To Love Part 33

That night, after he had gone up to his own room, the thought of Joan came to haunt d.i.c.k. For two months he had not let himself think of her; work and other interests had more or less crowded her out of his heart.

But the sudden, though long expected, call to action brought him, so to speak, to the verge of his own feeling. Other things fell away; he was face to face once again with the knowledge that he loved her, and that one cannot even starve love to death. He wanted her, he needed her; what did other things, such as anger and hurt pride, count against that. He had only kissed her once in his life, and the sudden, pa.s.sionate hunger for the touch of her lips shook his heart to a prompt knowledge of the truth. He must see her again before he left, for it might be that death would find him out there. War had seemed more of a game to begin with; that first evening when he had shouted with the others round Trafalgar Square he had not connected War with Death, but now it seemed as if they walked hand in hand. He could not die without first seeing Joan again.

He thought of writing her a short note asking her to be in when he called, but the post from Jarvis Hall did not go out till after twelve; he could get to London quicker himself. After breakfast he told Mabel that he found he had to go away for the day.

"Something you have forgotten--couldn't you write for it, d.i.c.k?" she asked. "It seems such a shame, because we shall only have one more day of you."

"No," he answered; he did not lift his eyes to look at her. "As a matter of fact it is somebody that I must see."

He had not written about or mentioned Joan since he had gone away from Sevenoaks last; Mabel had hoped the episode was forgotten. It came to her suddenly that it was Joan he was speaking of, and she remembered f.a.n.n.y's long, breathless explanation and the girl's rather pathetic belief that she would do something to help. She could not, however, say anything to him before the others.

"Will the eleven-thirty do for you?" Tom was asking. "Because I have got to take the car in then."

"It seems a little unreasonable, d.i.c.k," Mrs. Grant put in. She had not been the best of friends with him since their violent scene together; her voice took on a querulous tone when she spoke to him. "Who can there be in London, that you suddenly find you must see?" She, too, for the moment, was thinking of the outrageous girl.

"I am sorry," d.i.c.k answered. "It is my own fault for not having gone before. I'll try and get back to-morrow."

Mabel caught him afterwards alone on his way out to the garden to smoke a pipe. She slipped a hand through his arm and went with him.

"Mother is upset," she confided. "I don't think she can be awfully well; just lately she cries very easily."

"She always used to"--d.i.c.k's voice was not very sympathetic. "Do you remember how angry I was at the way she cried when father died?"

"Yes," Mabel nodded. "All the same, she does love you, d.i.c.k; it is a funny sort of love, perhaps, but as she gets older it seems to me that she gets softer, less selfish. And, d.i.c.k, I think she feels--as indeed I do, too--that you have grown away from us. It is not the War, though that takes men from us women, too; it is more just as if we were out of sympathy with one another. Are we?"

"What a funny thought." d.i.c.k smiled down at her. "There has never been, as you know, much sympathy between mother and myself. But for you, Mabel, things will always be the same between us. I trust you with everything I have."

"And yet you aren't quite trusting me now," she answered. "You are going up to London to see this girl, aren't you, d.i.c.k?--and all this time you have never written or spoken to me about her."

"I have been trying to forget," he confessed. "I thought, because of something she did to me, that I was strong enough to shut her outside my life. But last night the old battle began again in my mind, and I know that I must see her before I go out. It is more than probable, Mabel, that I shall not come back. I can't go out into the darkness without seeing her again."

Mabel's hand tightened on his arm. "You mustn't say that, d.i.c.k," she whispered. "You have got to come back."

They walked in silence and still Mabel debated the question in her mind.

Should she stand out of events, and let them, shape themselves? If d.i.c.k went to London and found Joan gone, what would he do then? Perhaps he would not see f.a.n.n.y and the landlady would not be able to tell him where Joan was. Wrotham would be the last place in which he would look for her, and on Sat.u.r.day he was leaving for the front. It was only just for a second that her mind wavered; she had initially too straight a nature for deceit.

"d.i.c.k," she said, coming to a standstill and looking up at him, "you needn't go to London. Miss Rutherford"--she hesitated on the word--"Joan, is back at Wrotham."

"At Wrotham?" he repeated, staring at her.

"Yes," she answered, "Old Miss Rutherford died two months ago. They had sent for Joan; I believe she arrived the day her aunt died, and she has stayed there ever since. Once or twice I have met her out with Colonel Rutherford. No, wait"--she hurried on, once she had begun. "There is something else I must tell you. I went, you know, to see her in London, but I found that she had left. As I was coming away I met the other girl--I cannot remember her name, but she came here to tea--she insisted on my going back with her; she had something she wanted to tell me about Joan. It was a long, rather jumbled story, d.i.c.k; only two facts stand out of it. One was that the baby was never born; Joan was in some sort of accident when she first went back to London; and the other thing was that this girl wanted me to use my influence to persuade you that Joan really loved you; that what had angered you that night was all a mistake." She broke off short, and began again quickly. "I did not promise, d.i.c.k; in fact I told the girl I would do nothing to interfere.

'If he can find his happiness anywhere else I shall be glad,' I said.

And that is what I felt. I don't try and excuse myself; I never wanted you to marry her if you could forget her, and, d.i.c.k, I almost hoped you had--I was not going to remind you."

"I see," said d.i.c.k. His pipe had gone out. He lit it again slowly and methodically. "Mabel," he said suddenly, "if I can persuade Joan to marry me before I go out, will you be nice to her as my wife?"

"You can't marry her, d.i.c.k," Mabel remonstrated, "there isn't time. But if you will trust me again beyond this, I promise to be as nice to her as you would like me to be."

"But I can, and what's more, I will," d.i.c.k answered. "I've shilly-shallied long enough. If she'll have me, and it would serve me jolly well right if she turned me down--it shall be a special licence at a registry office on Sat.u.r.day morning. My train doesn't leave till two-thirty." He stood up very tall and straight. Mabel thought she had never seen him look so glad to be alive. "And now," he added, "I am going straight across to ask her. Wish me luck, Mabel."

She stood up, too, and put both her hands on his. "You aren't angry with me?" she whispered. "d.i.c.k, from the bottom of my heart, I do wish you luck, as you call it."

"Angry? Lord bless you, no!" he said, and suddenly he bent and kissed her. "You've argued about it, Mabel, but then I always knew you would argue. I trust you to be good to her after I'm gone; what more can I say?"

CHAPTER x.x.x

"But love is the great amulet which makes the World a Garden."

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

Colonel Rutherford and Joan had had breakfast early that morning, for Uncle John was going to London to attend some big meeting, at which, much to his own secret gratification, he had been asked to speak. He rehea.r.s.ed the greater part of what he was going to say to Joan during breakfast, and on their way down to the station. He had long ago forgiven, or forgotten, which was more probable still, Joan's exile from his good graces. After Aunt Janet's funeral, when Joan had spoken to him rather nervously, suggesting her return to London, he had stared at her with unfeigned astonishment.

"Back to London," he had said, "whatever for?"

"To get some more work to do," Joan suggested.

His s.h.a.ggy eyebrows drew together in a frown. "Preposterous notion," he answered. "I never did agree with it. So long as a girl has a home, what does she want to work for? Besides, now your aunt is not here, who is going to look after the house and things?"

The question seemed unanswerable, and since he had apparently forgiven the past, why should she remind him? She realized, too, that he needed her. She wrote asking f.a.n.n.y to send on her things, and settled down to try and fill her mind and heart, as much as possible, with the daily round of small duties which are involved in the keeping of a house.

This morning on her way back from the station, having seen Uncle John into his train for London, she let fat Sally walk a lot of the way. The country seemed to be asleep; for miles all round she could see across field after field, not a creature moving, not a soul in sight, only a little dust round a bend of the road showed where a motor-car had just pa.s.sed. It occurred to her that her life had been just like that; the quiet, seeming, non-existence of the country; a flashing past of life which left its cloud of dust behind, and then the quiet closing round her again.

"The daily round, the common task, Shall furnish all we need to ask."

She hummed it under her breath.

"Room to deny ourselves--"

Perhaps that was the lesson that she had needed to learn, for in the old days her watchword had been:

"Room to fulfil myself."

If it was not for Uncle John now she would have liked to have gone back to London and thrown herself into some sort of work. Women would be needed before long, the papers said, to do the work of the men who must be sent to the firing-line. But Uncle John was surely the work to her hand; she would do it with what heart she had, even though the long hours of sewing or knitting gave her too much time to think.

Sally having been handed over to the stable-boy, Joan betook herself into the dining-room. Thursday was the day on which the flowers were done; Mary had already spread the table with newspaper, and collected the vases from all over the house. They had been cleaned and fresh water put in them; she was allowed to do as little work as possible, but the empty flower-basket and the scissors stood waiting at her hand. The gardener would really have preferred to have done the flower-cutting himself, but Aunt Janet had always insisted upon doing it, and Joan carried on the custom. There were only a few late roses left, but she gathered an armful of big white daisies.

As she came back from the hall Joan saw d.i.c.k waiting for her. The maid had let him in and gone to find "Miss Joan." Strangely enough the first thought that came into her mind was not a memory of the last time that they had met or a wonder as to why he was here; she could see that he was in khaki, and to her it meant only one thing. He was going to the front, he had come to say good-bye to her before he went. All the colour left her face, she stared at him, the basket swinging on her arm, the daisies clutched against her black dress.

"Joan," d.i.c.k said quickly; he came towards her. "Joan, didn't the maid find you, didn't they tell you I was here? What's the matter, dear; why are you frightened?"

He took the flowers and the basket from her and laid them down on the hall table. Mary coming back at the moment, saw them standing hand in hand, and ran to the kitchen to tell the others that Miss Joan's young man had come at last.

"Isn't there somewhere you can take me where we can talk?" d.i.c.k was saying. "I have such an awful lot to say to you."

"You have come to say good-bye," Joan answered. She looked up at him, her lips quivered a little. "You are going out there."