The History of Sir Richard Calmady: A Romance

quality was present in her aspect--her whole bearing and expression betraying, less the languor and defeat of physical illness, than the exhaustion of long sustained moral effort, followed by the calm of entire self-dedication and renunciation of will. On the table at her elbow were a bowl of fresh-picked violets and greenhouse-grown tea-roses, some books of the hour, both English and French, a miniature of Dickie at the age of thirteen--the proud, little head and its cap of close-cropped curls showing up against a background of thick-set foliage. On the table, too, lay a well-worn, vellum-bound copy of that holiest of books ever, perhaps, conceived by the heart and written by the hand of man--Thomas a Kempis' _Imitation of Christ_. It was open at the chapter which is thus entitled--"Of the Zealous Amendment of our Whole Life." While close against it was a packet of Richard's letters--those curt, businesslike communications, faultlessly punctual in their weekly arrival, which, while they relieved her anxiety as to his material well-being, stabbed his mother's heart only less by the little they said, than by all they left unsaid. And looking upon that mother now, taking cognisance of her surroundings, Honoria St. Quentin's young indignation, once again, waxed hot. While, since it was the tendency of her mind to run eagerly towards theory, to pass from the particular to the general, and instinctively to apprehend the relation of the individual to the mass, looking thus upon Katherine, she rebelled, not only against the doom of this one woman, but against that doom of universal womanhood of which she offered, just now, only too eloquent an example. And a burning compassion animated Honoria for feminine as against all masculine creatures, for the bitter patience demanded of the passive, as against the large latitude permitted the active principle; for the perpetual humiliation of the subjective and spiritual under the heavy yoke of the objective and practical,--for the brief joy and long barrenness of all those who are condemned to obey and to wait, merely, as against those who are born to command and to create. From a child she had been aware of the element of tragedy inherent in the fact of womanhood. It had quickened exaggerations of sentiment in her at times, and pushed her into not a little knight-errantry,--witness the affair of Lady Constance Quayle's engagement. But, though more sober in judgment than of old and less ready to get her lance in rest, the existence of that tragic element had never disclosed itself more convincingly to her than at the present moment, nor had the necessity to attempt the assuaging of the smart of it called upon her with more urgent voice. Yet she recognised that such attempt taxed all her circumspection, all her imaginative sympathy and tact. Very free criticism of the master of the house, of his sins of omission and commission alike, were permissible in the Chapel-Room and in the presence of her late companions. The subject, unhappily, had called for too frequent mention, by now, for any circumlocution to be incumbent in the discussion of it. But here, in the brooding quiet of this bedchamber, and in Lady Calmady's presence, all that was changed. Trenchant statements of opinion, words of blame, were proscribed. The sinner, if spoken of at all, must be spoken of with due reticence and respect, his wilfulness ignored, the unloveliness of his conduct gently, even eagerly, explained away. And, therefore, it came about that this fair champion of much-wronged womanhood, though fired with the zeal of righteous anger, had to go very softly and set a watch before her lips. But as she paused, fearful to break in too abruptly upon Lady Calmady's repose, she began to question fearfully whether speech was, in truth, still available as a means of communication between herself and the object of her solicitude. For Lady Calmady lay so very still, her sweet face showed so transparent against the rose-silk, muslin-covered pillows, that the younger woman was shaken by a swift dread that Dr. Knott's melancholy predictions had already found fulfilment, and that the lovely, labour-wasted body had already let the valiant, love-wasted soul depart. "Cousin Katherine, dear Cousin Katherine," she called very gently, under her breath, and then waited almost awestricken, sensible, to the point of distress, alike of the profound quiet, which it seemed as an act of profanity to have even assayed to break, and of the malign activity of those little, scriptural figures anticking so wildly in the chimney-space and on the hearth. Seconds, to Honoria of measureless duration, elapsed before Lady Calmady gave sign of life. At length she moved her hands, as though gathering, with infinite tenderness, some small and helpless creature close and warm against her bosom. Honoria's vision grew somewhat blurred and misty. Then, with a long-drawn, fluttering sigh, Katherine looked up at the tall, straight figure. "Dick--ah, you've come in! My beloved--have you had good sport?" she said. Honoria sat down on the end of the sofa, bowing her head. "Alas, alas, it is only me, Cousin Katherine. Nothing better than me, Honoria St. Quentin. Would that it were some one better," and her voice broke. But Lady Calmady had come into full possession of herself. "My dear, I must have been dozing, and my thoughts had wandered far on the backward road, as is the foolish habit of thoughts when one grows old and is not altogether well and strong."--Katherine spoke faintly, yet with an air of sweetly playful apology. "One is liable to be confused, under such circumstances, when one first wakes--and--you have the smell of the sleet and the freshness of the moors upon you." She paused, and then added:--"But, indeed, the confusion of sleep once past, I could hardly have anything dearer for my eyes first to light on than your very dear self." Hearing which gracious words, indignation in the cause of this woman, burning compassion for the wrongs and sorrows of universal womanhood, both of which must be denied utterance, worked very forcibly in Honoria. She bent down and taking Lady Calmady's hand kissed it. And, as she did this, her eyes were those of an ardent, yet very reverent lover, and so, when next she spoke, were the tones of her voice. But Katherine, still anxious to repair any defect in her recognition and greeting, and still with that same effect of playful self-depreciation, spoke first. "I had been reviewing many things, with the help of blessed Thomas a Kempis here, before I became so drowsy. The dear man lays his finger smartly upon all the weak places in one's fancied armour of righteousness. It is sometimes not quite easy to be altogether grateful to him. For instance, he has pointed out to me conclusively that I grow reprehensibly selfish." "Oh come, come!" Honoria answered, in loving raillery. "Thomas is acute to the point of lying if he has convinced you of that!" "Unhappily, no," Katherine returned. "I know it, I fear, without any pointing of Thomas's finger. But I rather shirked admission of my knowledge--well, for the very bad reason that I wanted very badly to put off the day of amendment. Now the holy man has touched my witness and"--she turned her head against the pillows and looked full at the younger woman, while her under-lip quivered a little. "My dear, I have come to be very greedy of the comfort of your companionship. I have been tempted to consider not your advantage, but solely my own. The pointing finger of Thomas has brought it home to me that Brockhurst and I are feeding upon your generosity of time, and helpfulness, to an unconscionable extent. We are devouring the best days of your life, and hindering you alike from work and from pleasure. It must not be. And so, my dear, I beg you go forth, once more, to all your many friends and to society. You are too young, and too gifted, to remain here in this sluggish backwater, alongside a derelict like me. It is not right. You must make for the open stream again and let the free wind and the strong current bear you gladly on your appointed course. And my gratitude and my blessing will go with you always. But you must delay no longer. For me you have done enough." For a little space Honoria held her friend's hand in silence. "Are--are--you tired of me then?" she said. "Ah, my dear!" Katherine exclaimed. And the exclamation was more reassuring, somehow, than any denial could have been. "After all," Honoria went on, "I really don't see why you're to have a monopoly of faithfulness. There's selfishness now, if you like--to appropriate a virtue _en bloc_ not leaving a rag, not the veriest scrappit of it for anybody else! And then, has it never occurred to you, that I may be just every bit as greedy of your companionship as you of mine--more so, I fancy, because--because----" Honoria bowed her head and kissed the hand she held, once again. "You see--I know it sounds as if I was rather a beast--perhaps I am--but I never cared for any one--really to care, I mean--till I cared for you." "My dear!"--Katherine said again, wondering, shrinking somewhat, at once touched and almost repulsed. The younger woman's attitude was so far removed from her own experience. "Does it displease you? Does it seem to you unnatural?" Honoria asked quickly. "A little," Lady Calmady answered, smiling, yet very tenderly. "All the same it's quite true. You opened a door, somehow, that had always been shut. I hardly believed in its existence. Of course I had read plenty about the--affections, shall we call them? And had heard women and girls, and men, too, for that matter, talk about them pretty freely. But it bored me a good deal. I thought it all rather silly, and rather nasty perhaps."--Honoria shook her head. "It didn't appeal to me in the least. But when you opened the door"--she paused, her face very grave, yet with a smile on it, as she looked away at the little figures anticking upon the hearth. "Oh, dear me, I own I was half scared," she said, "it let in such a lot of light!" But, for this speech, Lady Calmady had no immediate answer. And so the quiet came back, settling down sensibly on the room again--even as, when at dawn the camp is struck, the secular quiet of the desert comes back and possesses its own again. And, in obedience to that quiet, Katherine's hand rested passively in the hand of her companion, while she gazed wonderingly at the delicate, half-averted face, serious, lit up by the eagerness of a vital enthusiasm. And, having a somewhat sorrowful fund of learning to draw upon in respect of the dangers all eccentricity, either of character or development, inevitably brings along with it, she trembled, divining that noble and strong and pure though it was, that face, and the temperament disclosed by it, might work sorrow, both to its possessor and to others, unless the enthusiasm animating it should find some issue at once large and simple enough to engage its whole aspiration and power of work. But abruptly Honoria broke up the brooding quiet, laughing gently, yet with a catch in her throat. "And when you had let in the light, Cousin Katherine, good heavens, how thankful I was I had never married. Picture finding out all that after one had bound oneself, after one had given oneself! What an awful prostitution."--Her tone changed and she stroked the elder woman's hand softly. "So you see you can't very well order me off, the pointing finger of Thomas notwithstanding. You have taught me----" "Only half the lesson as yet," Katherine said. "The other half, and the doxology which closes it, neither I, nor any other woman, can teach you." "You really believe that?"