A murmur came from Archie’s throat. He was half affronted, half angry, offended by that laugh which had startled him in his unexpressed excitement. But yet he went and stood by her as she said.
“I was wrong to laugh,” said Evelyn, “but I could not help it. If you had seen yourselves, you would have laughed too. James, I got a clue just before you left home, but I could not tell you of it, because of Sir John: and then you went away with him. I don’t know that I should have told you: and I was glad you went away. It was the opportunity I wanted. I went up to town, and I saw the man who—James!—what is the matter. Do you know?”
He had lifted up his hands with a great exclamation of dismay. “Him!” he cried, and no more.
“I think,” said Evelyn with sudden gravity, “your father knows—independent of me. Archie, go and get ready to come home. It is a very sad story. Your father has the best heart, he is more sorry for him that has sinned than glad for him that is saved. I repent of my silly laugh. For though you have not done it, another poor boy has done it. James! God bless you, you have the best heart of us all.”
CHAPTER XLVI.
It was a very curious breakfast party: for this of course was what had to follow, neither father nor son having yet had any breakfast, notwithstanding all the agitations of the morning. And Mr. Rowland and his son, their minds being relieved, had a very different idea of what was implied in the word breakfast from that entertained by Evelyn, whose cup of tea and morsel of “bap” had satisfied all her needs. They meant other things, and their meaning was more promptly understood by Mrs. Brown than anything that had gone before. It had gone to her heart to see the eggs, the marmalade, and the scones, all neglected upon the tray which she had brought for Mrs. Rowland with the hospitality of a savage woman to her enemy: but now the opportunity was within reach of distinguishing herself in the most lavish way. She was continually on the road between the kitchen and parlour, hurrying, with one dish after another, eggs, finnan haddocks, fried ham, everything that her substantial system of cooking understood. It was Evelyn’s turn to sit and watch the progress of a meal which was so very different from her own, which she did with mingled amusement and amazement, and something of that feminine mixture of pleasure and laughing disdain for the men whose appetites are not interfered with by emotion, which is so common. She liked to see them eat with a certain maternal satisfaction in their well-being, though not so marked as that of Mrs. Brown, who ran to and fro supplying them, with tears of delight in her eyes—but with little jibes and jests at the ease of the transition from all their excitement to that excellent meal, which Archie, always afraid of being laughed at, was uncertain how to accept, though satisfied by seeing that they did not affect his father’s equanimity. Presently, however, these little jests began to slacken, the tone of her voice changed, and when, after a moment or two of silence, Rowland looked up to say something, he perceived, with the most unexpected sudden rush of emotion to his own eyes, and feeling to his heart, that his wife had fallen asleep. He had not understood Jane’s signals, who stood by with her finger on her lip, and who was drying her eyes with the big white apron which she had slipped on to save her gown, as she ran to and fro with the dishes which Bell in the kitchen was fully occupied in preparing.
“She’s just wearit to death,” Jane whispered with a small sob, “and vexed wi’ the contradictions o’ sinners, after a’ she’s done for you. Just hold your tongues now, and let her get a little peace, ye twa greedy men.” The elaborate pantomime in which the rest of the meal was carried on; the care of both to subdue the sound of their knives and forks, and suppress the little jar of the cups and saucers; and the super-careful clearing away, performed on tiptoe by Bell, as being less heavy in her movements than her mistress, aided by Archie, would have been very amusing to Evelyn could she have seen through her closed eyelids what was going on: but her sleep was very sincere, the involuntary and profound slumber of exhaustion, from which relief of mind, and the delightful ease of success, took every sting. When she came to herself it was in the quiet of a room given up to her repose, the blind drawn down, every sound hushed, and a large shawl—Mrs. Brown’s best, a real Indian shawl sent by Rowland in former days, of which the good woman was more proud than of anything she possessed—carefully arranged over her. Her husband sat near, not moving a finger, watching over her repose. Evelyn woke with a slight start, and it was a minute or two before she realised that she was not in the corner of a railway carriage nor the forlorn solitude of the London hotel, but that her mission was accomplished, and all hostilities vanquished. It was perhaps Jane’s shawl that made this most clearly apparent to her. It was a beautiful shawl, the colours like nothing but those fine tints of Cashmere with which her Indian experiences had made her fully acquainted, the texture so soft, the work so delicate. The first intimation that Rowland had of his wife’s waking, were the words, said to herself with a little sigh of pleasure, “He must have sent her this.”
“What did you say, my darling?” he said, getting up quickly.
“Oh, you are there, James! I said you must have sent it to her, and I meant she must approve of me at last, or she would not have covered me with her beautiful shawl.”
“Do you care for her approval, Evelyn?”