Wood and Stone (64 page)

As she approached Mr. Quincunx’s cottage she
experienced
a calm and restorative reaction from her distress of mind. She felt no longer alone in the world. Having resolved on a drastic stroke on behalf of clear issues, she was strangely conscious, as she had not been conscious for many months, of the presence, near her and with her, of the Redeemer of men.

It suddenly was borne in upon her that that other criminal abuse, which had so long oppressed her soul with a dead burden,—the affair of Lacrima and Goring,—was intimately associated with what she had discovered. It was more than likely that by exposing the one she could prevent the other.

Flushed with excitement at this thought she opened Mr. Quincunx’s gate and walked up his garden-path. To her amazement, she heard voices in the cottage and not only voices, but voices speaking in a language that vaguely reminded her of the little Catholic services in the chapel at Yeoborough.

Mr. Quincunx himself answered her knock and
opened the door. He was strangely agitated. The hand which he extended to her shook as it touched her fingers.

But Vennie herself was too astonished at the sight which met her eyes to notice anything of this. Seated opposite one another, on either side of the solitary’s kitchen-fire, were Lacrima and the little Dolores. Vennie had interrupted a lively and impassioned colloquy between the two Italians.

They both rose at her entrance, and their host, in hurried nervous speech, gave Vennie an incoherent account of what had happened.

When they were all seated,—Vennie in the little girl’s chair, and the child on Mr. Quincunx’s knees,—the embarrassment of the first surprise quickly
subsided
.

“I shall adopt her,” the solitary kept repeating,—as though the words were uttered in a defiance of universal opposition, “I shall adopt her. You’d advise me to do that, wouldn’t you Miss Seldom?

“I shall get a proper document made out, so that there can be no mistake. I shall adopt her.
Whatever
anyone likes to say, I shall adopt her!

“Those circus-scoundrels will hold their tongues and let me alone for their own sakes. I shall have no trouble. Lacrima will explain to the the police who the child is, and who her parents were. That is, if the police come. But they won’t come. Why should they come? I shall have a document drawn out.”

It seemed as though the little Neapolitan knew by instinct what her protector was saying, for she nestled down against his shoulder and taking one of his hands in both of hers pressed it against her lips.

Vennie gazed at Lacrima, and Lacrima gazed at
Vennie, but neither of them spoke. There was an inner flame of triumphant concentration in Vennie’s glance, but Lacrima’s look was clouded and sad.

“Certainly no one will interfere with you,” said Vennie at last. “We shall all be so glad to think that the child is in such good hands.

“The only difficulty I can see,” she paused a
moment
, while the grey eyes of Mr. Quincunx opened wide and an expression of something like defiance passed over his face, “is that it’ll be difficult for you to know what to do with her while you are away in Yeoborough. You could hardly leave her alone in this out-of-the-way place, and I’m afraid our Nevilton National School wouldn’t suit her at all.”

Mr. Quincunx freed his hand and stroked his beard. His fingers were quivering, and Vennie noticed a certain curious twitching in the muscles of his face.

“I shan’t go to Yeoborough any more,” he cried. “None of you need think it!

“That affair is over and done with. I shan’t stay here, any more, either, to be bullied by the Romers and made a fool of by all these idiots. I shall go away. I shall go—far away—to London—to Liverpool,—to—to Norwich,—like the Man in the Moon!”

This final inspiration brought a flicker of his old goblin-humour to the corners of his mouth.

Lacrima looked at Vennie with an imperceptible lifting of her eyebrows, and then sighed deeply.

The latter clasped the arms of her high-backed chair with firm hands.

“I think it is essential that you should know
where
you are going, Mr. Quincunx. I mean for the child’s
sake. You surely don’t wish to drag her aimlessly about these great cities while you look for work?

“Besides,—you won’t be angry will you, if I speak plainly?—what work, exactly, have you in your mind to do? It isn’t, I’m afraid, always easy—”

Mr. Quincunx interrupted her with an outburst of unexpected fury.

“That’s what I knew you’d say!” he cried in a loud voice. “That’s what
she
says.” He indicated Lacrima. “But you both say it, only because you don’t, want me to have the pleasure of adopting Dolores!

“But I
shall
adopt her,—in spite of you all. Yes, in spite of you all! Nothing shall stop me adopting her!”

Once more the little Italian nestled close against him, and took possession of his trembling hand.

Vennie perceived an expression of despairing
hopelessness
pass like an icy mist over Lacrima’s face.

The profile of the Nevilton nun assumed those lines of commanding obstinacy which had reminded Valentia a few hours ago of the mediæval baron. She rose to her feet.

“Listen to me, Mr. Quincunx,” she said sternly. “You are right; you are quite right, to wish to save this child. No one shall stop you saving her. No one shall stop you adopting her. But there are other people whose happiness depends upon what you do, besides this child.”

She paused, and glanced from Mr. Quincunx to Lacrima, and from Lacrima to Mr. Quincunx. Then a look of indescribable domination and power passed into her face. She might have been St. Catharine herself, magnetizing the whole papal court into obedience to her will.

“Oh you foolish people!” she cried, “you foolish people! Can’t you see where God is leading you? Can’t you see where His Spirit has brought you?”

She turned upon Mr. Quincunx with shining eyes, while Lacrima, white as a phantom and with drooping mouth, watched her in amazement.

“It’s not only this child He’s helped you to save,” she went on. “It’s not only this child! Are you blind to what He means? Don’t you understand the cruelty that is being done to your friend? Don’t you understand?”

She stretched out her arm and touched Mr.
Quincunx’s
shoulder.

“You must do more than give this little one a
father
,” she murmured in a low tone, “you must give her a mother. How can she be happy without a mother?

“Come,” she went on, in a voice vibrating with magnetic authority, “there’s no other way. You and Lacrima must join hands. You must join hands at once, and defy everyone. Our little wanderer must have both father and mother! That is what God intends.”

There was a long and strange silence, broken only by the ticking of the clock.

Then Mr. Quincunx slowly rose, allowed the child to sink down into his empty chair, and crossed over to Lacrima’s side. Very solemnly, and as if registering a sacred vow, he took his friend’s head between his hands and kissed her on the forehead. Then,
searching
for her hand and holding it tightly in his own, he turned towards Vennie, while Lacrima herself, pressing her face against his shabby coat, broke into convulsive crying.

“I’ll take your advice,” he said gravely. “I’ll take it without question. There are more difficulties in the way than you know, but I’ll do,—we’ll do,—just what you tell us. I can’t think—” he
hesitated
for a moment, while a curious smile flickered across his face, “how on earth I’m going to manage. I can’t think how we’re going to get away from here. But I’ll take your advice and we’ll do exactly as you say.

“We’ll do what she says, won’t we, Lacrima?”

Lacrima’s only answer was to conceal her face still more completely in his dusty coat, but her crying became quieter and presently ceased altogether.

At that moment there came a sharp knock a the door.

The countenance of Mr. Quincunx changed. He dropped his friend’s hand, and moved into the centre of the room.

“That must be the circus-people,” he whispered. “They’ve come for Dolores. You’ll support me won’t you?” He looked imploringly at Vennie. “You’ll tell them they can’t have her—that I refuse to give her up—that I’m going to adopt her?”

He went out and opened the door.

It was not the circus-men he found waiting on his threshold. Nor was it the police. It was only one of the under-gardeners from Nevilton House. The youth explained that Mr. Homer had sent him to fetch Lacrima.

“They be goin’ to lunch early, mistress says, and the young lady ’ave to come right along ’ome wi’ I.”

Vennie intervened at this moment between her agitated host and the intruder.

“I’ll bring Miss Traffio home,” she said sternly, “when she’s ready to come. You may go back and tell Mrs. Romer that she’s with me,—with Miss Seldom.”

The youth touched his hat, and slouched off, without further protest.

Vennie, returning into the kitchen, found Mr. Quincunx standing thoughtfully by the mantel-piece, stroking his beard, and the two Italians engaged in an excited conversation in their own tongue.

The descendant of the lords of Nevilton meditated for a moment with drooping head, her hands
characteristically
clasped behind her back. When she lifted up her chin and began to speak, there was the same concentrated light in her eyes and the same imperative tone in her voice.

“The thing for us to do,” she said, speaking
hurriedly
but firmly, “is to go—all four of us—straight away from here! I’m not going to leave you until things are settled. I’m going to get you all clean out of this,—clean away!”

She paused and looked at Lacrima. “Where’s Mr. Dangelis?” she asked.

Lacrima explained how the artist had written to Gladys that he was staying until the following day at the Gloucester Hotel in Weymouth.

Vennie’s face became radiant when she heard this. “Ah!” she cried, “God is indeed fighting for us! It’s Dangelis that I must see, and see at once. Where better could we all go,—at any rate for tonight—than to Weymouth? We’ll think later what must be done next. Dangelis will help us. I’m perfectly certain he’ll help us.

“Oh yes, we’ll go to Weymouth at once,—before there’s any risk of the Romers stopping us! We’ll walk to Yeoborough—that’ll give us time to think out our plans—and take the train from there.

“I’ll send a telegram to my mother late tonight, when there’s no chance of her communicating with the House. As to being seen in Yeoborough by any Nevilton people, we must risk that! God has been so good to us today that I can’t believe He won’t go on being good to us.

“Oh what a relief it’ll be,—what a relief,—to get away from Nevilton! And I shall be able to dip my hands in the sea!”

While these rapid utterances fell from Vennie’s excited lips, the face of Mr. Quincunx was a wonder to look upon. It was the crisis of his days, and he displayed his knowledge that it was so by more convulsive changes of expression, than perhaps, in an equal stretch of time, had ever crossed the visage of a mortal man.

“We’ll take your advice,” he said, at last, with immense solemnity.

Lacrima looked at him wistfully. Her face was very pale and her lips trembled.

“It isn’t only because of the child, is it, that he’s ready to go?” she murmured, clutching at Vennie’s arm, as Mr. Quincunx retired to make his brief preparations. “I shouldn’t like to think it was only that. But he
is
fond of me. He
is
fond of me!”

I
T was Mr. Quincunx who had to find the money for their bold adventure. Neither Vennie nor Lacrima could discover a single penny on their persons. Mr. Quincunx produced it from the bottom of an old jam-pot placed in the interior recesses of one of his deepest cupboards. He displayed to his three friends, with not a little pride, the sum he was possessed of,—no less in fact than five golden sovereigns.

Their walk to Yeoborough was full of thrilling little excitements. Three times they concealed themselves on the further side of the hedge, to let certain
suspicious
pedestrians, who might be Nevilton people, pass by unastonished.

Once well upon their way, they all four felt a strange sense of liberation and expansion. The little Neapolitan walked between Mr. Quincunx and
Lacrima
, a hand given to each, and her childish high spirits kept them all from any apprehensive brooding.

Once and once only, they looked back, and Mr. Quincunx shook his fist at the two distant hills.

“You are right,” he remarked to Vennie, “it’s the sea we’re in want of. These curst inland fields have the devil in their heavy mould.”

They found themselves, when they reached the town, with an hour to spare before their train started,
and entering a little dairy-shop near the station, they refreshed themselves with milk and bread-
and-butter
. Here Mr. Quincunx and the child waited in excited expectation, while the two girls went out to make some necessary purchases—returning finally, in triumph, with a light wicker-work
suitcase
, containing all that they required for several days and nights.

They were in the train at last, with a compartment to themselves, and, as far as they could tell, quite undiscovered by anyone who knew them.

Vennie had hardly ever in her life enjoyed anything more than she enjoyed that journey. She felt that the stars were fighting on her side or, to put it in terms of her religion, that God Himself was smoothing the road in front of her.

She experienced a momentary pang when the train, at last, passing along the edge of the backwater, ran in to Weymouth Station. It was so sweet, so strangely sweet, to know that three living souls depended upon her for their happiness, for their escape from the power of the devil! Would she feel like this, would she ever feel quite like this, when the convent-doors shut her away from this exciting world?

They emerged from the crowded station,—Mr. Quincunx carrying the wicker-work suit-case—and made their way towards the Esplanade.

The early afternoon sun lay hot upon the
pavements
, but from the sea a strong fresh wind was blowing. Both the girls shivered a little in their thin frocks, and as the red shawl of the young Italian had already excited some curiosity among the
passers-by
,
they decided to enter one of the numerous drapery shops, and spend some more of Mr. Quincunx’s money.

They were so long in the shop that the nervous excitement of the recluse was on the point of changing into nervous irritation, when at last they reappeared. But he was reconciled to the delay when he perceived the admirable use they had made of it.

All three were wearing long tweed rain-cloaks of precisely the same tint of sober grey. They looked like three sisters, newly arrived from some
neighbouring
inland town,—Dorchester, perhaps, or Sherborne,—with a view to spending a pleasant afternoon at the sea-side. Not only were they all wrapped in the same species of cloak. They had purchased three little woollen caps of a similar shade, such things as it would have been difficult to secure in any shop but a little unfashionable one, where summer and winter vogues casually overlapped.

Mr. Quincunx, whose exaltation of mood had not made him forget to bring his own overcoat with him, now put this on, and warmly and comfortably clad, the four fugitives from Nevilton strolled along the Esplanade in the direction of St. John’s church.

To leave his three companions free to run down to the sea’s edge, Mr. Quincunx possessed himself of the clumsy paper parcels containing the hats they had relinquished and also of the little girl’s red shawl, and resting on a seat with these objects piled up by his side he proceeded to light a cigarette and gaze placidly about him. The worst of his plunge into activity being over,—for, whatever happened, the initial effort was bound to be the worst,—the wanderer
from Dead Man’s Lane chuckled to himself with bursts of cynical humour as he contemplated the situation they were in.

But what a relief it was to see the clear-shining foam-sprinkled expanse of water lying spread out before him! Like the younger Andersen, Mr.
Quincunx
had a passionate love of Weymouth, and never had he loved it more than he did at that moment! He greeted the splendid curve of receding cliffs—the White Nore and St. Alban’s head—with a sigh of profound satisfaction, and he looked across to the massive bulk of Portland, as though in its noble uncrumbling stone—stone that was so much nearer to marble than to clay—there lurked some occult talisman ready to save him from everything connected with Leo’s Hill.

Yes, the sea was what he wanted just then! How well the salt taste of it, the smell of its sun-bleached stranded weeds, its wide horizons, its long-drawn murmur, blent with the strange new mood into which that morning’s events had thrown him!

How happy the little Dolores looked, between Lacrima and Vennie, her dark curls waving in the wind from beneath her grey cap!

All at once his mind reverted to James Andersen, lying now alone and motionless, under six feet of yellow clay. Mr. Quincunx shivered. After all it was something to be alive still, something to be still able to stroke one’s beard and stretch one’s legs, and fumble in one’s pocket for a “Three Castles” cigarette!

He wondered vaguely how and when this young St. Catharine of theirs intended to marry him to
Lacrima. And then what? Would he have to work frightfully, preposterously hard?

He chuckled to himself to think how blank Mr. Romer would look, when he found that both his victims had been spirited away in one breath. What a girl this Vennie Seldom was!

He tried to imagine what it would be like, this business of being married. After all, he
was
very fond of Lacrima. He hoped that dusky wavy hair of hers were as long as it suggested that it was! He liked girls to have long hair.

Would she bring him his tea in the morning, sometimes, with bare arms and bare feet? Would she sit cross-legged at the foot of his bed, while he drank it, and chatter to him of what they would do when he came back from his work?

His work!
That was an aspect of the affair which certainly might well be omitted.

And then, as he stared at the three girlish figures on the beach, there came over him the strange illusion that both Vennie and Lacrima were only
dream-people
—unreal and fantastic—and that the true living persons of his drama were himself and his little Neapolitan waif.

Suppose the three girls were to take a boat—one of those boats whose painted keels he saw glittering now so pleasantly on the beach—and row out into the water. And suppose the boat were upset and both Vennie and Lacrima drowned? Would he be so sad to have to live the rest of his life alone with the little Dolores?

Perhaps it would be better if this event occurred after Vennie had helped him to secure some work to
do—some not too hard work! Well—Vennie, at any rate,
was
going to be drowned in a certain sense, at least she was meditating entering a convent, and that was little different from being drowned, or being buried in yellow clay, like James Andersen!

But Lacrima was not meditating entering a
convent
. Lacrima was meditating being married to him, and being a mother to their adopted child. He hoped she would be a gentle mother. If she were not, if she ever spoke crossly to Dolores, he would lose his temper. He would lose his temper so much that he would tremble from head to foot! He called up an imaginary scene between them, a scene so vivid that he found himself trembling now, as his hand rested upon the paper parcel.

But perhaps, if by chance they left England and went on a journey,—Witch-Bessie had found a journey, “a terrible journey,” in the lines of his hand,—Lacrima would catch a fever in some foreign city, and he and Dolores would be left alone, quite as alone as if she were drowned today!

But perhaps it would be he, Maurice Quincunx, who would catch the fever. No! He did not like these “terrible journeys.” He preferred to sit on a seat on Weymouth Esplanade and watch Dolores laughing and running into the sea and picking up shells.

The chief thing was to be alive, and not too tired, or too cold, or too hungry, or too harassed by
insolent
aggressive people! How delicious a thing life could be if it were only properly arranged! If cruelty, and brutality, and vulgarity, and
office-work
, were removed!

He could never be cruel to anyone. From that worst sin,—if one could talk of such a thing as sin in this mad world,—his temperament entirely saved him. He hoped when they were married that
Lacrima
would not want him to be too sentimental about her. And he rather hoped that he would still have his evenings to himself, to turn over the pages of Rabelais, when he bad kissed Dolores good night.

His meditations were interrupted at this point by the return of his companions, who came scrambling across the shingle, threading their way among the boats, laughing and talking merrily, and trailing long pieces of sea-weed in their hands.

Vennie announced that since it was nearly four o’clock it would be advisable for them to secure their lodging for the night, and when that was done she would leave them to their own devices for an hour or two, while she proceeded to the Gloucester Hotel to have her interview with Ralph Dangelis.

Their various sea-spoils being all handed over to the excited little foundling, they walked slowly along the Esplanade, still bearing to the east, while they surveyed the appearance of the various “crescents,” “terraces,” and “rows” on the opposite side of the street. It was not till they arrived at the very end of these, that Vennie, who had assumed complete responsibility for their movements, piloted them across the road.

The houses they now approached were entitled “Brunswick Terrace,” and they entirely fulfilled their title by suggesting, in the pleasant liberality of their bay-windows and the mellow dignity of their
well-proportioned
fronts, the sort of solid comfort which
the syllables “Brunswick” seem naturally to convey. They began their enquiries for rooms, about five doors from the end of the terrace, but it was not till they reached the last house,—the last except two reddish-coloured ones of later date,—that they found what they wanted.

It was arranged that the two Italians should share a room together. Vennie elected to sleep in a small apartment adjoining theirs, while Mr. Quincunx was given a front-room, looking out on the sea, on the third floor.

Vennie smiled to herself as she thought how amazed her mother would have been could she have seen her at that moment, as she helped Lacrima to unpack their solitary piece of luggage, while Mr. Quincunx smoked cigarettes in the balcony of the window!

She left them finally in the lodging-house parlour, seated on a horse-hair sofa, watching the prim
landlady
preparing tea. Vennie refused to wait for this meal, being anxious—she said—to get her interview with the American well over, for until that moment had been reached, she could neither discuss their future plans calmly, nor enjoy the flavour of the adventure.

When Vennie had left them, and the three were all comfortably seated round the table, Mr. Quincunx found Lacrima in so radiant a mood that he began to feel a little ashamed of his ambiguous meditations on the Esplanade. She was, after all, quite
beautiful
in her way,—though, of course, not as beautiful as the young Neapolitan, whose eyes had a look in them, even when she was happy, which haunted one and filled one with vague indescribable emotions.

Mr. Quincunx himself was in the best of spirits. His beard wagged, his nostrils quivered, his wit flowed. Lacrima fixed her eyes upon him with
delighted
appreciation,—and led him on and on, through a thousand caprices of fancy. The poor Pariah’s heart was full of exquisite happiness. She felt like one actually liberated from the tomb. For the first time since she had known anything of
England
she was able to breathe freely and spontaneously and be her natural self.

For some queer reason or other, her thoughts kept reverting to James Andersen, but reverting to him with neither sadness nor pity. She felt no remorse for not having been present when he was buried that morning. She did not feel as though he were buried. She did not feel as though he were dead. She felt, in some strange way, that he had merely escaped from the evil spells of Nevilton, and that in the power of his new strength he was the cause of her own emancipation.

And what an emancipation it was! It was like
suddenly
becoming a child again—a child with power to enjoy the very things that children so often miss.

Everything in this little parlour pleased her. The blue vases on the mantelpiece containing dusty “everlasting flowers,” the plush-framed portraits of the landlady’s deceased parents, enlarged to a
magnitude
of shadowy dignity by some old-fashioned photographic process, the quaint row of minute china elephants that stood on a little bracket in the corner, the glaring antimacassar thrown across the back of the armchair, the sea-scents and sea-murmurs floating in through the window, the melodious crying
of a fish-pedler in the street; all these things thrilled her with a sense of freedom and escape, which
over-brimmed
her heart with happiness.

What matter, after all, she thought, that her little compatriot with the wonderful eyes had been the means of arousing her friend from his inertia! Her long acquaintance with Mr. Quincunx had mellowed her affection for him into a tenderness that was almost maternal. She could even find it in her to be glad that she was to be saved from the burden of struggling alone with his fits of melancholia. With Dolores to keep him amused, and herself to look after his material wants, it seemed probable that,
whatever
happened, the dear man would be happier than he had ever dreamed of being!