Expensive complaint, seemingly. So she"d come up to see a palmist, or some kind of an expert about him. She spoke of you, of her own accord. I said I was coming down here."
Sanchia"s hand at the kettle was steady, but her eyes flickered before they took the veil. "Tell me about Vicky. What did she say--of me?"
Chevenix came to the tea-table and stood by her. "I think Vicky"s all right. I do indeed. It seems to me she"d give her ears to see you--simple ears. Sinclair, you"ll find, is the trouble. He"s the usual airy kind of a.s.s. Makes laws for his womankind, and has "em kept. Vicky likes it, too."
"I suppose he is like that," Sanchia said, as if it was a curious case. "I have never spoken to him. He was about, of course--but Vicky took him up after--my time." For a moment emotion, like a wet cloud, drifted across her eyes. "I should like to see Vicky again. It"s eight years."
Chevenix was anxious. "I do think it could be managed, you know--with tact. I"d do any mortal thing, Sancie--you know I would, but--" He despaired. "Tact! Tact! That"s what you want."
Her soft mood chased away. She looked at him full. "I can"t use what you call tact with Vicky. That means that I am to grovel." She drove him back to his photographs. He peered into the little print on the wall.
"What have we here? A domestic scene, my hat! You appear to be bathing-- well over the knee, anyhow. High-girt Diana, when no man is by. Awfully jolly you look. But he _is_ by. Who on earth"s this chap?" He peered.
Sanchia from her tea-table watched him, in happy muse. He shouted his discovery. "I remember the chap! Now, what on earth was he called? Your casual friend, who lived in a cart and only had three pair of bags.
Nohouse--Senhouse! That was the man." He looked with interest at the pair, then at Sanchia. "Mixed bathing--what?"
She laughed. "Yes--we both got wet to the skin. Percy Charnock took it ages ago--oh, ages! Before I was out, or knew Nevile, or anybody except you. It was ten years ago. I must have been eighteen. It was when I was at Gorston with Grace Mauleverer--trying to save water-lilies from drowning in green sc.u.m. He--Mr. Senhouse--came along in his cart, and saw me, and lent me his bed for a raft--and worked it himself. That was the first time I ever saw him--" she ended softly in a sigh: "before anything happened."
Chevenix listened, nodding at the photograph. "Wish to heaven, my dear, nothing had ever happened. The less that happens to girls the better for them, I believe. Not but what _this_ chap would have been all right. If _he_ had happened, now! He was as mad as a hatter, but a real good sort.
Did I tell you?" He grew suddenly reminiscent. "I saw him a little more than a year ago--with a pretty woman. Had a talk with him--asked him to come up and have a look at you. It was when Nevile went off on this trip.
No, no, I liked old Senhouse. He was a nice-minded chap. Not the kind to eat you up--and take everything you"ve got as if he had a right to it. No.
That"s Nevile"s line, that is. You wouldn"t see Nevile lending you his bed, or risking his life after water-lilies."
Sanchia"s eyes were narrow and critical. She peered as if she were trying to find good somewhere in Nevile Ingram. "He"d risk anything to get what he thought were his rights. But not upon a bed for a raft. He"d write to London for the latest thing in coracles. He"s very conventional."
"You have to be," said Chevenix with sudden energy. He wheeled round upon her as he spoke. "We all have to be. We go by clockwork. You get the striking all wrong if you play tricks." He resumed the photograph. "By Jove, but that suits you. Child of Nature, what? I suppose you"re happiest when you"re larking?"
"Mud-larking?" she asked him, laughing and blushing.
"Well, we"ll say rampageing; going as you please."
"Yes." She owned to it without hesitation. "I can"t be happy, I think, unless I can do just what I like everywhere. It was one of the first things Jack Senhouse ever taught me. He was an anarchist, you know--and I suppose I"m one, too."
"Your gypsy friend?" He jerked his head backwards to the photograph. "By Jove, my dear," he added, "you must have knocked him sideways--even him-- when you carried out his little ideas--as you did."
She opened her eyes to a stare. She stared, rather ruefully. "Yes," she said, "I believe I did. I know I did. He was dreadfully unhappy. He and I were never quite the same after that. But I couldn"t help myself. It was before me--it had to be done."
"No, no, no!" cried he vehemently, but checked himself. "Pardon, Sancie.
We won"t go over all that, but surely you see, now, that it won"t do. Now that escapade in the pond, you know. That was all right--with only old Senhouse in the way. You must admit that you were rather _decolletee_, to say the least of it. Now, would you say that you can do those sort of things--go as you please, you know, anywhere?"
"Why not?" Her eyes were straightly at him.
"What! Whether you"re seen or not?"
She frowned. "I don"t want to know whether I"m seen or not."
"And mostly you don"t care?"
"And sometimes I don"t care."
"Ah," said Chevenix, "there you are. Your "sometimes" gives you away."
She changed the subject. "Do have some tea. It will be quite cold."
He had been staring again at the photograph--Sanchia"s gleaming limbs, the gypsy"s intent face shadowed over the water. He now relinquished it with an effort. "Thanks," he said. "I like it cold." He sat beside her, and they talked casually, like old, fast friends, of mutual acquaintance. But for him the air was charged; she was on his conscience. Reminiscences paled and talk died down; he found himself staring at the wall.
He resumed the great affair. "Nevile"s rather jumpy, don"t you think?"
Her serenity was proof. "Is he? Why should he be?"
"Ah, my dear!" cried the poor young man. "Let"s say it"s the old Devereux.
_Salmo deverox_, eh? Sounds fierce."
Not a flicker. "Mrs. Devereux? What has she been doing to him?"
"Nothing," he said; "and that"s just it. She won"t have anything to say to him."
Then she went a little too far. A man charged with friendly impulse, charged also with knowledge, must be handled tenderly. You must not be foolhardy. But here was bravado, nothing less. For she arched her brows, and showed her eyes innocently wide. "Oh!" she said, "why? Why won"t Mrs.
Devereux speak to Nevile?"
"Oh, come, you know." He looked at her keenly. He didn"t wink, but he blinked. Then he crossed the room. "Look here, Sancie. Will you let me talk to you--really--as an old friend?"
She looked up into his face, nodded and smiled. "Of course you may say what you like."
He sat by her, collecting himself. "Well, then, what I shall say is just this. The whole thing is in your hands--now. You can put it square.
There"s absolutely nothing in your way--now--well, now that Claire"s gone, you know." He watched her anxiously for a sign, but got none. So still she sat, glooming, watching herself--as on a scene.
"Mind," he said in a new tone. "You know all about me. I jibbed at first when you broke away. I"ll own to that. I couldn"t do otherwise. Why, old Senhouse himself went half off his head about it. Anything in the world to get you out of it, I"d have done. Any mortal thing, my dear. But there!
There was no holding you--off you went! But when once the thing was started--the extraordinary thing was that I was on your side directly. And so I always have been. Ask Vicky--ask your mother. I"ve done, in my quiet way, what you would never have asked of me. You must forgive me--I"ve defended you everywhere. I won"t mention names, but I"ve explained your case, only lately, in a rocky quarter--and I know I"ve made an impression.
I"m not much good at talking, as a rule, but I do believe that I put the thing rather well. You make your own laws--eh? Like Napoleon Buonaparte-- eh? And somehow--the way you do it--it"s all right, eh, Sancie?"
He got nothing from her. She sat on rigid, with unwinking eyes, staring at herself, as she saw herself on the scene. Chevenix leaned to her.
"And Nevile knows it. He believes it. He would say it anywhere. He"s difficult, is Nevile; a wayward beggar. He"s been his own master since he was sixteen; asked, and had. It"s hard to make him understand that he can"t go on. But he can"t, the old sweep, when you put in your say. You know his way--he puts his desires in the shape of truisms. He states them --that"s all he has to do--they become immutable laws. Very imposing, his desires, put like that. They"ve imposed upon me; they"ve imposed upon _you_ in their day. Well, with a man like that, you know, you can"t take him up too short. Go slow, go slow. What was it I heard Clyde saying to you just now? Who"s queen of herself is queen of the world--what? Now, that"s quite true. One for Clyde. Apply that to old Nevile. Queen of herself! Why, what else are you? And what"s Nevile but the blundering world in a man"s skin? Well, queen it, queen it--and there"s your kingdom under your feet. Marry the old chap, Sancie. You put everything right; you take your proper place. The county! But what are counties to you? You smile--and you may well smile. Let the county go hang; but there"s Vicky.
She"s more than county to you. There"s Melusine, there"s Philippa, there"s Hawise; there"s your good old dad, there"s your lady mother. You get "em all. And Nevile"s biting his nails for it. And a free man. Come now."
She had listened, that"s certain; she hadn"t been displeased. He had seen her eyes grow dreamy, he had marked her rising breast. Rising and falling, rising and falling, like lilies swayed by flowing water. That betokened no storm, nor flood; that meant the stirring of the still deeps, not by violent access, but by slow-moving, slow-gathered, inborn forces. Had he had eloquence, he thought, as he watched her, he had won. But he was anxious. She was such a deep one.
[Ill.u.s.tration: He had eloquence, he thought, as he watched her, he had won. But he was anxious. She was such a deep one.]
When she spoke there sounded to be a tinge of weariness in her voice; she dragged her sentences, as if she foresaw her own acts, and was tired in advance. She seemed almost to be pitying her fate. At first she looked down at her hands in her lap, at her fingers idly interweaving; but midway of her drawn-out soliloquy--for she seemed to be talking to herself--she turned him her eyes, and he plumbed their depths in vain.
"It"s very nice of you to be interested in me. You are much more interested than I am--and it"s a compliment, a great compliment. I think you are very loyal--if I can call it loyalty--if you"ll let me call it that. I like my work here; I"m perfectly happy doing it. It was hard at first. I knew absolutely nothing of housekeeping and managing things when I came here. I had to work--to learn book-keeping and accounts--cooking-- building--carpentering--stock-raising--oh, everything. I had to feel that I knew very nearly as much about everything as the people who were to do what I told them. And of course that was quite true; but it wasn"t at all easy. It has taken me eight years to get as far as I am now. And I could go on for years more. There"s n.o.body on the place whom I can"t manage: they all like me. I"m quite comfortable--if I can be let alone."
... Speaking so, she believed it. But, thinking it over she was driven to explain herself.
"People seem to think that girls--that women--care for nothing but one thing--being married, I mean. I"m sure that"s a mistake. One gets interested, one may get absorbed--and then there"s a difficulty. For it"s very true, I think, that unless we care for the one thing, and that thing only, we don"t care for it at all. At least, that is how I feel about it.
I have got lots of interests in life--all these things here--management of things. I don"t want Nevile--or to be married. I don"t want anything of the sort; I can"t be bothered. I cared once--frightfully; but now I don"t care. All that was long ago; at the beginning--eight years ago. Now it"s done with, I only want to be let alone--to do my work here. It doesn"t seem to me much to ask; but--" ...
It was then that she looked at him, and was beyond the power of his sounding. She grew vehement, full of still, pa.s.sionless rage. She was like a G.o.ddess p.r.o.nouncing a decree; she was final.