“I know what you mean,” said General Gaunt. “I’m not too fond of interference myself. But when a man has concealed his antecedents, and they have been found out. And then the little girl——”
“Yes: it is Frances I think of most,” said Mr Durant.
It was at last settled among them that it was clearly the clergyman’s business to interfere. He had been tolerably certain to begin with, but he liked the moral support of what he called a consensus of opinion. Mr Durant was not so reluctant as he professed to be. He had not much scope for those social duties which, he was of opinion, were not the least important of a clergyman’s functions; and though there was a little excitement in the uncertainty from Sunday to Sunday how many people would be at church, what the collection would be, and other varying circumstances, yet the life of the clergyman at Bordighera was monotonous, and a little variety was welcome. In other chaplaincies which Mr Durant had held, he had come in contact with various romances of real life. These were still the days of gaming, when every German bath had its tapis vert and its little troup of tragedies. But the Riviera was very tranquil, and Bordighera had just been found out by the invalid and the pleasure-seeker. It was monotonous: there had been few deaths, even among the visitors, which are always varieties in their way for the clergyman, and often are the means of making acquaintances both useful and agreeable to himself and his family. But as yet there had not even been many deaths. This gave great additional excitement to what is always exciting, for a small community—the cropping up under their very noses, in their own immediate circle, of a mystery, of a discovery which afforded boundless opportunity for talk. The first thing naturally that had affected Mr and Mrs Durant was the miraculous escape of Tasie, to whom Mr Waring might have made himself agreeable, and whose peace of mind might have been affected, for anything that could be said to the contrary. They said to each other that it was a hair-breadth escape; although it had not occurred previously to any one that any sort of mutual attraction between Mr Waring and Tasie was possible.
And then the other aspects of the case became apparent. Mr Durant felt now that to pass it over, to say nothing about the matter, to allow Waring to suppose that everything was as it had always been, was impossible. He and his wife had decided this without the intervention of General Gaunt; but when the General appeared—the only other permanent pillar of society in Bordighera—then there arose that consensus which made further steps inevitable. Mrs Gaunt looked in later, after dinner, in the darkening; and she, too, was of opinion that something must be done. She was affected to tears by the thought of that mystery in their very midst, and of what the poor (unknown) lady must have suffered, deserted by her husband, and bereft of her child. “He might at least have left her her child,” she said, with a sob; and she was fully of opinion that he should be spoken to without delay, and that they should not rest till Frances had been restored to her mother. She thought it was “a duty” on the part of Mr Durant to interfere. The consensus was thus unanimous; there was not a dissentient voice in the entire community. “We will sleep upon it,” Mr Durant said. But the morning brought no further light. They were all agreed more strongly than ever that Waring ought to be spoken to, and that it was undeniably a duty for the clergyman to interfere.
Mr Durant accordingly set out before it was too late, before the mid-day breakfast, which is the coolest and calmest moment of the day, the time for business, before social intercourse is supposed to begin. He was very carefully brushed from his hat to his shoes, and was indeed a very agreeable example of a neat old clerical gentleman. Ecclesiastical costume was much more easy in those days. It was before the era of long coats and soft hats, when a white tie was the one incontrovertible sign of the clergyman who did not think of calling himself a priest. He was indeed, having been for a number of years located in Catholic countries, very particular not to call himself a priest, or to condescend to any garb which could recall the soutane and three-cornered hat of the indigenous clergy. His black clothes were spotless, but of the ordinary cut, perhaps a trifle old-fashioned. But yet neither soutane nor berretta could have made it more evident that Mr Durant, setting out with an ebony stick and black gloves, was an English clergyman going mildly but firmly to interfere. Had he been met with in the wilds of Africa, even there mistake would have been impossible. In his serious eye, in the aspect of the corners of his mouth, in a certain air of gentle determination diffused over his whole person, this was apparent. It made a great impression upon Domenico when he opened the door. After what had happened yesterday, Domenico felt that anything might happen. “Lo, this man’s brow, like to a title leaf, foretells the nature of the tragic volume,” he said to Mariuccia—at least if he did not use these words, his meaning was the same. He ushered the English pastor into the room which Mr Waring occupied as a library, with bated breath. “Master is going to catch it,” was what, perhaps, a light-minded Cockney might have said. But Domenico was a serious man, and did not trifle.
Waring’s library was, like all the rooms of his suite, an oblong room, with three windows and as many doors, opening into the dining-room on one hand, and the ante-room on the other. It had the usual indecipherable fresco on the roof, and the walls on one side were half clothed with bookcases. Not a very large collection of books, and yet enough to make a pretty show, with their old gilding, and the dull white of the vellum in which so many were bound. It was a room in which he spent the most of his time, and it had been made comfortable according to the notions of comfort prevailing in these regions. There was a square of carpet under his writing-table. His chair was a large old fauteuil, covered with faded damask; and curtains, also faded, were festooned over all the windows and doors. The persiani were shut to keep out the sun, and the cool atmosphere had a greenish tint. Waring, however, did not look so peaceful as his room. He sat with his chair pushed away from the table, reading what seemed to be a novel. He had the air of a man who had taken refuge there from some embarrassment or annoyance; not the tranquil look of a man occupied in so-called studies needing leisure, with his note-books at hand, and pen and ink within reach. Such a man is usually very glad to be interrupted in the midst of his self-imposed labours, and Waring’s first movement was one of satisfaction. He threw down the book, with an apology for having ever taken it up in the half-ashamed, half-violent way in which he got rid of it. Don’t suppose I care for such rubbish, his gesture seemed to say. But the aspect of Mr Durant changed his look of welcome. He rose hurriedly, and gave his visitor a chair. “You are early out,” he said.
“Yes; the morning, I find, is the best time. Even after the sun is down, it is never so fresh in the evening. Especially for business, I find it the best time.”
“That means, I suppose,” said Waring, “that your visit this morning means business, and not mere friendship, as I had supposed?”
“Friendship always, I hope,” said the tidy old clergyman, smoothing his hat with his hand; “but I don’t deny it is something more serious: a—a—question I want to ask you, if you don’t mind——”
Just at this moment, in the next room there rose a little momentary and pleasant clamour of voices and youthful laughter; two voices certainly—Frances and another. This made Mr Durant prick up his ears. “You have—visitors?” he said.