Part 8 (2/2)
It was one of the things Tony could never condone in the big man called Daddie, that he could never answer the simplest question. He always asked another in return, and there was derision of some sort concealed in this circuitous answer. Doubtless he meant to be pleasant and amusing--Tony was just enough to admit that--but he was, so Tony felt, profoundly mistaken in the means he sought. He took liberties, too; punching liberties that knocked the breath out of a small boy's body without actually hurting much; and he never, never talked sense. Tony resented this. Like the Preacher, he felt there was a time to jest and a time to refrain from jesting, and it didn't amuse him a bit to be punched and rumpled and told he was a surly little devil if he attempted to punch back. In some vague way Tony felt that it wasn't playing the game--if it was a game. Often, too, for the past year and more, he connected the frequent disappearances of the big man with trouble for Mummy. Tony understood Hindustani as well as and better than English.
His extensive vocabulary in the former would have astonished his mother's friends had they been able to translate, and he understood a good deal of the servants' talk. He felt no real affection for the big, tiresome man, though he admired him, his size, his good looks, and a way he had with grown-up people; but he decided quite dispa.s.sionately, on evidence and without any rancour, that the big man was a ”budmash,” for he, unlike Auntie Jan, never did anything he said he'd do. And when, before they left Dariawarpur, the big man entirely disappeared, Tony felt no sorrow, only some surprise that having said he was going he actually had gone. Auntie Jan never mentioned him, Mummy had reminded them both always to include him when they said their prayers, but latterly Mummy had been too tired to come to hear prayers. Auntie Jan came instead, and Tony, watching her face out of half-shut eyes, tried leaving out ”bless Daddie” to see if anything happened. Sure enough something did; Auntie Jan looked startled. ”Say 'Bless Daddie,' Tony, 'and please help him.'”
”To do what?” Tony asked. ”Not to come back here?”
”I don't think he'll come back here just now,” Auntie Jan said in a frightened sort of whisper, ”but he needs help badly.”
Tony folded his hands devoutly and said, ”Bless Daddie and please help him--to stay away just now.”
And low down under her breath Jan said, ”Amen.”
CHAPTER VI
THE SHADOW BEFORE
Jan had been a week in Bombay, and her grave anxiety about Fay was in no way lessened. Rather did it increase and intensify, for not only did her bodily strength seem to ebb from her almost visibly day by day, but her mind seemed so detached and aloof from both present and future.
It was only when Jan talked about the past, about their happy girlhood and their lovable comrade-father, that Fay seemed to take hold and understand. All that had happened before his death seemed real and vital to her. But when Jan tried to interest her in plans for the future, the voyage home, the children, the baby that was due so soon, Fay looked at her with tired, lack-l.u.s.tre eyes and seemed at once to become absent-minded and irrelevant.
She was ready enough to discuss the characters of the children, to impress upon Jan the fact that Tony was not unloving, only cautious and slow before he really gave his affection. That little Fay was exactly what she appeared on the surface--affectionate, quick, wilful, and already conscious of her own power through her charm.
”I defy anybody to quarrel with Fay when she is willing to make it up,”
her mother said. ”Tony melts like wax before the warmth of her advances. She may have behaved atrociously to him five minutes before--Ayah lets her, and I am far too weak with her--but if _she_ wants to be friends Tony forgets and condones everything. Was I very naughty to you, Jan, as a baby?”
”Not that I can remember. I think you were very biddable and good.”
”And you?”
Jan laughed--”There you have me. I believe I was most naughty and obstreperous, and have vivid recollections of being sent to bed for various offences. You see, Mother was far too strong and wise to spoil me as little Fay is spoilt. Father tried his best, but you remember Hannah? Could you imagine Hannah submitting for one moment to the sort of treatment that baby metes out to poor, patient Ayah every single day?”
”By the way, how is Hannah?”
”Hannah is in her hardy usual. She is going strong, and has developed all sorts of latent talent as a cook. She was with me in the furnished flat I rented till the day I left (I only took it by the month), and she'll be with us again when we all get back to Wren's End.”
”But I thought Wren's End was let?”
”Only till March quarter-day, and I've cabled to the agent not to entertain any other offer, as we want it ourselves.”
”I like to think of the children at Wren's End,” Fay said dreamily.
”Don't you like to think of yourself there, too? Would you like any other place better?”
Jan's voice sounded constrained and a little hard. People sometimes speak crossly when they are frightened, and just then Jan felt the cold, skinny hands of some unnameable terror clutching her heart. Why did Fay always exclude herself from all plans?
They were, as usual, sitting in the verandah after dinner, and Fay's eyes were fixed on the deeply blue expanse of sky. She hardly seemed to hear Jan, for she continued: ”Do you remember the sketch Daddie did of me against the yew hedge? I'd like Tony to have that some day if you'd let him.”
”Of course that picture is yours,” Jan said, hastily. ”We never divided the pictures when he died. Some were sold and we shared the money, but our pictures are at Wren's End.”
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