"But I don"t want to tell you unless you know! No, I"m sure you know!"
"And do you know?"
"Yes, I know. My mother told me."
They understood one another now. Neeld made no further pretence.
"You mean about Harry Tristram?" he asked, simply, but in a low voice.
"Yes. At first I didn"t know what it meant to him. But I know now."
Neeld made no reply, and there was another moment of silence. Neeld wore a restless, timid, uneasy air, in strong contrast to the resolute intensity of Mina"s manner; she seemed to have taken and to keep the upper hand of him.
"And you know what it would mean to him?" she asked.
Neeld nodded; of course he knew that.
"What are you going to do?"
He raised his hands and let them drop again in a confession that he did not know.
"I knew, and I told," she said. He started a little. "Yes, I told, because I was spiteful. I was the Imp! I"ve never been happy since I told. Mr Tristram knows I"ve told, though he denies there"s anything in it. But he knows I"ve told. And still he"s been kind to me." Her voice shook.
"You told? Whom did you tell?"
"Never mind--or guess, if you can. I shan"t tell him any more. I shan"t help him any more. I won"t speak. I will not speak. I"m for Mr Tristram.
Thick and thin, I"m for Mr Tristram now." She came a step nearer to him.
"The man I told may try; but I don"t think he can do much without us--without me and without you. If we keep quiet, no, he can"t do much.
Why should we tell? Is it our business? You suppressed it in the Journal. Can"t you suppress it now?"
"The Ivers?" he stammered.
"The Ivers! What"s it to the Ivers compared to what it is to him? It"ll never come out. If it did--Oh, but it won"t! It"s life and death to him.
And isn"t it right? Isn"t it justice? He"s her son. This thing"s just a horrible accident. Oh, if you"d heard him speak of Blent!" She paused a moment, rubbing her hand across her eyes. Then she threw herself back into her chair, asking again, "What are you going to do?"
He sat silent, thinking hard. It was not his business. Right and justice seemed, in some sense at least, on Harry"s side. But the law is the law.
And there were his friends the Ivers. In him there was no motive of self-interest such as had swayed Major Duplay and made his action seem rather ugly even to himself. Neeld owed loyalty and friendship; that was all. Was it loyal, was it friendly, to utter no word while friends were deceived? With what face would he greet Iver if the thing did come out afterward? He debated with entire sincerity the point that Major Duplay had invoked in defence of himself against his conscience. On the other side was the strong sympathy which that story in the Journal had created in him since first he read it, and realized its perverse little tragedy; and there was the thought of Lady Tristram dying down at Blent.
The long silence was broken by neither of them. Neeld was weighing his question; Mina had made her appeal and waited for an answer. The quiet of the book-lined room (There were the yellowy-brown volumes from which Mina had acquired her lore!) was broken by a new voice. They both started to hear it, and turned alert faces to the window whence it came.
Harry Tristram, in flannels and a straw hat, stood looking in.
"I"ve got an hour off," he explained, "so I walked up to thank you for the flowers. My mother liked them, and liked to have them from you." He saw Neeld, and greeted him courteously. "I asked her if I should give you her love, and she said yes--with her eyes, you know. She speaks mostly that way now. Well, she always did a good deal, I expect." His smile came on the last words.
"She sent her love to me?"
"Yes. I told her what you did one evening, and she liked that too."
"I hope Lady Tristram is--er--going on well?" asked Neeld.
"She doesn"t suffer, thank you."
Mina invited him in; there was an appositeness in his coming which appealed to her, and she watched Neeld with covert eagerness.
Harry looked round the room, then vaulted over the sill.
"My uncle"s playing golf with Mr Iver," remarked Mina. "Tea?"
"No; too sick-roomy. I"m for nothing but strong drink now--and I"ve had some." He came to the middle of the room and stood between them, flinging his hat on the table where Mr Cholderton"s Journal had so lately lain. "My mother"s an extraordinary woman," he went on, evidently so full of his thought that he must speak it out; "she"s dying joyfully."
After an instant Mina asked, "Why?" Neeld was surprised at the baldness of the question, but Harry took it as natural.
"It"s like going off guard--I mean, rather, off duty--to her, I think."
He made the correction thoughtfully and with no haste. "Life has always seemed rather like an obligation to do things you don"t want to--not that she did them all--and now she"s tired, she"s glad to leave it to me. Only she wishes I was a bit better-looking, though she won"t admit it. She couldn"t stand a downright ugly man at Blent, you know. I"ve a sort of notion"--he seemed to forget Neeld, and looked at Mina for sympathy--"that she thinks she"ll be able to come and have a look at Blent and me in it, all the same." His smile took a whimsical turn as he spoke of his mother"s dying fancies.
Mina glanced at Mr Neeld; was the picture visible to him that rose before her eyes--of the poor sprite coming eagerly, but turning sadly away when she saw a stranger enthroned at Blent, and knew not where to look for her homeless, landless son? Mina was not certain that she could safely credit Neeld with such a flight of imagination; still he was listening, and his eyes were very gentle behind his spectacles.
"The parson came to see her yesterday. He"s not what you"d call an unusual man, Madame Zabriska--and she is an unusual woman, you know. It was--yes, it was amusing, and there"s an end of it." He paused, and added, by way of excuse, "Oh, I know her so well, you see. She wouldn"t be left alone with him; she wanted another sinner there."
Mina marked the change in him--the new expansiveness, the new appeal for sympathy. He had forgotten his suspicion and his watchfulness; she was inclined to say that he had forgotten himself. On her death-bed Addie Tristram had exerted her charm once more--and over her own son. Once more a man, whatever his own position, thought mainly of her--and that man was her son. Did Neeld see this? To Neeld it came as the strongest reinforcement to the feelings which bade him hold his peace. It seemed an appeal to him, straight from the death-bed in the valley below. Harry found the old gentleman"s gaze fixed intently on him.
"I beg your pardon for troubling you with all this, Mr Neeld," he said, relapsing rather into his defensive att.i.tude. "Madame Zabriska knows my ways."
"No, I don"t think I know this new way of yours at all," she objected.
"But I like it, Mr Tristram. I feel all you do. I have seen her." She turned to Neeld. "Oh, how I wish you had!" she cried.
Her earnestness stirred a little curiosity in Harry. He glanced with his old wariness at Neeld. But what could he see save a kindly precise old gentleman, who was unimportant to him but seemed interested in what he said. He turned back to Mina, asking:
"A new way of mine?"
"Well, not quite. You were rather like it once. But generally you"ve got a veil before your face. Or perhaps you"re really changed?"
He thought for a moment. "Things change a man." And he added, "I"m only twenty-two."
"Yes, I know," she smiled, "though I constantly forget it all the same."
"Well, twenty-three, come the twentieth of July," said he. His eyes were on hers, his characteristic smile on his lips. It was a challenge to her.
"I shan"t forget the date," she answered, answering his look too. He sighed lightly; he was a.s.sured that she was with him.
The twentieth of July! The Editor of Mr Cholderton"s Journal sat by listening; he raised no voice in protest.
"I must get back," said Harry. "Walk with me to the dip of the hill."
With a glance of apology to Neeld, she followed him and stepped out of the window; there were two steps at the side leading up to it. "I"ll be back directly," she cried over her shoulder, as she joined Harry Tristram. They walked to the gate which marked the end of the terrace on which Merrion stood.
"I"m so glad you came! You do believe in me now?" she asked.
"Yes, and I"m not afraid. But do you know--it seems incredible to me--I"m not thinking of that now. I shall again directly, when it"s over. But now--well, Blent won"t seem much without my mother."