Westways: A Village Chronicle Part 43

"How?" and she laughed. "How long have we been married!"

"Nonsense, Ann! What has that got to do with the matter?"

"Well," said Rivers, a little amused, "we shall know in a day or two. He will pa.s.s high."

"Of course," said Penhallow.

Then the talk drifted away to the mills, the village and the farm work. When after dinner Rivers declined to smoke with the Squire, Ann walked with the clergyman down the avenue and said presently, "Dine with us on Monday, Mark, and as often as possible. My husband is really worrying about John."

"And you, dear lady?"

"I-oh, of course, I miss them greatly; but Leila needs the contact with the social life she now has in the weekly holiday at Baltimore; and as for John, did it never occur to you that he ought to be among men of his age-and social position-and women too, who will not, I fancy, count for much in the 'West Point education.'

"Yes-yes, what you say is true of course, but ah! I dread for him the temptations of another life than this."

"Would you keep him here longer, if you could?" she asked.

"No. What would life be worth or how could character be developed without temptation? That is one of my puzzles about the world to come, a world where there would be no 'yes and no' would hardly be worth while."

"And quite beyond me," cried Ann, laughing. "We have done our best for them. Let us pray that they will not forget. I have no fear for Leila. I do not know about John. I must go home. Come often. Good-night. I suppose the sermon takes you away so early."

"Yes-more or less, and I am poor company just now. Good-night."

CHAPTER XV

When at breakfast on a Monday morning Penhallow said, "That mail is late again," his wife knew that he was still eager for news from John.

"The mail is always late on Monday morning, James. If you are in haste to get to the mills, I will send it after you."

"No, it is unimportant, Ann. Another cup, please. Ah! there it is now."

He went out on to the porch. "You are late, Billy."

"I ain't late-it was Mrs. Crocker-she kept me."

Penhallow selected two letters postmarked West Point, and opening one as he went in to the breakfast-room, said, "My dear, it is rather satisfactory-quite as much as could be expected."

"Well, James! What is rather satisfactory? You are really exasperating at times."

"Am I? Well, John has pa.s.sed in the first half dozen-he does not yet know just where-"

"And are you not entirely contented? You ought to be. What is the other letter?"

He opened it. "It is only a line from the old drawing-master to say that John did well and would have been second or third, they said, except for not being higher in mathematics." As he spoke he rose and put both letters in his pocket. "Now I must go."

"But let me see them, James."

"Oh, John's is only a half dozen lines, and I must go at once-I have an appointment at the mills-I want to look over the letters again, and shall write to him from the office." Ann was slightly annoyed, but said no more until on the porch before he mounted she took a mild revenge. "I know where you are going."

"Well, and where, please?" He fell into her trap.

"First, you will stop at the rectory and read those letters to Mark Rivers; then the belated mail will excuse a pause at the post-office to scold Mrs. Crocker. Tell Pole as you go by that last mutton was atrociously tough. Of course, you won't mention John."

"Well, are you done?" he said, as he mounted Dixy. "I can wait, Ann, until you read the letters."

"Thanks, I am in no hurry." He turned in the saddle and gave her the letters. She put aside her brief feeling of annoyance and stood beside him as she read them. "Thank you, James. What an uneasy old uncle you are. Now go. Oh, be off with you-and don't forget Dr. McGregor." As he rode away, she called after him, "James-James-I forgot something."

He turned, checking Dixy. "Oh, I forgot to say that you must not forget the office clerks, because you know they are all so fond of John."

"What a wretch you are, Ann Penhallow! Go in and repent."

"I don't," and laughing, joyously, she stood and looked after the tall figure as he rode away happy and gaily singing, as he was apt to do if pleased, the first army carol the satisfaction of the moment suggested:

Come out to the stable As soon as you 're able, And see that the horses That they get some corn.

For if you don't do it, The colonel will know it, And then you will rue it As sure as you're born.

"Ah!" said his wife, "how he goes back-always goes back-to the wild army life when something pleases him. Thank G.o.d that can never come again." She recalled her first year of married life, the dull garrison routine, the weeks of her husband's absences, and when the troop came back and there were empty saddles and weeping women.

At dinner the Squire must needs drink the young cadet's health and express to Rivers his regret that there was not a West Point for Leila. Mrs. Ann was of opinion that she had had too much of it already. Rivers agreed with his hostess, and in one of his darkest days won the privilege of long silences by questioning the Squire in regard to the studies and life at West Point, while Mrs. Ann more socially observant than her husband saw how moody was Rivers and with what effort he manufactured an appearance of interest in the captain's enthusiasm concerning educative methods at the great army school. She was relieved when he carried off Rivers to the library.

"It is chilly, Mark; would you like a fire?" he asked.

"Yes, I am never too warm."

The Squire set the logs ablaze. "No pipe, Mark?"

"Not yet." He stretched out his lean length before the ruddy birch blaze and was silent. The Squire watched him and made no attempt to disturb the deep reverie in which the young clergyman remained. At last the great grey eyes turned from the fire, and Rivers sat up in his chair, as he said, "You must have seen how inconsiderately I have allowed my depression to dismiss the courtesies of life. I owe you and my dear Mrs. Penhallow both an apology and an explanation."-

"But really, Mark-"

"Oh, let me go on. I have long wanted to talk myself out, and as often my courage has failed. I have had a most unhappy life, Penhallow. All the pleasant things in it-the past few years-have been given me here. I married young-"

"One moment, Mark. Before you came to us the Bishop wrote me in confidence of your life. Not even Mrs. Penhallow has seen that letter."

"Then you knew-but not all. Now I have had a sad relief. He told you of-well, of my life, of my mother's hopeless insanity-and the rest."

"Yes-yes-all, I believe-all."

"Not quite all. I have spent a part at least of every August with her; now at last she is dead. But my family story has left with me the fear of dying like my brothers or of becoming as she became. When I came to you I was a lonely soul, sick in mind and weak in body. I am better-far better-and now with some renewal of hope and courage I shall face my world again. You have had-you will have charity for my days of melancholy. I never believed that a priest should marry-and yet I did. I suffered, and never again can I dream of love. I am doubly armed by memory and by the horror of continuing a race doomed to disaster. There you have it all to my relief. There is some mysterious consolation in unloading one's mind. How good you have been to me! and I have been so useless-so little of what I might have been."

Penhallow rose, set a hand on Rivers's shoulder, seeing the sweat on his forehead and the appeal of the sad eyes turned up to meet his gaze. "What," he said, "would our children have been without you? G.o.d knows I have been a better man for your company, and the mills-the village-how can you fail to see what you have done-"

"No-no-I am a failure. It may be that the moods of self-reproach are morbid. That too torments me. Even to-day I was thinking of how Christ would have dealt with that miserable man, Peter Lamb, and how uncharitable I was, how crude, how void of sympathy-"

"You-you-" said Penhallow, as he moved away. "My own regret is that I did not turn him over to the law. Well, points of view do differ curiously. We will let him drop. He will come to grief some day. And now take my thanks and my dear Ann's for what you have told me. Let us drop that too. Take a pipe."

"No, I must go. I am the easier in my mind, but I am tired and not at all in the pipe mood." He went out through the hall, and with a hasty "good-night" to his hostess and "pleasant dreams-or none," went slowly down the avenue.

The woman he left, with her knitting needles at rest a moment, was considering the man and his moods with such intuitive sympathy and comprehension as belongs to the s.e.x which is physiologically the more subject to abrupt changes in the climate of the mind. As her husband entered, she began anew the small steadying industry for which man has no subst.i.tute.

"Upon my word, James, when you desire to exchange confidences, you must get further away from me."