Notwithstanding Part 17

Roger smiled indulgently. Annette's gross ignorance of country-life did not pain him. It seemed as much part of her as a certain little curl on the white nape of her neck.

Down the lane a child's voice came singing--

"If I could 'ave the one I love, 'Ow 'appy I should be!"

"That's Charlie Nokes," said Roger, feeling he ought to go, and singularly disinclined to move, and casting about for a little small-talk to keep him under this comfortable apple tree. "His father used to sing that song at Harvest Homes before he took to the drink.

Jesse Nokes. He's dead now. He and my cousin d.i.c.k, the present squire, used to get into all kinds of sc.r.a.pes together when they were boys. I've seen them climb up that vine and hide behind the chimney-stack when Uncle John was looking for them with his whip. They might have broken their necks, but they never thought of that. Poor Jesse! He's dead. And d.i.c.k's dying."

It was the first time Roger had ever spoken to her of the present owner of Hulver, the black sheep of the family, of whose recklessness and folly she had heard many stories from his foster-mother, Mrs. Nicholls.

Janey, in spite of their intimacy, never mentioned him.

And partly because he wanted to remain under the apple tree, partly because he was fond of Janey, and partly because a change of listeners is grateful to the masculine mind, Roger talked long about his two cousins, Janey and d.i.c.k Manvers: of her courage and unselfishness, and what a pity it was that she had not been the eldest son of the house.

And then he told her a little of the havoc d.i.c.k was making of his inheritance and of the grief he had caused his mother, and what, according to Roger, mattered still more, to Janey.

"Janey loved d.i.c.k," he said, "and I was fond of him myself. Everybody was fond of him. You couldn't help liking d.i.c.k. There was something very taking about him. Can't say what it was, but one felt it. But it seems as if those taking people sometimes wear out all their takingness before they die, spend it all like money, so that at last there is nothing left for the silly people that have been so fond of them and stuck so long to them. d.i.c.k is like that. He's worn us all out, every one, even Janey.

And now he's dying. I'm afraid there's no one left to care much--except, of course----"

He stopped short.

"I've just been to see him in Paris," he went on. "Didn't you live in Paris at one time? I wonder if you ever came across him?"

Annette shook her head.

"I never met a Mr. Manvers that I know of."

"But he dropped the Manvers when he started his racing-stables. He had the decency to do that. He always went by his second name, Le Geyt."

"_Le Geyt?_"

"Yes; d.i.c.k Le Geyt. Lady Louisa's mother was a Le Geyt of Noyes, you know, the last of the line. She married Lord Stour, as his second wife, and had no son. So her daughter, Lady Louisa, inherited Noyes."

"d.i.c.k Le Geyt?"

"Yes. Did you ever meet him? But I don't suppose you did. d.i.c.k never went among the kind of people you would be likely to a.s.sociate with."

Annette was silent for a moment, and then said--

"Yes, I have met him. I used to see him sometimes at my father's cabaret." She saw he did not know what a cabaret was, and she added, "My father keeps a public-house in the Rue du Bac." Roger was so astonished that he did not perceive that Annette had experienced a shock.

"Your father!" he said. "A publican!"

"He was a courier first," she said, speaking with difficulty, like one stunned but forcing herself to attend to some trivial matter. "That was how my mother met him. And after her death he set up a little drinking-shop, and married again--a woman in his own cla.s.s of life. I lived with them for a year, till--last September."

"Good Lord!" said Roger, and he said no more. He could only look at Annette in sheer astonishment. The daughter of a publican! He was deeply perturbed. The apple tree had quite ceased to be comfortable. He got slowly to his feet, and said he must be going. She bade him "good-bye"

absently, and he walked away, thinking that no other woman in Lows.h.i.+re would have let him go after four o'clock without offering him a cup of tea.

Just when she thought he was really gone she found he had come back and was standing before her.

"Miss Georges," he began, awkwardly enough, "I dare say I have no business to offer advice, but you don't seem to know country-life very well. Never seen hay in c.o.c.k before, I think you mentioned. So perhaps you would not think it cheek of me if I said anything."

"About the hay?"

"No, no. About what you've just told me."

"About my father keeping a public-house?"

"Yes. None of my business,"--he had become plum colour,--"but----"

She looked blankly at him. She felt unable to give him sufficient attention to help him out. He had to flounder on without a.s.sistance.

"If you mentioned that fact to anyone like Miss Black, it would go the round of the parish in no time."

"Would that matter?"

Roger was nonplussed for a moment. Her ignorance was colossal.

"Some things are better not talked about," he said. "I have been telling you of poor d.i.c.k, but there were things in _his_ life that were better not talked about, so I did not mention them."

His words transfixed her. Was it possible that he was warning her that he was aware of her adventure with d.i.c.k? At any rate, she gave him her full attention now.

She raised her eyes to his and looked searchingly at him. And she saw with a certainty that nothing could shake, that he knew nothing, that he was only trying to save her from a petty annoyance.

"The Miss Nevills have always been very close about your father," he added. "You can ask them, but I think you would find they wouldn't be much pleased if his--profession was known down here. It might vex them.

So many vexatious things in this world that can't be helped, aren't there? And if there are any that _can_, so much the better. That was all I came back to say. I should not volunteer it, if I were you. It seemed to drop out so naturally that I thought you might have said the same to Miss Black."

"Certainly I might. I do hate concealments of any kind." Annette spoke with conviction.

"So do I," said Roger whole-heartedly. "I've hushed up too many scrawls not to hate them. But this isn't a concealment. It's--it's--you see, Miss Black _does_ run round with her tongue out and no mistake, and Uncle John's advice when I settled down here as his agent was, 'Never say more than you must.' So I just pa.s.s it on to you, now that you've settled down at Riff too."

And Roger departed for the second time. She watched him go, and a minute later heard him ride out of the courtyard.

She sat quite still where he had left her, gazing in front of her, so motionless that the birds, disturbed by Roger's exodus, resumed possession of the gra.s.s-plot at once.

The plebeian sparrows came hopping clumsily as if they were made of wood, propped up by their stiff tails. A bulging thrush with wide speckled waistcoat hastened up and down, throwing out his wing each time he darted forward. A thin water-wagtail came walking with quick steps, and exquisite tiny movements of head and neck and long balancing tail. A baby-wagtail, brown and plump and voracious, bustled after it, shouting, "More! More!" the instant after its overworked, partially bald parent had stuffed a billful down its yellow throat.

Annette looked with wide eyes at the old dim house with its latticed windows and the vine across it--the vine which d.i.c.k had climbed as a lad.

d.i.c.k was Mr. Manvers of Hulver.

The baby-wagtail bolted several meals, fluttering its greedy little wings, while Annette said to herself over and over again, half stupefied--

"d.i.c.k is Mr. Manvers. d.i.c.k is Janey's brother."

She was not apprehensive by nature, but gradually a vague alarm invaded her. She must tell Mrs. Stoddart at once. What would Mrs. Stoddart say?

What would she do? With a slow sinking of the heart, Annette realized that that practical and cautious woman would probably insist on her leaving Riff. Tears came into her eyes at the thought. Was it then unalloyed bliss to live with the Miss Nevills, or was there some other subtle influence at work which made the thought of leaving Riff intolerable? Annette did not ask herself that question. She remembered with a pang her two friends Janey and Roger, and the Miss Blinketts, and Mrs. Nicholls, and her Sunday-school cla.s.s, and the choir. And she looked at the mignonette she had sown, and the unfinished annuals, and the sweet peas which she had raised in the frame, and which would be out in another fortnight.

She turned and put her arms round the little old apple tree, and pressed her face against the bark.