Part 20 (1/2)

'One always connects reading aloud with sick-beds and work-parties,'

said Jane. 'When you are ill, Kitty, I intend to come and read good books to you.'

'Mrs. Avory encouraged the canon,' said Kitty. 'I found out afterwards that she had read the story before, and yet she gave a sort of surprised giggle at everything.'

'The Wrottesleys are being awfully good to her,' said Jane excusingly.

Kitty was still gazing into the fire; her tone when she spoke was that of a sensible person considering some subject only remotely interesting to her. 'I suppose,' she said steadily, but with a touch of curiosity, 'that Mrs. Avory will always continue to think that to be true for ever and ever to Toffy is the most n.o.ble and virtuous action in the world.'

'They have been very faithful to each other,' said Jane.

A most unexpected thing then happened, for Kitty kneeled down suddenly on the hearth-rug, while the firelight shone in her eyes and gave a fierce red look to them. 'Oh, what is the use of it all?' she cried, 'and what is to be the end of it? Mr. Avory is not going to die--he 's the strongest man I know, and he can't be much more than forty years old! How does she think it is all going to end? Don't you see how absurd the whole thing is? She's seven years older than Toffy, so that even if she could marry him it would not be the best thing for him.

Oh, I know she has behaved well, and worked hard! I know she has eaten horrid food and trimmed parasols, and been faithful and good, but will she ever let him care for any one else?'

'Kitty!' said Jane; she took another step forward, and taking Kitty's face between her hands she turned it towards her. 'Kitty!'

'Isn't it ridiculous!' said Kitty. She swallowed down a sob in her throat and made a pretence of laughing while her hands played with her hair-brush, and her eyes, which endeavoured to blaze defiance, only succeeded in looking large and full of tears.

'I never knew--I never guessed----' began Jane helplessly.

'You were never meant to know,' said Kitty, and she turned away her face suddenly from Jane's encircling hands and buried it in the cus.h.i.+on of the chair. Her voice dropped ominously; she was still kneeling on the hearth-rug with the paraphernalia of her toilet about her--ribbons and gold-backed brushes, and a little enamel box for hair-pins. 'No one was ever meant to know!' she cried, 'and now I shall never be able to look you in the face again as long as we both do live! It's been going on so long, Jane, and you 've all been so sorry for Mrs. Avory, and so sorry for Toffy.'

'Does he know?' asked Jane, in a low voice.

Kitty raised her head and pretended to laugh again. 'I 've not proposed to him yet,' she said.

'But he cares,' said Jane, with conviction. 'He does care, Kitty!'

'Oh,' said Kitty, bursting into tears, 'isn't it all a frightful muddle!'

The conclusion, therefore, which may be arrived at on the vexed question as to which is preferable--the lot of the man who works or the lot of the woman who weeps, may be summed up in the convenient phrase, 'There is a great deal to be said on both sides.'

It is true that Kitty Sherard and Jane, left behind in comfortable and prosaic England, were spared the torment of flies and mosquitoes and other minor ills; they escaped most of the hard things of life, and enjoyed many of its pleasures and luxuries; and these mitigations seemed to them things of very little worth, and the life of action, when viewed from the safe security of their environment, appeared to be the only possible condition which might a.s.suage pain or lessen the bitterness of separation.

Peter Ogilvie, meanwhile, and his friend, Nigel Christopherson, were in the midst of weather as hot as can be very well endured even by English people, who seem capable of resisting almost every sort of bad climate.

The sun rose on the edge of the level plains every morning with horrible punctuality, and stared and blazed relentlessly until it had burned itself out in a beautiful rage and glory in the blood-red western sky.

'Dawn,' Ross said, 'is one of the things you are disposed to admire when you first come to Argentine, but when the hot weather begins you feel inclined to throw your boots at the sun when it rises.'

Now it was afternoon, and a heavy day's work in the corral was over.

Peter was writing letters, while Ross and Toffy dozed in long cane chairs in the corridor. Purvis sat on the little cretonne-covered box beside the empty fireplace, and looked with lack-l.u.s.tre eyes into s.p.a.ce. He had been helping with some work on the estancia; but he had brought none of his own men with him, as some neighbours had done, and the ominous whisper grew that there was trouble down at his place.

Ross treated the matter lightly, and explained it by saying that Purvis was making a fortune with his steamers, and was feeding his men on _carne flacca_. 'Purvis does his best, poor beast, and I believe he is worth a dozen detectives in this affair of yours, Peter.'

Peter himself, however, was inclined to draw back a little. 'He has put me on the wrong scent once or twice,' he said.

'After all, you haven't told him much,' said Ross.

And Peter agreed that this was so.