Sisters

said Mr Pennycuick, gloating upon his treasure over Guthrie"s shoulder.

"Not my aunt," explained Guthrie. "I don"t know what relation, but a long way farther off than that. I am only a very small Carey, you know, sir."

Mr Pennycuick testily intimated, as before, that to be a Carey at all was enough for him. It was his excuse for these confidences, of which he was half ashamed.

While Guthrie studied the poor picture, trying to look as interested as he was expected to be, his host turned and stared down into the drawer that had held it for so many years. Other things were there--the usual dead flowers, still holding together, still fusty to the nose; the usual yellowing ball glove, the usual dance and invitation cards, and faded letters, with their edges frayed; a book-marker with an embroidered "Friendship", mixed up with forget-me-nots, in coloured silks upon perforated card, backed by a still gleaming red satin ribbon looped at one end and fringed out at the other; the book that it was tucked into ("The Language of Flowers"), a large valentine in a wrapper with many broken seals, some newspaper cuttings, half a sixpence, with a hole in it, and a daguerreotype in a leather case.

This last he took up, opened and gazed at steadily, until his companion was compelled to interrupt him with an inquiring eye. Then he pa.s.sed it over, and Guthrie turned it this way and that, until he caught the outlines of a long aquiline face between bunched ringlets, and a long bodice with a deep point, which he understood to have belonged to his distant relative at some period before he was born.

"And this?" he murmured politely.

"Yes," said Mr Pennycuick; "that"s her. And I"ve never shown it to a soul before--not even to my wife."

"A--a sweet expression. Fair, was she?"

"Fair as a lily, and as pure, and as beautiful. Gentle as a dove. With blue eyes."

Guthrie did not care for this type just now. He liked them dark and flashing and spirited, like Miss Deborah. But he murmured "Hm-m-m"

sympathetically.

"The loveliest woman in England," the old man maundered on. "Surely you must have heard of her, in the family?"

Guthrie had not only heard of her, as we know, he had seen her; but he shook a denying head, and dropped another hint of his own position in the family--outside the royal enclosure, as it were.

"Well, now, I"ll just tell you what happened," said Mr Pennycuick, turning to the open drawer again. "Strictly between ourselves, of course--and only because you are a Carey, you understand--somehow you bring it all back--"

He was fumbling with the big valentine, getting it out of its case.

"Yes?" Guthrie encouraged him, while inwardly chafing to be gone.

"You see this?" It was an exquisite structure of foamy paper lace, silver doves, gauzed-winged Cupids, transfixed hearts and wreaths of flowers, miraculously delicate. How it had kept its frail form intact for the many years of its age was a wonder to behold. "You see this?"

said the old man. "Well, when I was a young fellow, the 14th of February was a time, I can tell you! You fellows nowadays, you don"t know what fun is, nor how to go a-courting, nor anything.... I was at old Redford that year, and she was at Wellwood, and all through the sleet and snow I rode there after dark, tied my horse to a tree, crept up that nut-walk--you know it?--and round by the east terrace to the porch, and laid my valentine on the door-step, and clanged the bell, and hid behind the yew-fence till the man came out to get it. Then I went home. And last thing at night there was a clatter-clatter at the door at Redford, and I dashed out to catch whoever it was--her brother she sent--but wasn"t quite smart enough. If only I"d seen him. I should have known--as I ought to have, without that; but I didn"t. It never occurred to me that she"d send the answer so soon, and she had disguised her writing in the address, and there was another girl--name of Myrtle Vining--who used to have myrtle on her note-paper, and all over the place--and here these flowers looked to me as if they were meant for myrtle, and these two crossed arrows are like capital V--and how I came to be such an egregious dolt, Lord only knows! Well, I"ve paid for it--that I have--I"ve paid for it. Look here--don"t touch!

I"ll show you what I found out when it was too late--after she"d played shy with me till I got angry and left her, and it was all over--my eyes aren"t good enough to see it now, but I suppose it"s there still--"

With infinite care and the small blade of his pocket-knife, he lifted the tiny tip of a tiny Cupid"s wing. With bent head and puckered eyelids, Guthrie peered under, and read: "Yours, M. C.," written on a s.p.a.ce of paper hardly larger than a pin"s head.

"In my valentine that night," said Mr Pennycuick, "I"d asked her to have me. I didn"t hide it up in this way; I knew, while I wondered that she took no notice, that she must have seen it. This was her answer.

And I never got it, sir, till she was married to another man--and then by the merest accident. Then I couldn"t even have the satisfaction of telling her that I"d got it, and how it was I hadn"t got it before. Of course, I wasn"t going to upset her after she was married to another man. I"ve had to let her think what she liked of me."

Guthrie was certainly interested now, but not as interested as he would have been the day before. The day before, this story would have moved him to pour out the tale of his own untimely and irreparable loss. He and old Mr Pennycuick would--metaphorically speaking--have mingled their tears together.

"You forget, off and on," said Mr Pennycuick, as he wrapped up his treasure with shaking hands and excessive care--"perhaps for years at a time, while you are at work and full of affairs; but it comes back--especially when you are old and lonely, and you think how different your life might have been. You don"t know anything about these things yet. Perhaps, when you are an old man like me, you will."

Guthrie did know--no one better, he believed. But he did not say.

Unknown to himself, he had reached that stage which Mr Pennycuick came to when he began courting Sally Dimsdale, who had made him such a good and faithful (and uninteresting) wife.

"It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all,"

says the old proverb. True enough. But one might write it this way, with even more truth: "It is better to love and lose than to love and gain." One means by love, romantic love, of course.

CHAPTER V.

Dinner was over. They had all gone up to the big drawing-room, which was the feature of the "new part"--the third house of the series which now made one. The new part was incongruously solid and modern, with a storey (comprising the drawing-room and its staircase only) which overtopped the adjacent roofs. Below it was a corresponding dining-room, and both apartments were furnished richly in the fashion of the time--tons of solid mahogany in the latter, and a pasture of gra.s.s-green carpet and brocade upholsterings in the former, lit up with gilded wall-paper and curtain-cornices as by rays of a pale sun. Curly rosewood sofas and arm-chairs, and marbled and mirrored chiffonniers, and the like, were in such profusion upstairs as to do away with the air of bleakness common to a right-angled chamber of large size and middle-cla.s.s arrangement. A fine grand piano stood open in a prominent place. Four large shaded lamps and four piano candles pleasantly irradiated the whole; while three French windows, opening on a balcony, still stood wide to the summer night.

By the great white marble mantelpiece, under the great gilt-framed pier-gla.s.s, filling the huge chair specially dedicated to his use, Father Pennycuick sat in comfortable gossip with his old friend, Th.o.r.n.ycroft of Bundaboo. It irked him to separate himself from pipe and newspaper, baggy coat and slouchy slippers, and his corpulent frame objected to stairs; but when he had guests he considered it his duty to toil up after them, in patent shoes and dining costume, and sit amongst them until music or card games were on the way, when he would retire as un.o.btrusively as his size and heavy footstep permitted. It was the custom to pretend not to see or hear him go, and it would have annoyed him exceedingly had anyone bidden him good-night.

The pair talked shop, after the manner of old squatters when they sit apart; but the tall, spare, grey man with the thoughtful face--more like a soldier than a sheep-farmer--was not thinking much of his flocks and herds. His thoughts followed the direction of his quiet eyes, focussed upon an amber silk gown and its immediate surroundings. Mr Th.o.r.n.ycroft was Deborah"s G.o.dfather, and at forty-seven was to all the sisters quite an elderly man, a sort of bachelor uncle to the family, one with no concern in such youthful pastimes as love-making and marrying, except as a benevolent onlooker and present-giver; and so the veiled vigilance of his regard was not noticed, as it would not have been understood, by anybody.

But other eyes, similarly occupied, were plainer to read.

Jim Urquhart"s, of course. Jim--as ineligible for the most coveted post in the Western District as he well could be, by reason of the family already depending upon him, together with the load of debt left along with it by his deceased father, a "pal" of Mr Pennycuick"s in the gay and good old times--still contrived to bring himself within the radius of Deborah"s observation whenever occasion served. And being there, although silent and keeping to the background, his gaze followed her as the gaze of an opossum follows a light on a dark night, with the same still absorption. Nothing but her returning gaze could divert it from its mark. It was so natural, so calmly customary, so un.o.btrusive, that n.o.body cared to attach importance to it.

He sat now, far back against the green brocade hangings of a corner window, where he could see the beloved profile in the middle of the room. His big, work-roughened hands clasped his big, bony knees, and his long, loose body hung forward out of the little chair that was never built for such as he; and he seemed given over to Rose Pennycuick"s tale of the pony that had corns, and the cat that had been mangled in a cruel rabbit trap. He gave her wise counsel regarding the treatment of these poor things, his deep, drawling voice an unnoticed instrument in the orchestra of tongues; but his crude-featured, sunburnt face held itself steadily in the one direction. From the day that he came to manhood his soul had kept the same att.i.tude towards the woman to whom the profile belonged. But he never alluded to the fact, save in this silent way.

Then there was the Reverend Bennet Goldsworthy, "Church of England minister", as his style and t.i.tle ran. Privately, Mr Pennycuick did not like him; but for the sake of the priestly office, and as being a parishioner, he gave him the freedom of the house, and much besides.

The parson"s buggy never went empty away. Redford hams, vegetables, poultry, b.u.t.ter and eggs, etc., kept his larder supplied. His horse-feed was derived therefrom; also his horse; also his cow. When his cow began to fail, he promptly mentioned the fact--he was mentioning it now to Mary Pennycuick. "Yes," he was saying, A PROPOS of his motherless little girl--whom he often brought to Redford for change of air, leaving her to the care of the sisters until convenient to him to reclaim her--"yes, it will mean much to my child in after life to have had the refining influences of this house at the most impressionable age." Truth was, that Ruby was growing a little old for her Kindergarten, and he wanted Redford to offer her (gratis, of course) a share in Francie"s governess. "I could not endure to see her grow up like the daughters of so many of my brother clergy, ignorant of the very rudiments of decent life"--meaning not decent life in the ordinary acceptation of the term, but the life that included evening dress and finger-gla.s.ses. "She has caught the colonial accent already at that horrid school. "When is the new keeow coming?" says she. And, by the way, that reminds me--your good father promised me the cow a fortnight ago. The one we have gives us hardly enough milk for the table; we have had no b.u.t.ter from her for months."

"I am so sorry," grieved Mary, as if Redford had failed in its sacred duty of hospitality. "I will tell him about it. The men have all been so busy with the shearing."

She was also distressed that she could not definitely invite Ruby for the impending holidays. But Deb had issued her commands that Redford was not to be saddled with a nurseless child at Christmas, when everybody"s hands would be full.

Mary was Ruby"s willing foster-mother when Redford had her in charge; she was also the kindest hostess of them all to Ruby"s father. To her was left the task of entertaining him, and she never neglected it.

Naturally, he gave her no thanks. When he said that what Ruby needed was a mother"s tender care, it was at Deborah he looked, who never turned a hair"s-breadth in his direction at any time, except when good manners obliged her, and who was not tender to Ruby, whom she called "that brat", and had smartly spanked on several occasions.

A beautiful woman cannot help having objectionable lovers any more than a king can help a cat looking at him. This man--a most well-meaning, good-hearted, useful little underbred person, typical of so large a cla.s.s in the Colonial Church--was Deb"s pet aversion, and did not know it. He was not made to see his own deficiencies as she saw them. When first she flashed upon his dazzled vision, splendid in a scarlet dinner gown, and carrying her regal head as if the earth belonged to her, he really saw no reason why he, with his qualifications of comparative youth, good looks (his sort of good looks), and notorious pulpit eloquence, should not aspire to rush in where so many feared to tread.

His rush had been checked at the outset, but he was still unaware of the nature of the barrier that Deb held rigid between them. He continued to gaze at her with his ardent little black eyes as if no barrier were there. And it was because he did so that Deb, who could not slap him for it, slapped Ruby sometimes, and called her a brat, and would not have her asked to Redford for the holidays; thereby giving occasion to envious Alice Urquhart for that warning to Guthrie Carey not to trust his baby to her.

There was still another lover present--the favoured lover. He sat with Alice near the piano where Francie and her governess were playing duets, listening without listening to his companion"s jerky talk--those pathetic attempts to attract him which so many second-rate girls were not too proud to make obvious to his keen apprehension. Claud Dalzell"s distinction was that he was the most polished young man of his social circle. He had had all the advantages that money could give and in addition, was naturally refined and handsome. To hear Claud Dalzell read poetry, or sing German folk-songs to his own graceful accompaniment, was to make a poet of the listener; to dance with him was pure enchantment (to another good dancer); he was the best horseman in the land; and if his present host could not appreciate his many charms--except perhaps the last named--others did. The whole race of girls, more or less, fell down and worshipped him.

He sat with Alice Urquhart because he could not sit with Deborah; or rather, because he would not condescend to share her with that "t"penny-ha"penny mate of a tramp cargo boat", as he styled Guthrie Carey, whom she had made happy at last. She had rescued him from her father"s clutches; she had called him to a chair beside her, where there was no room for a third chair. Her glistening skirt flowed over his modest toes. Her firm, round arm, flung along the chair arm between them, made him feel like Peter Ibbotson before the Venus of Milo--it was so perfect a piece of human sculpture. She lay back, slowly fanning herself, and smiling, her eyes wandering all the time in Dalzell"s neighbourhood, without actually touching him--a tall, deep-bosomed, dark-eyed, dignified as well as beautiful young woman, knowing herself to be such, and unspoiled by the knowledge. She wore her crown with the air of feeling herself ent.i.tled to it; but it was an unconscious air, without a trace of petty vanity behind it. Everything about her was large and generous and incorruptibly wholesome, even her undoubted high temper. And this was her charm to every man who knew her--not less than her lovely face.

Guthrie Carey--and who shall blame him?--basked in his good luck. But every now and then he looked up and met the glower of Claud Dalzell with a steely eye. These two men, each so fine of his kind, met with the sentiments of rival stags in the mating season; the impulse to fight "on sight" and a.s.sure the non-survival of the unfittest came just as naturally to them as to the less civilised animals. Each recognised in the other not merely a personal rival, but an opposing type.

It amused Deborah, who grasped the situation as surely as they did, to note the bristling antipathy behind the careful politeness of their mutual regard. If it did not bristle under her immediate eye, it crawled.

"Look out for the articles of virtue," Claud had warned her earlier in the evening. "That big sailor of yours is rather like a bull in a china shop; he nearly had the carved table over just now. He doesn"t know just how to judge distance in relation to his bulk. I"d like to know his fighting weight. When he plants his hoof you can feel the floor shake."

"He IS a fine figure of a man," Deb commented, with a smile.

"I can"t," yawned Mr Dalzell casually, "stand a person who eats curry with a knife and fork."

"It was pretty tough, that curry. I expect he couldn"t get it to pieces with a spoon."

"He did not try to."

"I never noticed. I shouldn"t remember to notice a little trifle like that."