Chapter XLVI. Listening

The Shuttle

by Francis Hodgson Burnett

On her way back to the Court her eyes saw only the white road
before her feet as she walked. She did not lift them until she found
herself passing the lych-gate at the entrance to the churchyard.
Then suddenly she looked up at the square grey stone tower where the
bells hung, and from which they called the village to church, or
chimed for weddings--or gave slowly forth to the silent air one
heavy, regular stroke after another. She looked and shuddered, and
spoke aloud with a curious, passionate imploring, like a child's.

"Oh, don't toll! Don't toll! You must not! You cannot!"
Terror had sprung upon her, and her heart was being torn in two in
her breast. That was surely what it seemed like--this agonising ache
of fear. Now from hour to hour she would be waiting and listening to
each sound borne on the air. Her thought would be a possession she
could not escape. When she spoke or was spoken to, she would be
listening-- when she was silent every echo would hold terror, when
she slept--if sleep should come to her--her hearing would be awake,
and she would be listening--listening even then. It was not Betty
Vanderpoel who was walking along the white road, but another
creature--a girl whose brain was full of abnormal thought, and whose
whole being made passionate outcry against the thing which was being
slowly forced upon her. If the bell tolled--suddenly, the whole
world would be swept clean of life--empty and clean. If the bell
tolled.

Before the entrance of the Court she saw, as she approached it,
the vicarage pony carriage, standing as it had stood on the day she
had returned from her walk on the marshes. She felt it quite natural
that it should be there. Mrs. Brent always seized upon any fragment
of news, and having seized on something now, she had not been able to
resist the excitement of bringing it to Lady Anstruthers and her
sister.

She was in the drawing-room with Rosalie, and was full of her
subject and the emotion suitable to the occasion. She had even
attained a certain modified dampness of handkerchief. Rosalie's
handkerchief, however, was not damp. She had not even attempted to
use it, but sat still, her eyes brimming with tears, which, when she
saw Betty, brimmed over and slipped helplessly down her cheeks.

"Betty!" she exclaimed, and got up and went towards her, "I
believe you have heard."

"In the village, I heard something--yes," Betty answered, and
after giving greeting to Mrs. Brent, she led her sister back to her
chair, and sat near her.

This--the thought leaped upon her--was the kind of situation she
must be prepared to be equal to. In the presence of these who knew
nothing, she must bear herself as if there was nothing to be known.
No one but herself had the slightest knowledge of what the past
months had brought to her--no one in the world. If the bell tolled,
no one in the world but her father ever would know. She had no
excuse for emotion. None had been given to her. The kind of thing
it was proper that she should say and do now, in the presence of Mrs.
Brent, it would be proper and decent that she should say and do in
all other cases. She must comport herself as Betty Vanderpoel would
if she were moved only by ordinary human sympathy and regret.

"We must remember that we have only excited rumour to depend
upon," she said. "Lord Mount Dunstan has kept his village under
almost military law. He has put it into quarantine. No one is
allowed to leave it, so there can be no direct source of information.
One cannot be sure of the entire truth of what one hears. Often it
is exaggerated cottage talk. The whole neighbourhood is wrought up
to a fever heat of excited sympathy. And villagers like the drama of
things."

Mrs. Brent looked at her admiringly, it being her fixed habit to
admire Miss Vanderpoel, and all such as Providence had set above
her.

"Oh, how wise you are, Miss Vanderpoel!" she exclaimed, even
devoutly. "It is so nice of you to be calm and logical when
everybody else is so upset. You are quite right about villagers
enjoying the dramatic side of troubles. They always do. And perhaps
things are not so bad as they say. I ought not to have let myself
believe the worst. But I quite broke down under the ringers--I was
so touched."

"The ringers?" faltered Lady Anstruthers

"The leader came to the vicar to tell him they wanted permission
to toll--if they heard tolling at Dunstan. Weaver's family lives
within hearing of Dunstan church bells, and one of his boys is to run
across the fields and bring the news to Stornham. And it was most
touching, Miss Vanderpoel. They feel, in their rustic way, that Lord
Mount Dunstan has not been treated fairly in the past. And now he
seems to them a hero and a martyr--or like a great soldier who has
died fighting."

"Who may die fighting," broke from Miss Vanderpoel sharply.

"Who--who may----" Mrs. Brent corrected herself, "though Heaven
grant he will not. But it was the ringers who made me feel as if all
really was over. Thank you, Miss Vanderpoel, thank you for being so
practical and--and cool."

"It was touching," said Lady Anstruthers, her eyes brimming over
again. "And what the villagers feel is true. It goes to one's
heart," in a little outburst. "People have been unkind to him! And
he has been lonely in that great empty place --he has been lonely.
And if he is dying to-day, he is lonely even as he dies--even as he
dies."

Betty drew a deep breath. For one moment there seemed to rise
before her vision of a huge room, whose stately size made its
bareness a more desolate thing. And Mr. Penzance bent low over the
bed. She tore her thought away from it.

"No! No!" she cried out in low, passionate protest. "There will
be love and yearning all about him everywhere. The villagers who are
waiting--the poor things he has worked for--the very ringers
themselves, are all pouring forth the same thoughts. He will feel
even ours--ours too! His soul cannot be lonely."

A few minutes earlier, Mrs. Brent had been saying to herself
inwardly: "She has not much heart after all, you know." Now she
looked at her in amazement.

The blue bells were under water in truth--drenched and drowned.
And yet as the girl stood up before her, she looked taller--more the
magnificent Miss Vanderpoel than ever-- though she expressed a new
meaning.

"There is one thing the villagers can do for him," she said.
"One thing we can all do. The bell has not tolled yet. There is a
service for those who are--in peril. If the vicar will call the
people to the church, we can all kneel down there-- and ask to be
heard. The vicar will do that I am sure--and the people will join
him with all their hearts."

Mrs. Brent was overwhelmed.

"Dear, dear, Miss Vanderpoel!" she exclaimed. "That is
touching, indeed it is! And so right and so proper. I will drive
back to the village at once. The vicar's distress is as great as
mine. You think of everything. The service for the sick and dying.
How right--how right!"

With a sense of an increase of value in herself, the vicar, and
the vicarage, she hastened back to the pony carriage, but in the hall
she seized Betty's hand emotionally.

"I cannot tell you how much I am touched by this," she murmured.
"I did not know you were--were a religious girl, my dear."

Betty answered with grave politeness.

"In times of great pain and terror," she said, "I think almost
everybody is religious--a little. If that is the right word."

There was no ringing of the ordinary call to service. In less
than an hour's time people began to come out of their cottages and
wend their way towards the church. No one had put on his or her
Sunday clothes. The women had hastily rolled down their sleeves,
thrown off their aprons, and donned everyday bonnets and shawls. The
men were in their corduroys, as they had come in from the fields, and
the children wore their pinafores. As if by magic, the news had
flown from house to house, and each one who had heard it had left his
or her work without a moment's hesitation. They said but little as
they made their way to the church. Betty, walking with her sister,
was struck by the fact that there were more of them than formed the
usual Sunday morning congregation. They were doing no perfunctory
duty. The men's faces were heavily moved, most of the women wiped
their eyes at intervals, and the children looked awed. There was a
suggestion of hurried movement in the step of each--as if no time
must be lost--as if they must begin their appeal at once. Betty saw
old Doby tottering along stiffly, with his granddaughter and Mrs.
Welden on either side of him. Marlow, on his two sticks, was to be
seen moving slowly, but steadily.

Within the ancient stone walls, stiff old knees bent themselves
with care, and faces were covered devoutly by work- hardened hands.
As she passed through the churchyard Betty knew that eyes followed
her affectionately, and that the touching of foreheads and dropping
of curtsies expressed a special sympathy. In each mind she was
connected with the man they came to pray for--with the work he had
done--with the danger he was in. It was vaguely felt that if his
life ended, a bereavement would have fallen upon her. This the girl
knew.

The vicar lifted his bowed head and began his service. Every
man, woman and child before him responded aloud and with a curious
fervour--not in decorous fear of seeming to thrust themselves before
the throne, making too much of their petitions, in the presence of
the gentry. Here and there sobs were to be heard. Lady Anstruthers
followed the service timorously and with tears. But Betty, kneeling
at her side, by the round table in the centre of the great square
Stornham pew, which was like a room, bowed her head upon her folded
arms, and prayed her own intense, insistent prayer.

"God in Heaven!" was her inward cry. "God of all the worlds!
Do not let him die. `If ye ask anything in my name that I will do.'
Christ said it. In the name of Jesus of Nazareth--do not let him
die! All the worlds are yours--all the power--listen to us--listen
to us. Lord, I believe--help thou my unbelief. If this terror robs
me of faith, and I pray madly--forgive, forgive me. Do not count it
against me as sin. You made him. He has suffered and been alone.
It is not time--it is not time yet for him to go. He has known no
joy and no bright thing. Do not let him go out of the warm world
like a blind man. Do not let him die. Perhaps this is not prayer,
but raging. Forgive--forgive! All power is gone from me. God of
the worlds, and the great winds, and the myriad stars--do not let him
die!"

She knew her thoughts were wild, but their torrent bore her with
them into a strange, great silence. She did not hear the vicar's
words, or the responses of the people. She was not within the grey
stone walls. She had been drawn away as into the darkness and
stillness of the night, and no soul but her own seemed near. Through
the stillness and the dark her praying seemed to call and echo,
clamouring again and again. It must reach Something--it must be
heard, because she cried so loud, though to the human beings about
her she seemed kneeling in silence. She went on and on, repeating
her words, changing them, ending and beginning again, pouring forth a
flood of appeal. She thought later that the flood must have been at
its highest tide when, singularly, it was stemmed. Without warning,
a wave of awe passed over her which strangely silenced her--and left
her bowed and kneeling, but crying out no more. The darkness had
become still, even as it had not been still before. Suddenly she
cowered as she knelt and held her breath. Something had drawn a
little near. No thoughts--no words--no cries were needed as the
great stillness grew and spread, and folded her being within it. She
waited--only waited. She did not know how long a time passed before
she felt herself drawn back from the silent and shadowy
places--awakening, as it were, to the sounds in the church.

"Our Father," she began to say, as simply as a child. "Our
Father who art in Heaven--hallowed be thy name." There was a
stirring among the congregation, and sounds of feet, as the people
began to move down the aisle in reverent slowness. She caught again
the occasional sound of a subdued sob. Rosalie gently touched her,
and she rose, following her out of the big pew and passing down the
aisle after the villagers.

Outside the entrance the people waited as if they wanted to see
her again. Foreheads were touched as before, and eyes followed her.
She was to the general mind the centre of the drama, and "the
A'mighty" would do well to hear her. She had been doing his work for
him "same as his lordship." They did not expect her to smile at such
a time, when she returned their greetings, and she did not, but they
said afterwards, in their cottages, that "trouble or not she was a
wonder for looks, that she was--Miss Vanderpoel."

Rosalie slipped a hand through her arm, and they walked home
together, very close to each other. Now and then there was a
questioning in Rosy's look. But neither of them spoke once.

On an oak table in the hall a letter from Mr. Penzance was
lying. It was brief, hurried, and anxious. The rumour that Mount
Dunstan had been ailing was true, and that they had felt they must
conceal the matter from the villagers was true also. For some
baffling reason the fever had not absolutely declared itself, but the
young doctors were beset by grave forebodings. In such cases the
most serious symptoms might suddenly develop. One never knew. Mr.
Penzance was evidently torn by fears which he desperately strove to
suppress. But Betty could see the anguish on his fine old face, and
between the lines she read dread and warning not put into words. She
believed that, fearing the worst, he felt he must prepare her
mind.

"He has lived under a great strain for months," he ended. "It
began long before the outbreak of the fever. I am not strong under
my sense of the cruelty of things--and I have never loved him as I
love him to-day."

Betty took the letter to her room, and read it two or three
times. Because she had asked intelligent questions of the medical
authority she had consulted on her visit to London, she knew
something of the fever and its habits. Even her unclerical knowledge
was such as it was not well to reflect upon. She refolded the letter
and laid it aside.

"I must not think. I must do something. It may prevent my
listening," she said aloud to the silence of her room.

She cast her eyes about her as if in search. Upon her desk lay
a notebook. She took it up and opened it. It contained lists of
plants, of flower seeds, of bulbs, and shrubs. Each list was headed
with an explanatory note.

"Yes, this will do," she said. "I will go and talk to
Kedgers."

Kedgers and every man under him had been at the service, but
they had returned to their respective duties. Kedgers, giving
directions to some under gardeners who were clearing flower beds and
preparing them for their winter rest, turned to meet her as she
approached. To Kedgers the sight of her coming towards him on a
garden path was a joyful thing. He had done wonders, it is true, but
if she had not stood by his side with inspiration as well as
confidence, he knew that things might have "come out different."

"You was born a gardener, miss--born one," he had said months
ago.

It was the time when flower beds must be planned for the coming
year. Her notebook was filled with memoranda of the things they must
talk about.

It was good, normal, healthy work to do. The scent of the rich,
damp, upturned mould was a good thing to inhale. They walked from
one end to another, stood before clumps of shrubs, and studied bits
of wall. Here a mass of blue might grow, here low things of white
and pale yellow. A quickly-climbing rose would hang sheets of bloom
over this dead tree. This sheltered wall would hold warmth for a
Marechal Niel.

"You must take care of it all--even if I am not here next year,"
Miss Vanderpoel said.

Kedgers' absorbed face changed.

"Not here, miss," he exclaimed. "You not here! Things wouldn't
grow, miss." He checked himself, his weather- toughened skin
reddening because he was afraid he had perhaps taken a liberty. And
then moving his hat uneasily on his head, he took another. "But it's
true enough," looking down on the gravel walk, "we--we couldn't
expect to keep you."

She did not look as if she had noticed the liberty, but she did
not look quite like herself, Kedgers thought. If she had been
another young lady, and but for his established feeling that she was
somehow immune from all ills, he would have thought she had a
headache, or was low in her mind.

She spent an hour or two with him, and together they planned for
the changing seasons of the year to come. How she could keep her
mind on a thing, and what a head she had for planning, and what an
eye for colour! But yes--there was something a bit wrong somehow.
Now and then she would stop and stand still for a moment, and
suddenly it struck Kedgers that she looked as if she were
listening.

"Did you think you heard something, miss?" he asked her once
when she paused and wore this look.

"No," she answered, "no." And drew him on quickly-- almost as
if she did not want him to hear what she had seemed listening for.

When she left him and went back to the house, all the loveliness
of spring, summer and autumn had been thought out and provided for.
Kedgers stood on the path and looked after her until she passed
through the terrace door. He chewed his lip uneasily. Then he
remembered something and felt a bit relieved. It was the service he
remembered.

"Ah! it's that that's upset her--and it's natural, seeing how
she's helped him and Dunstan village. It's only natural." He chewed
his lip again, and nodded his head in odd reflection. "Ay! Ay!" he
summed her up. "She's a great lady that--she's a great lady--same as
if she'd been born in a civilised land."

During the rest of the day the look of question in Rosalie's
eyes changed in its nature. When her sister was near her she found
herself glancing at her with a new feeling. It was a growing
feeling, which gradually became--anxiousness. Betty presented to her
the aspect of one withdrawn into some remote space. She was not
living this day as her days were usually lived. She did not sit
still or stroll about the gardens quietly. The consecutiveness of
her action seemed broken. She did one thing after another, as if she
must fill each moment. This was not her Betty. Lady Anstruthers
watched and thought until, in the end, a new pained fear began to
creep slowly into her mind, and make her feel as if she were slightly
trembling though her hands did not shake. She did not dare to allow
herself to think the thing she knew she was on the brink of thinking.
She thrust it away from her, and tried not to think at all. Her
Betty--her splendid Betty, whom nothing could hurt--who could not be
touched by any awful thing--her dear Betty!

In the afternoon she saw her write notes steadily for an hour,
then she went out into the stables and visited the horses, talked to
the coachman and to her own groom. She was very kind to a village
boy who had been recently taken on as an additional assistant in the
stable, and who was rather frightened and shy. She knew his mother,
who had a large family, and she had, indeed, given the boy his place
that he might be trained under the great Mr. Buckham, who was
coachman and head of the stables. She said encouraging things which
quite cheered him, and she spoke privately to Mr. Buckham about him.
Then she walked in the park a little, but not for long. When she
came back Rosalie was waiting for her.

"I want to take a long drive," she said. "I feel restless.
Will you come with me, Betty?" Yes, she would go with her, so
Buckham brought the landau with its pair of big horses, and they
rolled down the avenue, and into the smooth, white high road. He
took them far--past the great marshes, between miles of bared hedges,
past farms and scattered cottages. Sometimes he turned into lanes,
where the hedges were closer to each other, and where, here and
there, they caught sight of new points of view between trees. Betty
was glad to feel Rosy's slim body near her side, and she was
conscious that it gradually seemed to draw closer and closer. Then
Rosy's hand slipped into hers and held it softly on her lap.

When they drove together in this way they were usually both of
them rather silent and quiet, but now Rosalie spoke of many
things--of Ughtred, of Nigel, of the Dunholms, of New York, and their
father and mother.

"I want to talk because I'm nervous, I think," she said half
apologetically. "I do not want to sit still and think too much--of
father's coming. You don't mind my talking, do you, Betty?"

"No," Betty answered. "It is good for you and for me." And she
met the pressure of Rosy's hand halfway.

But Rosy was talking, not because she did not want to sit still
and think, but because she did not want Betty to do so. And all the
time she was trying to thrust away the thought growing in her
mind.

They spent the evening together in the library, and Betty read
aloud. She read a long time--until quite late. She wished to tire
herself as well as to force herself to stop listening.

When they said good-night to each other Rosy clung to her as
desperately as she had clung on the night after her arrival. She
kissed her again and again, and then hung her head and excused
herself.

"Forgive me for being--nervous. I'm ashamed of myself," she
said. "Perhaps in time I shall get over being a coward."

But she said nothing of the fact that she was not a coward for
herself, but through a slowly formulating and struggled-- against
fear, which chilled her very heart, and which she could best cover by
a pretence of being a poltroon.

She could not sleep when she went to bed. The night seemed
crowded with strange, terrified thoughts. They were all of Betty,
though sometimes she thought of her father's coming, of her mother in
New York, and of Betty's steady working throughout the day.
Sometimes she cried, twisting her hands together, and sometimes she
dropped into a feverish sleep, and dreamed that she was watching
Betty's face, yet was afraid to look at it.

She awakened suddenly from one of these dreams, and sat upright
in bed to find the dawn breaking. She rose and threw on a
dressing-gown, and went to her sister's room because she could not
bear to stay away.

The door was not locked, and she pushed it open gently. One of
the windows had its blind drawn up, and looked like a patch of dull
grey. Betty was standing upright near it. She was in her
night-gown, and a long black plait of hair hung over one shoulder
heavily. She looked all black and white in strong contrast. The
grey light set her forth as a tall ghost.

Lady Anstruthers slid forward, feeling a tightness in her
chest.

"The dawn wakened me too," she said.

"I have been waiting to see it come," answered Betty. "It is
going to be a dull, dreary day."