No doubt it was laughable at first, as naivete is. “Cuthbert was very funny about it”—for instance. “He was awfully anxious to see you, you know—you had never met, I think?—and yet not quite liking it. He said it was a great risk; he seemed to think I ought not to be there. He takes great care of me, the darling. And there was little Dickie, you see. Sancie! he can just walk—a kind of totter from my knees to Cuthbert's—and then so proud of himself! Cuthbert said that my duty was to Dickie; but I told him that I meant to come.”
Yes, it was comical. “Did Captain Sinclair think I should give him a complaint?” Sanchia was smiling, with eyes and mouth; but the smile was fixed.
Vicky hugged her. “You dear one! prettiness is your complaint. I should like him to have some of that.” She held her at arms' length, looked and glowed, and kissed. She took a serious tone, for the matter was serious. “You know, Sancie, you're the only beauty in our family, the only real beauty. Philippa's awfully handsome, I know, and greatly admired—and I've always said that Melot was lovely. There are those three sorts of women, you know. Philippa's handsome, Melot's lovely, and you're beautiful. Then there's prettiness. I know I'm rather pretty: everybody says so. Besides, there's Cuthbert. Oh, you can always tell! For one thing—he's so fussy about my clothes—you've no idea.” She preened herself, like a pigeon in the sun, before she returned to her praises. “But you! You're quite different. You're like a goddess.” She touched her curiously. “Yes, I thought so. Exactly like a goddess.” She sighed. “I can't think how you do it. Swedish exercises? I know it's wonderful what they do for you—in no time. But you have to think about them all the while, and I think of Cuthbert—and Dickie—and the horses—and, oh, all sorts of things! Those sort, I mean,—nice things.” She pondered Sanchia's godhead, shaking her pretty draperies out, then recalled herself. “Oh, yes, about coming here. Of course I knew that Mamma would make a fuss—but I had determined long ago, before I dreamed that it would ever happen, not to tell her a word. It was only Cuthbert who made me feel—well, serious. He is so wise, such a man of the world! But I told him that I meant to come whatever he could say—and afterwards it turned out that he wanted to come too. He was really quite keen. Wasn't that sweet of him? You would adore Cuthbert if you knew him as well as I do. But, of course, that's absurd.” She suddenly became intense. “Sancie!” she said, then stopped and peered.
“Yes?” It was a sobered goddess who waited for close quarters. Vicky put her question, but peered no more.
“I wish you would tell me one thing, which—has always puzzled me. But don't, if you would rather not. How did you—I simply can't understand it—how did you ever—? I suppose you loved him very much?”
Sanchia was in a hard stare. “Yes,” she said slowly, “I suppose I did.” Vicky's head darted back.
“Ah! But now you don't a bit. I knew you didn't! Sancie, that's what I can't understand. Because, you know, when you're married you do. You always love the same person. You must—you can't help it. He's so natural; he knows things that you know. He knows—everything. Oh, Sancie, I can't talk about it, but you understand, don't you?”
Poor Sancie nodded, not able to look up. Alas for her secrets, offered, taken, and forgotten! But Vicky's vivacious fingers groped in her empty cupboard. “And then, as well as that, you ought to love him. You see, you've promised; it's all been made so sacred. You never forget it—the clergyman, and the altar, and the hymns. You're all in white—veiled. And you kneel there—before the altar—and he holds your hand. And the ring, oh, Sancie, the feeling of the ring!” She opened her little hand and looked down at the smoothed gold, coiled below the diamonds and pearls. “You never forget the first feel of that. It means—everything!” She blushed, and said, in a hushed sort of way, “It meant—Dickie, to me.”
Sanchia drooped and bled. Vicky, deep in her holy joys, was remorseless. Even when she turned once more to her sister's affairs her consolation made wounds.
“Cuthbert said that it would come all right now—now that Mrs. Ingram-the wife—was—That's rather horrible. Even you must feel that. Instead of being sorry that his wife is dead, one has to be awfully glad. I suppose you felt that at once; and of course he did. Poor woman! I wonder if she was buried in her ring.” She eyed her own. “No one would dare take it off. I made Cuthbert promise me this morning. But—of course people do marry again, and it will be practically the same as that.” She reflected. “Yes, practically, it will, but—oh, it's very extraordinary! You've had all your fun of engagement and all that, long ago.” She looked down deeply at her hand; and then she gazed at her sister. “And, oh, Sancie, you've had your honeymoon!” Before the deadly simplicity of that last stroke Sanchia fell, and lay quivering. She could not ask for mercy, she could explain, extenuate, nothing. Huddled she lay. At this aching moment the one thing that the world held worth her having seemed to be the approbation of this butterfly child. For Vicky's happiness was specific. Nuptial bliss lay, as it were, crystallised within it. There are moments in one's life when love itself seems lust, and safety the only holy thing. Vicky, tearing at her heart, had turned her head.