Mother and Son (23 page)

“There is more difference within the sexes than between them. And perhaps men and women are different there.”

“They are not,” said Hester. “Look at the difference between you and your son. I have got into the way of calling him that. Miss Burke must forgive me, when she knows the truth.”

“She is to know it now,” said Rosebery. “Miss Burke, my mother had a story in her life, though it did not transpire until its end. My real father was not known to me, but he took thought for my welfare. We
shall depend on what he left for us. And you know I have not lacked a father. And this is the time to say that you are my first romance.”

“Is it the time to say it?” said Hester, idly. “I should hardly have thought it was, with me standing at her side. Not that I wish to lay claim to my priority.”

“Then why do you do so?” said Julius. “It would have been easy to be silent.”

“Perhaps it would not,” said Miss Burke. “And she has said nothing new. She did not keep silent at the time.”

“How little we know people, until we do know them!”

“I am not so sure,” said Emma. “I believe we always know them. We talk of unsuspected depths, but I doubt if there are such things.”

“There seem to be none left here.”

“None at all,” said Hester. “They are all completely open to me. And I believe it is true that they always have been.”

“We can only try to feel that our own are an exception,” said Emma.

“That seems an odd basis for married life.”

“It may help the element of mystery,” said Julius.

“You are experienced in providing that.”

“Uncle,” said Francis, “did you mean that you were our father?”

“I did not mean you to know it, but it is true. I also have a story in my past. It was a thing quite apart from my marriage. You yourself are old enough to understand, and you will explain it to the others.”

“I have always known,” said Alice. “I mean I have
known in a way. I saw there was some reason for your liking us. I guessed it was something like this, when I found out there were such things. I am glad we are your children.”

“I am glad indeed,” said Francis. “It is a great fulfilment. I had hoped we were.”

“You will explain it to Adrian. You will put it to him as I should wish. And you will know no more until you are older; you will not seek to know. I shall remain your uncle, and you will be to me what you have been. And in our hearts we know what that is, and are glad that we know.”

“What a perfect speech!” said Hester. “It is worthy of paper and print. You are indeed versed in such things. But poor children, what a burden on their youth! I wish it could have been spared them.”

“Did you choose the way to ensure it?”

“I had no choice. I took the only way there was.”

“Are we to tell Pettigrew?” said Adrian. “I mean about the marriages?”

“Yes, by all means,” said Julius. “There is no secret there.”

“We somehow feel that there is,” said Hester, “or that there ought to be.”

“It is because of Aunt Miranda,” said Adrian. “It seems that she ought not to know.”

“You must try to forget her,” said Hester, gently. “That is what other people are doing.”

“I don't think she is a person anyone could forget.”

“Neither do I,” said Emma. “I am proud that she came to my house.”

“Yes, indeed,” said Hester. “The woman who had been married for forty odd years to the man to whom you will be married for his last ones! It is a cause for pride.”

“Miss Wolsey,” said Rosebery gravely, “it is possible to conceive of pride's going before a fall.”

Hester did not look at him.

“I think you will have a good stepmother,” she said to the children. “I can leave you with an easy mind.”

“What are you going to do?” said Adrian.

“I am going to be free, free,” said Hester, clasping her hands. “A winged woman, a citizen of the world, a wanderer in far and foreign places. The thing I have longed to be.”

“Will you be able to afford it?”

“No,” said Hester, letting her hands fall. “It was a bright, momentary vision. You might have left it with me a little longer. But I have my plans. And the first one is to leave you. You will be safe with your stepmother.”

“They will call her ‘Aunt Emma',” said Julius.

“But I cannot call her that.”

“You can when you speak of her to them.”

“Well, I shall not be doing that much longer.”

Everyone became silent.

“I think it is time for us to go,” said Miss Burke.

“It must be,” said Emma. “It has been time for everything else.”

“Well, perhaps that is a good thing,” said Hester. “It is an awkward, unbecoming occasion, better over.
Everything will soon be familiar and ordinary; and the little, humdrum problems will bring relief.”

“I hope something will bring it. I was wondering if there was such a thing. We must go home, dear, and prepare ourselves for our future. It is a new demand on us, as this morning we had none.”

“And nice and restful it must have been,” said Hester. “The present is always the better thing. Give my love to Plautus. Tell him it is for ever his.”

“Was the love for Plautus a disguise?” said Miss Burke, as she and Emma left the house.

“I hope so. In that case it can be one again. It began to seem that nothing could ever be.”

“Now the children should leave us,” said Hester, when the guests had gone. “They should clearly be alone. They have things to discuss, or rather to be silent about; and that must be done in solitude.”

“Miss Wolsey,” said Rosebery, when she had been obeyed, “my father is living his last years, and I will not have his happiness spoiled and besmirched, as it has been to-day. I may feel that you understand me?”

“No real happiness ever suffers in that way,” said Hester, gravely. “That is a sign that it is not real. Your words should give you to think. There is no reason to be so careful of any real thing.”

“It has been a strange scene,” said Julius. “You saw us in your power, and you used it for our harm. What did you think to gain?”

“You surely did not think to lose?” said Hester, smiling. “Things that are sure in themselves do not need
such care. And how could I know you had not told Emma the truth?”

“You must have had your reason for doing it for me.”

“Well, you said you were going to do it yourself. So no harm was done. And you did it well. I do not think it could have been done better. I do not know why you hesitated.”

“But you assumed I had done so.”

“Oh, you want too much consideration for your own affairs. I don't know that I assumed anything. I did have a fear that you were marrying Emma with the secret between you, and I shall never have any proof that you were not. But that is all it was to me. Why should it have been more?”

“It was more,” said Rosebery, “and we are glad that it was. It was your excuse, and it is well that you have one. We should have sought one for you.”

“That would have been kind indeed. But I think your father, as we call him, needs excuses more. I had better go and make them to the children.”

“No,” said Julius. “I will have none made. They know the subject is forbidden. And it is best that you should be apart from them.”

“Then I had better leave the house at once. They are my reason for being in it. I can hardly be here without seeing them. They would not expect it, and, to be plain, neither should I.”

“You must do as you will. I will be of any help that I can, either now or in the future. I am grateful, as I ought to be, for what I owe to you. And anything I do
not acknowledge, I will try to repay. We need not make it a parting. There is no need or reason to do so.”

Hester turned and left the room, and left a silence.

“Father,” said Rosebery, “you teach me a lesson. And I see that I needed one. I must not forget my manhood.”

“I wonder what the children are saying. Saying to this end to it, saying to it all.”

“Would you be justified, things being as they are, in listening to them?”

“No, they are past the age. And I am also past it. I might hear what I should not have time to forget.”

When the children reached the schoolroom, Adrian was the first to speak.

“Was Uncle like a man with a mistress in history?”

“Yes,” said Francis; “but when it is not in history, it seems to be different.”

“And the man who was Rosebery's father, was the same?”

“Yes,” said Alice; “but when the mistress is Aunt Miranda, it seems more different still.”

“Are we an unusual family?”

“Yes, if we have a right to the name.”

“Do we have to be ashamed about it? It is not our fault.”

“That means that we do,” said Alice. “Otherwise it would not matter, if it was.”

“I don't feel ashamed.”

“Neither do any of us,” said Francis. “We feel uplifted. We are superior to Rosebery, because Uncle is our father and not his.”

“So that is why he gave up things to you,” said Alice. “I am glad he is not as noble as we thought.”

“Don't you like him to be noble?” said Adrian.

“Well, we do not want to look up to him. So it is better to have no reason.”

“Did Miss Wolsey lose control of herself? I have wondered what doing that meant.”

“So have I. But I shall do so no longer. And I could not dwell upon it.”

“Rosebery explained it with the help of Shakespeare,” said Francis. “He could hardly have managed with lesser aid.”

“Ought he to have said what he did?” said Adrian. “Uncle would not have said it.”

“I suppose not, considering everything.”

“But he is better than Uncle in a way. He would not have had a mistress.”

“We don't know what may transpire.”

“Nothing else,” said Alice, “or it would have transpired. It was a forcing ground for the process.”

“Pettigrew would not think I knew what the word meant,” said Adrian.

“Well, do not make the most of your knowledge. There are exceptions to every rule.”

“He does not know anything,” said Adrian, in a satisfied tone.

“Well, mind he does not learn too much,” said Francis. “I have a mind to forestall you.”

Adrian was on his guard against this, and lay in wait for the tutor.

“Uncle is going to marry Miss Greatheart.”

“Now I must take that as a frivolous statement. And it is not a subject for levity. You forget how lately your uncle has sustained his loss.”

“It is quite true.”

“Then I must accept it,” said Mr. Pettigrew, his tone suggesting that this put his pupil in a dilemma. “Did you offer a proper congratulation to your uncle?”

“No, he did not expect it.”

“I think with some reason,” said the tutor, smiling. “Francis, may I ask for your account of the matter?”

“It is as Adrian said. Uncle is engaged to Miss Greatheart.”

“Then may I send a congratulation in my turn? She is a very pleasant-looking lady, if I remember.”

“Is that the congratulation?” said Adrian.

“You do not misunderstand me. And I am assuming I do not misunderstand you.”

“No, Miss Greatheart will be here instead of Aunt Miranda.”

“We need hardly express it in that way. It is not as your uncle would see it. And what of the friend who I understood was her housekeeper? ‘Miss Burke' I think was the name. Will this involve a change for her?”

“She is going to marry Cousin Rosebery.”

“Now that is too much of a completion of things. You cannot expect me to accept it.”

“You will come to do so,” said Francis.

There was a pause.

“Am I to understand that there is actually a second engagement, that your cousin is to marry Miss Greatheart's friend?”

“She is her housekeeper,” said Adrian.

“Well, I think that description may be allowed to drop,” said Mr. Pettigrew, smiling. “It bears no relation to conditions as they stand. And I find a stray memory occurs to me. On the occasion when I saw your cousin escorting Miss Burke to the station, I was struck by his attentive attitude. And I should not regard myself as observant of such things. I believe I even spoke of it. It suggests that coming events cast their shadows before them.”

“Do you think Uncle will like Miss Greatheart better than Aunt Miranda?” said Adrian.

“The two feelings would hardly invite comparison. And in any case it does not become anyone here to make it.”

“Would you marry again, if Mrs. Pettigrew died?”

“Really, Adrian, your thoughts are running away with you. The change in your future has unsettled you, and perhaps with some reason. But if I countenance license, it must be within limits.”

“Do you think Aunt Miranda knows that Uncle is going to marry again?”

“That would lead us into spheres where I am hardly authorised to take you. I do not know your uncle's views on such matters.”

“If she did know, do you think she would mind?”

“It would be customary to say in such a case that she would understand.”

“I daresay she would,” said Alice, “and so would mind indeed.”

“Perhaps Miss Greatheart always wanted to marry, and could not get anyone,” said Adrian.

“I see no reason for the inference,” said Mr. Pettigrew. “By the way, what are Miss Wolsey's plans?”

“She has gone to Miss Greatheart,” said Alice in a casual tone. “She thought she ought not to have left her.”

“There is probably nothing like living together for blinding people to each other,” said Francis.

“In the case of Mrs. Pettigrew and myself time has added to our mutual understanding. But I must not adduce my own experience as typical.”