In justice to Mrs. de Tracy, it must be made plain that with all her faults, small 90 spite was not a part of her character. Yet to-day, her anger had been stirred by an incident so small that its very triviality annoyed her pride. It was Mark Lavendar’s custom, when his visits to Stoke Revel included a Sunday, cheerfully to evade church-going. His Sundays in the country were few, he said, and he preferred to enjoy them in the temple of nature, generally taking a long walk before lunch. But to-day he had announced his intention of coming to service, and well Mrs. de Tracy, versed in men and in human nature, knew why. Robinette would be there, and Lavendar followed, as the bee follows a basket of flowers on a summer day. As Mrs. de Tracy, like the Stoic that she was, accepted all the inevitable facts of life,––birth, death, love, hate (she had known them all in her day), she accepted this one also. But in that atrophy of every feeling except bitterness, that atrophy which is perhaps the only real solitude, the only real old age, her animosity was stirred. It was as 91 though a dead branch upon some living tree was angry with the spring for breathing on it. As she returned, herself unseen in the shadow of the yew tree, she saw Lavendar and Robinette enter together under the lych-gate, the figure of the young woman touched with sunlight and colour, her lips moving, and Lavendar smiling in answer. In the clashing of the bells––bells which shook the air, the earth, the ancient stones, the very nests upon the trees––their voices were inaudible, but in their faces was a young happiness and hope to which the solitary woman could not blind herself.
Presently in the lukewarm air within, Robinette was finding the church’s immemorial smell of prayer-books, hassocks, decaying wood, damp stones, matting, school-children, and altar flowers, a harmonious and suggestive one if not pleasant. What an ancient air it was, she thought; breathed and re-breathed by slow generations of Stoke Revellers during their sleepy devotions! The very light that 92 entered through the dim stained glass seemed old and dusty, it had seen so much during so many hundred years, seen so much, and found out so many secrets! Soon the clashing of the bells ceased and upon the still reverberating silence there broke the small, snoring noises of a rather ineffectual organ, while the amiable curate, Rev. Tobias Finch, made his appearance, and the service began.
Mrs. de Tracy had entered the pew first, naturally; Miss Smeardon sat next, then Robinetta. Lavendar occupied the pew in front, alone, and through her half-closed eyelids Robinetta could see the line of his lean cheek and bony temple. He had not wished to sit there at all and he was so unresigned as to be badly in need of the soothing influences of Morning Prayer. Robinetta was beginning to wonder dreamily what manner of man this really was, behind his plain face and non-committal manner, when the muffled slam of a door behind, startled her, followed as it was by a quick step upon the matted aisle. Then 93 without further warning, a big, broad-shouldered boy, in the uniform of a British midshipman, thrust himself into the pew beside her, hot and breathless after running hard. Mrs. Loring guessed at once that this must be Carnaby de Tracy, the young hopeful and heir of Stoke Revel of whom Mr. Lavendar had so often spoken, but the startling and unconventional nature of his appearance was not at all what one expected in a member of his family. Robinette stole more than one look at him as the offertory went round; a robust boy with a square chin, a fair face burnt red by the sun, a rollicking eye and an impudent nose; not handsome certainly, indeed quite plain, but he looked honest and strong and clean, and Robinette’s frolicsome youth was drawn to his, all ready for fun. Carnaby hitched about a good deal, dropped his hymn-book, moved the hassock, took out his handkerchief, and on discovering a huge hole, turned crimson.
Service over, the congregation shuffled out 94 into the sunshine, and Mrs. de Tracy, after a characteristically cool and disapproving recognition of her grandson, became occupied with villagers. Lavendar made known young Carnaby to Mrs. David Loring, but the midshipman’s light grey eyes had discovered the pretty face without any assistance.
“This lady is your American cousin, Carnaby,” said Mark. “Did you know you had one?”
“I don’t think I did,” answered the boy, “but it’s never too late to mend!” He attempted a bow of finished grown-upness, failed somewhat, and melted at once into an engaging boyishness, under which his frank admiration of his new-found relative was not to be hidden. “I say, are you stopping at Stoke Revel?” he asked, as though the news were too good to be true. “Jolly! Hullo––” he broke off with animation as the cassocked figure of the Rev. Tobias Finch fluttered out from the porch––“here’s old Toby! Watch Miss Smeardon now! She expects to catch 95 him, you know, but he says he’s going to be a celly––celly-what-d’you-call-’em?”
“Celibate?” suggested Lavendar, with laughing eyes.
“The very word, thank you!” said Carnaby. “Yes: a celibate. Not so easily nicked, good old Toby––you bet!”
“Do the clergymen over here always dress like that?” inquired Robinetta, trying to suppress a tendency to laugh at his slang.
“Cassock?” said Carnaby. “Toby wouldn’t be seen without it. High, you know! Bicycles in it. Fact! Goes to bed in it, I believe.”