CHAPTER VII
The day passed slowly for Anne after Dick had left. Her mind was troubled by vague half-formulated doubts. Had Dick spoken truly, or had he lied to save her pain? Surely, surely she could never mistake Sebastian’s signature, the same she had gazed at so often, and kissed, aye, and wept over also. She revolved these questions in her mind all day and found no satisfactory answers to them; when she lay down at night, one insistent suggestion whispered on in her ear, ‘Why did Dick look like that? Was he lying? Did ever man look so mazed and scared when he spoke the truth?’ Then Anne’s tired eyes closed and she entered the beautiful dream-world. Now the dream-world holds sensations of indescribable vividness not attainable on the earth-world; here experiences come within the scope of words, there we experience the inexpressible.
In a dream, then, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep had fallen upon her, Anne dreamed and thought she awoke in Paradise. For Sebastian came to her (out of nowhere, after the fashion of dreams), and their souls seemed fused together in a warm silence. Not a word was spoken between them; yet the miserable past was blotted out for ever; a great light shone everywhere—a glow, a heat of forgiveness, a passion of fulfilment at last; and the beautiful thrilling silence of it all! They seemed alone in hollow space, out of reach of this world’s hubbub. What need of explanations when all was understood? Her thoughts rested on that splendid wordless vacancy. ‘Sure I be in heaven at last!’ said poor Anne. ‘A fine heaven too, that quiet as it is! The old one as I used to hear on was all noise o’ trumpets an’ hosannas—here’s heaven indeed, with this grand quiet as is to go on for ever.’
Anne woke suddenly then—the appalling conviction of a dream was upon her: she might have spoken face to face with her dear lover, so vividly present he had seemed, such a sudden assurance of his faithfulness had come to her. She sat up in bed and called out aloud in the quiet room—
‘Lord! be it a dream? Sebastian dear, what’s this I’m feelin’? Have Dick Sundon fooled me out an’ out a-tellin’ lies of you all this long time? Help me, am I losing my judgment?’
She rose up, groped her way across the dark room, and drew back the window-curtain. The first streaks of day were showing in the sky, the peaceful wooded land was half shrouded still in the mists of morning. With long whistling notes the birds gave welcome to the coming day; they called to each other, near at hand, and far off among the blossoming thickets, like happy spirits that sing together in the fields of joy. Anne leaned from the window and listened to these songs that went up so straight into the dim blue morning skies. A great fear held her fast,—the fear that Dick, her husband, her helper, had deceived her. In her dismay and bewilderment she could only repeat again and again, ‘Lord help me, Lord help me,’ scarcely knowing what she said. Then, afraid to lie down again, she dressed and went down-stairs and into the garden. Far off on the London road she heard the distant trotting of a horse and the roll of wheels; some one must be driving along in the quiet morning dimness. Anne stepped down the little walk and stood leaning against the gate.
The wheels came nearer, and then came down the lane. Anne turned away, for even in that dim light the passers-by must see her tears.
Then she heard the chaise stop at the gate; Dick’s voice—how clear it sounded in the early stillness!—was speaking to the post-boy.
‘There, my man; that’s for your trouble all a dark night.’
‘Thank you, sir—thanks to you,’ said the boy as the chaise rattled off.
Anne turned and came down the little walk to meet Dick; her gown brushed the dew from the overgrown rose-bushes in showers as she passed. She came towards him silently, her face tear-stained, tragic. Dick held out both hands to her, but before he could speak Anne checked him with an upraised hand.
‘God’s spoke to me, Dick,’ she said, stopping before him like an avenging angel.
‘I have come to tell you everything,’ said poor Dick; and at that moment he drank the dregs of a bitter cup, ‘for I knew you guessed something when I left you.’
‘God spoke to me in a dream,’ repeated Anne. ‘When I waked up I knew for sure you had lied to me.’
‘Yes, Anne, I lied,’ he said, almost in a whisper.
‘About Sebastian?’
‘Yes.’
‘An’ he never played me false, nor married a Dutch wife?’
‘Never.’
‘Come,’ said Anne. ‘Come then an’ try if you can speak truth this once.’ She pointed to the seat by the bee-hives, and in silence they crossed over to it and sat down.
‘Tell me now,’ said Anne.
Dick leant forward and began his story, and a pitiful story it was. Now that he was face to face with the worst he made no attempt at extenuation of his falsity; he might have been reading off the words from a printed page, they came so straight from his lips, his flute-clear voice never hesitated once till the whole was told. Anne on her part listened quietly enough; without the usual exclamatory interruptions which her sex commonly indulge in. When the story was done there was a moment’s silence, before she said, speaking very low—
‘Eh! but I’ve been a bitter fool.’ She rose then and stood looking down at Dick.
‘I’m goin’ now,’ she said. ‘If I’m no man’s wife, at least I’ll be no man’s mistress. An’ for the child, you’d best care for him yourself. You’ll maybe make him as good a man as his father some day.’
Dick sprang up and caught her hand. ‘Anne, Anne,’ he cried, ‘you must see how it is—you must understand—I scarce knew all your feeling for Shepley at first—I thought you had forgot—I thought women forgot always—I had not realised—not until that night you spoke of him—and then, then I could not bear it, and I resolved to tell you truly. I——’
‘Oh, you’ve acted mighty true for certain,’ said Anne quietly.
‘I have indeed told you all the truth——’
‘Yes, now.’
‘But, Anne, men are mortal—will fall before temptation. ’Tis hard to blame us too cruelly.’
‘O yes; for certain men be mortal.’
‘I shall in truth provide for you all your days, Anne; I thought of no other thing.’
‘Will you, sir?’ said Anne, with a curious smile, and Meadowes, not catching its meaning, pursued eagerly—
‘All your days truly, Anne; you shall have all that woman can wish, if you will but pardon me.’
Anne stood looking at him in a curious dispassionate way for a moment.
‘I’d sooner starve,’ she said then, shortly.
‘But, Anne, you can never suppose that I would let you want, after all there has come and gone between us, after——’
Anne smiled again her curious smile, and shook her head.
‘A strange man you be for certain, Dick,’ she said; ‘kind an’ tender when you’ve a mind to be, and one as feels quick. She paused before adding slowly, ‘And just as false as hell.’
Meadowes winced under the words, but he went on, ‘False or no, Anne, I must provide for you—for you and the child.’
‘For the child mayhap, never for me,’ said Anne. ‘You’d best see after him, for he’ll be set down to your account when all things is squared. See you train him up to be so good a man as you are, Dick.’
‘Then do you not wish to care for your son yourself, Anne?’ asked Meadowes incredulously, for, up to this time, Anne had doted on the boy.
‘No more I do. He be your son, Dick, and ’tis for you to fend for him.’
‘Then——’ Meadowes hesitated, waiting for Anne to make her intentions known.
‘I’ve worked before, and now I’ll work again; and if so be I get no work, then I’ll starve, as I’ve starved before,’ said Anne quietly. ‘Martha’s kind and up in years, best leave the boy with her.’
‘Are you going to leave him?’
‘Yes, an’ never see him nor you again,’ said Anne. She turned away into the house without another word, and Meadowes heard her go up-stairs and move about in her room gathering a few possessions together. She came out again before long, carrying a little bundle.
‘Good-bye, Dick,’ she said, holding out her hand to him; ‘good-bye to the part on you as was kind to me—the rest be rotten bad.’
‘It cannot be you are really going, Anne.’
‘Good-bye,’ said Anne for answer, and she walked away down the lane and turned off at the opening that led into the London road.