Colonel Kingsward was rough and angry with Bee that first morning, to her consternation and dismay. She had never been the object of her father’s anger before, and this hasty and imperious questioning seemed to take all power of reply out of her. “What had she been doing to her mother?” She! to her mother! Bee was too much frightened by his threatening look, the cloud on his face, the fire in his eyes, to say anything. Her mind ran hurriedly over all that had happened, and that last terrible visit, which had changed the whole aspect of the earth to herself. But it was to herself that this stroke of misfortune had come, and not to her mother. A gleam of answering anger came into Bee’s eyes, sombre with the unhappiness which had been pushed aside by more immediate suffering, yet was still there like a black background, to frame whatever other miseries might come after. As for Colonel Kingsward, it was to him, as to so many men, a relief to blame somebody for the trouble which was unbearable. The blow was approaching which he had never allowed himself to believe in. He had blamed his wife instinctively, involuntarily, at the first hearing of every inconvenience in life; and it had helped to accustom him to the annoyance to think that it was her fault. He had done so in what he called this unfortunate business of Bee’s, concluding that but for Mrs. Kingsward’s weakness, Mr. Aubrey Leigh and his affairs would never have become of any importance to the family. He had blamed her, too, and greatly, for that weakening of health which he had so persistently endeavoured to convince himself did not mean half so much as the doctors said. Women are so idiotic in these respects. They will insist on wearing muslin and lace when they ought to wear flannel. They will put on evening dresses when they ought to be clothed warmly to the throat, and shoes made of paper when they ought to be solidly and stoutly shod, quite indifferent to the trouble and anxiety they may cause to their family. And now that Mrs. Kingsward’s state had got beyond the possibility of reproach, he turned upon his daughter. It must be her fault. Her mother had been better or he should not have left her. The quiet of the country was doing her good; if she had not been agitated all would have been well. But Bee, with all her declarations of devotion to her mother; Bee, the eldest, who ought to have had some sense; Bee had brought on this trumpery love business to overset the delicate equilibrium which he himself, a man with affairs so much more important in hand, had refrained from disturbing. It did him a little good, unhappy and anxious as he was, to pour out his wrath upon Bee. And she did not reply. She did not shed tears, as her mother had weakly done in similar circumstances, or attempt excuses. Even if he had been sufficiently at leisure to note it, an answering fire awoke in Bee’s eyes. He had not leisure to note, but he perceived it all the same.
Presently, however, every faculty, every thought, became absorbed in that sick chamber; things had still to be thought of outside of it, but they seemed strange, artificial things, having no connection with life. Then Charlie was summoned from Oxford, and the younger boys from school, which increased the strange commotion of the house, adding that restless element of young life which had no place there, nothing to do with itself, and which roused an almost frenzied irritation in Colonel Kingsward when he saw any attempt on the part of the poor boys to amuse themselves, or resume their usual occupations. “Clods!” he said; “young brutes! They would play tennis if the world were falling to pieces.” And again that glance of fire came into Bee’s eyes, marked unconsciously, though he did not know he had seen it, by her father. The boys hung about her when she stole out for a little air, one at each arm. “How is mother, Bee? She’s no worse? Don’t you think we might go over to Hillside for that tournament? Don’t you think Fred might play in the parish match with Siddemore? They’re so badly off for bowlers. Don’t you think——”
“Oh, I think it would be much better for you to be doing something, boys; but, then, papa might hear, and he would be angry. If we could but keep it from papa.”
“We’re doing mother no good,” said Fred.
“How could we do mother good? Why did the governor send for us, Bee, only to kick our heels here, and get into mischief? A fellow can’t help getting into mischief when he has nothing to do.”
“Yes,” repeated Fred, “what did he send for us for? I wish mother was better. I suppose as soon as she’s better we’ll be packed off again.”
They were big boys, but they did not understand the possibility of their mother not getting better, and, indeed, neither did Bee. When morning followed morning and nothing happened, it seemed to her that getting better was the only conclusion to be looked for. If it had been Death that was coming, surely it must have come by this time. Her hopes rose with every new day.
But Mrs. Kingsward had been greatly agitated by the sight of Charlie when he was allowed to see her. “Why has Charlie come home?” she said. “Was he sent for? Was it your father that brought him? Charlie, my dear, what are you doing here? Why have you come back? You should have been going on with—— Did your father send for you? Why—why did your father send for you, my boy?”
“I thought,” said Charlie, quite unmanned by the sight of her, and by this unexpected question, and by all he had been told about her state, “I thought—you wanted to see me, mother.”
“I always like to see you—but not to take you away from—— And why was he sent for, Moulsey? Does the doctor think?—does my husband think?——”