When she had gone the brothers sat without speaking for some minutes. The Rector drank his claret; John Germain was in a brooding stare. The younger broke the silence.
“Dear old boy, I wish that we could have stopped up a few more days—but the Diocesan Inspector can’t be put off. I tried him with my silkiest—he’s inexorable—adamant. And then there’s Constantia, with a bazaar on her conscience. A bazaar—in July!”
John Germain did not lift his head from the hand that propped it. “My dear fellow, I understand you perfectly. We all have our duties. We must all face them . . . whatever it cost . . . whatever it cost us.”
The Rector looked keenly at him. “You are not yourself, John—that’s as clear as day. I do wish that Mary had not left you. It was not like her. She should have known—” His goaded brother sat up sharply—like one who lifts his gory head from the press of battle, descrying fresh foes.
“Mary wished to go. I could not deny her. Indeed, I wished it also. Her parents are alone, and she is useful to them. I believe, nay, I am sure that she is happy there.”
“Your belief,” said the Rector, “is as pious as the fact, and as rare. The fashion of the day is for children to tolerate their parents. The cry is, ‘You brought us into the world, Monsieur et Dame; yes, and thank you for nothing!’ Thank God, Mary hasn’t caught that trick. But I do think that, if she is needed here, a hint from you——”
“But I will give her no such hints,” Germain said fiercely. “I am not so self-engrossed. I am inured to a solitary life, and she is not. I remember her youth, I remember her activity.”
“One would have thought that London in June—” the Rector began, and was checked at once. Germain said shortly that the activity excited by London in June was not wholesome. “She is better there than here,” he added, and snapped his lips together.
James Germain, having raised his eyebrows at this oracle, immediately lowered them again, and his eyes with them. After a pause he spoke more intimately, feeling his way along a dark, surmised passage.
“I believe you to mean that all this whirl is very new to her, and over-exciting. Must you not be patient, must you not lead? Accustom her to it by degrees? You know what I think of Mary, and that I have followed her steps with interest. You have told me how bravely she held her own in the country; and you aren’t likely to forget that she had two years in which to do it. You speak of our duties—meaning, I take it, your own among others? Well, where do these lie, these duties? Where we find ourselves, or where we may choose to put ourselves? You may tell me that public life is, in a sense, your sphere—and so it is, I grant you. But when you entered Mary’s little sphere—as you did, something of the suddenest—had you not then to inquire whether that could be made elastic enough to include your own? Surely you had. This Parliamentary career of yours, now. Nobody is more naturally at Westminster than yourself: that’s of course. I wish there were more like you, men of sober judgment, weighted with their private responsibilities. Upon my conscience, Parliament seems a place for buccaneering now-a-days—a high sea. I rejoiced, I say, when you stood up. But whether you could fairly ask a girl of Mary’s training to take over such work with you—by your side—” Here John Germain held up his hand.