The Daughters of Danaus Part 80

Sometimes, Professor Fortescue used to write to Hadria, and she looked forward to these letters as to nothing else. She heard from Valeria also, who had met the Professor at Siena. She said he did not look as well as she had hoped to find him. She could not see that he had gained at all, since leaving England. He was cheerful, and enjoying sunny Italy as much as his strength would allow. Valeria was shocked to notice how very weak he was. He had a look in his face that she could not bear to see. If he did not improve soon, she thought of trying to persuade him to return home to see his doctor again. When one was ill, home was the best place after all.

"You and Professor Fortescue," she said, in closing her letter, "are the two people I love in the world. You are all that I have in life to cling to. Write to me, dearest Hadria, for I am very anxious and wretched."

The affairs of life and death mix themselves incongruously enough, in this confused world. The next news that stirred the repose of Craddock Dene, was that of Algitha's engagement to Wilfrid Burton. In spite of his socialistic views, Mrs. Fullerton was satisfied with the marriage, because Wilfrid Burton was well-connected and had good expectations. The mother had feared that Algitha would never marry at all, and she not only raised no objection, but seemed relieved. Wilfrid Burton had come down to stay at the Red House, during one of Algitha's holidays, and it was then that the betrothal had taken place. The marriage promised to be happy, for the couple were deeply attached and had interests in common.

They intended to continue to work on the same lines after they were married. Both parents were favourably impressed by the son-in-law elect, and the Cottage became the scene of exciting arguments on the subject of socialism. Mr. Fullerton insisted on holding Wilfrid Burton responsible for every sort of theory that had ever been attributed not merely to socialists, but to communists, anarchists, collectivists, nihilists, and the rest; and nothing would persuade him that the young man was not guilty of all these contradictory enormities of thought. Wilfrid's personality, however, overcame every prejudice against him, on this account, after the first meeting.

Joseph Fleming, among others, congratulated Algitha heartily on her engagement.

"I can see you are very happy," he said navely. She laughed and coloured.

"Indeed I ought to be. Life is gloriously worth living, when it is lived in the presence of good and generous souls."

"I wish _I_ had married," said Joseph pensively.

"It is not too late to mend," suggested Algitha.

"How reckless you are!" exclaimed her sister. "How can you recommend marriage in the abstract? You happen to have met just the right person, but Mr. Fleming hasn't, it would seem."

"If one person can be so fortunate, so can another," said Algitha.

"Why tempt Providence? Rather bear the ills you have----"

"I am surprised to hear you take a gloomy view of anything, Mrs.

Temperley," said Joseph; "I always thought you so cheerful. You say funnier things than any lady I have ever met, except an Irish girl who used to sing comic songs."

Both sisters laughed.

"How do you know that, in the intervals of her comic songs, that girl has not a gloomy disposition?" asked Hadria.

"Oh no, you can see that she is without a care in the world; she is like Miss Fullerton, always full of good cheer and kindness."

"Had she also slums to cheer her up?" asked Hadria.

"No, not at all. She never does anything in particular."

"I am surprised that she is cheerful then," said Algitha. "It won't last."

"It is her slums that keep my sister in such good spirits," said Hadria.

"Really! Well, if you are fond of that sort of thing, Mrs. Temperley, there are some nasty enough places at the lower end of Craddock----"

"Oh, it isn't that one clings to slums for slums' sake," cried Hadria laughing.

"I am afraid they are already overrun with visitors," Joseph added.

"There are so many Miss Walkers."

It was not long after this conversation, that Craddock Dene was thrilled by another piece of matrimonial news. Joseph Fleming was announced to be engaged to the Irish girl who sang comic songs. She was staying with Mrs. Jordan at the time. And the Irish girl, whose name was Kathleen O'Halloran, came and sang her comic songs to Craddock Dene, while Joseph sat and beamed in pride and happiness, and the audience rippled with laughter.

Kathleen was very pretty and very fascinating, with her merry, kind-hearted ways, and she became extremely popular with her future neighbours.

Little changes had taken place in the village, through death or marriage or departure. Dodge had laid to rest many victims of influenza, which visited the neighbourhood with great severity. Among the slain, poor Dodge had to number his own wife. The old man was broken down with his loss. He loved to talk over her illness and death with Hadria, whose presence seemed to comfort him more than anything else, as he a.s.sured her, in his quaint dialect.

Sometimes, returning through the Craddock Woods, Hadria would pa.s.s through the churchyard on her way home, after her walk, and there she would come upon Dodge patiently at work upon some new grave, the sound of his pickaxe breaking the autumn silence, ominously. His head was more bent than of yore, and his hair was whiter. His old face would brighten up when he heard Hadria's footstep, and he would pause, a moment or two, for a gossip. The conversation generally turned upon his old "missus,"

who was buried under a yew tree, near the wicket gate. Then he would ask after Hadria's belongings; about her father and mother, about Hubert, and the boys. Mr. Fullerton had made the gravedigger's acquaintance, and won his hearty regard by many a chat and many a little kindness. Dodge had never ceased to regret that Martha had been taken away from Craddock. The place seemed as if it had gone to sleep, he said. Things weren't as they used to be.

Hadria would often go to see the old man, trying to cheer him and minister to his growing ailments. His shrewdness was remarkable. Mr.

Fullerton quoted Dodge as an authority on matters of practical philosophy, and the old gravedigger became a sort of oracle at the Cottage. Wilfrid Burton complained that he was incessantly confronted with some saying of Dodge, and from this there was no appeal.

The news from Italy was still far from rea.s.suring. Valeria was terribly anxious. But she felt thankful, she said, to be with the invalid and able to look after him. The doctors would not hear of his returning to England at the approach of winter. It would be sheer suicide. He must go further south. Valeria had met some old friends, among them Madame Bertaux, and they had decided to go on together, perhaps to Naples or Sorrento. Her friends had all fallen in love with the Professor, as every one did. They were a great help and comfort to her. If it were not for the terrible foreboding, Valeria said she would be perfectly happy.

The Professor's presence seemed to change the very atmosphere. He spoke often about Hadria, and over and over again asked Valeria to watch over her and help her. And he spoke often about his wife. Valeria confessed that, at one time, she used to be horribly and shamefully jealous of this wife, whom he worshipped so faithfully, but now that feeling had left her. She was thankful for the great privilege of his friendship. A new tone had come over Valeria's letters, of late; the desperate, almost bitter element had pa.s.sed away, and something approaching serenity had taken its place.

No one, she said, could be in the Professor's presence every day, and remain exactly the same as before. She saw his potent, silent influence upon every creature who crossed his path. He came and went among his fellows, quietly, beneficently, and each was the better for having met him, more or less, according to the fineness and sensitiveness of the nature.

"My love for him," said Valeria, "used at one time to be a great trouble to me. It made me restless and unhappy. Now I am glad of it, and though there must be an element of pain in a hopeless love, yet I hold myself fortunate to have cherished it."

Hadria received this letter from the postman when she was coming out of Dodge's cottage.

It threw her into a conflict of strong and painful feeling: foreboding, heart-sickness, a longing so strong to see her friends that it seemed as if she must pack up instantly and go to them, and through it all, a sense of loneliness that was almost unbearable. How she envied Valeria!

To love with her whole heart, without a shadow of doubt; to have that element of warmth in her life which could never fail her, like sunshine to the earth. Among the cruelest elements of Hadria's experience had been that emptying of her heart; the rebuff to the need for love, the conviction that she was to go through life without its supreme emotion.

Professor Theobald had thrown away what might have been a master-pa.s.sion. The outlook was so blank and cold, so unutterably lonely! She looked back to the days at Dunaghee, as if several lifetimes had pa.s.sed between her and them. What illusions they had all harboured in those strange old days!

"Do you remember our famous discussion on Emerson in the garret?" she said to Algitha.

"Do I? It is one of the episodes of our youth that stands out most distinctly."

"And how about Emerson's doctrine? _Are_ we the makers of our circ.u.mstances? _Does_ our fate 'fit us like a glove?'"

Algitha looked thoughtful. "I doubt it," she said.

"Yet you have brilliantly done what you meant to do."

"My own experience does not overshadow my judgment entirely, I hope,"

said Algitha. "I have seen too much of a certain tragic side of life to be able to lay down a law of that sort. I can't believe, for instance, that among all those millions in the East End, not _one_ man or woman, for all these ages, was born with great capacities, which better conditions might have allowed to come to fruition. I think you were right, after all. It is a matter of relation."

The autumn was unusually fine, and the colours sumptuous beyond description. The vast old trees that grew so tall and strong, in the genial English soil, burnt away their summer life in a grand conflagration.

Hubert had successfully carried the day with regard to the important case which had taken him abroad, and had now returned to Craddock Dene.

Henriette came to stay at the Red House.

She followed her brother, one day, into the smoking-room, and there, with much tact and circ.u.mlocution, gave him to understand that she thought Hadria was becoming more sensible; that she was growing more like other people, less opinionated, wiser, and better in every way.

"Hadria was always very sweet, of course," said Henriette, "but she had the faults of her qualities, as we all have. You have had your trials, dear Hubert, but I rejoice to believe that Hadria will give you little further cause for pain or regret." Hubert made no reply. He placed the tips of his fingers together and looked into the fire.

"I think that the companionship of Lady Engleton has been of great service to Hadria," he observed, after a long pause.

"Unquestionably," a.s.sented Henriette. "She has had an enormous influence upon her. She has taught Hadria to see that one may hold one's own ideas quietly, without flying in everybody's face. Lady Engleton is a p.r.o.nounced agnostic, yet she never misses a Sunday at Craddock Church, and I am glad to see that Hadria is following her example. It must be a great satisfaction to you, Hubert. People used to talk unpleasantly about Hadria's extremely irregular attendance. It is such a mistake to offend people's ideas, in a small place like this."

"That is what I told Hadria," said Hubert, "and her mother has been speaking seriously to her on the subject. Hadria made no opposition, rather to my surprise. She said that she would go as regularly as our dining-room clock, if it gave us all so much satisfaction."