Part 32 (1/2)

Before she joined Earley little Fay had been to the village with Meg to buy tape, and she had a great deal to say about this expedition. Meg saw that something was troubling Jan, and wondered if Mr. Ledgard had given her fresh news of Hugo. But Meg never asked questions or worried people.

She chattered to the children, and immediately after tea carried them off for the usual was.h.i.+ng of hands.

Jan went out into the hall; the door was open and the sunny spring evening called to her. When she was miserable she always wanted to walk, and she walked now; swiftly down the drive she went and out along the road till she came to the church, which stood at the end of the village nearest to Wren's End.

She turned into the churchyard, and up the broad pathway between the graves to the west door.

Near the door was a square headstone marking the grave of Charles Considine Smith; and she paused beside it to read once more the somewhat strange inscription.

Under his name and age, cut deep in the moss-grown stone, were the words: ”_Though an host should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear._”

Often before Jan had wondered what could have caused Tranquil, his wife, to choose so strenuous an epitaph. Tranquil, who had never stirred twenty miles from the place where she was born; whose very name, so far as they could gather, exemplified her life.

What secret menace had threatened this ”staid person,” this prosperous s.h.i.+pper of sherry who, apparently, had spent the evening of his life in observing the habits of wrens.

Why should his gentle wife have thus commemorated his fighting spirit?

Be the reason what it might, Jan felt vaguely comforted. There was triumph as well as trust in the words. Whatever it was that had threatened him, he had stood up to it. His wife knew this and was proud.

Jan tried the heavy oak door and it yielded, and from the soft mildness of the spring evening, so full of happy sounds of innocent life, she pa.s.sed into the grey and sacred silence of the church.

It was cold in the beautiful old fourteenth-century church, with that pervading smell of badly-burning wood that is so often found in country churches till all attempt at heating ceases for the summer. But nothing could mar the n.o.bility of its austerely lovely architecture; the indefinable, exquisite grace that soothes and penetrates.

She went and knelt in the Wren's End pew where Charles Considine Smith's vast prayer-book still stood on the book-board. And even as in the Bombay Cathedral she had prayed that strength might be given to her to walk in the Way, so now she prayed for courage and a quiet, steadfast mind.

Her head was bowed and buried in her hands: ”_My heart shall not fear_,” she whispered; but she knew that it did fear, and fear grievously.

The tense silence was broken by an odd, fitful, pattering sound; but Jan, absorbed in her pet.i.tion for the courage she could not feel, heard nothing.

Something clumsy, warm, and panting pushed against her, and she uncovered her face and looked down upon William trying to thrust his head under her arm and join in her devotions.

And William became a misty blur, for her eyes filled with tears; he looked so anxious and foolish and kind with his tongue hanging out and his absurd, puzzled expression.

He was puzzled. Part of the usual ritual had been omitted.

She ought, by all known precedents, to have put her arm round his neck and have admonished him to ”pray for his Master.” But she did nothing of the kind, only patted him, with no sort of invitation to join in her orisons.

William was sure something was wrong somewhere.

Then Jan saw Tony sitting at the far end of the seat, hatless, coatless, in his indoor strap shoes; and he was regarding her with grave, understanding eyes.

In a moment she was back in the present and vividly alive to the fact that here was chilly, delicate Tony out after tea, without a coat and sitting in an ice-cold church.

She rose from her knees, much to William's satisfaction, who did not care for religious services in which he might not take an active part.

He trotted out of the pew and Jan followed him, stooping to kiss Tony as she pa.s.sed.

”It's too cold for you here, dear,” she whispered; ”let us come out.”

She held out her hand and Tony took it, and together they pa.s.sed down the aisle and into the warmer air outside.