Anne Severn and the Fieldings Part 51

"That was nothing. I was very glad to do it for Jerrold, but it was my job, anyway."

"Well, you've saved Colin. And you've saved the land. What's more, I believe you've saved Jerrold."

"How do you mean, 'saved' him? I didn't know he wanted saving."

"He did, rather. I mean you've made him care about the estate. He didn't care a rap about it till he came down here this last time. You've found his job for him."

"He'd have found it himself all right without me."

"I'm not so sure. We were awfully worried about him after the war. He was all at a loose end without anything to do. And dreadfully restless.

We thought he'd never settle to anything again. And I was afraid he'd want to live in London."

"I don't think he'd ever do that."

"He won't now. But, you see, he used to be afraid of this place."

"I know. After his father's death."

"And he simply loves it now. I think it's because he's seen what you've done with it. I know he hadn't the smallest idea of farming it before.

It's what he ought to have been doing all his life. And when you think how seedy he was when he came down here, and how fit he is now."

"I think," Anne said, "I'd better be going."

Maisie's innocence was more than she could bear.

"Jerry'll see you home. And you'll come again, won't you? Soon.... Will you take them? I gathered them for you."

"Thanks. Thanks awfully." Anne's voice came with a jerk. Her breath choked her.

Jerrold was coming down the garden walk, looking for her. She said good-bye to Maisie and turned to go with him home.

"Well," he said, "how did you and Maisie get on?"

"It was exactly what I thought it would be, only worse."

He laughed. "Worse?"

"I mean she was sweeter.... Jerrold, she makes me feel such a brute.

Such an awful brute. And if she ever knows--"

"She won't know."

When he had left her Anne flung herself down on the couch and cried.

All evening Maisie's tulips stood up in the blue-and-white Chinese bowl on the table. They had childlike, innocent faces that reproached her.

Nothing would ever be the same again.

XV

ANNE, JERROLD, AND MAISIE

i

It was a Sunday in the middle of April.

Jerrold had motored up to London on the Friday and had brought Eliot back with him for the week-end. Anne had come over as she always did on a Sunday afternoon. She and Maisie were sitting out on the terrace when Eliot came to them, walking with the tired limp that Anne found piteous and adorable. Very soon Maisie murmured some gentle, unintelligible excuse, and left them.

There was a moment of silence in which everything they had ever said to each other was present to them, making all other speech unnecessary, as if they held a long intimate conversation. Eliot sat very still, not looking at her, yet attentive as if he listened to the pa.s.sing of those unuttered words. Then Anne spoke and her voice broke up his mood.

"What are you doing now? Bacteriology?"

"Yes. We've found the thing we were looking for, the germ of trench fever."

"You mean _you_ have."

"Well, somebody would have spotted it if I hadn't. A lot of us were out for it."

"Oh Eliot, I am so glad. That means you'll stamp out the disease, doesn't it?"

"Probably. In time."

"I knew you'd do it. I knew you'd do something big before you'd finished."

"My dear, I've only just begun. But there's nothing big about it but the research, and we were all in that. All looking for the same thing.

Happening to spot it is just heaven's own luck."

"But aren't you glad it was you?"

"It doesn't matter who it is. But I suppose I'm glad. It's the sort of thing I wanted to do and it's rather more important than most things one does."

He said no more. Years ago, when he had done nothing, he had talked excitedly and arrogantly about his work; now that he had done what he had set out to do he was reserved, impa.s.sive and very humble.

"Do Jerrold and Colin know?" she said.

"Not yet. You're the first."

"Dear Eliot, you _did_ know I'd be glad."

"It's nice of you to care."

Of course she cared. She was glad to think that he had that supreme satisfaction to make up for the cruelty of her refusal to care more.

Perhaps, she thought, he wouldn't have had it if he had had her. He would have been torn in two; he would have had to give himself twice over. She felt that he didn't love her more than he loved his science, and science exacted an uninterrupted and undivided service. One life hadn't room enough for two such loves, and he might not have done so much if she had been there, calling back his thoughts, drawing his pa.s.sion to herself.

"What are you going to do next?" she said.