The rector of St. Antipas shrugged modestly at this bald wording of his responsibility; then he sighed and bent his head as one honestly conscious of the situation's gravity.
CHAPTER X
The Reason of a Woman Who Had No Reason
It was not a jest—Nancy's telling Aunt Bell that her reason for going to Edom was too foolish to give even to herself. At least such reticence to self is often sincerely and plausibly asserted by the very inner woman. Yet no sooner had her train started than her secret within a secret began to tell itself: at first in whispers, then low like a voice overheard through leafy trees; then loud and louder until all the noise of the train did no more than confuse the words so that only she could hear them.
When the exciting time of this listening had gone and she stepped from the train into the lazy spring silence of the village, her own heart spelled the thing in quick, loud, hammering beats—a thing which, now that she faced it, was so wildly impossible that her cheeks burned at the first second of actual realisation of its enormity; and her knees weakened in a deathly tremble, quite as if they might bend embarrassingly in either direction.
Then in the outer spaces of her mind there grew, to save her, a sense of her crass fatuity. She was quickly in a carriage, eager to avoid any acquaintance, glad the driver was no village familiar who might amiably seek to regale her with gossip. They went swiftly up the western road through its greening elms to where Clytie kept the big house—her own home while she lived, and the home of the family when they chose to go there.
At last, the silent, cool house with its secretive green shutters rose above her; the wheels made their little crisping over the fine metal of the driveway. She hastily paid the man and was at the side door that opened into the sitting-room. As she put her hand to the knob she was conscious of Clytie passing the window to open the door.
Then they were face to face over the threshold— Clytemnestra, of a matronly circumference, yet with a certain prim consciousness of herself, which despite the gray hair and the excellent maturity of her face, was unmistakably maidenish—Clytie of the eyes always wise to another's needs and beaming with that fine wisdom.
She started back from the doorway by way of being playfully dramatic—her hands on her hips, her head to one side at an astounded angle. Yet little more than a second did she let herself simulate this welcoming incredulity—this stupefaction of cordiality. There must be quick speech—especially as to Nancy's face—which seemed strangely unfamiliar, set, suppressed, breathless, unaccountably young—and there had to be the splendid announcement of another matter.