Peter's Mother Part 11

"I will do my best," said John. He was touched by the note of piteous anxiety which had crept into the squire's harsh voice.

"Thank you," said Sir Timothy. "Will you await her here? She is returning immediately. Break it to her as gently as you can. I shall rest and compose myself by a talk with Dr. Blundell."

He went slowly to the study, leaving John Crewys alone.

CHAPTER VI

"Is that you, Cousin John?" said Lady Mary. "Is Sir Timothy gone? I have not been away more than a few minutes, have I?"

She spoke quite brightly. Her cheeks were flushed, and her blue eyes were sparkling with excitement.

John looked at her, and found himself wishing that her soft, brown hair were not strained so tightly from her forehead, nor brushed so closely to her head; the fashion would have been trying to a younger face, and fatal to features less regularly delicate and correct. He also wished she were not dressed like a Quaker's wife. The stiff, grey poplin fitted like a glove the pretty curves of Lady Mary's slender figure, but it lacked distinction, and appropriateness, to John's fastidious eye. Then he reproached himself vehemently for allowing his thoughts to dwell on such trifles at such a moment.

"Will you forgive me for going away the very day you come?" said Lady Mary.

How quickly, how surprisingly, she recovered her spirits! She had looked so weary and sad as she came down the stairs an hour ago. Now she was almost gay. A feverish and unnatural gaiety, no doubt; but those flushed cheeks, and glittering blue eyes--how they restored the youthful loveliness of the face he had once thought the most beautiful he ever saw!

"I am going to see the last of my boy. You'll understand, won't you?

You were an only son too. And your mother would have gone to the ends of the earth to look upon your face once more, wouldn't she? Mothers are made like that."

"Some mothers," said John; and he turned away his head.

"Not yours? I'm sorry," said Lady Mary, simply.

"Oh, well--you know, she was a good deal--in the world," he said, repenting himself.

"I use to wish so much to live in the world too," said Lady Mary, dreamily; "but ever since I was fifteen I've lived in this out-of-the-way place."

"Don't be too sorry for that," said John; "you don't know what a revelation this out-of-the-way place may be to a tired worker like me, who lives always amid the unlovely sights and sounds of a city."

"Ah! but that's just it," she said quickly. "You see I'm not tired--yet; and I've done no work."

"That is why it's such a rest to look at you," said John, smiling.

"Flowers have their place in creation as vegetables have theirs. But we only ask the flowers to bloom peacefully in sheltered gardens; we don't insist on popping them into the soup with the onions and carrots."

Lady Mary laughed as though she had not a care in the world.

"It is quite refreshing to find that a big-wig like you can talk just as much nonsense as a little-wig like me," she said; "but you don't know, for all that, what the silence and monotony of life here _can_ be. The very voice of a stranger falls like music on one's ears. I was so glad to see you, and you were so kind and sympathetic about--my boy. And then, all in a moment, my joy was turned into mourning, wasn't it? And Peter is going to the war, and it's all like a dreadful dream; except that I know I shall wake up every morning only to realize more strongly that it's true."

John remembered that he was dallying with his mission, instead of fulfilling it.

"Sir Timothy cannot go to see his son off? That must be a grief to him," he said.

"No; he isn't coming. He has business, I believe," said Lady Mary, a little coldly. "There has been a dispute over some Crown lands, which march with ours. Officials are often very dilatory and difficult to deal with. Probably, however, you know more about it than I do. I am going alone. I have just been giving the necessary orders. I shall take a servant with me, as well as my maid, for I am such an inexperienced traveller--though it seems absurd, at my age--that I am quite frightened of getting into the wrong trains. I dread a journey by myself. Even such a little journey as that. But, of course, nothing would keep me at home."

"Only one thing," said John, in a low voice, "if I have judged your character rightly in so short a time."

"What is that?"

"Duty."

She looked at him with sweet, puzzled eyes, like a child.

"Are you pleading Sir Timothy's cause, Cousin John?" she said, with a little touch of offence in her tone that was only charming.

"I am pleading Sir Timothy's cause," said John, seriously.

"Love is stronger than duty, isn't it?" said Lady Mary.

"I hope not," said John, very simply.

"You mean my husband doesn't wish me to go?"

"Don't think me too presuming," he said pleadingly.

"I couldn't," said Lady Mary, naively. "You are older than I am, you know," she laughed, "and a Q.C. And you know you would be my trustee and my boy's guardian if anything ever happened to Sir Timothy. He told me so long ago. And he reminded me of it to-day most solemnly. I suppose he was afraid I shouldn't treat you with proper respect."

"He has honoured me very highly," said John. "In that case, it would be almost my--my duty to advise you in any difficulty that might arise, wouldn't it?"

"That means you want to advise me now?"

"Frankly, it does."

"And are _you_ going to tell me that I ought to stay at home, and let my only boy leave England without bidding him G.o.d-speed?" said Lady Mary incredulously. "If so, I warn you that you will never convince me of that, argue as you may."

"No one is ever convinced by argument," said John. "But stern facts sometimes command even a woman's attention."

"When backed by such powers of persuasion as yours, perhaps."

She faced him with sparkling eyes. Lady Mary was timid and gentle by nature, but Peter's mother knew no fear. Yet she realized that if John Crewys were moved to put forth his full powers, he might be a difficult man to oppose. She met his glance, and observed that he perfectly understood the spirit which animated her, and that it was not opposition that shone from his bright hazel eyes, as he regarded her steadily through his pince-nez.

"I am going to deal with a hard fact, which your husband is afraid to tell you," said John, "because, in his tenderness for your womanly weakness, he underrates, as I venture to think, your womanly courage.

Sir Timothy wants you to be with him here to-morrow because he has to--to fight an unequal battle--"

"With the Crown?"

"With Death."

"What do you mean?" said Lady Mary.

"He has been silently combating a mortal disease for many months past," said John, "and to-morrow morning the issue is to be decided.

Every day, every hour of delay, increases the danger. The great surgeon, Dr. Herslett, will be here at eleven o'clock, and on the success of the operation he will perform, hangs the thread of your husband's life."

Lady Mary put up a little trembling hand entreatingly, and John's great heart throbbed with pity. He had chosen his words deliberately to startle her from her absorption in her son; but she looked so fragile, so white, so imploring, that his courage almost failed him.