The Daughters of Danaus Part 25

"And everybody respected of her, and the parson he thought a deal o'

her, he did, and used to hold her up as a sample to the other young women, and n.o.body dreamt as she'd go and bring this here scandal on the place; n.o.body knows who the man was, but it _is_ said as there's someone _not_ twenty miles from here as knows more about it nor he didn't ought to," Dodge added with sinister meaning. This dark hint conveyed absolutely no enlightenment to the mind of Mrs. Temperley, from sheer lack of familiarity, on her part, with the rumours of the district.

Dodge applied himself with a spurt to his work.

"When she had her baby, she was like one out of her mind," he continued; "she couldn't stand the disgrace and the neighbours talkin', and that.

Mrs. Walker she went and saw her, and brought her nouris.h.i.+n' things, and kep' on a-telling her how she must try and make up for what she had done, and repent and all that; but she never got up her heart again like, and the poor soul took fever from grievin', the doctor says, and raved on dreadful, accusin' of somebody, and sayin' he'd sent her to h.e.l.l; and then Wensday morning, ten o'clock, she died. Didn't you hear the pa.s.sing bell a-tolling, mum?"

"Yes, the wind brought it down the valley; but I did not know whom it was tolling for."

"That's who it was," said Dodge.

"This is an awfully sad story," cried Mrs. Temperley.

Dodge ran his fingers through his hair judicially. "I don't hold with them sort o' goings on for young women," he observed.

"Do you hold with them for young men?"

Dodge puckered up his face into an odd expression of mingled reflection and worldly wisdom. "You can't prevent young fellers bein' young fellers," he at length observed.

"It seems almost a pity that being young fellows should also mean being blackguards," observed Mrs. Temperley calmly.

"Well, there's somethin' to be said for that way o' lookin' at it,"

Dodge was startled into agreeing.

"I suppose _she_ gets all the blame of the thing," the lady went on, with quiet exasperation. Dodge seemed thrown off his bearings.

"Everybody in Craddock was a-talking about it, as was only to be expected," said the gravedigger. "Well, well, we're all sinners. Don't do to be too hard on folks. 'Pears sad like after keepin' 'spectable for all them years too--sort o' waste."

Mrs. Temperley gave a little laugh, which seemed to Dodge rather eccentric.

"Who is looking after the baby?" she asked.

"One of the neighbours, name o' Gullick, as her husband works for Lord Engleton, which she takes in was.h.i.+ng," Dodge comprehensively explained.

"Had its mother no relatives?"

"Well, she had an aunt down at Southampton, I've heard tell, but she didn't take much notice of her, not _she_ didn't. Her mother only died last year, took off sudden before her daughter could get to her."

"Your schoolmistress has known trouble," observed Mrs. Temperley. "Had she no one, no sister, no friend, during all this time that she could turn to for help or counsel?"

"Not as I knows of," Dodge replied.

There was a long pause, during which the stillness seemed to weigh upon the air, as if the pressure of Fate were hanging there with ruthless immobility.

"She ain't got no more to suffer now," Dodge remarked, nodding with an aspect of half apology towards the grave. "They sleeps soft as sleeps here."

"Good heavens, I hope so!" Mrs. Temperley exclaimed.

The grave had made considerable progress before she descended from the stile and prepared to take her homeward way. On leaving, she made Dodge come with her to the gate, and point out the red-roofed cottage covered with monthly roses and flaming creeper, where the schoolmistress had pa.s.sed so many years, and where she now lay with her work and her days all over, in the tiny upper room, at whose latticed window the sun used to wake her on summer mornings, or the winter rain pattered dreary prophecies of the tears that she would one day shed.

CHAPTER XVII.

"If you please, ma'am, the cook says as the meat hasn't come for lunch, and what is she to do?"

"Without," replied Mrs. Temperley automatically.

The maid waited for more discreet directions. She had given a month's notice that very morning, because she found Craddock Dene too dull.

"Thank goodness, that barbarian is going!" Hubert had exclaimed.

"We shall but exchange a Goth for a Vandal," his wife replied.

Mrs. Temperley gazed intently at her maid, the light of intelligence gradually dawning in her countenance. "Is there anything else in the house, Sapph--Sophia?"

"No, ma'am," replied Sophia.

"Oh, tell the cook to make it into a frica.s.see, and be sure it is well flavoured." The maid hesitated, but seeing from the wandering expression of her employer's eye that her intellect was again clouded over, she retired to give the message to the cook--with comments.

The library at the Red House was the only room that had been radically altered since the days of the former tenants, whose taste had leant towards the florid rather than the cla.s.sic. The general effect had been toned down, but it was impossible to disguise the leading motive; or what Mrs. Temperley pa.s.sionately described as its brutal vulgarity. The library alone had been subjected to _peine forte et dure_. Mrs.

Temperley said that it had been purified by suffering. By dint of tearing down and dragging out offending objects ("such a pity!" cried the neighbours) its prosperous and complacent absurdity had been humbled. Mrs. Temperley retired to this refuge after her encounter with Sophia. That perennially aggrieved young person entered almost immediately afterwards and announced a visitor, with an air that implied--"She'll stay to lunch; see if she don't, and what'll you do then? Yah!"

The p.r.o.nunciation of the visitor's name was such, that, for the moment, Mrs. Temperley did not recognize it as that of Miss Valeria Du Prel.

She jumped up joyfully. "Ah, Valeria, this _is_ delightful!"

The visit was explained after a characteristic fas.h.i.+on. Miss Du Prel realized that over two years had pa.s.sed since she had seen Hadria, and moreover she had been seized with an overwhelming longing for a sight of country fields and a whiff of country air, so she had put a few things together in a handbag, which she had left at Craddock station by accident, and come down. Was there anyone who could go and fetch her handbag? It was such a nuisance; she laid it down for a moment to get at her ticket--she never could find her pocket, dressmakers always hid them in such an absurd way; could Hadria recommend any dressmaker who did not hide pockets? Wasn't it tiresome? She had no time-table, and so she had gone to the station that morning and waited till a Craddock train started, and by this arrangement it had come to pa.s.s that she had spent an hour and a half on the platform: she did not think she ever had such an unpleasant time; why didn't they have trains oftener? They did to Putney.

Mrs. Temperley sat down and laughed. Whereupon the other's face lightened and she joined in the laugh at her own expense, settling into the easy chair that her hostess had prepared for her, with a gesture of helplessness and comfort.

"Well, in spite of that time at the station, I'm glad I came. It seems so long since I have seen you, dear Hadria, and the last time you know you were very unhappy, almost mad----"

"Yes, yes; never mind about that," interposed Mrs. Temperley hastily, setting her teeth together.

"You take things too hard, too hard," said Miss Du Prel. "I used to think _I_ was bad in that way, but I am phlegmatic compared with you.

One would suppose that----"

"Valeria, don't, don't, don't," cried Mrs. Temperley. "I can't stand it." Her teeth were still set tight and hard, her hands were clenched.

"Very well, very well. Tell me what you have been making of this ridiculous old world, where everything goes wrong and everybody is stupid or wicked, or both."

Mrs. Temperley's face relaxed a little, though the signs of some strong emotion were still visible.

"Well, to answer the general by the particular, I have spent the morning, accompanied by a nice young brood of Cochin-China fowls, in Craddock churchyard."

"Oh, I hate a churchyard," exclaimed Miss Du Prel, with a shudder. "It makes one think of the hideous mockery of life, and the more one would like to die, the worse seems the brutality of death and his hideous accompaniments. It is such a savage denial of all human aspirations and affections and hopes. Ah, it is horrible!" The sharply-outlined face grew haggard and white, as its owner crouched over the fire.