CHAPTER XXIV
A CAUSE AND IMPEDIMENT
"Oh!" was all that May said.
Lady Dashwood looked at her and looked again. She put out her hand andrested it on the mantelshelf, and still looked at May. May was takingoff one of her gloves. When she had unfastened the buttons shediscovered that she was wearing a watch on her wrist, and she wound itup carefully.
Lady Dashwood was still looking, all her excitement was suppressed forthe moment. What was May thinking of--what had happened to her?
"For how long?" asked May, and she suddenly perceived that there hadbeen a rigid silence between them.
"For how long?" exclaimed Lady Dashwood.
"Yes," said May.
"The engagement is broken off!" said Lady Dashwood. "Broken off, dear!"
"Not permanently?" said May, as if she were speaking of an incident ofno particular importance.
Lady Dashwood's eyes gleamed. "For ever," she said.
May looked at her watch again and began to wind it up again. It refusedto be wound any more. May looked at it anxiously.
"Gwendolen goes to-morrow," said Lady Dashwood. "It is she who hasbroken off the engagement, and she is going away before Jim returns. Itis all over, May, and I have been waiting for half an hour to tell youthe news. I have scarcely known how to wait."
May went up and kissed her silently.
"You are the only person I can speak to," said Lady Dashwood. "May, Ifeel as if this couldn't be true. Will you read this?" And she put aletter into May's hands. As she did so she saw, for the first time, thatMay's hands were trembling. She drew the letter back and said quietly:"No, let me read Marian Potten's letter to you. I want to read it againfor my own sake, though I have read it half a dozen times already."
"Mrs. Potten!" said May. "Aunt Lena, you'll think me stupid, but Ihaven't grasped things."
"Of course not," said Lady Dashwood. "And I am too much excited toexplain properly. I suppose my nerves have been strained lately. I wantto hear Marian's letter read aloud. Listen, May! Oh, my dear, dolisten!"
Lady Dashwood turned the letter up to the light and began to read in aslow, emphatic, husky voice--
"Dear Lena,
"Certain things have happened of which I cannot speak, and which necessitated a private interview between Gwendolen and myself. But what I am going to tell you now concerns you, because it concerns the Warden. In our interview Gwendolen confided to me that she had serious misgivings about the wisdom of her engagement. They are more than misgivings. She feels that she ought not to have accepted the Warden's offer. She feels that she never considered the responsibilities she was undertaking, and she had nobody to talk the matter over with who could have given her sensible advice. She feels that neither her character nor her education fit her to be a Warden's wife, and she shrinks from the duties that it involves. All this came out! I hope that you and the Warden will forgive the fact that all this came out before me, and that I found myself in the position of Gwen's adviser. She has come to the conclusion that she ought to break off this engagement--so hastily made--and I agree with her that there should not be an hour's delay in breaking it off. She is afraid of meeting the Warden and having to give him a personal explanation. It is a natural fear, for she is only a silly child and he is a man of years and experience. She does not feel strong enough to meet him and tell him to his face that she cannot be his wife. You will understand how unpleasant it would be for you all. So, with my entire approval and help, she has taken the opportunity of his absence to write him a decisive letter. She will hand you over this letter and ask you to give it to the Warden on his return home. This letter is to tell him that she releases him from his promise of marriage. And to avoid a very serious embarrassment I have invited her to come to Potten End to-morrow morning and stay with me till I have heard from Lady Belinda. I am writing myself to Lady Belinda, giving her full details. I am sure she will be convinced of the wisdom of Gwendolen so suddenly breaking off her engagement. I will send the car for Gwendolen to-morrow at ten o'clock, and meanwhile will you spare her feelings and make no reference to what has taken place? The poor child is feeling very sore and very much ashamed of all the fuss, but feels that she is doing the right thing--at last.
"Yours ever,
"MARIAN POTTEN."
Lady Dashwood folded up the letter and put it back into its envelope.She avoided looking at May just now.
"Marian must feel very strongly on the subject to offer to send her owncar," she said. "I have never known her do such a thing before," andLady Dashwood smiled and looked at the fire. "So the whole thing isover! But how did it all come about? What happened? I've been thinkingover every possible accident that could have happened to make Gwenchange her mind in this sudden way, and I am still in the dark," shewent on. "Do you think that Gwendolen had any misgivings about herengagement when she left this house after lunch, May? I'm sure shehadn't." Here Lady Dashwood paused and looked towards May but not ather. "It all happened at Potten End! I'm certain of it," she added.
May, having at last completely drawn off both her gloves, was foldingand unfolding them with unsteady hands.
"It's a mystery," said May.
"But I don't care what happened!" said Lady Dashwood, solemnly; "I don'treally want to know. It is over! I can't rest, I can't read, I can'tthink coherently. I can only be thankful--thankful beyond words."
May walked slowly in the direction of the door. "Yes, all your troublesare over," she said.
"Do you remember, May," went on Lady Dashwood, "how you and I stoodtogether just here, under the portrait, when you arrived on Monday?Well, all that torment is over. All that happened between then and nowhas been wiped clean out, as if it had never been."
But all had not been wiped out. Some of what happened had been writtendown in May's mind and couldn't be wiped out.
"Don't go this moment; sit down for a little, before you go and dress,"said Lady Dashwood, "and I'll try and sit, for I must talk, I must talk,and, May dear, you must listen. Come back, dear!"
Lady Dashwood sat down on one side of the fireplace and looked at May,as she came back and seated herself on the opposite side. There was thefireplace between them.
"Aren't you glad?" asked Lady Dashwood. "Aren't you glad, May?"
"I am very glad," said May. "I rejoice--in your joy."
Lady Dashwood leaned back in her chair, and let her eyes rest on May'sface.
"I can't describe to you what I felt when Gwendolen came in half an hourago. She came in quietly, her face pale and her eyes swollen, and saidquite abruptly: 'I have broken on my engagement with Dr. Middleton.Please don't scold me, please don't talk about it; please let me go. I'mmiserable enough as it is,' and she put two letters into my hand andwent. May, I took the letter addressed to Jim and locked it up, for ahorrible fear came on me that some one might destroy that letter.Besides, I had also the fear that because the thing was so sudden itmight somehow not be true. Well, then I came down here again and waitedfor you. I waited in the dark, trying to rest. You came in very late. Iscarcely knew how to wait. I suppose I am horribly excited. I am feelingnow as Louise feels constantly, but I can't get any relief in the wayshe does. A Frenchwoman never bottles up anything; her method is to wearother people out and save her own strength by doing so. From our cradleswe are smacked if we express our emotions; but foreigners have beenencouraged to express their emotions. They believe it necessary andproper to do so. They gesticulate and scream. It is a confirmed habitwith them to do so, and it doesn't mean much. I dare say when you or Ijust say 'Oh!' it means more than if Louise uttered persistent shrieksfor half an hour. But she is a good soul----" And Lady Dashwood ran onin this half-consequent, half-inconsequent way, while May sat in herchair, busy trying to hide the trembling of her knees. They wouldtremble. She tried holding the
m with her hands, but they refused to stopshaking. Once they trembled too obviously, and Lady Dashwood said, in achanged tone, as if she had suddenly observed May: "You have caughtcold! You have caught a chill!"
"Perhaps I have," said May, and her knees knocked against each other.
"You have, my dear," said Lady Dashwood; and as she pronounced thisverdict, she rose from her chair with great suddenness. There was on herface no anxiety, not a trace of it, but a certain great content. But asshe rose she became aware that her head ached and she felt a littledizzy. What matter!
"I may have got just the slightest chill," said May, rising too, "but ifso, it's nothing!"
"Most people like having chills, and that's why they never take anyprecautions, and refuse all remedies," said Lady Dashwood, making herway to the door with care, and speaking more slowly and deliberately;"but I know you're not like that, and I'm going to give you aninfallible cure and preventive. It'll put you right, I promise. Comealong, dear child. I ought to have known you had a chill. I ought tohave seen it written on your brow 'Chill' when you came in; but I'vebeen too much excited by events to see anything. I've been chatteringlike a silly goose. Come upstairs, I'm going to dose you."
And May submitted, and the two women went out of the drawing-roomtogether up the two or three steps and into the corridor. They walkedtogether, both making a harmless, pathetic pretence: the one to thinkthe other had a chill, the other to own that a chill it was, indeed,though not a bad chill!
What was Gwendolen doing now? Was she crying? "Poor thing, poor littleneglected thing!" thought Lady Dashwood.
"Marian can be very high-handed," she whispered to May. "I have knownher do many arbitrary things. She would be quite capable of---- Butwhat's the good! Poor Gwen! I couldn't pity her before, I felt too hard.But now Jim is safe I can think reasonably. I'm sorry for her. But," sheadded, "I'm not sorry for Belinda."
Now that they had reached May's room, May declared that she was not assure as she had been that she had got a chill.
But the chill could not be dropped like that. Lady Dashwood felt theimpropriety of suddenly giving up the chill, and she left the room andwent to search for the infallible cure and preventive. As she did so shebegan to wonder why she could not will to have no headache. She was sohappy that a headache was ridiculous.
When she returned, May was in her dressing-gown and was moving aboutwith decision, and her limbs no longer trembled.
"I don't pity Belinda," said Lady Dashwood, pretending not to see thechange. "I don't pity her, though I suppose that she, too, is merely asymptom of the times we live in." Here she began to pour out a dose fromthe bottle in her hand. "It can't be a good thing, May, for thecommunity that there should be women who live to organise amusement forthemselves; who merely live to meet each other and their men folk, andplay about. It can't be good for the community? We ought all to work,May, every one of us. Writing invitations to each other to come andplay, buying things for ourselves, seeing dressmakers isn't work. There,May!" She held out the glass to May. Each kept up thepretence--pretending with solemnity that May had been trembling becauseshe had possibly got a chill. It was a pretence that was necessary. Itwas a pretence that covered and protected both of them. It was a bravepretence. "No," said Lady Dashwood again, and firmly, as she releasedthe glass. "It isn't good for the community to have a class of busyidlers at the top of the ladder."
May had taken the glass, and now she tipped it up and drank thecontents. They were hot and stinging!
Then May broke her silence, and imitating a voice that Lady Dashwoodknew well, uttered these words:
"Oh, damn the community!"
"Was it very nasty?" said Lady Dashwood, laughing. "Ah, May, I can laughnow at Belinda! Alas! I can laugh!"