Kitabı oku: «The Career of Katherine Bush», sayfa 23

CHAPTER XXXIII

It was more than a month since, in the late July of 1914, the joy bells had rung out on all the Duke's estates for the birth of the heir, the infant Marquis of Valfreyne. And it was just a year since Katherine had become his Duchess!

And what a year in a woman's life!

Days and weeks and months of happiness, of ever-increasing understanding and companionship, with one whose every action and thought inspired respect and love.

The bond between the two had grown always more deep, more sacred, as the days went on, and as Katherine said one morning fondly:

"Mordryn, we are just like Rochester and Jane Eyre, not modern people, because we never want to be away from one another for a minute – only, thank God, you are not blind."

Theirs was a real marriage, and Lady Garribardine was fully content. She took personal pride in the manner in which her protégé fulfilled the rôle of Duchess, and she rejoiced to see her old love in the midst of such bliss.

For their union was divine and complete, and the coming of the baby Valfreyne had been the crowning joy.

It was a continual source of delight to the Duke to watch Katherine, and to know how absolutely his belief in her had been justified. To watch and to note with what supreme dignity she carried out the duties of his great state. And as each occasion came when some special effort was required, after it was over she would rush into his arms, and caress him, and ask to be petted, and told that he was satisfied, and that his beggar Duchess had pleased him and done all that he would wish!

The year of perfect happiness and gratified ambition had moulded Katherine into a new and noble being, in whom graciousness and sweetness and gentleness enhanced all her old charms.

She continued to make Lady Garribardine her model for everything.

The world had experienced a nine days' wonder when the engagement was announced; but, as Her Ladyship said, there was no use in having kept her iron heel upon the neck of society for all these years, if she could not now impose upon it unquestioned what she wished. So Katherine had had a triumphant entry, and very little antagonism to surmount. She paid visits to all the Duke's relatives under Lady Garribardine's wing, and her own tact and serene dignity had conquered them all, and turned them into friends.

"She is of no particular birth," Her Ladyship was wont to say, "but I know who she is, so you need none of you trouble yourselves about it. I will be answerable for her fitness for the post."

Thus the most romantic and fantastic rumours got about, and Lady Garribardine wrote amusedly to Gerard in Russia, after the wedding in September, giving a description of events:

I issued stern commands to Bronson, G., that there should be no talk below stairs, no gratifying of anybody's curiosity, and I think I can count upon their devotion to me, and their great liking for the girl herself, to feel that they will coöperate. Her family were the entertaining thing. The sisters from America wrote sensible letters, realising that the great divide had come, and fortunately the Bindon's Green remainder had themselves cut her off from their intimacy, because she was what they called a "paid servant," "living in," apparently a degraded status in that incredible class! Mordryn received a letter from her sister-in-law a few days after the news was in the papers, a most remarkable bit of feminine spite, which caused us all glee: informing him that as he had no doubt been sadly deceived by Katherine Bush, she felt it her duty to enlighten him as to who she really was! Great stress was laid upon the butcher grandfather, and regrets that she herself had contracted an alliance so far beneath her station, but having experienced the unpleasantness of it, she felt it was only right to warn the Duke!

I myself wrote the reply as though I had been his secretary, announcing that His Grace was in possession of all these facts and more from Miss Bush herself, and with due appreciation for the motive which had caused the letter to be written, the Duke thanked her for it and would not require to hear from her again!

So all that part is disposed of fortunately, and Katherine can go ahead.

Mordryn is frantically in love and so is she. Mordryn is like a boy and looks ten years younger. He showers gifts upon her, and on the day of the wedding, when he walked down the aisle with his beautiful new Duchess on his arm, I never have seen a man so proud. And when one comes to think of it, G., he has every right to be, for I must say the creature carries out the whole thing with a perfection which justifies my greatest expectations of her, and I think they stand a very fair chance of happiness, because the girl has a logical brain. She is not one of those fools who only like the excitement of a thing's being out of reach; she has the supreme wisdom of a sense of intrinsic values. She realises that she has secured a great position which will give ample scope for her vastest schemes – all high and fine ones, G.; we shall hear of her in the future, boy, not only as a beautiful Duchess, but as a great Englishwoman. And when one reflects that she has accomplished all this, won her game, so to speak, through sheer force of character, sheer knowledge of cause and effect, sheer calculation of action and no low scheming, one cannot but deeply respect her. Force will always win, but it will bring its own retribution if it has been used ill. Katherine has had the great cleverness to use it always well. Weak virtue may draw some kind of namby-pamby heavenly halo, but perfect honesty and strong common sense secure power and a substantial reward on earth! It will be very interesting to watch her career as it goes on. She is grateful for her happiness and knows that it is only weaklings who, once having secured this joy, then let it be taken from them by their own foolishness and discontent. Her whole mind is disciplined and ruled by an astonishingly sound judgment. Impulse is her servant, not her master; every view is broad. She sees all things as they really are without the illusion which nearly every woman invests them with. And, above all, she understands Mordryn, G. – and with all her balance and level-headedness, she is as passionate and vital and living as a woman can be, and that is the one kind of being who keeps a man with his temperament forever content. After his life of restraint and abstinence and solitary grief, to have such a creature for a companion must be no mean delight. So altogether, G., my dear boy, I am satisfied. As for his age, he does not look a day more than forty; they probably will have a glorious fifteen years, and you cannot have everything in life. He suits her far better than some younger man, they are made for one another. Mordryn has perfect health and strength, and no human being could be more attractive. You have not a notion of his ways as a lover, G.! He would be a lesson to any of these uncouth, cold-blooded, barley-water drinking modern young men!

Our Duchess is a fortunate creature, I assure you, in more ways than one! So we need not trouble about that or make unto ourselves a picture of a young woman and an elderly man! They are like a pair of love birds – and they will probably have that sturdy heir at once that I have always longed for, and then I can rest in peace.

And when Gerard read this at Moscow, where he happened to be, he was glad, and yet sad.

The wedded lovers wandered for several months in France and Italy, returning to England only in the new year, and all this interesting foreign travel expanded still further Katherine's mental gifts. Then after some triumphant weeks in London, there were long months of joy at Valfreyne, awaiting the coming of the son and heir.

And now in the early days of September, 1914, they were all again assembled there with Lady Garribardine for the christening – a great and important event!

But war and strain and sorrow lay with that black shadow over England, fallen with a suddenness which no one could realise as yet. Rumours of reverses had come – miscalculation of somebody's plans. And anxiety was tense.

Katherine was resting on the sofa in her boudoir, which looked out south over the exquisite gardens in the state suite at Valfreyne – the suite of her who should be reigning Duchess, in which she had wandered with the Duke on that Monday in Whitsuntide, when they had said their futile farewell! And now it was her own! And in an hour, they would go into the chapel and the splendid chubby baby heir would receive his many names.

Katherine felt very well and in herself supremely happy, in spite of the clouds over England. How good providence had been to her! How grateful her spirit felt!

She lay there in a peaceful dream, her half closed eyes taking in the wonderful beauty of the room, with its late seventeenth century magnificence and yet subtle touches of home.

Then the door opened, and the Duke came in with letters for her from the second post, and the opened Times he had been reading in his hand – He put them down upon a table near, and took a low chair close to his lady's side, and she moved a little from the sofa so that she lay half in his arms.

"My worshipped one!" he murmured fondly, kissing her hair, and smoothing it with infinite tenderness.

"Oh! Mordryn, I am so happy – are not you? What a sublime day for us, dear Love! Just to think that we have that darling little son, the very essence of us both! Tell me that he and I mean everything to you. Tell me that I have given you all you want?"

He reassured her with passionate insistence, as though he could not say enough, and then he asked her again and again if she loved him. It was as if he must have confirmation of her passion for him, and her consent.

And Katherine played with him fondly as was her wont, being altogether fascinating and full of foolish, tender love tricks, which never failed to intoxicate his senses.

But soon he held her closely to him, some shadow in his eyes – and with his free arm he reached over to the table and picked up the Times.

Then he spoke, and his wonderful voice sounded a little strained:

"My darling, there is some news in the paper this morning, which may cause you some concern – so I have brought it to you here while we are alone. It is about the retreat from Mons."

Katherine raised herself and looked at him enquiringly, and he found the column and began to read the glorious story, and of one supremely splendid stand made by a certain Guards regiment, which is now world-famed.

Then he paused and hesitated for a moment. For the name of the bravest who would gain the V. C. was Lord Algernon Fitz-Rufus who, single-handed, had performed an act of daring courage, resourcefulness and self-sacrifice, which had saved his men, but who had paid with his life for his last supreme effort, being shot through the heart as he had returned to a wounded comrade, Lieutenant Jack Kilcourcy, to bring him in to safety from that bloody corpse-strewn wood.

"What is it, Mordryn? – Please go on."

So the Duke read to the end, and then put the paper down.

And suddenly Katherine's heart seemed to stand still, and a mist darkened the room, and when it lifted she saw only the young débonnaire face of her once dear lover gazing at her again, her gay blue eyes alight with laughter and love. And with a stifled cry, she buried her head on the Duke's shoulder and burst into tears.

Thus Algy had fulfilled her hopes for him and become a fine soldier, and had died gallantly to save a comrade – A hero indeed!