CHAPTER VI

LETTERS

"AH, this is delightful!" were her first words. "Miss Urquhart, you will be my friend, and introduce me? I have really only come up on a little matter of business, Miss Pembroke. It is so kind of you to let me have your dairy produce. I am wanting to start a small poultry yard. Quite a few hens, you know, as I'm rather an ignoramus; but Major Urquhart has been advising me strongly to go in for eggs and chickens. I think he is wise, don't you? And I wondered if you could sell me a few good pullets. I want them to begin laying in the winter. Can you manage that for me? Ah, Miss Urquhart, I see you are laughing at me; but you know what I mean! I don't want to keep fowls all the winter and never get an egg. And I have heard of Miss Pembroke's fame. Everything she puts her hand to prospers, I was told. What a charming old house you have!"

She turned to Monica. Poultry and poultry-keeping was the subject of conversation, but it was one to which Monica always rose with alacrity; and again Sidney marvelled at Mrs. Norman's talent for interesting people at once.

When business was satisfactorily settled, Mrs. Norman turned to Sidney.

"I've left that dear boy, Austin, planting roses round my porch. Doesn't that sound ideal! I told him I would be back to tea, so must not stay. If you have time, Miss Pembroke, do come down and see me. I know you're a busy woman, but I shall be so grateful for any more hints about my poultry."

"I'm afraid I'm a bad hand at visiting," said Monica bluntly.

"Oh, I don't mean a state call," said Mrs. Norman, laughing. "You know I'm renowned for my unconventionality. I would not have dared to come to you this afternoon, unless I had known you were too sensible to mind; and, after all, it was business."

She got up to go; then laid her hand affectionately on Sidney's arm.

"Has Miss Urquhart told you how kind she has been to me, and how hospitable? Why, I feel now as if I am welcome at any meal, and can run in and out with all my troubles. A lone woman is at such a disadvantage when she comes to a fresh place."

Then Sidney spoke:

"I can't help wondering why your daughter did not come with you. She would have been a great help, would she not?"

"Poor Gavine! I would not spoil her good time by the drudgery of a move. When I am really established, and everything is pretty and comfortable, then I shall introduce my little daughter to you. And you will love her, as everyone does who sees her."

She shook hands and left.

Sidney gazed at Monica with a sparkle in her eyes.

"Well? Your verdict?"

"It's too soon to give it. I shouldn't say there was any harm in her."

"No, of course there is none. But she doesn't like me. I know she doesn't!"

"She realises you haven't taken to her."

"I did at first, but she simply overlooks me if there are men in the room, and I honestly hate that style of woman. But, oh, I have to be so careful, Monnie, in guarding my tongue from criticism when Uncle Ted is near. And now Austin is getting nearly as bad. What will his mother say, I wonder, when she comes back? I shall be curious to see how she and Mrs. Norman take to each other. Now I must be off home. I feel I have relieved my mind by my outpouring. I am so thankful we haven't sweet purring things to say to each other when we meet, Monnie."

Monica laughed.

"Ah, well, I should be the better for some of her sweetness, I know. And, after all, Sidney, she is wise to make friends. And it is hard to start in a fresh place alone."

Sidney walked home through the dusky mist feeling strangely depressed. But when she got in, her father claimed her attention, and she was her bright happy self again.

"There is one heart she can never touch, and that is dad's," she told herself. "His heart is divided between my mother and myself."

And then the next day her thoughts were turned from Mrs. Norman to Randolph Neville, for she got a letter from him.

"DEAR MISS URQUHART,

"I have written letters to you by the score, and torn them all up. One does foolish things on board ship to while away the time, but now I am going to write sense, if I can. I wonder if you have given me a thought since I left you? Thanning Dale seems a far-away country to me now, and yet if I shut my eyes I can see it all before me—your garden sloping down to the river, the Admiral reading in his chair under the old trees on the lawn, and you flitting about in your white gown with flecks of sunshine on your hair and a vast wealth of it in your eyes. Please forgive my personal remarks. That is why I have torn up so many of my effusions. I feared that you might consider them impertinent.

"Well, I got my billet, and I am on the way out, and on the same boat is a brown-faced wiry little doctor who is bound for the same spot. He is returning there after a furlough. I asked him if he was kept busy; but he tells me he has a tremendous round, and only stays there for three months in the year. 'A loathsome hole,' he terms it. There is not a single European woman in the station, and the few men are a motley crew with a great propensity for hard drinking. He looked me up and down this morning, and remarked as he walked away: 'The body and soul of a man goes to pieces there in a twelvemonth, and it's a race between them. I give you an extra six months, for you're extra fit.' This is a cheerful outlook.

"Do you think I'll fulfil his prediction? I am selfishly telling you this, for I don't want you to snap our chain of friendship. It is a slight one, I own, but if it is only a silken thread and you hold fast, I'll have grit and hope to pull along and fight my environment. It won't be severed at my end, I promise you. Tell me of your doings. Do you still instruct Chuckles on Sunday afternoons in the art of building? I should like to be instructed too. Give me a tip on the subject, if you will. We are all building something, are we not? And my buildings, as I told Chuckles before I left, have collapsed so disastrously that I am the more wary in the beginning of another.

"Well, what else can I tell you? The gossip of board ship will not interest you. Our outlook is sea and sky at present. The feeling of infinite space on all sides is a depressing one to me—I don't know why. Write to me soon. You promised to answer me; and I look and wait anxiously for the letter that is not yet begun.

"Yours most sincerely,

"RANDOLPH NEVILLE."

Sidney read this in the privacy of her bedroom. She sat for a long while with it on her knee, for the personality of the writer possessed her; and then she wrote a reply:

"DEAR MR. NEVILLE,

"Thank you for your letter. I have not forgotten you, and have often wondered how you are getting on. I shall not let my end of the chain slip, I assure you, for friends like yourself are few and far between. You seemed, when amongst us, to find a niche for yourself, and fit into it so comfortably that now the emptiness of that niche is ever before us. My father says no one here understands the political world as you do, and he misses your company.

"Well, I do congratulate you on your plot of building land; and the tougher the job, and the harder the ground, and the rougher the atmosphere, the more complete and astonishing and praiseworthy will be your success—for you will succeed, I do not doubt that. You have the elements of a superior force and conquering power within you, and a clean upright honest life will do much in degrading surroundings. Don't despise unseen strength from our unseen God. He is the Master Builder; we only work under Him. And in the dark places of the earth, where heathen teaching and devil worship preponderate, you cannot afford to fight single-handed against the principalities and powers of darkness. This is presumption on my part to offer you such advice, but I cannot help doing it.

"I have not been out in my boat since that disastrous day. It lives in my memory as an experience of contrasts. The utter misery with which I drifted on to the sandbank, the long waiting—learning lessons that I ought to have learnt before—and the steady downpour of rain, and then the sound of splashing oars and your cheerful shout. I could have hugged you from sheer gratitude, only naturally—I didn't! What a different world it was when I walked home by your side, feeling the blessing of a man's protection!

"Now my boat has been tucked away in the boathouse for the winter. The sea mists have begun, the leaves are dropping off the trees, and the gulls fly across our lawn, loving its shelter. The wind and waves keep up a duet of bluster and roar. Father piles up the logs on his study fire and says to me: 'Now for a feast of our favourite authors. Bring your work, and we will share them together.' It never strikes a man that a woman does not want to be ceaselessly sewing. He considers that a woman's needlework is the equivalent of his pipe. And perhaps it is, for it always soothes me when I have my knitting in hand; but there are times when I enjoy absolute idleness. My pen is running on. I must close.

"This will find you at the end of your journey. Do give me some details of your life. I want to see a wild frontier setting, and you the central figure in it. I shall often try to picture you building for the Empire in your lonely station, making a clean sweep of all the evil you can lay your hands upon, and lifting up and encouraging those who have tumbled and who want to rise again.

"I still teach Chuckles. Last Sunday he wished me to tell him whether it mattered whether a dog was good or wicked. 'Because,' he insisted, 'nothing will ever make it go to Heaven, John Endcott says, so why should it be good? I should be as wicked as I could be if I knew I couldn't go to Heaven.' We had a long talk about the instinct of animals, but I felt helpless in discussing their future state, as I always have a sneaking feeling that I may meet my dead favourites again. What do you think? Now, this is really good-bye.

"Your very sincere friend,

"SIDNEY URQUHART."

When her letter had gone, Sidney began to wish it back; there was so much she wished to alter in it; and then she laughed at the importance it was assuming in her eyes.

"What does it matter? Why should I think so much about it? I wish he were here. I loved talking to him. And yet I am glad he is away, for he would follow the others down to Mrs. Norman's cottage and give her the benefit of all his ideas. What a jealous creature I am getting! Mrs. Norman seems to creep into all my thoughts."

But Mrs. Norman did figure in Sidney's life a good deal, and she could not get away from her. The day after Mrs. de Cressiers' return from town, Austin appeared. It was after dinner, and Sidney and her father had retired to the study to have a cosy time together. The Major had strolled down to Mrs. Norman's with a magazine he had promised her. Austin came in rather breathlessly.

"I want to speak to you," he said, addressing Sidney.

"Am I in the way?" asked the Admiral.

Austin looked a little embarrassed; so, without a word, Sidney took him into the drawing-room.

"Have you been getting into any scrape?" she asked him.

"No; it's only—Dash it all! I won't beat about the bush. I want you to persuade the mother to call upon Mrs. Norman soon—to-morrow. She's so on her high horse with me. It's ridiculous! You can influence her; she is fond of you. It's a shame! The poor little woman is connected with us. Why should she be snubbed because she is poor and unknown? It's rank snobbery. You know what mother is like: 'I may call on her when I have time. There is no hurry. She is a complete stranger to me,' etc. etc. Do go up to-morrow and make her see reason."

Sidney smiled at his eagerness.

"My dear boy, your mother won't be driven. Does it make a vast difference to Mrs. Norman whether your mother calls at once or a little later? She means to do it, which is something."

"I should rather think she did," said Austin hotly. "She ought to have done it before she went away. Now, be a brick, and tell the mother what a good sort Mrs. Norman is. Women are always so queer when a man praises one of their own sex. But you're different; you're generous, and she'll listen to you and take your word for it."

Sidney was touched by his faith in her.

"I will do my very best," she said, "but don't blame me if I fail."

Austin looked relieved. He sat back in a chair and commenced to talk. He had not been to the house for a long time, and Sidney was glad to have him back on the old lines. But his talk was chiefly of Mrs. Norman, and Sidney listened and tried to give him her sympathy.

"Can't think why your uncle is always poking about down there. He's making her a fence now, but I told her it wasn't necessary; she has a nice iron railing. What else could she want? And he strikes me as getting quite doddery—makes eyes at her. Don't laugh! She finds him rather a bore, between ourselves; but he turns up nearly every day, she tells me."

"Poor Uncle Ted! Why shouldn't he like to talk to her as much as you do?"

Sidney's eyes were mischievous, but for once Austin did not join in her humour.

"I hope I shan't be so garrulous when I get to his age," he muttered.

In accordance with her promise, Sidney went up to Thanning Towers the next morning, but though Mrs. de Cressiers was unfeignedly glad to see her, nothing would induce her to call upon Mrs. Norman that same day.

"It's perfectly ridiculous, Sidney. Of course, I know that Austin has sent you to me. He seems quite infatuated with her. And it is a thousand pities. I have heard all about her in town. She married her husband for the sake of a home, neglected him whilst alive, and now poses as a broken-hearted widow. She couldn't be bothered to bring up her own child; found her an encumbrance when travelling about, and she has been brought up entirely by her father's family. Why she has come down here, I cannot fathom. She has five hundred a year of her own, but has very extravagant tastes. Now, is she a suitable wife for Austin?"

"I should see her and judge for myself," said Sidney craftily. Then she added quietly:

"I think if you oppose Austin in the matter you will perhaps hurry him into an engagement with her, when otherwise the acquaintance may die a natural death."

Mrs. de Cressiers sighed.

"I wish you and Austin would make a match of it. He is really fond of you, Sidney."

Sidney laughed gaily.

"As a sister, nothing more. I am much too old for him. He is a mere boy. I couldn't marry anyone younger than myself."

"Isn't this woman older than you?"

"I don't think it will come to anything. Uncle Ted is as often there as Austin. It's most amusing. But I'm afraid they're beginning to dislike each other heartily."

"Oh, I know her kind."

Mrs. de Cressiers' tone was contemptuous. Then she said with deliberation:

"I shall call on her to-morrow afternoon, and you must come with me."

"Oh, please not! I can't help thinking that she doesn't like me."

"Her likes or her dislikes cannot affect you. I will call for you in the carriage at three o'clock, and I shall stay ten minutes with her, not a moment more; and then you must come back to tea with me."

"You are so masterful," murmured Sidney.

She told Austin later of the result of her visit. He was satisfied.

"I said to her the mother was generally rather done up by her visits to town, so if she goes to-morrow it will be all right. And I'm glad you're going too, for you will prevent mother from being ''igh and 'aughty,' as our old nurse used to say."

Sidney did not relish what was before her, but she made the best of it, and the next afternoon joined Mrs. de Cressiers at the time appointed.

"Oh, dear!" she said with her bright laugh, as she looked at Mrs. de Cressiers in her most imposing attire, "I am glad I am not the poor victim of your visitation."

Mrs. de Cressiers smiled very slightly. Sidney was a favoured person, and perhaps the very fact that she had never been afraid of Mrs. de Cressiers was a point in her favour, for it was the fearful and timid who suffered most from that lady's masterful spirit.

"I am visiting her as a neighbour," she said.

"And as a friend," Sidney put in.

"That remains to be seen."

Lovelace's Cottage was fast assuming a neat and pretty aspect. A respectable-looking maidservant opened the door and ushered them into the tiny drawing-room, where they found Mrs. Norman sitting by a bright fire with needlework in her hand. She had discarded her loud-coloured cardigans and short skirts, and was in a dark green cloth gown which fitted her to perfection. The room was dainty and fresh. Yellow chrysanthemums were in bowls on the table. Her greeting to Mrs. de Cressiers was quiet and simple.

"It is very kind of you to come to see me. I did not expect it. I think I have made acquaintance with your son. Major Urquhart brought him in one day. What a nice fresh boy he is! He told me he felt quite lost when you were away. I don't expect to see him now you are back; but he seemed so lonely that I quite pitied him."

"Then I am afraid you wasted your pity," said Mrs. de Cressiers in her most frosty tone, "for Austin and I have our interests entirely apart, and we are hardly ever together."

Sidney's cheeks got quite hot, but Mrs. Norman was quite serene. She turned towards Sidney with a smile.

"I can't tell you, Mrs. de Cressiers, how very good and kind Miss Urquhart and her people have been to me. I came as a stranger to a strange land, and they befriended me from the very first day. I have always heard that country neighbours are real friends, and now I have proved it. Major Urquhart is my great stand-by. I think hardly a day passes without his coming down to give me some bit of advice or counsel. And one really feels that a man of that age can help one tremendously without any unseemly gossip following his kindness."

"I don't think we gossip in these parts," said Sidney. "Do we, Mrs. de Cressiers? There are so few to be interested in the doings of their neighbours. The rector is an old bachelor, and the doctor has a family of ten children, who keep their mother more than busy, and our other neighbours live too far-away to know anything about our daily life."

"Are you making a home here for your daughter?" asked Mrs. de Cressiers abruptly.

Just a glint of light seemed to pass over Mrs. Norman's eyes as she replied with a little laugh.

"I wish I could say 'Yes,' but she finds it dull to be with me. She is one of these modern girls who must have their hockey and golf and young companionship. And she gets it all at her aunt's house. But I mean to have her down as soon as she will come. And I will bring her to see you, if I may. She is considered a very handsome girl. Let me show you her photo."

She rose and went to a side table, producing a cabinet photo of a singularly interesting-looking girl, with broad intellectual brow and earnest wistful eyes. Sidney gazed at it with pleasure.

"She has a beautiful face," she said warmly.

"So people say," said Mrs. Norman. Then she turned to Mrs. de Cressiers: "I have heard so much of your goodness to the village people that I fancy there is not a small corner which I could occupy, is there? I do so want to do something to help my poorer neighbours. You see, I am an idle woman, and after a busy life the days will seem rather empty here unless I fill them with work and local interests. I used to help the secretary of the G.F.S. in Norfolk. I have always been interested in that society. I wonder if a branch has been started here?"

Sidney almost smiled as the big fish at last rose to the bait. Mrs. de Cressiers had been keenly anxious for a long while to have a branch of the G.F.S. in the villages surrounding her property. It had been tried, but for lack of proper organisation it had failed, and she could persuade no lady to take it. Sidney had enough already on her hands, and her father did not want her to take up anything more. She had her Sunday scholars, and a weekly working party amongst the fisherwomen, and was a district visitor as well. In fact, she was the rector's right hand in most of his parish work.

Now Mrs. de Cressiers began to thaw. In a few minutes she and Mrs. Norman were having an animated discussion upon the merits and advantages of the G.F.S., and the visit of ten minutes lengthened into nearly half an hour. Tea appeared, but that Mrs. de Cressiers would not stay for. When she and Sidney at last drove away, she said thoughtfully:

"Perhaps I was prejudiced. She is a lady, and evidently sees more of your uncle than of Austin. He is a mere boy, of course. I must have some girls down to stay in the house; they will employ his spare time. And I really shall be very thankful if Mrs. Norman will work up the G.F.S. in this part."

Sidney wisely said nothing, but she confided in her father that evening that Mrs. Norman was the cleverest woman she had ever met.