Brigit returned on Monday to Pensee at Curzon Street. It was the anniversary of Lord Fitz Rewes's death. The two women went to Catesby, where they visited his grave together, prayed together, and, in the quiet evening, sat by the library fire.
"This is a great contrast for you after all the excitement on Saturday night," said Pensee. "You are full of surprises, Brigit. Few young girls, having made such a brilliant success, would care to spend their time with poor, dull women like me. They would naturally wish to enjoy the triumph."
Brigit's eyes filled with tears.
"I know what you mean, cher coeur," she answered, "but there are no triumphs for any artist. We suffer and we work--sometimes we are able to please. But we suffer and work because we must; whereas we please by the merest accident."
"That is true, no doubt. One might as well speak of a successful saint as a successful artist. Every saint is not canonized, and every artist is not praised. But surely appreciation is a help."
"Yes, dearest; and I am grateful for it. And it gives encouragement to one's friends!"
"Let us suppose that they had not cared for your acting, dear child. What then?"
"I should have known that it was my vocation just the same. Don't believe that I shan't have my full share of doubts and struggles. This little first step makes me the more anxious about my next."
The older woman looked at her, and sighed deeply.
"You are too young to know life so well! I am sure you have suffered more severely than any of us--who say more and cry more. Your face has changed a good deal in the last day or two. In one way, it isn't so pretty as it was."
"No one can look quite so plain as I can look, Pensee," she answered, laughing.
"Let me finish what I had in my mind! You are not so pretty--not so much like a picture. But when I see you now, I don't think about your features at all. I watch your expressions--they suggest the whole world to me--all the things I have thought and felt. Rachel's face is like that. I am sure now that you were meant to be an actress. I have been very stupid. How I wish I understood you better, and could be more of a friend. I don't understand Robert entirely. Do you?"
"Yes, I understand him."
"I wonder how you came to love each other. I suppose it happened for the best. But it seems such a pity"--she paused and then repeated the words--"it seems such a pity that all doesn't come right--in the old-fashioned way."
"It has come right, dear," said Brigit; "perfectly right."
"You try to think so."
"I know it. His father sinned, and my father sinned. We were born for unhappiness. Unhappiness and misgivings are in our very blood."
"But how unjust!"
"No, dearest, on the contrary, it is strict justice. The laws of the universe are immutable. You might as well ask that fire should only burn sometimes--that it may be water, or air, or earth to suit sentimental occasions."
"I don't like to see you so sensible--it's--it's unlikely."
Brigit smiled at the word--a favourite one with Pensee when persons and events differed from the serene, unreasoned fiction which she called her experience.
"How can you call anything unlikely?" asked the girl. "I ought never to have been born at all, and Life has made no provision for me. She is boisterous and homely--like a housekeeper at an inn. She doesn't know me, and she has prepared no room for me. But I may rest on the staircase--that's under shelter at least."
"What whimsical ideas, darling!"
"Ah, to feel as I feel, you must have had my parents. You mustn't suppose that I woke up one morning and saw the reason for all my troubles. The reason did not come as though it were the sun shining into the room. Oh, no! I found no answer for a long, long time. But I feel it now. My father could not take me into his world, and my mother's world--I could not take. They wished to know that I was protected, so they found some one who knew the story, and knew both worlds. I was grateful, because I didn't understand. And when I understood I was still grateful, but I couldn't accept the terms. My marriage was not so terrible as many marriages. Yet it was terrible enough. Don't let us talk of it, Pensee. It is hopeless to quarrel with logic. Science is calm--as calm as the hills."
"And Robert?" said the older woman. "What about Robert?"
"His father was a Dominican. The Church will have her own again. Be quite sure of that!
_'Thy justice is like the great mountains.
Thy judgments are a great deep.'_
In God's way, all will come right. Every debt must be paid."
Although they had arranged to journey back to London the following day, the woods and gardens looked so fair, the peace of that house was so great, that they lingered there till Wednesday. Brigit was unusually silent. She sat for hours at the library window looking across the Channel toward France, her countenance drawn and white, all its loveliness departed.
Once she spoke--
"I know that Robert is in sorrow."
"Are you anxious? Shall I write?" asked Pensee, secretly troubled also.
"No, I am not anxious. There is sorrow, but I am not anxious."
Her room adjoined Pensee's, and, in the night, Pensee, sleepless, heard her walking to and fro, with even steps, till sunrise. When they met in the morning, Brigit seemed to have aged by ten years. Her youth returned, but the character of her face had altered for ever. She was never called pretty again. It was said that she varied and depended wholly on her moods. She could make herself anything, but nature had given her little more than a pair of eyes, a nose, and a mouth--indifferent good. Lady Fitz Rewes was appalled at the transformation. Remembering stories of the last dreadful touches of consumption, she feared for the girl's health. "She will die before long," she thought. But death can occur more than once in one life. The passing away of every strong emotion means a burial and a grave, a change, and a resurrection. The tearful, dusty, fiery, airy process must be endured seventy times seven and more, and more again--from everlasting to everlasting. And the cause is nothing, the motives are nothing, the great, great affliction and the child's little woe pass alike through the Process--for the Process belongs to the eternal law, whereas the rest is of the heart's capacity.
The way to the city--through the beautiful south of England, beautiful at all seasons of the year and sad also at all seasons--brought something which resembled calm to both their minds. Dwellings closely packed together destroy, or disturb, the finer vision of the grandeur, sternness, and depth of life. At Catesby, the solitude and the waves exercised their power over the spirit, diverting it from trivial speculations to awe and wonder. There, where the unseen could move freely and the invisible manifest itself on the perpetual rocks, the towering trees, the still green fields, and the vast acres of the sea, one could hear the dreaming prophet proclaim the burden of the Lord; and the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the sound of the mill-stones and the light of the candle mattered not. But the kingdom of all the worlds--the worlds and habitations not made with hands--rose up as the real theatre of man's destiny and the fit measure of his achievements. It is that sense of the eternity of consequences--and that sense only--which can satisfy the human heart. Time is too short, this planet is too small, and this mortal body is too weak for the surging thoughts, the unintelligible desires of the soul. Nothing less than infinity can hallow emotions: their passingness--which seems the rule in the fever and turmoil of city life--is not their abatement but their degradation. Change they must, but perish utterly they may not.
The women travellers, as the lights of the capital grew more numerous, and the roar of the traffic louder and more constant, drew back within themselves, assuming, unconsciously, the outward bearing--fatigued, sceptical, and self-distrustful--of the town-bred. When they reached Curzon Street, the two heaps of letters, the telegrams and cards on the hall-table symbolised crudely enough the practical side of daily affairs. One name--an unknown one--among the many engraved on the white scraps caught Brigit's attention at once:
The Rev. J. M. Foster.
"That gentleman is a priest, Madam," said the butler; "he will call again this evening. I told him that we expected you and her Ladyship about seven."
For some reason she felt alarmed. All that day and the night before she had been agitated by an inexplicable dread of strange tidings. She went to her room, but, without removing her travelling cloak or her hat, she sat down on the edge of her bed, waiting for some summons. Presently it came. Father Foster was in the library with Lady Fitz Rewes. Would Mrs. Parflete see him? She went down, and Pensee stood watching for her at the open door.
"My poor child!" she said, with a sob in her voice, as she drew Brigit into the room. "My poor child," she repeated, "Father Foster has come to tell us that--that Mr. Parflete died last night."
The priest stepped forward with the decision, and also the stern kindness, of those accustomed to break hard messages.
"He was injured in a quarrel, and died from the effect of the wound. He declined to give any particulars of the affair, and I fear we must call it a mystery. He asked me to say that his last words to you were these: Amate da cui male aveste--Love those from whom ye have had evil."
He looked at her compassionately as he spoke, wondering, no doubt, how great the evil had been.
"Can I go to him?" asked Brigit; "where is he?"
"Where he died--in his room at the hotel."
"I will go with you," said Pensee. She held Brigit's hand, and exchanged a long glance with Father Foster.
"Did you say," she asked, "that he left any letters or papers?"
"He destroyed all his papers, but he has left one letter addressed to you. He wished me to say, in the presence of Mrs. Parflete, that this had reference to some false report about her visiting Mr. Orange's lodgings. Mr. Parflete saw the lady who went to Vigo Street, and he did not know who she was. One thing, however, he did know: he had never seen her before."
Brigit inclined her head, but remained motionless, where she first halted when she entered the room.
"Did he die in pain?" she asked.
"I am afraid he suffered greatly."
"Was his mind at peace?"
"I believe so--from my heart."
"He had less to fear from God than man."
"The justice of God is severe," said the priest, "but He can never make mistakes. The hardest cruelties in this life are the mistakes which we commit in judging others--perhaps in judging ourselves."
"The carriage is at the door," whispered Pensee, touching Brigit's arm. "Shall we go?"
Nothing was said during the drive to the hotel near Covent Garden. Brigit sat with closed eyes and folded hands while Lady Fitz Rewes, lost in thought, stared out of the window. At last the horses stopped.
"This is the place," said Father Foster.
A large gas-lamp hung over the entrance, and two Swiss waiters, with forced solemnity, ushered the party through the hall and up the staircase. They tapped at a door, listened, from force of habit, for an answer which never came, and then turned the handle. Parflete's bed had been moved to the centre of the room. There was a table covered with a white cloth, on which four candles burnt. By the window there was a chair littered with illustrated newspapers.
"The nurse has just gone down to his supper," explained one of the waiters, "but le mort est bien convenable."
The dead man had been dressed in a rose-silk shirt embroidered with forget-me-nots. Upon his crossed arms lay a small ivory crucifix. In place of his wig he wore a black velvet skull-cap. The face was yellow: the features seemed set in a defiant, ironical smile. Hardship, terror, remorse, and physical agony had left their terrible scars upon his countenance.
Brigit, overcome at the sight of these awful changes, fell weeping on Pensee's shoulder.
"Thank God!" she whispered, "he has no more to fear from men."
When she grew calmer, she knelt down by the body, and told them that she would watch there that night.
"Madness!" exclaimed Lady Fitz Rewes.
"No, no! I wish to do it."
The priest stated a few objections, but she remained firm in her resolve.
"He was my father's friend," she said, quietly.
They both noticed that she never once referred to Parflete as her husband.
"If you stay, Brigit, I too will stay," said Pensee.
"That, dearest, you must decide for yourself. In any case, I cannot leave him. Tell the nurse not to come back. And let me be alone here for a little while."
Lady Fitz Rewes and Father Foster went downstairs to the coffee-room, and made a pretence of eating dinner. The two talked about the deplorable marriage, the Orange affair, Brigit's talents. Of course, she was very young. But Rachel--the great Rachel--made her first triumph at seventeen.
"One doesn't like to say it," observed Pensee, "but this death seems providential. If she marries Orange, she will give up the stage. Poor child! At last it really looks as though she might be happy--like other people."
"Like other people," repeated the priest, mechanically.
"I must send word to my housekeeper that I intend to remain here all night. And I should like our letters--I had no time to look at them."
A messenger was despatched, and they resumed their former conversation.
"I am afraid," said Pensee, "that poor Mr. Parflete was dreadfully wicked."
The priest sighed, and made some remarks about the dead man's intellectual brilliancy:
"He had great learning."
"Tell me, Father, with all your experience, do you understand life?" asked Pensee, abruptly.
"Let me take refuge in a quotation--
_'Justice divine
Mends not her slowest pace for pray'rs or cries.'_
I can understand that at least," answered the priest.
"How odd that you should speak of justice. Brigit was talking in the same strain only yesterday. It's a gloomy strain--for a young girl."
"I don't think so. One shouldn't sentimentalise. Life goes on, it doesn't halt: it's a constant development. I haven't much patience with----"
He stopped short.
"Pray finish the sentence."
"Well, I haven't much patience with those who want to linger, and look back, and cheat time. One must get along."
Pensee felt annoyed, and began to talk coldly about the housing of the poor, and winters which she had spent in Florence.
"Here are your letters," exclaimed her companion suddenly.
She turned them over with languid interest, murmuring unconsciously to herself the names of her correspondents.
"From dear Ethel. Why is she in Edinburgh? I hope her father isn't ill again. Alice. Uncle. Mrs. Lanark. Mary Butler. Prince d'Alchingen. That tiresome Miss Bates. Mr. Seward." She paused and flushed deeply. "Robert."
Then she turned to Father Foster with shining eyes.
"This letter," said she, "is from Mr. Orange. Don't you admire his handwriting?"
"A beautiful hand, certainly."
"I wonder what he has to say, and why he is abroad. Isn't that a foreign stamp?"
"The post-mark is Paris."
"So it is. Will you excuse me if I read it."
She broke the seal, and read the contents, while every vestige of colour left her face.
"I can't make it out," she said; "there must be another letter for Brigit. Will you look?"
He untied the packet, and recognised presently Orange's handwriting on an envelope.
"You seem rather displeased," said Pensee; "you think this is all very strange. It--it isn't a common case."
"No case is common."
"Well, you must help me to decide whether I ought to give her this letter at once. I can't take so much responsibility."
"Neither can I. She is a perfectly free woman now, at any rate."
He did not approve of the situation, and he made no attempt to conceal his feelings. His face became set. Pensee thought she detected a certain reprimand in the very tone of his voice.
"It isn't a common case," she repeated again. "He says he is on his way to Rome--to the Jesuits--for a long Retreat, if they will take him. If he knew--what has happened--he might change his mind."
"What! you would have him turn back?"
"Oh, don't be so hard."
"I am not hard," he added more gently. "But would this woman, if she really loved him, wish him to turn back? And, if there is anything in him, could he ever be happy in any stopping short of the fullest renunciation--once resolved on that renunciation?"
"Ah, don't put it that way to her. She has had so much trouble already. Your Church seems so selfish. Forgive me, but I do resent these celibate views. They are unnatural."
"I shan't interfere. Take her the letter by all means. She must decide for herself."
Pensee rose from the table, and went up the stairs to the room where Brigit still knelt by Parflete's dead body.
"Dearest," said Lady Fitz Rewes, "I think you ought to read this letter. I have had one also. Robert thinks of taking a great step, and perhaps----"
Her glance met Brigit's.
"No," said Brigit, under her breath: "no."
Then, with trembling hands, she read the letter once, twice, three times.
"Say something," said Pensee, touching her. "Say something, Brigit."
She smiled and held the letter to the candle flame. It caught fire and burnt away quickly while she held it.
"Mind your hand--it will catch your hand."
"I don't feel it," said Brigit. She bore the scar of that burn always.
"Say something," implored Pensee.
"He is on his way to Rome. He asks me not to write to him. Castrillon is dying. They fought a duel."
"But of course you will write--now. You must write."
"Hasn't my love done harm enough already? I will never see him again. I shall never write to him again."
"You can't mean that. You can't realise what you are saying. People will like him all the better for fighting Castrillon."
"Oh, it isn't the duel, Pensee. He sees his way clearly. He has always tried not to see it. I, too, have tried not to see it. But all that is at an end now."
"And he will renounce his career."
"Everything! Everything!"
Pensee threw up her hands, and left the room. Father Foster was standing under a gas-jet at the end of the corridor reading his office. He looked at Lady Fitz Rewes.
"She won't stand in his way?" he asked quietly.
"She won't stand in his way," she answered. "I hope you realise what that means--to her."
"I hope I can realise what it means to both of them," said he.
