The Rosary

CHAPTER XXXIII

“SOME­THING IS GO­ING TO HAP­PEN!”

Wednes­day dawned; an ide­al First of May: Garth was in the gar­den be­fore break­fast. Jane heard him singing, as he passed be­neath her win­dow.

“It is not mine to sing the state­ly grace, The great soul beam­ing in my la­dy’s face.”

She leaned out.

He was walk­ing be­low in the fresh­est of white flan­nels; his step so light and elas­tic; his ev­ery move­ment so lithe and grace­ful; the on­ly sign of his blind­ness the Malac­ca cane he held in his hand, with which he oc­ca­sion­al­ly touched the grass bor­der, or the wall of the house. She could on­ly see the top of his dark head. It might have been on the ter­race at Shen­stone, three years be­fore. She longed to call from the win­dow; “Dar­ling–my Dar­ling! Good morn­ing! God bless you to-​day.”

Ah what would to-​day bring forth;–the day when her full con­fes­sion, and ex­pla­na­tion, and plea for par­don, would reach him? He was such a boy in many ways; so light-​heart­ed, lov­ing, artis­tic, po­et­ic, ir­re­press­ible; ev­er young, in spite of his great af­flic­tion. But where his man­hood was con­cerned; his love; his right of choice and of de­ci­sion; of main­tain­ing a fair­ly-​formed opin­ion, and set­ting aside the less com­pe­tent judg­ment of oth­ers; she knew him rigid, in­flex­ible. His very pain seemed to cool him, from the molten lover, to the bar of steel.

As Jane knelt at her win­dow that morn­ing, she had not the least idea whether the evening would find her trav­el­ling to Ab­erdeen, to take the night mail south; or at home for­ev­er in the heav­en of Garth’s love.

And down be­low he passed again, still singing:

“But mine it is to fol­low in her train; Do her be­hests in plea­sure or in pain; Burn at her al­tar love’s sweet frank­in­cense, And wor­ship her in dis­tant rev­er­ence.”

“Ah, beloved!” whis­pered Jane, “not ‘dis­tant.’ If you want her, and call her, it will be to the clos­est close­ness love can de­vise. No more dis­tance be­tween you and me.”

And then, in the cu­ri­ous way in which in­spired words will some­times oc­cur to the mind quite apart from their in­spired con­text, and bear­ing a to­tal­ly dif­fer­ent mean­ing from that which they pri­mar­ily bear, these words came to Jane: “For He is our peace, Who hath made both one, and hath bro­ken down the mid­dle wall of par­ti­tion be­tween us . . . that He might rec­on­cile both . . . by the cross.” “Ah, dear Christ!” she whis­pered. “If Thy cross could do this for Jew and Gen­tile, may not my boy’s heavy cross, so brave­ly borne, do it for him and for me? So shall we come at last, in­deed, to ‘kiss the cross.’”

The break­fast gong boomed through the house. Simp­son loved gongs. He con­sid­ered them “Haris­to­crat­ic.” He al­ways gave full mea­sure.

Nurse Rose­mary went down to break­fast.

Garth came in, through the French win­dow, hum­ming “The thou­sand beau­ties that I know so well.” He was in his gayest, most in­con­se­quent mood. He had picked a gold­en rose­bud in the con­ser­va­to­ry and wore it in his but­ton­hole. He car­ried a yel­low rose in his hand.

“Good day, Miss Rose­mary,” he said. “What a May Day! Simp­son and I were up with the lark; weren’t we, Simp­son? Poor Simp­son felt like a sort of ‘Queen of the May,’ when my elec­tric bell trilled in his room, at 5 A.M. But I couldn’t stay in bed. I woke with my some­thing-​is-​go­ing-​to-​hap­pen feel­ing; and when I was a lit­tle chap and woke with that, Margery used to say: ‘Get up quick­ly then, Mas­ter Garth, and it will hap­pen all the soon­er.’ You ask her if she didn’t, Simp­son. Miss Gray, did you ev­er learn: ‘If you’re wak­ing call me ear­ly, call me ear­ly, moth­er dear’? I al­ways hat­ed that young wom­an! I should think, in her ex­cit­ed state, she would have been wak­ing long be­fore her poor moth­er, who must have been worn to a per­fect rag, mak­ing all the hussy’s May Queen-​clothes, overnight.”

Simp­son had wait­ed to guide him to his place at the ta­ble. Then he re­moved the cov­ers, and left the room.

As soon as he had closed the door be­hind him, Garth leaned for­ward, and with unerring ac­cu­ra­cy laid the open­ing rose up­on Nurse Rose­mary’s plate.

“Ros­es for Rose­mary,” he said. “Wear it, if you are sure the young man would not ob­ject. I have been think­ing about him and the aunt. I wish you could ask them both here, in­stead of go­ing away on Thurs­day. We would have the ‘mad­dest, mer­ri­est time!’ I would play with the aunt, while you had it out with the young man. And I could eas­ily keep the aunt away from nooks and cor­ners, be­cause my hear­ing is sharp­er than any aunt’s eyes could be, and if you gave a gen­tle cough, I would prompt­ly clutch hold of aun­tie, and in­sist up­on be­ing guid­ed in the op­po­site di­rec­tion. And I would take her out in the mo­tor; and you and the young man could have the gig. And then when all was sat­is­fac­to­ri­ly set­tled, we could pack them off home, and be by our­selves again. Ah, Miss Gray, do send for them, in­stead of leav­ing me on Thurs­day.”

“Mr. Dal­main,” said Nurse Rose­mary, re­prov­ing­ly, as she leaned for­ward and touched his right hand with the rim of his saucer, “this May-​Day morn­ing has gone to your head. I shall send for Margery. She may have known the symp­toms, of old.”

“It is not that,” said Garth. He leaned for­ward and spoke con­fi­den­tial­ly. “Some­thing is go­ing to hap­pen to-​day, lit­tle Rose­mary. When­ev­er I feel like this, some­thing hap­pens. The first time it oc­curred, about twen­ty-​five years ago, there was a rock­ing- horse in the hall, when I ran down­stairs! I have nev­er for­got­ten my first ride on that rock­ing-​horse. The fear­ful joy when he went back­ward; the aw­ful plunge when he went for­ward; and the proud mo­ment when it was pos­si­ble to cease cling­ing to the leather pom­mel. I near­ly killed the cousin who pulled out his tail. I thrashed him, then and there, WITH the tail; which was such a sil­ly thing to do; be­cause, though it dam­aged the cousin, it al­so spoiled the tail. The next time–ah, but I am bor­ing you!”

“Not at all,” said Nurse Rose­mary, po­lite­ly; “but I want you to have some break­fast; and the let­ters will be here in a few min­utes.”

He looked so brown and ra­di­ant, this dear de­light­ful boy, with his gold-​brown tie, and yel­low rose. She was con­scious of her pal­lor, and op­pres­sive earnest­ness, as she said: “The let­ters will be here.”

“Oh, both­er the let­ters!” cried Garth. “Let’s have a hol­iday from let­ters on May Day! You shall be Queen of the May; and Margery shall be the old moth­er. I will be Robin, with the break­ing heart, lean­ing on the bridge be­neath the hazel tree; and Simp­son can be the ‘bold­er lad.’ And we will all go and ‘gath­er knots of flow­ers, and buds, and gar­lands gay.’”

“Mr. Dal­main,” said Nurse Rose­mary, laugh­ing, in spite of her­self, “you re­al­ly must be sen­si­ble, or I shall go and con­sult Margery. I have nev­er seen you in such a mood.”

“You have nev­er seen me, on a day when some­thing was go­ing to hap­pen,” said Garth; and Nurse Rose­mary made no fur­ther at­tempt to re­press him.

Af­ter break­fast, he went to the pi­ano, and played two-​steps, and rag-​time mu­sic, so in­fec­tious­ly, that Simp­son lit­er­al­ly tripped as he cleared the ta­ble; and Nurse Rose­mary, sit­ting pale and pre­oc­cu­pied, with a pile of let­ters be­fore her, had hard work to keep her feet still.

Simp­son had two-​stepped to the door with the cloth, and closed it af­ter him. Nurse Rose­mary’s re­marks about the post-​bag, and the let­ters, had re­mained unan­swered. “Shine lit­tle glow­worm glim­mer” was peal­ing gai­ly through the room, like sil­ver bells,–when the door opened, and old Margery ap­peared, in a black satin apron, and a blue print sun­bon­net. She came straight to the pi­ano, and laid her hand gen­tly on Garth’s arm.

“Mas­ter Garthie,” she said, “on this love­ly May morn­ing, will you take old Margery up in­to the woods?”

Garth’s hands dropped from the keys. “Of course I will, Margie,” he said. “And, I say Margie, SOME­THING IS GO­ING TO HAP­PEN.”

“I know it, lad­die,” said the old wom­an, ten­der­ly; and the ex­pres­sion with which she looked in­to the blind face filled Jane’s eyes with tears. “I woke with it too, Mas­ter Garthie; and now we will go in­to the woods, and lis­ten to the earth, and trees, and flow­ers, and they will tell us whether it is for joy, or for sor­row. Come, my own lad­die.”

Garth rose, as in a dream. Even in his blind­ness he looked so young, and so beau­ti­ful, that Jane’s watch­ing heart stood still.

At the win­dow he paused. “Where is that sec­re­tary per­son?” he said, vague­ly. “She kept try­ing to shut me up.”

“I know she did, lad­die,” said old Margery, curt­sey­ing apolo­get­ical­ly to­wards Jane. “You see she does not know the ’some­thing-​is-​go­ing-​to-​hap­pen-​to-​day’ awak­en­ing.”

“Ah, doesn’t she?” thought Jane, as they dis­ap­peared through the win­dow. “But as my Garth has gone off his dear head, and been tak­en away by his nurse, the thing that is go­ing to hap­pen, can’t hap­pen just yet.” And Jane sat down to the pi­ano, and very soft­ly ran through the ac­com­pa­ni­ment of The Rosary. Then,–af­ter shad­ing her eyes on the ter­race, and mak­ing sure that a tall white fig­ure lean­ing on a short dark one, had al­most reached the top of the hill,–still more soft­ly, she sang it.

Af­ter­wards she went for a tramp on the moors, and stead­ied her nerve by the rapid swing of her walk, and the deep in­breath­ing of that glo­ri­ous air. Once or twice she took a tele­gram from her pock­et, stood still and read it; then tramped on, to the won­der of the words: “Spe­cial li­cense eas­ily ob­tained.” Ah, the li­cense might be easy to ob­tain; but how about his for­give­ness? That must be ob­tained first. If there were on­ly this dar­ling boy to deal with, in his white flan­nels and yel­low ros­es, with a May-​Day mad­ness in his veins, the li­cense might come at once; and all he could wish should hap­pen with­out de­lay. But this is a pass­ing phase of Garth. What she has to deal with is the white-​faced man, who calm­ly said: “I ac­cept the cross,” and walked down the vil­lage church leav­ing her–for all these years. Lov­ing her, as he loved her; and yet leav­ing her,– with­out word or sign, for three long years. To hire, was the con­fes­sion; his would be the de­ci­sion; and, some­how, it did not sur­prise her, when she came down to lun­cheon, a lit­tle late, to find HIM seat­ed at the ta­ble.

“Miss Gray,” he said grave­ly, as he heard her en­ter, “I must apol­ogise for my be­haviour this morn­ing. I was what they call up here ‘fey.’ Margery un­der­stands the mood; and to­geth­er she and I have lis­tened to kind Moth­er Earth, lay­ing our hands on her sym­pa­thet­ic soft­ness, and she has told us her se­crets. Then I lay down un­der the fir trees and slept; and awak­ened calm and sane, and ready for what to-​day must bring. For it WILL bring some­thing. That is no delu­sion. It is a day of great things. That much, Margery knows, too.”

“Per­haps,” sug­gest­ed Nurse Rose­mary, ten­ta­tive­ly, “there may be news of in­ter­est in your let­ters.”

“Ah,” said Garth, “I for­got. We have not even opened this morn­ing’s let­ters. Let us take time for them im­me­di­ate­ly af­ter lunch. Are there many?”

“Quite a pile,” said Nurse Rose­mary.

“Good. We will work sober­ly through them.”

Half an hour lat­er Garth was seat­ed in his chair, calm and ex­pec­tant; his face turned to­wards his sec­re­tary. He had han­dled his let­ters, and amongst them he had found one sealed; and the seal was a plumed hel­met, with vi­sor closed. Nurse Rose­mary saw him pale, as his fin­gers touched it. He made no re­mark; but, as be­fore, slipped it be­neath the rest, that it might come up for read­ing, last of all.

When the oth­ers were fin­ished, and Nurse Rose­mary took up this let­ter, the room was very still. They were quite alone. Bees hummed in the gar­den. The scent of flow­ers stole in at the win­dow. But no one dis­turbed their soli­tude.

Nurse Rose­mary took up the en­ve­lope.

“Mr. Dal­main, here is a let­ter, sealed with scar­let wax. The seal is a hel­met with vi­sor–“

“I know,” said Garth. “You need not de­scribe it fur­ther. Kind­ly open it.”

Nurse Rose­mary opened it. “It is a very long let­ter, Mr. Dal­main.”

“In­deed? Will you please read it to me, Miss Gray.”

A tense mo­ment of si­lence fol­lowed. Nurse Rose­mary lift­ed the let­ter; but her voice sud­den­ly re­fused to re­spond to her will. Garth wait­ed with­out fur­ther word.

Then Nurse Rose­mary said: “In­deed, sir, it seems a most pri­vate let­ter. I find it dif­fi­cult to read it to you.”

Garth heard the dis­tress in her voice, and turned to her kind­ly.

“Nev­er mind, my dear child. It in no way con­cerns you. It is a pri­vate let­ter to me; but my on­ly means of hear­ing it is through your eyes, and from your lips. Be­sides, the la­dy, whose seal is a plumed hel­met, can have noth­ing of a very pri­vate na­ture to say to me.”

“Ah, but she has,” said Nurse Rose­mary, bro­ken­ly.

Garth con­sid­ered this in si­lence.

Then: “Turn over the page,” he said, “and tell me the sig­na­ture.”

“There are many pages,” said Nurse Rose­mary.

“Turn over the pages then,” said Garth, stern­ly. “Do not keep me wait­ing. How is that let­ter signed?”

“YOUR WIFE,” whis­pered Nurse Rose­mary.

There was a pet­ri­fy­ing qual­ity about the si­lence which fol­lowed. It seemed as if those two words, whis­pered in­to Garth’s dark­ness, had turned him to stone.

At last he stretched out his hand. “Will you give me that let­ter, if you please, Miss Gray? Thank you. I wish to be alone for a quar­ter of an hour. I shall be glad if you will be good enough to sit in the din­ing-​room, and stop any one from com­ing in­to this room. I must be undis­turbed. At the end of that time kind­ly re­turn.”

He spoke so qui­et­ly that Jane’s heart sank with­in her. Some dis­play of ag­ita­tion would have been re­as­sur­ing. This was the man who, bow­ing his dark head to­wards the cru­ci­fix­ion win­dow, said: “I ac­cept the cross.” This was the man, whose foot­steps nev­er once fal­tered as he strode down the aisle, and left her. This was the man, who had had the strength, ev­er since, to treat that episode be­tween her and him­self, as com­plete­ly closed; no word of en­treaty; no sign of re­mem­brance; no hint of re­proach. And this was the man to whom she had signed her­self: “Your wife.”

In her whole life, Jane had nev­er known fear. She knew it now.

As she silent­ly rose and left him, she stole one look at his face. He was sit­ting per­fect­ly still; the let­ter in his hand. He had not turned his head to­ward her as he took it. His pro­file might have been a beau­ti­ful carv­ing in white ivory. There was not the faintest tinge of colour in his face; just that ivory pal­lor, against the ebony lines of his straight brows, and smooth dark hair.

Jane soft­ly left the room, clos­ing the door be­hind her.

Then fol­lowed the longest fif­teen min­utes she had ev­er known. She re­alised what a tremen­dous con­flict was in progress in that qui­et room. Garth was ar­riv­ing at his de­ci­sion with­out hav­ing heard any of her ar­gu­ments. By the strange fa­tal­ity of his own in­sis­tence, he had heard on­ly two words of her let­ter, and those the cru­cial words; the two words to which the whole let­ter care­ful­ly led up. They must have re­vealed to him in­stant­ly, what the char­ac­ter of the let­ter would be; and what was the at­ti­tude of mind to­wards him­self, of the wom­an who wrote them.

Jane paced the din­ing-​room in des­per­ation, re­mem­ber­ing the hours of thought which had gone to the com­pil­ing of sen­tences, cau­tious­ly prepar­ing his mind to the rev­ela­tion of the sig­na­ture.

Sud­den­ly, in the midst of her men­tal per­tur­ba­tion, there came to her the re­mem­brance of a con­ver­sa­tion be­tween Nurse Rose­mary and Garth over the pic­tures. The for­mer had said: “Is she a wife?” And Garth had an­swered: “Yes.” Jane had in­stant­ly un­der­stood what that an­swer re­vealed and im­plied. Be­cause Garth had so felt her his dur­ing those won­der­ful mo­ments on the ter­race at Shen­stone, that he could look up in­to her face and say, “My wife”–not as an in­ter­ro­ga­tion, but as an ab­so­lute state­ment of fact,–he still held her this, as in­dis­sol­ubly as if priest, and book, and ring, had gone to the wed­ding of their union. To him, the union of souls came be­fore all else; and if that had tak­en place, all that might fol­low was but the out­ward in­dorse­ment of an ac­com­plished fact. Ow­ing to her fear, mis­trust, and de­cep­tion, noth­ing had fol­lowed. Their lives had been sun­dered; they had gone dif­fer­ent ways. He re­gard­ed him­self as be­ing no more to her than any oth­er man of her ac­quain­tance. Dur­ing these years he had be­lieved, that her part in that evening’s wed­ding of souls had ex­ist­ed in his imag­ina­tion, on­ly; and had no bind­ing ef­fect up­on her. But his re­mained. Be­cause those words were true to him then, he had said them; and, be­cause he had said them, he would con­sid­er her his wife, through life,–and af­ter. It was the in­tu­itive un­der­stand­ing of this, which had em­bold­ened Jane so to sign her let­ter. But how would he rec­on­cile that sig­na­ture with the view of her con­duct which he had all along tak­en, with­out ev­er hav­ing the slight­est con­cep­tion that there could be any oth­er?

Then Jane re­mem­bered, with com­fort, the ir­re­sistible ap­peal made by Truth to the soul of the artist; truth of line; truth of colour; truth of val­ues; and, in the realm of sound, truth of tone, of har­mo­ny, of ren­der­ing, of con­cep­tion. And when Nurse Rose­mary had said of his paint­ing of “The Wife”: “It is a tri­umph of art”; Garth had replied: “It is a tri­umph of truth.” And Jane’s own ver­dict on the look he had seen and de­pict­ed was: “It is true–yes, it is true!” Will he not re­alise now the truth of that sig­na­ture; and, if he re­alis­es it, will he not be glad in his lone­li­ness, that his wife should come to him; un­less the con­fes­sions and ad­mis­sions of the let­ter cause him to put her away as whol­ly un­wor­thy?

Sud­den­ly Jane un­der­stood the im­mense ad­van­tage of the fact that he would hear ev­ery word of the rest of her let­ter, know­ing the con­clu­sion, which she her­self could not pos­si­bly have put first. She saw a High­er Hand in this ar­range­ment; and said, as she watched the min­utes slow­ly pass: “He hath bro­ken down the mid­dle wall of par­ti­tion be­tween us”; and a sense of calm as­sur­ance de­scend­ed, and gar­risoned her soul with peace.

The quar­ter of an hour was over.

Jane crossed the hall with firm, though noise­less, step; stood a mo­ment on the thresh­old rel­egat­ing her­self com­plete­ly to the back­ground; then opened the door; and Nurse Rose­mary re-​en­tered the li­brary.