III
The Duchess's feelings were indeed confused as she was helped into Roddy's room, placed in a large easy chair opposite to him and at last left alone with him.
Enough of itself to disturb her was the fact that now for the first time for thirty years she was able to examine some room different from her own—A large, high white-walled room with wide windows that displayed the park, sporting prints on the walls, antlers over the fireplace, a piano in one corner, a large bowl of primroses on the piano, some boxing-gloves and two old swords over the door, a wooden case with thin rosewood drawers and "Birds' Eggs" in gold letters upon it, a round table near the sofa upon which Roddy was lying and on the table a photograph of Rachel—
All these things her sharp old eyes noticed before she allowed them to settle upon Roddy—
His quiet, almost humorous "Well, Duchess," set, quite concisely, the note for this conversation. Not for either of them was it to betray any consciousness that this meeting of theirs was in any way out of the ordinary. Formerly it had been the ebullient, vigorous Roddy who had brought his vigour to renew her fierce old age; now that old age must be brought to him—
The Beaminsters did not show surprise at anything at all; had she come from her grave to visit him he would have greeted her with his quiet "Well, Duchess"—his life was broken in pieces, but she was not to offer any comment on that either.
She was exhausted even by that little drive, and that little passage from door to door, so she just lay back in her chair for a little while and looked at him.
His body was covered with a rug; his hands, still brown and large and clumsy, were folded on his lap; he was wonderfully tidy, brushed and cleaned, it seemed to her, as though he were always expecting a doctor or a visitor or were performed upon by some valet or other, simply, poor dear, that the time might be filled. His cheeks were paler of course and his face thinner, but it was in his eyes—his large, simple, singularly ungrown-up eyes she had always considered them—that the great change lay—
They smiled across at her with the same genial good temper that they had always presented to her. But indeed she could never call them "ungrown-up" again. Roddy Seddon had grown up indeed since she had seen him last; she knew now, as she faced the experience and, above all, the strength that those eyes now presented for her, that she had a new spirit to encounter.
Yes—he "had had a horrible time," but she was wise enough, at that instant, to realise that the "horrible time" had drawn character out of him that she, at least, had never, for an instant, suspected.
The old woman was moved so that she would have liked to have tottered to his sofa, to have caught his hands in her old dry ones, to have kissed him, to have smoothed his hair—but she sat quietly in her chair, recovered her breath and, grimly, almost saturninely, smiled at him.
"Well, Roddy," she said, "how are you?"
"I'm quite splendid. Play patience like a professor, can knit five mufflers in a week and am learning two foreign languages—But indeed how rippin' to see you here. I've spent a lot o' time on this old sofa wonderin' how you and I were goin' to see one another."
"Have you?" She was pleased at that—"Well, you see, I have managed it and quite easily too, not so bad after thirty years. My good Roddy, you of all people to tumble off a horse! What were you about?"
"Oh! it was simple enough." Roddy's eyes worked swiftly to the park and then back again. "I was worried, you see—my thoughts were wandering, and the old mare just tripped into a hole, pitched and flung me—I fell on a heap o' stones, they knocked the sense out of me, the horse was frightened and went dashin' along with me tangled up in her. All came of my thoughts wanderin'—But you know, Duchess, I've had heaps of accidents, heaps and heaps, every kind of thing has happened to me, but it's never been serious—always the most wonderful luck. Well, for once it left me."
"Poor old Roddy."
"Yes, it was 'poor old Roddy,' I can tell you, for the first six weeks—thought I simply couldn't stand it, had serious thoughts of kickin' out altogether, seemed to me everythin' had gone ... it's wonderful, though, the way you pick up. And then everyone's been so tremendous, and as for Rachel!"
He heaved a great sigh—Her eyes half closed, then she looked very carefully at the photograph on the little round table. "That's a good photograph of her you've got."
"Yes—it's my favourite. But you, Duchess, tell me about yourself. You must be in magnificent form to have planned this great adventure."
She told him about herself—only a little, all very carefully chosen—She was fancying, as she sat there, that she was again playing the great diplomatist before the world.
This expedition had greatly excited her, it had fired her blood, and just now she felt that she was equal to taking up her old life of thirty years ago, playing once more a tremendous part, beating Mrs. Bronson and others of her kind straight off the field.
She had a great plan now of coming often to see Roddy and of gaining a very great influence over him; she did not say to herself in so many words that she could not bear to think of him lying there helpless and therefore completely in Rachel's power, but that is what in reality stirred her.
Roddy's helplessness—the sight and sound of it—drove higher that flame that had burnt now for so long before the altar at which Rachel was, one day, to be sacrificed. "She may come and go as she pleases. He lies here—He can do nothing. He can know nothing of her movements—He's in her hands—after what I know...."
What did she know? The acquaintanceship of Breton's man-servant and Dorchester had produced the fact of Rachel's visit, of letters—but wasn't that all? Amongst the strange mingled visions that now crossed and recrossed her brain it were hard to say what were real and what phantasmal. But granted that the two of them had come together at all, why then it was plain enough to anyone who knew them that only one result was possible—Poor Roddy ... her poor Roddy!
But she did not know even now that she intended to tell him anything; her sense of the pain that that revelation would give to him held her, but as the minutes passed her delight at being back once more in this gay, bustling world (yes, she liked its new invigorating noises) the sense of power that she had, and youth, and strength, spun her brain to finest cobwebs of entanglements.
She was glad to be with her Roddy again, it was only fair that, helpless as he was, there should still be someone to guard and protect him ... to protect him, yes!
Her eyes flashed at the photograph.
But for a long time they talked in precisely their old fashion. The War, friends and enemies, victories and defeats, marriages and deaths; Roddy seemed, for a time, the old Roddy.
And then gradually through it all there pushed towards her the consciousness that he was doing it now to please her; more than that, again and again she was aware that some bitter jest, some sharp distraction, some fierce criticism had been turned by him deftly aside—simply rejected with a deftness and a strength that the old Roddy could never have summoned.
Here again then—and it stabbed her there in the midst of her new pride and confidence—was a reminder that her power, her sovereignty had vanished! Was Roddy also to be beyond her influence, Roddy whom she had had at her feet since he was a boy of sixteen?
The photograph smiled across at her—She bent forward, her hand raised a little as though to lend emphasis to her words—"And then you know, Roddy, I'm still troubled with my abominable relation——"
"What! Breton? Why, how's he been behaving?" Roddy's voice was scornful.
"Oh! he's not done anything that I know of—But he's always there—so tiresome to have him so close, and John and Adela have grown so peculiar lately that there's no knowing—They may ask him in to tea one day——"
"Oh no, they won't," said Roddy. "He must be the most awful outsider."
"I wanted to speak about him to you because I thought you might give a word of warning to Rachel——"
"To Rachel?" Roddy's voice was amazed.
"Yes—She's become such a friend of his! Surely you know? That's what makes it so difficult for me—When one's own granddaughter——"
"Rachel! A friend of Breton's! But I didn't know she'd ever spoken to him—Look here, Duchess, you must explain——"
"I thought you must have known. I've often wished to speak to you about it, only Rachel is so difficult and I didn't want to worry you, and it seems especially hard just now——"
"But it doesn't worry me—not a bit. Only tell me—How do you mean that she's a friend of his?"
"Only that she goes to see him, writes to him——"
"Goes to see him——"
"Oh yes—is in complete sympathy——"
"Are you sure?"
"Absolutely. You must ask her."
"I will of course——"
He lay back on his sofa. For a little time there was silence between them. She was filled now with wild regrets. She wished that she had said nothing. His face was hard and old—She wished ... she scarcely knew what she wished; she only knew that suddenly she was tired and would like to go home.
A bell was rung and Christopher was sent for. She would like to have kissed Roddy, but only wagged her bony finger at him—
"Now be a good patient boy and I'll soon come again."