Chapter VII: Part 7

"Why are you still here?" I asked.

"Where would you have me be?" he said. "I have always loved France. But henceforth, France will mean for me just these few square yards of shadow on the stones."

"You must not brood," I answered. "You talk as if you are never to be happy any more."

"In some other world," he said, smiling sadly, "I mean to be happy with You."

"Some other world?" I said. "Who knows that God may not reward you soon in this?"

He turned to me with a start; but I did not let him speak.

"Have you eaten?" I asked.

"Not yet."

"How silly!" I said. "Nor have I. Come, eat bread with me. This wind shall be the salt."

He took half the roll and smiled. But I could see that my high spirits first jarred on him, and then troubled him.

"You are not well," he said. "You are over-wrought. You are excited. Let me lead you home."

"No," I said. "I have not felt so well for years. I must go; but not home. There is business to be done."

"Where?" he asked, startled.

"Along the beach."

"Then," he said firmly, "you do not go alone."

I considered for a moment. Then I looked him full in the face.

"If I allow you to come," I said, "will you promise to disappear when you are told, and to come out when you are called, and not to speak till I give you leave?"

He answered, "I promise."

I did not disdain his arm. Whatever befell new, he was mine, all mine. The wind was in our faces, the moonbeams flashed on the water. Colour came to my cheeks, and the breeze ruffled the hair which had gone so long without Susan's brush and comb. As we stamped over the stones we might have been a boy and a girl escaping on a frolic.

A few hundreds of yards from the beck we were able to climb the low slope, and to pad along mutely over the grass. At the first brambles we turned inland, and descended softly into the ravine. We pulled up behind a high bush.

"Hush!" I whispered. "Not a sound. Don't move or speak till I give the word."

Through the thin autumn foliage, by the pale light of the moon, we could see a woman's figure across the beck. It was Susan, seated upon a modest bag.

I did not explain to Ruddington. I did not even tell him who the woman was. Two or three minutes passed; and then the silver chime of Berigny proclaimed half-past eight.

Susan drew out her little handkerchief, and wiped away a tear. My heart went out to her. There was no Gibson; and I began to hope our task would be easy. But we heard a sudden sound of snapping branches and hurrying feet; and Gibson broke through into the light. Susan jumped up to meet him.

"Oh, Tom!" she wailed. "I began to think you wasn't coming."

Ruddington touched my hand.

"Oughtn't we to go away from here?" he whispered.

"No!" I whispered back, shaking my fist. "We oughtn't."

"I was out with a blooming car," explained Gibson. "Georgette brought your letter at half-past three, but I didn't get it till seven."

"Thank goodness you wasn't away for the night!" exclaimed Susan fervently.

"Well, I'm here, anyway," said Gibson. "Not that I expect it's going to do me any good. You promised you'd settle me this week, on or off, one way or another. I suppose you've only brought me here to give me the chuck?"

Susan did not reply.

"What've you got there?" asked Gibson with a jump. He had caught sight of Susan's bag.

"It's my things," said Susan. "Oh, Tom, I want you to take me away!"

"Take you away?" echoed Gibson, thunderstruck.

"Yes, yes, take me away! Now, this minute. Oh, Tom, don't say you won't!"

"But where can I take you to?" asked astounded Gibson.

"To Granpong."

"Not me!" said Susan's gallant, with emphasis. "I suppose you think that at a caffy-resterong you can do anything? Don't make no mistake. They're the properest lot at Granpong that ever I struck in all my natural. Why, just to think of Madum opening the door, and me bringing in a young lady at midnight! Not me!"

"Oh, Tom, don't be such a beast!" moaned Susan. "The very idea! You know quite well, you do, that I'd never go to the same house. I'd die first. But, oh Tom, you must take me somewhere. We might go to the clergyman's wife."

"They don't have no clergymen in France," said Gibson, with British scorn; "only priests. And priests don't have no wives. But look here. What do you want to be took away for? What's up?"

Susan was silent.

"It's some tiff with the Missis," said Gibson derisively; "that's what it is. And I ain't going to be a party to it. Bet my feet the Missis is in the right. Fact is, this toff"--Gibson paused, and repeated the word with disdain--"this toff has given you swelled head. Not me! I ain't going to take sides against the Missis just for the sake of him. The old girl's always been too good to me."

The undress grammar and off-duty vocabulary of my two model domestics opened my eyes wide and made my ears burn. As for Ruddington, he touched my hand again, and I saw that his face was full of pain. He had guessed that I was showing him Susan.

"We mustn't stay," he said.

"We must," I answered, stamping my foot on the grass. For Susan was speaking.

"No, Tom, no," she moaned; "not the Missis! It isn't a tiff with the Missis. Oh, it breaks my heart to think of it! To-night, just before I ran away, she was sitting looking at the fire. She looked that sad and lonely, I burst out crying; and if I hadn't run straight out of the house, I wouldn't have come at all. No, no, no! Not the Missis."

"What the dooce is it, then?" asked Gibson.

"It's ... it's him!" blurted Susan, desperately.

"Him? Not ... not the toff?"

"Yes," groaned Susan, "the toff! He's coming. He wants to meet me, here."

"Here? To-night?"

"No. To-morrow. Eleven o'clock. Oh, Tom, I can't bear it! Take me away!"

Gibson emitted a long, low whistle. He took off his cap, crushed it up, and put it on again. Then he ducked for Susan's bag and dropped it down a few yards away, as if he wanted room. Last of all, he bent his head till he could look straight into Susan's eyes.

"Susie," he said slowly, "you don't say you're going to give him up?"

He had dropped his vile pronunciation, and had strangely regained the simple dignity with which he had spoken to me at Traxelby.

"Not that you're going to give him up?" he repeated.

"Yes, yes, yes!" said Susan. "I don't want him! I won't have him! I can't bear him! Take me away!"

"And if I do," he asked intently, "can you bear me, Susie? Will you have _me_?"

"Oh, Tom, of course I will!" she wailed, clinging to him with all her might. And, suddenly raising herself on tiptoe, she gave him a resounding rustic kiss.

Behind our bush we recoiled a little, both from them and from one another.

"We will go," said Ruddington.

"We won't," I said, pinching his arm to keep him quiet. So we looked away while Gibson returned the kiss, not once, or twice, or thrice.

"Susie," demanded Gibson at last, "what is his name? Who is he?"

"His name," proclaimed Susan, after an effective delay, "is Lord Ruddington."

Gibson let her fall from his embrace like a stone. He sprang back a man's length.

"Oh yes, of course," he said mockingly, when he had found his breath. "Lord Ruddington, _alias_ the King of Spain, alias the Emperor of Russia! Of course!"

"Honour bright, it's true!" said Susan indignantly. "If it isn't, may I be struck down dead. His lordship fell over his head in love with me in Traxelby church."

"Susie, this is true?" he demanded, striding up to her and speaking fiercely. "This is true?"

"Don't go on silly," said Susan.

Gibson leaned against a tree and thought for some time. At last he straightened himself up, and said, in low excited tones:

"Look here, Susie, this makes a difference. You don't think I'm going to help you miss a chance like that? Haven't I always said you're fit to be a duchess? No, Susie, it isn't good enough. D'ye think I'm going to let you throw yourself away on a poor thirty-bob-a-week devil like me?"

"Oh don't, Tom, don't!" she pleaded, clinging to him again. "Don't! or you'll make me change my mind."

"There isn't a finer gentleman in all England nor Lord Ruddington," said Gibson.

"Oh don't!" wailed Susan again.

"What is the matter with him?" demanded Gibson. "It isn't his money. No, nor his horses. Perhaps it's his looks?"

"We'd better be going!" I whispered to Ruddington, behind our bush.

"No, no," protested Susan, "it isn't his looks. When I put him in that folding frame, facing Miss Langley, they looked lovely--just like Royalty. No, it isn't his looks. I could put up with that."

"Then what is it you can't put up with?" asked Gibson searchingly.

She scraped the ground with her foot, as she used to scrape the garden gravel, before she replied mysteriously:

"Tom, he's so funny. He's all twists and turns. It'd be like being married to an eel. If he's the same as his letters, he'd make me all giddy. When I read them, everything seems to begin turning and turning round."

Gibson snorted impatiently. "With a thousand pound a week," he said ironically, "you'll soon get used to that."

"Tom, don't, don't!" she cried. "How can you be so cruel? If you cared about me as you said you did, you wouldn't let nobody have me but you--not if it was the Prince of Wales crawling on his bended knees."

Gibson came more into the light. I could read in his face the bitterness of his heart.

"Susie," he said, "what's the use of talking? If I take you away to-night, you know you'll have to marry me, even if you change your mind before to-morrow morning. Unless there's some good reason why you won't marry Lord Ruddington, you'll repent of it when we're poor and when we've to work hard for a living. You'll throw it in my teeth, and we shall be worse'n a cat and a dog."

I was amazed at Gibson's paltriness; amazed and angry. But not for long. All at once my groom drew himself up as grandly as a knight of romance, and demanded:

"Susie, girl--isn't there a better reason?"

My maid was his equal.

"Yes, Tom, yes," she cried passionately. "There's a better reason. Oh, Tom, I'm in love with you, and I always have been, though I've behaved like a little Beast. And I couldn't never be in love with Lord Ruddington if he was all made of gold. Take me away!"

"Why should I?" asked the radiant lover a minute afterwards, making a descent into the practical. "If it's a bargain, what's the good of running away from the Missis? We sha'n't find such a soft job or such a good old girl again in a hurry. If we run away, she won't have us back."

"But he's coming to-morrow," interrupted Susan in a panic.

"A jolly good thing too!" declared Gibson. "If you're going to give him the push, the sooner the better. Let him come. Give him the straight tip. In fact, I'm not sure," added Gibson meditatively, "that he oughtn't to be made to part with a hundred pound for breach of promise. Cheer up, and let 'em all come!"

"No, no!" cried Susan, terror-stricken. "If I see him, he'll turn me round his little finger. I shall be too scared to say a word. I shall be just like a stuck pig. Besides, he'll ask me about the letters."

"Letters?" echoed Gibson.

"Yes, the letters. Oh, Tom, I've been so wicked. When his first letter came to Traxelby, I copied the answer out of an old book."

"You can go now ... if you want to!" I murmured to Ruddington, behind our bush. But he only plucked at my hand, and held it as in a vice, while he listened with all his ears. Susan talked on.

"That old book, with the covers off. But, when I showed it to Miss Langley, she said it didn't sound right, and she wrote out a lovely letter for me to copy, and----"

"Go ahead!" said Gibson.

"And--oh, Tom, I told a lie! I pretended I didn't know I was to copy it out. I thought his Lordship would make fun of my writing and give me up. So I posted it in ... in Miss Langley's writing."

"Lord love us!" put in Gibson, in tones of awe.

"Yes. And Miss Langley was dreadfully angry. But when we'd begun, we had to go on I promised faithful that I would practise my writing; but I didn't play fair."

"So the Missis has been helping him?" demanded Gibson with a blaze of wrath. "The Missis wanted you to have him?"

"No, no! The Missis asked me..."

"Asked what?"

"She asked ... oh, Tom, she asked if I cared for you! And I told a lie, and I said I didn't. Then she helped me. But she put it in all the letters that he must wait, and that he mustn't come after me, and that he mustn't persuade me, and that I wouldn't marry him unless I could be in love with him. No, no, Tom. The Missis has been splendid!"

"What's he come for, then, if you told him he mustn't?" Gibson asked, less angrily.

"I don't know. But Tom, Tom, don't wait here or we shall be caught. Say Yes or No. Will you take me away?"

Gibson's answer came boldly;

"Yes!"

Later on, he added: "We will go back to England and be married at once."

"I have thirty pounds," said practical Susan. "It's in Derlingham Post-office."

"I've only got nineteen pounds seven and six," said Gibson glumly. "Mine's at Derlingham too. But what the dooce does it matter?" he burst out, snatching her to him and challenging Fate with ringing pride. "Susie girl, I've got _you_. You're the grandest girl God ever made. It's all a lot of rot about those letters. You're giving him up all for ... me! Susie girl, if I've to slave my head off to do it, I'll make you happy. If I don't, hell's too good for me. I'll go through water and fire. Let's be off. We'll tell Maddum all about it, and she'll tell us what to do. Where's the bag?"

They turned and stooped to find it. In a twinkling, I broke through the bush, tripped over the stones, and stood on the other side of the beck.

"No," I cried. "You sha'n't go!"

Susan screamed as if she had seen a ghost, and tumbled cowering against Gibson's broad chest. As for Gibson himself, after the first shock of astonishment, he opposed to me a fearless front.

"Asking pardon, Ma'am," he said respectfully but firmly. "She shall."

"She sha'n't," I cried, more firmly still. "Susan, you shall not go."

"Asking pardon, Ma'am," said Gibson again. "We are not slaves. We sha'n't never forget your kindness, Ma'am, and we don't hope to find the like again. But you are speaking to Susan's husband, Ma'am, which isn't the same as the groom. Susan's going with me."

"Gibson," I said, "not so fast. You talk as if I am against you both. When have I ever done you wrong?"

"Done me wrong, Ma'am?" he said, harshly and with a darkening face. "Begging pardon, you've done me wrong this very day. You've broke your promise. He's coming tomorrow--and you didn't,----"

"I did," I said hastily. "It'll be at Grandpont in the morning. I posted it to-day. Gibson, you say Susan will marry you. Susan, is it true?"

"Yes, Miss," said Susan faintly. "It is true."

"Then," I said, "why run away? Lord Ruddington is answered. Susan can't marry Gibson and Lord Ruddington too."

"You mean fair, Ma'am," replied Gibson, "and you wish us well. But you are a young lady, Ma'am. Susan don't trust herself to meet him. And I don't neither."

"Gibson, Susan," I asked, "what if I give you both my word that Lord Ruddington will not ask Susan to marry him, and that he will never write to her any more?"

"With due respects, Ma'am," Gibson answered, "don't pledge your word to any such thing. I say it again, Ma'am, you are a young lady. He's a man, and he's been about the world. If his Lordship's in love with Susan, and if he's come all the way to Sinn Verrynick to ask her, he won't be beat by the groom. You'll no more turn Lord Ruddington back to-morrow, Ma'am, than you'll turn me and Susan back to-night. Susan, let us go."

I stepped forward to seize her, but he waved me aside.

"Susan!" I cried. "Gibson! Listen! Let Susan come to me for one minute. Something tremendous has happened to-night, and I am bound to let her know it. Susan, come here. When you have heard it, you shall go with Gibson or come home with me, just as you think best."

Before he could restrain her, she slipped from his grasp and ran to my side. He followed. I threw my arm round her waist.

"If you please, Ma'am," said Gibson tensely, standing almost as close to me as Susan, "there's going to be no more secrets. What's right to be said at all can be said out loud."

I considered. Then I spoke out clearly and loudly.

"Very well. Have it so. But it would have been easier for Susan to hear it alone. Susan, there has been some dreadful, horrible mistake. It was not you, Susan, whom Lord Ruddington saw at Derlingham and in Traxelby church. He was misinformed. He has never seen you in his life. He does not want to marry you."

Susan stared at me, first, with a face as white as chalk. Then she reddened like a rose, and moaned like one wounded, with a choking moan.

"No, Miss Gertrude, no!" she pleaded in anguish, "Don't say it wasn't real. Don't say..."

"My poor Susan," I answered, "it wasn't real. But what does it matter? You have given him up for Gibson."

"No," she cried, with a sudden burst of wild and terrible grief. "I didn't, I didn't, I didn't! He wasn't mine to give."

I hesitated, wondering whether to tell her that Ruddington had indeed been hers to give, because he was willing to sacrifice himself to the end. But I decided not to try her poor wits any more.

"You are wrong, Susan," I said gently. "It's true he wasn't yours to give. But you believed he was. It is all the same. Gibson, she gave up money, and luxury, and a splendid name, all for you!"

"And, if you please, Ma'am," demanded Gibson, "how do we know all this is true? If it wasn't Susan he saw in Derlingham, who was it? If he didn't fall in love with Susan, who did he fall in love with? If he doesn't want to marry Susan, who is it that he does want to marry? No, Ma'am, I'm not taking any more risks. To-morrow, perhaps, we shall find it's Susan after all."

I turned to beckon towards the high bush. But Ruddington was already over the stones, I saw him and held my tongue. He came so quietly, so masterfully, that I knew I had only to listen and look on.

"You are Susan?" he said kindly in her ear.

Susan looked up and gave a piercing shriek.

"It's him, it's him!" she screamed.

"Don't be afraid, Susan," he said gently. "Miss Langley has told you that you have no more to fear. Some other day, you shall know all. To-night, let me just tell you, on my honour, that it was not my fault. If it had been my fault, I should never forgive myself for causing you all this worry and pain. Depend on me to do all I can to make you and Gibson happy. Tell me that you will try to forgive me."

"Oh, sir!" panted Susan.--"I mean, Your Lordship! So it wasn't never me at all?"

"No. It was never you at all."

She began to weep.

"Oh, Your Lordship!" she gasped. "Then ... who ... who ... who was it?"

I caught my breath. Gibson bent forward to be sure that all was well. Ruddington drew my free arm through his and smiled.

Susan stared at us with wide eyes.

"Oh, Miss Gertrude," she cried, with a great sob, "thank God!"

Both her warm arms were round my neck. Her soft girlish breast pressed mine, and I could feel her true heart beating wildly with grief and joy. Holding her to me as a mother holds a weeping child, I felt strangely calm. I watched the moonlight dappling the ground under the tree. I heard the sounds of the night: the stirring leaves, the far-off plash of the waves, the soft croon of the wind, the swirl of the beck, and loudest of all, my true-hearted Susan's sobs.

"Yes," I said softly. "Susan ... Gibson ... thank God! For to-night He has been good to us all."

Then I too became as a little child. I broke down and sobbed in Susan's warm embrace till a strong arm clasped me round and led me tenderly away.

_Saturday morning, seven o'clock_.

A month to-day since we came to France! This morning is gay. The young sunbeams are dancing on the sea, the air is soft, the sky is necked with little white clouds like a blue bay alive with sails. I have been standing on the balcony with my hair floating in the wind. Down on the grass in the garden, three plump, pretty gulls are quite at home.

He prayed that he might come here early this morning, but I said No, not till eleven--the time appointed!

How much there will be to ask, how much to tell! I don't understand yet how the mistake was made. All I have worked out so far is that he saw me three times with--Alice! The Derlingham know-alls, in a hurry to answer his questions before he had fairly asked them, jumped to the conclusion that he had seen me with Susan. It seems he inquired who was the shorter one, the younger one, the prettier one: and both the know-alls made haste to assure him (a courtly compliment, this, to poor me!) that it was Susan--Susan Briggs, Miss Langley's maid. Then a dozen things conspired, he says, to confirm him in his blunder, just as a dozen things have conspired to drag me into this affair and to involve me in it more and more.

He has no light yet on the puzzle of last Tuesday's letter. But he loves me so much that I can tell him all: even to the showing of this book. Perhaps he has kept a book of his own, who knows? If so, I shall learn everything. But, somehow, I feel that the explanations on both sides can wait. What does it matter which way the path has turned and twisted through stones and thorns now that we have reached the goal at last?

I told Susan not to call me till nine o'clock. But I mean to slip downstairs softly; I have business at Berigny. There is reparation to be made among those white graves where I slammed the gates of my heart. And, amid the holy stillness of the morning, I am fain to chasten my spirit in the Communion of Saints. For, on this day of my happiness, do I not feel that grannie, and father and mother, and all who have ever loved me, are yearning to me out of the depths that after all are not so very deep and down from the heights that after all are not so very high? So I will go forth, through the little yellow flowers and over the sweet, crisp grass. I will go and sit in the sunshine, on the old steps of the Calvary, while all that great love yearns out to me from the unseen, fondling me and caressing me as with soft hands. I go to say my De Profundis at last, and to breathe a prayer for this poor land, where the fool hath said in his heart that there is no God.

THE END.