At this point a servant appeared at the other end of the hall, and St Aubyn went to see what he wanted. The next moment he returned, with quickened steps.
"Come away with you--you and your spooks!" he cried, cheerfully, taking Austin by the arm. "Here"s an old aunt of mine suddenly dropped from the skies, and clamouring for a cup of tea. We must go in and entertain her. She"s all by herself in the library."
"I shall be very glad," said Austin. "You go on first, and I"ll be with you in two minutes."
So St Aubyn strode off to welcome his elderly relative, and when Austin came into the room he found his friend stooping over a very small, very dowdy old lady dressed in rusty black silk, with a large bonnet rather on one side, who was standing on tiptoe, the better to peck at St Aubyn"s cheek by way of a salute. She had small, twinkling eyes, a wrinkled face, and the very honestest wig that Austin had ever seen; and yet there was an air and a style about the old body which somehow belied her quaint appearance, and suggested the idea that she was something more than the insignificant little creature that she looked at first sight. And so in fact she was, being no less a personage than the Dowager-Countess of Merthyr Tydvil, and a very great lady indeed.
"But, my dear aunt, why did you never let me know that I might expect you?" St Aubyn was saying as Austin entered. "I might have been miles away, and you"d have had all your journey for nothing."
"My dear, I"m staying with the people at Cleeve Castle, and I thought I"d just give "em the slip for an hour or two and take you by surprise," answered the old lady as she sat down. "No, you needn"t ring--I ordered tea as soon as I came in. They just bore me out of my life, you see, and they"ve got a pack o" riffraff staying with "em that I don"t know how to sit in the same room with. But who"s your young friend over there? Why don"t you introduce him?"
"I beg your pardon!" said St Aubyn. "Mr Austin Trevor, a near neighbour of mine. Austin, my aunt, Lady Merthyr Tydvil."
"Why, of course I know now," said the old lady, nodding briskly. "So you"re Austin, are you? Roger was telling me about you not three weeks ago. Well, Austin, I like the looks of you, and that"s more than I can say of most people, I can tell you. How long have you been living hereabouts?"
"Ever since I can remember," Austin said.
"Roger, do touch the bell, there"s a good creature," said Lady Merthyr Tydvil. "That man of yours must be growing the tea-plants, I should think. Ah, here he is. I"m gasping for something to drink. Did the water boil, Richards? You"re sure? How many spoonfuls of tea did you put in? H"m! Well, never mind now. I shall be better directly. What are those? Oh--Nebuchadnezzar sandwiches. Very good. That"s all we want, I think."
She dismissed the man with a gesture as though the house belonged to her, while St Aubyn looked on, amused.
"I thought I should never get here," she continued. "The driver was a perfect imbecile, my dear--didn"t know the country a bit. And it"s not more than seven miles, you know, if it"s as much. I was sure the wretch was going wrong, and if I hadn"t insisted on pulling him up and asking a respectable-looking body where the house was I believe we should have been wandering about the next shire at this moment. I"ve no patience with such fools."
"And how long are you staying at Cleeve?" asked St Aubyn, supplying her with sandwiches.
"I"ve been there nearly a week already, and the trouble lasts three days more," replied his aunt, as she munched away. "The Duke"s a fool, and she"s worse. Haven"t the ghost of an idea, either of "em, how to mix people, you know. And what with their horrible charades, and their nonsensical round games, and their everlasting bridge, I"m pretty well at the end of my tether. Never was among such a beef-witted set of addlepates since I was born. The only man among "em who isn"t a hopeless b.o.o.by"s a Socialist, and he"s been twice in gaol for inciting honest folks not to pay their taxes. Oh, they"re a precious lot, I promise you. I don"t know what we"re coming to, I"m sure."
"But it"s so easy not to do things," observed St Aubyn, lazily. "Why on earth do you go there? I wouldn"t, I know that."
"Why does anybody do anything?" retorted the old lady. "We can"t all stay at home and write books that n.o.body reads, as you do."
Austin looked up enquiringly. He had no idea that St Aubyn was an author, and said so.
"What, you didn"t know that Roger wrote books?" said the old lady, turning to him. "Oh yes, he does, my dear, and very fine books too--only they"re miles above the comprehension of stupid old women like me. Probably you"ve not a notion what a learned person he really is. I don"t even know the names of the things he writes of."
"And you never told me!" said Austin to his friend. "But you"ll have to lend me some of your books now, you know. I"m dying to know what they"re all about."
"They"re chiefly about antiquities," responded St Aubyn; "early Peruvian, Mexican, Egyptian, and so on. You"re perfectly welcome to read them all if you care to. They"re not at all deep, whatever my aunt may say."
During this brief interchange of remarks, Lady Merthyr Tydvil had been gazing rather fixedly at Austin, with her head on one side like an enquiring old bird, and a puzzled expression on her face.
"The most curious likeness!" she exclaimed. "Now, how is it that your face seems so familiar to me, I wonder? I"ve certainly never seen you anywhere before, and yet--and yet--who _is_ it you remind me of, for goodness" sake?"
"I wish I could tell you," replied Austin, laughing. "Likenesses are often quite accidental, and it may be----"
"Stuff and nonsense, my dear," interrupted the old lady, brusquely.
"There"s nothing accidental about this. You"re the living image of somebody, but who it is I can"t for the life of me imagine. What do you say your name is?"
"My surname, you mean?--Trevor," replied Austin, beginning to be rather interested.
"Trevor!" cried Lady Merthyr Tydvil, her voice rising almost to a squeak. "No relation to Geoffrey Trevor who was in the 16th Lancers?"
"He was my father," said Austin, much surprised.
"Why, my dear, my dear, he was a _great_ friend of mine!" exclaimed the old lady, raising both her hands. "I knew him twenty years ago and more, and was fonder of him than I ever let out to anybody. Of course it doesn"t matter a bit now, but I always told him that if I"d been a single woman, and a quarter of a century younger, I"d have married him out of hand. That was a standing joke between us, for I was old enough to be his mother, and he was already engaged--ah, and a sweet pretty creature she was, too, and I don"t wonder he fell in love with her. So you are Geoffrey"s son! I can scarcely believe it, even now. But it"s your mother you take after, not Geoffrey. She was a Miss--Miss----"
"Her maiden name was Waterfield," interpolated Austin.
"So it was, so it was!" a.s.sented the old lady, eagerly. "What a memory you"ve got, to be sure. One of Sir Philip Waterfield"s daughters, down in Leicestershire. And her other name was Dorothea. Why, I remember it all now as though it had happened yesterday. Your father made me his confidante all through; such a state as he was in you never saw, wondering whether she"d have him, never able to screw up his courage to ask her, now all down in the dumps and the next day halfway up to the moon. Well, of course they were married at last, and then I somehow lost sight of them. They went abroad, I think, and when they came back they settled in some place on the other side of nowhere and I never saw them again. And you are their son Austin!"
Interested as he was in these reminiscences, Austin could not help being struck with the wonderful grace of this curious old lady"s gestures. In spite of her skimpy dress and antiquated bonnet, she was, he thought, the most exquisitely-bred old woman he had ever seen.
Every movement was a charm, and he watched her, as she spoke, with growing fascination and delight.
"It is quite marvellous to think you knew my parents," he said in reply, "while I have no recollection of either of them. My mother died when I was born, and my father a year or two later. What was my mother like? Did you know her well?"
"She was a delicate-looking creature, with a pale face and dark-grey eyes," answered the old lady, "and you put me in mind of her very strongly. I didn"t know her very well, but I remember your father bringing her to call on me when they were first engaged, and a wonderfully handsome couple they were. No doubt they were very happy, but their lives were cut short, as so often happens, leaving a lot of stupid people alive that the world could well dispense with. But I see you"ve lost one of your legs! How did that come about, I should like to know?"
"Oh--something went wrong with the bone, and it had to be cut off,"
said Austin, rather vaguely.
"Dear, dear, what a pity," was the old lady"s comment. "And are you very sorry for yourself?"
"Not in the least," said Austin, smiling brightly. "I"ve got quite fond of my new one."
"You"re quite a philosopher, I see," said the old lady, nodding; "as great a philosopher as the fox who couldn"t reach the grapes, and he was one of the wisest who ever lived. And now I think I"ll have another cup of tea, Roger, if there"s any left. Give me two lumps of sugar, and just enough cream to swear by."
The conversation now became more general, and Austin, thinking that the countess would like to be alone with her nephew for a few minutes before returning to the Castle, watched for an opportunity of taking leave. He soon rose, and said he must be going home. The old lady shook hands with him in the most cordial manner, telling him that in no case must he ever forget his mother--oblivious, apparently, of the fact that by no earthly possibility could he remember her; and St Aubyn accompanied him to the door. "You"ve quite won her heart," he said, laughingly, as he bade the boy farewell. "If she was ever in love with your father, she seems to have transferred her affections to you. Good-bye--and don"t let it be too long before you come again."
Austin brandished his leg with more than usual haughtiness as he thudded his way home along the road. He always gave it a sort of additional swing when he was excited or pleased, and on this particular occasion his gait was almost defiant. It must be confessed that, never having known either of his parents, he had not hitherto thought much about them. There was one small and much-faded photograph of his father, which Aunt Charlotte kept locked up in a drawer, but of his mother there was no likeness at all, and he had no idea whatever of her appearance. But now he began to feel more interest in them, and a sense of longing, not unmixed with curiosity, took possession of him. What sort of a woman, he wondered, could that unknown mother have been? Well, physically he was himself like her--so Lady Merthyr Tydvil had said; and so much like her that it was through that very resemblance that all these interesting discoveries had been made. Then his thoughts reverted to what Aunt Charlotte had told him about his mother"s dying words, and how bitterly she had grieved at not living to bring him up herself. And yet she was still alive--somewhere--though in a world removed. Of course he couldn"t remember her, having never seen her, _but she had not forgotten him_--of that he felt convinced. That was a curious reflection. His mother was alive, and mindful of him. He could not prove it, naturally, but he knew it all the same. He realised it as though by instinct. And who could tell how near she might be to him? Distance, after all, is not necessarily a matter of miles. One may be only a few inches from another person, and yet if those inches are occupied by an impenetrable wall of solid steel, the two will be as much separated as though an ocean rolled between them. On the other hand, Austin had read of cases in which two friends were actually on the opposite sides of an ocean, and yet, through some mysterious channel, were sometimes conscious, in a sub-conscious way, of each other"s thoughts and circ.u.mstances. Perhaps his mother could even see him, although he could not see her. It was all a very fascinating puzzle, but there was some truth underlying it somewhere, if he could only find it out.
Chapter the Tenth
Austin returned in plenty of time to spend a few minutes loitering in the garden after he had dressed for dinner. It was a favourite habit of his, and he said it gave him an appet.i.te; but the truth was that he always loved to be in the open air to the very last moment of the day, watching the colours of the sky as they changed and melted into twilight. On this particular evening the heavens were streaked with primrose, and pale iris, and delicate limpid green; and so absorbed was he in gazing at this splendour of dissolving beauty that he forgot all about his appet.i.te, and had to be called twice over before he could drag himself away.
"Well, and did you have an interesting visit?" asked Aunt Charlotte, when dinner was halfway through. "You found Mr St Aubyn at home?"
Austin had been unusually silent up till then, being somewhat preoccupied with the experiences of the afternoon. He wanted to ask his aunt all manner of questions, but scarcely liked to do so as long as the servant was waiting. But now he could hold out no longer.
"Yes--even more interesting than I hoped," he answered. "I had plenty of delightful chat with St Aubyn, and then a visitor came in. It"s that that I want to talk about."
"A visitor, eh?" said Aunt Charlotte, her attention quickening. "What sort of a visitor? A lady?"
"Yes, an old lady," replied Austin, "who----"
"Did she come in an open fly?" pursued Aunt Charlotte, helping herself to sauce.