Vera Nevill Part 35

"Mother, I have been to see John this morning. I am afraid he is really very ill," he said, gravely.

Lady Kynaston shrugged her shoulders. "He is like a baby over that foolish affair," she said, impatiently. "He does not seem able to get over it; why does he shut himself up in his rooms? If he were to go out a little more----"

"He has been out; it is that that has made him ill. He went out a few mornings ago--the wind was very cold; he says it is that which gave him a chill. But, from what he says, I fancy he saw, or he thinks he saw, Miss Nevill."

Lady Kynaston sat at her davenport with all the litter of her daily correspondence before her; her son stood up by the mantelpiece, leaning his back against it, and looked away out of window at the figures of Beatrice and his future wife sauntering up and down the garden walks. She could not well see his face as he spoke these last words.

"Tiresome woman!" cried Lady Kynaston, angrily; "there is no end to the trouble she causes. John ought to be thankful he is well rid of her. Did you hear what Beatrice Miller said at lunch about her? I call it shocking bad taste, her coming up to town and flirting and flaunting about under poor John's nose--heartless coquette! Creating 'a sensation,' indeed!

That is one of those horrible American expressions that are the fas.h.i.+on just now!"

"It is no wonder she is admired," said Maurice, dreamily: "she is very beautiful."

"I wish to goodness she would keep out of John's way. Where did he see her?"

"It was in the Row, I think, and, from what he said, he only fancied he saw her back, walking away. I told him, of course, it could not be her, because I thought she was down at Sutton; but, after what Beatrice told us at lunch, I make no doubt that it was her, and that John really did see her."

"I should have thought that your brother would have had more spirit than to sit down and whine over a woman in that way," said her ladys.h.i.+p, sharply; "it is really contemptible."

"But if he is ill in body as well as in mind, poor fellow?"

"Pooh! fiddlesticks! I am quite sure, if Helen jilted you, you would bear it a great deal better--losing the money and all--than he does."

Maurice smiled.

"That is very possible; but a man can't help his disposition, and John has been utterly shattered by it."

"Well, I am sorry for him, of course; but I confess that I don't see that anybody can do anything for him."

And then Maurice was silent for a minute. G.o.d only knew what pa.s.sed through his soul at that minute--what agonies of self-renunciation, what martyrdom of all that makes life pleasant and dear to a man! It is certain his mother did not know it.

"I think," he said, after a minute, and only a slight harshness in his voice marked the internal struggle that the words were to cost him--"I think, mother, _you_ might do a great deal for him. Miss Nevill is in town. Could you not see her?"

"I see her! What on earth for?"

"If you were to tell her how ill John is, how desperately he feels her treatment of him--how----"

"Stop, stop, my dear! You cannot possibly suppose that I am going down upon my knees to entreat Miss Nevill to marry my son after she has thrown him over!"

"It is no question of going on your knees, mother. A few words would suffice to show her the misery she is causing to John, and if those few words would restore his lost happiness----"

"How can I tell that anything I can say would influence her? I suppose she had good reasons for throwing him over. She cared for some one else, I suppose, or, at all events, she did not care for him."

"I am quite certain, on the contrary, that she had a very sincere affection for my brother; and, as to the some one else, I do not think that will prevent her returning to him. Oh, mother!" he cried, with a sudden pa.s.sion, "the world is full of miserable misunderstandings and mistakes. For G.o.d's sake, let us try to put some of its blunders right!

Do not let any poor, mean feelings of false pride stand in our way if we can make one single life happy!"

She looked up at him, wondering a little at his earnestness. It did not strike her at the minute that his interest in Vera was unusual, but only that his affection for his brother was stronger than she imagined it to be. "You know," she said, "I do not want things to come right in that way. I do not want John to marry. I want the old place to come to you and your children; and now that John has agreed to let you and Helen live there----"

He waved his hand impatiently. "And you know, mother dear, that such desires are unlawful. John is the eldest, and I will never move a step to take his birthright from him. To stand in the way of his marriage for such a cause would be a crime. Is it not better that I should speak plainly to you, dear? As to my living at Kynaston, I think it highly unlikely that I should do so in any case, much as you and Helen seem to wish it. But that has nothing to do with John's affairs. Promise me, little mother, that you will try and set that right by seeing Miss Nevill?"

"I do not suppose I should do any good," she answered, with visible reluctance.

"Never mind; you can but try."

"You can't expect me to go and call upon her for such a purpose, nor speak to her, without John's authority."

"You might ask her to come here, or go to some house where you will meet her naturally in public."

"Yes, that would be best; perhaps she will be at Lady Cloverdale's ball next week."

"It is easy, at all events, to ensure her an invitation to it; ask Beatrice Miller to get her one."

"Oh, yes; that is easy enough. Oh, dear me, Maurice, you always manage to get your own way with me; but you have given me a dreadfully hard task this time."

"As if a woman of your known tact and _savoir faire_ was not capable of any hard and impossible task!" answered her son, smiling, as he bent and kissed her soft white face.

The gentle flattery pleased her. The old lady sat smiling happily to herself, with her hands idle before her, for some minutes after he had left her.

How dear he was to her, how good, how upright, how thoroughly generous too, and unselfish to think so much of his brother's troubles just now, in the midst of all his own happiness.

She got up and went to the window, and watched him as he strolled across the garden to join the ladies, smiling and kissing her hand to him when he looked back and saw her.

"Dear fellow, I hope he will be happy!" she said to herself, turning away with a half sigh. And then suddenly something brought back the ball at Shadonake to her recollection. There flashed back into her memory a certain scene in a cool, dimly-lit conservatory: two people whispering together under a high-swung Chinese lamp, and a background of dark-leaved shrubs behind them.

She had been puzzled that night. There had been something going on that she had not quite understood. And now again that feeling of unsatisfied comprehension came back to her. For the first time it struck her painfully that the son whom she idolized so much--whose life and character had been her one study and her one delight ever since the day of his birth--was nevertheless a riddle to her. That the secret of his inner self was as much hidden from her--his mother--as though she had been the merest stranger; that the life she had striven so closely to entwine with her own was nothing after all but a separate existence, in the story of whose soul she herself had no part. He was a man struggling single-handed in all the heat and turmoil of the battle of life, and she, nothing but a poor, weak old woman, standing feebly aside, powerless to help or even to understand the creature to whom she had given birth.

There fell a tear or two down upon her wrinkled little hands as she thought of it. She could not understand him; there was something in his life she could not fathom. Oh, what did it all mean?

Alas, sooner or later, is not that what comes to every mother concerning the child she loves best?

CHAPTER XXIL.

MR. PRYME'S VISITORS.

For courage mounteth with occasion.

Shakespeare, "King John."

Mr. Herbert Pryme stood by a much ink-stained and littered table in his chambers in the Temple, with his hands in his trousers pockets, whistling a slow and melancholy tune.

It was Mr. Pryme's habit to whistle when he was dejected or perplexed; and the whistling generally partook of the mournful condition of his feelings. Indeed, everything that this young man did was of a ponderous and solemn nature; there was always the inner consciousness of the dignity of the Bar vested in his own person, to be discerned in his outer bearing. Even in the strictest seclusion of the, alas! seldom invaded privacy of his chambers Mr. Pryme never forgot that he was a barrister-at-law.

But when this young gentleman was ill at ease within himself he was in the habit of whistling. He also was given to the thrusting of his hands into his pockets. The more unhappy he was, the more he whistled, and the deeper he stuffed in his hands.

Just now, to all appearances, he was very unhappy indeed.