Sparrows Part 106

"Think! I know. If you don't want to come, it's your duty to sacrifice yourself for the boy's health."

This decided Mavis. Less than an hour later, they were driving in the cool of Surrey lanes, where the sweet air and the novelty of the motion brought colour to Mavis's cheeks.

They lunched at a wayside inn, to sit, when the simple meal was over, in the garden where the air was musical with bees.

"This is peace," exclaimed Mavis, who was entranced with the change from dirty, mean Pimlico.

"As your life should always be, little Mavis."

"It is going to be."

"But what are you going to do till this marriage comes off?"

Mavis told him how it was arranged that she was soon to commence work at Melkbridge. Much to her surprise and considerably to her mind's disquiet, Windebank hotly attempted to dissuade her from this course.

He urged a variety of reasons, the chief of which was the risk she ran of the fact of her motherhood being discovered. But he might as well have talked to Jill, who accompanied the party. Mavis's mind was made up. The obstacles he sought to put in her way, if anything, strengthened her determination. One concession, however, he wrung from her--this, that if ever she were in trouble she would not hesitate to seek his aid. On the return home in the cool of the evening, Windebank asked if he could secure her better accommodation than where she now lived until she left for Wiltshire. Mavis would not hear of it, till Windebank pointed out that her child's health might be permanently injured by further residence in unwholesome Halverton Street. Before Mavis fell in with his request, she stipulated that she was not to pay more than a pound a week for any rooms she might engage. When she got back, she was overwhelmed with inquiries from Lil, the girl upstairs, with reference to "the mug" whom she (Mavis) had captured. But Mavis scarcely listened to the girl's questions; she was wondering why, first of all, Miss Toombs and then Windebank should be against her going to Melkbridge. Her renewed faith in Perigal prevented her from believing that any act of his was responsible for their anxiety in the matter.

She could only conclude that they believed that in journeying to Melkbridge, as she purposed, she ran a great risk of her motherhood being discovered.

The next morning, Mavis set about looking for the new rooms which she had promised Windebank to get. Now she could afford to pay a reasonable price for accommodation, she was enabled to insist upon good value for the money. The neat appearance of a house in Cambridge Street, which announced that lodgings were to let, attracted her. A clean, white-capped servant showed her two comfortably furnished rooms, which were to let at the price Mavis was prepared to pay. She learned that the landlady was a Mrs Taylor. Upon asking to see her, a woman, whose face still displayed considerable beauty, glided into the room.

Mrs Taylor spoke in a low, sweet voice; she would like to accommodate Mavis, but she had to be very, very particular: one had to be so careful nowadays. Could Mavis furnish references; failing that, would Mavis tell her what place of worship she attended? Mavis referred Mrs Taylor to Miss Toombs at Melkbridge and Mrs Scatchard at North Kensington, which satisfied the landlady. When, twenty-four hours later, Mavis moved in, she found that Windebank had already sent in a profusion of wines, meats, fruit and flowers for her use. She was wishing she could send them back, when Mrs Taylor came into her sitting-room with her hands to her head.

Upon Mavis asking what was amiss, she learned that Mrs Taylor had a violent headache and the only thing that did her any good was champagne, which she could not possibly afford. Mavis hastened to offer Mrs Taylor a bottle of the two dozen of champagne which were among the things that Windebank had sent in.

Under the influence of champagne, Mrs Taylor became expansive. She had already noted the abundance with which Mavis was surrounded.

"Have you a gentleman friend, dear?" she presently asked in her soft, caressing voice.

"I have one very dear friend," remarked Mavis, thinking of Windebank.

"I hope you're very careful," remarked Mrs Taylor.

"What do you mean?"

"Excuse my mentioning it, but gentlemen will be gentlemen where a pretty girl is concerned."

"Thank you, but I am quite, quite safe," replied Mavis hotly. "And do you know why?"

Mrs Taylor shook her auburn head.

"I'll tell you. It's because he loves me more than anything else in the world. And, therefore, I'm safe," she declared proudly.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

MAVIS GOES TO MELKBRIDGE

On the following Sunday fortnight, Mavis left the train at Dippenham quite late in the evening. She purposed driving with her baby and Jill in a fly the seven miles necessary to take her to Melkbridge. She choose this means of locomotion in order to secure the privacy which might not be hers if she took the train to her destination.

During the last few days, her boy had not enjoyed his usual health; he had lost appet.i.te and could not sleep for any length of time. Mavis believed the stuffy atmosphere of Pimlico to be responsible for her baby's ailing; she had great hopes of the Melkbridge air effecting an improvement in his health.

She had travelled down in a reserved first-cla.s.s compartment, which Windebank, who had seen her off at Paddington, had secured. He had only been a few minutes on the platform, as he had to catch the boat train at Charing Cross, he being due at Breslau the following day, to witness the German army manoeuvres on a special commission from the War Office.

Mavis had seen much of him during her stay at Mrs Taylor's. At all times, he had urged upon Mavis the inadvisability of going to Melkbridge. He was so against this contemplated proceeding that he had vainly offered to settle money on her if only it would induce her to forego her intention. Miss Toombs had by letter joined her entreaties to Windebank's. She pointed out that if Mavis brought her child to Melkbridge, as she purposed doing, it was pretty certain that its ident.i.ty would be discovered. But Windebank pleaded and Miss Toombs wrote to no purpose. Before Windebank had said good-bye at Paddington, he again made Mavis promise that she would not hesitate to communicate at once with him should she meet with further trouble.

The gravity with which he made this request awakened disquiet in her mind, which diminished as her proximity to Melkbridge increased.

Impatient to lessen the distance that separated her from her destination, she quickly selected a fly. A porter helped the driver with her luggage; she settled herself with her baby and Jill, and very soon they were lumbering down the ill-paved street. Her mind was so intent on the fact of her increasing nearness to the loved one, that she gave but a pa.s.sing remembrance to the occasion of her last visit to Dippenham, when she had met Perigal after letting him know that she was about to become a mother. Her eyes strained eagerly from the window of the fly in the direction of Melkbridge. She was blind, deaf, indifferent to anything, other than her approaching meeting with her lover, which she was sure could not long be delayed now she had come to live so near his home. She was to lodge with her old friend Mrs Trivett, who had moved into a cottage on the Broughton Road.

Mavis had written to tell Mrs Trivett the old story of her fict.i.tious marriage; she had, also, stated that for the present she wished this fact, together with the parentage of her child, to be kept a strict secret. Mavis little recked the risk she ran of discovery. She was obsessed by the desire to breathe the Melkbridge air. She believed that her presence there would in some way or other make straight the tangle into which she had got her life. The fly had left Dippenham well behind, and was ambling up and down the inclines of the road. Mavis looked out at the stone walls which, in these parts, take the place of hedgerows: she recognised with delight this reminder that she was again in Wiltshire. Four miles further, she would pa.s.s a lodge gate and the grounds of Major Perigal's place. She might even catch a glimpse of the house amongst the trees as she pa.s.sed. As the miles were wearily surmounted and the dwelling of the loved one came ever nearer, Mavis's heart beat fast with excitement. She continually craned her neck from the window to see if the spot she longed to feast her eyes upon were in sight. When it ultimately crept into view, she could scarcely contain herself for joy. She caught up her baby from the seat to hold him as high as it was possible in order that he might catch a glimpse of his darling daddy's home.

The baby arms were hot and dry to the touch, but Mavis was too intent on looking eagerly across the expanse of park to notice this just now.

Many lights flashed in her eyes, to be hidden immediately behind trees.

Her lover's home was unusually illuminated to-night--unusually, because, at other times, when she had pa.s.sed it, only one or two lights had been visible, Major Perigal living the life of a recluse who disliked intercourse with his species. Half an hour later, Mavis was putting her baby to bed at Mrs Trivett's. His face was flushed, his eyes staring and wide awake; but Mavis put down these manifestations to the trying journey from town. She went downstairs to eat a few mouthfuls with Mr and Mrs Trivett before returning to his side. She found them much altered; they had aged considerably and were weighted with care. Music teaching in Melkbridge was a sorry crutch on which to lean for support. During the short meal, neither husband nor wife said much. Mavis wondered if this taciturnity were due to any suspicions they might entertain of Mavis's unwedded state. But when Mrs Trivett came upstairs with her, she sat on the bed and burst into tears.

Upon Mavis asking what was amiss, Mrs Trivett told her that they were overwhelmed with debt and consequent difficulties to such an extent, that they did not know from one day to another if they would continue to have a roof over their heads. She also told Mavis that her coming as a lodger had been in the nature of a G.o.dsend, and that she had returned to Melkbridge upon the anniversary of the day on which her husband had commenced his disastrous tenancy of Pennington Farm.

Mavis slept little that night. Her baby was restless and wailed fitfully throughout the long hours, during which the anxious mother did her best to comfort him. Mavis made up her mind to call in a doctor if he were not better in the morning. When she was dressing, the baby seemed calmer and more inclined to sleep, therefore she had small compunction in leaving him in Mrs Trivett's motherly arms when, some two hours later, she left the Broughton Road for the boot factory. Miss Toombs was already at the office when she got there. Mavis scarcely recognised her friend, so altered was she in appearance. Dark rings encircled her eyes; her skin was even more pasty than was its wont.

Mavis noticed that when her friend kissed her, she was trembling.

"What's the matter, dear?" asked Mavis.

"Indigestion. It's nothing at all."

The two friends talked quickly and quietly till Miss Hunter joined them. Beyond giving Mavis the curtest of nods, this young person took no notice of her.

Mavis was more grateful than otherwise for Miss Hunter's indifference; she had feared a series of searching questions with regard to all that had happened since she had been away from Melkbridge.

Miss Toombs's appearance and conduct at meeting with Mavis was not the only strange behaviour which she displayed. When anyone came into the office, she seemed in a fever of apprehension; also, when anyone spoke to Mavis, her friend would at once approach and speak in such a manner as to send them about their business as soon as possible. Mavis wondered what it could mean.

Her boy did not seem quite so well when she got back to Mrs Trivett's for the midday meal. During the afternoon's work, her anxiety was such that she could scarcely concentrate her attention on what she was doing. When she hurried home in the evening, the boy was decidedly worse; there was no gainsaying the seriousness of his symptoms. Every time Mavis tried to make him take nourishment, he would cry out as if it hurt him to swallow.

Mrs Trivett, who had had much experience with the ailments of a sister's big family, feared that the baby was sickening for something.

Mavis would have sent for a doctor at once, but Mrs Trivett pointed out that doctors could do next to nothing for sick babies beyond ordering them to be kept warm and to have nourishment in the shape of two drops of brandy in water every two hours; also, that if it were necessary to have skilled advice, the doctor had better be sent for when Mavis was at the boot factory; otherwise, he might ask questions bearing on matters which, just now, Mavis would prefer not to make public. Mrs Trivett had much trouble in making the distraught mother appreciate the wisdom of this advice. She only fell in with the woman's views when she reflected, quite without cause, that the doctor's inevitable questioning might, in some remote way, compromise her lover. Late in the evening, when it was dark, Miss Toombs came round to see how matters were going.

"It's all your fault, foolish Mavis, for coming to Melkbridge," she remarked, when Mavis had told her of her perplexities.

"But how was I to know?"

"The only way to have guarded against complications was to keep away altogether. I suppose you wouldn't go even now?"

"He's much too ill to move. Besides---"

"Will you go when he's better, if I tell you something?"

"What?" asked Mavis, seriously alarmed by the deadly earnestness of her friend's manner.