Margaret Pedler - The Moon out of Reach

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Her thoughts were suddenly scattered by the sound of the opening door and
the sight of Mrs. Seymour's inquiring face peeping round it.

"Awake?" queried Kitty.

With a determined mental effort Nan pulled herself together, prepared to
face the world as it was and not as she wanted it to be. She answered
promptly:

"Yes. And hungry, please. May I have some breakfast?"

"Good child!" murmured Kitty approvingly. "As a matter of fact, your
brekkie is coming hard on my heels"--gesturing, as she spoke, towards the
trim maid who had followed her into the room, carrying an
attractive-looking breakfast tray. When she had taken her departure,
Kitty sat down and gossiped, while Nan did her best to appear as hungry
as she had rashly implied she was.

Somehow she must manage to throw dust in Kitty's keen eyes--and a
simulated appetite made quite an excellent beginning. She was determined
that no one should ever know that she was anything other than happy in
her engagement to Roger. She owed him that much, at least. So when
Kitty, making an effort to speak quite naturally, mentioned that Peter
had been obliged to return to town unexpectedly, she accepted the news
with an assumption of naturalness as good as Kitty's own. Half an hour
later, leaving Nan to dress, Kitty departed with any suspicions she might
have had entirely lulled.

But her heart ached for the man whose haggard, stern-set face, when he
had told her last night that he must go, had conveyed all, and more, than
his brief words of explanation.

"Must you really go, Peter?" she had asked him wistfully. "I
thought--you told me once--that you didn't mean to break off your
friendship? . . . Can't you even be friends with her?"

His reply came swiftly and with a definiteness there was no mistaking.

"No," he said. "I can't. It's true what you say--I did once think I
might keep her friendship. I was wrong."

There was a pause. Then Kitty asked quickly:

"But you won't refuse to meet her? It isn't as bad as that, Peter?"

He looked down at her oddly.

"It's quite as bad as that."

She felt herself trembling a little at the queer intensity of his tone.
It was as though the man beside her were keeping in check, by sheer force
of will, some big emotion that threatened to overwhelm him. She
hesitated, then spoke very quietly and simply:

"That was a perfectly selfish question on my part, Peter. Don't take any
notice of it."

"How--selfish?" he asked, with a faint smile.

"Because, if you refuse to meet Nan, I shall always have to see you
separately--never together. I love you both and I can't give up either
of you, so it will be rather like cutting myself in half."

Mallory took her hand in both his.

"You shall not have to cut yourself in half for me, dear friend," he
said, with that touch of foreignness in his manner which revealed itself
at times--not infrequently when he was concealing some strong feeling.
"We shall meet again--some day--Nan and I. But not now--not at present."

"She'll miss you, Peter. . . . You're _such_ a good pal!" Kitty gripped
his hands hard and her voice was a trifle unsteady. After Barry, there
was no one in the whole world she loved as much as she loved Peter. And
she was powerless to help him.

"You'll be back in town soon," he answered her. "I shall come and see
you sometimes. After all"--smiling a little--"Nan isn't constantly with
you. She has her music." He paused a moment, then added gravely, with a
quiet note of thankfulness in his voice: "As I, also, shall have my work."

There remained always that--work, the great palliative, a narcotic
dulling the pain which, without it, would be almost beyond human
endurance.

* * * * * *

"Everything's just about as bad as it could be!"

Kitty's voice was troubled and the eyes that sought Lord St. John's
lacked all their customary vivacity. The tall old man, pacing the
quadrangle beside her in the warmth of the afternoon sunshine, made no
comment for a moment. Then he said slowly:

"Yes, it's pretty bad. I'm sorry Mallory had to leave this morning."

"Oh, well," murmured Kitty vaguely, "a well-known writer like that often
has to dash off to town in the middle of a holiday. Things crop up, you
know"--still more vaguely.

St. John paused in the middle of his pacing and, putting his hand under
Kitty's chin, tilted her face upward, scrutinising it with a kindly,
quizzical gaze.

"Lookers-on see most of the game, my dear," he observed, "I've no doubts
about the 'business' which called Mallory away."

"You've guessed, then?"

"I was there when we first thought Nan might be in danger last night--and
I saw his face. Then I was sure. I'd only suspected before."

"I knew," said Kitty simply. "He told me in London. At first he didn't
intend coming down to Mallow at all."

"Better, perhaps, if he'd kept to his intention," muttered St. John
abstractedly. He was thinking deeply, his fine brows drawn together.

"You see, he--some of us thought Maryon had come back meaning to fix up
things with Nan. So Peter kept out of the way. He thinks only of
her--her happiness."

"His own is out of the question, poor devil!"

Kitty nodded.

"And the worst of it is," she went on, "I can't feel quite sure that Nan
will be really happy with Roger. They're the last two people in the
world to get on well together."

Lord St. John looked out across the sea, his shoulders a little stooped,
his hands clasped behind his back. No one regretted Nan's precipitate
engagement more than he, but he recognised that little good could be
accomplished by interference. Moreover, to his scrupulous, old-world
sense of honour, a promise, once given, was not to be broken at will.

"I'm afraid, my dear," he said at last, turning back to Kitty, "I'm
afraid we've reached a _cul-de-sac_."

His tones were despondent, and Kitty's spirits sank a degree lower. She
looked at him bleakly, and he returned her glance with one equally bleak.
Then, into this dejected council of two--cheerful, decided, and
aboundingly energetic swept Aunt Eliza.

"Good afternoon, my dear," she said, making a peck at Kitty's cheek.
"That flunkey, idling his life away on the hall mat, said I should find
you here, so I saved him from overwork by showing myself in. How are
you, St. John? You're looking a bit peaky this afternoon, aren't you?"

"It's old age beginning to tell," laughed Lord St. John, shaking hands.

"Old age?--Fiddlesticks!" Eliza fumed contemptuously. "I suppose the
truth is you're fashin' yourself because Nan's engaged to be married.
I've always said you were just like an old hen with one chick."

"I'd like to see the child with a nest of her own, all the same, Eliza."

"Hark to the man! And when 'tis settled she shall have the nest, he
looks for all the world as though she had just fallen out of it!"

St. John wheeled round suddenly.

"That's exactly what I'm afraid of--that some day she may . . . fall out
of this particular nest that's building."

"And why should she do that?" demanded Eliza truculently. "Roger's as
bonnie and brave a mate as any woman need look for, and Trenby Hall's a
fine home to bring his bride to."

"Yes. But don't you see," explained Kitty, "it's all happened so
suddenly. A little while ago we thought Nan cared for someone else and
now we don't want her to rush off and tie herself up with anyone in a
hurry--and be miserable ever after."

"I'm no' in favour of long engagements."

"In this case a little delay might have been wiser before any engagement
was entered upon," said Lord St. John.

"I don't hold with delays--nor interfering between folks that have
promised to be man and wife. The Almighty never intended us to play at
being providence. If it's ordained for Nan to marry Roger Trenby--marry
him she will. And the lass is old enough to know her own mind; maybe
you're wrong in thinking her heart's elsewhere."

Then, catching an expression of dissent on Kitty's face, she added
shrewdly:

"Oh, I ken weel he's nae musician--but it's no' a few notes of the piano
will be binding husband and wife together. 'Tis the wee bairns build the
bridges we can cross in safety."

There was an unwontedly tender gleam in her hard-featured face. Kitty
jumped up and kissed her impulsively.

"Aunt Eliza dear, you've a much softer heart than you pretend, and if Nan
weren't happily married you'd be just as sorry as the rest of us."

"Perhaps Eliza's right," hazarded St. John rather uncertainly. "We may
have been too ready to assume Nan won't be happy with the man she's
chosen."

"I know Nan," persisted Kitty obstinately. "And I know she and Roger
have really nothing in common."

"Then perhaps they'll find something after they're married," retorted
Eliza, "and the looking for it will give a spice to life. There's many a
man--ay, and woman, too!--who have fallen deeper in love after they've
taken the plunge than ever they did while they were hovering on the
brink."

"That may be true in some cases," responded St. John. "But you're
advocating a big risk, Eliza."

"And there's mighty few things worth having in this world that aren't
obtained at a risk," averred Mrs. McBain stoutly. "You've always been
for wrapping Nan up in cotton wool, St. John--shielding her from this,
protecting her from that! Sic' havers! She'd be more of a woman if
you'd let her stand on her own feet a bit."

Lord St. John sighed.

"Well, she'll have to stand on her own feet henceforth," he said.

"What about the money?" demanded Eliza. "Are you still going to allow
her the same income?"

"I think not," he answered thoughtfully. "That was to give her freedom
of choice--freedom from matrimony if she wished. Well, she's chosen.
And I believe Nan will be all the better for being dependent on her
husband for--everything. At any rate, just at first."

Kitty looked somewhat dubious, but Mrs. McBain nodded her approval
vigorously.

"That's sound common-sense," she said decidedly. "More than I expected
of ye, St. John."

He smiled a little. Then, seeing the unspoken question in Kitty's eyes,
he turned to her reassuringly.

"No need to worry, Madame Kitty. Remember, I'm always there, if need be,
with the money-bags. My idea is that if Nan doesn't like entire
dependence on her husband, it may spur her into working at her music.
I'm always waiting for her to do something big. And the desire for
independence is a different spur--and a better one---than the necessity
of boiling the pot for dinner."

"You seem to have forgotten that being a professional musician is next
door to a crime in Lady Gertrude's eyes," observed Kitty. "She doesn't
care for anyone to do more than 'play a little' in a nice, amateur,
lady-like fashion!"

"Then Lady Gertrude will have to learn better," replied St. John sharply.
Adding, with a grim smile: "One of my wedding-presents to Nan will be a
full-sized grand piano."

So, in accordance with Eliza's advice, everyone refrained from "playing
providence" and Nan's engagement to Roger Trenby progressed along
conventional lines. Letters of congratulation poured in upon them both,
and Kitty grew unmistakably bored by the number of her friends in the
neighbourhood who, impelled by curiosity concerning the future mistress
of Trenby Hall, suddenly discovered that they owed a call at Mallow and
that the present moment was an opportune time to pay it.

Nan herself was keyed up to a rather high pitch these days, and it was
difficult for those who were watching her with the anxious eyes of
friendship to gauge the extent of her happiness or otherwise. From the
moment of Mallory's departure she had flung herself with zest into each
day's amusement behaving precisely as though she hadn't a care in
life--playing about with Sandy, and flirting so exasperatingly with Roger
that, although she wore his ring, within himself he never felt quite sure
of her.

Kitty used every endeavour to get the girl to herself for half an hour,
hoping she might be able to extract the truth from her. But Nan had
developed an extraordinary elusiveness and she skilfully avoided
tete-a-tete talks with anyone other than Roger. Moreover, there was that
in her manner which utterly forbade even the delicate probing of a
friend. The Nan who was wont to be so frank and ingenuous--surprisingly
so at times--seemed all at once to have retired behind an impenetrable
wall of reticence.

Meanwhile Fenton and Penelope had mutually decided to admit none but a
few intimate friends into the secret of their engagement. As Ralph
sagely observed: "We shall be married so soon that it isn't worth while
facing a barrage of congratulations over such a short engagement."

They were radiantly happy, with the kind of happiness that keeps bubbling
up from sheer joy of itself--in love with each other in such a
delightfully frank and barefaced manner that everyone at Mallow regarded
them with gentle amusement and loved them for being lovers.

Nothing pleased Nan better than to persuade them into singing that
quaintly charming old song, _The Keys of Heaven_--the words of which hold
such a tender, whimsical understanding of the feminine heart. Perhaps
the refusal of the coach and four black horses "as black as pitch," and
of all the other good things wherewith the lover in the song seeks to
embellish his suit, was not rendered with quite as much emphasis as it
should have been. One might almost have suspected the lady of a desire
not to be too discouraging in her denials. But the final verse lacked
nothing in interpretation.

Passionate and beseeching, as the lover makes his last appeal, offering
the greatest gift of all, Ralph's glorious baritone entreated her:

"Oh, I will give you the keys of my heart,
And we'll be married till death us do part,
Madam, will you walk?
Madam, will you talk?
Madam, will you walk and talk with me?"

Then Penelope's eyes would glow with a lovely inner light, as though the
beautiful possibilities of that journey through life together were
envisioned in them, and her voice would deepen and mellow till it seemed
to hold all the laughter and tears, and all the kindness and tender
gaiety and exquisite solicitude of love.

Sometimes, as she was playing the accompaniment, Nan's own eyes would
fill unexpectedly with tears and the black and white notes of the piano
run together into an oblong blur of grey.

For though Peter had given her the keys of his heart that night of moon
and sea at Tintagel, she might never use them to unlock the door of
heaven.

CHAPTER XVIII

"TILL DEATH US DO PART"

Within a fortnight of Mallory's departure from St. Wennys, the whole of
the house-party at Mallow had scattered. Lord St. John was the first
to go--leaving in order to pay a short visit to Eliza McBain before
returning to town. Often though she might scarify him with her sharp
tongue, she was genuinely attached to him, and her clannishly
hospitable soul would have been sorely wounded if he had not spent a
few days at Trevarthen Wood while he was in the neighbourhood. Ralph
Fenton had been obliged to hurry north to fulfil an unexpected concert
engagement; and on the same day Barry left home to join a
shooting-party in Scotland. A few days later Nan and Penelope returned
to London, accompanied by Kitty, who asserted an unshakable
determination to take part in the orgy of spending which Penelope's
forthcoming wedding would entail.

Meanwhile Ralph, being "a big fish" as Penny had once commented, had
secured his future wife's engagement as a member of the concert
party--by the simple method of declining to accept the American tour
himself unless she were included, so that to the joy of buying a
trousseau was added the superlative delight of choosing special frocks
for Penelope's appearances on tour in the States. Lord St. John had
insisted upon presenting the trousseau, Barry Seymour made himself
responsible for the concert gowns, and Kitty announced that the wedding
was to take place from her house in Green Street.

For the first time in the whole of her brave, hard-working life,
Penelope knew what it was to spend as she had seen other women spend,
without being driven into choosing the second-best material or the less
becoming frock for the unsatisfying reason that it was the cheaper.
The two men had given Kitty carte blanche as regards expenditure and
she proceeded to take full advantage of the fact, promptly quelling any
tentative suggestions towards economy which Penelope, rather
overwhelmed by Mrs. Seymour's lavish notions, occasionally put forth.

The date on which the concert party sailed was already fixed; leaving a
bare month in which to accomplish the necessary preparations, and the
time seemed positively to fly. Nan evaded taking part in the shopping
expeditions which filled the days for Penelope and Kitty, since each
new purchase, each frail, chiffony frock or beribboned box which
arrived from dressmaker or milliner, served only to remind her that the
approaching parting with Penelope was drawing nearer.

In women's friendships there must always come a big wrench when one or
other of two friends meets the man who is her mate. The old, tried
friendship retreats suddenly into second place--sometimes for a little
while it almost seems as though it had petered out altogether. But
when once the plunge has been taken, and the strangeness and wonder and
glory of the new life have become ordinary and commonplace with the
sweet commonness of dear, familiar, daily things, then the old
friendship comes stealing back--deeper and more understanding, perhaps,
than in the days before one of the two friends had come into her
woman's kingdom.

Nan sat staring into the fire--for the first breath of autumn had
already chilled the air--trying to realise that to-day was actually the
eve of Penelope's wedding-day. It seemed incredible--even more
incredible that Kitty and she should have gone off laughing together to
see about some detail of the next day's arrangements which had been
overlooked.

She was suddenly conscious that if this were the eve of her own
marriage with Roger laughter would be far enough away from her.
Regarded dispassionately, her decision to marry him because she
couldn't marry the man she loved, seemed rather absurd and illogical.
It was like going into a library and, having discovered that the book
which you required was out, accepting one you didn't really want
instead--just because the librarian, who knew nothing whatever about
your tastes in literature, had offered it to you. You always began the
substitute hopefully and generally ended up by being thoroughly bored
with it and marvelling how on earth anybody could possibly have found
it interesting! Nan wondered if she would get bored with her
substituted volume.

She had rushed recklessly into her engagement, regarding marriage with
Roger much as though it were a stout set of palings with "No Right of
Way" written across them in large letters. Outside, the waves of
emotion might surge in vain, while within, she and Roger would settle
down to the humdrum placidity of married life. But the dull, ceaseless
ache at her heart made her sometimes question whether anything in the
world could keep at bay the insistent claim of love.

She tried to reassure herself. At least there would always remain her
music and the passionate delight of creative work. It was true she had
written nothing recently. She had been living at too high an emotional
strain to have any surplus energy for originating, and she knew from
experience that all creative work demands both strength and spirit,
heart and soul--everything that is in you, if it is to be worth while.

These and other disconnected thoughts flitted fugitively through her
mind as she sat waiting for Penelope's return. Vague visions of the
future; memories--hastily slurred over; odd, rather frightened musings
on the morrow's ceremony, when Penny would bind herself to Ralph ". . .
_in the sight of God, and in the face of this congregation_."

Rather curiously Nan reflected that she had never actually read the
Marriage Service--only caught chance phrases here and there in the
course of other people's marriages. She switched on the light and
hunted about for a book of Common Prayer, turning the pages with quick,
nervous fingers till she came to the one headed: _The Solemnization of
Matrimony_. She began to read.

"_I require and charge you both, as ye will answer at the dreadful day
of judgment when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed . . ._"

How tremendously solemn and searching it sounded! She never remembered
being struck with the awfulness of matrimony when she had so
light-heartedly attended the weddings of her girl friends. Her
principal recollection was of small, white-surpliced choir-boys shrilly
singing "The Voice that breathed o'er Eden," and then, for a brief
space, of a confused murmur of responsive voices, the clergyman and the
bride and bridegroom dividing the honours fairly evenly between them,
while the congregation rustled their wedding garments as they craned
forward in their efforts to obtain a good view of the bride.

Followed the withdrawal into the vestry for the signing of the
register, when everybody seemed to be kissing everybody else with
considerable lack of discrimination. Finally, to the inspiriting
strains of Mendelssohn--who evidently saw nothing sad or sorrowful in a
wedding, but only joy and triumph and the completing of life--the whole
company, bride and bridegroom, relatives and guests, trooped down the
aisle and dwindled away in cars and carriages, to meet once more, like
an incoming tide, at the house of the bride's parents.

But this! . . . This solemn "_I charge ye both . . ._"--Nan read
on--"_If either of you know any impediment why ye may not be lawfully
joined together in matrimony, ye do now confess it_."

There would certainly be an impediment in her own case, since the bride
was in love with someone other than the bridegroom. Only, in the
strange world we live in, that is not regarded in the light of a
"lawful" impediment, so she wouldn't need to confess it--at least, not
to anyone except Roger, and her sense of fair play had already impelled
her to do that.

Her eyes flew along the words of the service, skimming hastily over the
tender beauty of the vows the man and woman give each other. For they
are only beautiful if love informs them. To Nan they were rather
terrifying with their suggestion of irrevocability.

"_So long as ye both shall live . . ._"

Why, she and Roger were young enough to anticipate thirty or forty
years together! Thirty or forty years--before death came and released
them from each other.

"_Then shall the priest join their right hands together and say, Those
whom God hath joined together, let no man put asunder._"

Nan stretched out a slender right hand and regarded it curiously. Some
time to-morrow--at about half-past twelve, she supposed--the priest
would join the hands of Penelope and Ralph and henceforth there would
be no sundering "till death did them part."

Driven by circumstances, she had not stopped to consider the possible
duration of marriage when she pledged her word to Roger, and during the
time which had elapsed since she left Mallow the vision of the Roger
who had sometimes jarred upon her, irritating her by his narrowed
outlook and his lack of perception, had inevitably faded considerably,
as the memory of temperamental irritations is apt to do as soon as
absence has secured relief from them.

Latterly, Nan had been feeling quite affectionately disposed towards
him--he was really rather a dear in some ways! And she had accepted an
invitation to spend part of the winter at Trenby Hall.

The Seymours had planned to go abroad for several months and, since
Penelope would be married and on tour, it had seemed a very natural
solution of matters. So that when Lady Gertrude's rather
stiffly-worded letter of invitation had arrived, Nan accepted it,
determining in her own mind that, during the visit, she would try to
overcome her mother-in-law's dislike to her. The knowledge of how much
Roger loved her and of how little she was really able to give him in
return, made her feel that it was only playing the game to please him
in any way she could. And she recognised that to a man of Roger's
ideas, the fact that his wife and mother were on good terms with one
another would be a source of very definite satisfaction.

But now, as she re-read the solemn phrase: _So long as ye both shall
live_, she was seized with panic. To be married for ten, twenty, forty
years, perhaps, with never the hand of happy chance--the wonderful,
enthralling "might be" of life--to help her to endure it! With a
little stifled cry she sprang up and began pacing the room
restlessly--up and down, up and down, her slim hands clenching and
unclenching as she walked.

Presently--she could, not have told whether it was five minutes or five
hours later--she heard the click of a latch-key in the lock. At the
sound, the imperative need for self-control rushed over her. Penelope,
of all people, must never know--never guess that she wasn't happy in
her engagement to Roger. She didn't intend to spoil Penny's own
happiness by the faintest cloud of worry on her account.

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