The Daughter Pays Part 39

It was as they approached Bignor that Gerald said:

"As soon as Baines has set us down he is going to run the car into Chichester and back. I am expecting a man down for a couple of nights from town, and I told him to come to Chichester, because I thought we could pick him up from thence more easily. Baines will run there in no time--'tisn't more than twelve or fifteen miles each way, and he can fill up his petrol-tank there. He'll be back by the time we have done our sightseeing."

"Bringing the man with him?" she asked, in evident disappointment.

"Yes. By the way, it's a friend of yours--Mr. Ferris, from Perley Hatch."

"_What!_" cried Virgie, with so sharp an accent of dislike that he was startled.

"Don't you like him? I thought they were friends of yours--they spoke most warmly of you," he began awkwardly.

"Oh, his wife is all right, but he--do you know, Gerald, I think he is odious," said she warmly. "It will just spoil our day, having him with us! What a pity!"

"Have I put my foot into it? You don't know how sorry I am," said Gerald warmly. "I wouldn't have done it for worlds; but I didn't like him to come down and spend the evening alone in Worthing. I thought we could dine at Pulborough, and go home at leisure by moonlight."

"Well, promise me one thing--you won't sit in front with Baines and leave me behind with him, will you?" she begged. "I really couldn't bear that. You don't know what an outsider he is."

He was fervent in his protestations that she should not be left to the society of the das.h.i.+ng Percy. He was a good deal put out by her evident distaste of the whole arrangement. He had never heard her speak so decidedly about any one in her life as she expressed herself with regard to Ferris.

The talk was put a stop to by their arrival in the narrow lane where a small finger-post announced: "This way to the Roman Villa."

They paused, alighted; Gerald put a wrap over his arm for her, gave his final instructions to Baines, and the car hurried on to the forge, where the width of the road permitted it to turn and run back along the lane by which they had come.

"He will be out on the high road in two or three miles, and then he can let her rip," said Gerald; "but he can't be back for an hour, so we will take things easy."

They leisurely ascended the gra.s.sy field which leads to the carefully covered-in and precious pavements.

Then for a while Virgie forgot everything in the delight of examining this wonderful relic of a bygone civilisation. The sweet-faced, elderly lady who is custodian of the place, and speaks of it with reverence and fervour which are infectious, warmed towards the beauty and enthusiasm of this visitor. She showed her all that was to be seen, and explained each small detail of plan and execution. Virgie reconstructed in her own mind the entire existence of the wealthy officials, exiled from all that const.i.tuted their world, and cast away among these barbarian British in a fold of the Suss.e.x hills, far, as it seemed, from all communication with their kind. Then, pointing across the valley to the romantic swell of the southern Downs, the custodian told how Stane Street, the great Roman highway, had crossed the hills from Chichester, just opposite where they stood. The Roman n.o.ble's sentinels must have seen every figure, every horseman, as he topped the rise, and have kept him in sight as he approached, the whole way into the valley. All gone!

Even the semblance of the track wiped out! It would be ten miles before Baines would strike the still surviving section of the Roman road.

The hour was nearly expired when they had seen all, and they strolled away to find somewhere to sit down until the car's return. Finally they sat upon the gra.s.s, Gerald's raincoat under them, near the lane, and watched the sunset fade from the sky.

Gerald reverted to the coming of Ferris, and said how sorry he was to have made so stupid a plan. Virgie answered with impulsive penitence.

She could not think how she came to be so disagreeable about a trifle--when he had given her this glorious day, and shown her such grand things, when she owed all her pleasure to him. She felt ashamed of herself.

"I am so glad to have seen this," she said with unconscious pathos. "It has done me good. The thought of all that life and energy, here where even the memory has pa.s.sed away, the quiet to which it has gone back--the disappearance of the great road, have brought home to me what a little thing one human life is. We walk in a vain shadow and disquiet ourselves in vain. I mean suffering, and being what we call unhappy, matters so little when you think how soon it will be over. That helps one to bear things."

Her eyes, misty with regret, were fixed upon the amphitheatre of rolling downs and on the green, rabbit-run turf, where once the busy highway swarmed with traffic.

He leaned towards her and spoke softly. "Thank you, dear, for trying to comfort me. I am trying to bear things, as you put it--I truly am. Most particularly because I know they are all my own fault. But I have to own that your thought brings me very little comfort. Here are you and here am I, alive and warm, wanting to enjoy our little day. The knowledge that, five centuries hence, n.o.body will ever have heard our names, does nothing to still my craving."

She looked at him dumbly, and her lip quivered.

"You didn't surely mean--you can't have meant that it is you--_you_ who have to bear things?" he added in a hurried, choky whisper.

For the first time he saw panic in her eyes. She was staring into his as though fascinated. He could almost _see_ the hasty clutch of her will upon her tongue, to prevent her making any admission.

"n.o.body," she said, almost inaudibly, "has more to bear than they deserve--more than they can carry; but every one has something--something, don't you think?"

He mercilessly held her gaze. "If I were to tell you what I think of you," he began; and she made a little motion with her hand.

"No, don't. Please don't. Because it really does comfort me to feel that I am only a grain of sand upon the sh.o.r.e of time, and that soon I shall be swept away. Only one thing matters, and that is, to have done one's best while one was here. Sometimes it seems hard, but one has to go on, one has to keep on trying. Don't you agree--oh, you must agree--that everybody has something to bear?"

"I think," he muttered savagely, "that you have always been made to bear too much. All the burdens of the whole family have rested on your little, tender shoulders. It is time that you were freed----"

"No," she cried quickly, sharply, "that is the one thing I can never be! I have tied myself, and no human power can release me now."

Even as Gerald's blood leapt with the throb of triumph, he realised how careful he must be not to let her see the admission she had just made.

The thing which he might safely say sprang into his mind as by inspiration. "There is such a thing as spiritual freedom, Virgie," he softly murmured. "Don't forget that liberty is a thing n.o.body can really take from you."

She turned a radiant face to him, and broke into a smile. "Oh, Gerald, how lovely! How fine of you to say that! Yes, it is so. You are right.

I shall remember that always, and that it was you who said it."

"Because I am your friend," he continued steadily, knowing himself upon the right road. "Remember always that I am your friend, and that I have a right to your spiritual freedom. If ever you should be in trouble or difficulty, you will think of our friends.h.i.+p, won't you? Think of this perfect day, and how we have been together in pure friends.h.i.+p and mutual confidence. You trust me, don't you, Virgie?"

"I should think so." She gave her hand, impulsively, and as he held it--soft, warm, and ungloved--he wondered how much more of this he could stand. She hesitated, as if she wanted to say something, and dared not. At last: "You don't want words, do you, Gerald? You understand?" she faltered.

"Yes." The word was gulped. He lifted her hand, kissed it, laid it upon her knee, and rose hurriedly. Baines had been gone nearly two hours.

"Something has delayed the car," he remarked, coming back to her, watch in hand. "I wonder what we had better do? It is getting late--you will want some dinner."

"Oh, no, I have had a very good tea," she answered calmly, "but we shall be cold if we sit here much longer."

He went into the lane and looked up and down. Then he returned again.

"I wonder if the kind old lady would let you sit in her parlour while I go and reconnoitre?" he suggested. "We might go off together somewhere and get some dinner, while I station a sentry here to warn Baines where to find us? I am afraid we are a good way from anything in the way of food, but I may as well inquire."

This was agreed upon, and Virgie settled herself in a tiny parlour, full of furniture, while Gerald disappeared. She kept her ears strained for the humming of the car, but no such sound broke the pastoral silence of the remote spot. She began to wonder what they really would do should the car have broken down, for she knew that her own powers of walking were very limited, in spite of her immensely improved health.

Half an hour pa.s.sed slowly, and then Gerald returned.

"There is apparently an inn of sorts at Dilvington, but a very poor one. I suppose they could give some fried ham and potatoes. That would be better than nothing, wouldn't it?"

"How far is it?"

He studied the map. "Inside a mile."

"I think I can do that if we walk slowly."

He looked taken aback. "I say! I forgot how little you can walk!"

"Oh, I can walk a mile, but I could not do much more."

"No, by Jove, I suppose you could not. I hope I am not going to knock you up. What an a.s.s I was to trouble about Ferris!"

She smiled bravely, and said it would be all right. The weather was lovely. Gerald laughed uncomfortably. A flurry of rain was coming up slowly from the southwest, across the heave of the downs.

They left word at the custodian's house and also at the forge, as to the direction they had taken, and walked off towards Dilvington.

Virgie came along quite bravely, but before they reached the little roadside "public" the rain had begun to fall.