Cicely was no longer on her knees. She had risen, when Grimshaw approached, retreating a little, divining somehow that her lover was about to use a weapon of which she knew nothing. But the weapon, when she saw it, inspired little confidence. Brian, so far as she was aware, had not changed. Were he alive, he would stand beside his mother now and always, as she affirmed with such poignant conviction. None the less faith in her lover remained constant.
Lady Selina addressed Cicely, not Grimshaw.
“Do you remember, child, that Brian came home on leave shortly after Mr. Grimshaw left Upworthy to go to France?”
“I remember.”
“Your brother was Mr. Grimshaw’s friend, and fully alive to his many sterling qualities and, and—attractions. Because of these he guessed what might happen. And he warned me. And, as I say, I laughed at him. Brian would say, if he were present, what I am about to say.”
She paused to select the right words, thinking not only of her son but of her husband. Brian, possibly, was more Danecourt than Chandos, and dearer to the mother on that account. But in matters which concerned the women of his family he was unquestionably his father’s son, a stickler for tradition, an upholder of the unwritten law which forbade marriage between persons of unequal social position. She continued with austere solemnity:
“I can hardly believe, Cicely, that you have considered what is at stake. This big property was left to me to pass on to a successor, to a child whom your dear father and I believed to be bone of our bone, sharing our ideas and governing principles, content, like us, to walk in the old ways, to carry on our work. Brian would have done so. But he died——”
Her voice died away mournfully.
Cicely edged nearer, much moved. But when she attempted to take her mother’s hand, Lady Selina repulsed her, saying quietly:
“I am speaking now for Brian, for your father, and for myself. If you decide to marry what I firmly believe to be the wrong man, Upworthy and all it includes will go to your cousin George.”