He would not himself admit that he was ill at all, and his whole energies at the time were devoted to the preparation of a series of three addresses on the subject of Land Reform, which were to be delivered in October to the delegates of a large number of working-men's clubs from all parts of London. So strong was Hallin's position among working-men reformers, and so beloved had been his personality, that as soon as his position towards the new land nationalising movement, now gathering formidable strength among the London working men, had come to be widely understood, a combined challenge had been sent him by some half-dozen of the leading Socialist and Radical clubs, asking him to give three weekly addresses in October to a congress of London delegates, time to be allowed after the lecture for questions and debate.
Hallin had accepted the invitation with eagerness, and was throwing an intensity of labour into the writing of his three lectures which often seemed to his poor sister to be not only utterly beyond his physical strength, but to carry with it a note as of a last effort, a farewell message, such as her devoted affection could ill endure. For all the time he was struggling with cardiac weakness and brain irritability which would have overwhelmed any one less accustomed to make his account with illness, or to balance against feebleness of body a marvellous discipline of soul.
Lord Maxwell was still alive, and Hallin, in the midst of his work, was looking anxiously for the daily reports from Aldous, living in his friend's life almost as much as in his own—handing on the reports, too, day by day to Marcella, with a manner which had somehow slipped into expressing a new and sure confidence in her sympathy—when she one evening found Minta Hurd watching for her at the door with a telegram from her mother: "Your father suddenly worse. Please come at once." She arrived at Mellor late that same night.
On the same day Lord Maxwell died. Less than a week later he was buried in the little Gairsley church. Mr. Boyce was then alarmingly ill, and Marcella sat in his darkened room or in her own all day, thinking from time to time of what was passing three miles away—of the great house in its mourning—of the figures round the grave. Hallin, of course, would be there. It was a dripping September day, and she passed easily from moments of passionate yearning and clairvoyance to worry herself about the damp and the fatigue that Hallin must be facing.
Since then she had heard occasionally from Miss Hallin. Everything was much as it had been, apparently. Edward was still hard at work, still ill, still serene. "Aldous"—Miss Hallin could not yet reconcile herself to the new name—was alone in the Curzon Street house, much occupied and harassed apparently by the legal business of the succession, by the election presently to be held in his own constituency, and by the winding-up of his work at the Home Office. He was to resign his under-secretaryship; but with the new session and a certain rearrangement of offices it was probable that he would be brought back into the Ministry. Meanwhile he was constantly with them; and she thought that his interest in Edward's work and anxiety about his health were perhaps both good for him as helping to throw off something of his own grief and depression.
Whereby it will be noticed that Miss Hallin, like her brother, had by now come to speak intimately and freely to Marcella of her old lover and their friend.
Now for some days, however, she had received no letter from either brother or sister, and she was particularly anxious to hear. For this was the fourth of October, and on the second he was to have delivered the first of his addresses. How had the frail prophet sped? She had her fears. For her weekly "evenings" in Brown's Buildings had shown her a good deal of the passionate strength of feeling developed during the past year in connection with this particular propaganda. She doubted whether the London working man at the present moment was likely to give even Hallin a fair hearing on the point. However, Louis Craven was to be there. And he had promised to write even if Susie Hallin could find no time. Some report ought to reach Mellor by the evening.
Poor Cravens! The young wife, who was expecting a baby, had behaved with great spirit through the Clarion trouble; and, selling their bits of furniture to pay their debts, they had gone to lodge near Anthony. Louis had got some odds and ends of designing and artistic work to do through his brother's influence; and was writing where he could, here and there. Marcella had introduced them to the Hallins, and Susie Hallin was taking a motherly interest in the coming child. Anthony, in his gloomy way, was doing all he could for them. But the struggle was likely to be a hard one, and Marcella had recognised of late that in Louis as in Anthony there were dangerous possibilities of melancholy and eccentricity. Her heart was often sore over their trouble and her own impotence.
Meantime for some wounds, at any rate, time had brought swift cautery! Not three days after her final interview with Wharton, while the catastrophe in the Labour party was still in every one's mouth, and the air was full of bitter speeches and recriminations, Hallin one evening laid down his newspaper with a sudden startled gesture, and then pushed it over to Marcella. There, in the columns devoted to personal news of various sorts, appeared the announcement:
"A marriage has been arranged between Mr. H.S. Wharfon, M.P. for West Brookshire, and Lady Selina Farrell, only surviving daughter of Lord Alresford. The ceremony will probably take place somewhere about Easter next. Meanwhile Mr. Wharton, whose health has suffered of late from his exertions in and out of the House, has been ordered to the East for rest by his medical advisers. He and his friend Sir William Ffolliot start for French Cochin China in a few days. Their object is to explore the famous ruined temples of Angkor in Cambodia, and if the season is favourable they may attempt to ascend the Mekong. Mr. Wharton is paired for the remainder of the session."