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The Canon said it was, and so did his wife. In fact at tea next day in Mrs. Luke’s little garden, on that bit of lawn round the cedar, near the low fence across which grazed Mr. Thorpe’s Jersey cows, they all three were unanimous that it was. Wonderful how daylight, ordinary things, meals, tea-cups, callers, dispelled doubts.
‘Better to have both, of course,’ said the Canon, eating Mr. Thorpe’s forced strawberries after covering them with the cream that had been, twenty-four hours earlier, inside those very cows, ‘but if that’s not possible, give me character. It’s what tells. It’s the only thing that in the long run tells.’
‘Oh, well—one isn’t seriously disputing it,’ said Mrs. Luke. ‘Only these theories, if one presses them——’
She paused, and poured out more tea for Mrs. Walker.
‘For instance,’ she went on, ‘suppose a man had a cook of a completely admirable nature. If he married her, could he be happy? I mean, an educated man. Let us say a very well educated man.’
‘Certainly, if she cooked nicely,’ said the Canon, who thought he scented rather than saw the form of Mr. Thorpe lurking somewhere at the back of his delightful parishioner’s remarks, and wasn’t going to be caught.
He knew the importance of turning away seriousness, when it cropped up at the wrong moment, with a laugh. A man as valuably rich as Mr. Thorpe shouldn’t be taken too seriously, shouldn’t be examined and pulled about. His texture simply wouldn’t stand it. He should be said grace over, thought the Canon, who fully realised what a precious addition Mr. Thorpe’s wealth in Mrs. Luke’s hands was going to be to South Winch, and gobbled up thankfully. Gobbled up; not turned over first on the plate.
Mrs. Luke hadn’t invited the Walkers to tea. On the contrary, when first they appeared at the back door, ushered through it by the little maid who each time she saw the Canon’s gaiters was thrown by them into a fresh convulsion of respectfulness, she had been annoyed. Because all day long she had been vainly trying to collect and arrange her thoughts, soothe her nerves, prepare her mind for the evening, when Jocelyn had said he would arrive—to supper, he wrote, somewhere round eight o’clock,—and define what her attitude was going to be both to him and to the girl with the utterly ridiculous Christian name; and not having one bit succeeded, and impelled by some vague hope that out of doors she might find quiet, that in Nature she might find tranquillity and composure, had said she would have tea in the garden.
Nature never did betray the heart that loved her....
Some idea like that, though she wasn’t at all a Wordsworthian and regarded him at best with indulgence, drove her out to what her corner of South Winch held of Nature,—the bit of lawn, the cedar, the Kerria japonica against the wall by the kitchen window, the meadow across the railing, full of daisies and cows, and, on that fine spring afternoon of swift shadows and sunshine, the wind, fresh and sweet with the scent of young leaves.
But once the Walkers were there she found they did her good. They distracted her. And they liked her so much. It was always pleasant and restoring to be with people who liked one. The Canon made her feel she was good-looking and important, and his wife made her feel she was important. Also, they helped with the strawberries, from which, after a fortnight of them at every meal, she had for some time turned away her eyes. Later on, when she was alone again, there would still be at least a couple of hours to decide in what sort of a way she would meet Jocelyn; quite long enough, seeing how she couldn’t, whenever she thought of the meeting, stop herself from trembling.
Oh, he had behaved outrageously to her—to her, his mother, who had given up her life to him. There had been men in past years she might have married, men of her own age and class, by whom she might have had other children and with whom she might have been happy all this time; and she had turned them down, dismissed them ruthlessly because of Jocelyn, because only Jocelyn, and his gifts and career, were to have her love and devotion. Wasn’t it a shame, wasn’t it a shame to treat her so? To behave to her as though she were his enemy, the kill-joy who mustn’t be told and mustn’t be consulted, who must be kept in the dark, shut out? And why, because he had gone mad about a girl, must he go still more mad, and ruin himself by throwing up Cambridge?
A wave of fresh misery swept over her. ‘Go on talking—please,’ she said quickly, when the Walkers, replete, fell momentarily silent.
They looked up surprised; and they were still more surprised when they saw that her face, usually delicately pale, was quite red, and her eyes full of tears.
The Canon was affectionately concerned, and his wife was concerned.
‘Are you not well, dear Mrs. Luke?’ she inquired.
‘My dear friend,’ said the Canon, setting down his cup, tidying his mouth, and taking her hand. ‘My dear, dear friend—what is it?’
Then, impulsively, she told them. ‘It’s Jocelyn,’ she said. ‘He’s married, and given up Cambridge.’
And all her mortification and bitter unhappiness engulfed her, and she began helplessly to cry.
‘Dear, dear. Dear me. Dear, dear me,’ said the Canon.
‘Dear Mrs. Luke——’ said his wife.
They sat impotently looking on. Such excessive weeping from the poised, the unemotional, the serene Mrs. Luke, was most disconcerting. One shouldn’t expose oneself like that, however unhappy one was, thought the Canon’s wife, feeling terribly uncomfortable; and even the Canon had a sensation he didn’t like, as of fig-leaves being wrenched off and flung aside.
Well, having behaved like this—really her nerves had completely gone—there was nothing left but to explain further, and after a few painful moments of trying to gulp herself quiet she told them all about it.
They were horrified. Jocelyn’s behaviour, to the Walkers who had ripening sons of their own, seemed to the last degree disgraceful. That the girl was some one to be ashamed of was very plain, or why should he have come down voluntarily from Cambridge? Marriage by itself didn’t stop a student from continuing there. He was ruined. He would never be anything now. And as representing South Winch, which had not yet in its history produced a distinguished man, the Canon felt this blighting of its hopes that some day it would be celebrated as the early home of Sir Jocelyn Luke, perhaps of Lord Luke—why not? hadn’t there been Kelvin?—very keenly.
Poor mother. Poor, poor mother.
The Canon took her hand, and, raising it reverently to his lips, kissed it. His wife didn’t mind this, because in sorrow, as in sickness, there is no sex. Nobody enjoys kissing the hand of the sick. She minded nothing the Canon did so long as he didn’t enjoy it.
‘Yes—and he’s bringing her here to-night,’ gasped Mrs. Luke, struggling to keep down a fresh outburst.
‘Here? Bringing her here? Without first asking your permission and forgiveness?’ cried the Canon. ‘Disgraceful. Outrageous. Unpardonable.’
‘Oh, isn’t it, isn’t it——’ wept Mrs. Luke into her handkerchief.
Never, never could she forgive Jocelyn. No, she never, never would. Let him manage for himself now. Let him lie as best he could on the miserable bed he had made. She would tell him so plainly, and though she couldn’t help his coming there that night she would insist that he should go away again next morning and never, never come back....
And then, over the top of her handkerchief, she saw him standing there, standing in the back-door looking at her: Jocelyn; the light of her eyes; the only thing really in her life.
‘Jocelyn—oh, Jocelyn!’
She gave a kind of sobbing sigh; she struggled to her feet; she stood, swaying a moment, holding on to the table; and then simply ran to him.