"You might let Jane Mucklow do it, or Uncle."

"Susan Yellam is my parishioner. G.o.d's hand lies heavy on her--how heavy I am unable to determine. I have never felt, Pomfret, so conscious of my disabilities, of anaemic faith in such cases as this."

The Squire stood confounded.

"I wish I had your faith, Hamlin."

"What is faith?" asked Hamlin, almost fiercely. "Is it merely a belief that satisfies and helps oneself? The faith that burned in the Apostles was more than that. It saved others. Virtue, at a touch, went out of the faithful into the faithless. If I could touch this poor old woman----!"

"You will," said the Squire, with a.s.surance.

"No. And that is why I wish that I could be spared another--failure."

Soon afterwards he left the Vicarage, and, pa.s.sing the church, paused a moment. He went in and stood near the Font, staring at the Christmas decorations and then at the Pomfret achievements emblazoned upon many of the windows. The decorations served to remind the smallest child in his congregation that another Child had been born into the world; the achievements reminded the more sophisticated of the Pomfrets who had died. The Child had been born to save others; the Pomfrets, many of them worthy, G.o.d-fearing persons, had been mainly concerned in preserving their own bodies and souls.

"He saved others; Himself He cannot save."

The wonderful line came into his mind, as his thoughts dwelt upon the millions of seemingly righteous, respectable men and women bent on saving their own souls, with but little regard for the souls of others.

The Salvation Army, so derided and condemned by Church and State when he was a boy, had accomplished work which could not be ignored by priest and prelate, work undertaken by labourers with no outshining qualifications except faith in their ability to convince others, others as humble in condition as themselves, who stood, for the most part, beyond the pale of organised charity and richly-endowed religious denominations.

Did this war, in relation to such thoughts, a.s.sume a new significance?

Could regeneration, reconstruction come from below, from the ma.s.ses, for example, out of which General Booth had enlisted his soldiers? Would a privilege, the n.o.blest in the world, the sacrosanct prerogative to touch others to finer issues, emanate from the unprivileged? Hamlin could not answer the question. Or, as seemed more likely, would light shine from above, from a purified aristocracy, purged of self-interest by sacrifice, proud and eager to remove intolerable burdens from their less fortunate fellow-men? Or, a happier hypothesis than either, would the complex problem be solved by co-operation of ma.s.ses and cla.s.ses made one by sorrow and suffering, born anew through blood and tears? It might well be so.

He left the church, and walked through the village. Much rain had fallen. He noticed that the Avon was swollen, and ready to overflow its banks. The wind blew cold upon his cheeks. The sun moved behind heavy clouds ready to discharge vast acc.u.mulations of moisture. In short, a raw, drizzling day, one of the last of an unhappy year.

When Hamlin reached the cottage, a small girl, who came in during the morning to do house-work, the scrubbing and cleaning so dear to Susan, told the Parson that Mrs. Yellam was upstairs. She believed that Mrs.

Alfred had pa.s.sed a nice night. The baby was doing "lovely."

Susan appeared within a minute. A glance at Hamlin's face was enough for her. In silence he took her hand and pressed it.

"You has news of Alferd, sir?"

Her voice was perfectly calm, calmer than his.

"I have a letter from his Commanding Officer. Sit down, and read it."

They were alone in the parlour. The antimaca.s.sars had been taken from the big Bible and replaced. But no fire burned in the grate. To Hamlin the room stood for all that he detested and a.s.sailed in English life and character. In its humble way, it positively exuded pretension. The carpet, a crudely-coloured body Brussels, the ornaments on the mantel-shelf, the enlarged photographs, the horse-hair and mahogany furniture, the prim bookcase, glazed and glaringly varnished, imprisoning, under lock and key, books that n.o.body read or could read, the mirror, the velveteen curtains with imitation lace under-curtains, all had been bought to impress neighbours! It was pathetic to reflect that Mrs. Yellam thought this hideous parlour a thing of beauty, whereas her kitchen, a joy to behold, was merely regarded as utilitarian. And yet the kitchen expressed sincerely all that was finest in Mrs. Yellam; the parlour set forth blatantly the defects of her strong personality.

She read the letter.

"May I keep it, sir?"

"Yes. Colonel Tring tells us, Mrs. Yellam, what we all know here. Alfred was a son to be proud of."

Her face remained impa.s.sive. She agreed respectfully that it would be unwise to tell Fancy the truth till some measure of strength returned to her. Hamlin had thought out a score of simple sentences. He said none of them. In all his long life he had never realised so acutely the illimitable s.p.a.ce which may divide two human beings. At this moment Parson and Parishioner stood far apart as the poles. He had intended to allude to his own son. But she might fling in his teeth the cutting reminder that he had others and a daughter. And in this cold, ugly room, looking upon her frozen face, sympathy congealed at its source. He withheld condolence, because it must hurt instead of help. In silence he commended her soul to G.o.d, and went away.

Mrs. Yellam unlocked her bra.s.s-cornered desk, and placed the letter amongst other papers. Then, idly, she looked out of the window, which faced the road and river. Before Hamlin came, she had stood at the window upstairs, staring out upon the same familiar landscape. And she had asked for a sign. She had looked at the heavy clouds even as Fancy had looked at her cards. If light shone through them, she might believe that for her spring and summer would bloom again.

The sign had not been vouchsafed.

Now, she stood at the window again, with features slightly relaxed. Such an expression informed her face as may be seen, sometimes, on the faces of steerage pa.s.sengers upon trans-Atlantic boats taking leave for ever of their native land.

She turned from the window and went, heavily, into the kitchen.

Had she waited a minute longer, she would have seen a sign. Through the falling rain shone a strange light, palely amber. It illuminated the dull water-meadows, evoking colour--iridescent, opaline tints--where colour had ceased to be. It trans.m.u.ted, magically, the sombre lead of the swollen river into sparkling gold. And then, swiftly, the light failed, the vision splendid vanished like a mirage, leaving behind a desert.

She went up stairs. Fancy said eagerly:

"What does Mr. Hamlin say, Mother?"

Mrs. Yellam hesitated, for one second only. She was unprepared for this question; she had forgotten the small maid who had scuttled into the room, saying that the Parson wanted to see Mrs. Yellam. With a tremendous effort she lied superbly, this woman who loathed lies because, in her masculine wisdom, she knew that lies made all ordinary matters worse instead of better.

She held up her finger.

"You be much too curious, my girl. Mr. Hamlin dropped in, very friendly-like, to ask me about the baby's christening. He be a oner for gettin' the lambs into the fold so quick as may be."

Fancy was quite satisfied.

"I told 'un," continued Mrs. Yellam placidly, embroidering her theme after a fashion which surely would have provoked envy and commendation from Uncle, "that you'd be up and about in no time. We pa.s.sed a few cheerful remarks about this be-utiful weather, and then off he goes."

"I'd like to wait for Alfred," murmured Fancy. "I've a notion that he'll come before the New Year. If he ain't a prisoner, he will come. I wonder if he knows how bad I want him."

"Ah-h-h!" She paused, and then added sharply: "If wanting 'd bring Alferd, he'd be here now. You eat more and think less, and then we'll all be happy."

With that Mrs. Yellam went abruptly out of the room.

CHAPTER XX

THE TRAVELLER RETURNS

Throughout the day, Mrs. Yellam hovered in and out of Fancy's room, instinctively conscious that her patient was less strong, but obstinately determined to fight that instinct. Outwardly, there was no change. Fancy lay quiet, thinking and talking of Alfred. Lizzie Alfreda, happily, evoked no maternal anxiety. Colic did not disturb the infantile slumbers. She smiled ineffably at a bottle which contained Frisian-Holstein milk drawn from prize-winners, and judiciously blended with lime-water. On this mild tipple the child thrived amazingly. The monthly nurse now retired to her own cottage at night, returning in the morning. Susan Yellam slept upon a small bed made up in Fancy's room.

The doctor had expressed gratification at the increasing vitality of his patient. And on the Wednesday, he said that he should not call again for three days, unless he were sent for. He congratulated Susan upon her devotion and skill with unmistakable sincerity.

In the afternoon, the morning's drizzle became a downpour, and the Avon escaped from its banks. If such rain continued, the Yellam cottage would soon become an island. Susan was not disturbed by this. Nothing mattered; nothing distracted her save the overpowering determination to put Fancy on her feet again. Fancy would a.s.sume control of her child.

And then an old woman would sit down, fold her hands, and await the end.

Her premature conviction that Fancy would die and that she would live had been modified on reflection. Susan held theories about life and work. Before the war she had contended that folks were called when their work was done. A few rotten apples might stick to the tree, but they proved the general rule. Fruit fell to the ground when ripe.

Satisfied in her mind that she would save Fancy by her own undivided efforts, Mrs. Yellam contemplated with grim satisfaction her approaching decease. She regarded herself as dead. She could survey with detachment what was left of the Susan who rose early, waited diligently upon Fancy, ate her meals (without any pleasure in them) and lay down to troubled sleep. So chilled was she in mind, soul and body, that she noticed without regret that Solomon, the faithful Solomon, too affectionate, too demonstrative to a hard old flint, had transferred his allegiance to Fancy. The dog lay at the foot of her bed night and day. Fancy talked to him about Alfred, not about Lizzie Alfreda, because Solomon was jealous.

When Lizzie Alfreda came in, Solomon went for a run in the garden, and heartened himself up by sniffing at various food-stuffs in a delightful state of decomposition. But, oddly enough, he never wandered farther afield. Within half an hour--Lizzie Alfreda's visits were drastically curtailed--he would patter up the wooden stairs, scratch at the door, whine, and be admitted. In a jiffy he was on the bed again, staring hard at Fancy, as if he were a doctor contemplating a change of treatment.

It had been agreed between Hamlin and Mrs. Yellam that Alfred's death should be kept a secret from the villagers till the official notification appeared in the newspapers. But when Uncle walked into the cottage at tea-time, full of cheer despite the weather, and cracking many small jokes about boats and swimmers, Mrs. Yellam simply could not bear it. She said with startling abruptness:

"Habakkuk, I'd break bad news to 'ee gently, if I could. But 'tisn't in me to do it. Alferd be dead."