Part 61 (1/2)

The day of the funeral came, and the Easter flowers were all taken away.

The Vicarage blinds were drawn, the bell tolled again, and Jeanie, weighed down with a dreadful sense of wickedness, lay face downwards on the schoolroom sofa and wept and wept.

Avery was very anxious about her. The disgrace and punishment of the past few days had told upon her. She was sick with trouble and depression, and Avery could find no means of comforting her. She had meant herself to slip out and to go to the funeral for Piers' sake, but she felt she could not leave the child. So she sat with her in the darkened room, listening to her broken sobbing, aware that in the solitude of her room Gracie was crying too, and longing pa.s.sionately to gather together all five of the luckless offenders and deliver them from their land of bondage.

But there was to be no deliverance that day, nor any lightening of the burden. The funeral over, the Vicar returned and sent for each child separately to the study for prayer and admonition. Jeanie was the last to face this ordeal and before it was half over Avery was sent for also to find her lying on the study sofa in a dead faint.

Avery's indignation was intense, but she could not give it vent. Even the Vicar was a little anxious, and when Avery's efforts succeeded at length in restoring her, he reprimanded Jeanie severely and reduced her once more to tears of uncontrollable distress.

The long, dreary day came to an end at last, and the thought of a happier morrow comforted them all. But Avery, though she slept that night, was troubled by a dream that came to her over and over again throughout the long hours. She seemed to see Piers, as he had once described himself, a prisoner behind bars; and ever as she looked upon him he strove with gigantic efforts that were wholly vain, to force the bars asunder and come to her. She could not help him, could not even hear his voice. But the agony of his eyes haunted her--haunted her. She awoke at last in anguish of spirit, and slept no more.

CHAPTER x.x.xVI

THE SUMMONS

With the morning came a general feeling of relief. The Vicar was almost jocose, and Mrs. Lorimer made timid attempts to be mirthful though the parting with her children sorely tried her fort.i.tude.

The boys' spirits were subdued, but they burst forth uproariously as soon as the station-cab was well outside the gate. Ronald and Julian cheered themselves hoa.r.s.e, and Pat scuttled off to the back of the house to release Mike from his chain to partic.i.p.ate in the great rejoicing.

There was no disguising the fact that everyone was pleased--everyone except Olive who went away to her father's study which had been left in her especial charge, and locked herself in for a morning of undisturbed reading.

Avery could not feel joyful. The thought of Piers was still with her continually. She had heard so little of him--merely that he had followed his grandfather to the grave supported by the old family solicitor from Wardenhurst, Lennox Tudor, and a miscellaneous throng of neighbours; that he had borne himself without faltering, and had gone back to his solitude with no visible sign of suffering. Only indirectly had she heard this, and she yearned to know more.

She knew that like herself he was practically devoid of relatives,--the last of his race,--a figure of splendid isolation that would appeal to many. She knew that as a wealthy and unmarried baronet, he would be greatly sought after and courted; made much of by the whole county, and half London as well. He was so handsome, so romantic, so altogether eligible in every way. Was it for this that he had left that note of hers unanswered? Did he think that now that his horizon had widened the nearer haven was hardly worth attaining? Above all, if he decided to take that which she had so spontaneously offered, would it satisfy him?

Would he be content therewith? Had she not done better to have waited till he came again to ask of her that which she had till the day of his bereavement withheld?

It was useless to torture herself with such questionings. Because of her promise to the dead, she had acted, and she could now but await the result of her action. If he never answered,--well, she would understand.

So pa.s.sed yet another day of silence.

She was busy with the household accounts that night which Mrs. Lorimer in her woe had left in some confusion, and they kept her occupied till long after the children had gone to bed, so late indeed that the servants also had retired and she was left alone in the dining-room to wrestle with her difficulties.

She found it next to impossible to straighten out the muddle, and she came at length reluctantly to the conclusion that it was beyond her powers. Wondering what the Reverend Stephen would have said to such a crime, she abstracted a few s.h.i.+llings from her own purse and fraudulently made up the deficit that had vexed Mrs. Lorimer's soul.

”I can write and tell her now that it has come right,” she murmured to herself, as she rose from the table.

It was close upon eleven o'clock. The house was shuttered and silent. The stillness was intense; when suddenly, as she was in the act of lighting a candle, the electric bell pinged through the quiet of the night.

She started and listened. The thought of Piers sprang instinctively to her mind. Could it be he? But surely even Piers would not come to her at this hour! It must be some paris.h.i.+oner in need of help.

She turned to answer the summons, but ere she reached the hall it was repeated twice, with nervous insistence. She hastened to withdraw the bolts and open the door.

At once a voice accosted her, and a sharp pang of disappointment or anxiety, she knew not which, went through her.

”Mrs. Denys, is she here?” it said. ”May I speak with her?”

It was the unmistakable speech of a Frenchman. By the light of the hall-lamp, Avery saw the plump, anxious face and little pointed moustache of the speaker. He entered uninvited and stood before her.

”Ah! But you are Mrs. Denys!” he exclaimed with relief. ”_Madame_, I beg that you will pardon me! I am come to you in distress the most profound.

You will listen to me, yes?”