Chapter XXV: The Unexpected

On Monday the doctor took out the stitches and gave permission for Olwen to sit up in a chair by the fire. Sunia having been sent away for an extra rug, he turned to his patient, and said abruptly:

"I was almost forgetting! Here is a letter for you. I went into the post office to get your new tonic made up, and Branson said: 'Here's a letter for the young lady at the Pele, and as it's a foreign one, she'll be glad to get it before to-morrow morning, if you're going up, sir.'"

"A foreign letter?" said Olwen wonderingly. "I wonder who is my correspondent abroad? I know of nobody."

"New York post-mark," said he, handing over the envelope. "Now I must go, for Mrs. Kay's baby is unwell, and I promised Ezra to drive on there. Good-bye."

He had made no reference of any kind to their talk of Saturday.

Olwen held the letter hesitatingly, wondering whether she should open it. Suddenly came a determination not to allow Sunia to know she had had a letter. Repeatedly she had been conscious of a suspicion that all her correspondence was overhauled by the woman--and she was Ninian's spy!

If she knew that Olwen had received a letter, she would probably search for it at the first opportunity. If, on the contrary, she was unaware of its arrival, she would not be anxious to learn its contents.

Although consumed with curiosity, the girl therefore hid away the foreign envelope, with the name of a hotel in New York printed on the outside. A wonder was faintly stirring within her as to whether by any chance her correspondent could be Lily Martin? That young lady had originally come from America, so Ninian had informed her. She might have returned thither. Were she and he still in touch with one another? Had he mentioned Olwen, and had she determined to send the new love a chapter of the private history of the Guyses?

It was hard to wait in order to ascertain the truth of these exciting conjectures. Yet she forced herself to be patient until the hour at which the ayah went downstairs to wait at table, when she knew she would be undisturbed. Then she drew forth the mysterious missive from the place where she had concealed it, and prepared to satisfy her curiosity.

The first words upon the sheet of paper within brought the blood flowing to her face, and caused her to catch her breath with a low cry of amazement:

"Little daughter of mine, have they allowed you to remember that you have such a thing as a father? He doesn't feel worthy to be called anything so holy, but he exists, and the craving for you, which he has always kept stowed away in a dark corner of his heart, has been lately growing so large that he finds he has room in his life for little else.

"My child, I am actually that which I used to declare myself in church at the time when I didn't believe that I was anything of the kind--a miserable sinner. In my youth I must have been potentially so. For very many years I have been actually so. I have likewise suffered for it. Sometimes I have vague hopes that the suffering and the sin may perhaps, when God adds up the column, balance one against the other. That is probably because of my ignorance and my egoism. God, He knoweth.

"I have lived in such poverty and hardship that I have had to stifle the longing I always felt for you. Now, however, things are a little better. At the cost of health and a good many other things, I have scraped together enough money to bring me back to civilisation, and to prevent me from having to sponge upon the Wilsons.

"Has my daughter any memory of me, any love for me? Duty won't do. I want love for the few, very few remaining years--it may be only months that we might spend together. Knowing what I know of your training, your upbringing, I feel it very doubtful that you can judge of me otherwise than your poor mother was able to do. And yet, in the days when I had you with me--had you, and didn't know what it would be to feel the miss of you--I used to believe that you loved me, as she, poor soul, never did.

"When first I determined to write to you, it was my intention to wait here until I got an answer--until I knew whether there was strong enough reason for me to make the effort of the voyage to England. But last week an attack of illness decided me that there is no time to lose--that, if I want to hold my child in my arms, it is now or never.

"The doctors say I shall be ready to start in a fortnight from now. I have booked my passage on the _Stupendous_, and am due at Liverpool about the tenth of March. If you can give me a welcome, come to the docks. I shall look for you there, and if I do not see you, will drive to the Columbus Hotel. If you are not there, and have sent no message, I shall know that you repudiate the man who for so many years has grossly failed in his duty to you. Don't fear that I shall blame you. All the blame lies on my shoulders. I shall say, as once I said after the verdict in a Court House in the west of Canada, 'The sentence just passed upon me by the court is just.' God bless you.--Your prodigal father,

"MADOC INNES."

At the end of the letter appeared two spirited little sketches. The first, entitled, "My child as I remember her," showed a little girl in very short skirts, with thin black legs and long masses of flying hair. The second, "My child as she probably is now," showed an ultra-fashionable young lady, with hat of the newest tilt, carrying a parasol, yet with a something in her carriage and general aspect which did suggest Olwen.

These little pictures brought tears streaming from the girl's eyes. It was the first time she had sat up by the fire to eat her dinner, and she was still weak. For some time she could not check her weeping, although its cause was chiefly delight.

All unexpectedly Fate had come to the aid of Dr. Balmayne. She would have to leave the Pele now. Her father was to sail a fortnight after the date of his letter. Said letter had been through adventures. It had been sent to Gratfield, her grandfather's old parish, thence to Bramforth, thence to the Pele. He would set sail, as near as she could calculate, in three days' time. She could not reply to his letter, he would be gone long before her answer could reach him. He was due to arrive at Liverpool in about ten days' time. She could just manage it. If she left without notice, she would have to forfeit her second month's salary. No matter. One month's salary would take her to Liverpool and enable her to stay there a night or two until the boat came in.

She surrendered herself to the joy which the thought of her father brought. He had not forgotten her, he had not been heartless. She had often pictured him as settled in some new country, with a new wife, and other children on his knee. She had wronged him there. No one had supplanted her in his heart, ill-regulated though it might be. As soon as he had snatched out of the jaws of adversity enough to prevent his being a burden to her family, he was coming home to claim her. They would be together. Delight surged up in her.

Someone to stand by her, to advise her, to fight her battles! What would he think of Ninian Guyse?

It was curious that the whole affair seemed somehow different when she contemplated it with her father in the background. How little, as a fact, she knew of Ninian Guyse! Dr. Balmayne was a good adviser.

Ah! How splendid, yet how improbable it sounded, that in ten short days she would be in her own father's arms, his most serious object in life, recipient of his whole attention. Her future would be the one thing of all things in the world which would interest him. How glad he would be that she had not married Ben! She laughed out in her glee, and was so lost to all sense of time and place that she very nearly allowed the ayah to surprise her with the letter in her hand. A slight noise behind the arras was the only thing which saved her.

Sunia was in silent mood that night. She put the girl to bed almost grimly. Olwen longed to ask how the sahib had enjoyed himself with the "Kendall-folk," but refrained. Just as she was leaving her for the night the ayah remarked, "Don't be frightened if Daff bark in the night. Sahib not come in yet."

"I'm not likely to be frightened," said Olwen sleepily; and she gave a little laugh of childish exultation, at the thought of her news, her letter, her secret, which Sunia did not so much as suspect! ... Yet, as she lay alone, after the woman had left her, she had a dull pain somewhere in her heart, for she believed that this day with the Kendalls showed that the night in the mile-castle had brought illumination to Ninian also. He had seen that he was following a will-o'-the-wisp--that nothing could come of the friendship between them, so oddly begun. "I wish to God I had never seen you!" ...

So he was going to erect barriers. He was going to take Rose Kendall, to prevent him from making a fool of himself with Miss Innes.

Olwen was honest, and she knew that, had he been engaged to Rose, she would never have gone out for a day's skating with him. She had, then, hoped or expected something, in spite of all her denials.

What did it matter? She had her father now.

Next morning she sent a courteously worded note to Madam, asking her whether she could possibly exert herself to climb the top flight of stairs and pay her a visit, as the doctor would not let her go down, and she had something to say.

She rose, with the ayah's help, and dressed by about twelve o'clock. Soon after she was established by the fire Madam knocked at the door and entered. Her expression gave the girl a shock. Olwen had supposed, she hardly knew why, that her adventure with Ninian would not be likely to displease Madam very much. She had found her so _laissez-aller_, so languid in her views, that she had not anticipated severe condemnation: more especially as on certain occasions it had seemed as if their intimacy were being encouraged. Now she saw in a flash that she was seriously out of favour. Madam wore the look which Olwen had seen now and then on her face when Ninian had opposed her will, or she feared that he intended to do so. Her mouth was compressed, her eyes stony.

"I trust you are better," said she, standing just within the door.

Miss Innes sprang to her feet. "It is good of you to come," she began confusedly. "I have been wanting to see you. I don't know what you must think of--of my imprudence. I'm sorry--oh, I am very sorry that it--it happened."

Madam gloomed at her very stiffly. "That what happened?" she questioned.

Olwen crimsoned. "My--accident," she said mumblingly, sinking back into her chair. Madam's attitude had put everything in a new light. She felt like the veriest culprit. "Mr.--Mr. Guyse would have told you that it was altogether unintentional----"

There was a bitter little smile. "Mr. Guyse has not been too explicit. I had perhaps better hear your account of it."

Olwen's eyes filled. She felt most unequal to a scene. "Won't--won't you sit down? I can see, of course, that you are much displeased with me. I--I realise now that I ought not to have gone out with Mr. Guyse as I did; but it was with your approval, Madam--indeed it was with your approval, as you must remember."

Madam sat down, as it were, reluctantly upon the edge of a chair. She had somewhat the aspect of a most unwilling visitor in someone else's house. "Really, Miss Innes, you have been two months in this family. Surely you cannot pretend to be ignorant of the fact that I and my approval count for less than nothing with my son."

Olwen swallowed tears of extreme mortification. "Then you thought, all the time, that I ought not to go, but never said so! Yet I am in your care, and I am not very old or very experienced. However, perhaps, there is no need to go over the thing in great detail. It shows that I am not a suitable person for my position here, and I will relieve you of my presence as soon as the doctor gives me leave to travel. I think he said I might go on Thursday, and this is Tuesday. I--of course I can only expect one month's pay, as I leave you without notice. I am sure it is what you would wish--that I should go at once. I am grieved"--pride had upheld her so far, but here her humiliation broke down her voice pitifully--"yes, indeed, I am grieved to have been such a--such a failure. I meant to do so well!"

Madam twisted her mouth up on one side as she regarded the drying of the tearful eyes. "I don't think my son has found your society a failure," she remarked, with meaning.

Olwen winced. Was this deserved? Had Madam all along blamed her conduct, thought her too free, been censuring beneath that apathetic manner? Nothing whips and stings an innocent girl like the accusation of bold conduct. "You think I deserve that?" she whispered passionately.

"Do you deny that you have flirted with him?" asked Madam, as if surprised.

"Yes!" cried the girl, flaming at the injustice of the lady's attitude. "I have not flirted, I declare that I have not!" ... She meant to say more, but refrained. She would not accuse Ninian. Had he had the baseness to represent to his mother that the advances had been hers?

"Come, come, there is no need for so much tragedy. What has happened is most unfortunate--I conclude, at least, that you agree with me in thinking so? It was a deplorable adventure, and the fact of your encounter with the doctor at Hazel Crag made it a great deal worse. But, fortunately, you have to deal with a young man who, perverse as he is, has nevertheless a great deal of good feeling. You need not be so apprehensive. I am authorised to let you know that my son is quite ready to marry you."

Olwen stared. Then she rose to her feet, choking. In her shame and terror she could hardly speak.

"You mean--you mean that I am compromised--that the only way out is for Mr. Guyse to sacrifice himself--to marry me?" she managed to bring out.

Madam's eyes surveyed her with a fish-like gaze. "What did you expect?" she asked.

"Expect? Nothing! What should I expect? I am here as your companion, and if I have been out with Mr. Guyse, I say frankly that his company has been thrust upon me--that you have actually thrown us together! If you have a spark of justice in you, you must admit this!"

"Well, but you bewilder me, Miss Innes. I was under the impression, as my son certainly was, that you had an affection for him, and were willing to marry him. Had I not supposed so, I should certainly not have allowed you to go out for the day together. I understood that he meant to ask you to be his wife in the course of that day. Did he not do so?"

"Certainly not. Nothing of the kind! He had no more idea of it than I had! I--I cannot think what you mean by talking like this! Your son and I, owing to a quite unforeseen accident, had to remain out all night. Nothing could be more scrupulous than the way he behaved--nothing could be more complete than Dr. Balmayne's understanding of the position! And even if he did not understand it--even if he did look upon me as compromised, what does that matter to me? I am leaving this place on Thursday, and I hope I may never see or hear anything of any of you again!"

"Thank you, that shows very good feeling!" said Madam icily. "I wonder at you, indeed I do, Miss Innes. I had supposed that I came to reassure you. I expected to find you in some mental anxiety, and was desirous to let you know at the earliest moment that my son admitted his responsibility and had no desire to shirk it. This will be a blow to him."

"Oh, I think he will get over it. I can disappear, as Miss Martin did, and you see this has only lasted such a short time, it will not make any deep impression. As a matter of fact, I should have had to leave in any case owing to family reasons. I heard from home yesterday, and find I am wanted at once."

Again Madam smiled. "Like the young man at a dull house-party, you have received a telegram summoning you away," said she. "I happen to be aware that the post yesterday brought no letters for you."

"No, but Dr. Balmayne brought one. The chemist at the post office asked him to take it with him when he came."

Madam changed colour violently. She could not, for a moment, control what seemed like extreme annoyance. For quite an appreciable time she could not speak, and Olwen sat contemplating the unexpected result of her simple announcement, and saying over and over to herself, "I knew it! They have always overlooked my correspondence! What a mercy the doctor happened to bring this one!"

Madam rose from her seat and went to the window. After a minute she faced round, and said steadily:

"As long as you are here you are in my charge. Before allowing you to leave, I intend to write to your grandfather a full account of what has taken place. I could not permit him to suppose me so careless of you as to let you go out all day long with my son if I had not believed that you were as good as engaged. Before receiving you back he shall be made acquainted with all the facts."

Olwen half rose, but sank down again, and bit back the plea that rose to her lips. She felt as if she were in a trap, running round and round, seeking a way out. But there was a last appeal she meant to try. She did not believe that Ninian would allow her to be bullied or coerced. She could take her stand upon his sense of justice and honour.... Ah, but could she? ... Dr. Balmayne, who knew him far better than she did, thought otherwise. She trembled with a sense of her helplessness.

Madam saw that her last threat had hit the girl hard. She stood inflexibly awaiting a reply.

Olwen threw up her chin, and spoke bravely. "I shall appeal to Mr. Guyse," she said. "I will insist upon his telling you himself that no love-making has passed between us."

"Very good," replied Madam at once. "I, too, think that you should do as you suggest. I will not write to your grandfather until I know what the result of your interview will be. If you could exert yourself so far as to come down to tea in the banqueting-hall, it would save poor ayah some of the running up and down stairs which, during the past few days, has been almost too much for her."

This parting thrust brought the tears smarting to the girl's eyes.

Madam looked round the room with an appraising gaze, as she moved slowly towards the door. "I don't think," said she, with a very faint smile, "that you could truly say that you have not been comfortable here."

"Oh--I--you--what am I to say?" burst forth Olwen vehemently. "I was so happy, I was growing to love"--Madam turned swiftly--"to love the old Pele and the wild country, and my life here--and now you have spoilt it all! Nothing can ever be the same again." She grasped the arm of her chair, and leaned her brow upon her hands, almost disappearing beneath the overweight of her tumbling hair.

"Oh, come, things are not so bad as you think," replied Madam, in a different tone. "If you marry Nin you would stay here always."

"Marry him because I have lost my reputation!" cried the girl wildly, lifting her tear-stained face. "You must be mad to think I am that kind of a girl!"

Madam shrugged her thin shoulders. "Well, I shall expect to see you at tea time," she said, and went out.