Scene III.--EXTRAVAGANZA

Human nature is so constituted as to be incapable of lonely satisfaction; man, like those plants which are formed to embrace others, is led by an instinctive impulse to recline on his species.--_Cicero_.

To account for Conway’s non-appearance at Kingsmore vicarage it will be necessary to revert to the day of Dr. Berry’s meeting with Maude upon the upland, because that encounter was in the main responsible, although indirectly, for the young man’s absence. The scholar walked back to the rectory, but did not open his books that evening. Outpourings from the intellects of the immortals would not content him then. In a heat he cast off an original poem and proceeded with it into the garden of the Strath; and there he came upon Conway who was confused by struggling memories and a present anxiety. Money had been required of him for the settlement of accounts. Being unable to comprehend the meaning of that demand he had taken his trouble to Drayton; but the writer, who was entirely engrossed upon his historical play, gave him little satisfaction. “If the woman asks for money, give it her,” he said, and straightway had returned to his work.

Dr. Berry’s understanding was less obscured. After listening to Conway’s complaint, he advised him to leave the garden, and walk out of the valley. “You will then perceive what should be done,” he added. “If you require to write letters, go into my study, and write them there.”

Conway did as he was directed, that is to say he left the garden; but he did not enter the rectory. He walked out of the valley, and when darkness came upon the country he was still walking, with his face set towards the town. Night fell upon the Strath, but the master was absent. The next day Drayton noticed that he was alone, but his mind had no desire to learn the cause. Another day went, but Conway remained absent. The next morning a letter came to Drayton, and the dazed writer found himself charged with various heinous offences. It appeared that the profligate’s furniture had been seized for non-payment of rent, and among the articles on the inventory made by the agent the two masks did not appear. Therefore, the writer argued, Drayton had most perfidiously stolen them. The shaky epistle concluded with the statement that the writer was about to return to Thorlund for the sole purpose of dragging the “ungrateful, sponging, thievish brute,” Drayton to-wit, out of his house by the ears.

“A strange document,” murmured the gentle scribe. “Interesting also as illustrating a phase of the human mind. Penned, I should determine, by a dissolute character, somewhat under the influence of _aqua-fortis_.”

As the letter was not of sufficient interest to be subjected to any more critical analysis, he set it aside, and went into the orchard to think of other things. Late in the evening Conway returned; but so soon as he entered upon his property, shame took the place of anger. He became dimly conscious that he had degraded himself during the past three days. Very soon the determination, which he had made that morning, to offer the Strath for sale, and to resume his former manner of living, became forgotten. As he made towards the house, feeling sleep settling again about his eyes, he encountered the perfidious Drayton; but, instead of seizing the thief by the ears, he passed his arm within that of the writer, and asked, “Have you finished the translation of that ode of Horace, the song in which he deals with woman’s love?”

Drayton put a hand to his forehead, and presently replied, “I have forgotten. I will make you the English rendering to-night. Have you not been out a long time?” he added.

“Yes,” said Conway absently. “I have been troubled with bad dreams of late.” This was Conway’s first and final effort to break from the influence of the Strath; and after failure his mind, like that of his companion, succumbed entirely.

There came a day when rain soaked the moss-grown garden and the trunks of the trees were black with moisture. Mists were exhaled from the stagnant moat to form into shapes about the house. The spell-bound wanderers, hovering between the seen and unseen, found the Strath altered. It remained peaceful in its decay; there was neither fluttering of tapestries nor whisper of misery; but over all brooded an indefinable sensation of calamity impending.

In that room where Winifred Hooper had slept and written, Conway sat alone, with her journal between his hands. The influence impelled him to reason concerning himself. “What was he?” A card, engraved with a mere name, lay on the table, but the words Charles Conway brought no answer to his question. Perhaps he was a product of that damp old house, an ephemeral growth like the mosses and lichens upon its walls, or a passing shadow, with a name to distinguish it from other shadows. One touch of sunlight might cause him to vanish into vapour. Or again a little spark roving like Jack o’ lanthorn through space, seeking another spark with which to unite and strike the wondrous flame called life. He saw a face in the time-stained mirror. Was it that of Flora Neill, or of Winifred Hooper, or of Lone Nance of the hills? The spark which was himself became blown into fire, and waved to and fro.… The place became a museum, and he a dry and dusty exhibit, catalogued Charles Conway, and numbered 31. He was a curiosity, genuine and of some practical use once, but now out of fashion. What had he done in his foolish life? Walked out with his hair in papers, inhaling snuff through the pepper-pot head of a clouded cane; sauntered at auctions, or in the Mall; spent one quarter of the day in dressing, another in dining, a third at the coffee-house, a fourth at play; half the night in drawing-rooms, the other half in sleep. What noise had he made in the world, beyond piping on the French horn, or springing the rattle of a drunken watchman? If there had been work to his hand he had closed his eyes. Work! Why should a man work? What was the reward for a life devoted to tilling the ground, to fighting the French, to ministering to the sick, to sitting at the king’s council? The finest machine must break down some day, and rust, and become old framework. Work! What about Southey, poet laureate, sweating heart and brain, and confessing at the end that it had not been possible for him to lay by anything for old age? What about old learned Johnson, putting off his threadbare clothes upon his birthday, and muttering bitterly, “I can now look back upon threescore and four years, in which little has been done, and little has been enjoyed; a life diversified by misery, spent part in the sluggishness of penury, and part under the violence of pain, in gloomy discontent or importunate distress?” What about Lamb, thanking for nothing a great minister who brought the reward of labour as the hand of death dragged him off the scene?

The Strath was in a morbid mood. Drayton was pacing the saloon, crying like a woman. The deaf crone prepared food in the kitchen, working out her time indifferent to the drama. The rain poured heavily flooding the worm-eaten boards of the upper rooms. Conway raised his hands, which held the book in shagreen covers, brought the yellow pages nearer to his eyes, and read aloud:

“To-day the wind is warm, and the birds sing merrily. For it is spring, the gladdest time in all the year. Were this a letter to you, my love, as I would cheer myself by believing, I might tell you much that would bring you pleasure, and much that would not be true. I might describe to you the beauty of the country. I might tell you how happy I am to breathe the odours of the young larches, and to feel the warmth of the sun. I might assure you how I laugh in the mornings, and sometimes sing the songs you taught me, and how I watch the roads with a light heart, sure that you are upon your way. And I might promise you, praying God the same moment to forgive the lie, that I know no trouble. But, alas, this is my journal, and here I may not cheat myself.

“Spring will never come again, unless it brings you, Geoffrey. All day I have sat beside a downstairs window, listening to the joyful sounds of life, watching the little leaves unfolding, and the first yellow butterfly playing across the lawn. Everything in nature has something to do, and I alone am idle. I can only sit, with my hands together, wondering that there should be joy upon earth for the brown sparrow, and none for me. Yet the sparrow might pine and cease her twitter, perchance give up her little ghost, were she to be imprisoned in a cage. Even so there might be happiness for her. She might see her mate, and sometimes hear his song.

“Last night my father threw at me a log of wood, which struck my ankle, and to-day I cannot bear my shoe. Ah, Geoffrey, could you but see my poor swollen foot! I dwell upon the happy thought that you are nursing it in your dear hands, and looking up into my face with your tender eyes. Would you not come through fire and water to save me? But I know all now. The light of life has gone, and each morning and evening the message of curfew comes, ringing, ‘No more! No more!’

“My father has admitted much over his wine. Your messengers have never reached this valley. Perhaps they have been killed upon the highway, for my father’s men are instructed to watch the roads, and he has lost all scruples. I cannot warn you, Geoffrey. I am not able to bid you keep away from me. Would I, if I could? I do not know. I have become selfish. You might meet Sir John, and he is stronger than you. Were they to carry you dead into this house.… well, we should be together at last, for I would throw away my chance of heaven in the hope that my soul might pass with yours through space. If you killed my father I would yet receive you with the same love. I am unnatural indeed, but he has beaten me with a cane when in his cruel mood, and has pulled me to the ground by my hair, and closed his hand round my arm, tighter and tighter like a vice, until I have satisfied his cruelty by fainting.

“I know that my father is a highwayman and the most daring of them all. It is when I am so unfortunate as to see him returning from some expedition that he is more than usual pitiless. I have seen Thomas Reed, his trusted man, leading the chestnut mare--the swiftest horse in the country, they say--sweating to her stable at midnight, and I have seen his masks, his pistols, and his sword. He will have this Reed into the saloon to drink with him. I have heard them fighting, but Reed is a strong-willed fellow, and know my father cannot break with him, lest he should turn informer. I know the vileness of their lives; but God also must know, and if there be justice above--which sometimes I am wicked enough to doubt--an end must come, and soon.

“Placing before me the beloved face which I hold in my heart, I painted your portrait, and finished it last Saturday at sunset. It was a happy sorrow to kiss those cold lips, to touch and retouch that fair hair, only one shade darker than my own, and to bring into being your own dear smile. During that night the portrait seemed to me to have taken life, and through the hours of darkness--for I sleep but little--I thought you were protecting me, and I felt the warmth of your eyes, and heard your breathing, and your soft whisper, ‘Winifred,’ just as you whispered it--ah, so long ago--with your lips against my hair. It was so like you, Geoffrey. Even that tiny spot, where you were cut as a child above your left eyebrow, was there in all the beauty of its blemish. On Sunday I went to church, not indeed to listen to Mr. Blair’s hypocrisies, but to pray with all my soul for you and for myself; and returning hurried to your portrait to tell it how I love you. But it had been cut into pieces, and the pieces were strewed about the floor.

“I did not shed any tears. Indeed it is seldom that I cry now, not because I am stronger, but perhaps I have shed them all. I began to sing, and put a flower into my hair, and laughed and talked to you, so that I might forget how I was shivering. I am made of tough stuff, though I am small and white, and as for my heart is it not yours, and did you not replace my loss with the gift of your own? It is your strength that holds me up. But it was a good portrait, Geoffrey, else my father had not recognised it.

“That night I saw a strong light pouring through the keyhole and the chinks in the wood. While I looked the door came open, and there was old Deborah, standing in her nightdress, with a candle in her hand, and the passage round her was filled with light and a fragrant odour. She made me a sign that I should not be afraid and said, ‘There is a stranger waiting for you below.’ So I got up, and wrapped a cloak round me, and went down. There was light everywhere, but I could not see whence it came. Standing in the hall I saw an old man, clad in white, with hair flowing upon his shoulders, and holding a great pitcher between his hands. He came to me, when I stopped in fear, and spoke in a low sweet voice, ‘I am bidden to return you these. They are your tears.’ But when I held out my hands to take the pitcher it dropped and I found myself standing among pearls, and it was dark, and the old man was gone. Then I awoke and discovered that I had been walking in my sleep.

“Do you not dream, dear, in your London home? Do you never see me, bending low, drawing my hair across your face? Do you not hear me calling? Cannot you feel my lips near yours in sleep? Am I never with you? Oh, my love, I am there. Look, and you shall see me. Call, and I will answer. Put out your hand, and I will touch it. What has space to do with love? There is nothing between us, but the will of God. I am yours, beloved, and you are mine until these shadows pass away.”

There the book fell, and it seemed to Conway that an invisible hand had struck it out of his. He rose, leaving the journal lying open as it had fallen, and hurried from the room. A gloom filled the passage, and the house was full of horror, resounding with the sufferings of its past inhabitants, and dripping with their tears. His hand closed upon the damp balustrade, and the rotten wood exuded moisture like a sponge. A minute later the owner, but not the master, of the Strath was speeding through the garden, his being reaching out to find an affinity, as embryonic life must grope into the darkness for its promised soul.

The deluge had ceased. Milky rivulets bubbled down the chalk road and dark clouds scudded across the hills, while Conway hastened in the direction of Kingsmore, with Winifred Hooper’s piteous voice still sounding in his ears. When he came near the grass-filled road which led to Queensmore he thought he saw her. She reached scarcely to his shoulder, the pretty pale maid, and over her white forehead the fair hair clustered and tumbled into tendrils round her ears and neck. There was a scar upon her delicate wrist, and she limped slightly as she walked from the sign-post downwards. Her voice was exceedingly plaintive, and the words caught in her throat with the sound of a sob. Her eyes were large and blue, like two corn-flowers upon white satin, and her features were small and very frail. They quivered when the wind met them.

On the far side of the hills a more serious dreamer was at that moment shaking out his umbrella in the porch of a little farm-house, while its dainty bedecked mistress implored him to wait until the rain had passed, and insisted upon retaining a precious bundle of manuscript--of which she could understand no single word--that she might study it alone. And the handsome dreamer remained yet another hour, until the watery sun broke through the clouds and tinged the mist with red, and when he departed the manuscript which he left behind was not so precious as it had been.

At Kingsmore the sun was shining through the rain. A bow was bending across the sky, one end of its span over the ruins of Queensmore, the other filling a chalk-pit with coloured vapour. Mr. Price assumed one of his shameful overcoats, a slouch hat, and long boots, and went out upon the farm to poke about in ditches and free obstructed drain-pipes. Mrs. Neill was upstairs, writing ungrammatical letters. Flora roamed aimlessly about the house, yawning for dulness, and well able to appreciate the saying of Chilo the sage, that one of the three most difficult things in life is to make a profitable use of leisure time.

Finally she wandered into the study, a room forbidden to her sex, therefore the more attractive, and stood aghast at its untidiness. Mr. Price was the most unmethodical man incarnate. Upon his writing-desk were farming-reports, parish-magazines, bundles of twine, sermons, cigarettes, horse-shoes, theological works, and samples of wool. More books were piled upon a central table, novels, bibles, philosophical works, and agricultural digests, thrown together with bags of grain, much of which was scattered over the carpet, and eggs dated in blue pencil. The fireplace was filled with rubbish, an old saddle, and a broken reaping-hook. The single armchair was piled with horse-cloths. The pictures on the walls, chiefly framed photographs of horses and landscapes, were hanging awry and begrimed with dust. An open work of Josephus was covered with cartridges, and a brace of pigeons, shot in the early morning, were staining the right reverend bishop’s latest charge. The remaining chairs were occupied with a jumble of tools, coats, and hats. Boots and guns were lying about the carpet. A bust of Shakspere supported a leather shooting-cap; and a little oak desk of ecclesiastical design held a couple of soiled collars, an incomplete copy of a book of common prayer tied together with string, a flask half filled with sherry, some candle-ends, and a half-dozen unanswered letters.

“No one would imagine uncle was well off,” Flora murmured, moving through the confusion, with her skirts gathered round her. “I wonder how much he loses every year on this stupid farm. It would be much more sensible if he put by the money for me to spend later on.”

She approached the window and pushed it open; but while shaking some rain-drops off the back of her hand footsteps became audible upon the wet gravel. She knew it was not her uncle’s tread, and looking out saw Conway, his garments splashed with chalky mud, and his face flushed by the wind.

She was at the door before he could ring. He came up, and said quickly, but solemnly, as though it were a matter of the last importance, seizing her hand and looking into her eyes, “There is a change to-day.”

The girl flushed, because she saw a crisis impending. Conway was altogether different; younger, fresher, better-looking. There was not a trace of nervousness in his manner.

“Won’t you come in?” she said. “How wet you are! Uncle is out, but will be back soon, and then we will have tea. You are right about the change. But we agricultural people wanted this rain.”

“It is the Strath,” he exclaimed. “The change is there.”

Flora looked round, with a very uncomfortable feeling. There was not a sound in the house, except the ticking of a big clock in the hall.

“Come in,” she repeated.

“I cannot quite remember what has happened,” Conway went on rapidly, his eyes fixed stupidly upon her. “I want you to come back with me. The rain has stopped. I want to show you a room in my house, a room with a blocked up window. I think you will recognise it.”

“Mr. Conway,” Flora exclaimed. “Do you know what you are talking about?”

“I have something to show you there. I have made a discovery, and I must share it with you. Is it not Cicero who says, ‘Were a man to be carried up to Heaven, he would receive little pleasure from the scene, if there were none to whom he might relate his experience?’”

“I cannot talk to you while you are in this state,” said Flora.

“Then will you come with me to Queensmore? We can cross by Deadman’s Hill. I can tell you everything there, but here I cannot remember things.”

“If you have anything to say to me I can hear it here,” Flora replied. “Mother is in the house,” she added. “But, if you are going to stay--come in.”

“You want to sit down?” said Conway. “Your ankle pains you still?”

The strong-minded girl looked at the speaker in dismay. This was sheer madness.

“I have not hurt my ankle,” she said.

“It must have been some time ago,” he muttered.

“Mr. Conway, if you will take my advice you will live no longer in the Strath,” Flora said strongly. “Remember what happened to your uncle there. They have never been able to discover who killed him. No stranger could have entered Thorlund without being observed. It is a horrible place.”

Conway shook his head, perplexed at her argument. The Strath was to him a Paradise.

“That is only because you are not there,” he answered. “Hooper is dead now, and the house is yours. The Reeds were always interlopers. I want you to take possession of the Strath at once.”

“You want me to have the Strath?” exclaimed Flora with a laugh.

“It waits for you,” he replied.

“And its master?” she said.

“There is no master. I am its servant, and yours.”

“You have made a quaint proposal, Mr. Conway,” the girl said flippantly. “If the Strath were mine I would take uncle’s advice and have it down; and if you were my servant--well, I might perhaps want to give you notice and engage another. I think you had better not stay,” she went on. “You are not yourself. I am sure you do not know what you have been saying.”

“I cannot enjoy life alone,” cried Conway.

“Is Mr. Drayton so unsociable? Give up the Strath, Mr. Conway. Take my advice--and another house, before it is too late.”

Then, as Conway still evinced no inclination either to enter the house or to move away, Flora unsympathetically shut him out.