The Parts Men Play Part 55

'Wot a infant!' commented the groom proudly. 'I never see such a offspring for his age--never. Whoopin'-cough something horrid? Well, well!'

For a full minute he reflected with such apparent satisfaction on his son and heir's vulnerability to human ailments that there is no telling when he would have left off, if his reverie had not been broken by his wife placing a pipe in his hands and a bowl on the table.

'It was always waiting on you, daddy,' said the good woman. 'I sez to Wellington, "That's his favourite, it is, and we'll always have it ready for him when he comes home."'

Without any display of emotion or undue haste, the old groom filled the pipe, lit it, drew a long breath of smoke, and slowly blew it into the air, regarding his good partner throughout with a look that clearly showed the importance he attached to the experiment.

He took a second puff, raised his eyes from hers to the ceiling, and his broad face crinkled into a grin, the like of which his wife had never seen before on his countenance.

'Old girl,' he said, 'when I sees you first I sez, "There's the filly for my money;" and so you was. And, by Criky! you and me hevn't reached the last jump yet--no, sir. Give me a kiss. . . .

Thar--that's werry "bon," as them queer-spoke Frenchies would say. M'

dear, I hev some nooz for _you_ now.'

He puffed tantalisingly at the pipe, and surveyed his wife's intense curiosity with studied approbation.

'When Milord come to see me last week,' he said, measuring the words slowly, 'he tells me as how he won't go for to hev no more hosses, and conseckens o' me bein' all bunged up by them sausage-eaters, he sez as how would I like to be the landlord o' "The Hares and Fox" in the village, him havin' bought the same, and would I go for to tell you as a surprise, likewise and sim'lar?'

'Heavenly hope!' cried the good woman, bursting into tears; 'if that ain't marvellous grand!'

'That,' said Mathews, beckoning for her to hand him his crutches, 'is what Milord has done for you and me. And, missus, as long as there's a drop in the cellar none o' the soldier-lads in the village will go for to want a pint o' bitter nohow. Now, old girl, if you'll give a leg up we'll go and see how the infant is lookin'.'

II.

A few days later, in the chapel decked with flowers, the marriage of Selwyn and Elise took place.

In spite of her disappointment that Elise was not marrying a t.i.tle, Lady Durwent rose superbly to the occasion. She led the weeping and the laughing with the utmost heartiness, and recalled her own wedding so eloquently and vividly that those who didn't know about the Ironmonger supposed she must have been the daughter of a marchioness at least, and was probably related to royalty.

Just before the ceremony itself the youthful Wellington, who had confounded science by a remarkable recovery from his ailment, was confronted with the offer of half-a-crown if he acquitted himself well, and threatened with corporal punishment if he didn't. With this double stimulus, he pumped without cessation and with such heartiness that the rector's words were at times hardly audible above the sound of air escaping from the bellows--necessitating a punitive expedition on the part of the s.e.xton, and engendering in Wellington a permanent mistrust in the justice of human affairs.

Late in the afternoon bride and groom left for London, on their way to America.

When the train came in and they had entered their compartment, Selwyn, with feelings that left him dumb, looked out at the little group who had come to say farewell.

Lord Durwent stood with his unchangeable air of gentleness and courtesy, but in his eyes there was the look of a man for whom life holds only memories. Lady Durwent alternated dramatically between advice and tears; and Mathews stood proudly beside his wife (whose hat was of most marvellous size and colours), nodding his head sagaciously, and uttering as much philosophy in five minutes as falls to the lot of most men in a decade.

And so, with his wife's hand trembling on his arm, Austin Selwyn leaned from the window and waved good-bye to the little English village.

III.

A year went by, and, with the pa.s.sing of winter, Selwyn and Elise, in their home at Long Island, watched the budding promise of another spring.

Their home was by the sea, and in the presence of that great majestic force they had lived as man and wife, taking up the broken threads of life, and knitting them together for the future.

The task of resuming his literary work had been next to impossible for Selwyn. He had tried to mould the destinies of nations--and they had fallen back upon him, crushing him. His thoughts cried out for utterance, but self-distrust robbed him of courage. Months went by, and his chafing, restless longing for self-expression grew more intense and more intolerable.

And then the woman who was his wife lost her own yoke of self-restraint in solicitude for him. Timidly, hesitatingly at first, she invaded the precincts of his mind. With subtle persistence, yet never seeming to force her way, she wove her personality about his like a web of silken thread. Her purity of thought, her innate artistry, her depth of feeling, played on his spirit like dew upon the parched earth.

As the pa.s.sing hours took their course, each nature unconsciously gave to the other the freedom that comes only with surrender. His strength and his care for her liberated her womanhood, and, like a flower that has lived in shadow, her soul blossomed to fullness in that warmth.

And his troubled mind, directionless, yet rebellious of inaction, found again the meaning and the hidden truths of life, then gained the courage to be life's interpreter.

Once more Austin Selwyn wrote.

One evening towards the summer Elise was sitting on the veranda, when he came from his study and joined her. The first pale stars were shining through a sheen of blue that rose from the horizon in an encircling, shimmering mist.

'Are you through with your writing?' she said.

'Not yet,' he answered, sitting beside her; 'but I could not resist the call of you and this wonderful night.'

'Isn't it glorious?' she said softly, taking his hand in hers. 'I think that blue over the sea must be like the Arabian desert at night when the camel-trains rest on their way. Don't you love the sound of the waves?'

With a little sigh she leaned her head on his shoulder, and he held her close to him.

'Happy, Elise?'

'So happy,' she whispered, 'that I am afraid some day I shall find it isn't true.'

He laughed gently, and for a few moments neither spoke, held by the wonderful intimacy of the spirit that does not need words for understanding.

'Austin dear,' she said at length, 'before you came out I was counting the stars--and playing with dreams. Don't think me silly, will you?

But I was planning, if we have a son, what I should like to call him.'

'I think I know,' he said, pressing his lips against her hair. 'd.i.c.k?'

'And Gerard for his second name. I should want him to be strong and true like Gerard--but he must have d.i.c.k's eyes and d.i.c.k's smile. But, then, I want so much for this dream-boy of ours--for, most of all, he must be like my husband.'

With a sudden shyness she hid her face against his breast, and he ran his hand caressingly over her arm, which was like cool velvet to the touch.

The glimmering stars grew stronger, and a breeze from the sea crept murmuringly over the spring-scented fields.

'There are times,' he said, 'when I long for the power to reach out for the great truths that lie hidden in s.p.a.ce and in the silence of a night like this--to put them in such simple language that every one could read and understand. If I could only translate the wonder of you and the spirit of the sea into words.'

She looked up into his face, and something of the mystic blue of the skies lay in the depths of her eyes.

IV.

Late that night he resumed work in his study, but a thousand memories and fancies came crowding to his mind. He tried to shake them off, but they clung to him--memories of the war--memories of the times when the world was drunk with pa.s.sion. He heard, as if afar off, the whine and shriek of sh.e.l.ls, and he saw the dead--grotesque, silent, horrible.

That was the great absurdity--_the dead_.

It was hopeless to write. He was no longer pilot of his thoughts.

He rose to his feet and threw open the door with an impatient desire for fresh air. Though the cool breeze refreshed his temples, the restlessness of his mind was only increased by the hush of nature's nocturne, through which the sound of the sea came like a drone.

Beneath the canopy of that same sky the dead were lying. Across the seas a breeze of spring was stealing about the graves, as now it played about his face.