The War Workers Part 48

"But," Char said to Miss Bruce, "we shall have to discuss business sooner or later. For all I know, we may have to leave Plessing. It was to be my mother's for her life, I believe, but she may choose to let Uncle Charles come into it at once. He has a large family of children, after all. His being in Salonika now makes it all so much more complicated."

"I dare say there will be no change just at present. Everything will be so unsettled until this dreadful war is over," Miss Bruce soothed her vaguely.

But she, too, thought that it would be necessary for Lady Vivian soon to give her daughter some outline of her future plans.

On New Year's Day, rising from the helping of apple-pudding which she had left unfinished as a protest, Miss Bruce after lunch said firmly to Lady Vivian: "You will want to talk to Charmian this afternoon, I feel sure. There is a fire in the library, so perhaps--"

She looked meaningly at Miss Jones, who, instead of making at least a pretence of at once following her out of the room, gazed imperturbably at Lady Vivian.

"Char," inquired Joanna mildly, "do you want to talk to me?"

"We'd better come to an understanding, hadn't we, mother? You see, I haven't the vaguest idea of your plans."

"But why should you have any, my dear? They won't interfere with your work at Questerham. If you want to know about Plessing, I can tell you in two words. Your Uncle Charles doesn't want any change made until after the war, so that I can either let it or go on living in it, as I please."

Decorum took Miss Bruce as far as the door of the dining-room, but was not strong enough to put her outside it while Grace Jones still remained, with no apparent consciousness of indiscretion, sitting unmoved in her place, and in full hearing of this discussion, which every tradition would restrict to a family one.

Even Char said: "Hadn't we better come to the library?"

Joanna rose.

"I'm going there now, for the very good reason that Lesbia Willoughby is to be shown in there in half an hour's time. I shall have to see her some time, and I may as well get it over."

"Mother, must you? Why not say that you're not seeing any one?"

"My dear," said Joanna dryly, "I've already answered two telegrams and three letters and several telephone messages in which she offered to come to me, and I think that nothing but word of mouth will have any effect upon her. But I'll talk to you this evening, if there's anything you want to know. John is dining here to tell us the result of his Medical Board."

Joanna left the room, with her decisive, unhurried step, and Char, ignoring Grace, said to Miss Bruce: "I have a lot of letters, sent on from the office. Perhaps you'd be kind enough to give me a little help this afternoon?"

"Certainly, Charmian."

Miss Bruce was gratified; but when Char had walked away without so much as glancing at Grace, she could not help saying to her, with a sort of fl.u.s.tered kindness: "I hope you'll find some way of amusing yourself, Miss Jones."

She had loyally adopted Char's prejudice, but was too kind-hearted not to try furtively to make up for it.

Miss Jones, however, was not destined to spend a solitary afternoon.

Mrs. Willoughby was driven to Plessing by Captain Trevellyan in his car; and although Miss Bruce, casting sidelong glances from the window of Char's boudoir, where she was busily taking notes from her dictation, distinctly saw him enter the house, she felt certain that he proceeded no further than the hall, where Grace sat reading by the fire.

Mrs. Willoughby went at once to the library, where she enfolded the resigned Joanna in a prolonged embrace.

"My poor, poor dear! Words can _never_ tell you how I've felt for you--how much I've longed to be with you!"

But despite the inadequacy of words, Mrs. Willoughby had a shrill torrent of them at her command, with which she deluged Lady Vivian for some time.

"Poor Lesbia!" Lady Vivian remarked afterwards to Grace; "she enjoyed herself so much that I really couldn't grudge it to her!"

"He was so much, much older than you, dear, that it must almost feel like losing a father, and I know that that unfortunate girl of yours isn't very much comfort. She must be racked with remorse. Now, do tell me, Joanna, would you like me to take her off your hands for six months?

Let her come back to London with me next week, and get her married off before it's too late."

"Too late?"

"Well, Joanna, she must be thirty, and, mark my words, whatever people may say about there being no men left, _things are happening every day_.

Half the mothers in London are getting their girls off now, what with officers back on leave and officers in hospitals, and those dear Colonials. Girls who never had a look in before the war can do anything they like in the way of nursing, or leading the blind about, or working in some of those departments where the over-age men are. Char is just the sort of creature to prefer a man old enough to be her grandfa--"

Mrs. Willoughby's jaw dropped, and she made a repentant s.n.a.t.c.h at Joanna's hand.

"Forgive me, darling! _How_ idiotic to say such a thing to you, of all people! But if you'll give me your girl, I'll undertake to find chances for her. She'll be very good-looking when she doesn't look so sulky and take such airs, and one could make capital of all the patriotic work she's been doing down here. And I _always_ think it's rather an a.s.set than otherwise to be in mourning, especially in these days. Black suits her, too, with that sandy colouring. Does she choose her own clothes, Joanna?"

"She does, Lesbia, and has chosen them ever since she was out of long clothes, as far as I remember. But--"

"Joanna, you've been culpably weak, and of course that poor, dear old man had simply no idea of discipline. But I can put the whole thing right for you in six weeks, when the dear girl comes to me."

"It's no use, Lesbia," said Joanna, half laughing. "It's very kind of you, but Char wouldn't hear of it and really at thirty I can't coerce her--besides, there's her work here."

"My dear, you don't mean to say that you're going to allow that to go on?"

"To begin with, I couldn't prevent it. To go on with, I think it perfectly right that Char should do what she can in the way of war-work.

There wouldn't be the slightest object in her giving it up now."

"But Sir Piers--the memory of his wishes--_his_ memory!" almost shrieked Mrs. Willoughby.

"His memory will survive it, Lesbia. Besides, as long as he was himself, you know, he didn't mind her doing war-work. He quite understood the necessity, and was proud of her."

"But, my dear, wrong-headed creature, when she so deliberately and heartlessly went against his wishes at the last?"

"Well," said Joanna placidly, "she won't be doing that now, so she can go on working with a clear conscience."

"Joanna," said Mrs. Willoughby, with an air of discovery, "upon my word, I don't understand you."

Nevertheless, she devoted the major half of the afternoon to the object of her perplexity.

"One word, dearest, I must say," she declared at the end of an hour that, to Joanna's thinking, held already more than a sufficiency of words. "Have you considered what is happening to that delightful lad?"

"Never," said Joanna unhesitatingly. "And who on earth are you talking about, Lesbia?"

"That precious creature, Johnnie. Too guileless for words, my dear; but if there's one thing I do understand, inside out and upside down, it's men. I should have made a _perfect_ mother--young things adore me. Look at my sweet Puffles! But I'm _miserable_ about John, who really has a perfect pa.s.sion for me, dear lad. Lewis always says that all the boys of his regiment go through it, just like measles."

Joanna, who had heard this quotation before, ruthlessly disregarded it.

"What is happening to John?"

"My dear, do you mean to tell me you haven't seen it? But of course you haven't, at such a time. What a brute I am! Forgive me, Joanna, but you seem so _utterly_ unlike a widow. I can hardly realize it. But, of course, that little secretary creature--she's had her eye on him all along."

"I suppose, Lesbia, that you don't mean my poor old Bruce, who's been with me almost ever since John was born?"

Lesbia uttered a screech between laughter and reproach.

"What an absurdity! Of course I mean the little Canteen girl--Jones, or whatever her name is. My dear, will you believe me when I tell you that when that poor innocent boy drove us up here just now and followed me into the hall, there she was, actually waiting to pounce upon him, sitting over the fire?"