A God and His Gifts (17 page)

“My daughter!” said Alfred. “The other words can be the same.”

“Your niece, Aunt Penelope!” said Emmeline, smiling and passing to the third embrace.

“My sons!” said Ada. “Your nephews whom you have not seen.”

“And my daughter!” said Emmeline. “For that is how you must see her. It is what she is to me.”

“And will be to us,” said Penelope. “You did wisely to choose a girl. Your father is rich in grandsons.”

“She has always been needed. She came to me when I was alone. And my husband was glad to share her. We never felt we were childless. You will not think of me in that way.”

The daughter came forward, a comely girl of about twenty-two, seeming rather mature for her age. She had pleasant, straight features, large, hazel eyes, and an expression at once amiable, confident and resolute. Emmeline was always aware of her, and when interest turned to her from herself, seemed to expect and wish it.

Hereward moved towards them and spoke for every ear.

“So we meet at last. With much to remember and forget. We can do both. It is a clear way.”

“It is,” said Emmeline. “And it is more. It is to be a new one.”

“I am a minor figure on the occasion,” said Sir Michael. “But as Ada's father-in-law I can feel a part of it.”

“I feel it might be the same without me,” said Joanna. “And I believe it would.”

“I feel you are my relations as well as Ada's,” said Emmeline. “As we are sisters, it seems to be natural. But there is so much to know about you all.”

“I will give you my account,” said Hereward. “I am still the slave of the pen. And still by some held to be its master.”

“I am one of those,” said Hetty. “And I am Merton's wife. That is all I need to say.”

“There is that about Hereward's books,” said Sir Michael. “They can be read by people of any age or kind. To my mind it is the truest strength.”

“One of them could be read by Grandpa,” said Reuben. “I saw it admitting of it.”

“So did I,” said Salomon. “And the true strength was Grandpa's.”

“I am hardly a slave of the pen,” said Merton. “That implies too much. But I remain its servant.”

“I am a useful member of society,” said Reuben. “I should hardly be a member, if I were not useful. And that may show it is not society.”

“I am nothing but myself,” said Salomon. “So that is enough about me. There can hardly be any more.”

“So am I,” said Viola. “And I feel it is quite enough. Why should we be more than ourselves?”

“I am the person who provides Viola,” said Emmeline. “Nothing further can be asked of me.”

“Oh, I belong to myself, Mother. But I am glad to be with you in your home.”

“She will belong to someone else one day,” said Sir Michael.

“Not any more than he will belong to me. Things will be equal between us.”

“Now there is another meeting,” said Ada. “Viola, here are your grandparents. I see my aunt as a sort of parent. She has filled the place.”

“I make no bid for attention,” said Alfred. “There are many stronger claimants.”

“Oh, you are still our show specimen, Father. None of us can hold a candle to you, though Merton owes you a debt. I am happy to be like my mother, but the prize for looks was yours. She would have been the first to assign it to you.”

“I did not ever wish her different.”

“No, and you would not wish me so. We do not want change in the people we care for. It would mean they were not the same.”

“I daresay it would,” said Salomon.

“It might be the outcome,” said Merton.

“Now do not sneer at your mother. Any chance word can be taken up like that. It is too obvious a line to follow. Now who is this come to see us?”

Henry entered the room by himself, having been
brought to the house by Nurse and left at the door. He kept looking back, as if at a loss without her, and paused to gaze at the newcomers.

“Now who are these dear people?” said Ada. “Can you guess?”

“Two,” said Henry, finding the number unusual.

“Yes, Aunt Emmeline and Cousin Viola. Are you not pleased to see them?”

“Very nice house,” said Henry, looking round.

“Nicer than ours?”

“Oh, yes it is.”

“It is smaller,” said Alfred.

“Yes, dear little house.”

“You know it is not small,” said Merton. “Did you walk to it or let Nurse carry you?”

“Yes, poor Nurse very tired. Henry read to her.”

“What do you read.”

“Little Bo-Peep,” said Henry, incidentally.

“You know it by heart,” said Merton. “You don't read from a book.”

“Yes, have a book and read.”

“Well, read to us out of this one.”

Henry took the Bible and proceeded with his eyes on it.

“‘Little Bo-Peep

Has lost her sheep,

And doesn't know where to find them.'”

“‘Leave them alone,

And they'll come home,

Bringing their tails behind them,'”

said Merton, exposing the method.

“And does Nurse listen?” said Hereward, disregarding his second son.

“Yes. Not tired any more. Show her the picture.”

“And what else do you read?”

“‘Ride a cock horse

To Banbury Cross,'”

said Henry, looking down with the negligence of modesty.

“Would you really like to read?” said Merton.

“No, he is too young yet.”

“You know you can't read, don't you?”

“Oh, yes, he knows,” said Henry, with the air of a conspirator.

“We don't want Maud to pretend to read. We will wait until she can.”

“Yes, pretend,” said Henry, as if accepting the word.

“She has forestalled us,” said Hetty. “She pretends already.”

“Oh, no, not pretend,” said Henry, in a tone of disapproval.

“He is getting rather spoilt, Father,” said Merton.

“No,” said Henry.

“Do you know what it means?”

“No,” said Henry, easily.

“I don't think you are spoilt,” said Viola.

“No,” said Henry, smiling into her face.

“Have you a message for Maud?” said Merton. “You love her, don't you?”

“No, her,” said Henry, indicating Viola.

“I have no little boy,” said Emmeline. “Only a girl.”

Henry looked round for the latter.

“Here she is,” said Emmeline, putting her hand on Viola's shoulder.

“No,” said Henry. “Lady.”

“I think it is long enough, ma'am,” said Nurse at the door.

Henry turned and ran towards her, ignoring the farewells that followed him.

“You are honoured among women,” said Salomon to
Viola. “And indeed among men. We all strive for Henry's favour.”

“Were you glad when your father adopted him?”

“I was surprised. But I like a child in the house. My brothers are married and provided for.”

“You could marry yourself, if you wished.”

“I would only marry whom I wished. And another point of view is involved.”

“Is it strange to have a famous father?”

“I am used to it. It has become a part of our life.”

“You do not want to write yourself?”

“The question does not arise. I am not able to.”

“If you were, would you try to write like your father?”

“Would anyone try to do anything like anyone else? If I produced anything, it would be my own. But my father's work looms large to us. We depend on it for much of what we have. We can only be grateful for it. And there are parts of it, that I can be proud that he has written.”

“Does he know how you feel about it?”

“He has two sets of readers, the large and the small. He knows I belong to the second, and is not concerned. He sees his work with his own eyes.”

“Both may be right in a way. The larger need not always be wrong.”

“It contains many honest people. I am not going to pity it, if it includes you.”

“What of your brother's work? Has he also two sets of readers?”

“He writes for one. And it remains small. His work has not so far found a place. Of course my father's always did. But it is easy to judge such things, and difficult to do them. I have no right to speak.”

“It is such a change for me to be with a family like this.”

“It is not to me. But something else is a change. Something I have imagined and given no name. I can hardly give it one now.”

“There may be things that have no names.”

“There are. They are outside the sphere of words. If you had lived in that sphere, as I have, you would know it. They have their life beyond them.”

“What an earnest pair!” said Hereward. “Am I allowed to join?”

“You hardly can,” said Viola. “The talk was about writers, and you would have to lead.”

“What has Salomon been saying of his father? I dare to guess I was an example.”

“That you have written things he is proud of.”

“Oh, so I have a loyal son. I was not sure of it.”

“How can he not have?” murmured Salomon for Viola's ears, as he moved away. “Things being as they are. He being as he is. His writing giving us what it does. I am what I have to be. I do what I must.”

“So you are my adopted niece?” said Hereward. “We will forget the adoption and keep the rest. We will forget it all, and have something of our own. There is a word I have to say to you. I want to take the place of the father you have not had. You will let me try? My heart would be in it. And it could be between ourselves.”

“I wish you would try. I wish you were my father. I have thought and asked about you. But my mother could not tell me much.”

“And am I what you imagined?”

“I did not dare to go far, in case I imagined too much. But it might have been the whole. You are just what you ought to be.

“So I have been told. And I should be what people want. They want my books, and I put myself into them.”

“And you are yourself out of them. And it is said that writers seldom are.”

“Their energy is used. As mine would never be. I say it of myself, as it is true. It is a thing that puts me apart.”

“One of the things. It is what you are.”

“And what you should not be,” said Ada's voice.
“Come and join the rest of us, and put all ideas of being apart out of your heads. Apart! Why should you be? Why should any of us? I have never had such a thought in my life. The wish must be father to it. Come and join your—betters I almost said—but I will say your equals. That should be enough for you.”

“For me,” said Viola. “But what about my Uncle Hereward?”

“Enough for him too. In ordinary life he takes the usual part. His position with his readers is different.”

“It is,” said Hereward. “I will not deny it.”

“Then it can be with me,” said Viola. “I am one of them.”

“Well, so it can,” said Sir Michael. “And he deserves that it should be. He has a right to anything that comes to him.”

“Very little comes to us, that we have not a right to,” said Zillah. “We can accept it all freely.”

Hereward accepted what came, until a time when it was questioned. Some weeks later Salomon approached him, and spoke of the matter in a candid manner that suggested it was not a great one.

“Father, you will let me say a word? It is nothing of great significance. I am not suggesting that history is repeating itself. I know your feeling for Viola is fatherly and nothing more. It has been clear from the first. That is why you have not thought. But in a way you are trespassing again on a son's preserves. I will ask you to leave my path clear. You are too impressive a figure to be in the way.”

“What do you mean? What is it you are saying? You don't mean you are in love with Viola?”

“What else should I mean? I should be taken to mean it. I tried to make it plain.”

“You are not thinking of marrying her? No, you cannot be.”

“Why not? I am in a position to marry. You have
said you wished I would, that it was time. What is there against it?”

“Oh, my poor boy!” said Hereward. “My poor boy!”

“Why, what is the trouble?”

“Now I am an unfortunate man,” said Hereward, throwing up his hands. “Here I do my best for my family, work for them, bear with them, make no effort for myself! And I become a threat and a danger and a despoiler of their lives! You tell me to get out of your path. There is a word for a father's ears. What if I had not been in it? If I had left it clear, as you say? It is true that I have had my temptations, and that my life has kept them at hand. But what would have happened, if it had not been so? Where would you have been without me? Where would those who matter more than you, have been? Your mother and mine would have been thrust from their place. Would you have been able to help them? Or would you have turned to me? Answer me and answer me truly. What can I be but what I am? What could I have done but what I did?”

“Father, have done. Be plain. You have said nothing yet. I feel you can have nothing to say.”

“Salomon, I speak to you as to another man. You have reached your full manhood. You know that your mother's sister left us in her youth. That a threat was seen in her remaining with me. My son, it was more than a threat. The consequence came. Neither she nor I betrayed it. We felt silence was best. She adopted the child and still said nothing. I provided for its needs, and still provide for them. I had my usual part. Viola does not know. It seemed better that she should not. But it was not better. Nothing has been. Everything has gone awry for me. I look for nothing else. But of course I was drawn to her. Of course I was in the path. Did I not see her in mine? You have my sympathy, Salomon. You deserve it indeed. But I ask for yours. And I ask something else. I can face no further exposure. I ask that there shall be none.”