CHAPTER XXIX

IN THE CHURCH PORCH

It was somewhere about the second week in December that Trix became the recipient of another letter, a letter quite as amazing, perplexing, and extraordinary as that which she had perused in the summer-house at Llandrindod Wells. They had returned to London in October.

The letter was brought to her in the drawing-room one evening about nine o'clock. Mrs. Arbuthnot had gone out to a Bridge party.

Trix was engrossed in a rather exciting novel at the moment, a blazing fire and an exceedingly comfortable armchair adding to her blissful state of well-being. Barely raising her eyes from the book, she merely put out her hand and took the letter from the tray. It was not till she had come to the end of the chapter that she even glanced at the handwriting. Then she saw that the writing was Miss Tibb.u.t.t's.

Now, a letter from Miss Tibb.u.t.t was of such extremely rare occurrence that Trix immediately leapt to the conclusion that Pia must be ill. It was therefore with a distinct pang of uneasiness that she broke the seal.

This is what she read:

"My Dear Trix,--

"I have made rather an astounding discovery. At least I feel sure I've made it, I mean that I am right in what I think. I have no one in whom I can confide, as it certainly would not do to speak to Pia on the subject,--I feel sure she would rather I didn't, so I am writing to you as I feel I must tell someone. My dear, it sounds too extraordinary for anything, and I can't understand it myself, but it is this. Pia knows the under-gardener at the Hall, really knows him I mean, not merely who he is, and that he is one of the gardeners, and that he came to these parts last March, which, of course, we all know.

"I found this out quite by accident, and will explain the incident to you. You must forgive me if I am lengthy; but I can only write in my own way, dear Trix, and perhaps that will be a little long-winded.

"Yesterday afternoon, which was Sat.u.r.day, Pia and I motored into Byestry, as she wanted to see Father Dormer about something. I went into the church, while she went to the presbytery. I noticed a man in the church as I went in, a man in workman's clothes, but of course I did not pay any particular attention to him. I knelt down by one of the chairs near the door, and just beyond St. Peter's statue. I suppose I must have been kneeling there about ten minutes when the man got up. He didn't genuflect, and I glanced involuntarily at him. He didn't notice me, because I was partly hidden by St. Peter's statue. Then I saw it was the under-gardener,--Michael Field, I believe his name is.

"My dear, the man looked dreadfully ill, and so sad. It was the face of a man who had lost something or someone very dear to him. He went towards the porch, and just before he reached it, I heard the door open. Whoever was coming in must have met him just inside the church. There was a sound of steps as if the person had turned back into the porch with him. Then I heard Pia's voice, speaking impulsively and almost involuntarily. At least I felt sure it was involuntarily. It sounded exactly as if she couldn't help speaking.

"'Oh,' she said, 'you've been ill.'

"'Nothing of any consequence, Madam,' I heard the man's voice answer.

"'But it must have been of consequence,' I heard Pia say. 'Have you seen a doctor?'

"'There was no need,' returned the man.

"Then I heard Pia's voice, impulsive and a little bit impatient. She evidently had not seen me in the church, and thought no one was there.

"'But there is need. Why don't you go and see Doctor Hilary?'

"'I am not ill enough to need doctors, Madam,' returned the man.

"'But you are,' returned Pia, in the way that she insists when she is very anxious about anything.

"I heard the man give a little laugh."

"'It is exceedingly good of you to trouble concerning me,' he said, 'and I really don't know why you should.'

"'Oh,' said Pia quickly, 'you need not be afraid that I, personally, wish to interfere with you again. You made it quite plain to me months ago that you had no smallest wish for me to do so. But, speaking simply as one human being to another, as complete and entire strangers, even, I do ask you to see a doctor.'

"Then there was a moment's silence."

"'I think not,' I heard the man say presently. 'I am really not sufficiently interested in myself. Though--' and then, Trix dear, he half stopped, and his voice altered in the queerest way,--'the fact that you have shown interest enough to ask me to do so, has, curiously enough, made me feel quite a good deal more important in my own eyes.'

"'You refused my friendship,' I heard Pia say, and her voice shook a little.

"'I did,' said the man in rather a stern voice.

"Again, Trix dear, there was a little silence. Then Pia said:

"'I don't intend again to offer a thing that has once been rejected. I shall _never_ do that. But because we once were friends, or at all events, fancied ourselves friends, I do ask you to see Doctor Hilary.

That is all.'

"She must have turned from him at once, because she came into the church, and went up the aisle to her own chair. She knelt down, and put her hands over her eyes; and, Trix dearest, she was crying. I am crying now when I think about it, so forgive the blots on the paper. A minute later I heard the door open and shut again, so I knew the man had gone. I got up as softly as I could, and slipped out of the church. It would never have done for Pia to see me, and I was so thankful to St. Peter for hiding me.

"Well, my dear Trix, wasn't it amazing? And one of the most amazing things was that the man's voice and way of speaking was quite educated, not the least as one would suppose a gardener would speak.

"I went to the post-office and bought some stamps, though I really had plenty at home, and loitered about for nearly a quarter of an hour. Then I thought I had better go and find Pia. I met her coming out of the church. She was very pale; but she smiled, and wanted to know where I'd been, and I told her to the post-office. And then we drove home together.

Pia laughed and chatted all the way, while my heart was in a big lump in my throat, and I could hardly keep from crying, like the foolish old woman that I am. I ought to have been talking, and helping Pia to pretend.

"She has been quite gay all to-day, and oddly gentle too. But you know the kind of gayness. And to-night my heart feels like breaking for her, for there is some sad mystery I can't fathom. So, Trix dearest, I have written to you, because I cannot keep it all to myself. And I am crying again now, though I know I oughtn't to. So I am going to leave off, and say the rosary instead.

"Good night, my dear Trix.

"Your affectionate old friend, "Esther Tibb.u.t.t.

P.S. I wish you could come down here again. Can't you?"

Trix leant back in her chair, and drew a long breath. The novel was utterly and entirely forgotten. So _that_ was what Pia's letter had meant. It was this man she had been thinking of all the time. A dozen little unanswered questions were answered now, a dozen queer little riddles solved.

Trix slid down off her chair on to the bear-skin rug in front of the fire. She leant her arms sideways on the chair, resting her chin upon them. Most a.s.suredly she must place the whole matter clearly before her mind, in so far as possible. She gazed steadily at the glowing coals, ruminative, reflective.

And firstly it was presented to her mind as the paramount fact, that it was the mention of this man--this Michael Field, so-called--that had been the direct cause of Pia's odd irritability, and not the indirect cause, as she most erroneously had imagined. Somehow, in some way, he had caused her such pain that the mere mention of his name had been like laying a hand roughly on a wound. Secondly, though Trix most promptly dismissed the memory, there was Pia's hurting little speech, the speech which had followed on her--Trix's--theories promulgated beneath the lime trees. In the light of Miss Tibb.u.t.t's letter that speech was easy enough of explanation. Had not Pia had practical proof of the unworkableness of those theories? Proof which must have hurt her quite considerably. How utterly and entirely childish her words must have seemed to Pia,--Pia who _knew_, while she truly was merely surmising, setting forth ideas which a.s.suredly she had never attempted to put into practice. Thirdly--Trix ticked off the facts on her fingers--there was the amazing little game of cross-questions. That too was entirely explained. How precisely it was explained she did not attempt to put into actual formulated words.

Nevertheless she perceived quite clearly that it was explained. And lastly there was Pia's letter to her, the letter which had vainly tried to hide the bitterness which had prompted it. Clear as daylight now was the explanation of that letter. Buoyed up by Trix's advice, by Trix's eloquence, she had once more attempted to put the high-sounding theories into practice. And it had proved a failure, an utter and complete failure.

All these things fell at once into place, fitting together like the pieces of a puzzle, an unfinished puzzle, nevertheless. The largest pieces were still scattered haphazard on the board, and there seemed extremely little prospect of fitting them into the rest. How had Pia ever met the man? What was he doing at Chorley Old Hall? And why was he pretending to be Michael Field, when she--Trix--now knew him to be Antony Gray? The last two proved the greatest difficulty, nor could Trix, for all her gazing into the fire, find the place they ought to occupy. She remembered, too, her own idea regarding the colour of that bubble. Was it possible that she had been right in her idea? Verily, if she had been, in the face of this new discovery, it opened up a yet more astounding problem. Pia actually and verily in love with the man, a man she believed to be under-gardener at the Hall,--Pia, the distant, the proud, the reserved Pia! It was amazing, unthinkable!

Trix heaved a sigh; it was all quite beyond her. One thing alone was obvious; she must go down to Woodleigh again as soon as possible.

Certainly she had no very clear notion as to what precise good she could do by going, nevertheless she was entirely convinced that go she must.

And then, having reached this point in her reflections, she returned once more to the beginning, and began all over again.

And suddenly another idea struck her, one which had been entirely omitted from her former train of thought. Was it possible that Mr. Danver knew of the ident.i.ty of this Michael Field? Was it possible, was it conceivable that he held the key to those greatest riddles? Truly it would seem possible. His one big action had been so extraordinary, so mad even, that it would be quite justifiable to believe, or at least conjecture, that minor extraordinary actions might be mixed up with it.

And then, from that, Trix turned to a somewhat more detailed consideration of Pia's position. One point presented itself quite definitely and clearly to her. It was certainly evident from that memorable letter of Pia's, that she _did_ regard this man as a social inferior, from which fact it was entirely plain that she had no smallest notion of his real ident.i.ty. Trix clasped her hands beneath her chin, shut her eyes, and plunged yet deeper into her reflections. They were becoming even more intricate.

Now, would it be a comfort to Pia to know that this man was by birth her social equal, or would it, in view of the fact that he had in some way shown her what she had called "a glimpse of the hairy hoof," appear to her an added insult. Trix pondered the question deeply, turning it in her mind, and sighing prodigiously more than once in the process.

And then, all at once, she opened her eyes. Where, after all, was the use of troubling her head on that score. Comfort or not, who was to tell Pia?

Most a.s.suredly Trix couldn't. She had considered that question already, weeks ago in fact, and answered it in the negative. Of course it was quite possible that she was being somewhat over-sensitive and ultra-scrupulous on the subject. But there it was. It was the way she regarded matters.