“So you are out already, Charity; you are out by yourself,” said Rowland, meeting Miss Marcon on the road leading past the Ponsonbys’ gates. “You are not going into the house?”
“Yes, of course I am going in. But we can’t arrive in a body to ask questions.”
“No, no, not in a body, no. But we want to ask some questions; yes, I think we do.”
“To find out about the marriage we have seen in the papers. How else are we to know about it? It is a wonderful and startling thing and fraught with bitterness for others. It may make one’s own lot better by comparison.”
“Then it will really help,” said Evelyn. “But if we ask no questions, we have no lies told us. I have subtler methods of finding out the truth.”
“You mean you have subtler ways of asking questions. If you ask no questions, you have no truth told you either. It is surprising how much truth people tell: I would not, if I were they. And you can get a lot of truth from the falsehoods they tell, when you ask them questions. I admire them so much for telling them so awkwardly: I have a great respect for people. I can’t think what people mean when they say disparaging things about human nature. Poor, weak, erring human nature! Ah, Charity, rightly named! I think it is absurd.”
“Won’t you go home and let us go in?” said Evelyn. “Father did not like the errand for Aunt Jane. She is sitting at home, waiting to hear everything.”
“Stephen insisted on it for me. He is doing the same, so he had to insist on it. We are always afraid he will lose his self-control with Mrs. Ponsonby, when he is a man and she is an aged woman. It is always the fault of men that the other people in the world are women. But he does want to know the family secrets; he has a morbid curiosity about them. Though I don’t know why curiosity is so often morbid; I expect this is ordinary curiosity. Now what exactly do you want to know? If you wait here, I will come and tell you. Things are not so good at second hand, but they are better than nothing, so much better.”
“We want to know the whole thing,” said Evelyn. “Our curiosity is neither morbid nor ordinary. It is the kind known as devouring. We want you to be completely satisfying. It is awful not to be satisfied.”
“A good battery of direct questions,” said his father with a smile. “That is the way. People are obliged to tell you something.”
“I think they are obliged to tell you everything,” said Miss Marcon. “They always seem to be.”
“When people do not wish to talk of a matter,” said Evelyn, “we do not refer to it again. I told you I had subtler methods.”
“But they do not refer to it again either. They just do what they wish. They have methods too. But generally they do wish to talk of it. Think how dreadful it is not to talk of things! That is why we must not let them bottle them up. It is really not allowed. We have to show we think nothing of them. And I really do not think much of this. Miss Hallam’s marrying John is not so much after all.”
“Indeed your voice trails away in reaction and disappointment.”
“No, the son’s marrying the governess might have been much more,” said Rowland, with a note of regret.
“I don’t know. Might it?” said his son. “There is the deposition of Hetta. Could anything be more?”
“No, no, no. That isn’t coming. No.”
“It is too much,” said Miss Marcon. “It could not be. I want to know how it is to be avoided, and if you wait here, you shall know too. It is well worth your while.”
“Indeed,” said Rowland, settling himself against a tree.
“I am glad Jane did not come; it is going to rain,” said Miss Marcon, turning towards the house. “It does not matter about me; I am as strong as a horse. It is always a horse’s strength that human beings have, and it would make them indifferent to weather.”
“Why should we always give way to women?” said Evelyn. “Savages do not.”
“People always talk as if we should base ourselves upon savages,” said Miss Marcon, looking back, “when we have been all these centuries getting away from them. Savages do a good many things besides not giving way to women. And we are all based upon them at heart. That is the explanation of your hankering after them. The term, ‘noble savage,’ is a great disgrace to us. Personally I am very highly civilised; I hardly give a thought to the savage; I am not giving a thought to him now.”
Miss Marcon went on to the house, asked if Mrs. Ponsonby or her daughter was at home, and on being told that the maid would see, followed her to the drawing-room and found the women of the family.
“I knew you would want to see me. It is a time when you would only want to see old friends. I have not brought Stephen, for fear you have not looked on him for long as a friend.”
“Have you come to congratulate us?” said Hetta. “On the new addition to our family?”
“Yes, that is what I have come for: to congratulate you, and to hear how it happened, how you arranged it. You have had to arrange it before for John. I have never had to for Stephen. He does make less work.”
“Oh, I had no hand at all in John’s first marriage. As far as this one is concerned, I managed by impressing upon him, early and late, that we could only do with someone we were used to in the household.”
“And the only person was Miss Hallam. You certainly had a hand in this marriage. How about the wedding?” Miss Marcon knew that no one had attended. “Did you think it worth while to go?”
“Oh, well, no, not for this kind of marriage,” said Hetta, leaning back and putting her hands behind her head. “We should have found it an echo of the first; and why drag up the past, when you are turning an interested gaze towards the future?”
“The children could not have found it that. They did not exist before the first.”
“And would that help them to keep their thoughts from it?” said Hetta with a laugh. “They must see it the reason of their existence. And some of them remember their mother.”
“My dear, how shallow I am! It is because the deep experiences of life have passed me by. Do go on telling me about the second marriage. It is the only one I can understand.”
“Well, it has happened, and I am to have Edith as a permanent member of my household. What do you think of that?”
“Edith will have Aunt Hetta as a member of hers,” said Clare to France. “That is the truth.”
“You have just heard it is not. And I hardly think it is.”
“I am going to call Miss Hallam, Edith,” said Muriel, addressing the guest betimes.
“Muriel, you should wait to be spoken to,” said Sabine. “Children should be seen and not heard.”
“Muriel must learn early to reckon with life’s inconsistencies,” said France.
“What a dear child she is!” said Miss Marcon. “I am sure I should have wanted to marry her father and her governess and everyone to do with her.”
“I am going to have a new governess.”
“The weak point of the new arrangement,” said Hetta. “More expense, even if not much. And we hoped there would be no more.”
“Your father can’t marry her this time, Muriel. And he generally doesn’t, does he? You often have a new one; I remember you had Miss Bunyan. I can’t think why people say it is difficult to talk to children. They so often have a governess. Edith will be able to train the future governesses.”
“Yes, that is a great thing,” said Hetta in a serious tone, turning aside with her friend. “I shall put all that on to her, as Mater gets past it. I have no knack for that side of things, and John does not want me occupied with it. He gets so fidgeted, when I insist upon talking about children and education and the rest of it.”
“Well, do not insist on it, dear. John has married Miss Hallam to prevent it, and it would not be reasonable. What would be the good of his doing it? Has he married her for any other reason, do you think? I know he tells you everything, so please betray his confidence. That does not matter between one woman and another. It can’t, or it would matter too much to be possible, and it is always found to be possible.”
“Well, we thought it over and threshed it out and came to the conclusion that the reasons were enough. We had an uncertain time, and he wanted his mind made up for him”—Hetta gave a laugh—“but we got things to a head at last. Yes, it is behind us now.”
“And Edith was glad you decided on her, that you did not prefer to talk about education? You might have had a liking for it: I suppose she has.”
“Oh come, don’t put it all on to one line like that; and mind you don’t betray me. I think John is really attached to her, and welcomes her as an addition to the house. And you like her yourself, don’t you? I have heard you say you do.”
“Yes, but I preferred her to be a spinster. I do prefer clever women to be spinsters; I have some thought of myself. And Stephen is never annoyed by her, as he is by most people. I ought to have arranged for him to marry her: I should have thought about it, as you did. You are a much better sister. People are always asking me why I do not make my brother marry. They seem to see it as my duty. They are really asking me why I do not break up my life, and of course they see that as my duty. I could not choose his wife, and have her for a member of my household, as you can; and I suppose they see I could not. You have made your brother marry without giving people any secret satisfaction, and that is a great success.”
“I believe John is never annoyed by her either,” said Hetta, as if this dawned on her mind. “And that is such a good foundation. I really don’t think things will break up. If they do, I will never undertake any responsibility again: I will not; I have made up my mind.” She ended lightly and turned to the others.
“Now what do you all think about it?” said Miss Marcon. “Muriel is the only one who has talked of it, and she does not usually speak for you all.”
“I welcome an addition to the family,” said Clare. “We were getting too set and sordid amongst ourselves.”
“And it is nice to have things different, isn’t it?” said Muriel.
“Change should be for the better,” said France, “when reasonable people make it.”
“It would tend in that direction here,” said Clare.
“I don’t think you are at all set among yourselves,” said Miss Marcon.
“Oh, that is Clare’s note,” said Hetta. “We take no notice of it.”
“We are glad Father is to have Edith’s companionship,” said Clare, looking at her aunt.
“Now that is better,” said Hetta, with a laugh of understanding. “I was wondering if any of you would have a reason apart from yourselves. Muriel, what do you think about it? You have not really told us.”
Muriel found her disability reassert itself.
“You must know why you are glad Father is marrying Miss Hallam, if you are glad. Now don’t say you are going to call her Edith, or going to have a new governess. We know that.”
“When Muriel speaks, she drives her words home,” said Clare.
“She must be one of those people of few words, whose words are always remembered,” said France.
Muriel stood at a loss, as her advance in conversation was nullified.
“You must have some reasons. You have only to state them,” said Hetta. “Perhaps you are not glad, are you?”
“No, Aunt Hetta.”
“If you have not any reasons for being glad, of course you cannot state them. Perhaps you have some reasons for being sorry, but we will not ask you to state those.”
“I must go now,” said Miss Marcon. “I see Rowland and Evelyn standing in the rain. Perhaps they saw me come in and waited for me.”
“I saw them with you outside the gates,” said Muriel.
“Then of course they saw me come in, dear.”
“You can tell them we are all glad of the situation but Muriel,” said Hetta. “Children are conservative.”
“I don’t think anything can make them glad,” said Miss Marcon. “They always despise their surroundings and dislike innovation. I don’t see what can be done.”
“Here is a letter from the new governess,” said Sabine. “Blake seems to be her name; I thought it was Bloke. I did not think to open it; I thought it was nothing. Governesses write so many letters before they come. And she is coming to-day by the early train. Does it matter, Hetta, my dear?”
“No, not so much. She has to come soon or late, and she may as well settle down before our truants return.”
“May I stay and see her come?” said Miss Marcon. “I enjoy that, and I am good at it, a great help.”
“I think it is a thing for the family,” said Sabine, leaning back and using a weak tone.
“I am sure it is,” said Clare. “And I doubt if any of the things for the family are fit for other eyes.”
“Ours are dark dealings with governesses,” said France. “There is a skeleton in every cupboard. Grandma is right not to bring it out. What is the use of the cupboard?”
“A skeleton is none the better for being ridiculous,” said Clare.
“It may be better, but it is more embarrassing. It should be guilty and tragic.”
“Are you talking quickly to cover my embarrassment?” said Miss Marcon. “I think Muriel might have spoken. I do see why you teach her to speak. This is when people wish the floor would open and swallow them. I wonder if I am carrying it off: I shall tell Stephen I did so. I behaved as if I were one of yourselves, when I am a mere acquaintance. If I am a friend, I presumed on the friendship. If I am an old friend, I am one of those who think they can do and say anything. That was worst of all. No, I behaved as if my particular touch justified anything; that was worst. I hope I do not seem at all ill at ease; I hope I seem sorrier for all of you than for myself.”
“No one is ill at ease,” said Clare. “We are all hardened.”
“Well, goodbye. I will go away quietly, without having my wish gratified.”
“Must you go?” said Sabine, offering her hand.
“I wanted to stay, to welcome the new governess, to help you to receive her. I thought I was more one of the family than I was: I don’t know why people are ever one of the family.” Miss Marcon moved across the room, talking as she went, and Hetta went to have a word with her in the hall.
“How old will Miss Blake be?” said Muriel.
“She is about thirty eight,” said Sabine. “Now that is enough.”
“Enough is as good as a feast,” said Clare. “We do seem to savour Muriel’s words.”
“Let me see the letter, Mater,” said Hetta, returning in a lighter mood.
“It is an unnecessary letter. Changing her day, giving inconvenience, arriving just after luncheon, when she will have had luncheon, or not had it, and we shall not know whether she has had it or not! Well, she will not have it. Our time will be past and it cannot be altered.”
“The letter is certainly unnecessary,” said France.
“We need not know whether she has had it or not,” said Clare.
“We had better not know,” said her sister.
“I desire to hear no more from any one of you, until she arrives.”
“This is how Muriel’s weakness grows upon her,” said France.
Miss Blake arrived while luncheon was in progress, stood inside the door with a shy, bright air, and then came forward and greeted Sabine with more than the usual deference for her age. She was a dark, small woman, with a swift, short step, a bright, kind glance of which she seemed to be aware, clothes which seemed independent of any principle of choice, and an air of respect for herself and others, which she held to be her main attribute, and held to be so justly, as she attended to its being the case.
“Now do not get up; I could not have it,” she said in low, quick, staccato tones, holding Sabine’s hand a moment longer than was usual. “I am disturbing your family luncheon, which is better for me than for you.”
She gave a deep little laugh, and Muriel was already enough in sympathy with her to echo it.
“Muriel, you may go out of the room,” said Sabine.
“No, Mrs. Ponsonby, I ask for my first favour that she may stay,” said Miss Blake, looking at her pupil with a charitable, interested gaze.
“Then you must understand me, Muriel.”
Muriel understood her grandmother, and knew that Miss Blake was placed between Miss Hallam and Miss Bunyan, and surveyed her making a luncheon without emotion.
“I am not Muriel’s first governess?”
“No, she has had several. The last one has become more to us, and is on her honeymoon with my son, Muriel’s father. They will be returning in a week.”
“Now I shall have no chance of getting as far as that,” said Miss Blake, laughing and continuing to laugh. “The ground is cut away from under my feet. I do not start fair at all.”
“I must remember to get John’s papers sorted and ready for him,” said Hetta, indicating her position with her brother. “He will want to get back to work at once.”
Miss Blake turned her eyes on Hetta, allowing them to recognise her looks.
“So I am not the only person who does necessary work. I have to admit another to my level.”
“You do. My brother keeps me firmly to it. I am seldom allowed to step down.”
“I claim to be on a level with you both,” said Alfred. “I do not allow that my labours are less, or that my pupils’ education is less important than Muriel’s. I recognise the pre-eminence of women, but in the matter of education their most earnest advocate only demands for them equality.”
“We work on a level indeed,” said Miss Blake in a low, deep tone.
“Have you spoken to Miss Blake, Muriel?” said Sabine.
Muriel did not reply.
“The youngest child of a large family is often backward,” said Victor.
“Speak to Miss Blake when I tell you, Muriel.”
“I can’t think of anything to say, Grandma.”
“It is astonishing how a backward child will suddenly say a whole sentence at once,” said Chilton.
“There was never any real need for anxiety,” said his brother.
“How old are you, dear?” said Miss Blake, not seeming to change the subject as entirely as she intended.
“Twelve,” said Muriel with tears in her voice.
“Yes, it is sad,” said Chilton, “a very sad case. I think such a thing is sadder when the subject realises it.”
“It is better when there is a merciful lack of comprehension.”
“Do not talk nonsense,” said Sabine. “You are making Muriel as silly as yourselves. As you cannot talk in a reasonable way, we will have silence. I was never less proud of any of you.”
“An extreme occasion, as you suggest,” said Clare.
“When were we least proud of Grandma?” said Victor.
“Muriel, are you coming to help me unpack?” said Miss Blake.
“There is one branch of Muriel’s education not neglected,” said France, as Miss Blake left the room.
“Miss Blake does not want a child who cannot speak,” said Sabine. “Such a child might not be able to understand what she said.”
“Several kinds of deficiency do often go together,” said Victor.
“I said we would have silence,” said Sabine almost on a shriek.
“We will have it, Mrs. Ponsonby,” said Alfred, coming to help her from her chair. “If we cannot have silence, we will go where silence is.”
“It is silly to put out your grandmother on the day when Miss Blake comes,” said Hetta. “We shall be having Miss Bunyan over again, if you do not take care.”
“We have had some of her,” said France. “I don’t think we shall have it all. Grandma has exact perceptions.”
“Miss Blake is better than Miss Bunyan, isn’t she?” said Muriel.
“You go too far in talking about your elders. I ought to make a change, before your father comes home and takes my time.”
“Will he want your time now?” said Muriel.
“Why should he not?”
“Well, he will have Miss Hallam.”
“That will make no difference. He has explained that he will want my time as he always has, and I must be prepared to give it to him. He has been quite clear.”
“Why does he want you both? Why did he marry Miss Hallam?”
“Muriel’s power of speech!” muttered Chilton. “Grandma, Grandma, you little know what you have done.”
“Because you were all getting fond of her,” said Hetta, in an instructive tone, “and she was getting fond of us, and Father was becoming fond of her too; and it seemed best to put things on a regular footing. Father and I both thought it was best. Now how can you all spend so much time standing about? Do you feel it is an occupation? I could not.”
“We do not feel it is that,” said Clare. “That is the point of it.”
“We are having some conversation,” said Chilton.
“You are certainly not doing that. Your little schoolroom brightnesses are not anything approaching to it.”
“Do you mean to give us pain, Aunt Hetta?”
“I mean to say the simple truth. That will not hurt you. You are too fond of shutting yourselves up in your own little world and tossing about your own little speeches.”
“You are wrong, Aunt Hetta. The truth has hurt us.”
“Has habit bred affection unawares?” said Clare.
“Dr. Chaucer is coming to dinner, and you will behave as if you were civilised. Miss Blake will be thinking you are savages. I should be sorry to hear her opinion of you.”
“I should like to hear her opinion of Grandma,” said Clare, “or rather, should also be sorry to hear it.”
“Muriel, would you like to come down to dinner, as it is Miss Blake’s first night?”
“No, thank you, Aunt Hetta.”
“You had better come down. Then there need be no schoolroom tea. You can think of some things to say. And remember questions will not do.”
Chaucer arrived at the appointed hour, looked at Miss Blake with covert curiosity, and appeared to devote himself to Sabine, as a preliminary to transferring his attention.
“Miss Blake came by a different train, Grandma,” said Muriel at the table, breaking into precautionary speech. “That one is a more punctual train. The other was late when Miss Hallam came, and late when Miss Bunyan came. It was only when Aunt Hetta came by it, that it was in time.”
“It evidently draws a distinction between governesses and members of the family,” said Miss Blake, laughing. “The former’s is a history of an oppressed race.”
“Miss Blake, you are surely thinking of the time when their position was different,” said Chaucer, leaning forward.
“People are inevitably oppressed in some positions, are they?”
“Mrs. Ponsonby,” said Chaucer, “do you make it a stipulation, when you engage a—when you seek an instructress for your grandchild, that she should evince powers of repartee?”
“I bear witness that no such stipulation was made,” said Alfred. “As an instructor of the grandchildren, I was accepted without it.”
“I was thinking of the sex which is more noted than ours for quickness with the tongue.”
“I can hardly do that,” said Sabine, “but it is an advantage to the grandchild.”
“Grandma has her own conception of Muriel,” said France. “It may be the explanation of her demands.”
“To the grandchild, I make no doubt,” said Chaucer; “but what of the guest, who happens to be at your table?”
“The guest must need fewer weapons, when all is said and done,” said Miss Blake, laughing again.
“Mrs. Ponsonby, I ask you!” said Chaucer, making a gesture.
“I don’t think anyone needs any weapons in my house.”
“No, indeed, and that is a view which Miss Blake will second, when she has had the experience.”
“I suppose Chaucer has forgotten Miss Bunyan now,” said Chilton. “He always made light of her.”
“Mater, this chattering in mutters!” said Hetta. “It is incredible at their ages.”
“Age is not a thing to taunt, but to respect,” said Chilton.
“It is a thing to taunt when its obligations are not observed,” said Alfred. “It is generally taunted then.”
“Old people do return to the habits of childhood,” said Clare.
“You have not returned to them. You have never left them,” said Hetta. “There should be a stage in between.”
“Is Aunt Hetta in it?” whispered Muriel.
“Muttering again! Did you hear what I said?”
“Yes,” said Chilton, “but we only have at our disposal the feeble accents of age.”
“Did you hear what I said, Victor?”
“Well, Aunt Hetta, my hearing is hardly what it was.”
“Smartness and pertness! I get so sick of it,” said Hetta, as if to herself.
“Miss Hetta, you can hardly expect the young people to live and move and have their being on your level,” said Chaucer, with a note of earnestness. “If you want an equal on your own ground, I should recommend Miss Blake, as the most likely to come up to your standard.”
Hetta turned, as if reminded, to talk to the newcomer, and the meal drew to its close.
In the drawing-room the boys put chairs for the women, and Chaucer took a chair and carried it with some urgency to Miss Blake, as though to ensure that she was not left out of the attention.
“Thank you,” she said in low, deep tones, glancing at him as she took it.
“Miss Blake,” said Chaucer, sitting down beside her, “it must be a great adventure to come to a new household, and confront the little human interchanges which make up the relation of a family. It must need, if I may say so, a brave spirit.”
“It has its demands,” said Miss Blake, speaking very low and then changing her tone. “I do sometimes feel it rather a heroic position. It would be natural to cry myself to sleep, and I never do.”
Chaucer shook his head at the truth thus lightly expressed.
“I hope you will find a home here. I vouch for it that there is a real welcome.”
“I hope I shall: I have to find a home.”
Chaucer gave this admission the tribute of a moment’s silence.
“I had the acquaintance of your predecessor. You will also become acquainted with her, as she is now a member of the family.”
“She has found a home here,” said Miss Blake, laughing. “It is held a success for the governess to marry the widower. But I would rather hold to my own position; it is the one I chose.”
“You are wise not to relinquish your chosen work until an alternative really recommends itself,” said Chaucer, thinking of one which should do this, and of supporting the recommendation at a later date.