Chapter IX: Sudden Silence

FRIDAY'S luncheon was in full swing; and Mrs. Brutt felt miserable. She loved to be the best-got-up woman in a room. But to be wrongly got-up is another matter.

She had come in her most imposing grey silk, topped by a toque fit for Hyde Park in the month of May. And she found rural simplicity to be the order of the day.

That Doris, whom she brought with her, should wear a serge skirt and white blouse mattered nothing. But when she found Katherine Stirling hardly better dressed; and when little Mrs. Stirling, who always looked as dainty as a doll under a glass case, turned up in a black alpaca, and the most innocent of country hats, her heart sank.

A woman of more force would, after a moment's regret, have dismissed the subject. Mrs. Brutt could not so easily put it aside. She might have felt flattered at being asked to so informal a luncheon—"quite a family affair," as she told herself; but she was direfully troubled, none the less.

Somebody else's heart had sunk very low beforehand. This was Katherine's first sight of Hamilton, since her discovery that he had begun to care too much for Doris—too little for herself. But she was a perfect hostess; and no one could have guessed from her look or manner how she had dreaded the hour.

The little party of six dropped naturally into three couples; and Mrs. Stirling, who fell to Katherine's share, chatted without cessation.

Hamilton was talking also, not less continuously than his mother; and Katherine heard every word he uttered, even while her polite attention in other directions never failed. In his monotonous undertone he was pouring forth a stream of information; and Doris listened with an air of deferential interest, which brought to his mind the ideal Mrs. Hamilton Stirling, lately hidden from view. He became sure that at last he had found her.

Doris was a different being this day from the girl whom he had met last in the house. She held herself in; she did not chatter; her voice was low; her colour was normal; her eyes were not brilliant. Despite Mrs. Brutt's advice that she should "let herself go"—advice which she had not forgotten,—she was bent upon undoing the previous impression.

So she heard, smiled, and was gracious; and if a slight yawn had to be more than once suppressed, he did not see. That she could be charming in a reckless mood, he knew; but this self-restraint, this pretty girlish dignity, suited him far better. He decided that Katherine must already have used influence to bring about such an improvement; and he sent across a grateful glance, which set Katherine's pulse leaping. Then he reverted to Doris and the Stone Age, and forgot her.

Mrs. Brutt had the Squire to herself; and—despite the dress blunder— she was bent on making the most of her chance. By hook or by crook she dragged in two or three titled names, offering them as credentials for her own respectability. Then discussion of the neighbourhood followed. Presently, gliding into foreign travel, she conducted her polite listener through two or three galleries of pictures, and was just beginning to suggest anew the advantages of a trip abroad for Doris,—"So important for the development of a young mind! So widening, didn't he think?" —when a break occurred; one of those odd sudden breaks which sometimes come without apparent reason.

One instant all three couples were hard at work. The next—voices had stopped, as if by general consent.

"Farmer Paine—" had sounded clearly in Mrs. Stirling's little bird-like tones. And everybody waited to hear what would come next.

Afterwards Mrs. Brutt recalled that it was the Squire himself who first stopped; stopped in the middle of a sentence. He tried to catch it up, but in vain. Mrs. Brutt did not wish others to hear what she had to say about Doris; and her own attention was distracted by the farmer's name. Hamilton, having just arrived at the end of a lengthy statement, came likewise to a pause at the critical moment.

"Farmer Paine! Do you know him?" asked Mrs. Brutt, leaning forward. "Such an interesting old man! He told me all about his poor wife, and the niece that has come to live with him. A genuine son of the soil!— the real antique type, don't you know?"

Mrs. Stirling lifted her eyebrows. "He's a worthy old fellow," she said irreverently.

"I heard only yesterday," remarked Katherine, "about his widowed niece having come. Can that be Mrs. Morris—'Nurse Molly' that was?"

Mr. Stirling responded to her glance of inquiry. "Yes. She was your nurse for a short time." He spoke composedly, but his forehead was a mass of fine wrinkles,—a sure token of disquietude.

"It has always been said that she saved my life."

"You were in a delicate state, and she was a careful nurse. One must allow for some exaggeration in such statements."

"I must look her up one day soon."

"Quite unnecessary. You have no recollection of her—and she was well remunerated. No need to take further steps."

The unwonted sharpness of tone took them all by surprise, as well as the objection made to so simple and natural a course of action. In general the Squire was noted for his considerate and delicate kindness towards his tenantry.

"If I were Katherine, I should certainly make a point of going," Mrs. Stirling observed. She and her son were about the only people who ever contradicted the Squire. "But if you could remember her—" turning to Katherine—"you'd find her extraordinarily altered. Nurse Molly was a perfect picture; the prettiest creature, with smiling eyes, and little tendrils of curly hair, and exquisite colouring— really exquisite. You remember, Richard?"

"She was good-looking—" reluctantly.

"That's all gone. She is transmuted into a stout, commonplace, middle-aged person, with not a ghost of good looks, and as dull as ditchwater. Nothing to say for herself."

"Unlike her uncle, then," rippled Mrs. Brutt, who never could endure a talk in which she had no share. "Such an idyllic old man! I positively adore the real old yeoman farmer."

"Mrs. Morris is anything rather than idyllic. I never saw a more prosaic individual. She has two daughters—one rather like her old self, with a considerable difference. But the other—"

"As pretty as Mrs. Morris in her young days?" interjected Mrs. Brutt.

"Too sickly. One can't judge. Nurse Molly was a wild-rose beauty, in perfect health and high spirits. Winnie is gentle and refined— I can't think where she gets that refinement from. But the elder girl, Jane, is a most impossible person. She goes cycling about in a yellow blouse, with a voice that can be heard two streets off. You know—" to the Squire. "I was telling you."

The Squire answered by a disapproving glance, and Katherine tried to stem the tide.

"She is always carrying on a flirtation with somebody," pursued Mrs. Stirling. "Her mother must find her a handful. I believe she was sent to some very inferior school, which just did for her. Yes, Katherine,— I beg your pardon. No, nothing more, thanks."

Katherine looked at Mrs. Brutt, and a move followed.

"Would you rather go straight home, or would you like a longer round?" the hostess asked presently of Mrs. Brutt, who was to be taken back in the Lynnthorpe carriage. Katherine had had as much as she wanted both of the widow and of Doris; but she seldom thought of her own wishes.

Mrs. Brutt welcomed with avidity the idea of a longer round. She would be charmed. So excessively kind of Miss Stirling. And might she make a suggestion? Would Miss Stirling feel disposed to go in the direction of Wyldd's Farm? If that was not too far, she positively longed to see again that dear idyllic old farmer. She confessed also to a slight curiosity about the niece—the once-lovely Nurse Molly.

Privately, Katherine thought the request rather presumptuous; but she acquiesced. It mattered little either way. She meant to go some time; why not now?

When they were about to start, the Squire asked for a word with Katherine in his study. He shut the door, stood for a moment thoughtfully, facing the side-window which looked out upon a magnificent cedar of Lebanon; then, without preface, he said—

"I do not wish you to have anything to do with the Morris family. Since the subject has come up, I had better say so at once."

She did not ask why, but smiled gently.

"The elder daughter is a pushing forward person. You might find her troublesome."

That brought a smile of a different type. As Miss Stirling of Lynnthorpe she had had to do with pushing persons; and, despite her shy humility, she knew how to hold her own.

"I think there is no danger," she said.

"You have not seen the young woman. She is capable of a good deal. In any case, I wish you to keep her at a distance. The less you have to say to them, the better I shall be pleased." His forehead was all over wrinkles again; but he laid a kind hand on her arm. "My dear child, you do not look well to-day. What is the matter?"

She could bear up better against anything than sympathy, and her throat ached fiercely. "I'm a little—tired," she said.

"Try to have a good rest by-and-by. You must not get over-done."

But at present no respite was possible. Outside the study door she was seized on by Mrs. Stirling.

"Hamilton and I have to be off. He declares it is going to rain. My dear—" in a whisper—"do you like that widow? I don't. She's a mass of affectations. How in the world she managed to get hold of your father—but he is as soon deluded as most men. And after a fashion she is clever. What made you propose to take her for a round?"

"She seemed to expect it."

"You look much more fit to go to bed! If ever there was a Spartan, it's you—you poor dear!—with those white cheeks. Well,—we mustn't delay any longer. You'll have her on your hands for a good two hours yet, if you don't take care. How sweet Doris looks to-day! So much prettier than when she gets into one of her rattling moods!"

Katherine was wondering why she had not mentioned to her uncle that she might be calling at the farm that afternoon. She wondered also— would it be wiser on the whole to give up the plan?

But the call would have to be paid. That little attention was, she felt, only due to one to whom—it was said—she owed her life. Since Mrs. Brutt wished to see the farm again, the present was as good a time as any other.

She hardly gave a second thought to aught so unimportant as the manners of Jane Morris. And somehow she failed to gauge the force of Mr. Stirling's injunction. It did not occur to her—perhaps because her mind was preoccupied with Doris and Hamilton—that he had definitely meant her not to go at all.