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Tragic Bride

<h2 id="id00370" style="margin-top: 4em">XVI</h2> In the last week of the holidays, if only Mrs. Payne had been more acute, she might have surprised his secret. Walking the lowest of their meadows on the side of Bredon Hill, they came suddenly upon a southern slope already powdered with the flowers of cowslips. This cloth of gold was the chief glory of their spring, blooming mile on mile of meadowland, and drenching the air with a faint perfume. Mrs. Payne stooped to pick some, for the scent provoked so many memories, and to her it was one of the sensations that returned year by year with amazing freshness—that and the spice of pinks in early summer or the green odour of phlox. "Smell them, they smell like wine," she said, giving her bunch to Arthur. "Mrs. Considine told me that there are no cowslips in their part of Devon," he said. And then, after a moment of hesitation, he went down on his knees and began to pick the flowers. The hue of their smooth stalks was pale as the first apple-leaves, springing straight and slender each above its leafy mat. "Why are you picking so many? They're more beautiful as they are." "If they haven't any I'd like to send her some?" He went on picking cowslips till the light faded from the fields. Next morning he packed them carefully, and posted them, with a letter, to Lapton. She thought it very charming and thoughtful of him to send Mrs. Considine the flowers. It merely struck her as typical of his new nature, and she thought it rather shabby of Gabrielle, when, after three days of waiting, she had not acknowledged the gift. Altogether she felt that Mrs. Considine had been rather a broken reed as far as Arthur was concerned. In the beginning she had taken to her, and expected quite a lot of her. Arthur, too, seemed disturbed that she did not reply. Day after day he waited for a letter from Lapton with eagerness. There was no reason why he shouldn't have been anxious to know that his present had not gone astray. She had not seen the note that Arthur posted with his flowers. With no more than the vaguest mistrust—for she still felt that in some way she had fallen short of full possession, Mrs. Payne saw him return to Lapton for the summer term. During the early weeks Arthur scarcely ever wrote to her, and when she protested mildly, his reply seemed to her evasive. It was a dutiful reply, and though she couldn't help admitting that in Arthur the recognition of any duty was a new thing, the suspicion that for some obscure reason she was losing him, persisted. She was not in the ordinary way a woman of acute intuitions, but her whole mind had been so wrapped up in that son of hers that she was sensitive to the smallest changes of tone, and she knew that while he was writing her letters his head had been full of other things. At the same time she had sense enough to see that with his recovery Arthur's life had become crowded with so many new interests that she couldn't reasonably expect the old degree of absorption in herself. This was the price of his recovery, and she determined to pay it without grudging. She settled down into this state of patience and resignation. She even prepared to deny herself her usual privilege of a visit to Lapton in term-time, feeling that it would be unfair of her to interrupt the progress of Considine's remarkable system. In the meantime she kept in touch with Arthur through her jealous care of the things that he had left behind, in the arrangement of his books, in the mending of his clothes, and in the preparation of an upstairs room that he had begun to turn into a study for his holiday reading. On these inanimate traces of him she lavished a peculiar tenderness, for their presence had the effect of making her feel less lonely. One day she took up to his new study a number of note-books that he had used during the Easter holidays. When he had sat out under the cedar in the evenings she had often noticed him writing with a pencil though she had never thought to enquire what he was doing. Now, with a chance curiosity, she happened to open one of these books and examine what he had written. She saw at once that they were verses, and laughed at the idea. But when she had read one or two of his poems she laughed no longer. She realised at once that they were love-poems, feeble and amateurish in their expression, but daringly sensual and passionate in their content. They made the good woman blush—her husband had never been so direct in his days of courtship—but to her blushes succeeded a moment of fierce maternal alarm. It was impossible, she thought, that anyone innocent of a violent sexual passion could have conceived the ideas that the verses contained. They were fully as physical, and nearly as direct, as the love-songs of Herrick. She was not only shocked, but frightened, for her long years of widowhood had isolated her from all feelings of the kind that Arthur expressed so glibly. She read the poems over again and again. She could not sleep at night for thinking of them. In the end she became convinced that the thing which she had feared most had come to pass; that even if the coming of manhood had brought to Arthur the birth of a moral sense in matters of ordinary social intercourse, the gain had been neutralised by the release of a new instinct that was powerful enough to wreck the rest. The boy was obviously and violently in love—not with any shadowy dreamed ideal, but actually with a woman of definite physical attributes. It was almost possible to reconstruct a picture from the poems. A skin of ivory, grey eyes, hair that was like night, red lips, pale hands, all rather commonplace, but, none the less, damningly definite. It is curious that the image of Gabrielle never suggested itself to her. Perhaps it was the fact that Arthur, for some unaccountable reason, probably because he usually saw them in a half-light, had made her violet eyes—an unmistakable feature—grey. As the matter stood Mrs. Payne was convinced that he had become entangled, and intimately entangled, with some dangerous and designing woman. It was her plain duty to save him. The only thing that restrained her from immediate action was the fear that any big emotional disturbance might undo the work that Considine had already accomplished. She didn't in the least connect the passion with the reformation, and yet she wondered if interference with the one might somehow prejudice the other. It was a harrowing dilemma. In the end, with her accustomed courage, she decided to face the risk. At any rate no harm need be done by her taking Considine into her confidence. She encouraged herself with a pathetic trust in his stability and wisdom in all matters that affected Arthur. Without even the warning of a telegram she made her decision, ordered the carriage for the station and set off for Lapton. She arrived there late on a Saturday night to the astonishment of the Considines, who had disposed of the boys for the evening, and were sitting together in the library. Considine, who prided himself on never being surprised by an emergency, welcomed her as if there were nothing unusual in her visit, and Gabrielle, a little nervous, went off to see the housekeeper, and arrange about a room for the visitor. At the door Mrs. Payne stopped her. "If you don't mind," she said, "I should be glad if you wouldn't let Arthur know that I'm here." Considine was quick to agree: "Certainly not, if you wish it." Gabrielle left them and he prepared to hear her story. She was very agitated, and found it difficult to express herself. For a little time, in spite of Considine's encouragements, she beat about the bush. She felt that her revelation would amount to a criticism of Considine's management. At last, realising that she was getting no further, she produced her documents and handed them to him. Considine examined them slowly and judicially without a flicker of emotion. It seemed to Mrs. Payne a very solemn moment, full of awful possibilities. She waited breathlessly for his verdict. "Well?" he said at last, putting the papers aside. "Arthur wrote them." "Yes…. I recognised his writing." "He is in love with some woman." "Presumably … yes. But I'm not so sure of that." "What do you mean?" She gasped at the prospect of relief. He explained to her at length. It was a very common thing for boys of Arthur's age, he said, to write verse. "Verses of that kind?" Yes… even verses of that kind. To be perfectly candid he himself, when a boy in his teens, had done very much the same sort of thing. It was true perhaps that the verses which he had written had not been quite so … perhaps frank was the best word. On the other hand his own development had followed more normal lines. He hadn't, in the manner of Arthur, burst suddenly into blossom. All boys wrote verses. Often they wrote verses of an amatory character, not particularly because they happened to be in love, but because the bulk of English lyrical poetry, to which they went for their models, was, regrettably, of an amatory character. At this stage in a boy's development, even in the development of the greatest poets (and Arthur, he noticed in passing, did not show any signs of amazing genius) the verses were usually imitative. It rather looked as if he had been reading Herrick, or possibly the Shakespeare sonnets … the dark lady, you know. Seriously, he didn't think there was anything to worry about. He folded the papers and handed them back to her. For once in a way Considine didn't satisfy her. There were other things, she said. Things that she hadn't attached any value to at the time when they happened, but which now seemed significant. When she came to think of it Arthur's whole behaviour during the holidays had been that of a youth who was in love. With all deference to Dr. Considine she felt that she couldn't pass the matter over. It was her plain duty to enquire into it, and find, if possible, a more obvious reason for this strange and sudden outburst. Considine agreed that no harm could be done by a little quiet investigation. At the same time he couldn't possibly see what opportunities Arthur could have had for falling in love at Lapton. "We're very isolated here," he said. "The Manor is a kingdom in itself. It seems to me that circumstances would force him to invent an ideal for the want of any living model." She shook her head. There was no isolation, she said, into which love could not enter; and this, in the face of classical precedent, Considine was forced to admit. Could she, then, make any suggestions? Mrs. Payne said, "Servants," and blushed. Considine also blushed, but with irritation. The suggestion brought the matter uncomfortably near home. "I think you can put that out of your mind," he said. "I'll admit that I did not consider this point when I engaged them, but I do not think you'll find any one peculiarly attractive among them." "They're women," said Mrs. Payne obstinately. It seemed to her that Considine's incredulity was forcing them both into a blind alley. "If you don't mind," she said, "I think it would be better for me to talk the matter over with your wife. A woman, if you'll allow me to say so, is much more acutely sensitive to … this kind of thing." Again Considine blushed. The prospect of engaging Gabrielle in the matter was altogether against his principles. He had always made it a rule that her essential femininity should not be compromised by any contact with the business of the school. He did not even like her to take an intimate share in the management of the house. After all she was a Hewish and a cousin of the august Halbertons. That was why he had employed Mrs. Bemerton as housekeeper. "I shall be obliged," he said, "if you don't mention a matter that may possibly become unsavoury, to Mrs. Considine. She knows nothing of the servants, and I prefer her to take no part in the affairs of my pupils." Altogether the good woman felt that she had been snubbed for her pains. She had expected a great deal from Considine, and even more from Gabrielle. Still, if Considine objected to his wife being consulted, she was prepared to accept his decision. The only course that remained open to her was to make enquiries for herself, and determine, by observation, what women were possibly available for the disposal of Arthur's affections. "Very well," she said with a sigh. "If you don't wish me to speak to your wife, of course I won't." "If you'll pardon my saying so, I think you're unduly anxious. After all, the most obvious thing is to ask Arthur himself. Why not do that?" She hesitated and then spoke the truth. "I'm afraid he'd tell me a lie. I don't want him to do that … now. I'd much rather find out for myself. I wish I could believe you. I do indeed." She paused for a moment and then said, almost as if she were speaking to herself, "There's no place where there aren't opportunities. Farmer's daughters … village girls. There are more women in the world than there are men." He couldn't help smiling at the mathematical accuracy of her remark, but once more he shook his head. "At any rate," she said, returning to the practical aspect of the case, "I suppose you've no objection to my staying here for a day or two, and keeping my eyes open. Failing anything else I will speak to Arthur about it." "Please consider the house your own," said Considine, who had now recovered his usual politeness. "Thank you," she said. "You're very kind. But you know how grateful I am to you already." Mrs. Considine returned, and a little later showed her to her room. In the candle-light of the passage Mrs. Payne was assailed by an overwhelming desire to break her promise and disclose her troubles to Gabrielle. She felt that her quest was so lonely. Gabrielle seemed to her sympathetic and she knew that it would be a great relief to her to discuss the affair with another woman. As they paused at her bedroom door, her old attraction towards Mrs. Considine that had once culminated in an impulsive kiss took hold of her again. She wanted, for some obscure reason, to kiss Gabrielle once more. Perhaps there was something in the attraction of her opposite physical type that accounted for this impulse as well as for Arthur's infatuation. For the present she suppressed her inclination. After all Considine had acted fairly enough with her, and she felt that she could not fail him in a point of honour. Alone in her room she read over Arthur's poems again. Now that she was so near to him they impressed her less with a sense of fear and anxiety than with one of pity and of love. He was her child, and therefore to be protected and caressed. She found it difficult not to leave her room in the night, and grope her way along the creaking corridors to the room in which she knew he was sleeping. She wanted to kiss him and hold him in her arms. She placed the poems on the table at her bedside and blew out the candle. It was unfortunate for her bewilderment that Arthur had not left in his notebook the rough copy of the verses that he had sent to Gabrielle with the box of cowslips, the verses to which she had not dared to reply. Next morning at breakfast Arthur and his mother met. All through the holidays she had been indefinitely conscious of an awkwardness between them; now, with so much guilty knowledge in her mind, the relation became definitely embarrassing. She wondered if he felt it as deeply as she did. Certainly he showed no sign of any emotion but surprise at her visit. "But if you came last night, why on earth didn't you come along to my room?" he said. "And why are you so mysterious? What's it all about?" She put him off as well as she could. "I wanted to see you, that was all," she said. "I thought you would be pleased by the surprise," and then: "You don't seem very pleased." "Of course I'm pleased," he said, blushing. "But I don't understand it." Whatever he said she knew in her heart that she wasn't wanted. It was a bitter thing to realise, but it made her more than ever certain that there was a secret to be disclosed. After breakfast the Sunday morning routine of a country house began. She and Arthur walked together over the fields to church. The whole country breathed a lazy atmosphere of early summer. Its beauty and its placidity mocked her. Before them went the Considines. He wore a long cassock that swept the grass, as they went, while Gabrielle walked in silence at his side. Never once in their journey did she look back. It struck Mrs. Payne for the first time how young she was, how very much younger and more supple than her husband. And yet they seemed to be happy. The service was the usual slow ceremony of a village church, Considine moving with the dignity of his vestments from the lectern and the altar to the organ seat which he also occupied. Arthur, standing or kneeling at his mother's side, appeared to be properly engrossed in the service. Singing the psalms beside him she became aware how much of a man he was now, for his voice, that had been cracking for several years, had now sunk to a deep and sonorous bass. It was not until Considine ascended the pulpit and began to preach, that Mrs. Payne became conscious of anything extraordinary. At first she was held by the sermon, which was unusually well constructed, but in the middle of it she became aware that Arthur was not listening. He sat straight in the pew beside her as though he were intent on the preacher, but all the time his eyes were wandering to the other side of the aisle. Mrs. Payne tried to follow their direction. Here, presumably, was a fairly representative collection of the female inhabitants of the village. Here she might expect to find the farmer's daughter, or, in the last emergency, the housemaid, on whom his affections were centred. She heard no more of Considine, only watching Arthur's eyes, and watching, she soon discovered that these were for Mrs. Considine and her alone. She could not deny the fact that Gabrielle, with her fine pale profile set against a pillar of grey sandstone, was a creature of amazing beauty. She herself was fascinated by this vision of refinement and grace to such a degree that she almost shared in Arthur's rapture. For a little while she could not be sure of it, for this was the last possibility that had entered her mind: but at last it seemed that Gabrielle became conscious of the gaze that she could not see. Suddenly, without the least warning, she turned her head in Arthur's direction. Their eyes met. She blushed faintly, and, at the same moment, became aware of Mrs. Payne. The blush deepened, spreading into the ivory whiteness of her neck; and Mrs. Payne had no need to look at her any longer, for she knew. Her mind leapt quickly to the whole situation. In the light of this evidence she recalled a hundred things that had not even puzzled her before. She saw the reason for the strange fate that had overtaken their correspondence, she divined the secret of Gabrielle's sudden reticence, and the break in Arthur's frank enthusiasms. She knew that she had made a triumphant discovery, but in her elation realised that it would be wiser to go gently. This was a secret that could not be blurted out without disaster. The situation needed careful handling. Once in possession of certain knowledge it was no longer difficult for her to interpret Arthur's moods. In the afternoon when they sat out under the trees on the lawn, she stumbled on a strange corroboration. She had fallen into a doze in a lounge chair at his side, and when she awoke she saw that he was reading poetry. He seemed to be reading one poem over and over again, and a sudden curiosity made her ask what he was reading. "Tennyson," he said, and closed the book. But he had left a long grass for marker between the pages, and when they moved towards the house at tea-time she picked up the book and opened it. Her eyes fell upon a significant stanza from "Maud." She came to the village church, And sat by a pillar alone; An angel watching an urn Wept over her, carved in stone: And once, but once, she lifted her eyes, And suddenly, sweetly, strangely blushed, To find they were met by my own … Mrs. Payne's heart beat faster as she read the verse. Later in the day, to test him, she asked him what he had been reading. She half expected him to tell her a lie, but, strangely enough, it was the truth that he gave her. "What do you like about 'Maud'?" she said. "I like it all," he replied. "It's the kind of thing that anyone might feel." He hesitated. "And there's one part of it in particular——" She waited, with her heart in her mouth. "What is that?" she said. "Oh, right at the beginning. I don't suppose it would mean much to you. I can't remember it exactly, but it starts like this: I hate the dreadful hollow behind the little wood, Its lips in the field above are dabbled with blood-red heath, The red-ribbed ledges drip with a silent horror of blood … I can't remember any more…" "But why should that appeal to you?" she asked, disappointed. "I don't know. It reminds me of something that happened to me once." She did not feel that it would be profitable to press him further on this uninteresting point. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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