To Love Part 10

"I cannot pretend to understand you," she grumbled, "and I don't know why you talk of St. Paul's. I never suggested such a place; Harry and I were married at St. Mary's, Kensington."

d.i.c.k, when consulted on the matter, proved even less amenable. "I dislike the whole affair," he answered gruffly; "please don't ask me where it should take place."

He ran up to London himself the week before the wedding. A vague and rather incoherent wish to meet Joan again had kept him restless ever since her abrupt departure. He did not attempt to define his thoughts in any way. The girl had interested him, and startled him out of the even tenor of his beliefs. He hated to think of her turned adrift and left, as the possibility was she had been left, to fend for herself. He had not seen the elder Miss Rutherford since his visit, but rumour in the village ran that Miss Joan had got into disgrace of sorts and been sent away. The servants from the Manor spoke with bated breath of the change which had come over the household; of how Miss Joan's rooms had been locked and her pictures taken down. The world is horribly hard to women when they leave the beaten paths of respectability; he could not bear to think of what she might be suffering, of where it might lead her.

He walked about somewhat aimlessly for his few days in town, but the chance of meeting anyone in this way is very remote, and of course he did not succeed. He could not, however, shake away the depression which the thought of her brought him.

Mabel came to sit in his smoking-room the night before her wedding, Mrs.

Grant having gone early to bed.

"Did you see anyone up in town?" she asked.

d.i.c.k shook his head, puffing at his pipe. "Not a soul I knew," he commented, "except Mathews about my job. Wish I hadn't gone; London is a depressing place."

"You rather hoped to meet someone, didn't you?" asked Mabel.

d.i.c.k glanced up at her and away again quickly. "What makes you ask that?" he said.

Mabel let the curtain fall back into place; she had been peering out into the street, and turned to face him. "You have shut me outside things, d.i.c.k," she spoke slowly, "this last month, ever since my engagement; but shutting me out can't keep me from knowing. You only saw that girl over at the Manor once, but she has been in your thoughts ever since." She came forward, perching herself on the arm of his chair as had been her habit in the old days, one arm thrown round his shoulders to support herself. "Little brother," she asked, "did you think I should not know when you fell in love?"

Fell in love! How completely the thought startled him. Of course Mabel was utterly mistaken in her wild conjectures. To throw aside the doubt he turned quickly, and put a hand over hers where it lay near him.

"Why do you say I have shut you out?" he parried her question. "Because I lost my temper over your engagement?"

"No." Mabel shook her head. "It was not exactly because of that. I know you have not understood, d.i.c.k; I am not even sure that I want you to; and I know that that helped to build a wall between us, but that was not what began it. Never mind"--she bent and kissed the top of his head--"if your secret is not ready to share you shall keep it a little longer to yourself. You will go up to London, won't you, d.i.c.k, after Tom and I have come back and Mother has settled down?"

"I suppose so," he agreed; "but I want to get away for a bit first, if I can. Spoke to Mathews when I was in town and he has promised to keep his eyes open for a job on one of those P. and O. liners for me."

"I see," she said; "but when you come back you will settle in town and sometimes you will spare us week-ends from your very strenuous career, won't you?"

"Of course," he answered; his hand tightened on hers. "Mabel," he said suddenly, "you are happy, aren't you; it isn't because of me or anyone else that you are getting married, is it?"

He was not looking at her, therefore she did not have to lie with her eyes. "I am quite happy," she answered softly. "Dear, stupid d.i.c.k, how you have fretted your heart out about my happiness."

"I know," he admitted, "I could not bear to think--I mean, love somehow stands for such a lot in people's lives, I----" he broke off, and stood up abruptly. "You will think I am a sentimental a.s.s, but I have always wanted you to have the best of things, Mabel, and I have been horribly afraid that Fate, or Mother, or perhaps even I, were shoving you into taking the second best."

"You have wanted the best for me, d.i.c.k," she answered, "that counts for a lot."

Then one of those dull silences fell between them that come sometimes to two people who love with their whole hearts and who have been trying to speak some of their thoughts to each other--a silence that stood between them almost as it were with a drawn sword, while d.i.c.k puffed at his pipe and Mabel stared at her white hands, showing up against the darkness of her dress. Then finally she moved, standing up, and just for a second their eyes met.

"Good-night," she said across the silence, "it is late, d.i.c.k, I meant to be in bed ages ago."

"Good-night," he answered, and she turned quickly and went from the room.

Mrs. Grant kept everyone, including herself, in a state of unexplained fuss from the moment when early morning light woke her on the day of Mabel's marriage till the moment when, much to d.i.c.k's embarra.s.sment, she collapsed into his arms, sobbing bitterly, in the vestry where they had all gone to sign their names.

At the reception she slightly recovered her spirits, but broke down again when the time came for the couple to depart. They were going to Paris for a fortnight's honey-moon; Mabel had stipulated that they should not be away for longer than that. Jarvis Hall was ready for their return; already Mrs. Grant was using one of the motors and ordering crested paper with the address on it for her own letters. But d.i.c.k, Mabel knew, was simply aching to be quit of it all, and away on his own.

He had arranged to hand over the practice and proposed to take a two years' trip abroad. It was only in the complete freedom of d.i.c.k that she would know that part of her plan was being fulfilled.

When she drew back her head after the final farewells had been waved and the house was out of sight it was to meet Jarvis' intent, short-sighted stare. His gla.s.ses magnified the pupils of his eyes to an unusual extent when he was looking straight at anyone.

"Well," he said, "that's done. Till the last moment, Mabel, I rather wondered if you would go through with it. But I might have known," he went on quickly, "you are not the sort to shrink from a bargain once it is made."

Her hand lay pa.s.sive in his, she did not even stir when he leaned forward to kiss her. What he had said was perfectly true, the bargain had been made, she was not one of those who shirk payment.

CHAPTER X

"And you shall learn how salt his food who fares Upon another's bread; how steep his path, Who treadeth up and down another's stairs."

D. G. ROSSETTI.

There are some natures which cannot live with any happiness in drab surroundings. Atmosphere affects everyone more or less; but whereas there are a few fortunate ones who can rise triumphant to a certain contentment through squalor and ugliness, there are a great many more who find even cheerfulness very hard to attain to under like circ.u.mstances.

The shut-in dinginess of Digby Street, the gloomy aspect of Shamrock House, cast such a chill across Joan's spirits that, as she stood hesitating with her hand on the bell, the instinct came to her to scramble back into the cab and tell the man to drive her anywhere away from such a neighbourhood. Of course it was absurd, and the cabman did not look as if he would be in the least willing to comply. He had treated her with a supercilious disbelief in there being any tip for him as soon as he had heard of her destination. Joan had gone to Victoria Station to collect her luggage, and it had been both late and dark before the need for a cab had arisen. She had elected not to leave the hospital till after tea; somehow, when it had come near to going, her courage, which she had been bolstering up with hope and promises of what she should do in her new life, had vanished into thin air. Perhaps more than anything else she lacked the physical strength which would have enabled her to look cheerfully into the future. The hospital had been a place of refuge, she hated to leave it.

This feeling grew upon her more and more as she sat back in a corner of the cab while it rumbled along the Vauxhall Bridge Road. There seemed always to be a tram pa.s.sing, huge giant vehicles that shook the earth and made a great deal of noise in their going. The houses on either side were dingy, singularly unattractive-looking buildings, and the further the cab crawled away from Victoria Street the deeper the shade of poverty and dirt that descended on the surroundings. Digby Street and Shamrock House were the culminating stroke to Joan's depression.

Miss Abercrombie had written recommending it to her as a Girls' Club where she would probably get companionship and advice on the question of work. "You won't like it," she had added, "but it is very conveniently situated and ridiculously cheap." So Joan had described her destination to the cabman as a ladies' club, somewhere in Digby Street. He had answered with a sniff, for it was here that he had lost sight of his tip, that he supposed she meant the Home for Working Girls that lay in those parts. Looking up at the large, red-fronted building, with its countless uncurtained windows, Joan realized that the man's description was probably nearer the truth than her own.

She was to learn later that on this particular occasion she saw Digby Street at its very worst, for it was Sat.u.r.day night, and barrows of fish, meat and vegetables stood along the pavements, illuminated by flares of light so that all the ugliness was only too apparent. Little children played in and out, under the barrows and along the gutters; a public-house stood at the corner near Shamrock House, and exactly opposite the Salvation Army added its bra.s.s band and shrill voices to the general tumult.

Joan's first timid attempt at the bell produced no answer, nor her second. By this time the cabman had dismounted her box and stood staring at her in sullen disapproval, while a couple of very drunk but cheerful costers argued with each other as to whether they ought not to help the young lady to get in. Her third effort was perhaps more violent, for, to her relief, she could see the dim light in the hall being turned up and the door was opened on the chain and very slightly ajar. A couple of bright eyes peered at her through this opening, then, having apparently satisfied their owner that Joan was neither dangerous nor drunk, the door was further opened, and Joan could see into the red-tiled hall and pa.s.sage with its numbered, white-painted doors.

"What do you want?" asked the lady of the eyes; a small, plump person with grey hair brushed back very straight from an apple-red face.

"I want a room," Joan explained. "I have been recommended to come here.

I do hope you have one to spare."

The little lady moved aside and beckoned to the cabman. "You can come in," she said, "and the man had better fetch in your box. I thought it was one of those troublesome children when you first rang, it was so very violent, and they make a point of trying to break the bells."

"I am so sorry," Joan murmured meekly, an apology she realized was expected from her. "I was so dreadfully tired and no one seemed to be going to answer."

"We do not keep a staff of servants to answer the bell day and night,"

the woman answered. "Still, I am sorry you were kept waiting. Will you come in here"--she opened a door a little way down the pa.s.sage--"this is my office. I must see your letter of recommendation before I let you talk about the rooms, that is one of our rules."

Joan paid the cabman and followed her inquisitor into the office. Miss Nigel let down the front of the desk, opened a large ledger and donned a pair of spectacles. "Now," she said, "who are you, what are your references, and who recommended you?"

Fortunately Miss Abercrombie had remembered to send a letter of introduction. Joan produced it and handed it to Miss Nigel. "My name is Joan Rutherford," she added; "I did not know about having to have references."

Miss Nigel peered at her over the tops of her gla.s.ses; she only used them for reading and could not see out of them for other purposes. "We have to make a point of it in most cases," she answered, "but also I judge by appearances. In your case this letter from Miss Abercrombie--her name is in our books although I do not know her personally--will be quite sufficient. Now, how much do you want to pay?"

"As little as possible," Joan confessed, "only I would like to have a room to myself."

"Quite so," the other agreed, "and in any case, all our cubicles are taken. They are, of course, cheaper than anything else." She ran her finger down the lines of the ledger. "I can let you have a room on the top floor which will work out to fifteen and six a week. That includes breakfast, late dinner, lights and baths. There is a certain amount of attendance, but we expect the girls to make their own beds and keep the rooms tidy."