Читать книгу Where Three Roads Meet - Ethel M. Dell - Страница 14

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That cry of Molly’s—“Never, never again!” was on her lips many times before full understanding returned to her.

But when at length her youth asserted itself and she returned to life, she stilled it of her own accord. Of what avail to resist the cruel Fate that bound her? As well strive against the inevitable Death that had taken from her her beloved one! As well pit herself against the laws of the universe!

She came back from the closed gates in silence—an old, old woman with the body of a girl. The battle was over, and she was vanquished—broken. When they congratulated her, she smiled. When she held the tiny heir of Aubreystone against her breast, she was passive. When Ivor came to her, clasped her closely and spoke of the happy future before them, she was dumbly submissive.

Slowly life returned to her, but the baby whom she lacked the vitality to nourish gained strength faster than she did. He was nearly three months old before she began to find her feet and walk slowly in the June sunshine.

Her mother-in-law openly lost patience with her, took her to task.

“You’re not doing your duty. You don’t even try,” was the burden of her reproach. “If you had made any effort at all, you’d have been well long ago. A girl of your age!”

Of her age! Her twenty-first birthday came, and Ivor gave her pearls such as she had never dreamed of possessing. She smiled and thanked him, but in her heart she shrank. For they seemed to her as the price of herself. A stiffly-starched nurse had the charge of Ivor’s heir, and the faithful Rose still lumbered after her little Rollo in all his escapades. There was nothing left for her to do—except the duty of which Ivor’s mother so sternly spoke.

Physical health returned to her when she would fain have delayed it. She had given an heir to the house of Aubreystone—and he was treated as a thing so sacred that she scarcely dared to regard him as her own. But one was not enough. Every day—as old Lady Aubreystone inexorably pointed out—Englishmen were dying on the battlefield. Babies died too—even the healthiest and most tenderly cared for. This child—Vivian as they had called him after the late Lord Aubreystone—might not survive to succeed to the title. She herself had borne four sons, and only one yet lived. So, continually, her argument persisted, till it was driven home to Molly that sheer selfishness alone was her motive in sheltering behind her own weakness—unless cowardice also played a part.

Ivor did not argue. He had long since made her realize that his will was paramount. He loved her, but he would not give way to any foolish fancies on her part. When her strength had returned sufficiently for her to take her place in the family circle, he very practically decided that the time had come for him to resume undisputed possession. He took it for granted that even if her desires did not wholly coincide with his, it was better that she should conform to his own very precise ideas of what was not only fitting but necessary. He did not profess to understand her, but a certain reticence on her part seemed to him not unnatural and in a degree becoming. He overcame it without discussion, not unkindly but with an obvious determination against which there was no appeal. He considered her eminently suitable to be the mother of his children, and the dread possibility of risking her life a second time was one with which he did not parley. It was unfortunate that the birth of the heir had cost her so much, but now that she had grown more accustomed to her surroundings and had gained more experience he was satisfied that youth would tell in her favour and refused to allow himself to be morbidly influenced by any doubts upon the subject.

He agreed substantially with his mother’s often reiterated creed. There should be at least three sons to make the succession safe; and he was too sensible to permit any vague feminine whims to stand in his way. There was a good deal of complacency also in his attitude towards his young wife which rendered it practically impossible for him to appreciate any other point of view besides his own. She owed him so much that it seemed preposterous that she should not wish to make all the return in her power. He believed, moreover, that she entertained a sincere regard for him, and he attributed the fact that she never made any outward demonstration of it to a timidity inherent in her nature which his mother was more inclined to describe as a secret rebelliousness.

He never found her other than completely submissive, and her mental reserve was a matter that he never attempted to probe. He was fond of her, and he was satisfied that their marriage was the success that he had intended it to be. He was happy in his own way, and he believed that she was happy in hers. He looked forward to an uninterrupted period of bliss when the War should be over, and until then he was content to make the best of things.

The summer waxed and waned, and the last throes of the Titanic struggle drew near. The gold of September melted into the deeper glow of October, and the Aubreystone woodlands became a vivid glory of colour.

Molly never wandered in the woods now, but Rollo revelled in them. He and the Honourable Vivian with their respective escorts spent many sunlit hours under the great beech-trees on the parkland slopes. Rollo had no great opinion of his small half-brother, but since he had become a part of his daily existence he tolerated him accordingly. He did not like Vivian’s nurse, who was inclined to treat him with some disdain and strongly discouraged any sort of comradeship between the two little boys. In her opinion Rollo ought to be brought up to treat the heir with becoming deference, and this was a point of view which held no sort of appeal for the independent Rollo, and he was backed in this respect by the sturdy Rose who maintained that being the elder entitled him to some rights of his own.

Curiously enough, this girl, Rose Masters, had a shrewder conception than anyone else regarding the sorrowful workings of the younger Lady Aubreystone’s mind. Though Molly had bestowed no confidence upon her, Rose was well acquainted with all the circumstances that had led up to her second marriage, and she had the wit to put two and two together. She had known and admired from afar the fiery young lover of Molly’s girlhood, and she had the insight to realize the heartbreak that had followed his loss. She knew perfectly well that Rollo was far dearer to his mother than any other child could ever be, and because of this knowledge she was more jealous on his behalf than he was on his own.

For jealousy was no part of Rollo’s nature. He was sunny and generous, quick-tempered perhaps, but never sullen. To efface himself was quite contrary to every instinct, but, as Rose said, he knew the meaning of fair play; and in her opinion it was rather a wonder that he did not actually dislike his younger brother. The attitude of Kennedy, Vivian’s nurse, was well calculated to encourage enmity between them, but somehow Rollo managed to evade the baleful effects of her influence. He disliked her heartily from the day that she first slapped him for waking her slumbering charge, but he bore no grudge against Vivian. In fact, but for the woman’s rigid insistence upon the baby heir’s priority in all things, the two children might have been good friends. But Kennedy’s slappings were frequent and severe when Rose was not on guard, and they kept Rollo at a distance. Even at that early age he felt correction keenly, and from a person of Kennedy’s stamp it was too humiliating to be incurred lightly.

There was no one else that he disliked in the same way though he knew himself to be more or less of an outsider at Aubreystone Castle. He avoided his stepfather on all occasions, but his feeling for him was more of awe for an almost complete stranger than actual aversion. Old Lady Aubreystone he found it easy to ignore since she invariably ignored him; and for Caroline he entertained a secret admiration because she sat a horse like a man, and he had a passion for horses. In fact, on one occasion when she dismounted in the drive, and, seeing him near, snatched him up with a grim laugh and set him on her tall hunter, instead of shrieking with fright as she half-expected, he turned rather white for a second or two, and then gathered the bridle into his baby fists and chuckled encouragement to the horse. Even Caroline was fain to admit after that episode that the stepson of the family was a sportsman. Had she been of a less morose temperament, she might have won young Rollo’s warm allegiance on the strength of it, but, as she openly said, she had no use for brats and never time to waste on superfluous people. There was far too much to be done, with her mother growing feeble and her sister-in-law always ailing.

For by the day on which a thousand maroons trumpeted the news of the coming of peace to a world dazed and wounded almost beyond all hope of healing, Molly knew that another cruel ordeal lay before her, and that peace—whatever it might mean for the rest of creation—was not for her.

She too was dazed, as though an irretrievable calamity had come upon her. Somehow, after the birth of the heir whom she could scarcely be said to own, she had not thought it possible that she could ever bear another child. But the unexpected had happened, and there was no escape for her from the stark realities of life. She had given herself to a man she did not love while her heart was far away where the guns were thundering over battlefields that she would never see, and now she paid the penalty in anguish of body and bitterness of soul.

Old Lady Aubreystone, grown a little deaf and slightly infirm, made loud and repeated assertions of satisfaction over this fresh happy event, scolded her for giving way to morbid feelings of malaise, and predicted a large family of sons to carry on the ancient name. Molly shuddered at the thought. Rollo was all she wanted or ever could want now. But she endured in silence, hoping pathetically that one more son would be enough for Ivor, whatever his mother’s aspirations might be.

There were more comforts available during the winter that succeeded the end of the War, and her health improved in consequence. With the coming of spring she viewed her situation with more resignation. She was still young, and her physical vitality renewed itself almost without her knowledge.

But there was a shattering disappointment in store. In the early days of April the period of waiting ended in the birth of a daughter. Molly was not so ill this time, but mentally she felt as if she had received a staggering blow. Her mother-in-law was furious and would not come near her or take the faintest interest in the unlucky dispeller of her high hopes.

“It’s just what would happen!” she declared wrathfully. “And once she begins having girls she’ll probably make a habit of it!”

Caroline’s ironical laughter did not allay her indignation. She was getting too old for disappointment. By the time Molly was about again, it had developed into a deep-seated grievance against her. The fact that Molly also was bitterly disappointed carried no weight at all. In some obscure fashion old Lady Aubreystone felt that the disaster was all due to perversity on the part of her daughter-in-law.

The general atmosphere indeed became so highly charged with electricity that Ivor at length deemed it advisable to intervene.

“It is really absurd,” he said, “to take things to heart in this fashion. Molly is not yet twenty-two. There is ample time before us. I am only forty myself.”

“Oh, you!” said his mother.

And the tone in which she said it decided him. That night he very quietly informed Molly that as soon as she was able to leave home he intended to take her for a prolonged honeymoon. And Molly, with a sword through her heart whenever she thought of Rollo, knew by the very precision of his announcement that meek acquiescence was her only course.