Monica, Volume 2 (of 3)

The floor was of polished parquetrie work; the panelled walls, quaintly and curiously carved, shone with the care that had been bestowed upon them; the vaulted roof had been carefully restored and was a fine specimen of mediæval skill and beauty. The mullioned window to the west had been filled with rich stained glass, that gave back a dusky glimmer through its tinted panes, though the daylight was failing fast. Near to the window stood the one great feature of the room, an organ, which Monica’s eyes saw at once was a particularly fine and perfect instrument. An organ of her very own! It was just like Randolph to think of it! She gave him one sweet glance of gratitude, and went up to it in the dim, dusky twilight.

“How good you are to me!” she said softly.

He heard the little quiver in her voice, and bent his head to kiss her; but he spoke in a lighter tone.

“Do you like it? I am so glad! I thought your home ought not to be without its music-room. See, Monica, your organ will be a sort of friend to whom you can confide all your secrets; for you want nobody to blow it for you. You can set the bellows at work by just turning this handle, and nobody need disturb your solitude when you want to be alone.”

She looked up gratefully. He never forgot anything – not even her old love for solitude.

“I never want to be alone now, Randolph,” she said. “I always want you.”

“And you generally have me, sweet wife. I think we have hardly been separated for more than a few hours at a time since that happy, happy day that made you really mine.”

“I want it always to be like that,” said Monica, dreamily; “always like that.”

He looked at her, and carried the hand that he held to his lips.

“Will you play, Monica?”

She sat down and struck a few dreamy chords, gradually leading up to the theme that was in her mind. Randolph leaned against the mullioned window-frame and watched her. He could see, even in the darkness, the pure, pale outline of her perfect profile, and the crown of her golden hair that framed her face like an aureole.

“Another dream realised, Monica,” he said softly, as she turned to him at length.

“What dream, Randolph?”

“A dream that came to me once, in the little cliff church where we were married, as I watched you – little as you knew it – sitting at the organ, and playing to yourself, one sunny afternoon. But this is better than any dream of pictured saint or spirit – my Monica, my own true wife.”

She looked up at him, and came and put her arms about his neck – an unusual demonstration, even now, for her, and they stood very close together in the gathering darkness that was not dark to them.

Monica paid an early visit to St. Maws to see her friends, and to confide to Mrs. Pendrill a little of the wonderful happiness that had flooded her life with sunshine. Then, too, she wanted to see Tom, and to ask him the result of the mission he had half promised to undertake. So far she had learned nothing save that Fitzgerald had not been seen near Trevlyn for many weeks, and was supposed to have gone abroad.

“Did you see him, Tom?” she asked, when she had found the opportunity she desired.

“Yes, once or twice. I had a good look at him. I should not call him exactly mad, though in a decidedly peculiar mental state. We merely met, as it were, by chance, and talked on indifferent subjects for the most part. Once he asked me, in a sort of veiled way, for professional advice, describing certain unpleasant symptoms and sensations. I advised him to give up the use of spirits, and to try what travelling would do for him. He seemed to think he would take my advice, and shortly afterwards he disappeared from the neighbourhood; but where he has gone I do not know.”

Monica knew that this advice had been followed. “He may go anywhere he likes, if he will only keep away from here,” she said. “I am very much obliged to you, Tom, for doing as I asked.”

“Pray don’t mention it.”

“I must mention it, because it was very good of you. Tom, will you come and stay at Trevlyn next week? We have one or two people coming for the pheasants, and we want you to make one of the party, if you will.”

“Oh, very well; anything to please. I have had no shooting worth speaking of so far. I should like a week’s holiday very well.”

So that matter was speedily and easily arranged.

Tom did not ask who were the guests he was to meet, and Monica did not think of naming such entire strangers, Lord Haddon and Lady Beatrice Wentworth. She forgot that Tom and the young earl had met once before on a different occasion.

Those two were to be the first guests. Perhaps later on they would ask more, but Monica was too entirely happy in her present life to wish it in any way disturbed, and Randolph by no means cared to be obliged to give up to guests those happy hours that heretofore he had always spent with Monica. But Beatrice and her brother had already been invited. They were his oldest friends, and were Monica’s friends too. She was glad to welcome them to her old home, and the rapturous admiration that its beauties elicited would have satisfied a more exacting nature than hers.

Beatrice was, as usual, radiant, bewitching, delightful. Monica wished that Tom had come in time to see her arrival, and listen to her sparkling flow of talk. Tom professed to be a woman-hater, or next door to it, but she thought that even he would have to make an exception in favour of Lady Beatrice Wentworth.

She went upstairs with her guest to her room at length, when Beatrice suddenly turned towards her, with quite a new expression upon her face.

“Monica,” she said, looking straight into her eyes, “you are changed – you are different from what you were in London – different even from what you were in Scotland, though I saw a change then. I don’t know how to express it, but you are beautified – glorified. What is it? What has changed you since I first knew you?”

Monica knew right well; but some feelings could not be translated into words.

“I am very happy,” she said, quietly. “If there is any change, that must be the cause.”

“Happier than you have ever been before?”

“Yes; I think every week makes me happier. I learn to know my husband better and better, you see.”

A sudden wistful sadness flashed into the eyes so steadily regarding her. Monica saw it before it had been blotted out by the arch drollery of the look that immediately succeeded.

“And it does not wear off, Monica? Sometimes it does, you know – after a time. Will it ever, in your case, do you think?”

“I think not,” she answered.

“And I think not, too,” answered Beatrice. “Ah me! How happy some people are!”

She laughed, but there was something of bitterness in the tone. Monica looked at her seriously.

“Are you not happy, Beatrice?”

The girl’s audacious smile beamed out over her face.

“Don’t I look so?”

“Sometimes – not always.”

“One must have variety before all things, you know,” was the gay answer. “It would never do to be always in the same style – it lacks piquancy after a time. Now let me have time to beautify myself in harmony with this most charming of old places, and come back for me when you are dressed; I feel as if I should lose my way, or see bogies in these delightful corridors and staircases.”

And Monica left her guest as desired, coming back, half an hour later, to find her transformed into the semblance of some pictured dame of a century or two gone by, in stiff amber brocade, quaintly cut about the neck and sleeves, and relieved here and there by dazzling scarlet blossoms. Beatrice never at any time looked like anybody else, but to-night she was particularly, strikingly original.

“Ah, you black-robed queen, you will just do as a foil for me!” was the greeting Monica received. “Whenever I see you in any garb, no matter what it is, I always think it is just one that suits you best of everything. Are you having a dinner-party to-night?”

“Not exactly. A few men are coming, who have asked Randolph to shoot since we came back. You and I are the only ladies.”

And then they went down to the empty drawing-room a good half-hour before any one else was likely to appear.

Beatrice chatted away very brightly. She seemed in gay spirits, and had a great deal to tell of what had passed since their farewell in Scotland a month or two ago.

She moved about the drawing-room, examining the various treasures it contained, and admiring the beauty of the pictures. She was standing half concealed by the curtains draping a recessed window, when the door opened, admitting Tom Pendrill. He was in dinner dress, having arrived about an hour previously.

“You have come then, Tom,” said Monica. “I am glad. I was afraid you meant to desert us after all.”

“The wish being father to the thought, I presume,” answered Tom, shaking hands. “By-the-bye, here is a letter from Arthur’s doctor I’ve brought to show you. He gives a capital account of his patient. Can you read German writing, or shall I construe? He writes about as crabbedly as – ”