Then Robin said to Anne that they ought to be getting back, as his father liked his dinner rather early, so good-byes were said.
“It is really good-bye to everything nice for ever,” said Mrs. Morland in her deepest tragedy voice, “from to-day onwards.”
“Don’t be a fool, Laura,” said Lord Stoke, who had happened to hear her. “World’s got to go on somehow.”
“But it is all going to be horrid for ever,” said Mrs. Morland. “We shall have a horrid winter and probably the Government will send all our coal and all our food to the Russians or the Mixo-Lydians, and there will be millions of conferences with millions of foreigners eating what’s left and commandeering all the hotels. And no clothes, and everyone being rude. And we shall be so tired,” said Mrs. Morland sadly, “that we shan’t even try to protest. And Tony will probably be killed in India because of Fakeers and Yogis and Gandhis and things rioting and the army being sent for and not allowed to fire on them till they have all been murdered.”
“Yes, it is all dreadful,” said Lady Graham sympathetically. “But you will write another book, Mrs. Morland, won’t you, and we shall all read it aloud, shan’t we, Clarissa darling, with Gran and Merry.”
“Come along, Laura,” said Lord Stoke, who had been looking out of the window. “The cob doesn’t like standing.”
“Oh, Lord Stoke,” said Clarissa, bringing forward the green vase with the bulrushes, “this is yours.”
“It’s not mine,” said Lord Stoke indignantly. “Never set eyes on it in my life.”
“But you bought a ticket for it, at least you gave Betty Hubback some money to buy tickets,” said Clarissa. “It’s the only raffle you won, but Betty bought some jam and things for you and they are in the dog-cart.”
“Excuse me, sir,” said Leslie major, noting Lord Stoke’s marked dislike for the vase, “but if you don’t need it, could I have it? The Matron in our house has a birthday next term and it is just in her line.”
“Who are you, eh?” said Lord Stoke. “Leslie’s boy? Here you are and don’t let me see it again.”
“Beast,” said Leslie minor, though without heat. “I wanted it for Matron myself,” and he attacked his brother in a friendly way on the doorstep. The vase fell and was shattered beyond mending.
Lord Stoke climbed up into the dog-cart where Mrs. Morland was already seated, the elderly groom got up behind and they went away. Then Anne embraced everyone with fervour and promised to telephone to Sylvia and Emmy and Clarissa about wedding preparations nearly every day; and then she and Robin got into his cheap little car and drove towards Hallbury.
The weather which had at first been grey and cold had gradually cleared. The breeze had dropped, everything was warm and comfortable again. Not that one could trust it, but one could enjoy the present moment. Robin and Anne had a great deal to talk about as they drove and not till they had by-passed Barchester did Anne remember something she had forgotten.
“Oh, Robin,” she said. “I have remembered something perfectly dreadful.”
Robin, who was not seriously alarmed, asked what it was.
“You remember at Rushwater we were talking about secrets,” said Anne, “and you said you had a special secret secret to tell me and somehow you never did. Is it still very secret?”
Robin said not very secret now, because it was all settled. The Housemaster of the Junior House was resigning next year because an uncle wanted him to go into a very good family business and Mr. Birkett had formally offered him the post with the approval of the Governors.
“And will you take it?” said Anne. “Oh, Robin!”
Robin said he had accepted it. The house itself was a nice one, not too large; the matron was well disposed and as the Leslies were there he hoped they would give him a good character.
“And what with my salary and my own money that my mother left me and what I can squeeze out of the boarders by watering the milk,” he said, “I shall be quite well off. I shall go there in September next year, or possibly in the summer term. It all depends on how long Kitson’s uncle will wait. But no violent hurry.”
Anne expressed the greatest delight at this news and they imagined some very good ways of stinting the boys’ food and fuel and washing, so that Robin could get very rich.
“And you’ll need a wife, won’t you?” she asked.
She had said this once before when the possibility of a housemastership was raised, but lightheartedly. Now, suddenly, she felt uneasy; as if she had made a social blunder. Perhaps one ought not to ask people, not even Robin, about getting married. Robin spoke of something else. The afternoon did not seem quite so warm, so bright, to either of them.
“It’s very exciting to be two bridesmaids,” said Anne, feeling that she had better talk. “I mean Sylvia’s and Rose’s. David is going to give Clarissa and me and the other bridesmaids real paste ear-rings. I do think David and Rose getting married is one of the most exciting things that ever happened. I almost knew in a kind of way that it was going to happen, because of something Rose said to me, and I jumped with joy inside, because David had been rather horrid to me and Clarissa—not really horrid of course, but a little schoolboyish,” said Anne from her lofty nineteen years. “But the minute he was engaged to Rose everything was perfect and I am terrifically glad. Martin and Sylvia isn’t quite so exciting, but it’s the nicest thing that could possibly happen and Sylvia is going to ask me to stay at Rushwater when she is married.”
Part of Robin answered Anne suitably. Part of him noted with amusement the word terrifically, Rose’s catchword of the moment. Another part wondered why it suddenly felt so cheerful and was informed by yet another part that it had made a complete fool of itself by ever thinking that Anne had any kind of feeling for Martin or for David. Then the four different parts of Robin became one and he urged his cheap little car joyfully over the level crossing and up the steep Hallbury High Street.
“Let’s go to the Rectory first,” said Anne, “and see Dr. Dale. I expect he would love to hear about the weddings.”
So they left Anne’s suitcase at her parents’ house and drove up Little Gidding, that narrow crooked lane whose name was of immemorial antiquity, to the Rectory stable yard where Robin put the car away.
The warmth of a four o’clock August sun, though by Pretence Time it was six, was so delightful that they sat down on the stone mounting-block to bask before going up to the Rectory, talking of the sale and this and that, and Anne told Robin how much her Regard ring had been admired.
“Do you remember,” said Robin, “when my father gave you that ring on your birthday and you had it on your engagement finger?”
“He said I could be engaged to him till I was really engaged,” said Anne, looking pensively into the past.
“And you said you didn’t think you were old enough to be really engaged then,” said Robin, “so you put it on the other hand.”
“And mummy said only wear it for evenings or occasions,” said Anne, “and I thought Lady Graham’s sale was an occasion, because I’d never stayed at Holdings before, so I put it on. I love it.”
She held out her right hand upon which Ruby, Emerald, Garnet, Amethyst, Ruby, Diamond sparkled in the sun.
“May I look at it,” said Robin and without waiting for an answer took it gently off her finger.
“Do you think I am old enough for being engaged now?” said Anne.
“I think so,” said Robin. “But it all depends on whom to, and it depends on you a good deal.”
Anne looked at him with interest.
“You see,” said Robin, “I think I know a good job for you, only it would mean being engaged.”
Anne’s gaze was fixed on him and questioning.
“If I take on the Junior House next year,” said Robin, as warily as if he were approaching a small bright-eyed bird with crumbs or a worm, “a wife would be extraordinarily useful.”
“She could help you with the House,” said Anne, looking away at the gooseberry bushe
s.
“I suppose she could,” said Robin. “But I was really thinking how very nice it would be to have someone to talk to after school, and when the boys have gone to bed. I have thought about that a good deal.”
“You mean you might be lonely,” said Anne, her gaze still averted, but not unkindly.
“I might,” said Robin. “My papa is never lonely as far as I can make out. I suppose he is so used to being lonely since my mother died that he really doesn’t notice it. One might get quite used to it in time.”
Anne turned her head towards Robin and looked down upon her ringless hands, lightly clasped upon her lap.
“Do you mean that I could be the one?” she asked, looking up at him under her lashes in the way David had admired and which made Robin nearly die with love.
“I do,” said Robin. “If you could consider yourself engaged to me, I would feel perfectly safe about loneliness.”
“So would I,” said Anne after a pause.
And then she rubbed her face gently against Robin’s coat sleeve and said nothing.
“I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you,” said Robin, with all his heart, but quietly, so that the bird should not take wing and disappear.
“Then I had better have my ring upon the proper hand, please,” said Anne, holding out her left hand.
“You have the loveliest hands,” said Robin, slipping the Regard ring onto her third finger.
“David said they were even nicer than Clarissa’s,” said Anne, talking to gain time.
“An hour ago I’d have said Blast David,” said Robin, “but now I simply don’t care. Anne, my darling.”
As Anne did not appear to resent this remark, he kissed her hair with great devotion.
“‘O love, O fire! once he drew
With one long kiss my whole soul through
My lips, as sunlight drinketh dew,’”
said Miss Anne Fielding, ever mindful of her favourite poet, Lord Tennyson.
“Well, he didn’t,” said Robin indignantly. “He simply kissed the top of your head. Listen, my own precious, divine angel. The church clock has struck half past six and we must be moving. Come and see my papa and tell him you are engaged to me, and then we will go and tell your people.”
“I hope your father won’t mind,” said Anne.
“If it comes to that, I hope yours won’t either,” said Robin, “nor your mother. But I think everything will be all right, and they can’t un-engage us.”
“If they do, I’ll wait till I’m twenty-one and then I’ll run away with you,” said Anne.
Robin said he was delighted to find that he had chosen such a practical wife, and they walked up the garden to the Rectory.
Just outside the french window of his study the Rector was sitting in an armchair, a book on his knees, the sun shining beneficently upon him. Kind Sister Chiffinch from the Cottage Hospital came forward to greet them.
“I’ve been paying one of my little friendly visits to the Rector,” she said to Robin, “and he had a fancy to sit in the sun. He was asleep till just now. And if it isn’t Miss Fielding, as I suppose I must call her now she is a grown-up young lady.”
Robin, falling into her manner of speech, replied that she might have to call Anne Mrs. Robin Dale some day, upon which Sister Chiffinch, cautiously going yet a little further from Dr. Dale lest she should disturb him, expressed her extreme delight and said she had always foreseen the engagement.
“Well, I didn’t,” said Robin with great candour. “Did you Anne? It suddenly came upon me like a flash.”
“It was partly a flash, and partly not being surprised in the least,” said Anne, considering the matter carefully.
“Excuse me, Sister,” said Robin, “but I simply must kiss Miss Fielding at once,” which he did, though in so gentle a way that Anne found it very agreeable.
“And how is my papa, Sister?” he asked.
Sister Chiffinch said he seemed quite cheerful, but very much weaker than when she had last visited him. Robin’s face grew troubled.
“If papa has to resign, it will kill him,” he said.
“Mr. Dale,” said Sister Chiffinch earnestly, drawing him a little apart. “I don’t think Dr. Dale will need to resign.”
Robin looked at her and wondered if he understood.
“The machinery is running down very quickly,” said Sister Chiffinch. “He is with your mother most of the time, Mr. Dale, back in their early married days. But he will be pleased to see you and to hear about his new daughter-in-law-to-be. My friend Sister Heath who is on holiday here is coming to spend the night at the Rectory and she will ring up Dr. Ford if it is necessary. But I don’t think it will be.”
Robin still could not quite understand whether her words were of good or ill omen. Everything seemed suddenly to be strange; except Anne.
“Come and talk to papa,” he said, taking her hand. “Papa, here is Anne Fielding.”
Dr. Dale, who was looking at something very far away, roused himself to courteous attention.
“Anne Fielding,” he repeated. “Yes, I think I know her. How are you, my dear?”
Anne said quite well thank you, and looked to Robin for help.
“Papa dear, Anne and I are engaged,” said Robin.
“‘From this day will I bless you,’” said the Rector, using the words of his favourite prophet Haggai, whose words were lying open upon his knees.
“Oh, thank you,” said Anne. “And I am engaged with your ring, Dr. Dale.”
She held out her left hand with the Regard ring upon its third finger.
“Yes, I know your ring,” said the Rector, speaking as if to himself.
“He is very tired,” said kind Sister Chiffinch in a low voice. “Take Miss Fielding home, Mr. Dale, and then come back. I shan’t go till Sister Heath comes.”
“Good-bye. I will come and see you again soon,” said Anne.
The Rector looked at her and through her at something very far away.
“The lovely creature,” he said, in a voice that was hardly more than a breath.
“It is your mother he means,” said Sister Chiffinch to Robin, always speaking low. “He has thought she was near him all day.”
Anne kissed the Rector’s forehead and went away with Robin. Sister Chiffinch returned to Dr. Dale who had very quietly left a world in which he was too tired to remain. She looked after Robin and Anne with compassion. But they were young and would not be unhappy for long.
Peace Breaks Out Page 32
