A Singer from the Sea Part 11

She sat down in the small reception-room into which she had been shown and waited. She heard Elizabeth and her husband go through the hall together, and the pleasant odours of coffee and broiled meats certified to the serving of breakfast. But no one came near her. As the minutes slipped away her wonder became anger; and she was resolving to leave the inhospitable house when she heard Roland's step. He came slowly down the polished oak stairs, went to the front door, opened it and looked out into the frosty day; then turning rapidly in from the cold, he went whistling softly through the hall to the breakfast-room.

Just as he entered the footman was saying: "A young person, ma'am. She had no card, and when I asked her name she only looked at me, ma'am."

"Where did you put her?" asked Elizabeth.

"In the small reception-room."

"Is the room warm?"

"Not very cold, ma'am."

At this point Robert Burrell looked at his wife and said: "It is perhaps that little friend of yours, called Denas."

"Jove!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Roland. "I should not wonder. You know, Elizabeth, she was always an early visitor. Shall I go and see?"

"Frederick will go. Frederick, ask the young person her name." In a few moments Frederick returned and said, "Miss Penelles is the name."

Then Robert Burrell and Roland both looked at Elizabeth. She had a momentary struggle with herself; she hesitated, her brows made themselves into a point, her colour heightened, and the dead silence gave her a most eloquent chance to listen to her own heart. She rose with leisurely composure and left the room. Mr. Burrell and Roland took no notice of the movement. Mr. Burrell had his watch in his hand; Roland was directing Frederick as to the particular piece of fowl he wanted. Then there was a little laugh and the sound of voices, and Elizabeth and Denas entered together. Elizabeth had made Denas remove her hat and cloak, and the girl was exceedingly pretty. Roland leaped to his feet and imperatively motioned Frederick to place a chair beside his own, and Robert Burrell met her with a frank kindness which was pleasantly rea.s.suring.

Denas had been feeling wronged and humiliated, but Elizabeth by a few kind words of apology had caused a reaction which affected her inexperienced guest with a kind of mental intoxication. Her countenance glowed, her eyes sparkled, her hair appeared to throw off light; her ruby-coloured dress with its edges of white lace accentuated the marvellous colouring of her cheeks and lips, the snow-white of her wide brows and slender throat, and the intense blue of eyes that had caught the brightest tone of sea and sky.

She talked well, she was witty without being ill-natured, and she described all that had happened in the little town since Elizabeth's wedding-day with a subdued and charming mimicry that made the room ring with laughter. Also, she ate her breakfast with such evident enjoyment that she gave an appet.i.te to the others. All took an extra cup of coffee with her, and it seemed only a part of the general conversation and delightful intercourse.

After breakfast Robert Burrell said he would delay his visit to London for a train if Denas would sing for him once more; and they went together to the parlour, and Roland fell at once into the rocking measure of Robert's favourite, and in the middle of a bar Denas joined her voice to it, and they went together as the wind goes through the trees or the song of the water through its limpid flow.

As she finished, Roland looked at her with a certain intelligence in his eyes, and then struck a few wild, startling chords. They proved to be the basis of a sea-chant. Denas heard them with a quick movement of her head and an involuntary though slight movement of the hands, as she cried out in a musical cadence:

"Here beginneth the sea, That ends not until the world ends.

Blow, westerly wind, for me!

When the wind and the tide are friends, Westerly wind and little white star, Safe are the fishermen over the bar."

She would sing no more when the chant was finished. She had seen a look on Elizabeth's face, not intended for her to see, which took the music out of her heart. Yet she had sung enough, for she had never before sung so well. She was astonished at her own power, and Robert Burrell thanked her with a sincerity beyond question.

"My brain will be among figures all the way to London, Miss Penelles,"

he said, "but I am quite sure my soul will be wandering on the s.h.i.+ngle, and feeling the blowing winds, and hearing the plash of the waves, and singing with all its power:

"'Here beginneth the sea, That ends not till the world ends.'"

Then he went away, and Elizabeth took her embroidery and sat down with Denas. A great gulf suddenly opened between them. There was no subject to talk about. Elizabeth had sent Roland away on the double pretence of wanting him to take a message to Caroline and of wanting to have Denas all to herself. And she watched Roland so cleverly that he had no opportunity to say a word to Denas; and yet he had, for in bidding her good-bye he managed, by the quick lift of his brows and the wide-open look in his eyes, to give her a.s.surance that he would be at their usual place of meeting. Elizabeth was a clever woman, but no match for a man who has love in his heart and his eyes to speak for him.

So she had Denas all to herself, and then, in spite of everything she could do, her manner became indifferent and icy. She asked after John and Joan and more pointedly after Tris. And Denas thought there could be no harm in talking of Tris and his affection for her. She chattered away until she felt she was not being listened to. Then she tried to talk of the past; Elizabeth said it was so a.s.sociated with poor papa she would rather not talk of it. It was very painful to her, and she had promised Mr. Burrell not to indulge in painful thoughts. So Denas felt that the past was a shut and clasped book between them for ever.

Nothing remained but to ask Elizabeth about her wedding-trip. She answered her, but not as she would have answered an acquaintance of her own circle. In her heart she felt it to be a presumption in Denas.

Why should this girl question her about her opinions and doings? Her conscience had continually to urge her to justice, and she felt the strife of feeling to be very uncomfortable.

Denas had hoped to be shown all the pretty dresses and cloaks and knick-knacks of fine wearing apparel that Elizabeth had bought in London, Paris, and other European capitals. These things had been much talked of in the town, and it would have been a little distinction to Denas to have seen and handled them. Perhaps, also, there had been, in her deepest consciousness, a hope that Elizabeth had brought her some special gift--some trinket that she could be proud of all her life and keep in memory of their early friends.h.i.+p.

But Elizabeth showed her nothing and gave her nothing; moreover, when Denas spoke of the beautiful morning robe she wore, Elizabeth frowned slightly and answered with an evident disinclination to discuss the subject, "Yes, it is beautiful." For though Elizabeth did not a.n.a.lyse the feeling, she was annoyed at even a verbal return to a time when gowns of every kind had been a consideration worth while discussing with one whose taste and skill would help to fas.h.i.+on them. Poverty casts only shadows on memory, and few people like to stand voluntarily again in them.

About noon there was a visitor, and Elizabeth received her in another room. She made an apology to Denas, but the girl, left to herself, began to be angry with herself. She could hear Elizabeth and her caller merrily discussing the affairs of their own set, and Elizabeth had quite a different voice; it was sympathetic, ready to break into laughter, full of confidential tones. Denas remembered this voice well. She had once been used to hear it and to blend her own with it.

Her heart burned when she called to mind her old friend's excessive civility; her hardly concealed weariness; the real coldness of feeling which no pleasant words could warm. There was no longer any sympathy between them; there was not even any interest which could take the place of sympathy. Elizabeth did not really care whether Denas was offended or not, but she had a conscience, and it urged her to be kind and just. And she did try to obey the order, but when orders perversely go against inclination they do not obtain a cheerful service.

Denas felt and thought quickly: "I am not wanted here. I ought to go away, and I will go." These resolutions were arrived at by apprehension, not by any definable process of reasoning. She touched a bell, asked for her hat and cloak, left a message for Elizabeth, and went away from Burrell Court at once.

The rapid walk to St. Penfer relieved her feelings. "I have been wounded to-day," she sobbed, "just as really as if Elizabeth had flung a stone at me or stabbed me with a knife. I am heart-hurt. I am sorry I went to see her. Why did I go? She is afraid of Roland! Good! I shall pay her back through Roland. If she will not be a friend to me, she may have to call me sister." Then she remembered what Roland had said about her voice and her face was illumined by the thought, and she lifted her head and stepped loftily to it. "She may be proud enough of me yet. I wonder what I have done?"

To such futile questions and reflections, she walked back to St.

Penfer. She had not yet found out that the sum of her offending lay in her ability to add the four letters which spelled the word fair to her name. If she had been strikingly ugly and dull, instead of strikingly pretty and bright, Elizabeth would have found it easier to be kind and generous to her.

Denas went to Priscilla Mohun's. Reticence is a cultivated quality, and Denas had none of it; so she told the whole story of her ill-treatment to Priscilla and found her full of sympathy. Priscilla had her own little slights to relate, and if all was true she told Denas, then Elizabeth had managed in a week's time to offend many of her old acquaintances irreconcilably.

Denas remained with Priscilla until three o'clock; then she walked down the cliff to the little glade where she hoped to find Roland. He was not there. She calculated the distance he had to ride, she made allowance for his taking lunch with Caroline Burrell, and she concluded that he ought to have been at the trysting-place before she was. She waited until four o'clock, growing more angry every moment, then she hastened away. "I am right served," she muttered. "I will let Roland Tresham and Elizabeth Burrell alone for the future." The tide of anger rose swiftly in her heart, and she stepped homeward to its flow.

She had gone but a little way when she heard Roland calling her. She would not answer him. She heard his rapid footsteps behind, but she would not turn her head. When he reached her he was already vexed at her perverse mood. "I could not get here sooner, Denas," he said crossly. "Do be reasonable."

"You need not have come at all."

"Denas, stop: Listen to me. If you walk so quickly we shall be seen from the village."

"I wish father to see us. I will call him to come to me."

"Denas, what have I done?"

"You! You are a part of the whole. Your sister has taught me to-day the difference between us. I am glad there is a difference--I intend to forget you both from this day."

"Will you punish me because Elizabeth was unkind?"

"Some day you also will change just as she has done. I will not wait for that day. No, indeed! To be sure, I shall suffer. Father, mother, everybody suffers in one way or another. I can bear as much as others can."

"You are an absurd little thing. Come, darling! Come back with me! I want to tell you a very particular secret."

"Do you think you can pet, or coax, or tell me tales like a cross child? I am a woman, and I have been hurt in every place a woman can be hurt by your sister. I will not go back with you."

"Very well, Denas. You will repent this temper, I can tell you, my dear."

"No, I shall not repent it. I will go to my father and mother. I will tell them how bad I have been and ask them to forgive me. I shall never repent that, I know."

She drew her arm from his clasp and, without lifting her eyes to him, went forward with a swift, purposeful step. He watched her a few moments, and then with a dark countenance turned homeward. "This is Elizabeth's doing," he muttered. "Elizabeth is too, too detestably respectable for anything. I saw and felt her sugared patronage of Denas through all her soft phrases; she treats me in the same way sometimes. When women get a husband they are conceited enough, but when they get a husband and money also they are--the devil only knows what they are."

He entered Elizabeth's presence very sulkily. Robert was in London and there was no reason why he should keep his temper in the background.

"There is Caroline's answer," he said, throwing a letter on the table, "and I do wish, Elizabeth, you would send me pleasanter errands in the future. Caroline kept me waiting until she returned from a lunch at Colonel Prynne's. And then she hurried me away because there was to be a grand dinner-party at the Pullens'."

"At the Pullens'? It is very strange Robert and I were not invited."

"I should say very strange indeed, seeing that Caroline is their guest. But Lord and Lady Avonmere were to be present, and of course they did not want any of us."

"Any of us? Pray, why not?"