By Mr. Dixon’s orders the young woman had received her betrothed with outward friendliness, though she declined with quiet, persistent obstinacy, to say she was sorry for what had happened. Reconciliations made to order are apt to carry about them a very strong flavour of their artificial nature and origin, and this particular reconciliation bore the stamp of unreality very plainly to be read.
On going in on Christmas Eve, Roger was, for once, not at all sorry to find that the Dixons had friends with them. Mr. Dixon received him heartily, Ada demurely, Mrs. Dixon coldly, scarcely speaking to him at all. There was a miserable constraint and unreality about everything. Roger felt it a relief to himself, and had a bitter conviction that it was also one to Ada, when he had to tell her that he had promised Mr. Johnson to take all the organist’s duty on the following day, in order that that official might take a holiday and visit some friends. His time would, therefore, be so much taken up that he would not be able to call and see her before service. She heard his excuse with indifference, and Roger went to bed that night, and arose also on the following morning, with a heavy problem agitating his mind. How was he to treat her? What was he to do with this wilful creature whom he loved so much, and who had succeeded in making their mutual relations so miserable and so embarrassed? For it was he who had been sinned against, as he very well knew, and though in his tenderness he was ready to condone that, and would have eagerly made an effort after any reconciliation that should have reality in it, yet the sense of duty and of the fitness of things stepped in, and told him that to let a condition of things be initiated in which the woman was to be humoured even when wrong, and the man was to beg forgiveness for all misunderstandings, whether caused by himself or not, was simple madness. Yet how he was to institute anything more reasonable, he did not see, unless Ada were brought to see that she had behaved badly, of which truth not the most glimmering consciousness seemed to have been afforded her.
With this trouble in his mind he went to church on Christmas morning, and tried, almost unconsciously, to find a solution to his difficulties in the language spoken to him by his music. To a certain extent he found what he wanted; he received soothing, and that alone was a help to counsel. It was not the first time that music had come to him with healing on her wings; most likely it would not be the last.
Seated up in the organ-loft, and looking into the mirror in front of him, he could see, not only the vicar and his curate, but a good many of the congregation too,—all diminished, reversed in position, moving up and down silently, rising and sitting down again like automata or dream-creatures. His sight was keen and long. He could identify a good many of those who came in, and amongst them he saw Ada and her father and mother. Ada, he perceived, was not so prostrate under the shock of their quarrel as to have neglected the claims of Christmas Day to be considered a fête day in matters of toilette. She was dressed gaily, and he saw a pretty face, looking prettier still in the framework of a smart and becoming new bonnet. It was a fresh, sweet face, seen thus in repose, and at a distance, and his heart yearned towards its owner, and he tried to put out of his mind the ugly recollection of the same face turned upwards towards Otho Askam, with a smile, and afterwards looking at him, cross, distorted, pouting.
Whether the music inspired him, or the sight of Ada, he knew not, but there flashed suddenly into his mind the recollection that he must most likely soon lose sight of her, for a considerable time at any rate, and with this recollection the conviction that that was the best thing that could possibly happen to them both. Separation for a season would, he argued, teach them both to look upon things with less prejudiced eyes. She would miss him, and want him, and he would learn to be less indignant at what had happened between them.
As he came to this conclusion, which he hugged as a conviction, because it presented to him a way out of his difficulty with regard to the most judicious course to take with Ada, he perceived Gilbert Langstroth walking up the aisle behind Eleanor Askam, and they went together to the great square pew belonging to Thorsgarth. Roger began to wonder if Michael was right in thinking there might be something between them. Then he saw the choir and parsons coming in, and he wound up his voluntary, and the service began. When it was over, he played the congregation out to the music of a quick movement from a sonata of Beethoven—a passage full of storm and stress; of pain, struggle, and striving. And as the wild and noble music pealed out, some of his pain and unrest passed away with it.
When he had left the church, and got into the churchyard, it was almost empty. One or two groups still lingered in conversation. Ada and her parents were not amongst them, but Roger was surprised to see Gilbert and Miss Askam still there. She looked very pale, he noticed, and grave, but also very beautiful in her dark brown velvet and furs. He raised his hat, and was passing on, but Gilbert stepped forward, and to Roger’s bewildered amazement, accosted him.
‘I have been waiting for you,’ said he. ‘I want a word with you, if you can spare a moment; and Miss Askam desires me to present you to her;’ and he turned from one to the other.
Again Roger’s hat came off, and he could not find it in his heart to look with anything but gentleness upon this sad young face, in which he, like Michael, had begun to perceive a nobility and firmness of expression beneath the mere beauty of outline, which expression attracted him whether he would or no. She only said a very few words to him, quietly and simply.
‘I wished to make your acquaintance. I have heard much about you from Dr. Rowntree, and from my friend, Mrs. Johnson.’