Chapter III

THE views upon the convent current in the village suffered but very little modification as time went on. Subconscious public opinion had deeply suspected that within a week or two, at any rate, some mask or other would be thrown off, and figures would emerge in order to set about some mysterious business of bewitchment or proselytism. It was not seriously credible that confinement and prayer were really the objects for which so much preparation had been made. And the fact that no mask had yet been thrown off made the nuns all the more dangerous.

There began then very soon, in the public-houses of Manningham, that slow stream of comment and rotatory argument that continues in them, I believe even to the present day. There were practically no data to argue upon; nobody but a tradesman's boy or two and a laundress's assistant ever approached the house, and these had nothing to report except H 193 the appearance of a curiously dressed woman with her head wrapped up, who spoke in a very un-English manner. The argument therefore must always be of an a priori nature.

Naturally the squire came in for a quantity of comment also. He had been certainly popular; a man does not play for the Gentlemen of England without becoming a kind of compelling demi-god, scarcely human. And to this had been added Jack's own extreme geniality and approachableness. He had given a cricket ground to the village as soon as he had arrived in the place; and on certain glorious evenings he had himself bowled at the nets for a few minutes to the chieftains of the village team. But his last mood had bewildered all the world. It was not that he lost his popularity. Rather he was contemplated with a kind of pity, as a pleasant man suddenly struck insane. The burning of his bats, the rumour of his prayers, in fact his whole violent change of front, had tossed him back into the atmosphere of suggestive mystery in which, as a Catholic, he had first arrived.

A small event, however, took place at the very close of the shooting season that once more complicated the situation.

There was gathered at the lodge-gate on the last day of January a group of men and boys, in leggings, armed with heavy sticks, at half-past ten o'clock; and it was understood that the Wetherly coverts were to be beaten for the last time. It was an almost perfect shooting day — turquoise sky, frost in the air, and a small breeze. Three or four retrievers pulled small boys about at the ends of chains; low conversation filled the air; and Mr. Truman in a velveteen jacket stood a little apart like Napoleon before a battle. It was known that six guns were required; three were to be provided by the house, three more were to come from a distance— personages known as "the Colonel," Mr. Francis, and " Parkinses." The Colonel had already whisked up the drive in his dog-cart, a vision of red face and cropped white hair, beside his man; Mr. Francis, even now, could be discerned walking up from the station carrying his gun; and simultaneously half-past ten struck from the church-clock.

There followed the clash of a gate within the park; and three minutes later Jack and his four guests appeared — the Colonel, magnificent now in his loose knickerbockers of loud check, his gaiters, and his Norfolk jacket, and the three men staying in the house. Jack, it was evident, had no intention of shooting; he had not been out once this season, and now his stockinged legs and low shoes made it plain that to-day was to be no exception.

There was a short pause while " Parkinses " was still expected. Yet he should have come by the ten fifteen, and Mr. Francis reported no glimpse of him. Jack strode about, bare-headed, swinging his stick, and giving directions to Mr. Truman, while the beaters stood in groups, shifting slowly from one leg to the other, the dogs tugged, and the guests said a good many things over and over again to one another.

The tableau was broken by a telegraph boy. Jack took the orange envelope and tore it open.

" Parkins isn't coming," he said; " wired for — or something. Well, it can't be helped."

Mr. Truman saluted.

"Beg pardon, sir."

"Yes?"

" Can't do the Wetherly coverts without six guns, sir," he said. " We could do with eight."

Jack jerked his head impatiently.

" Well, who is there? You can't take a gun! You'll be wanted."

Mr. Truman made no remark. And the church clock struck the quarter.

The guests looked at one another, and at Jack. There had been almost the beginning of a faintly unpleasant scene in the smoking-room the night before. The youngest of the men, who had been with Jack at school, had attempted to rally him genially on his Puritanism; but the extreme impatience of his air, coupled with a single remark as to " a man's own business," had caused an uncomfortable pause. (Algy Lennox had made one or two bitter little mental notes on the apparent failure of religion to make a man behave decently.)

So everyone looked at everyone else first and then at Jack, in dead silence. Jack was observed to bite his nails.

" Damn it! " he said suddenly. " Truman, send one of the boys up for my gun. I shall shoot vilely; but it can't be helped. Oh! and tell him to bring a cap. I've come out without one."

Rapid and almost feverish conversation broke out upon the instant, as the boy vanished at a run through the park-gate.

" Let's be getting on, anyhow," observed Jack. " We've a good half-mile across the fields. Yes, we may as well spread out. There may be outlying birds."

Lunch was to be eaten in the outhouse of a farm at one o'clock, and Mary and Sarah were to be present,

At a little after twelve they came together up through the coverts that had already been shot, guided by the sound of firing, and emerged at last upon one of the broad rides — trunk-roads, so to say — that cut this patch of woodland into three or four large copses. Straight in front of them, with his back turned towards them, facing the tall, leafless trees beyond, stood the Colonel, his legs about a yard apart, waiting. Mary whistled gently to make their presence known, lifted her eyebrows in interrogation; and, reassured by his nod, sat down on a stump.

It was a delicious day; and the two had not said anything particularly vital on their walk uphill. The world up here looked very charming — the wall of wood before them rose from the green darkness of rhododendrons and undergrowth into a perspective of filigree against the radiant sky; and it was not too cold for enjoyment. All was at present silent; the beat was a long one, and the men, Mary supposed, some half-mile away. Neither yet had the game begun to appear.

There is a curious meditative, almost hypnotic mood into which one falls at such times. The objective faculties are fixed intently upon external expectation, and the subjective powers work in a mill-like kind of way, serene and redundant. There was a background always to Mary's thoughts now — dating from the previous summer, but established more firmly than ever now by the happenings of the last month. The nuns, the past, the future, the convent-needs, Jack — these recurred like figures in a zoetrope, gently and not unpleasantly revolving.

Yet there was a sense of discomfort, for all that.

She began to wonder faintly what exactly Jack was doing. He had said at breakfast that perhaps he would start with the shooters, and since he had not come back to the house, she imagined he was with them still. At any rate, she would see him presently at lunch....

A movement from Sarah brought her to facts again; and she looked up to see the Colonel bending this way and that in an effort to see through the complicated undergrowth in front. A brown body whisked out like a streak away to the right; there was a formidable bang, a mutter, and, far away, she heard the patter pass away and cease.

Then she sat up to attend: she loved such days as these. They were objective and distracting....

The approach of driven game through a wood is as incalculable and as mysterious as the advent of spring. Certain things always happen: there are always a few ideal shots to be had — swift birds coming straight and high like projectiles; a cunning group taking advantage of every shred of cover; a certain proportion of rabbits that appear and vanish again like fast-bouncing cricket- balls; hares that emerge suddenly, sit up and look, and then do something unexpected; certain inexplicable pauses, and equally inexplicable torrents of flying targets — all these phenomena take place in the average drive-The skill bears upon the discerning of which are which, and the meeting of each in its proper manner. Mary was well entertained to-day.... She had the pleasure of seeing half a dozen quite excellent shots — again and again she saw the streak overhead, smooth and curved, heard the bang, saw again the curve broken, and after an ecstatic pause heard the mellow thump on the dry leaves. She counted seven rabbits killed quite perfectly as they whizzed across the ride, and two hares. Further, she had the pleasure, no less keen, though different, of observing four times a clucking pheasant pass unscathed, triumphant and hysterical, reprieved for one more summer among the woods.

It was always delightful to watch this Colonel. He was not good enough to be at all infallible; he was not bad enough to be disappointing. And he looked so capable, so business-like, and so steady. He smiled so frankly when all went well; he was so obviously indignant with something other than himself when it did not.

Again the thought of Jack recurred.... Ah! what a pity it was...

A beater or two emerged presently, and the Colonel turned round.

" Done pretty well, Mrs. Weston," he said, " for the last day. Ah! Lady Sarah."

He took off his cap with an air.

It is always suggestive to watch the two sexes on such an occasion as this. The situation is so obviously a reversion to a primitive type. The men lord it always; the women submit femininely. The women are there on sufferance. They stand for the squaws who should presently gather and cook the game by the camp fires of the tribe. They are politely snubbed, gently mocked, and they play their own parts perfectly. The men at the best are tolerant and kind. Chivalry vanishes, or is retained only by a series of violent efforts. And the men, again, are so complacent. There is a sense abroad of duty done and hardships endured.

The Colonel was magnificent. He descended to small talk with a magnanimous air, and Sarah played up to him beautifully; while Mary, who though she loved it all, had never been quite sure that the business comprised the whole duty of man, observed them philosophically. But her philosophy received presently a small jerk.

She heard Jack and Mr. Truman in earnest conversation approaching round the corner, and an instant later saw them appear. From Mr. Truman's left hand depended a dead cock pheasant (head keepers will seldom condescend to carry a rabbit), and over Jack's shoulder was an undeniable gun. He broke off in the middle of a sentence as he caught his wife's eye.

"Why, Jack," she said, "whose gun?"

He dropped his eyes.

" Parkins didn't turn up," he said in a slightly high voice. " I'm taking his place."

She paused for an infinitesimal instant.

" I'm so glad," she said. " Sarah and I will stand behind you at the next drive. May we? "

The next drive was even more favourable to spectators.

The line of guns was drawn up in a grass field outside that which was the very pick of the woods, and Mary and Sarah, standing a yard or two behind Jack, had a view of the entire line from end to end. Algy Lennox was to their immediate left, and the rest, down to the stout Colonel, dwindled far away to the right.

Mary was conscious of such a mixture of emotions, and all of them so slight, that she was quite unable to formulate any conclusion. She tried to tell herself how sensible Jack was and how pleased she ought to be, yet simultaneously she was aware of a faint resentment that was wholly without justification. It took shape in a resolution to watch Jack's shooting in serene silence, and to praise him very enthusiastically indeed for any good shots that he might make. Also she determined to exchange no glances with Sarah at all. It was all very unreasonable, and she knew it.

But Jack's shooting was so singularly bad that there was little opportunity for enthusiasm. He stood like a rigid statue, with a kind of determination apparent in the curve of his back, and he missed everything except one rabbit, which, looking at him with a hesitating air, he shot straight in the face at a distance of fifteen yards.

The performance began with a pheasant, rising slowly and perpendicularly out of the undergrowth in front. Two barrels full of shot rent the air about him, and he disappeared, crowing, back again into the wood. A hare followed, crossing smooth ground at a good steady pace, and grass sprang twice into the air in his rear. Then came a bustle of pheasants one after another, exploding like fireworks. The rabbit came next and died. Some more pheasants followed and lived, and so forth.

There was a dismal little pause as two beaters appeared and a retriever.

Mary drew a breath.

" You got that rabbit all right," she said.

Jack paused before answering.

" Please don't stand quite so close again," he said. " It bothers me."

Ill

" May I come in? " said Mary at a quarter to twelve that night, tapping at the door of Jack's bedroom.

It had been rather a dreary evening. Two or three satisfactory people had come in to dine; the three bachelor guests were quite pleasant people; yet the thing had hung fire. Jack himself did not seem altogether at his ease.

She had had no opportunity of speaking to him alone till now, and even now she had not the least idea what she wanted to say. Everything surely was as satisfactory as it could be. Jack had shot again, not in the least because he wished it, but simply to fill up a vacant place. And why shouldn't he shoot, anyhow? Was not this kind of reasonableness exactly what she had urged upon him so often?

Yet she was uneasy; she felt there was something to be said, though she did not know what. She sat up in her dressing-gown in her own room, told her maid not to wait, and had listened urgently for the closing of Jack's door beyond her own and the vibration of his foosteps.

" Oh, yes; come in," he said.

He was standing straddle-legs, with his back to the fire, in his smoking-coat, and did not move as she came in.

" What is it? " he said.

" Oh, nothing," said Mary comfortably. " I must sit down a minute. Your fire's better than mine. Did you have a good day?"

" Oh, it was all right," he said. " I forget the bag • it was pretty decent"

Mary arranged herself delicately in a chintz armchair and spread her feet before her. Then she took a sudden determination.

" I was awfully glad you shot," she said. " What was the matter with Mr. Parkins?"

He did not answer her question.

" Are you?" he said abruptly.

Mary looked at him with a deliberately assumed wonder.

"Why, of course," she said. "Haven't I asked you again and again."

Jack grunted.

".But, Jack " She stopped.

"Yes?"

She took the fence at a rush.

" I mean I'm awfully glad that you did it just this once. I don't mean "

He waited, silent.

Again she took it at a rush. She had no intention of saying this kind of thing when she came in just now, but somehow the pleasant intimacy of this room, the firelight, Jack in his smoking-coat, and the rest of it — this suddenly broke down at least one or two of her barriers. She leaned forward a little, looking into the fire.

" I mean I'm glad you did it just this once. It was an entirely right and reasonable thing to do. But, you know, I don't feel as I did a couple of months ago, or even as I did when you didn't go after the hounds."

" How do you mean? " came in a carefully deliberate voice.

She glanced up and down again.

" Well, I've changed rather," she said. " I mean — oh! I may as well say it right out. I mean that I think there is a good deal more in your point of view than I thought at first."

There was a dead silence. She felt she had taken some plunge of unknown significance.

She had seen nothing at all in Jack's face as she had looked up just now. He had put his bedroom candle on the mantelpiece, and he himself was in shadow. She looked up again, half nervous, and saw only that he was looking at her. Then he moved a little.

" Tell me," he said. " How do you mean? "

Mary leaned back once more, clasping her hands behind the loose billows of hair that her maid had just arranged. Somehow this seemed to her a critical conversation; she did not know why. She supposed it was because she was going to make a confidence, and she was not quite sure how much she was going to say, nor, in fact, how much she had already said. So she determined to be easy and natural.

" Well," she said, " it's rather hard to put into words. I — I think I should say that — that I rather agree now with what you said about being more — oh! " she wailed suddenly, "this is horribly priggish. I can't keep it — but, being more, well, serious. I'm — I'm not quite sure that I think shooting and — and cricket — and — and this sort of life is quite ideal after all. Oh, Jack, please don't think me a prig. I can't put it like you.... Oh, what would Sarah say? "

She was taking refuge in mock-misery, and knew it. But she thought it the only way.

Jack turned abruptly to the mantelpiece, took off it a small china bowl clasped by a small china boy, and began to examine it with an intent, connoisseur-like air. For an instant she thought him a little irresponsive. Then she decided it must be through an anxiety not to say too much; it was through depth of feeling that he was silent.

" Oh, you're beginning to think that too," he said slowly. " Do you mean "

" No, no," cried Mary, suddenly frightened. " I don't in the least want to do what you suggested at first — I mean about monks and nuns. That's all perfectly impossible. But I mean in other ways. I think you've been perfectly splendid, and I want to help you, really. And I think your shooting to-day was the best of all. It shows you're — you're finding your balance again. It seems to me that things will be easier now — on both sides. I don't in the least want you to make these things a regular business again, as you used. But I want you to be able to do them when you ought; and to be a good magistrate, and landlord, and all the rest; and — and — well, say your prayers and be properly pious. I — I think it's splendid," she ended abruptly.

" I see," said Jack shortly.

" You know it's that convent," she said, " partly " (relieved now that she had got her confession over); " they've done me a lot of good "

" But I want to know," said Jack, putting the china bowl carefully back again, " I want to know exactly what you wish. Do you mean that you think "

" I mean I'm going to be converted too," said Mary. "There! that's it, in a nutshell. I've been thinking a lot. Oh, I know that Sarah '11 howl; but I shan't tell her. It's not her business. She can find out if she likes; I don't care. And it seems to me that we can just go on living here as before, only — only be pious too. It seems to me that your ideas are perfectly splendid; the convent and everything. I can't imagine why we shouldn't, both of us, be really good Catholics, and yet go on here." (She was beginning to talk rather feverishly, and was aware of it.) " I don't believe for an instant that we ought to give it all up and be something else. And I wanted to tell you that. I don't in the least agree with the ideas you had at first, you know, and

I never shall. I think that was real fanaticism, you know — all that about you and me going off to the convents, or living in a gamekeeper's cottage. You and I aren't made for that, are we? Oh, I'm sure you see that now. But I wanted to tell you that I do agree with the way you're doing it now — and — and that I won't be tiresome. Do you see, Jack?"

Again there was a moment's silence.

Mary felt her excitement pause for a moment, like a wave before it breaks. The impulse had come upon her so suddenly that it seemed like an inspiration. But she was driven too by another motive which she refused to recognise.

The point was, how would Jack take it? She waited with an extraordinary expectancy for his answer. It seemed to her as if some kind of sentence was to be pronounced. Jack's face was still in shadow; and in that moment of time it appeared that tremendous issues were being decided, utterly disproportionate to the situation as she had stated it. Again, she knew, but refused to recognise what those issues were.

Then the tension broke; and when Mary went to her room five minutes later, she knew, with a sinking at her heart, that judgment had been deferred.

All Jack had done was to kneel suddenly forward and kiss her.

"Thank you, my dear," he had said — no more than that. Then he stood up, nodded good night, and turned away.

So Mary sat some half-hour more before her fire, motionless.