Part 63 (1/2)
Jack took her hand. ”It wasn't my place to do it. I ask your pardon.”
Then he turned to the Nun. ”You'll excuse me, miss?”
The Nun smiled radiantly at him. ”I hate your going, Jack. Perhaps you'd better, though. Only don't be unhappy. There's no harm done, you know.”
Jack shook his head again sadly, then put his hat on it with a rueful air. He regarded Vivien for a moment with a ponderous sorrow, lifted his hat again, shook his head again, and walked out of the garden. The Nun gave a short gurgle, and then regained a serene and silent composure. It was most certainly a case for allowing the other side to take first innings! Vivien sat down in the seat that Jack had vacated in such sad confusion.
”It was about--Harry?” she asked slowly. ”You all hear and know! I hear nothing, I know nothing. n.o.body mentions him to me. Not Andy, not my father any more. Mr. Belfield said a word or two once--not happy words.
Except for that--well, he might be dead! I don't see the use of treating me like that. I think I've a right to know.”
”What Jack said was more about you really. There's no fresh news about Harry.”
While saying these words, the Nun allowed her look at Vivien to be very direct. ”You must accept that as final,” the look seemed to say.
”Lots of men, good men, make a mistake, one mistake, about things like that. He'll be all right now--with his boy.”
”He's had a love affair, repented of it--and probably started another since that event. The child, if I remember, is about five months old.”
Still with her gaze direct, the Nun laughed. Vivien flushed. ”There's no other way to take it,” the Nun a.s.sured her.
Vivien spoke low; her cheeks red, her eyes dim. ”I gave him all my heart, oh, so readily--and such trust! Doris, did he ever make love to you?”
”As a general rule I don't tell tales. In this case I feel free to say that he did.”
Vivien's smile was woeful. ”What, he wanted to marry you too once?”
”Oh no, he never wanted to marry me, Vivien.”
It was drastic treatment--and the doctor paid for it as well as the patient.
”But you went on being friends with him!”
”I became friends with him again--presently,” the Nun corrected. ”I suppose I don't come well out of it, according to your views. I know the difference there is between us in that way. Look at your life and mine!
That's bound to make a difference. Besides, it would have been taking him much too seriously.”
”I think you're rather hard, Doris.”
”Thank G.o.d, I am, my dear! I need it.”
”It's a terrible thing to make the mistake I did.”
”It's worse to go on with it.”
”I should have liked to go on with it. I feel as people must who've lost their religion.”
”Is that so sad, if the religion is proved not to be true?”
”Yes, terribly sad.” Vivien's back was to the street. She wept silently; none saw her tears save Doris. ”I thought I had lost everything. It's worse to find that you never had anything, and have lost nothing.”
”It's good to find that out, when it's true,” Doris persisted stoutly.