely saw her reading; yet all the while he had a feeling that had she desired to shine in any or all of the arts peculiar to women she would have no difficulty in doing so.

That she ordered her household excellently he knew from the glimpses he had obtained of her domestic life; but there again she was a.s.sisted by a staff of superior servants who all, from her personal attendant, the devoted Tochatti, down to the boy who cleaned the knives, worshipped their mistress with a wholehearted affection which held about it a touch of something almost resembling fanaticism.

One day Anstice did find her with a book in her hand; and on venturing to inquire into its contents was informed it was a well-known _Treatise on Chess_.

"Do you play?" he asked, rather astonished, for in common with many men he imagined chess to be almost purely a masculine pastime.

"Yes--at least I used to play once," she admitted slowly. "I can't very well indulge in a game nowadays. Even the grownup Cherry declines to play, though I hope in time I may incite her to learn!"

"I used to play--indifferently--once," Anstice said meditatively; and Chloe looked at him with a faint smile.

"Did you? Some day when you are not too busy will you drop in to tea and play a game with me?"

"I'd like to immensely." His tone was sincere, and Chloe's manner warmed ever so little.

"Can you stay now?" The hour was just on five; and Cherry, who had that day been promoted to tea downstairs, seconded the invitation as usual from her nest on the big Chesterfield.

"Do stay, my dear, and I'll help you to move all the funny little men and the castles!"

Anstice could not refuse this double invitation; and after a hasty cup of tea he and his hostess sat down to the board and set out the ancient ivory chessmen which were so well suited to the pretty, old-fashioned room in which the players sat.

To Anstice's quite unjustifiable surprise Chloe Carstairs played an admirable game. Her moves were clearly reasoned out, and she displayed a quickness of thought, a brilliance of man[oe]uvre, which soon convinced Anstice he was outplayed.

At the end of fifteen minutes Chloe had vanquished him completely; and while most of his men were reposing in the carved box at her elbow, the ranks of her army were scarcely thinned.

"I give in, Mrs. Carstairs!" He laughed and rose. "You won't think me unsporting if I run away now? I'm beat hollow, and I know it, but if you will condescend to play with me another day----"

"I shall look forward to another game," she said serenely; and Anstice departed, feeling he had been permitted to obtain another sidelight on her somewhat complex character.

Two days later he made another and rather disconcerting discovery, which set him wondering afresh as to the real nature of the woman who, like himself, had been the victim of a strangely vindictive fate.

The day was Sunday, and Cherry had been permitted the indulgence of breakfast in bed; so that Anstice interviewed his young patient in her own pink-and-white nest, where, attended by the faithful Tochatti, she gave herself innumerable airs and graces, but finally allowed him to examine her small arm, which was now practically healed.

"Mrs. Carstairs not up yet?" It was ten o'clock--but there was no sign of Cherry's mother.

"Yes, sir." Tochatti spoke slowly, her foreign accent more strongly marked than usual. "My mistress has a slight headache and is in her own room. She would like to see you before you go."

Accordingly, after a prolonged parting from Cherry, who shamelessly importuned him to neglect his other and less important patients, Anstice accompanied Tochatti to Mrs. Carstairs' sitting-room where its owner presumably awaited him.

The room itself was in its way as uncommon as its occupant, being furnished entirely in black and white. The walls were white, the carpet black. The chairs and couches were upholstered in black-and-white chintz, with a profusion of cushions of both hues, and the pictures on the white walls were etchings in black oak frames. On the mantelpiece was a collection of carved ivory toys of all kinds, with here and there an ebony elephant from Ceylon or a.s.sam. The paint on doors and windows was black, yet in spite of the sombreness of the general scheme there was nothing depressing, nothing sinister in the finished effect.

Possibly because Chloe Carstairs was an artist--or a wise woman who knew the value of relief--one note of colour was struck in the presence of a huge china bowl filled with tulips of every conceivable shade of flame and orange and yellow and red; but with that exception black and white predominated, and when Chloe Carstairs rose from her low chair near the window and advanced towards him, she, too, carried out the subtle suggestion of the whole room.

Dressed in white, her silky black hair and blue eyes the only bits of colour about her, she looked paler than usual, and Anstice jumped to the conclusion she had sent for him to prescribe for her.

"Good morning, Dr. Anstice." Anstice, who hated shaking hands with most people, always liked her firm, cool handshake. "How is Cherry? You find her better?"

"Yes, she is really quite herself again, and her arm has healed most satisfactorily." He stood in front of her as he spoke, and studied her face carefully. "But you don't look very fit, Mrs. Carstairs. Can I do anything for you now that your little daughter has finished with me?"

She looked at him with a smile which was more melancholy than usual.

"I think not," she said slowly. "You see, I am not ill, only a little tired--tired with remembering days that are gone."

"Isn't that rather a fatal thing to do?" His own bitter memories gave him the clue to her state of mind. "No good ever comes of remembering sad things. I think the perfect memory would be one which would only retain the happiness of life. You know the old motto found on many sundials: 'I only record sunny hours.'"

"I don't agree with you," she said quietly. "It's the shadows which give value to the high lights, isn't it? And sometimes to remember dreadful things is a happiness in itself, knowing they are gone for ever. I can quite well bear to remember that horrible prison"--as always when speaking of it, her lips whitened--"because no power on earth can ever put me back there again."

"I don't think it can do you any good to dwell on such memories," he persisted. "If you are wise you will forget them. No wonder your head aches if you dwell on such unpleasant things."

She looked at him more fully, and in her eyes he read something which baffled him.

"You are quite right--and delightfully sane and sensible," she said.

"But as a matter of fact, I wasn't really thinking of the prison to-day.

You see, this is the anniversary of my wedding day, and my thoughts were not altogether sad ones."

He looked at her, nonplussed for the moment, and suddenly Chloe's face softened.

"Dr. Anstice, forgive me. The fact is, I had a bad night, and am all on edge this morning."

"Why do you sit in here?" asked Anstice abruptly. "It is a lovely morning--the sun is warm and there's no wind. Why not go out into your charming garden? Lie in a low chair and sleep--or read some amusing book. Is this a particularly engrossing one?"

He picked up the volume she had laid down at his entrance, and she watched him with a faint hint of mockery in her blue eyes. His face changed as he read the t.i.tle.

"De Quincey's _Confessions_! Mrs. Carstairs, you're not interested in this sort of thing?"

"Why not?" Her manner was ever so slightly antagonistic. "The subject is a fascinating one, isn't it? I confess I've often felt inclined to try opium--morphia or something of the sort, myself."