Delia Blanchflower by Mrs. Humphry Ward (good beach reads TXT) 📕

account to me for this cheque, I must entirely refuse to take it!"

Delia put her hands behind her, like a scolded child.

"It is my very own," she protested, mildly. "I had some ugly jewels that my grandmother left me, and I have sold them--that's all."

Winnington's grey eyes held her.

"H'm--and--has Mr. Lathrop had anything to do with the sale?"

"Yes!" She looked up frankly, still smiling. "He has managed it for me."

"And it never occurred to you to apply to your guardian in such a matter? Or to your lawyer?"

She laughed--with what he admitted was a very natural scorn. "Ask my guardian to provide me with the means of helping the 'Daughters'--when he regards us all as criminals? On the contrary, I wanted to relieve your conscience, Mr. Winnington!"

"I can't say you have succeeded," he said, grimly, as he began to pace the drawing-room, with slow steps, his hands in his pockets.

"Why not? Now--everything you give me--can go to the right things--what you consider the right things. And what is my own--my very own--I can use as I please."

Yet neither tone nor gesture were defiant, as they would have been a few weeks before. Rather her look was wistful--appealing--as she stood there, a perplexing, but most charming figure, in her plain black dress, with its Quakerish collar of white lawn.

He turned on her impetuously.

"And Mr. Lathrop has arranged it all for you?"

"Yes. He said he knew a good deal about jewellers. I gave him some diamonds. He took them to London, and he has sold them."

"How do you know he has even treated you honestly!"

"I am certain he has done it honestly!" she cried indignantly. "There are the letters--from the jewellers--" And running to the bureau, she took thence a packet of letters and thrust them into Winnington's hands.

He looked them through in silence,--turning to her, as he put them down.

"I see. It is of course possible that this firm of jewellers have paid Mr. Lathrop a heavy commission behind the scenes, of which you know nothing. But I don't press that. Indeed I will assume exactly the contrary. I will suppose that Mr. Lathrop has acted without any profit to himself. If so, in my eyes it only makes the matter worse--for it establishes a claim on you. Miss Delia!--" his resolute gaze held her--"I do not take a farthing of this money unless you allow me to write to Mr. Lathrop, and offer him a reasonable commission for his services!"

"No--no! Impossible!"

She turned away from him, towards the window, biting her lip--in sharp distress.

"Then I return you this cheque"--he laid it down beside her. "And I shall replace the money,--the L500--which I ought never to have allowed you to spend as you have done, out of my own private pocket."

She stood silent, looking into the garden, her chest heaving. She thought of what Lady Tonbridge had told her of his modest means--and those generous hidden uses of them, of which even his most intimate friends only got an occasional glimpse. Suddenly she went up to him--

"Will you--will you promise me to write civilly?" she said, in a wavering voice.

"Certainly."

"You won't offend--insult him?"

"I will remember that you have allowed him to come into this drawing-room, and treated him as a guest," said Winnington coldly. "But why, Miss Delia, are you so careful about this man's feelings? And is it still impossible that you should meet my wishes--and refuse to see him again?"

She shook her head--mutely.

"You intend--to see him again?"

"You forget--that we have--business together."

Winnington paused a moment, then came nearer to the chair on which she had dropped.

"This last week--we have been very good friends--haven't we, Miss Delia?"

"Call me Delia, please!"

"Delia, then!--we have come to understand each other much better--haven't we?"

She made a drooping sign of assent.

"_Can't_ I persuade you--to be guided by me--as your father wished--during these next years of your life? I don't ask you to give up your convictions--your ideals. We should all be poor creatures without them! But I do ask you to give up these violent and illegal methods--this violent and illegal Society--with which you have become entangled. It will ruin your life, and poison your whole nature!--unless you can shake yourself free. Work for the Suffrage as much as you like--but work for it honourably--and lawfully. I ask you--I beg of you!--to give up these associates--and these methods."

The tenderness and gravity of his tone touched the girl's quivering senses almost unbearably. It was like the tenderness of a woman. She felt a wild impulse to throw herself into his arms, and weep. But instead she grew very white and still.

"I can't!"--was all she said, her eyes on the ground. Winnington turned away.

Suddenly--a sound of hasty steps in the hall outside--and the door was opened by a nurse, in uniform.

"Miss Blanchflower!--can you come?"

Delia sprang up. She and the nurse disappeared together.

* * * * *

Winnington guessed what had happened. Weston who was to face a frightful operation on the morrow as the only chance of saving her life, had on the whole gone through the fortnight of preparatory treatment with wonderful courage. But during the last forty-eight hours, there had been attacks of crying and excitement, connected with the making of her will, which she had insisted on doing, being herself convinced that she would die under the knife. Medically, all such agitation was disastrous. But the only person who could calm her at these moments was Delia, whom she loved. And the girl had shewn in dealing with her a marvellous patience and strength.

Presently Madeleine Tonbridge came downstairs--with red eyes. She described the scene of which she had just been a witness in Weston's room. Delia, she said, choking again at the thought of it, had been "wonderful." Then she looked enquiringly at Winnington--

"You met that man going away?"

He sat down beside her, unable to disguise his trouble of mind, or to resist the temptation of her sympathy and their old friendship.

"I am certain there is some plot afoot--some desperate business--and they are trying to draw her into it! What can we do?"

Lady Tonbridge shook her head despondently. What indeed could they do, with a young lady of full age,--bent on her own way?

Then she noticed the cheque lying open on the table, and asked what it meant.

"Miss Delia wishes to repay me some money I lent her," said Winnington, after a pause. "As matters stand at present, I prefer to wait. Would you kindly take charge of the cheque for her? No need to worry her about it again, to-night."

* * * * *

Delia came down at tea-time, pale and quiet, like one from whom virtue has gone out. By tacit consent Winnington and Lady Tonbridge devoted themselves to her. It seemed as though in both minds there had arisen the same thought of her as orphaned and motherless, the same pity, the same resentment that anything so lovely should be unhappy--as she clearly was; and not only, so both were convinced, on account of her poor maid.

Winnington stayed on into the lamplight, and presently began to read aloud. The scene became intimate and domestic. Delia very silent, sat in a deep arm chair, some pretence at needlework on her knee, but in reality doing nothing but look into the fire, and listen to Winnington's voice. She had changed while upstairs into a white dress, and the brilliance of her hair, and wide, absent eyes above the delicate folds of white, seemed to burn in Winnington's consciousness as he read. Presently however, Lady Tonbridge looking up, was startled to see that the girl had imperceptibly fallen asleep. The childish sadness and sweetness of the face in its utter repose seemed to present another Delia, with another history. Madeleine hoped that Winnington had not observed the girl's sleep; and he certainly gave no sign of it. He went on reading; and presently his companion, noticing the clock, rose very quietly, and went out to give a letter to the parlour-maid for post.

As she entered the room again, however, she saw that Winnington had laid down his book. His eyes were now on Delia--his lips parted. All the weather-beaten countenance of the man, its deep lines graven by strenuous living, glowed as from an inward light--marvellously intense and pure. Madeleine's pulse leapt. She had her answer to her speculations of the afternoon.

Meanwhile through Delia's sleeping mind there swept scenes and images of fear. She grew restless, and as Lady Tonbridge slipped again into her chair by the fire, the girl woke suddenly with a long quivering sigh, a sound of pain, which provoked a quick movement of alarm in Winnington.

But she very soon recovered her usual manner; and Winnington said good-night. He went away carrying his anxieties with him through the dark, carrying also a tumult of soul that would not be stilled. Whither was he drifting? Of late he had felt sure of himself again. Her best friend and guide--it was that he was rapidly becoming--with that, day by day, he bade himself be content. And now, once more, self-control was uprooted and tottering. It was the touch of this new softness, this note of innocent appeal, even of bewildered distress, in her, which was kindling all his manhood, and breaking down his determination.

He raged at the thought of Lathrop. As to any danger of a love-affair, like Lady Tonbridge, he scouted the notion. It would be an insult to Delia to suppose such a thing. But it was simply intolerable in his eyes that she should have any dealings with the fellow--that he should have the audacity to call at her house, to put her under an obligation.

And he was persuaded there was more than appeared in it; more than Delia's devices for getting money, wherewith to feed the League of Revolt. She was clearly anxious, afraid. Some shadow was brooding over her, some terror that she could not disclose:--of that Winnington was certain. And this man, whom she had already accepted as her colleague in a public campaign, was evidently in the secret; might be even the cause of her fears.

He began hotly to con the terms of his letter to Lathrop; and then had to pull himself up, remembering unwillingly what he had promised Delia.


Chapter XV

"Do you know anything more?"

The voice was Delia's; and the man who had just met her in the shelter of the wooded walk which ran along the crest of the hill above the Maumsey valley, was instantly aware of the agitation of the speaker.

"Nothing--precise. As I told you last week--you needn't be afraid of anything immediate. But my London informants assure me that elaborate preparations are certainly going on for some great _coup_ as soon as Parliament meets--against Sir Wilfrid. The police are uneasy, though puzzled. They have warned Daunt, and Sir Wilfrid is guarded."

"Then of course our people won't attempt it! It would be far too dangerous."

"Don't