Delia Blanchflower Part 4

Yours faithfully, "DELIA BLANCHFLOWER."

A few days later, after long interviews with some very meticulous solicitors, a gentleman, very much in doubt as to what his reception would be, took train for Maumsey and the New Forest, with a view to making as soon as possible a first call upon his ward.

Chapter III

"We ought soon to see the house."

The speaker bent forward, as the train, sweeping round a curve, emerged from some thick woods Into a s.p.a.ce of open country. It was early September and a sleepy autumnal suns.h.i.+ne lay upon the fields. The Stubbles just reaped ran over the undulations of the land in silky purples and gold; the blue smoke from the cottages and farms hung poised in mid air; the eye could hardly perceive any movement in the clear stream beside the line, as it slipped noiselessly by over its sandy bed; it seemed a world where "it was always afternoon"; and the only breaks in its sunny silence came from the occasional coveys of partridges that rose whirring from the harvest-fields as the train pa.s.sed.

Delia Blanchflower looked keenly at the English scene, so strange to her after many years of Colonial and foreign wandering. She thought, but did not say--"Those must be my fields--and my woods, that we have just pa.s.sed through. Probably I rode about them with Grandpapa. I remember the pony--and the horrid groom I hated!" Quick the memory returned of a tiny child on a rearing pony, alone with a sulky groom, who, out of his master's sight, could not restrain his temper, and struck the pony savagely and repeatedly over the head, to an accompaniment of oaths; frightening out of her wits the little girl who sat clinging to the creature's neck. And next she saw herself marching in erect--a pale-faced thing of six, with a heart of fury,--to her grandfather, to demand justice on the offender. And grandpapa had done her bidding then as always; the groom was dismissed that day. It was only grandmamma who had ever tried to manage or thwart her; result, perpetual war, decided often for the time by the brute force at command of the elder, but ever renewed. Delia's face flamed again as she thought of the most humiliating incident of her childhood; when Grandmamma, unable, to do anything with her screaming and stamping self, had sent in despair for a stalwart young footman, and ordered him to "carry Miss Delia up to the nursery." Delia could still feel herself held, wriggling and shrieking face downwards, under the young man's strong arm, unable either to kick or to scratch, while Grandmamma half fearful, half laughing, watched the dire ascent from the bottom of the stairs.

"Male tyranny--my first taste of it!" thought Delia, smiling at herself. "It was fated then that I should be a militant."

She looked across at her friend and travelling companion, half inclined to tell the story; but the sight of Gertrude Marvell's att.i.tude and expression checked the trivial reminiscence on her lips.

"Are you tired?" she said, laying her hand on the other's knee.

"Oh, no. Only thinking."

"Thinking of what?"--

"Of all there is to do."--

A kind of flash pa.s.sed from one face to the other, Delia's eyes darkly answering. They looked at each other for a little, as though in silent conversation, and then Delia turned again to the landscape outside.

Yes, there was the house, its long, irregular line with the village behind it. She could not restrain a slight exclamation as she caught sight of it, and her friend opposite turned interrogatively.

"What did you say?"

"Nothing--only there's the Abbey. I don't suppose I've seen it since I was twelve."

The other lady put up an eye-gla.s.s and looked where Miss Blanchflower pointed; but languidly, as though it were an effort to shake herself free from pre-occupying ideas. She was a woman of about thirty-five, slenderly made, with a sallow, regular face, and good, though short-sighted eyes. The eyes were dark, so was the hair, the features delicate. Under the black shady hat, the hair was very closely and neatly coiled. The high collar of the white blouse, fitting tightly to the slender neck, the coat and skirt of blue serge without ornament of any kind, but well cut, emphasized the thinness, almost emaciation, of the form. Her att.i.tude, dress, and expression conveyed the idea of something amazingly taut and ready--like a s.h.i.+p cleared for action. The body with its clothing seemed to have been simplified as much as possible, so as to become the mere instrument of the will which governed it. No superfluity whatever, whether of flesh on her small bones, or of a single unnecessary b.u.t.ton, fold, or tr.i.m.m.i.n.g on her dress, had Gertrude Marvell ever allowed herself for many years. The general effect was in some way formidable; though why the neat precision of the little lady should convey any notion of this sort, it would not at first sight have been easy to say.

"How old did you say it is?"--she asked, after examining the distant building, which could be now plainly seen from the train across a stretch of green park.

"Oh, the present building is nothing--a pseudo-Gothic monstrosity, built about 1830," laughed Delia; "but there are some old remains and foundations of the abbey. It is a big, rambling old place, and I should think dreadfully in want of doing up. My grandfather was a bit of a miser, and though he was quite rich, he never spent a penny he could help."

"All the better. He left the more for other people to spend." Miss Marvell smiled--a slight, and rather tired smile, which hardly altered the face.

"Yes, if they are allowed to spend it!" said Delia, with a shrug. "Oh well, anyway the house must be done up--painted and papered and that kind of thing. A trustee has got to see that things of that sort are kept in order, I suppose. But it won't have anything to do with me, except that for decency's sake, no doubt, he'll consult me. I shall be allowed to choose the wall-papers I suppose!"

"If you want to," said the other drily.

Delia's brows puckered.

"We shall have to spend some time here, you know, Gertrude! We may as well have something to do."

"Nothing that might entangle us, or take too much of our thoughts,"

said Miss Marvell, gently, but decidedly.

"I'm afraid I like furnis.h.i.+ng," said Delia, not without a shade of defiance.

"And I object--because I know you do. After all--you understand as well as I do that _every day_ now is important. There are not so many of us, Delia! If you're going to do real work, you can't afford to spend your time or thoughts on doing up a shabby house."

There was silence a moment. Then Delia said abruptly--"I wonder when that man will turn up? What a fool he is to take it on!"

"The guardians.h.i.+p? Yes, he hardly knows what he's in for." A touch of grim amus.e.m.e.nt shewed itself for a moment in Miss Marvell's quiet face.

"Oh, I daresay he knows. Perhaps he relies on what everyone calls his 'influence.' Nasty, sloppy word--nasty sloppy thing! Whenever I'm 'influenced,' I'm degraded!" The young shoulders straightened themselves fiercely.

"I don't know. It has its uses," said the other tranquilly.

Delia laughed radiantly.

"O well--if one can make the kind of weapon of it you do. I don't mean of course that one shouldn't be rationally persuaded. But that's a different thing. 'Influence' makes me think of canting clergymen, and stout pompous women, who don't know what they're talking about, and can't argue--who think they've settled everything by a stale quotation--or an appeal to 'your better self'--or St. Paul. If Mr.

Winnington tries it on with 'influence'--we'll have some fun."

Delia returned to her window. The look her companion bent upon her was not visible to her. It was curiously detached--perhaps slightly ironical.

"I'm wondering what part I shall play in the first interview!" said Miss Marvell, after a pause. "I represent the first stone in Mr.

Winnington's path. He will of course do his best to put me out of it."

"How can he?" cried Delia ardently. "What can he do? He can't send for the police and turn you out of the house. At least I suppose he could, but he certainly won't. The last thing a gentleman of his sort wants is to make a scandal. Every one says, after all, that he is a nice fellow!"--the tone was unconsciously patronising--"It isn't his fault if he's been placed in this false position. But the great question for me is--how are we going to manage him for the best?"

She leant forward, her chin on her hands, her sparkling eyes fixed on her friend's face.

"The awkward thing is"--mused Miss Marvell--"that there is so little _time_ in which to manage him. If the movement were going on at its old slow pace, one might lie low, try diplomacy, avoid alarming him, and so forth. But we've no time for that. It is a case of blow on blow--action on action--and the publicity is half the battle."

"Still, a little management there must be, to begin with!--because I--we--want money, and he holds the purse-strings. Hullo, here's the station!"

She jumped up and looked eagerly out of the window.

"They've sent a fly for us. And there's the station-master on the lookout. How it all comes back to me!"

Her flushed cheek showed a natural excitement. She was coming back as its mistress to a house where she had been happy as a child, which she had not seen for years. Thoughts of her father, as he had been in the old days before any trouble had arisen between them, came rus.h.i.+ng through her mind--tender, regretful thoughts--as the train came slowly to a standstill.

But the entire indifference or pa.s.sivity of her companion restrained her from any further expression. The train stopped, and she descended to the platform of a small country station, alive apparently with traffic and pa.s.sengers.

"Miss Blanchflower?" said a smiling station-master, whose countenance seemed to be trying to preserve the due mean between welcome to the living and condolence for the dead, as, hat in hand, he approached the newcomers, and guided by her deep mourning addressed himself to Delia.

"Why, Mr. Stebbing, I remember you quite well," said Delia, holding out her hand. "There's my maid--and I hope there's a cart for the luggage.

We've got a lot."

A fair-haired man in spectacles, who had also just left the train, turned abruptly and looked hard at the group as he pa.s.sed them. He hesitated a moment, then pa.s.sed on, with a curious swinging gait, a long and shabby over-coat floating behind him--to speak to the porter who was collecting tickets at the gate opening on the road beyond.