Alas! My heart, to its surprise, Has learned to look; and now it sighs For you!"
She became conscious of somebody near, as she ended. She turned and saw Murtagh Skeel at her elbow--saw his agitated, ashen face--looked beyond him and discovered other people gathered in the tinted light beyond, listening; then she lifted her clear, still gaze again to the white-faced man beside her, and saw his shaken soul staring at her through the dark windows of _his_ eyes.
"Where did you learn it?" he asked with a futile effort at that control so difficult for any Celt to grasp where the heart is involved.
"The song I sang? "Blue Eyes"?" she inquired.
"Yes--that."
"I have the ma.n.u.script of the composer."
"Could you tell me where you got it--and--and who wrote those words you sang?"
"The ma.n.u.script came to me from my mother.... She wrote it.... I think you knew her."
His strong, handsome hand dropped on the piano"s edge, gripped it; and under his pale skin the quick blood surged to his temples.
"What was your--your mother"s name, Miss Soane?"
"She was Eileen Fane."
The throbbing seconds pa.s.sed and still they looked into each other"s eyes in silence. And at last:
"So you did know my mother," she said under her breath; and the hushed finality of her words set his strong hand trembling.
"Eileen"s little daughter," he repeated. "Eileen Fane"s child.... And grown to womanhood.... Yes, I knew your mother--many years ago....
When I enlisted and went abroad.... Was it Sir Terence Soane who married your mother?"
She shook her head. He stared at her, striving to concentrate, to think. "There were other Soanes," he muttered, "the Ellet Water folk--no?----But there were many Soanes among the landed gentry in the East and North.... I cannot seem to recollect--the sudden shock--hearing a song unexpectedly----"
His white forehead had grown damp under the curly hair now clinging to it. He pa.s.sed his handkerchief over his brow in a confused way, then leaned heavily on the piano with both hands grasping it. For the ghost of his youth was interfering, disputing his control over his own mind, filling his ear with forgotten words, taking possession of his memory and tormenting it with the distant echoes of a voice long dead.
Through the increasing chaos in his brain his strained gaze sought to fix itself on this living, breathing face before him--the child of Eileen Fane.
He made the effort:
"There were the Soanes of Colross----" But he got no farther that way, for the twin spectres of his youth and _hers_ were busy with his senses now; and he leaned more heavily on the piano, enduring with lowered head the ghostly whirlwind rushing up out of that obscurity and darkness where once, under summer skies, he had sowed a zephyr.
The girl had become rather white, too. One slim hand still rested on the ivory keys, the other lay inert in her lap. And after a while she raised her grey eyes to this man standing beside her:
"Did you ever hear of my mother"s marriage?"
He looked at her in a dull way:
"No."
"You heard--nothing?"
"I heard that your mother had left Fane Court."
"What was Fane Court?"
Murtagh Skeel stared at her in silence.
"I don"t know," she said, trembling a little. "I know nothing about my mother. She died when I was a few months old."
"Do you mean that you don"t know who your mother was? You don"t know who she married?" he asked, astounded.
"No."
"Good G.o.d!" he said, gazing at her. His tense features were working now; the battle for self-control was visible to her, and she sat there dumbly, looking on at the mute conflict which suddenly sent the tears flashing into his dark eyes and left his sensitive mouth twitching.
"I shall not ask you anything now," he said unsteadily; "I shall have to see you somewhere else--where there are no people--to interrupt....
But I shall tell you all I know about--your mother.... I was in trouble--in India. Somehow or other I heard indirectly that your mother had left Fane Court. Later it was understood that she had eloped.... n.o.body could tell me the man"s name.... My people in Ireland did not know.... And I was not on good terms with your grandfather. So there was no hope of information from Fane Court.... I wrote, indeed, begging, beseeching for news of your mother. Sir Barry--your grandfather--returned my letters unopened.... And that is all I have ever heard concerning Eileen Fane--your mother--with whom I--fell in love--nearly twenty years ago."
Dulcie, marble pale, nodded.
"I knew you cared for my mother," she said.
"How did you learn it?"
"Some letters of hers written to you. Letters from you to her. I have nothing else of hers except some verses and little songs--like the one you recognised."
"Child, she wrote it as I sat beside her!----" His voice choked, broke, and his lips quivered as he fought for self-control again....
"I was not welcome at Fane Court.... Sir Barry would not tolerate me.... Your mother was more kind.... She was very young. And so was I, Dulcie.... There were political troubles. I was always involved. G.o.d knows which was the stronger pa.s.sion--it must have been love of country--the other seeming hopeless--with the folk at Fane Court my bitter enemies--only excepting your mother.... So I went away.... And which of the Soanes your mother eloped with I have never learned....
Now, tell me--for you surely know that much."
She said:
"There is a man called Soane who tells me sometimes that he was once a gamekeeper at what he calls "the big house." I have always supposed him to be my father until within the last year. But recently, when he has been drinking heavily, he sometimes tells me that my name is not Soane but Fane.... Did you ever know of such a man?"
"No. There were gamekeepers about.... No. I cannot recall--and it is impossible! A gamekeeper! And your _mother_! The man is mad! What in G.o.d"s name does all this mean!----"
He began to tremble, and his white forehead under the cl.u.s.tering curls grew damp and pinched again.
"If you are Eileen"s daughter----" But his face went dead white and he got no further.
People were approaching from behind them, too; voices grew distinct in conversation; somebody turned up another lamp.
"Do sing that little song again--the one you sang for Mr. Skeel," said Lee Barres, coming up to the piano on her brother"s arm. "Mrs.
Gerhardt has been waiting very patiently for an opportunity to ask you."
XXIV
A SILENT HOUSE