They passed through the tall iron gates which, with a true squirearchical air, guarded the precincts of Hilsey Manor.
"Why, look, there's papa in the garden, walking on the lawn!" cried Margaret.
Yes, there was Godfrey, heavily wrapped in shawls, walking to and fro briskly. He had got up and come downstairs—to face the situation.
[CHAPTER XXIV]
DID YOU SAY MRS.?
The end of another fortnight found Arthur still at Hilsey, but on the eve of leaving it for a time at least. Another summons had reached him, one which he could not disregard. His mother wrote, affectionately reproaching him for delaying his visit to Malvern. "You promised us to come before this. Besides I'm not very well, and you'll cheer me up. You mustn't altogether forsake us for the other branch of the family!"
Arthur recognised his duty, but with a reluctance of which he was ashamed. Common disaster had drawn the party at Hilsey more closely together. Judith and Arthur, working hand in hand to "make things go," had become firm friends, though they were apt to spar and wrangle still. The little girl—she knew by now that her mother's visit was to be a long one—responded to the compassionate tenderness evoked by a misfortune which she herself did not yet understand; she gained confidence from marks of love and, as she claimed affection more boldly, elicited it in ampler measure.
Freed from a struggle to which he was morbidly conscious of being unequal, Godfrey Lisle showed his better side. Aggressive courage was what he lacked and knew that he lacked; he was not without fortitude to endure the pain of a blow that had fallen—especially when he could be sure it was the last! He was at peace now; the worst possible had happened—and, lo, it was not unendurable! There were compensations; he was not humiliated any more, and the sad leak in his finances—it had threatened even his tenure of Hilsey itself—could be stopped. Though he was still fussy, self-important over trifles, sometimes ridiculous, and very dependent on his stronger kinsfolk, he was more amiable, less secretive of his feelings, free from sulks and grievances. The gentleman in him came out, both in his bearing towards those about him and in the attitude he adopted towards Bernadette herself. He spoke of her as seldom as he could but without rancour, and in regard to future arrangements put himself at her disposal. When letters came from Oliver Wyse's lawyers, acting on instructions received from the voyagers on summer seas, he caused Arthur to reply for him that he would give her the freedom she desired, and would endeavour to meet whatever might be her wishes in regard to Margaret. He was scrupulous—and even meticulous—over setting aside all her personal belongings to await her orders. He declared himself ready to consider any pecuniary arrangement which might be thought proper; some relics of his old pride in lavishly supplying all her requirements seemed to survive in his mind, side by side with his relief at the thought of paying off his mortgage.
To Arthur the quiet after the storm brought a more sober view of himself and of his life, of what he had done and what had happened to him. His eyes saw more clearly for what they were both the high-flying adoration and the tempestuous gust of passion which jealousy had raised. A critical and healthy distrust of himself and his impulses began gradually to displace the bitter and morbid self-contempt of the first hours and days after the disaster. He must still grieve with the forsaken worshipper of the smoking-room; he could not yet forget the pangs of the baffled lover; but a new man was coming to birth in him—one who, if he still grieved and sighed, could come near to smiling too at these extravagant gentlemen with their idolising dreams and gusty passions. Rueful and bitter the smile might be, but it was tonic. It helped to set devotion, passion, and catastrophe in their true places and to assign to them their real proportions. In it was the dawn of a recognition that he was still no more than on the threshold of a man's experience.