In searching his pockets for matches, Godfrey found the letter whichhad been given to him as he left the Abbey. He knew the writing on theenvelope at once, and was minded not to open it, for this and theforeign stamp told him that it came from Madame Riennes. Stillcuriosity, or a desire to take his mind off the miseries by which itwas beset, prevailed, and he did open the envelope and read. It ranthus:
"Ah! my little friend, my godson in the speerit, Godfrey
"I daresay you thought that poor old Madame was dead, gone to join the Celestials, because you have not heard from her for so long a while. Not a bit, my little Godfrey, though perhaps I should not call you little, since my crystal shows me that you have grown taller even than you were in the old days at Lucerne, and much broader, quite a good-made man and nice to look at. Well, my Godfrey, I hear things about you sometimes, for the most part from the speerit called Eleanor who, I warn you, has a great bone to pick with you. Because, you see, people do not change so much as you think when they get to the other side. So a woman remains a woman, and being a woman she stays jealous, and does not like it when her affinity turns the back on her, as you have done on Eleanor. Therefore she will give you a bad trick if she can, just as a woman would upon the earth. Also I hear of you sometimes from Miss Ogilvy or, rather, her speerit, for she is as fond of you as ever, so fond that I think you must have mixed up together in a previous life, because otherwise there is nothing to account for it. She tries to protect you from Eleanor the indignant, with whom she has, I gather, much row.
"Now for my message, which come to me from all these speerits. I hear you have done very well in what they call examinations, and have before you a shining future. But do not think that you will be happy, my Godfrey, for you will not get that girl you want for a long, long while, and then only for the shortest of time, just enough to kiss and say, 'Oh! my pretty, how nice you are!' And then _au revoir_ to the world of speerits. Meanwhile, being a little fool, you will go empty and hungry, since you are not one of those who hate the woman, which, after all, is the best thing in life for the man while he is young, like, so the spirits tell me, does your dear papa. And oh! how plenty this woman fruit hang on every tree, so why not pluck and eat before the time come, when you cannot, because if you still have appetite those nice plums turn your stomach? So you have a bad time before you, my Godfrey, waiting for the big fat plum far away which you cannot see or touch and much less taste, while the other nice plums fall into different hands, or wither--wither, waiting to be eaten.
"At end, when you get your big, fat plum, just as you set your teeth in it, oh! something blow it out of your mouth, I know not what, the speerits will not say, perhaps because they do not know, for they have not prescience of all things. But of this be sure, my Godfrey, when that happen, that it is your own fault, for had you trusted to your godmamma Riennes it never would have chanced, since she would have shown you how to get your plum and eat it to the stone and then throw away the stone and get other plums and be happy--happy and full instead of empty. Well, so it is, and as I must I tell you. There is but one hope for you, unless you would go sorrowful. To come back to your godmamma, who will teach you how to walk and be happy--happy and get all you want. Also, since she is now poor, you would do well to send her a little money to this address in Italy, since that old humbug of a Pasteur, whom she cannot harm because of the influences round him, still prevents her from returning to Switzerland, where she has friends. Now that big plum, it is very nice and you desire it much. Come to your godmamma and she will show you how to get it off the tree quickly. Yes, within one year. Or do not come and it will hang there for many winters and shrivel as plums do, and at last one bite and it will be gone. And then, my godson, then, my dear Godfrey--well, perhaps I will tell you the rest another time. You poor silly boy, who will not understand that the more you get the more you will always have.
"Your Godmamma, "Who love you still although you treat her so badly, "The Countess of Riennes.
"(Ah! you did not know I had that title, did you, but in the speerit world I have others which are much higher.)"
Godfrey thrust this precious epistle back into his pocket with afeeling of physical and mental sickness. How did this horrible womanknow so much about him and his affairs, and why did she prophesy suchdreadful things? Further, if her knowledge was so accurate, althoughveiled in her foreign metaphor, why should not her prophecies beaccurate also? And if they were, why should he be called upon to sufferso many things?
He could find no answer to these questions, but afterwards he sent herletter to the Pasteur, who in due course returned it with some uprightand manly comments both upon the epistle itself and the story of histroubles, which Godfrey had detailed to him. Amongst much else he wrotein French:
"You suffer and cannot understand why, my dear boy. Nor do I, but it is truth that all who are worth anything are called upon to suffer, to what end we do not know. Nothing of value is gained except by suffering. Why, again we do not know. This wretched woman is right in a way when she refers all solutions to another world, only her other world is one that is bad, and her solutions are very base. Be sure that there are other and better ones that we shall learn in due time, when this little sun has set for us. For it will rise elsewhere, Godfrey, in a brighter sky. Meanwhile, do not be frightened by her threats, for even if they should all be true, to those evils which she prophesies there is, be sure, another interpretation. As I think one of your poets has said, we add our figures until they come even. So go your way and keep as upright as you can, and have no fear since God is over all, not the devil."
Thus preached the Pasteur, and what he said gave Godfrey the greatestcomfort. Still, being young, he made one mistake. He did send MadameRiennes some money, partly out of pity--ten pounds in a postal orderwithout any covering letter, a folly that did not tend to a cessationof her epistolatory efforts.
On reaching town Godfrey went straight to Hampstead. There to hissurprise he found all prepared for his reception.
"I was expecting you, my dear," said Mrs. Parsons, "and even have alittle bit extra in the house in case you should come."
"Why, when I told you I had gone home for a month?" asked Godfrey.
"Why? For the same reason as I knows that oil and vinegar won't abidemixed in the same bottle. I was sure enough that being a man grown, youand your father could never get on together in one house. But perhapsthere is something else in it too," she added doubtfully.
Then Godfrey told her that there was something else, and indeed allabout the business.
"Well, there you are, and there's nothing to be said, or at least somuch that it comes to the same thing," remarked Mrs. Parsons, in areflective tone, when he had finished his story. "But what I want toknow," she went on, "is why these kind of things happen. You two--Imean you and Miss Isobel--are just fitted to each other, appointedtogether by Nature, so to speak, and fond as a couple of doves upon aperch. So why shouldn't you take each other and have done? What isthere to come between a young man and a young woman such as you are?"
"I don't know," groaned Godfrey.
"No, nor don't I; and yet something does come between. What's themeaning of it all? Why do things always go cussed in this 'ere world?Is there a devil about what manages it, or is it just chance? Whyshouldn't people have what they want and when it's wanted, instead ofbeing forced to wait until perhaps it isn't, or can't be enjoyed, oroften enough to lose it altogether? You can't answer, and nor can't I;only at times I do think, notwithstanding all my Christian teachingsand hundreds and hundreds of your father's sermons, that the devil,he's top-dog here. And as for that there foreign woman whose letteryou've read to me, she's his housemaid. Not but what I'm sure it willall come right at last," she added, with an attempt at cheerfulness.
"I hope so," replied Godfrey, without conviction, and went to bed.
Presently he descended from his room again, bearing a pill-box in
whichwas enclosed a certain ring that years before he had bought at Lucerne,a ring set with two hearts of turquoise.
"I promised not to write," he said, "but you might address this to her.She'll know what it is, for I told her about it."
"Yes," said Mrs. Parsons, "the young lady shall have that box of pills.Being upset, it may do her good."
In due course Isobel did have it; also the box came back addressed toMrs. Parsons. In it was another ring, a simple band of ancient gold--asa matter of fact, it was Roman, a betrothal ring of two thousand yearsago. Round it was a scrap of paper on which was written:
"This was dug up in a grave. My great-grandmother gave it to my great-grandfather when they became engaged about a hundred years ago, and he wore it all his life, as in a bygone age someone else had done. Now the great-granddaughter gives it to another. Let him wear it all his life, whatever happens to her, or to him. Then let it go to the grave again, perhaps to be worn by others far centuries hence."
Godfrey understood and set it on the third finger of his left hand,where it remained night and day, and year by year.