The Christian Part 58

"Yes, I am altered," he said in the pause that followed.

"And I?"

"You are altered too." He was looking at her with an earnest and pa.s.sionate gaze. It was she--herself--Glory--not merely a vision or a dream. Again he recognised the glorious eyes with their brilliant lashes and the flas.h.i.+ng spot in one of them that had so often set his heart beating. She looked back at him and thought, "How ill he must have been!" and then a lump came into her throat and she began to laugh that she might not have to cry, and broke out into broad Manx lest he should hear the tremor in her voice:

"But you're coming too, aren't ye? And you've left that theer--Aw, it's glad ter'ble I am, as our people say, and it's longin' mortal you'd be for all, boy."

Another trill of nervous laughter, and then a burst of earnest English: "But tell me, you've come for good--you are not going back to----"

"No, I am not going back to the Brotherhood, Glory." How friendly his low voice sounded!

"And you?"

"Well, I've left the hospital, you see."

"Yes, I see," he said. His weary eyes were wandering about the room, and for the first time she felt ashamed of its luxuries and its flowers.

"But how did you find me?"

"I went to the hospital first----"

"So you hadn't forgotten me? Do you know I thought you had quite--But tell me at once, where did you go then?"

He was silent for a moment, and she said, "Well?"

"Then I went to Mr. Drake's chambers."

"I don't know why everybody should think that Mr. Drake----"

His great eyes were fixed on her face and his mouth was quivering, and, to prevent him from speaking, she put on a look of forced gaiety and said, "But how did you light on me at last?"

"I meant to find you, Glory, if I tramped all London over and everybody denied you to me"--the lump in her throat was hurting her dreadfully--"but I chanced to see the name over the music hall."

She saw it coming, and broke into laughter. "The music hall! Only think!

You looking at music halls!"

"I was there on Monday night."

"You? Monday? Then perhaps it was not my fancy that I saw you by the stage do--." Her nerves were getting more and more excited, and to calm them she crossed her arms above her head. "So they gave you my address at the stage door, did they?"

"No, I wrote for it to Peel."

"Peel?" She caught her breath, and her arms came down. "Then perhaps you told them where----" "I told them nothing, Glory." She looked at him through her eyelashes, her head held down.

"Not that it matters, you know."

"I've just been writing to them, and they'll soon--But, oh, I've so much to say, and I can't say it here. Couldn't we go somewhere? Into the park or on to the heath, or farther--much farther--the room is so small, and I feel as if I've been suffocating for want of air."

"I've something to say too, and if----"

"Then let it be to-morrow morning, and we'll start early, and you'll bring me back in time for the theatre. Say Paddington Station, at eleven--will that do?"

"Yes."

She saw him to the gate, and when he was going she wanted him to kiss her hand, so she pretended to do the high handshake, but he only held it for a moment and looked steadily into her eyes. The suns.h.i.+ne was pouring into the garden, and she was bareheaded. Her hair was coiled up, and she was wearing a light morning blouse. He thought she had never looked so beautiful. On getting into the omnibus at the end of the street he took a letter out of his vest pocket, and, being alone, he first carried it to his lips, then reopened and read it:

"See her at once, dear John, and keep in touch with her, and I shall be happy and relieved. As for your father, that old Chaise is going crazy and is sending Lord Storm crazy too. He has actually discovered that the dust the witch walks on who has cast the evil eye on you lies in front of Glenfaba gate, and he has been sweeping it up o' nights and scattering it in front of Knockaloe! What simplicity! There are only two women here. Does the silly old gawk mean Rachel? or is it, perhaps, Aunt Anna?"

And while the omnibus joggled down the street, and the pale young clergyman with the great weary eyes was poring over his letter, Glory was sitting at her table and writing with flying fingers and a look of enthusiastic ecstasy:

"I've had three bites at this cherry. But who do you think has just been here? John!--John Storm! But then you know that he is back, and it wasn't merely my fancy that I saw him by the stage door. It seems as if people have been denying me to him, and he has been waiting for me and watching over me." (Blot.) "His voice is so low, but I suppose that comes to people who are much alone, and he is so thin and so pale, and his eyes are so large, and they have that deep look that cuts into the heart. He knew he was changed, and I think he was ashamed" (blot), "but of course I didn't let whit that I was taking notice, and I'm so happy for his sake, poor fellow! that he has escaped from his cage in that Salvation zoo that I know I shall make them split their sides in the theatre to-night." (Blot, blot.) "How tiresome! This ink must have got water in it somehow, and then my handwriting is such a hop-skip-and-a-jump anyway. But hoots!

"Why shouldn't I love Johnny, "And why shouldn't Johnny love me?

"Glory."

IV.

It was a beautiful May morning, and standing by the Paddington Station with the dog at his feet, he felt her approach instinctively as she came toward him with her free step in her white cambric dress under the light parasol fringed with lace. Her face was glowing with the fresh air, and she looked happy and bright. As they walked into the station she poured out a stream of questions about the dog, took possession of him straightway, and concluded to call him Don.

They agreed to spend the day at Burnham Beeches, and while he went for the tickets she stepped on to the platform. It was Sat.u.r.day, the bookstall was ablaze with the picture papers, and one of them was prominently displayed at a page containing her own portrait. She wanted John to see this, so she invented an excuse for bringing him face to face with it, and then she laughed and he bought the paper.

The clerk recognised her--they could see that by the smile he kept in reserve--and a group of officers in the Guards, in flannels and straw hats, going down to their club at Maidenhead, looked at her and nudged each other as if they knew who she was. Her eyes danced, her lips smiled, and she was proud that John should see the first fruits of her fame. She was proud of him, too, with his bold walk and strong carriage, as they pa.s.sed the officers in their negligent dress, with their red and blue neckties. But John's heart was aching, and he was wondering how he was to begin on the duty he had to do.

From the moment they started she gave herself up to the delights of their holiday, and even the groaning and cranking and joggling of the train amused her. When the Guards had got into their first-cla.s.s carriage they had glanced at the open window where her brilliant eyes and rosy lips were gleaming behind a veil. John gazed at her with his slow and tender looks, and felt guilty and ashamed.

They left the train at Slough, and a wave of freshness, with an odour of verdure and sap, blew into their faces. The dog leaped and barked, and Glory skipped along with it, breaking every moment into enthusiastic exclamations. There was hardly any wind, and the clouds, which were very high overhead, were scarcely moving. It was a glorious day, and Glory's face wore an expression of perfect happiness.

They lunched at the old hotel in the town, with the window open, and the swallows darting in the air outside, and Glory, who took milk "for remembrance," rose and said, "I looks toward Mr. Storm," and then drank his health and swept him the prettiest courtesy. All through lunch she kept feeding the dog from her own fingers, and at the end rebuked him for spreading his bones in a half circle across the carpet, a thing which was never done, she said, in the best society, this side the Cannibal Islands.

"By-and-bye," he thought, "time enough by-and-bye," for the charm of her joy was infectious.

The sun was high when they started on their walk, and her face looked flushed and warm. But through the park-like district to the wood she raced with Don, and made him leap over her sunshade and roll over and over on the bright green gra.s.s. The larks were trilling overhead, everything was humming and singing.

"Let her have one happy day," he thought, and they began to call and shout to each other.

Then they came to the beeches, and, being sheltered from the fiery rays of the sun, she put down her sunshade and John took off his hat. The silence and gloom, the great gnarled trees, with their thews and sinews, their arms and thighs and loins, the gentle rustle of the breeze in the branches overhead, the deep acc.u.mulation of dead leaves underfoot, the fluttering of wings, the low cooing of pigeons, and all the mystery and wonder of the wood, brought a sense of awe, as on entering a mighty minster in the dusk. But this wore away presently, and Glory began to sing. Her pure voice echoed in the fragrant air, and the happiness so long pent up and starved seemed to bubble in every word and note.

"Isn't this better than singing in music halls?" he thought, and then he began to sing too, just like any happy boy, without thinking of yesterday or to-morrow, of before or after. She smiled at him. He smiled back. It was like a dream. After his long seclusion it was difficult to believe it could be true. The open air, the perfume of the leaves they were wading through, the silver bark of the birches and the blue peeps of the sky between, and then Glory walking with her graceful motion, and laughing and singing by his side! "I shall wake up in a minute," he thought, "I'm sure I shall!"

They sang one song together. It was La.s.ses and Lads, and to make themselves think it was the old time back again they took each other's hands and swung them to the tune. He felt her clasp like milk coursing through his body, and a great wave of tenderness swept up his hard resolve as sea-wrack is thrown up after a storm. "She is here; we are together; why trouble about anything more?" and the time flew by.

But their voices went wrong immediately, and they were soon in difficulties. Then she laughed, and they began again; but they could not keep together, and as often as they tried they failed. "Ah, it's not like the old days!" he thought, and a mood of sadness came over him.

He had begun to observe in Glory the trace of the life she had pa.s.sed through--words, phrases, ideas, s.n.a.t.c.hes of slang, touches of moods which had the note of a slight vulgarity. When the dog took a bone uninvited she cried: "It's a click; you've sneaked it"; when John broke down in the singing she told him to "chuck it off the chest"; and when he stopped altogether she called him glum, and said she would "do it on her own."