CHAPTER XII
One morning a fortnight later, Jack, Dodo, and Edith were sittingtogether on the cliff above the bay, looking down to the sandyforeshore. Jack, finding that Dodo was obliged to stop at Meering withNadine, had personally abandoned his third shooting-party, leavingBerts, whom he implicitly trusted to make himself and everybody elsequite comfortable, in charge. Among the guests was Berts' father, whomBerts apparently kept in his place. Jack had just told Dodo and Ediththe contents of Berts' letter, received that morning. All was going verywell, but Berts had arranged that his father should escort two ladies ofthe party to see the interesting town of Lichfield one afternoon,instead of shooting the Warren beat, where birds came high and Berts'father was worse than useless. But it was certain that he would enjoyLichfield very much, and the shoot would be more satisfactory withouthim. If his mother was still at Meering, Berts sent his love, and knewshe would agree with him.
Edith just now, working her way through the entire orchestra, wasengaged on the _cor anglais_ which, while Hugh was still so ill, Dodoinsisted should not be played in the house. It gave rather melancholynotes, and was productive of moisture. But she finished a passage whichseemed to have no end, before she acknowledged these compliments. Thenshe emptied the _cor anglais_ into the heather.
"Poor Bertie is a drone," she said; "he never thinks it worth while todo anything well. Berts is better: he thinks it worth while to sit onhis father really properly. I thought my energy might wake Bertie up,and that was chiefly why I married him. But it only made him go tosleep. Lichfield is about his level. I don't know anything aboutLichfield, and I don't know much about Bertie. But they seem to merather suitable. And much more can be done with the _cor anglais_ thanWagner ever imagined. The solo in _Tristan_ is absolute child's play. Icould perform it myself with a week's practice."
Dodo had been engaged in a small incendiary operation among the heather,with the match with which she had lit her cigarette. For the moment itseemed that her incendiarism was going to fulfil itself on larger linesthan she had intended.
"Jack, I have set fire to Wales, like Lloyd George," she cried. "Stampon it with your great feet. What great large strong feet! How beautifulare the feet of them that put out incendiary attempts in Wales! AboutBertie, Edith, if you will stop playing that lamentable flute for amoment--"
"Flute?" asked Edith.
"Trombone, if you like. The point is that your vitality hasn't inspiredBertie; it has only drained him of his. You set out to give him life,and you have become his vampire. I don't say it was your fault: it washis misfortune. But Berts is calm enough to keep your family going. Thereal question is about mine. Yes, Jack, that was where Hughie went intothe sea, when the sea was like Switzerland. And those are the reefs,before which, though it's not grammatical, he had to reach the boat. Heswam straight out from where your left foot is pointing. A HumaneSociety medal came for him yesterday, and Nadine pinned it upon hisbed-clothes. He says it is rot, but I think he rather likes it. Shepinned it on while he was asleep, and he didn't know what it meant. Hethought it was the sort of thing that they give to guards of railwaytrains. The dear boy was rather confused, and asked if he had joined thestation-masters."
Jack shaded his eyes from the sun.
"And a big sea was running?" he asked.
"But huge. It broke right up to the cliffs at the ebb. And into it hewent like a duck to water."
Edith got up.
"I have heard enough of Hugh's trumpet blown," she said.
"And I have heard enough of the _cor anglais_," said Dodo. "Dear Edith,will you go away and play it there? You see, darling, Jack came out thismorning to talk to me, and I came out to talk to him. Or we will go awayif you like: the point is that somebody must."
"I shall go and play golf," said Edith with dignity. "I may not be backfor lunch. Don't wait for me."
Dodo was roused to reply to this monstrous recommendation.
"If I had been in the habit of waiting for you," she said, "I shouldstill be where I was twenty years ago. You are always in a hurry,darling, and never in time."
"I was in time for dinner last night," said Edith.
"Yes, because I told you it was at eight, when it was really at halfpast."
Edith blew a melancholy minor phrase.
"_Leit-motif_," she said, "describing the treachery of a friend."
"Tooty, tooty, tooty," said Dodo cheerfully, "describing the gayimpenitence of the same friend."
Edith exploded with laughter, and put the _cor anglais_ into itsgreen-baize bag.
"Good-by," she said, "I forgive you."
"Thanks, darling. Mind you play better than anybody ever played before,as usual."
"But I do," said Edith passionately.
Dodo leaned back on the springy couch of the heather as Edith strodedown the hillside.
"It's not conceit," she observed, "but conviction, and it makes her socomfortable. I have got a certain amount of it myself, and so I knowwhat it feels like. It was dear of you to come down, Jack, and it willbe still dearer of you if you can persuade Nadine to go back with you toWinston."
"But I don't want to go back to Winston. Anyhow, tell me about Nadine. Idon't really know anything more than that she has thrown Seymour over,and devotes herself to Hugh."
"My dear, she has fallen head over ears in love with him."
"You are a remarkably unexpected family," Jack allowed himself to say.
"Yes; that is part of our charm. I think somewhere deep down she wasalways in love with him, but, so to speak, she couldn't get at it. Itwas like a seam of gold: you aren't rich until you have got down throughthe rock. And Hugh's adventure was a charge of dynamite to her; it sentthe rock splintering in all directions. The gold lies in lumps beforehis eyes, but I am not sure whether he knows it is for him or not. Hecan't talk much, poor dear; he is just lying still, and slowly mending,and very likely he thinks no more than that she is only sorry for him,and wants to do what she can. But in a fortnight from now comes the datewhen she was to have married Seymour. He can't have forgotten that."
"Forgotten?" asked Jack.
"Yes; he doesn't remember much at present. He had severe concussion aswell as that awful breakage of the hip."
"Do they think he will recover completely?" asked Jack.
"They can't tell yet. His little injuries have healed so wonderfullythat they hope he may. They are more anxious about the effects of theconcussion than the other. He seems in a sort of stupor still; herecognizes Nadine of course, but she hasn't, except on that first night,seemed to mean much to him."
"What was that?"
"He so nearly died then. He kept calling for her in a dreadful strangevoice, and when she came he didn't know her for a time. Then she put herwhole soul into it, the darling, and made him know her, and he went tosleep. She slept, or rather lay awake, all night by his bed. She savedhis life, Jack; they all said so."
"It seems rather perverse to refuse to marry him when he is sound, andthe moment he is terribly injured to want to," said Jack.
"My darling, it is no use criticizing people," said Dodo, "unless byyour criticism you can change them. Even then it is a greatresponsibility. But you could no more change Nadine by criticizing her,than you could change the nature of the wildcat at the Zoo by sittingdown in front of its cage, and telling it you didn't like itsdisposition, and that it had not a good temper. You may take it thatNadine is utterly in love with him."
"And as he has always been utterly in love with her, I don't know whyyou want me to take Nadine away. Bells and wedding-cake as soon as Hughcan hobble to church."
"Oh, Jack, you don't see," she said. "If I know Hughie at all, hewouldn't dream of offering himself to Nadine until it is certain that hewill be an able-bodied man again. And she is expecting him to, and isworrying and wondering about it. Also, she is doing him no good now. Itcan't be good for an invalid to have continually before him the girl towhom he has given his soul, who has persistently refused to accept it.It is true that
they have exchanged souls now--as far as that goes mydarling Nadine has so much the best of the bargain--but Hugh has tobegin the--the negotiations, and he won't, even if he sees that Nadineis a willing Barkis, until he knows he has something more than ashattered unmendable thing to offer her. Consequently he is silent, andNadine is perplexed. I will go on saying it over and over again if itmakes it any clearer, but if you understand, you may signify your assentin the usual manner. Clap your great hands and stamp your great feet:oh, Jack, what a baby you are!"
"Do you suppose she would come away?" said Jack, coughing a little atthe dust his great feet had raised from the loose soil.
"Yes, if you can persuade her that her presence isn't good for Hugh. Soyou will try; that's all right. Nadine has a great respect for PapaJack's wisdom, and I can't think why. I always thought a lot of yourheart, dear, but very little of your head. You mustn't retort that younever thought much of either of mine, because it wouldn't be manly, andI should tell you you were a coward as the Suffragettes do when they hitpolicemen in the face."
"And why should it be I to do all this?" asked Jack.
"Because you are Papa Jack," said Dodo, "and a girl listens to a manwhen she would not heed a woman. Oh, you might tell her, which isprobably true, that Edith is going away to-morrow, and you want somebodyto take care of you at Winston. I think even Nadine would see that itwould not quite do if she was left here alone with Hughie. At least itis possible she might see that: you could use it to help to preach downa stepdaugher's heart. You must think of these things for yourself,though, because in my heart I am really altogether on Nadine's side. Ithink it is wonderful that she should now be waiting so eagerly andhumbly for Hugh, poor crippled Hugh, as he at present is, to speak. Shehas chosen the good part like Mary, and I want you for the present totake it away from her. It's wiser for her to go, but am I," asked Dodogrammatically, "to supply the ruthless foe, which is you, with guns andammunition against my daughter?"
"You can't take both sides," remarked Jack.
"Jack, I wish you were a woman for one minute, just to feel howludicrous such an observation is. Our lives--not perhaps Edith's--arepassed in taking both sides. My whole heart goes out to Hugh, who hasbeen so punished for his gallant recklessness, and then the moment I say'punished' I think of Nadine's awakened love and shout, 'No, I meantrewarded.' Then I think of Nadine, and wonder if I could bear beingmarried to a cripple, and simultaneously, now that she has shown she canlove, I cannot bear the thought of her being married to anybody else.After all Nelson had only one eye and one arm, and though he wasn'texactly married to Lady Hamilton, I'm sure she was divinely happy. Butthen, best of all, I think of Hugh making a complete recovery, and oncemore coming to Nadine with his great brown doggy eyes, and tellingher.... Then for once I don't take both sides, but only one, which istheirs, and if it would advance their happiness, I would even take awayfrom poor little Seymour his jade and his Antoinette, which is all thatNadine left him with, without a single qualm of regret."
Jack considered this a moment.
"After all, she has left him where she found him," said Jack, who hadrather taken Edith's view about their marriage. "He had only hisAntoinette and his jade when she accepted him, and until you make afurther raid, he will have them still."
Dodo shook her head.
"Jack, it is rather tiresome of you," she said. "You are making me beginto have qualms for Seymour. She had found his heart for him, you see,and now having taken everything out of it, she has gone away again,leaving him a cupboard as empty as Mother Hubbard's."
"He will put the jade back--and Antoinette," said Jack hopefully.
Dodo got up.
"That is what I doubt," she said. "Until we have known a thing, we can'tmiss it. We only miss it when we have known it, and it is taken away,leaving the room empty. Then old things won't always go back into theirplaces again; they look shabby and uninteresting, and the room isspoiled. It is very unfortunate. But what is to happen when a girl'sheart is suddenly awakened? Is she to give it an opiate? What is theopiate for heart-ache? Surely not marriage with somebody different. Yetjilt is an ugly word."
Dodo looked at Jack with a sort of self-deprecation.
"Don't blame Nadine, darling," she said. "She inherited it; it runs inthe family."
Jack jumped up, and took Dodo's hands in his.
"You shall not talk horrible scandal about the woman I love," he said.
"But it's true," said Dodo.
"Therefore it is the more abominable of you to repeat it," said he.
But there was a certain obstinacy about Dodo that morning.
"I think it's good for me to keep that scandal alive in my heart," shesaid. "Usen't the monks to keep peas in their boots to prevent them fromgetting too comfortable?"
"Monks were idiots," said Jack loudly, "and any one less like a monkthan you, I never saw. Monk indeed! Besides, I believe they used to boilthe peas first."
Dodo's face, which had been a little troubled, cleared considerably.
"That showed great commonsense," she said. "I don't think they can havebeen such idiots. Jack, if I boil that pea, would you mind my stillkeeping it in my boot?"
"Rather messy," said he. "Better take it out. After all, you did reallytake it out when you married me."
Dodo raised her eyes to his.
"David shall take it out," she said.
Jack had not at present heard of this nomenclature. In fact, it does himcredit that he instantly guessed to whom allusion was being made.
"Oh, that's settled, is it?" he said. "And now, David's mother, give mea little news of yourself. Is all well?"
Dodo's mouth grew extraordinarily tender.
"Oh, so well, Jesse," she said, "so well!"
She was standing a foot or so above him, on the steep hillside, andbending down to him, kissed him, and was silent a moment. Then shedecided swiftly and characteristically that a few words like those thathad just passed between them were as eloquent as longer speeches, andbecame her more usual self again.
"You are such a dear, Jack," she said, "and I will forgive your dreadfulignorance of the name of David's mother. Oh, look at the sea-gullsfishing for their lunch. Oh, for the wings of a sea-gull, not to flyaway and be at rest at all, but to take me straight to the dining-room.And I feel certain Nadine will listen to you, and it would be a goodthing to take her away for a little. She is living on her nerves, whichis as expensive as eating pearls like Cleopatra."
"Drinking," said Jack. "She dissolved them--"
"Darling, vinegar doesn't dissolve pearls: it is a complete mistake tosuppose it does. She took the pearls like a pill, and drank some vinegarafterwards. Jack, pull me up the hill, not because I am tired, butbecause it is pleasanter so. I am sorry you are going to-morrow, and Ishall make love to Hughie after you've gone and pretend it's you. I dopray Hughie may get quite well, and he and Nadine, and you and I allhave our heart's desire. Edith too: I hope she will write a symphony sobeautiful that by common consent we shall throw away all the works ofBeethoven and Bach and Brahms just as we throw away antiquatedBradshaws."
She was rather out of breath after delivering herself of this series ofremarkable statements, and Jack got in a word.
"And who was David's mother?" he asked, with a rather tiresome reversionto an abandoned topic.
"I don't know or care," said Dodo with dignity. "But I'm going to be."
* * * * *
It required all Jack's wisdom to persuade Nadine to go away with him,more particularly because at the first opening of the subject, Edith,who was present, and whom Jack had unfortunately forgotten to take intohis confidence, gave a passionate denial to the fact that she wasdeparting also. But in the end she yielded, for during this lastfortnight she had felt (as by the illumination of her love she could nothelp doing) that at present she 'meant' very little to Hugh. Herpresence, which on that first critical night had not done less than sethis face towards life instead of death, had, she felt,
since then, dimlytroubled and perplexed him. Every day she had thought that he would needher, but each day passed, and he still lay there, with a barrier betweenhim and her. Yet any day he might want her, and she was loth to go. Butshe knew how tired and overstrained she felt herself, and the ingeniousPapa Jack made use of this.
"You have given him all you can, my dear, for the present," he said."Come away and rest, and--what is Dodo's phrase?--fill your pond again.You mustn't become exhausted; you will be so much wanted."
"And I may come back if Hughie wants me?" she asked.
That was easy to answer. If Hugh really wanted her, the difficultsituation solved itself. But there was one thing more.
"I don't suppose I need ask it," said Nadine, "but if Hughie gets worse,much worse, then I may come? I--I couldn't be there, then."
Jack kissed her.
"My dear girl," he said, "what do you take me for? An ogre? But we won'tthink about that at all. Please God, you will not come back for thatreason."
Nadine very rudely dried her eyes on his rough homespun sleeve.
"You are such a comfort, Papa," she said. "You're quite firm and strong,like--like a big wisdom-tooth. And when we are at Winston, will you letSeymour come down and see me if he wants to? And--and if he comes willyou come and interrupt us in half-an-hour? I've behaved horribly to him,but I can't help it, and it--that we weren't to be married, I mean--wasin the _Morning Post_ to-day, and it looked so horrible and cold. Butwhatever he wants to say to me, I think half-an-hour is sufficient. Iwonder--I wonder if you know why I behaved like such a pig."
"I think I might guess," said Jack.
"Then you needn't, because there's only one possible guess. So we'llassume that you know. What a nuisance women are to your poor,long-suffering sex. Especially girls."
Jack laughed.
"They are just as much a nuisance afterwards," said he. "Look at yourmother, how she is making life one perpetual martyrdom to me."
"But she used to be a nuisance to you, Papa Jack," said Nadine.
"There again you are wrong," he said. "I always loved her."
"And does that prevent one's being a nuisance?" asked Nadine. "Are yousure? Because if you are, you needn't interrupt Seymour quite so soon. Isaid half-an-hour, because I thought that would be time enough for himto tell me what a nuisance I was--"
"You're a heartless little baggage," observed Jack.
"Not quite," said Nadine.
"Well, you're an April day," said he, seeing the smile break through.
"And that is a doubtful compliment," said she. "But you are wrong if youthink I am not sorry for Seymour. Yet what was I to do, Papa Jack, whenI made The Discovery?"
"Well, you're not a heartless little baggage," conceded Jack, "but youhave taken your heart out of one piece of the baggage, and packed it inanother."
"Oh, la, la," said Nadine. "We mix our metaphors."
* * * * *
Nadine left with Jack in the motor soon after breakfast next morning. Ithad been settled that she should not tell Hugh she was going, until shesaid good-by to him, and when she went to his room next morning to doso, she found him still asleep, and the tall nurse entirely refused tohave him awakened.
"Much better for him to sleep than to say good-by," said this adamantinewoman. "When he wakes, he shall be told you have gone, if he asks."
"Of course he'll ask," said Nadine.
She paused a moment.
"Will you let me know if he doesn't?" she added.
Nurse Bryerley's grim capable face relaxed into a smile. She did notquite understand the situation, but she was quite content to do her bestfor her patient according to her lights.
"And shall I say that you'll be back soon?" she asked.
Nadine had no direct reply to this.
"Ah, do make him get well," she said.
"That's what I'm here for. And I will say that you'll be back soon,shall I, if he wants you?"
"Soon?" said Nadine. "That minute."
* * * * *
Hugh slept long that morning, and Dodo was not told he was awake andready to receive a morning call till the travelers had been gone acouple of hours. She had spent them in a pleasant atmosphere ofconscious virtue, engendered by the feeling that she had sent Jack awaywhen she would much have preferred his stopping here. But as Dodoexplained to Edith it took quite a little thing to make her feel good,whereas it took a lot to make her feel wicked.
"A nice morning, for instance," she said, "or sending my darling Jackaway because it's good for Nadine, or getting a postal-order. Quitelittle things like that make me feel a perfect saint. Whereas the powersof hell have to do their worst, as the hymn says, to make me feelwicked."
Edith gave a rather elaborate sigh. She had to sigh carefully becauseshe had a cigarette and a pen in her mouth, while she was scratching outa blot she had made on the score she was revising. So care was needed;otherwise cigarette and pen might have been shot from her mouth. Whenshe spoke her utterance was indistinct and mumbling.
"I suppose you infer that you are more at home in heaven than hell," shesaid, "since just a touch makes you feel a saint. I should say it wasthe other way about. You are so at home in the other place that the mostabysmal depths of infamy have to be presented to you before you knowthey are wicked at all, whereas you hail as divine the mostinfinitesimal distraction that breaks the monotonous round of vice.Perhaps I am expressing myself too strongly, but I feel strongly. Theworld is more high-colored to me than to other people."
"Darling, I never heard such a moderate and well-balanced statement,"said Dodo. "Do go on."
"I don't want to. But I thought your optimism about yourself was sickly,and wanted a--a dash of discouragement. But you and Nadine are both thesame: if you behave charmingly, you tell us to give the praise to you;if you behave abominably you say, 'I can't help it: it was Nature'sfault for making me like that.' Now I am not like that: whatever I do, Itake the responsibility, and say, 'I am I. Take me or leave me.' But Ihave no doubt that Nadine believes it has been _too_ wonderful of her tofall in love with Hugh. And when she jilts Seymour, she says 'Enquire atNature's Workshop; this firm is entirely independent.' Bah!"
Dodo laughed, but her laugh died rather quickly.
"Ah, don't be hard, Edith," she said. "We most of us want encouragementat times, and we have to encourage ourselves by making ourselves out asnice as we can. Otherwise we should look on the mess we make of thingsas a hopeless job. Perhaps it is hopeless but that is the one thing wemustn't allow. We are like"--Dodo paused for a simile--"we are likechildren to whom is given a quantity of lovely little squares of mosaic,and we know, our souls know, that they can be put together into the mostbeautiful patterns. And we begin fairly well, but then the devil comesalong, and jogs our elbow, and smashes it all up. Probably it is our ownstupidity, but it is more encouraging to say it is the devil or nature,something not ourselves. Good heavens, my elbow has jogged oftenenough! And when the pattern gets on well, we encourage ourselves bysaying, 'This is clever and good and wise Me doing it now!' And thenperhaps something very big and solemn comes our way, and we bow ourheads, and know it isn't ourselves at all."
Edith had finished erasing her blot, and was gathering her sheetstogether. She tapped them dramatically with an inky forefinger.
"This is big and solemn," she said. "But it's Me. The artist'sinspiration never comes from outside: it is always from within. I'mgoing to send it to have the band parts copied to-day."
At the moment the message came that Hugh received, and Dodo got up. Hehad received Edith one morning, but the effect was that he had eaten nolunch and had dozed uneasily all afternoon. Edith had been content withthe explanation that her vitality was too strong for him, and, whileready to give him another dose of it, did not press the matter; anyhow,she had other business on hand.
He lay propped up in bed, with a wad of pillows at his back. He lookedfar more alert and present than he had yet done. Hi
therto, he had beenslow to grasp the meaning of what was said to him, and he hardly evervolunteered a statement or question, but this morning he smiled andspoke with quite unusual quickness.
"Morning, Aunt Dodo," he said. "I'm awfully brisk to-day."
Nurse Bryerley put in a warning word.
"Don't be too brisk," she said. "Please don't let him be too brisk," sheadded, looking at Dodo.
"Hughie, dear, you do look better," she said; "but we'll all be quitecalm, and self-contained like flats."
Hugh frowned for a moment; then his face cleared again.
"I see," he said. "Bright, aren't I? Aunt Dodo, I have certainly woke upthis morning. You look real, do you know; before I was never quitecertain about you. You looked as if you might be a good forgery, butspurious. Have a cigarette, and why shouldn't I?"
"Wiser not," said Nurse Bryerley laconically.
Hugh's briskness did not seem to be entirely good-natured.
"How on earth could a cigarette hurt me?" he said. "Perhaps it would bewiser for Lady Chesterford not to smoke either. Aunt Dodo, you mustn'tsmoke. Wiser not."
Nurse Bryerley smiled with secret content.
"That's right, Mr. Graves," she said. "I like to see my patientsirritable. It always shows they are getting better."
"I should have thought you might have seen that without annoying me,"said Hugh.
"Well, well, I don't mind your having one cigarette to keep LadyChesterford company," said the nurse. "But you'll be disappointed."
Dodo took out her case as Nurse Bryerley left the room. "Here you are,Hughie," she said.
Hugh lit one, and blew a cloud of smoke through his nostrils.
"Are they quite fresh, Aunt Dodo?" he said.
"Yes, dear, quite. Doesn't it taste right?"
"Yes, delicious," said Hugh, absolutely determined not to find itdisappointing. "I say, what a sunny morning!"
"Is it too much in your eyes?"
"It is rather. Will you ask Nurse Bryerley to pull the blind down? Whyshould you?"
"Chiefly, dear, because it isn't any trouble."
Dodo pulled down the blind too far on the first attempt to be pleasing,not far enough on the second. Hugh felt she was very clumsy.
"Isn't Nadine coming to see me this morning?" he asked. "But I daresayshe is tired of sitting with me every day."
Dodo came back to her chair by the bed again.
"She went off with Jack to Winston this morning," she said. "Just for achange. She was very much tired and overdone. You've been a fearfulanxiety to her, you dear bad boy."
Hugh put his cigarette down and shut his mouth, as if firmly determinednever to speak again.
"She came in to say good-by to you," she said, "but you were asleep andthey didn't want to wake you."
There was still dead silence on Hugh's part.
"It was only settled she should go yesterday," she continued, "and shehad to be persuaded. But Jack wanted one of us, and, as I say, she wasvery much overdone. Now I'm not the least overdone. So I stopped. But Iwish she could have seen how much more yourself you were when you woketo-day."
At length Hugh spoke.
"What is the use of telling me that sort of tale?" he said. "She isgoing to be married to Seymour in a few days. She has gone away forthat. I suppose in some cold-blooded way she thought it better to sneakoff without telling me. No doubt it was very tactful of her."
Dodo turned round towards him.
"No, Hughie, you are quite wrong," she said. "Nadine is not going tomarry Seymour at all."
Hugh lifted his right hand, and examined it cursorily. A long cut, nowquite healed, ran up the length of his forefinger.
"I see," he said. "She said she would marry Seymour in order to get ridof me, and now that I have been got rid of in other ways, she has nofurther use for him. Isn't that it?"
His face had become quite white, and the hand with the healed woundtrembled so violently that the bed shook.
"No, that is not it," said Dodo quietly. "And don't be so nervous andfidgety, my dear."
Suddenly the trembling ceased.
"Aunt Dodo, if it is not that, what is it?" he asked, in a voice thatwould have melted Rhadamanthus.
She turned a shining face on him, and laid her hand on his.
"Oh, Hughie, lie still and get well," she said. "And then ask Nadineherself. She will come back when you want her. She told Nurse Bryerleyto tell you so, if you asked."
Hugh moved across his other hand, so that Dodo's lay between his.
"I must ask you one more thing," he said. "Is it because of me in anyway that she chucked Seymour? I entreat you to say 'no' if it is 'no.'"
"I can't say 'no,'" said Dodo.
Hugh drew one long sobbing breath.
"It's mere pity then," he said. "Nadine always liked me, and she wasalways impulsive like that. I daresay she won't marry him till I'mbetter, if I am ever better. She will wait till I am strong enough toenjoy it thoroughly."
Dodo interrupted him.
"Hughie, don't say bitter and untrue things like that," she said. "Anddon't feel them. She is not going to marry Seymour, either now orafterwards."
Once again Hugh was silent, and after an interval Dodo spoke, diviningexactly what was in his irritable convalescent mind.
"I have never deceived you before, Hughie," she said, "and you have noright to distrust me now. I am telling you the truth. I also tell youthe truth when I say you must get bitter thoughts out of your mind. Ah,my dear, it is not always easy. There's a beast within each of us."
"There's a beast within me," said Hugh.
"And there's a dear brave fellow whom I am so proud of," said Dodo.
Hugh's lip quivered, but there was a quality in his silence as differentfrom that which had gone before, as there was between his callings forNadine on the night when she fought death for him.
"And now that's enough," said Dodo. "Shall I read to you, Hughie, orshall I leave you for the present?"
He held her hand a moment longer.
"I think I will lie still and--and think," he said.
"Good luck to your fishing, dear," said she, rising.
"Good luck to your fishing?" he said. "It's on a picture. Small boyfishing, kneeling in the waves."
Dodo beat a strategic retreat.
"Is it?" she said.
But it seemed to Hugh that her voice lacked the blank enquiry tone ofignorance.
Hugh settled himself a little lower down on his backing of pillows,after Dodo had left him, and tried to arrange his mind, so that thetopics that concerned it stood consecutively. But Dodo's last remark,which certainly should have stood last also in his reflections, kept onshouldering itself forward. She had wished him "good luck to hisfishing," and he could not bring himself to believe that, consciously orunconsciously, there was not in her mind a certain picture, of a littlewinged boy, kneeling in the waves, who dropped a red line into theunquiet sea. He could not, and did not try to remember the painter, butcertainly the picture had been at some exhibition which he and Nadinehad attended together. A little winged boy.... The title was printedafter the number in the catalogue.
Nadine was not to marry Seymour now or afterwards.... There came a blackspeck again over his thoughts. He himself had been got rid of by thiscrippling accident, and now she had expunged Seymour also. 'And thoughshe saw all heaven in flower above, she would not love.' The lines cameinto his mind without any searching for them; for the moment he couldnot remember where he had heard them. And then memory began to awake.
Hitherto, he had not been able to recall anything of the day or two thatpreceded his catastrophe. A few of the immediate events before it he hadnever forgotten. He remembered Nadine calling out, "No Hugh, not you,"he remembered her cry of "Well done"; he remembered that he had toppledin on that line of toppling waters with a small boy on his back. But nowa fresh line of memory had been awakened: some connection in his brainhad been restored, and he remembered their quarrel and reconciliation onthe day the gale be
gan; how she had said, "Oh, Hughie, if only I lovedyou!" Soon after came the portentous advent of the wind, with theblotting out of the sun, and the transformation of the summer sea.
He heard with unspeakable irritation the entry of Nurse Bryerley. Thatseemed an unwarrantable intrusion, for he felt as if he had been alonewith Nadine, and now this assiduous grenadier broke in upon them with ahundred fidgety offices to perform. She restored to him a fallen pillow,she closed a window through which a breeze was blowing rather freely,she brought him a cup of chicken-broth. It seemed an eternity before sheasked him if he was comfortable, and made her long-delayed exit. Eventhen she reminded him that the doctor was due in half-an-hour.
But for half-an-hour he would be alone now, and for the first time sincehis accident he found that he wanted to think. Hitherto his mind had satvacant, like an idle passenger who sees without observation or interestthe transit of the country. But Dodo's visit this morning and hercommunications to him had made life appear a thing that once moreconcerned him; till now it was but a manoeuver taking place round him,but outside him. Now the warmth of it reached him again, and began tocirculate through him. And what she had told him was being blown out, asit were, in his brain, even as a lather of soapsuds is blown out into aniridescent bubble, on which gleam all the hues of sunset and moonriseand rainbow. The rainbow was not one of the vague dreams in which,lately, his mind had moved; it was a real thing, not receding but comingnearer to him, blown towards him by some steady breeze, not idly vagrantin the effortless air. Should it break on his heart, not intonothingness, but into the one white light out of which the sum of alllights and colors is made?
He could not doubt that it was this which Dodo meant. Nadine had thrownover Seymour and that concerned him. And then swift as the coming of thestorm which they had seen together, came the thought, clear and preciseas the rows of thunder-clouds, that for all he knew a barrier foreverimpenetrable lay between them. For he could never offer to her acripple; the same pride that had refused to let him take an intimateplace beside her after she, by her acceptance of Seymour, had definitelyrejected him, forbade him, without possibility of discussion, to let hertie herself to him, unless he could stand sound and whole beside her. Hemust be competent in brain and bone and body to be Nadine's husband. Andfor that as yet he had no guarantee.
Since his accident he had not up till now cared to know precisely whathis injuries were, nor whether he could ever completely recover fromthem. The concussion of the brain had quenched all curiosity, andinterest not only in things external to him, but in himself, and he hadreceived the assurance that he was going on very well with the unconcernthat we feel for remote events. But now his thoughts flew back fromNadine and clustered round himself. He felt that he must know hischances, the best or the worst ... and yet he dreaded to know, for hecould live for a little in a paradise by imagining that he would getcompletely well, instead of in a shattered ruin which the knowledge ofthe worst would strew round him.
But this morning the energy of life which for those two weeks had laindormant in him, began to stir again. He wanted. It seemed to him but afew moments since his nurse left him that Dr. Cardew came in. He saw theflushed face and brightened eyes of his patient, and after an enquiryor two took out the thermometer which he had not used for days, andtested Hugh's temperature. He put it back again in its nickel case witha smile.
"Well, it's not any return of fever, anyhow," he said. "Do you feeldifferent in any way this morning?"
"Yes. I want to get well."
"Highly commendable," said Dr. Cardew.
Hugh fingered the bed-clothes in sudden agitation.
"I want to know if I shall get well," he said. "I don't mean half well,in a Bath-chair, but quite well. And I want to know what my injurieswere."
Dr. Cardew looked at him a moment without speaking. But it was perfectlyclear that this fresh color and eagerness in Hugh's face was but thelamp of life burning brighter. There was no reason that he should notknow what he asked, now that he cared to know.
"You broke your hip-bone," he said. "You also had very severe concussionof the brain. There were a quantity of little injuries."
"Oh, tell me the best and the worst of it quickly," said Hugh withimpatience.
"I can tell you nothing for certain for a few days yet about thefracture. There is no reason why it should not mend perfectly. Andto-day for the first time I am not anxious about the other."
Quite suddenly Hugh put his hands before his face and broke into apassion of weeping.