CHAPTER XXV

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"WILL YE NO COME BACK AGAIN?"

That winter was like to be nearly as melancholy as the previous winter, when Pierce was dying slowly. The months passed, and no word came of Esther's lover, and as she had taken our ill news that first day so she took it always, with her face to the wall and in silence.

Her secret lay between her godmother and me. It seemed scarcely worth while to reveal it now, even to Aline. If Harry De Lacy did not return, we said, she would have to live it down, as many another girl before her has had to live down such a trouble. We could do no more to help her--her godmother and I--though either of us would have sacrificed anything in the world for her happiness. We could only wait with our love till she should be able to turn round and find comfort in it. Now, except for the constant silent testimonies of love, it was better to leave her alone, and we left her alone.

She came out of her feverish cold slowly and languidly, and looking very thin and pinched. Her godmother was anxious about her, and would have carried her off to a warmer climate, but Esther preferred to stay where she was, and by this we knew that all hope was not dead in her heart.

When she got about again at last, in the frosty days before Christmas, it was not to either of us that she first turned for companionship and comfort. Quite unknown to us, she had been friends for some time with Margaret Flaherty, the comfortable wife of a small farmer, who had fostered Harry De Lacy in his delicate babyhood. Now everyone knows that the ties of fosterage are hardly less dear and close than those of maternity itself, and when Harry De Lacy came back to his wretched home at Angry, there had been no heart in all the place to welcome him except the faithful heart of his foster-mother.

We were glad when we discovered that Esther had this comfort. Her unhappiness had weighed heavily on her godmother. During that winter our dear old lady's age seemed suddenly to have found her out. Her bright, brisk, merry ways deserted her, and she began to be racked with rheumatism, the result, I suppose, of our damp climate. Yet she would not go away so long as Esther desired to stay; and when we spoke of it, Esther always cried out for a reprieve, as though news were on its way, which would surely arrive the minute she was absent.

All the time she was so tender, so loving, so full of compunction over her dear godmother, that we could not be angry with her, or think her selfish. I felt that she was held to the place by bonds which she was powerless to break. Yet she had promised to go in March,--they had a project of spending Easter in Rome,--and with that we had to be content.

The trouble weighed so much on my spirits that I had scarcely the heart to be glad when _Love in the Valley_ in its coat of delicate blue and silver, reached me a little before Christmas. Nor even when the first reviews were distinctly favourable. I began to grow pessimistic, I who had always been cheerful. Was there nothing but trouble in the sweet world? I asked myself as I looked about me. There was Esther breaking her heart, and we who loved her breaking ours with her in sympathy; there was Aline, looking for ever like a dove whose mate has flown; there was the dear old General, bearing like a saint and a soldier his own terrible trouble. Only the young ones were glad, and they were like lambs playing in the fields, whom every hour brought nearer to the butcher's knife.

"It is time," I said to myself one day, "for something happy to happen; for very long there have been nothing but unhappy things."

I spent my time now pretty well between Annagower and Rose Hill. The General at last had his house in order, and was sitting down, as he said, to enjoy life under his own fig-tree. But sometimes I thought it was a melancholy kind of enjoyment. He had been used to so active a life, and he was not of those who grow old easily. It would have suited him better to have dropped between the shafts.

I used to find it lonely and melancholy when I went in during the short winter afternoons, and found him sitting there with an odd, unhappy air of doing nothing. He used to brighten wonderfully when he saw me, but I knew that the sadness would come again when I went away. Presently, I felt, things would be better with him, for he had not yet shaken down into the new life.

"You must become a country gentleman," I said, "and a magistrate, and sit on boards, and farm a little. And in the intervals of your busy life you must write a book about your Indian experiences."

Then he would smile, and say I was right, and that presently he would find his work to his hand and do it.

But, brave and resigned as he was, I could see that the uncertainty about his son's fate was weakening the spring of life and energy in him.

We had finished cataloguing the library and getting it into order, and very proud I was of my work. The house was in the most spick-and-span condition, and there was nothing left for us to do. And now I began the feast of reading which I had promised myself.

Well, a day came when I bullied the General at last into getting into his cords and boots, and riding to a meet, which was at no great distance.

"Every country gentleman hunts," I said; "and you are shirking the duties of your state in life by not hunting."

"I was never a shirker, little girl," he replied, laughing; "and I suppose I must obey orders."

"I will wait and dine with you," said I, "if you're very good, and afterwards you can drive me home."

By this time General MacNeill was nearly as much our friend as Esther's godmother, and, like her, had brought untold pleasure into our humdrum lives.

He rode off, looking quite cheerful, and I felt that already he was better in the prospect of meeting his fellows, and having a good day after the fox. I was in a pleasanter mood with myself and the whole world, when I settled down to my long quiet day, alone in the library, or alone except for Paudeen, who is the most unobtrusive company, and is never so rowdy but what he can vent his high spirits on tearing the paper in the waste-paper basket into infinitesimal strips.

It was twelve o'clock I found, after the General had departed, for he had only a short distance to ride to the meet.

The hours passed with luxurious slowness. At half-past one a maid brought my lunch and set it on a table drawn close to the fire. After lunch I read again till it was nearly tea-time; I expected the General to be in for his tea, a repast which he fondly loved.

About four, Mary O'Connor herself brought in the tea-tray, and lit the spirit-lamp under the urn. Having done this, she made up a bright little fire, and fetched the lamp with its large green shade. I had put down my book, and sat lazily watching her from my favourite seat, the top rung of the library steps, on which I perched, dangling my feet.

"You've no idea, Mary," I said, "of how jolly the room looks from here."

"Glory be to goodness, child!" said Mary, for the thousandth time, "I wish you'd come off that ould flight o' steps, and sit in a chair like a Christian. 'Tis breakin' your neck you'll be one o' these days."

After she had gone out of the room I sat there listening to the song of the tea-urn, and feeling drowsily comfortable. Any moment I knew might bring the General, and it didn't seem worth while to get absorbed in a book again.

As I sat there, suddenly the door leading to the garden, which I had left unlocked, began to open. I watched it with some alarm. Tramps were few in our neighbourhood, yet occasionally the mines brought rough customers looking for work, who would not be at all agreeable people to meet. Fortunately I am not the nervous kind, or I should have fallen off my high seat. As it was, I sat still to await developments, while Paudeen made for the door, with hair bristling and little white teeth showing.

When the door was fully opened a man came a step over the threshold, and stood looking about the room. As there was no light beyond the radius of the fire and lamp I could not see him very well. He was dressed in a long rough coat, and was wearing a soft hat which hid his face.

Since he did not seem inclined to come any further, and had plainly no idea of my presence, I sat still, hoping he would go. But suddenly there was a growl and a dart from Paudeen, and the stranger uttered an exclamation, then stooping, he lifted my little dog by the scruff of its neck.

"Oh, please don't hurt him!" I broke out piteously. "I'm so sorry if he's bitten you, but he's my little dog, and he thought it his duty."

"Hello!" said the stranger, advancing a step or two, and still holding Paudeen. "Are you one of the family portraits, or do you live in mid-air?"

As he stood blinking towards me in the darkness, plainly not seeing me, I burst out laughing. It was partly relief, because the minute he spoke I knew he was a gentleman and no tramp, and partly because it was so funny that I should have addressed him out of the ceiling, so to speak.

He put down Paudeen very gently, saying:

"Now, little chap, don't nip me again. Honour bright!" I saw that Paudeen began to wag his tail as if his doubts had been set at rest.

Then the stranger deliberately took off the lamp-shade, and, lifting the lamp, advanced towards me, holding it so that he could see me.

I felt rather absurd all at once, and cried out:

"I'm only sitting on the library steps reading. Please put down the lamp, and I'll come down."

But he lifted the lamp instead, and stared at me attentively. As he took in my abashed features he uttered a long whistle.

Then he put down the lamp and said deliberately:

"The last time I saw you I picked you out of a ditch. And now I find you sitting on the top of a ladder."

I uttered a shriek of delight, and utterly forgetting myself and my shyness I scrambled down the steps anyhow, upsetting several books as I did so, and caught the stranger by the two hands.

"Oh, you are Lance!" I cried, "Lance come back, thank God! The General will die of joy."

"We mustn't let him do that, little girl. That's why I came prospecting by the back-door. I did not know how to approach him. Is he well?"

"He will be quite well now that he has you. I am expecting him every minute. He must not see you till I have told him you are here."

"But who are you, you mysterious child? I only know you as the little girl of Annagassan Races. How do you come to be here, and looking after my father?"

So recalled to myself, I blushed, and let his hands, which unconsciously I had been holding, drop.

"I am Hilda Brandon," I said, "and your father is our dear friend."

"Whew!" said he with an air of comic perplexity. "Then I suppose you are grown-up and a young lady, and I have been taking you for a child and a peasant. Why didn't you undeceive me that day long ago?"

"You never asked me."

"But you knew I didn't like your vanishing into thin air. Still, I admit that I was an unready fellow."

"And where have you been all those years?"

"Since you saw me?"

"Since you left your father."

"The greater part of the time in a tower in the hill-country above the Khyber Pass, a prisoner, and expecting my quietus every day."

"And you escaped?"

"Fortunately for me, my tribe kicked up a rumpus, and a British regiment came along and blew my tower to pieces, and very nearly blew me sky-high with it. Only, I managed to let them know in time. However, all that is a story for a winter's night."

"Ah!" said I, "the General heard something of this months ago, but did not dare to hope that the prisoner was you. Then the war broke out, and we heard no more."

"The fellows who had kicked open my rat-trap stayed to fight, so the matter never got reported at head-quarters. I was sorely tempted to stay with them, but the thought of the dad restrained me. I made my way through the hills and back into the regions of her Imperial Majesty's government. At some stages of that journey I was in as bad case, nearly, as I was in my tower. But why do I tell you all this? I am here anyhow, and now, how will the dad take it?"

"Oh, joy never kills!" said I.

He looked at me with an oddly shy look.

"Perhaps you do not know,--" he began.

"That you parted in anger? Oh, yes, I do! Well, I should think neither of you will ever be angry again while you live."

"Oh, that's a large order!" he said laughing. "Still, I had time for repentance."

"So had the General," said I. "He is never angry now."

"Dear old dad!" he said; "if he isn't, I shall think the fairies have been changing him. He may be as angry as he likes with me for all the rest of his days, but I'll never take him at his word again--never."

"I am glad you are ashamed of yourself," said I.

"That's rubbing it in, and ungenerous, Miss Hilda, especially to a man newly come from the dead, as it were.

"Hush!" I cried, for I had heard a horse's hoofs on the gravel. "Your father is coming. He must not see you suddenly. Here, come behind the screen till I have prepared him."

"Don't take long, Miss Hilda, or I shall burst out upon him as soon as I hear his dear voice."

"Have patience," said I; "I shall not take long."

I had just time to draw the screen across his corner when the General came in, stamping with his feet as he pulled off his riding-gloves.

"Ah, this is pleasant!" he said. "There's a touch of frost to-night. I hope the wind will change, or it will spoil the hunting."

"I'm glad you're keen about it," said I. "Had a good day?"

"Capital. I'll tell you about it when I've changed. I'm too muddy for a lady's tea-table."

"You're not going to change," said I, "not till you've had a cup of tea. You're quite good enough for me," and I pushed him into a chair.

"Very well, very well," he said, "it's not as it ought to be; but when a lady takes command."

I began to make the tea with a hand that trembled. I was wondering what I should say next, and an occasional impatient rustle in the corner flurried me still more.

"Ah!" said the General, "what is that? Oh, is it you, you rascal?" for Paudeen had made a timely appearance from behind the screen.

The general reached over and took the cup of tea from my hand.

"Do you know, little girl," he said, "your prescription has done me good? I felt uncommonly cheerful to-day. I suppose there's some hint of the spring in the air that touches up even old blood like mine."

"General," said I, "do you think that you felt cheerful perhaps because--because--good news was coming?"

He put down his cup and stared at me.

"Do you mean anything, Hilda?" he said. "You know what good news means for me. Have you heard anything?"

"Yes, I have heard something."

"Tell me, then," he said, rising and advancing a step. "I'm not a child or a woman. You have news of Lance?"

"Why, yes," I cried, between laughing and weeping. "Thank God! news has come--news of the best. It has brought--Lance."

Then a tall figure from behind the screen hurled itself at the General like a stone from a catapult. I gave just a glance at the two men shaking hands with the most tremendous energy, and heard the General's broken "Thank God!" Then I went out and left them together.

Now, as I am nothing if not severely practical, I went straight to Mary O'Connor, and told her of the wonderful occurrences of the last half-hour. That good woman quite fulfilled my expectations of her. With a flurry, which was no flurry, she issued her commands.

"Run up, you, Jane, to the best bed-room and light a fire, and put out the best linen sheets to air."

And then in an aside to me:

"I don't suppose the cratur's slept in a dacent bed this many a year."

I didn't mind saying anything about the long homeward journey, which must have inured the wanderer once more to sleeping in sheets, for Mary went on:

"The table for three to-night, Anne; an' the best table-linen; the satin damask with the little cockle-shells upon it; an' all the silver you can get into use. An' you, Miss Hilda, run out like a good child an' coax Crosspatch to cut some o' them ould flowers of his. 'Tis a great day for Rose Hill entirely."

I knew the culinary matters might safely be left in Mary's hands, so I went off obediently to the gardener, whose proper name, Crosbie, had easily become Crosspatch in Mary's mouth.

He was as disagreeable as most gardeners about cutting his flowers, though I could usually get what I wanted from him. However, he rose to the occasion on this day of days, and when he heard of the General's great joy, was as anxious as anyone to do his share in celebrating it.

[Illustration; "HE WAS AS DISAGREEABLE AS MOST GARDENERS ABOUT CUTTING HIS FLOWERS."]

"An' to think, glory be to God (there's me best Camille de Rohan for you), that the Lord's looked down on the master at last (come down here, you conthrary divil; some o' them roses is as unwillin' to be picked as some people is to die), an' sent him home the young master to be the prop an' stay av his ould age (there goes the finest Malmaison in the County Kerry!). Sure, 'tis wonderful! wonderful! Well, the Lord is good to his own. (You've destroyed me prospects at the show entirely.) Click, click; I'd as soon you'd be cuttin' off meself as them tubey roses. Here, take them! Don't have me lookin' at them. 'Tis a holy show you've made o' the greenhouse!"

"Never mind, Crosbie," said I, "you don't grudge them to-day," as I took the heaped-up basket.

"I try not to, I try not to," he said gloomily. "But there's that man at the Towers. He'll be havin' a fine crow over me at Aisther. Yerra! why didn't the masther's son put off comin' till the show was over for another year?"

I left the old man amid his half-comical regrets, and went to the dining-room, which I found resplendent with silver and fine linen. I had made up my mind to slip off as soon as I had arranged the flowers, so as to let the General and his restored son have their first meal together alone.

But just as I was setting the last satiny rose amid its bronze leaves in the last specimen-glass, the General came in search of me.

"Ah, decorating, Hilda!" he said. "My boy is gone upstairs to have a wash. How glad I am that you were here to welcome him, and to give me the good news!"

"And very stupidly I did it. I was expecting him to burst cover every minute of my bungling."

"Oh, no, my dear! it was most kind and considerate. My boy tells me he remembers you quite well, and recognized you at once."

"I haven't changed much," I said carelessly. "But now, General, that I have finished, I am going to make myself scarce. Hawkins will drive me to Brandon."

"You'll do nothing of the sort," said the General, a choleric spark coming into his eye. "You're not going to drop me now Lance has come, I can tell you."

"I don't mean to drop you the least bit in the world. But you will have so much to say to each other this very first evening."

"Nothing that we don't want you to share. Why, little girl"--and a wonderful smile broke over his face--"we have years before us in which to talk, please God, for Lance has promised never to leave me again."

So I consented to stay, feeling rather dissatisfied with my plain frock of navy-blue serge on this day of rejoicing. Still, with a cluster of Crosspatch's Camille de Rohans fastened at the belt, I brightened it up a little for dinner, and hoped I did not look very dingy when I arrived in the dining-room.

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