Comethup left him and drove home. Miss Charlotte Carlaw, even in the midst of an affectionate greeting, expressed her surprise that he should not have telegraphed the hour of his arrival, in order that the carriage might meet him. He explained lamely that he had made up his mind quite suddenly to return, and that there had been no time for anything. Miss Carlaw sat in her accustomed chair, amid a curious silence, for some moments, evidently waiting for him to speak, feeling, probably, after the confidence he had before given her, that there would be something further to say. Delicacy urged her to be silent, but impatience and anxiety for him prompted her to speak, and at last she broke out, in characteristic fashion:
“Well, boy, how fares the wooing? Do you come back with a heart too big for your waistcoat to hold it, or has the jade proved fickle and sent you about your business? Come, I’m an old woman—perhaps an old fool—but I’m tingling to know if she has used you well, and if you’re happy.”
He crossed to her and stooped, and put an arm about her shoulders and kissed her. “Yes, dear,” he said, with a little laugh; “I’m so happy that I can’t express what I feel.”
She put her hand up and softly stroked the hand that lay on her shoulder. “That’s well, boy; that’s well,” she said. “And what did she say to you, and what did you say to her?”
“Lots of things that I can’t remember—lots of beautiful things that I didn’t think any one could ever say to me,” he replied.
“Well, don’t tell me; you’ve evidently got it pretty badly. I’ve never seen this girl, and know nothing about her; but I’m quite sure that she’s all that’s good and sweet and true, or you wouldn’t have selected her from all other women. Just a word or two to you, my boy, although I don’t think you need it; but I’m a woman myself, and women are strange creatures to deal with. Don’t forget that a girl is a thing of moods and whims and fancies—quite the best of them are that—and they’ve got to be humoured, just like spoilt children. The world has banded itself together for centuries past to spoil its womenkind—sometimes in the best sense, generally in the worst—and you can’t blame the women if they’ve learned to take advantage of it. I think a woman wants to feel that a man is her master, but she wants him to be a gentle master, all the same. And there is no woman living will love a man, in the best and finest way that a man can be loved, unless she is first his friend and his comrade—unless, unerringly, in time of doubt or trouble, her thoughts fly to him. There! I’ve done preaching. Now tell me what you’re going to do, or what’s going to happen, or what you’ve determined on.”
“Oh, I don’t think we’ve determined on anything yet,” said Comethup. “You see, it seems only just to have happened. I’ve only just found out, as it were, that she loves me.”
“She’d be a fool if she didn’t,” ejaculated Miss Carlaw. “Well, I’m not going to interfere in your love-making. In your own good time I must make the girl’s acquaintance. In this, as in everything else, I leave all to your own good judgment and common sense. Make your own plans, and I’ll back you up; I can’t say more than that. But remember that if at any time you want her to come to London or to see me, this house is open to her, and she may stay under my wing as long as she likes. Selfishly, I’m glad to hear she has no friends. Relatives are a nuisance—at least, mine have always been. But you know I don’t include you in that, don’t you?”
Comethup’s visits to the old town became of necessity more frequent. It was splendid to think, as he started off from London on each occasion, that in the desolate garden would be waiting the woman who watched for his coming and listened for his footsteps through weary days when he could not reach her. Once or twice he had suggested that she should go to London as his aunt’s guest, and see all the wonders of that wonderful city; but she had hung back shyly, pleading that there was plenty of time, or that she liked better to see him down there. Always she had some half-laughing excuse, so that he ceased at last to urge her, and was content to live in the happy present, and to leave the more formal questions of introduction and such like matters to the future. Always, too, she was the same petulant, impulsive, warm-hearted creature, quick to anger and as sudden in her repentance; wounding him deeply at times, and yet striving afterward to heal the wound with so much of love and tenderness and self-reproach that he would not willingly have been without the pain which revealed to him such depths of wonderful compassion in her. Each night, when he sought his bed, there was some faint bitterness in his heart; and yet, greater than the bitterness, the remembrance of some beautiful phrases she had used, some sudden, half-shy glance of her eyes, some wholly spontaneous caress. His love for her grew with the wonder of her; but she seemed always so intangible, so changeful, that he was never sure of her—was forever, after he had parted from her, on the verge of rushing back to crave her forgiveness for this, or her clearer understanding of that.
Once, when he parted from her at night under the balcony, she clung to him, held him for a moment after they had whispered their “Good-nights,” and looked up into his eyes. He saw her own were swimming in tears. “Dear,” she whispered, “I wish I were kinder to you; you deserve so much more than I can ever give you.”