For none knew better than this little grey woman, the agony of mind that must be endured when a sensitive, highly organized nature is first brought face to face with its own affliction. None knew better the terrible nerves of the invert, nerves that are always lying in wait. Super-nerves, whose response is only equalled by the strain that calls that response into being. Puddle was well acquainted with these things—that was why she was deeply concerned about Stephen.
But all she could do, at least for the present, was to be very gentle and very patient: “Drink this cocoa, Stephen, I made it myself—” And then with a smile, “I put four lumps of sugar!”
Then Stephen was pretty sure to turn contrite: “Puddle—I’m a brute—you’re so good to me always.”
“Rubbish! I know you like cocoa made sweet, that’s why I put in those four lumps of sugar. Let’s go for a really long walk, shall we, dear? I’ve been wanting a really long walk now for weeks.”
Liar—most kind and self-sacrificing liar! Puddle hated long walks, especially with Stephen who strode as though wearing seven league boots, and whose only idea of a country walk was to take her own line across ditches and hedges—yes, indeed, a most kind and self-sacrificing liar! For Puddle was not quite so young as she had been; at times her feet would trouble her a little, and at times she would get a sharp twinge in her knee, which she shrewdly suspected to be rheumatism. Nevertheless she must keep close to Stephen because of the fear that tightened her heart—the fear of that questioning, wounded expression which now never left the girl’s eyes for a moment. So Puddle got out her most practical shoes—her heaviest shoes which were said to be damp-proof—and limped along bravely by the side of her charge, who as often as not ignored her existence.
There was one thing in all this that Puddle found amazing, and that was Anna’s apparent blindness. Anna appeared to notice no change in Stephen, to feel no anxiety about her. As always, these two were gravely polite to each other, and as always they never intruded. Still, it did seem to Puddle an incredible thing that the girl’s own mother should have noticed nothing. And yet so it was, for Anna had gradually been growing more silent and more abstracted. She was letting the tide of life carry her gently towards that haven on which her thoughts rested. And this blindness of hers troubled Puddle sorely, so that anger must often give way to pity.
She would think: “God help her, the sorrowful woman; she knows nothing—why didn’t he tell her? It was cruel!” And then she would think: “Yes, but God help Stephen if the day ever comes when her mother does know—what will happen on that day to Stephen?”
Kind and loyal Puddle; she felt torn to shreds between those two, both so worthy of pity. And now in addition she must be tormented by memories dug out of their graves by Stephen—Stephen, whose pain had called up a dead sorrow that for long had lain quietly and decently buried. Her youth would come back and stare into her eyes reproachfully, so that her finest virtues would seem little better than dust and ashes. She would sigh, remembering the bitter sweetness, the valiant hopelessness of her youth—and then she would look at Stephen.
But one morning Stephen announced abruptly: “I’m going out. Don’t wait lunch for me, will you.” And her voice permitted of no argument or question.
Puddle nodded in silence. She had no need to question, she knew only too well where Stephen was going.
IV
With head bowed by her mortification of spirit, Stephen rode once more to The Grange. And from time to time as she rode she flushed deeply because of the shame of what she was doing. But from time to time her eyes filled with tears because of the pain of her longing.
She left the cob with a man at the stables, then made her way round to the old herb-garden; and there she found Angela sitting alone in the shade with a book which she was not reading.
Stephen said: “I’ve come back.” And then without waiting: “I’ll do anything you want, if you’ll let me come back.” And even as she spoke those words her eyes fell.
But Angela answered: “You had to come back—because I’ve been wanting you, Stephen.”
Then Stephen went and knelt down beside her, and she hid her face against Angela’s knee, and the tears that had never so much as once fallen during all the hard weeks of their separation, gushed out of her eyes. She cried like a child, with her face against Angela’s knee.
Angela let her cry on for a while, then she lifted the tear-stained face and kissed it: “Oh, Stephen, Stephen, get used to the world—it’s a horrible place full of horrible people, but it’s all there is, and we live in it, don’t we? So we’ve just got to do as the world does, my Stephen.” And because it seemed strange and rather pathetic that this creature should weep, Angela was stirred to something very like love for a moment: “Don’t cry any more—don’t cry, honey,” she whispered, “we’re together; nothing else really matters.”
And so it began all over again.
V
Stephen stayed on to lunch, for Ralph was in Worcester. He came home a good two hours before teatime to find them
