The Annam Jewel (19 page)

She paused, and looked at Hendebakker. He nodded, and laid another scrawl before her; “Fix it for him to come and see you as soon as he gets back.” She glanced at it, and spoke again.

“Peter, when am I going to see you? You will come soon, won't you? You know, after last night I'm just relying on you—I can't say how much. You don't know what it is to feel that there's someone you can trust and who'll see you through.…” She paused for a moment, and then added, “Peter, don't tell Father I asked about your going down to Sunnings—he mightn't like it—he's like that. Well, good-bye, dear boy, see you tomorrow perhaps.”

She rang off and turned to Hendebakker for approval. He gave it unstintedly.

“That was a right smart bit of work,” he said.

He patted her shoulder approvingly and walked to the inner door.

“Anita,” he called.

CHAPTER XXII

Peter lunched with the Gaisfords at Merton Clevery. He listened to Major Gaisford's jovial and richly embroidered anecdotes, and duly admired the infant Jimmy.

Mrs. Gaisford was very amiable. She had grown plump and placid, and she was disposed to smile upon Peter.

“You must come and stay with us at Chark instead of now,” she said graciously. “I was sorry your visit had to be put off, but this whole place does want painting so dreadfully, and my cousin Monty Ferguson's offer of his house at Chark was too good to be wasted; so we're really off tomorrow for a month. Do you know Monty at all? He swears Chark will be
the
golf-course of the future, and I'm sure he's only lending us the house because he thinks James will be converted and go about cracking it up. But there it is, you must come down and see it for yourself—any time, you know. There's lots of room. Just send a wire and come.”

After lunch Peter asked Rose Ellen to walk across the moor with him. He could catch a train at Hastney Mere, and they could talk. They climbed the sandy lane together and when Rose Ellen had said three things without receiving any answer she looked sideways at Peter, beheld him wrapped in frowning silence, and spoke no more. They walked on. Overhead the sky was hazy and flecked with innumerable little clouds. A light wind blew across the moor.

Peter was thinking very hard. It was always easy to think things out when he was with Rose Ellen; she understood, she always understood even when you didn't tell her anything. Most girls would be talking now, but Rose Ellen just walked on beside him in that understanding silence.

Peter was thinking about Sylvia. He was not quite sure of where he stood with Sylvia. Last night now—of course she was nervous and overwrought, but she had certainly kissed him and clung to him. Peter frowned horribly. He tried to recall exactly what he himself had done. To the best of his recollection he had patted her shoulder—had, in fact, gone on patting it for some time. He had also kissed her somewhere on the point of the cheekbone, after which Sylvia had kissed him again and cried a good deal. To be sure, she had told him on the telephone this morning that her own recollection of what had happened was very hazy. That looked as if she did not attach very much importance to those kisses. On the other hand, she had said things about relying on him, and about his having promised to see her through. He had certainly said that he would help her; but just what helping Sylvia might involve.… He broke off his thought with a jerk. There was no doubt at all that Sylvia wanted someone to look after her pretty badly. There was no doubt at all that, in some sort, he had pledged himself to look after her. He walked beside Rose Ellen, thinking hard.

It was when they left the moor that he began to talk about Sylvia. The path ran downhill, turned, and brought them into the beach-wood where they had slept as children. The drift of last year's leaves was under their feet, and this year's first exquisite green stretched between them and the sky.

Rose Ellen stopped suddenly.

“Did you come down here to talk to me about Sylvia?” she said.

Peter nodded without looking at her.

“Are you going to marry her, Peter?”

Peter had stopped too. He pushed the beech leaves with his foot.

“I—don't—know,” he said at last.

Rose Ellen met the blow with a great courage.

“Are you thinking about it, Peter?” she said. There was a pause. “If he would only speak,” thought Rose Ellen; “if he would only tell me—if I really knew! Peter, Peter, speak!” Her hands came together, held one another tightly.

“I have thought about it,” said Peter, speaking very slowly. Then, more quickly and in a low voice, “She's in trouble—very unhappy, I'm afraid—she wants someone to look after her—I've been trying to think it out—if it's my job, I mean—I don't know, but I think perhaps it is.”

Rose Ellen's colour deepened. She never took her eyes from Peter's face. They were clear and deep, like shadowed water.

“I see,” she said. “I wonder if that's a good reason for marrying anyone.”

“I think it might be. Don't you think so, Rose Ellen?”

Rose Ellen's hands held one another. She said:

“No, Peter de—ah.”

“You mean I'm not in love with her. That's what I don't quite know. I was once—frightfully. I told you. Do you remember? But you see I was just a fool of a boy. One takes things so damned hard at seventeen, and—and—well, I'm twenty-five now; and there's been the war and all that; and one's probably got past that intense sort of feeling. And perhaps it's my job—I don't know—I'm not sure.”

Rose Ellen looked at him. At that moment her love for him was an agony of mother-love. Her heart was full of tragic tears, and yet more tragic laughter over Peter, who was too old for love at twenty-five.

“So—so—I think I'll be getting along,” he said. “I—wanted to tell you. You always understand, and—well, I'll write.”

For some reason Peter found himself unable to go on. He had meant to talk the whole thing out with Rose Ellen in a calm and reasonable manner; but he couldn't do it; he could not go on talking, or stay a moment longer in the beech-wood. A wave of unbearable agitation seemed to have broken over him. He did not understand it, and he had no power to control it. He caught at Rose Ellen's hands, gripped them very hard, tried to speak, choked, and flung away.

Rose Ellen watched him go. She heard the beech leaves rustle under his feet. She watched until the turn of the path hid him and he was gone. Peter was gone—gone to Sylvia Moreland. All her life he had been there—just Peter—and now he was gone.

Rose Ellen put out her hand and felt for something to lean against. There was one of the great beech trunks not far off. She went and leaned against it. It was very strong. Its roots were safe in the soil, and its lovely green branches stretched out to the wind and the rain and the sun. She stood there, and looked at the path by which Peter had gone. He had passed the bend where the bushes jutted out and the primroses grew on the bank. She could not hear his footsteps any longer. It was no use looking at the empty path any more.

She leaned against the tree, and was glad because it was so strong. That was the hollow where Peter had heaped the leaves for her head and covered her with his coat. Rose Ellen looked at it, and remembered all that Peter had been to her, all that Peter had meant to her, all that Peter had done for her. Quite suddenly her reserve and her self-control broke. She began to cry, and to talk out loud in little broken sentences, as people do sometimes when their trouble is very great and they think that they are quite alone.

Peter went on down the road. He walked at first with great strides, but by degrees his pace slackened. At first his one thought had been to get away, but after a minute or two he began to recover his balance, to wonder at himself, and to consider what had made him behave so strangely. Rose Ellen must have thought he had gone crazy.

He slowed down, and presently came to a standstill. He had meant to talk the whole thing out. The only part that he had thought would be difficult was breaking the ice, and that hadn't been difficult at all. Rose Ellen's quiet, “Are you going to marry her?” ought to have made it quite easy for them both. That was what bothered him. They had begun to talk all right in just the understanding, friendly way which he had planned—and then—what had gone wrong? It wasn't Rose Ellen's fault; he was quite clear about that. It was something in him, Peter—a rush of indescribable emotion and pain; it had come upon him when Rose Ellen had said, “I wonder if that's a good reason for marrying anyone.” Yes, it had begun then, and he had said, “Don't you think it might be?” and with Rose Ellen's answer, the pain and the emotion had become unbearable. Yet, after all, what had she said? Only three words, only, “No, Peter de—ah.” But when she said those three words he had looked at her just for a moment. Quite definitely Peter traced his hurt back to the moment when he looked into Rose Ellen's eyes and saw the patience in them. He hadn't see her look like that since the day when she walked towards him down the hard asphalt at St. Gunburga's.

Peter turned, and began to walk back along the way by which he had just come. He had ceased to care about his train, or Roden Coverdale, or the Jewel. That look in Rose Ellen's eyes would have brought him from the ends of the earth. His only necessity was to find out what had brought it there. He couldn't bear it. He walked back quickly.

It was when he came to where the primroses grew on the broken bank and some bushes overhung the path that he heard a sound that took his breath. It was a sob, and words. He stood still at the turn of the path and saw Rose Ellen. She was leaning against a beech tree, half turned away from him, not looking at him at all; and she was speaking, but not to him; and she was crying as he had never seen her cry. Anguish had broken through the patience in her eyes; the tears ran down, the very bitter tears.

Peter stood, and heard Rose Ellen speak.

“My Peter de—ah. No, not mine—no, I don't want him to be mine—I don't—it's not for that—only for her to love him—to be good to him—Sylvia, if you can, if you will—I won't mind, I'll be glad.” Her voice dropped, shaken and despairing. “She won't—
she won't
—she hasn't got it to give—oh, my Peter, my Peter de—ah, oh, my Peter
de
—
ah!”

Something broke in Peter's heart. He knew that he belonged to Rose Ellen, and that she belonged to him. They had always belonged to each other, and he had not known it. He had not seen her because she was so near. She had known, but he had not known.

Rose Ellen was not speaking any longer. Her face was hidden against the tree. Peter would have given all the world twice over to have comforted her; but something held him back, something stronger than his passion of pity and love. It was as if he had come into a holy place and seen holy things that were not meant for him to see. And then he was pledged in some sort to Sylvia. He must put that straight before he could go to Rose Ellen.

He turned, and went down the path that led to Hastney Mere.

CHAPTER XXIII

Peter picked up the bag which he had left at the junction, and travelled down to Sunnings. He found quite a lot to think about. He thought about what a fool he had been. He thought of how near he had been to losing Rose Ellen. He might have shut a door between them which he would never have been able to open again. He had, as it were, had his hand upon that door, ready to slam it, too. It really didn't bear thinking about.

The train went on; stations came and went; porters and newsboys shouted; people got in and out. Peter sat still, and went on thinking. He didn't want to sit still. He wanted to do something that would bring him nearer to Rose Ellen. What he really would have liked to do was to dash across the platform, burst into the telegraph office, and write with a stubby pencil on a neatly divided telegraph-form, “Rose Ellen, I love you terribly. I'm coming back at once.” This being impossible, he sat in his corner seat and appeared to slumber.

Coverdale met him at the station with a small car which he was driving himself. He nodded without offering his hand, and talked pleasantly of indifferent matters until they had reached the house.

“Dinner is in half an hour,” he said, then: “And I think, if you don't mind, we'll keep our real talk for afterwards.”

Peter assented, and was shown to his room.

After dinner, in the library, Coverdale plunged straight into the middle of things.

“I'd like to say that I very much appreciate your coming,” he began. “I had reasons for not wishing to come to Town just now, or I shouldn't have troubled you. And, quite seriously, I wanted to see you very much. You are, as a matter of fact, my dear Waring, that most remarkable phenomenon, a really honest man. I won't say I haven't met one or two before; but I'm not certain that I would have trusted any of them with the Annam Jewel. Tell me now, why did you send it back?”

Peter didn't answer at once. At last he said:

“Well, if it's yours, I don't want it; and, if it's mine, I'd rather get it myself.”

“I see.” Coverdale's tone betrayed a hint of amusement. “Well, well, that's very admirable; and I'm naturally a good deal obliged to you, both on my own account and on Sylvia's. But you say ‘if it's yours', ‘if it's mine'. May I ask what you mean by that?”

Peter looked him straight in the face and said:

“I have my father's notes, sir.”

Coverdale nodded.

“Yes, I thought so. I thought there'd be something like that. Your father's notes on the history of the Jewel, and the circumstances which he conceived gave him some claim to it?”

“His brother left it to him by will,” said Peter.

“Yes, I knew that. The question is, Waring, how much do you know?”

“I think,” said Peter, “that you had better read my father's notes, and then you'll see.” He held out the shabby book as he spoke. “I expect there are gaps that you can fill, and I'd rather have the whole thing cleared right up and settled.”