Mary Gray Part 31

"It will probably rain all the time I am there. And I shall be able to forgive it because of its first delicious moments."

"What are you going to do?" He asked the question almost roughly.

"I am going to be with my father, in a mean, little two-storied house of six rooms. At least, it is mean outwardly; but no house could be mean inside where he lived and spread his light. He will have to be at his work every day till he gets his fortnight's holiday in September. If I get away in, say, a fortnight's time, I shall help my stepmother about the house while he is at business all day; I shall have a thousand things to do. They have only one servant; and my stepmother and sisters do the greater part of the work. They would treat me like a queen when I go over there, if I would let them; but I never do let them. I love dusting, and cooking, and mending, and helping the little ones with their lessons. Then as soon as my father is free I am going to carry them off to a hotel I know between the mountains and the sea. It is a big, old-fashioned house, and there is a lovely garden, full of roses and lilies, and phlox and stocks and hollyhocks and mignonette and sweet peas. I stayed there once with dear Lady Anne. We shall all have a lovely time. There is a trout-stream at the end of the garden and the trout sail by in it. There are hundreds of little streams running down from the mountains. They make golden pools in the road and they hang like gold and silver fringes from the crags that edge the road."

There had been a deliberation in what she told him about the little house. But she was mistaken if she thought to surprise him. He was picturing her there at her domestic duties and thinking that no small or mean surroundings could dwarf her soul's stature. Hadn't the hideous official room that held her been heaven to him?--the singing of the naked gas-jets the music of the spheres?

"It will be a great change from London," he said.

"I am going back to the old days. I have refused to see any of my fine new friends. The Ilberts will be staying over there with the Lord Lieutenant at the same time. I have forbidden Mr. Ilbert to call."

Again his mood changed to one of unreasonable irritation. What had she to do with the Ilberts, or they with her?

"If I find myself over there I shall certainly call," he said, with an air of doggedness.

"Oh, very well, then, you shall," she said merrily. "_You_ won't embarra.s.s us, not even if we have to ask you to dinner."

An hour or two later the good news came, brought by Mrs. Rooke in person. Captain Langrishe could hardly yet be considered out of danger, but he lived; he had been sent down in a litter to the nearest station, where there were appliances and comforts and white people all about him, outside the sights and sounds of war, beyond the danger of recapture by the enemy.

Nelly bore the better news well: she had been prepared for it, she said.

Seeing her so quiet, Mrs. Rooke brought out a sc.r.a.p of blue ribbon cut through and blood-stained. It was in a little case which had been hacked through by knives. It had been sent home to her at the first when there was no hope, when, practically, G.o.dfrey Langrishe was a dead man.

"It is not mine, my dear," she said to Nelly, "and I think it must be yours. I did not dare show it to you before."

Nelly went pale and red. Yes, it was her ribbon, which had fallen from her hair that morning more than a year ago when Captain Langrishe had ridden by with the regiment and the wind had carried off her ribbon.

She received it with a trembling eagerness.

"Yes, it is mine," she said. "I knew he had it. He showed it to me before he went away."

"How furious G.o.dfrey will be when he misses it!" Mrs. Rooke said.

"Somebody will be having a bad quarter of an hour. And now, Nelly, when are you going to be well enough to come to see my mother? She longs to know you. She is the dearest old soul. She wanted me to bring you to her while yet we were in suspense. But I waited for news, one way or another."

"I should love to go," Nelly said.

"She has a room in a gable fitted up for you; the windows open on roses.

The place is full of sweet sounds and sights. All through this trouble her thoughts have been with you. Will you come?"

"If papa can spare me."

"Then I shall ask him, and we can go down on Sat.u.r.day. Won't he come for the day? When you know my mother I am going to leave you there with her.

Poor Cyprian is off to Marienbad and I must go with him. He's dreadfully afraid of losing his figure. A fat lawyer, he says, is the one unpardonable thing. Will you look after my mother?"

The General was only too glad to give his consent to the plan which had brought the colour to Nelly's cheek and the light to her eye. After leaving Nelly in Suss.e.x he and Robin would go down to Southampton, get out the yacht and cruise about the coast till Nelly felt inclined for a longer run.

So Mary Gray was free to go. She went out in the afternoon, leaving Robin to look after his cousin. The General had gone off to the club with a lighter heart than he had known for many a month. Robin had suggested a drive, but Nelly would not hear of that. She was going to save up her pleasure, she said, for Suss.e.x and Sat.u.r.day. She consented to walk in the Square, where she had not been for quite a long time. He noticed that she looked delicate and languid and his manner to her was very tender. In fact, a new under-gardener in the Square, who was very susceptible to romance, put quite an erroneous interpretation on Robin's manner to his cousin, and hovered in their vicinity with eager curiosity till he was pulled up sharply by one of his superior officers.

"So we are all going to scatter, Nell," Drummond said, half regretfully.

She glanced at him.

"Poor Robin! It was too bad, keeping you in town."

"I haven't minded it at all, I a.s.sure you, Nell. Indeed, I couldn't have gone happily while you were in suspense."

"Robin," she said suddenly, "what are you waiting for?"

He started. "Waiting for?" he repeated. "What do you mean, Nell?"

"You're not going to let Mary go without speaking to her?" Under her light shawl her hand felt for and held the locket which contained the blood-stained blue ribbon. "Haven't you waited long enough? I believe she would wait an eternity for you, but don't try her. Speak now."

"My dear Nell," he stammered, "it is only a fortnight or so from the day that should have been our wedding day."

"I was thinking as much. What have you had in your mind? Some foolish Quixotic notion. What were you waiting for?"

"To tell the truth, Nell, till you should be happy."

"Don't take the chances of letting her go away without telling her. Do you think I haven't known that you were in love with her all the time?

Why, that first day I saw her I said to myself in amazement, 'Where were his eyes that he could have chosen you before her?'"

"Nelly, how do I know that she will look at me?"

"She will never look at anyone else. Speak now, if only in fairness to the men who might be in love with her, who are in love with her and may have false hopes."

"She won't look at me, Nell."

"She has sent Mr. Ilbert about his business, but he will not let her be.

He says that so long as she is not anybody else's she may yet be his. I didn't want to betray him, but I must make you understand."

Poor Ilbert! For a moment Drummond's mind was filled with a lordly compa.s.sion towards him. Ilbert rejected! And for him! To be sure, he knew Mary cared for him. She was not the girl to have admitted him to the intimacy of last winter unless she cared. She had borne with him exquisitely. She had even taken her successful rival to her breast. He had made her suffer, the magnanimous woman.

Suddenly he took fire. He had been a slow, dull fellow, he said to himself, and quaked at the thought that Ilbert might have robbed him of his jewel. Now, he felt as though he must follow her, and make her his without even the possible mischances of a few hours of absence.

"She comes back to dinner?" he asked.

"She comes back to tea," his cousin answered, "and you have made me tired, Robin. I am going to rest till tea-time."

They went back to the house and Nelly left him in the drawing-room while she went away to her own room. He knew that she was giving him his opportunity and was grateful for it. How could he have been so mad as to think of letting Mary go away with nothing settled between them?

He walked up and down restlessly, while the dogs watched him in amazement from their cushions. It was a topsy-turvy world in which the dogs found themselves of late. They had almost reached the point of being surprised at nothing. It was lucky the carpet was so faded and shabby, for of late the General had worn a path in it with his restless movements; and now here was his nephew behaving as though he were an untamed creature in a cage and not a sober, serious legislator.

At last he heard her knock, and her light foot ascending the stairs. She looked surprised to find him alone and asked rather anxiously for Nelly.

"You didn't let her get over-tired?" she asked, apprehensively.

"No; we walked very little. She said she would rest till tea-time. Well, have you packed?"

"I have put my things together. I am going to ask to be allowed off to-morrow. I shall sleep at the flat to-morrow night, if they can spare me, and be off the next morning."