Vera

"I think----" she stammered, flushing, for she was now very timid indeed, "you"ve forgotten the sugar, Chesterton."

"Will you not interfere!" exclaimed Wemyss very loud, putting down his cup with a bang.

The flush on Lucy"s face vanished as if it had been knocked out. She sat quite still. If she moved, or looked anywhere but at her plate, she knew she would begin to cry. The scenes she had dreaded had not included any with herself in the presence of servants. It hadn"t entered her head that these, too, were possible. She must hold on to herself; not move; not look. She sat absorbed in that one necessity, fiercely concentrated.

Chesterton must have gone away and come back again, for presently she was aware that sugar was being put on the tea-tray; and then she was aware that Everard was holding out his cup.

"Give me some more tea, please," he said, "and for G.o.d"s sake don"t sulk. If the servants forget their duties it"s neither your nor my business to tell them what they"ve forgotten,--they"ve just got to look and see, and if they don"t see they"ve just got to stand there looking till they do. It"s the only way to teach them. But for you to get sulking on the top of it----"

She lifted the teapot with both hands, because one hand by itself too obviously shook. She succeeded in pouring out the tea without spilling it, and in stopping almost at the very moment when he said, "Take care, take care--you"re filling it too full." She even succeeded after a minute or two in saying, holding carefully on to her voice to keep it steady, "I"m not--sulking. I"ve--got a headache."

And she thought desperately, "The only thing to be done with marriage is to let it wash over one."

XXV

For the rest of that day she let it wash; unresistingly. She couldn"t think any more. She couldn"t feel any more,--not that day. She really had a headache; and when the dusk came, and Wemyss turned on the lights, it was evident even to him that she had, for there was no colour at all in her face and her eyes were puffed and leaden.

He had one of his sudden changes. "Come here," he said, reaching out and drawing her on to his knee; and he held her face against his breast, and felt full of maternal instincts, and crooned over her. "Was it a poor little baby," he crooned. "Did it have a headache then----" And he put his great cool hand on her hot forehead and kept it there.

Lucy gave up trying to understand anything at all any more. These swift changes,--she couldn"t keep up with them; she was tired, tired....

They sat like that in the chair before the fire, Wemyss holding his hand on her forehead and feeling full of maternal instincts, and she an unresisting blank, till he suddenly remembered he hadn"t shown her the drawing-room yet. The afternoon had not proceeded on the lines laid down for it in his plans, but if they were quick there was still time for the drawing-room before dinner.

Accordingly she was abruptly lifted off his knee. "Come along, little Love," he said briskly. "Come along. Wake up. I want to show you something."

And the next thing she knew was that she was going downstairs, and presently she found herself standing in a big cold room, blinking in the bright lights he had switched on at the door.

"This," he said, holding her by the arm, "is the drawing-room. Isn"t it a fine room." And he explained the piano, and told her how he had found a b.u.t.ton off, and he pointed out the roll of rugs in a distant corner which, unrolled, decorated the parquet floor, and he drew her attention to the curtains,--he had no objections to curtains in a drawing-room, he said, because a drawing-room was anyhow a room of concessions; and he asked her at the end, as he had asked her at the beginning, if she didn"t think it a fine room.

Lucy said it was a very fine room.

"You"ll remember to put the cover on properly when you"ve finished playing the piano, won"t you," he said.

"Yes I will," said Lucy. "Only I don"t play," she added, remembering she didn"t.

"That"s all right then," he said, relieved.

They were still standing admiring the proportions of the room, its marble fireplace and the brilliancy of its lighting--"The test of good lighting," said Wemyss, "is that there shouldn"t be a corner of a room in which a man of eighty can"t read his newspaper"--when the gong began.

"Good Lord," he said, looking at his watch, "it"ll be dinner in ten minutes. Why, we"ve had nothing at all of the afternoon, and I"d planned to show you so many things. Ah," he said, turning and shaking his head at her, his voice changing to sorrow, "whose fault has that been?"

"Mine," said Lucy.

He put his hand under her chin and lifted her face, gazing at it and shaking his head slowly. The light, streaming into her swollen eyes, hurt them and made her blink.

"Ah, my Lucy," he said fondly, "little waster of happiness--isn"t it better simply to love your Everard than make him unhappy?"

"Much better," said Lucy, blinking.

There was no dressing for dinner at The Willows, for that, explained Wemyss, was the great joy of home, that you needn"t ever do anything you don"t want to in it, and therefore, he said, ten minutes" warning was ample for just washing one"s hands. They washed their hands together in the big bedroom, because Wemyss disapproved of dressing-rooms at home even more strongly than on honeymoons in hotels. "n.o.body"s going to separate me from my own woman," he said, drying his hands and eyeing her with proud possessiveness while she dried hers; their basins stood side by side on the brown mottled marble of the washstand. "Are they," he said, as she dried in silence.

"No," said Lucy.

"How"s the head?" he said.

"Better," she said.

"Who"s got a forgiving husband?" he said.

"I have," she said.

"Smile at me," he said.

She smiled at him.

At dinner it was Vera who smiled, her changeless little strangled smile, with her eyes on Lucy. Lucy"s seat had its back to Vera, but she knew she had only to turn her head to see her eyes fixed on her, smiling. No one else smiled; only Vera.

Lucy bent her head over her plate, trying to escape the unshaded light that beat down on her eyes, sore with crying, and hurt. In front of her was the bowl of kingcups, the birthday flowers. Just behind Wemyss stood Chesterton, in an att.i.tude of strained attention. Dimly through Lucy"s head floated thoughts: Seeing that Everard invariably spent his birthdays at The Willows, on that day last year at that hour Vera was sitting where she, Lucy, now was, with the kingcups glistening in front of her, and Everard tucking his table napkin into his waistcoat, and Chesterton waiting till he was quite ready to take the cover off the soup; just as Lucy was seeing these things this year Vera saw them last year; Vera still had three months of life ahead of her then, three more months of dinners, and Chesterton, and Everard tucking in his napkin.

How queer. What a dream it all was. On that last of his birthdays at which Vera would ever be present, did any thought of his next birthday cross her mind? How strange it would have seemed to her if she could have seen ahead, and seen her, Lucy, sitting in her chair. The same chair; everything just the same; except the wife. "_Souvent femme varie_," floated vaguely across her tired brain. She ate her soup sitting all crooked with fatigue ... life was exactly like a dream....

Wemyss, absorbed in the scrutiny of his food and the behaviour of Chesterton, had no time to notice anything Lucy might be doing. It was the rule that Chesterton, at meals, should not for an instant leave the room. The furthest she was allowed was a door in the dark corner opposite the door into the hall, through which at intervals Lizzie"s arm thrust dishes. It was the rule that Lizzie shouldn"t come into the room, but, stationary on the other side of this door, her function was to thrust dishes through it; and to her from the kitchen, pattering ceaselessly to and fro, came the tweeny bringing the dishes. This had all been thought out and arranged very carefully years ago by Wemyss, and ought to have worked without a hitch; but sometimes there were hitches, and Lizzie"s arm was a minute late thrusting in a dish. When this happened Chesterton, kept waiting and conscious of Wemyss enormously waiting at the end of the table, would put her head round the door and hiss at Lizzie, who then hurried to the kitchen and hissed at the tweeny, who for her part didn"t dare hiss at the cook.

To-night, however, nothing happened that was not perfect. From the way Chesterton had behaved about the tea, and the way Lizzie had behaved about the window, Wemyss could see that during his four weeks" absence his household had been getting out of hand, and he was therefore more watchful than ever, determined to pa.s.s nothing over. On this occasion he watched in vain. Things went smoothly from start to finish. The tweeny ran, Lizzie thrust, Chesterton deposited, dead on time. Every dish was hot and punctual, or cold and punctual, according to what was expected of it; and Wemyss going out of the dining-room at the end, holding Lucy by the arm, couldn"t but feel he had dined very well. Perhaps, though, his father"s photograph hadn"t been dusted,--it would be just like them to have disregarded his instructions. He went back to look, and Lucy, since he was holding her by the arm, went too. No, they had even done that; and there was nothing further to be said except, with great sternness to Chesterton, eyeing her threateningly, "Coffee at once."

The evening was spent in the library reading Wemyss"s school reports, and looking at photographs of him in his various stages,--naked and crowing; with ringlets, in a frock; in knickerbockers, holding a hoop; a stout schoolboy; a tall and slender youth; thickening; still thickening; thick,--and they went to bed at ten o"clock.

Somewhere round midnight Lucy discovered that the distances of the treble bed softened sound; either that, or she was too tired to hear anything, for she dropped out of consciousness with the heaviness of a released stone.

Next day it was finer. There were gleams of sun; and though the wind still blew, the rain held off except for occasional spatterings. They got up very late--breakfast on Sundays at The Willows was not till eleven--and went and inspected the chickens. By the time they had done that, and walked round the garden, and stood on the edge of the river throwing sticks into it and watching the pace at which they were whirled away on its muddy and disturbed surface, it was luncheon time. After luncheon they walked along the towpath, one behind the other because it was narrow and the gra.s.s at the sides was wet. Wemyss walked slowly, and the wind was cold. Lucy kept close to his heels, seeking shelter under, as it were, his lee. Talk wasn"t possible because of the narrow path and the bl.u.s.tering wind, but every now and then Wemyss looked down over his shoulder at her. "Still there?" he asked; and Lucy said she was.

They had tea punctually at half-past four up in Vera"s sitting-room, but without, this time, a fire--Wemyss had rectified Lizzie"s tendency to be officious--and after tea he took her out again to show her how his electricity was made, while the gardener who saw to the machinery, and the boy who saw to the gardener, stood by in attendance.

There was a cold sunset,--a narrow strip of gold below heavy clouds, like a sullen, half-open eye. The prudent cows dotted the fields motionlessly, lying on their dry bite of gra.s.s. The wind blew straight across from the sunset through Lucy"s coat, wrap herself in it as tightly as she might, while they loitered among outhouses and examined the durability of the railings. Her headache, in spite of her good night, hadn"t gone, and by dinner time her throat felt sore. She said nothing to Wemyss, because she was sure she would be well in the morning. Her colds never lasted. Besides she knew, for he had often told her, how much he was bored by the sick.

At dinner her cheeks were very red and her eyes very bright.

"Who"s my pretty little girl," said Wemyss, struck by her.

Indeed he was altogether pleased with her. She had been his own Lucy throughout the day, so gentle and sweet, and hadn"t once said But, or tried to go out of rooms. Unquestioningly acquiescent she had been; and now so pretty, with the light full on her, showing up her lovely colouring.

"Who"s my pretty little girl," he said again, laying his hand on hers, while Chesterton looked down her nose.

Then he noticed she had a knitted scarf round her shoulders, and he said, "Whatever have you got that thing on in here for?"

"I"m cold," said Lucy.