in an hour's time she suffered indescribable distress. Godwin wrote--so she convinced herself after repeated perusals--as if discharging a task; not a word suggested tenderness. Had the letter been unsolicited, she could have used it like the former one; but it was the answer to an appeal. The phrases she had used were still present in her mind. 'I am anxious . . . it is more than half a year since you wrote . . . I have been expecting . . . anything that is of interest to you will interest me. . . .' How could she imagine that this was reserved and formal? Shame fell upon her; she locked herself from all companionship, and wept in rebellion against the laws of life.
A fortnight later, she wrote from Royat to Sylvia Moorhouse. It was a long epistle, full of sunny descriptions, breathing renewed vigour of body and mind. The last paragraph ran thus:
'Yesterday was my birthday; I was twenty-eight. At this age, it is wisdom in a woman to remind herself that youth is over. I don't regret it; let it go with all its follies! But I am sorry that I have no serious work in life; it is not cheerful to look forward to perhaps another eight-and-twenty years of elegant leisure--that is to say, of wearisome idleness. What can I do? Try and think of some task for me, something that will last a lifetime.'
Part VII
CHAPTER I
At the close of a sultry day in September, when factory fumes hung low over the town of St. Helen's, and twilight thickened luridly, and the air tasted of sulphur, and the noises of the streets, muffled in their joint effect, had individually an ominous distinctness, Godwin Peak walked with languid steps to his lodgings and the meal that there awaited him. His vitality was at low ebb. The routine of his life disgusted him; the hope of release was a mockery. What was to be the limit of this effort to redeem his character? How many years before the past could be forgotten, and his claim to the style of honourable be deemed secure? Rubbish! It was an idea out of old-fashioned romances. What he was, he was, and no extent of dogged duration at St. Helen's or elsewhere, could affect his personality. What, practically, was to be the end? If Sidwell had no money of her own, and no expectations from her father, how could she ever become his wife? Women liked this kind of thing, this indefinite engagement to marry when something should happen, which in all likelihood never would happen--this fantastic mutual fidelity with only the airiest reward. Especially women of a certain age.
A heavy cart seemed to be rumbling in the next street. No, it was thunder. If only a good rattling storm would sweep the bituminous atmosphere, and allow a breath of pure air before midnight.
She could not be far from thirty. Of course there prevails much conventional nonsense about women's age; there are plenty of women who reckon four decades, and yet retain all the essential charm of their sex. And as a man gets older, as he begins to persuade himself that at forty one has scarce reached the prime of life----
The storm was coming on in earnest. Big drops began to fall. He quickened his pace, reached home, and rang the bell for a light.
His landlady came in with the announcement that a gentleman had called to see him, about an hour ago; he would come again at seven o'clock.
'What name?'
None had been given. A youngish gentleman, speaking like a Londoner.
It might be Earwaker, but that was not likely. Godwin sat down to his plain meal, and after it lit a pipe. Thunder was still rolling, but now in the distance. He waited impatiently for seven o'clock.
To the minute, sounded a knock at the house-door. A little delay, and there appeared Christian Moxey.
Godwin was surprised and embarrassed. His visitor had a very grave face, and was thinner, paler, than three years ago; he appeared to hesitate, but at length offered his hand.
'I got your address from Earwaker. I was obliged to see you--on business.'
'Business?'
'May I take my coat off? We shall have to talk.'
They sat down, and Godwin, unable to strike the note of friendship lest he should be met with repulse, broke silence by regretting that Moxey should have had to make a second call.
'Oh, that's nothing! I went and had dinner.--Peak, my sister is dead.'
Their eyes met; something of the old kindness rose to either face.
'That must be a heavy blow to you,' murmured Godwin, possessed with a strange anticipation which he would not allow to take clear form.
'It is. She was ill for three months.' Whilst staying in the country last June she met with an accident. She went for a long walk alone one day, and in a steep lane she came up with a carter who was trying to make a wretched horse drag a load beyond its strength. The fellow was perhaps half drunk; he stood there beating the horse unmercifully. Marcella couldn't endure that kind of thing--impossible for her to pass on and say nothing. She interfered, and tried to persuade the man to lighten his cart. He was insolent, attacked the horse more furiously than ever, and kicked it so violently in the stomach that it fell. Even then he wouldn't stop his brutality. Marcella tried to get between him and the animal--just as it lashed out with its heels. The poor girl was so badly injured that she lay by the roadside until another carter took her up and brought her back to the village. Three months of accursed suffering, and then happily came the end.'
A far, faint echoing of thunder filled the silence of their voices. Heavy rain splashed upon the pavement.
'She said to me just before her death,' resumed Christian, '"I have ill luck when I try to do a kindness--but perhaps there is one more chance." I didn't know what she meant till afterwards. Peak, she has left nearly all her money to you.'
Godwin knew it before the words were spoken. His heart leaped, and only the dread of being observed enabled him to control his features. When his tongue was released he said harshly:
'Of course I can't accept it.'
The words were uttered independently of his will. He had no such thought, and the sound of his voice shook him with alarm.
'Why can't you?' returned Christian.
'I have no right--it belongs to you, or to some other relative--it would be'----
His stammering broke off. Flushes and chills ran through him; he could not raise his eyes from the ground.
'It belongs to no one but you,' said Moxey, with cold persistence. 'Her last wish was to do you a kindness, and I, at all events, shall never consent to frustrate her intention. The legacy represents something more than eight hundred a year, as the investments now stand. This will make you independent--of everything and everybody.' He looked meaningly at the listener. 'Her own life was not a very happy one; she did what she could to save yours from a like doom.'
Godwin at last looked up.
'Did she speak of me during her illness?'
'She asked me once, soon after the accident, what had become of you. As I knew from Earwaker, I was able to tell her.'
A long silence followed. Christian's voice was softer when he resumed.
'You never knew her. She was the one woman in ten thousand--at once strong and gentle; a fine intellect, and a heart of rare tenderness. But because she had not the kind of face that'----
He checked himself.
'To the end her mind kept its clearness and courage. One day she reminded me of Heine--how we had talked of that "conversion" on the mattress-grave, and had pitied the noble intellect subdued by disease. "I shan't live long enough," she said, "to incur that danger. What I have thought ever since I could study, I think now, and shall to the last moment." I buried her without forms of any kind, in the cemetery at Kingsmill. That was what she wished. I should have despised myself if I had lacked that courage.'
'It was right,' muttered Godwin.