CHAPTER XXXV
A year and a day had passed since Lady Bletchley’s obsequies. (The word is what she would herself have liked to hear applied to them.) All the presidencies, vice-presidencies, memberships of committees and governing bodies which she had so stirringly filled, had been apportioned among half a dozen less active-minded holders; and though the newspapers of the day had pronounced her loss to be an irreparable one, to the naked eye it seemed already repaired. On the other hand, her memory probably lurked unsuspected in the breasts of recipients of her least trumpeted benefactions. The winter had been mild, and the season promised to be a forward one.
“Through wood and stream and field and hill and ocean, A quickening life from the earth’s heart had burst; As it has ever done with change and motion, From the great Morning of the world when first God dawned on chaos.”
And above the sheeted primroses in the Stillington woods the birds’ calls and rondels rang out in intemperate gladness. That was outside; within, a white woman lay on a bed--a white woman lately escaped from the surgeon’s knife, escaped with life from the surgeon’s hands.
Camilla, in the late months of growing suffering, had made every disposition for death; had “set her house” in order--not that it ever needed that--and had turned her stern face with silent valour towards the unpierceable darkness of the grave. And Death would have none of her! Not only had the operation she had undergone been performed successfully, in a different sense from poor Felicity’s, but it had revealed the comparatively harmless character of the malady that had rendered it necessary. Camilla was to live, and not die.
By the bedside a man knelt, holding her wan hands. She was whispering to him.
“Can you forgive me?”
“Forgive you? For what?”
“For not having died! Not--having--set you--free.”
He bowed his head on her hands; and she felt his tears upon them. Then he lifted his face.
“_Forgive_ you! Forgive the one person in the world who loves me for having the charity not to leave me!”
* * * * *
Though Mrs. Tancred’s convalescence was a rapid one, she was not for some days allowed to see her correspondence, nor read any of the numerous letters of sympathy and congratulation addressed to her husband. Amongst the first put into her hands by the latter was one which ran as follows. It was dated on the eve of the operation.
“212, Green Street, “London, W.
“MY DEAR MR. TANCRED,
“I have heard of the dreadful anxiety you are in about dearest Mrs. Tancred, and must send you a line to tell you how deeply, deeply I simpathize with you!” (The first _i_ in simpathize had looked to the writer a little odd, but not enough so to cause alteration of the vowel.) “If you could let me know how she gets over it, I should be so, _so_ grateful to you! I hope you will not think me impertinent for writing to you, but I am so _miserable_ about you both!”
“Your deeply grieved “BONNYBELL.”
“P.S.--I should not tell you at such a moment, only that I cannot bear you to hear from any one else, that Lord Bletchley has persuaded me to marry him. I did not at all wish to at first--you know that I always rather hated the idea of marrying--but I cannot stay on here, as complic_k_ations have arisen.”
Miss Ransome had meant to have run that doubtful _k_ to earth in the dictionary, but in the ardour of composition had forgotten this necessary precaution. “Of course, Edward will understand that Colonel Slammer has been making love to me!” At this point the writer had laid down her pen, and rested her pensive head upon a left hand from which some very fine diamonds shot their reconciling sparkle. “It seems brutal to tell him just at this moment, of all others, but I know that it is the truest kindness. He is so good-hearted that he will feel the blow less while he is soothing poor dear Camilla’s last moments.” She glanced at her betrothal ring. “I know I shall be glad by-and-by; but it does seem rather dearly bought just now.” With a sigh she resumed her pen--
“We are both rather alone in the world, and I am sure he will be kind to me. We shall be much more like father and daughter than husband and wife.”
* * * * *
Camilla laid down the letter. “It seems rather soon,” she said; and that was the only comment which the remarriage of their connection with their _protégée_ ever evoked between husband and wife.
At the time it was being uttered Bonnybell was sitting on a sofa in the Slammer drawing-room beside her _fiancé_. A barrier of sofa-cushions had--accidentally as it appeared to Tom--risen between them. Across, but unable to level them, the lover leaned and beamed.
“And you are _quite_ sure that you never were in love with any one else before?”
“_Never!_”
“Not with Toby Aylmer?”
“How likely!”
“Nor”--a hesitation and an altered tone--“nor--with--Edward Tancred?”
“If you are going to ask me ridiculous and improper questions, I shall be obliged to give up talking to you.”
FINIS
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES.
Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:
than, with lightning speed=> then, with lightning speed {pg 27}
though a silly and misplaced=> though silly and misplaced {pg 28}
visitor’s limp hands=> visitors’ limp hands {pg 123}