Stella Fregelius Part 17

So he shrugged his shoulders, and they limped forward up the roofless nave and through the door. She stared at the plain stone altar, at the eastern window, of which part was filled with ancient coloured gla.s.s and part with cheap glazed panes; at the oak choir benches, mouldy and broken; at the few wall-slabs and decaying monuments, and at the roof still strong and ma.s.sive.

"I dreamed of a place very like this," she said, nodding her head. "I thought that I was standing in such a spot in a fearful gale, and that the sea got under the foundations and washed the dead out of their graves."

"Really, Miss Fregelius," he said, with some irritation, for the surroundings of the scene and his companion's talk were uncanny, "do you think this an occasion to explore ruins and relate nightmares?" Then he added, "I beg your pardon, but I think that the cold and wet have affected your nerves; for my part, I have none left."

"Perhaps; at least forgive me, I did so want to look," she answered humbly as, arm-in-arm, for she needed support, they pa.s.sed from the altar to the door.

A grotesque imagination entered the numbed mind of Morris. Their slow and miserable march turned itself to a vision of a bridal procession from the altar. Wet, dishevelled, half-frozen, they two were the bride-groom and the bride, and the bride was a seer of visions, and the bridegroom was a dreamer of dreams. Yes, and they came up together out of the bitter sea and the darkness, and they journeyed together to a vault of the dead----

Thank Heaven! they were out of the place, and above was the sun s.h.i.+ning, and, to the right and left, the grey ocean and the purple plough-lands, cold-looking, suggesting dangers and labour, but wholesome all of them, and good to the eye of man. Only why did this woman see visions, and why did he dream dreams? And what was the meaning of their strange meeting upon the sea? And what----

"Where are we going?" asked Stella after a while and very faintly.

"Home; to the Abbey, I mean, where your father lies. Now it is not much more than a mile away."

She sighed; her strength was failing her.

"You had better try to walk, it will warm you," he urged, and she struggled on.

It was a miserable journey, but they reached the house at length, pa.s.sing first through a street of the village in which no one seemed to be awake. A wretched-looking couple, they stumbled up the steps into the porch, where Morris rang the bell, for the door was locked. The time seemed an age, but at last steps were heard, the door was unbarred, and there appeared a vision of the lad Thomas, yawning, and clad in a nights.h.i.+rt and a pair of trousers, with braces attached which dangled to the floor.

"Oh, Lord!" he said when he saw them, and his jaw dropped.

"Get out of the way, you young idiot," said Morris, "and call the cook."

It was half-past seven in the evening, that is, dinner time, and Morris stood in the study waiting for Stella, who had announced through the housemaid that she was coming down.

After telling the servants to send for the doctor and attend to his companion, who had insisted upon being led straight to her father's room, Morris's first act that morning on reaching home was to take a bath as hot as he could bear. Then he drank several cups of coffee with brandy in it, and as the office would soon be open, wrote a telegram to Mary, which ran thus:

"If you hear that I have been drowned, don't believe it. Have arrived safe home after a night at sea."

This done, for he guessed that all sorts of rumours would be abroad, he inquired after Mr. Fregelius and Stella. Having learned that they were both going on well and sent off his telegram, Morris went to bed and slept for ten hours.

Morris looked round the comfortable sitting-room with its recessed Tudor windows, its tall bookcases and open hearth, where burned a bright fire of old s.h.i.+p's timbers supported on steel dogs, and thought to himself that he was fortunate to be there. Then the door opened, he heard the housemaid's voice say, "This way please, Miss," and Stella came in. She wore a plain white dress that seemed to fit her very well, though where she got it from he never discovered, and her luxuriant hair was twisted up into a simple knot. On the bosom of her dress was fixed a spray of brilliant ampelopsis leaves; it was her only ornament, but none could have been more striking. For the rest, although she limped and still looked dark and weary about the eyes, to all appearances she was not much the worse for their terrible adventure.

Morris glanced at her. Could this dignified and lovely young lady be that red-cloaked, loose-haired Valkyrie whom he had seen singing at daybreak upon the prow of the sinking s.h.i.+p, or the piteous bedraggled person whom he had supported from the altar in the Dead Church?

She guessed his thought--from the beginning Stella had this curious power of discovering his mind--and said with a smile:

"Fine feathers make fine birds, and even Cleopatra would have looked dreadful after a November night in an open boat."

"Have you recovered?" he asked.

"Yes, Mr. Monk; that is, I don't think I am going to have inflammation of the lungs or anything horrid of the sort. The remedies and that walk stopped it. But my feet are peeling from being soaked so long in salt water, and my hands are not much better. See," and she held them towards him.

Then dinner was announced, and for the second time that day they walked arm-in-arm.

"It seems a little strange, doesn't it?" suggested Morris as he surveyed the great refectory in which they two, seated at the central table, looked so lone and small.

"Yes," she answered; "but so it should, anything quite usual would have been out of place to-day."

Then he asked her how her father was going on, and heard what he had already learned from the doctor, that he was doing as well as could be expected.

"By the way, Mr. Monk," she added; "if you can spare a few minutes after dinner, and are not too tired, he would so much like to see you."

"Of course," answered Morris a little nervously, for he scented a display of fervent grat.i.tude.

After this they dropped into desultory conversation, curiously different from the intimate talk which pa.s.sed between them in the boat. Then they had been in danger, and at times in the very shadow of Death; a condition that favours confidences since those who stand beneath his wings no longer care to hide their hearts. The reserves which so largely direct our lives are lifted, their necessity is past, and in the face of the last act of Nature, Nature a.s.serts herself. Who cares to continue to play a part when the audience has dispersed, the curtain is falling, and the pay-box has put up its shutters? Now, very unexpectedly these two were on the stage again, and each a.s.sumed the allotted role.

Stella admired the room; whereon Morris set to work to explain its characteristics, to find, to his astonishment, that Miss Fregelius had more knowledge of architecture than he could boast. He pointed out certain details, alleging them to be Elizabethan work, to which age they had been credited for generations, whereon she suggested and, indeed, proved, that some of them dated from the earlier years of Henry VIII., and that some were late Jacobean. While Morris was wondering how he could combat this revolutionary opinion, the servant brought in a telegram. It was from Mary, at Beaulieu, and ran:

"Had not heard that you were drowned, but am deeply thankful that you are saved. Why did you pa.s.s a night at sea in this weather? Is it a riddle? Grieved to say my father not so well. Best love, and please keep on sh.o.r.e. MARY."

At first Morris was angry with this rather flippant message; then he laughed. As he had already discovered, in fact, his anxieties had been quite groundless. The page-boy, Thomas, it appeared, when questioned, had given the inquirers to understand that his master had gone out to fish, taking his breakfast with him. Later, on his non-appearance, he amended this statement, suggesting out of the depths of a fertile imagination, that he had sailed down to Northwold, where he meant to pa.s.s the night. Therefore, although the cook, a far-seeing woman who knew her Thomas and hated him, had experienced pangs of doubt, n.o.body else troubled the least, and even the small community of Monksland remained profoundly undisturbed as to the fate of one of its princ.i.p.al inhabitants.

So little is an unsympathetic world concerned in our greatest and most particular adventures! A birth, a marriage, an inquest, a scandal--these move it superficially, for the rest it has no enthusiasm to spare. This cold neglect of events which had seemed to him so important reacted upon Morris, who, now that he had got over his chill and fatigue, saw them in their proper proportions. A little adventure in an open boat at sea which had ended without any mishap, was not remarkable, and might even be made to appear ridiculous. So the less said about it, especially to Mary, whose wit he feared, the better.

When dinner was finished Stella left the room, pa.s.sing down its shadowed recesses with a peculiar grace of which even her limp could not rob her.

Ten minutes later, while Morris sat sipping a gla.s.s of claret, the nurse came down to tell him that Mr. Fregelius would like to see him if he were disengaged. Reflecting that he might as well get the interview over, Morris followed her at once to the Abbot's chamber, where the sick man lay.

Except for a single lamp near the bed, the place was unlighted, but by the fire, its glow falling on her white-draped form and pale, uncommon face, sat Stella. As he entered she rose, and, coming forward, accompanied him to the bedside, saying, in an earnest voice:

"Father, here is our host, Mr. Monk, the gentleman who saved my life at the risk of his own."

The patient raised his bandaged head and stretched out a long thin hand; he could stir nothing else, for his right thigh was in splints beneath a coffer-like erection designed to keep the pressure of the blankets from his injured limb.

"Sir, I thank you," he said in a dry, staccato voice; "all the humanity that is lacking from the hearts of those rude wretches, the crew of the Trondhjem, must have found its home in you."

Morris looked at the dark, quiet eyes that seemed to express much which the thin and impa.s.sive face refused to reveal; at the grey pointed beard and the yellowish skin of the outstretched arm. Here before him, he felt, lay a man whose personality it was not easy to define, one who might be foolish, or might be able, but of whose character the leading note was reticence, inherent or acquired. Then he took the hand, and said simply:

"Pray, say no more about it. I acted on an impulse and some wandering words of yours, with results for which I could not hope. There is nothing to thank me for."

"Then, sir, I thank G.o.d, who inspired you with that impulse, and may every blessing reward your bravery."

Stella looked up as though to speak, but changed her mind and returned to her seat by the fire.

"What is there to reward?" said Morris impatiently; "that your daughter is still alive is my reward. How are you to-night, Mr. Fregelius?"