"Pixie, dear--I'm afraid we've not been helpful. ... I lost my head, but it was such a shock.--I flew into a pa.s.sion without hearing what you had to say for yourself. ... Darling, tell me--tell me honestly--_how do you feel_?"

"I feel--" Pixie raised both hands, and moved them up and down above her shoulders, as though balancing a heavy load--"as though a great ton weight had been rolled off my shoulders. ... Bridgie! You are angry; I was angry too, but now I've had time to think. ... There have been two and a half years since he went away--that's about nine hundred days. ...

Bridgie! If you only knew it--there's not been one day out of all that nine hundred when you hadn't more cause to pity me than you have to-day!--"

Suddenly, pa.s.sionately, she burst into tears.

Two days later Bridgie Victor returned home. The need for chaperonage was over, and it was abundantly evident that Pixie was in no need of consolation. The first shock of disillusionment over, it was pre-eminently relief that she felt--relief from a bond which had weighed more and more heavily as time pa.s.sed by. If Stanor had come home, looking his old self, caring for her, depending on her as he had done during the days of their brief engagement, she would have been ready and willing to give him her life, but it had been a strange man who had entered the sitting-room of the little flat, a man with a strange face, and a strange voice, and a heart that belonged to another girl. Pixie was _free_; the bonds which had bound her were loosed, and with each hour that pa.s.sed her liberty became more sweet. She shared in her sister's relief that the understanding with Stanor had been known to no one outside the family, for no human girl enjoys being pitied for such an experience, and Pixie had her own full share of conceit. It was comforting to know that there would be no talk, no fuss; that she could go her way, free from the consciousness of watching eyes.

On the morning of Bridgie's departure two letters arrived by the first post, and were read in silence by their respective owners. Bridgie's was in a man's handwriting, and the perusal of its lines brought a flush to her cheeks and the glimmer of tears to her eyes. She put it in her pocket when she had finished reading, and remained densely oblivious of her sister's hints.

"What does he say?"

"Who?"

"Mr Glynn, of course. Don't pretend! I know his writing."

"He's very ... very--I don't know exactly _what_ he is, Pixie. He is as we all were at first--upset!"

"What does he say?"

"Oh, er--er--the usual things. Sorry. Ashamed. It's so difficult for him, because, of course, in a certain sense it _is_ his doing. ...

Naturally, he feels--"

"What does he say?"

"Pixie, _don't_ go on repeating that! It's stupid. I've _told_ you!

And there's a message for you. He thanks you for _your_ message, (I didn't know you had sent one!) and says it was 'like you.' What did you say?"

But Pixie did not enlighten her.

"I think he ought to have written to me!" she said decisively. "After all, Bridgie, it is my business, not yours. I thought he _would_ write."

Bridgie had the grace to blush.

"But just at first, dear, it is difficult.--He feels it so much. It's easier to a third person. Later on, in a few months' time, when things have settled down, he wants to come north to see us. It will be easier then..."

"Oh!" Pixie seemed of a sudden as eager to avoid the subject as she had been to continue it. She handed her own letter across the table with a short "From Honor! You may read it," and thereby protected herself against the scrutiny of Bridgie's eyes.

The sheet was covered with a large, straggling handwriting, and Pixie, reading it, had seemed to hear Honor's very voice speaking to her.

"My dear Patricia,--I guess you may not want to hear from me, but I'm bound to write, and maybe I can say a few things that will help us both. You're feeling pretty badly at the moment. But I want you just to realise that I've been feeling that way for a good year back, and to try to see both sides.

"It began, Patricia, through our both feeling lone and lorn and trying to comfort each other. You'll recollect you _asked_ me to be good to him! Things went on all right for a spell, but before we knew where we were that friendship had got to be too important to us both. There wasn't a thought of disloyalty in it, Patricia, on his part or mine, and the very first time I had an inkling of what was happening I went off west for a tour of four months. I presume it was too late by that time, for when I went home (I was bound to go home!) matters didn't seem to have mended. After a while we had it out--it was bound to come some time--and I told Stanor straight he'd either got to make a clean breast of things to you or never see me again. Up till then, I guess, we'd behaved as well as any two youngsters could have been expected to do under the circ.u.mstances, but after that things went to pieces. He _wouldn't_ tell, and he _couldn't_ keep away! I'm not defending Stanor. He's shown up pretty badly over this business.

He's been weak, and obstinate, and dishonourable. I don't delude myself a mite, but, you see, Pixie, I love him! It's the real thing with both of us this time, and that makes a mighty difference. I can see his faults and feel sorry about them, but it don't make me love him any the less; and if all my money were to pan out to-morrow he'd be sorry, but he'd love me just the same. So there it was, Pixie--and a wearing time I've had of it, fighting against his wishes--and my own! In the end I decided to join some friends and come over to Europe, and leave him to think things over by himself. Maybe I guessed he'd follow and be forced to meet you. It's difficult to understand one's own motives at these times. Anyway, before I knew where I was he'd taken a berth in the same boat, and--here we are!

"Stanor says you have grown-up, and look different. You are both different after these years apart, and, anyway, it was a mistake from the beginning, Patricia, and wouldn't have worked out. Now, _we_ suit each other, and the life we are going to lead will bring out the best in us both! He seems to you pretty contemptible at this moment, but there's so many sides to one human creature, and that is only one side. He's got lots of others that are good and true--

"Yesterday I had an ordeal. I was introduced to the 'Runkle.' Why didn't I know he was like that? He was quite courteous--he couldn't be anything else. But his eyes, (what eyes!) made arches at me, as if to say, 'He prefers _her_!' and I felt frozen stiff. Now I shan't rest satisfied till that man's my friend, but it will take time--

"Pixie, we're going to be married quite soon--as soon as ever we can fix up the necessary formalities, spend a honeymoon in Switzerland, and get back to our work. I don't ask to see you--just at the moment it would do no good, but couldn't you just manage to send me a line to melt this stone in my heart? I'd be so happy if it wasn't there. But it won't melt till I hear from you, that you understand, and you forgive!

"Lovingly,--Honor."

Bridgie read and sighed, folded the sheet carefully, and sighed again.

"It's so _difficult_,"--she began.

"What is difficult?"

"To be as angry with people as you would like!" replied Bridgie unexpectedly. "You start by thinking that all the right is on your own side, and all the wrong on theirs, and that you're a martyr and they are brutes, and that your case is proven and there's not a word that could be said in their defence; and then of a sudden--" she lifted the letter in her hand--"you get _this_! And they _have_ a side, and they are not brutes; and instead of being angry you have to be--you are forced into being--sorry instead! It does feel hard! I didn't _want_ to be sorry for Honor Ward..."

"I'm not sorry for her," said Pixie softly, "I'm glad. She's going to be happy. ... Bridgie, dear, what can I send her, for a wedding present?"

CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT.

PIXIE FINDS HER HAPPINESS.

As soon as Pat had sufficiently recovered, he and Pixie travelled to Ireland to spend a few weeks in the old homestead, now blooming in fresh beauty under the management of Jack O'Shaughnessy and Sylvia his wife.

The great hall which had been of old so bare and desolate was now embellished with Turkey carpets and tapestried walls: so far as the eye could reach there was not one shabby, nor broken, nor patched-up article; in sight; the damp and fusty odour which had filled the great drawing-room, and which for years had been a.s.sociated with State apartments in Pixie's youthful mind, was a thing of the past. Even in the chilliest weather the room remained warm, for electric radiators, cunningly hidden from sight, dispelled the damp, and were kept turned on night and day, "whether they were needed, or whether they were not," to the delight and admiration of the Irish staff. For pure extravagance, for pure pagan delight in extravagance, the Irishman _and_ woman are hard to beat. The very warmth and generosity of their nature makes it abhorrent to them to stint in any direction, which is one reason, out of many, for the prevailing poverty of the land.

Jack and Sylvia made delightful hosts, and it was a very happy and a very merry quartette which pa.s.sed those spring days together in Knock Castle. They were complete in themselves, and any suggestion of "a party" was instantly vetoed by the visitors, who announced their desire to remain "just as we are."

Sylvia and Pixie rode or drove about the country, pulling up every half mile or so to chat with cottagers, who were all eager to see Miss Pixie, to invoke blessings on her head, and--begging her honour's pardon!--to sigh a sigh for the memory of the times that were no more.

On frequent occasions this same curious, and to English-bred Sylvia, inexplicable regret for the days of old was manifested by the dwellers on the country-side. "_What did they want_?" she asked herself impatiently. "What could they wish for that had not already been done?"

Repaired cottages, improved sanitation, higher wages, perquisites without number--since the new reign all these things had been bestowed upon these ungratefuls, and still they dared to regret the past!

Sylvia had not yet grasped the fact that her birth and upbringing made a chasm between herself and her tenants which no kindness could span.

They would burn her peat, waste her food, accept, and more or less waste again, all that she chose to bestow, but given a choice between the present days of plenty and the lean, bare years of the reign of the jovial "Major" and his brood, they would enthusiastically have acclaimed the latter's return.

Occasionally something of the same spirit would manifest itself in the O'Shaughnessys themselves, as when Jack's voice would take on an apologetic tone in telling his brother of some improvement in the estate, or Pixie gazing at the old Persian carpet in the dining-room would sigh regretfully, "There _used_ to be a hole!" On such occasions Sylvia was sometimes forced to depart on a visit to the nursery and relieve her feelings by a stamp _en route_. When she returned Jack's twinkling eyes would search her face, and he would take an early opportunity of pa.s.sing her chair and touching her with a caressing hand, and once more all would be peace and joy.

Jack and his wife heard from Pat's lips all details as to Stanor Vaughan and his approaching marriage, but to Pixie herself the subject was never mentioned.

"Anyway, she's not fretting!" said Jack. "Never saw her brighter and happier. Bless her big, little heart! I'm thankful the fellow has taken himself out of her way. She'd never have given him up of her own accord. We've all been so happy in our marriages that we can't stand any second-bests for Pixie! When are _you_ going to settle down, old chap?"

"Oh, about next June year," replied Pat calmly. "Always said I would about twenty-eight. Nice time of year, too, for a honeymoon!"

"But ... but..." Jack stammered in surprise. "Have you met the girl?"

"My good man! Dozens! There's no difficulty there. Faith, I love them all!" sighed handsome Pat.

Well, it was a happy holiday, but there was no sadness when it came to an end, for Pat was ready and eager to get back to work, and Pixie to the northern town which meant Bridgie and home. Brother and sister parted with mutual protestations of grat.i.tude and appreciation, and with several quite substantial castles in the air as regards future meetings, and within a few days both had settled down to the routine of ordinary life.

"Pixie is just the same. All this business has not altered her at all,"