Part 36 (1/2)

”He _knows_ things--as Donal does. The secret things you can't talk about--the meaning of things.”

She went on as if she were remembering bit by bit. ”When we were in the Wood in the dark, he said the first thing that made my mind begin to move--almost to think. That was because he _knew_. Knowing things made him send the book.”

The fact was that he knew much of which it was not possible for him to speak, and in pa.s.sing a shop window he had been fantastically arrested by a mere pair of small sleeves--the garment to which they belonged having by chance so fallen that they seemed to be tiny arms holding themselves out in surrendering appeal. They had held him a moment or so staring and then he had gone into the shop and asked for their catalogue.

”Yes, he knew,” Dowie replied.

A letter had been written to London signed by Dowie and the models and patterns had been sent to the village and brought to the castle by Jock Macaur. Later there had come rolls of fine flannel and lawn, with gossamer thread and fairy needles and embroidery floss. Then the sewing began.

Doctor Benton had gradually begun to look forward to his daily visits with an interest stimulated by a curiosity become eager. The most casual looker-on might have seen the change taking place in his patient day by day and he was not a casual looker-on. Was the improvement to be relied upon? Would the mysterious support suddenly fail them?

”What in G.o.d's name should we do if it did?” he broke out unconsciously aloud one day when Dowie and he were alone together.

”If it did what, sir?” she asked.

”If it stopped--the dream?”

Dowie understood. By this time she knew that, when he asked questions, took notes and was professionally exact, he had ceased to think of Robin merely as a patient. She had touched him in some unusual way which had drawn him within the circle of her innocent woe. He was under the spell of her pathetic youngness which made Dowie herself feel as if they were watching over a child called upon to bear something it was unnatural for a child to endure.

”It won't stop,” she said obstinately, but she lost her ruddy colour because she was not sure.

But after the sewing began there grew up within her a sort of courage.

A girl whose material embodiment has melted away until she has worn the aspect of a wraith is not restored to normal bloom in a week. But what Dowie seemed to see was the lamp of life relighted and the first flickering flame strengthening to a glow. The hands which fitted together on the table in the Tower room delicate puzzles in bits of lawn and paper, did not in these days tremble with weakness. Instead of the lost look there had returned to the young doe's eyes the pretty trusting smile. The girl seemed to smile as if to herself nearly all the time, Dowie thought, and often she broke into a happy laugh at her own small blunders--and sometimes only at the sweet littleness of the things she was making.

One fact revealed itself clearly to Dowie, which was that she had lost all sense of the aspect which the dream must wear to others than herself. This was because there had been no others than Dowie who had uttered no suggestion of doubt and had never touched upon the subject unless it had been first broached by Robin herself. She had hidden her bewilderment and anxieties and had outwardly accepted the girl's own acceptance of the situation.

Of the incident of the sewing Lord Coombe had been informed later with other details.

”She sits and sews and sews,” wrote Dowie. ”She sewed beautifully even before she was out of the nursery. I have never seen a picture of a little saint sewing. If I had, perhaps I should say she looked like it.”

Coombe read the letter to his old friend at Eaton Square.

There was a pause as he refolded it. After the silence he added as out of deep thinking, ”I wish that I could see her.”

”So do I,” the d.u.c.h.ess said. ”So do I. But if I were to go to her, questioning would begin at once.”

”My going to Darreuch would attract no attention. It never did after the first year. But she has not said she wished to see me. I gave my word. I shall never see her again unless she asks me to come. She does not need me. She has Donal.”

”What do you believe?” she asked.

”What do _you_ believe?” he replied.

After a moment of speculative gravity came her reply.

”As without proof I believed in the marriage, so without proof I believe that in some mysterious way he comes to her--G.o.d be thanked!”

”So do I,” said Coombe. ”We are living in a changing world and new things are happening. I do not know what they are, but they shake me inwardly.”

”You want to see her because--?” the d.u.c.h.ess put it to him.