The Three Brothers; vol. 3/3

by Mrs. Oliphant

And then Ben smiled. ‘I should like to hear,’ he said, ‘what you know about me?’

What did she know about him? Nothing,—and yet everything, Mary thought.

‘Sometimes one divines,’ she said.

‘And sometimes one divines all wrong,’ said Ben.

Then there followed a pause. It was a very exciting game of fence so far as she was concerned. But she felt instinctively it was not safe to keep it up.

‘Godmamma will not come down to luncheon,’ she said, ‘but in the evening I hope she will be all right again. And when Alice is here and the children they will be a great help. Alice is not clever, you know, but she harmonises things somehow. I wonder if it is because she is musical.’

‘You harmonise things, too, and you are not particularly musical,’ said Ben.

‘Oh, me!’ Mary turned away, not caring to discuss that subject. He was always so nice to her,—so frank and affectionate. ‘If he were to marry Ruth Escott now, or Helen Cookesley, how nice it would be to be a sister to her!’ Mary thought! but Millicent! Could he be thinking of Millicent now? He had got up from his chair, and was looking out with a certain wistfulness—or at least what would have been wistfulness in a woman, who has always to wait for any one she particularly wishes to see. A man can go forth and seek, and has no call to be wistful; but then it was only according to feminine rules that Mary, so long unaccustomed to anything else, could form her thoughts.

‘I have ordered up a boat from Cookesley,’ he said; ‘and remember, I mean to row you to the Swan’s Nest this afternoon. It is clearing up—— ’ for it had become cloudy, and rain had fallen during that period of newspaper-reading in Mrs. Renton’s room. And then Ben went out abruptly and left her. He stood upon no sort of ceremony, as if she were anything but his natural sister, but went away without any explanation. Going to the Swan’s Nest it would be necessary to pass The Willows; and at this moment he was taking the path to the river. Could he be going the very first morning to lay himself again at the syren’s feet? Could it be the mere pleasure of passing her house, being in the neighbourhood, that moved him? Mary, without pausing to think, flew up-stairs,—up beyond the servants’ floor to a little turret-room which commanded a view of the river. And when she had waited long enough to recover her breath, there, sure enough, was a boat shooting out from the green bank at Renton with one figure in it, which must be Ben. And the course he took was up the river. She covered her face for a moment when she saw it, and a hot, sudden tear brimmed just over, wetting her eyelashes. Mo more. Was it her business that she should weep over Ben’s folly? No man can redeem his brother, much less any woman, alas! However dreadful it might be, the man must go his own way.

Mrs. Renton rallied sufficiently that afternoon to go for her drive, and Mary’s services were wanted accordingly. But when she had got through that duty, there was still time for the Swan’s Nest, to which she had been looking forward with an excitement which was almost feverish. Ben was waiting for them at the door. He took his mother up to her room, subduing his big pace as best he could to quietness, and put her into Davison’s hands for her rest before dinner. It was an arrangement very grateful to all parties. While Mrs. Renton was taking her favourite refreshment and being comfortably tucked up on her sofa, the young people were making their way down to the bank with something of the gaiety of former days. ‘I once beat you, Ben, running down,’ Mary said, for a moment forgetting The Willows and all that was involved in it. ‘I defy you to beat me now,’ her cousin said, and Mary’s heart for one moment felt so light that she made a woman’s wild dash down one wind of the path, and stopped short breathless, catching at the great beech to support her. But between the branches of the beech Mary saw a sight which quickly sobered her. Could it be by previous arrangement, or was it by chance? A boat lay at the little steps before The Willows, and some one,—there could be no difficulty in guessing whom,—was getting into it. Mary’s heart sank away down to the lowest depths,—a sudden sickness of the light, and the brightness, and the river, and the day, came over her. She turned even from Ben, feeling sick of him too. A certain contempt of him rose up in her tender soul. Yes; there are many pangs in the sensation with which a woman recognises that another less worthy is preferred to herself; but not the least penetrating is that instinctive, involuntary contempt. He had gone and arranged with Millicent no doubt, and then he thought to please all parties by taking her, Mary, to meet the woman he loved. Ben, for his part, with the stupidity of a male creature, saw that some shadow had come over her, and thought she had struck her foot in her rapid descent against the roots of the beech. ‘Ah, you should not have gone in for it,’ he said in not triumph, but sympathy;—‘take my arm. I hope you have not twisted your foot.’ I twisted her foot!—when it was he who wrung her heart! But to be sure, Mary did not wish him to divine what was her real ailment; and it was so like a man! But the laughter and the fun were over. The two descended soberly to the river-side and got into the boat. And Mary gathered the cords of the little rudder into her hands, and Ben took up the sculls. They were face to face, and it was difficult for one to hide from the other what emotions might rise or what change come over them. ‘I am afraid you have hurt your foot badly,—you look quite pale,’ Ben said, bending forward to her with absolute anxiety. ‘Oh, no, I am all right,’ Mary replied, saying in her heart, What fools men are! How stupid they must be!—a threadbare sentiment which does not bear expression. And then she cried, ‘Remember I am strong,’ with a certain gleam of wicked glee. She could run him into the weeds if he showed too much interest in that other boat. She could keep him out of speaking distance to baulk Millicent’s wiles, or she could run into them to give her a fright. Mary began to feel herself when she pulled that cord which put some power into her hands, and saw the little skiff turn and dart about at her will from one side to another. ‘Take care what you are doing,’ cried Ben in dismay, thinking his coxswain had lost her wits; but she was only getting possession of them, and beginning to remember that there was no need to be passive, and that she, too, had arms in her hands.