The Wooden Horse Part 15

She was excited and stood over him as though she would force him to be interested.

"It's too much, Garrett. It's got to stop."

"What?"

"Harry. Some one must speak to him."

Garrett smiled. "That, of course, will be you, Clare--you always do; but if it's my permission that you want you may have it and welcome.

But we've discussed all this before. What's the new turn of affairs?"

"No. I want more than your permission; we must take some measures together. It's no good unless we act at once. Miss Ponsonby told me this afternoon--it has become common talk--the things he does, I mean.

She did not want to say anything, but I made her. He goes down continually to some low public-house in the Cove; he is with those Bethels all day, and will see nothing of any of the decent people in the place--he is becoming a common byword."

"It is a pity," Garrett said, "that he cannot choose his friends better."

"He must--something must be done. It is not for ourselves only, though of course that counts. But it is the House--our name. They laugh at him, and so at all of us. Besides, there is Robin."

Garrett looked at his sister curiously--he had never seen her so excited before. But she found it no laughing matter. Miss Ponsonby would not have spoken unless matters had gone pretty far. The Cove!

The Bethels! Robin's father!

For, after all, it was for Robin that she cared. She felt that she was fighting his battles, and so subtly concealed from herself that she was, in reality, fighting her own. She was in a state of miserable uncertainty. She was not sure of her father, she was not sure of Robin, scarcely sure of Garrett--everything threatened disaster.

"What will you do?" Garrett had no desire that the responsibility should be s.h.i.+fted in his direction; he feared responsibility as the rock on which the s.h.i.+p of his carefully preserved proprieties might come to wreck.

"Do? Why, speak--it must be done. Think of him during the whole time that he has been here--not only to Pendragon, but to us. He has made no attempt whatever to fit in with our ways or thoughts; he has shown no desire to understand any of us; and now he must be pulled up, for his own sake as well as ours."

But Garrett offered her little a.s.sistance. He had no proposals to offer, and was barren of all definite efforts; he hated definite lines of any kind, but he promised to fall in with her plans.

"I will come down to breakfast," she said, "and will speak to him afterwards."

Garrett nodded wearily and went back to his work. On the next morning the crisis came.

Breakfast was a silent meal at all times. Harry had learnt to avoid the cheerful familiarity of his first morning--it would not do. But the heavy solemnity of the ma.s.sive silver teapot, the ham and cold game on the sideboard, the racks of toast that were so needlessly numerous, drove him into himself, and, like his brother and son, he disappeared behind folds of newspaper until the meal was over.

Clare frequently came down to breakfast, and therefore he saw nothing unusual in her appearance. The meal was quite silent; Clare had her letters--and he was about to rise and leave the room, when she spoke.

"Wait a minute, Harry. I want to say something. No, Robin, don't go--what I'm going to say concerns us all."

Garrett remained behind his newspaper, which showed that he had received previous warning. Robin looked up in surprise, and then quickly at his father, who had moved to the fireplace.

"About me, Clare?" He tried to speak calmly, but his voice shook a little. He saw that it was a premeditated attack, but he wished that Robin hadn't been there. He was, on the whole, glad that the moment had come; the last week had been almost unbearable, and the situation was bound to arrive at a crisis--well, here it was, but he wished that Robin were not there. As he looked at the boy for a moment his face was white and his breath came sharply. He had never loved him quite so pa.s.sionately as at that moment when he seemed about to lose him.

Clare had chosen her time and her audience well, and suddenly he felt that he hated her; he was immediately calm and awaited her attack almost nonchalantly, his hand resting on the mantelpiece, his legs crossed.

Clare was still sitting at the table, her face half turned to Harry, her glance resting on Robin. She tapped the table with her letters, but otherwise gave no sign of agitation.

"Yes--about you, Harry. It is only that I think we have reason--almost a right--to expect that you should yield a little more thoroughly to our wishes. Both _Garrett_"--this with emphasis--"and myself are sure that your failing to do so is only due to a misconception on your part, and it is because we are sure that you have only to realise them to give way a little to them, that I--we--are speaking."

"I certainly had not realised that I had failed in deference to your wishes, Clare."

"No, not failed--and it is absurd to talk of deference. It is only that I feel--we all feel"--this with another glance at Robin--"that it is naturally impossible for you to realise exactly what are the things required of us here. Things that would in New Zealand have been of no importance at all."

"Such as----?"

"Well, you must remember that we have, as it were, the eyes of all the town upon us. We occupy a position of some importance, and we are definitely expected to maintain that position without lack of dignity."

"Won't you come to the point, Clare? It is a little hard to see----"

"Oh, things are obvious enough--surely, Harry, you must see for yourself. People were ready to give you a warm welcome when you returned. I--we--all of us, were only too glad. But you repulsed us all. Why, on the very day after your arrival you were extremely--I am sorry, but there is no other word--discourteous to the Miss Ponsonbys.

You have made your friends almost entirely amongst the fisher cla.s.s, a strange thing, surely, for a Trojan to do, and you now, I believe, spend your evenings frequently in a low public-house resorted to by such persons--at any rate you have spent them neither here nor at the Club, the two obvious places. I am only mentioning these things because I think that you may not have seen that such matters--trivial as they may seem to you--reflect discredit, not only on yourself, but also, indirectly, on all of us."

"You forget, Clare, that I have many old friends down at the Cove.

They were there when I was a boy. The people in Pendragon have changed very largely, almost entirely. There is scarcely any one whom I knew twenty years ago; it is, I should have thought, quite natural that I should go to see my old friends again after so long an absence."

He was trying to speak quietly and calmly. His heart was beating furiously, but he knew that if he once lost control, he would lose, too, his position. But, as he watched them, and saw their cold, unmoved att.i.tude his anger rose; he had to keep it down with both hands clenched--it was only by remembering Robin that the effort was successful.

"Natural to go and see them on your return--of course. But to return, to go continually, no. I cannot help feeling, Harry, that you have been a little selfish. That you have scarcely seen our side of the question. Things have changed in the last twenty years--changed enormously. We have seen them, studied them, and, I think, understood them. You come back and face them without any preparation; surely you cannot expect to understand them quite as we do."

"This seems to me, I must confess, Clare, a great deal of concern about a very little matter. Surely I am not a person of such importance that a few visits to the Cove can ruin us socially?"

"Ah! that is what you don't understand! Little things matter here.

People watch, and are, I am afraid, only too ready to fasten on matters that do not concern them. Besides, it is not only the Cove--there are other things--there are, for instance, the Bethels."

At the name Robin started. He liked Mary Bethel, had liked her very much indeed, but he had known that his aunt disapproved of them and had been careful to disguise his meetings. But the instant thought in his mind concerned the Feverels. If the Bethels were impossible socially, what about Dahlia and her mother? What would his aunt say if she knew of that little affair? And the question which had attacked him acutely during the last week in various forms hurt him now like a knife.

He watched his father curiously. He did not look as if he cared very greatly. Of course Aunt Clare was perfectly right. He had been selfishly indifferent, had cared nothing for their feelings. Randal had shown plainly enough how impossible he was. Indeed the shadow of Randal lurked in the room in a manner that would have pleased that young gentleman intensely had he known it. Clare had it continually before her, urging her, advising her, commanding her.

At the mention of the Bethels, Harry looked up sharply.

"I think we had better leave them out of the discussion." His voice trembled a little.

"Why? Are they so much to you? They have, however, a good deal to do with my argument. Do you think it was wise to neglect the whole of Pendragon for the society of the Bethels--people of whom one is an idler and loafer and the other a lunatic?" Clare was becoming excited.

"You forget, Clare, that I first met them in your drawing-room."

"They were there entirely against my will. I showed them that quite distinctly at the time. They will not come again."

"That may be. But they are, as you have said, my friends. I cannot, therefore, hear them insulted. They must be left out of the discussion."

On any other matter he could have heard her quietly, but the Bethels she must leave alone. He could see Mary, as he spoke, turning on the hill and laying her hand on his arm; her hair blew in the wind and the light in her eyes shone under the moon. He had for a moment forgotten Robin.

"At any rate, I have made my meaning clear. We wish you--out of regard for us, if for no other reason--to be a little more careful both of your company and of your statements. It is hard for you to see the position quite as we do, I know, but I cannot say that you have made any attempt whatsoever to see it with our eyes. It seems useless to appeal to you on behalf of the House, but that, too, is worth some consideration. We have been here for many hundreds of years; we should continue in the paths that our ancestors have marked out. I am only saying what you yourself feel, Garrett?"

"Absolutely." Garrett looked up from his paper. "I think you must see, Harry, that we are quite justified in our demands--Clare has put it quite plainly."

"Quite," said Harry. "And you, Robin?"

"I think that Aunt Clare is perfectly right," answered Robin coldly.