Part 4 (1/2)

7.

He gave me the letter. I looked at the handwriting on the folded paper. I don't know what I thought to see. Something bold, perhaps, with loops and flourishes; or its reverse, darkly scrawled and mean. This was just handwriting, much like any other, except that the ends of the words tailed off in little dashes, making the words themselves not altogether easy to decipher.

”She does not appear to know that we have heard the news,” said my G.o.dfather. ”She must have left Florence before Signor Rainaldi wrote his letter. Well, see what you make of it. I will give you my opinion afterwards.”

I opened up the letter. It was dated from a hostelry in Plymouth, on the thirteenth of September.

”DEAR MR. KENDALL, ”When Ambrose spoke of you, as he so often did, I little thought my first communication with you would be fraught with so much sadness. I arrived in Plymouth, from Genoa, this morning, in a state of great distress, and alas alone.

”My dear one died in Florence on the 20th of July, after a short illness but violent in its attack. Everything was done that could be done, but the best doctors I could summon were not able to save him. There was a recurrence of some fever that had seized him earlier in the spring, but the last was due to pressure on the brain which the doctors think had lain dormant for some months, then rapidly increased its hold upon him. He lies in the Protestant cemetery in Florence, in a site chosen by myself, quiet, and a little apart from the other English graves, with trees surrounding it, which is what he would have wished. Of my personal sorrow and great emptiness I will say nothing; you do not know me, and I have no desire to inflict my grief upon you.

”My first thought has been for Philip, whom Ambrose loved so dearly, and whose grief will be equal to my own. My good friend and counselor, Signor Rainaldi of Florence, a.s.sured me that he would write to you and break the news, so that you in turn could tell Philip, but I have little faith in those mails from Italy to England, and was fearful either that the news should come to you by hearsay, through a stranger, or that it would not come at all. Hence my arrival in this country. I have brought with me all Ambrose's possessions; his books, his clothes, everything that Philip would wish to have and keep, which now, by right, belong to him. If you will tell me what to do with them, how to send them, and whether or not I should write to Philip myself, I shall be deeply grateful.

”I left Florence very suddenly, on impulse and without regret. I could not bear to stay with Ambrose gone. As to further plans, I have none. After so great a shock time for reflection is, I think, most necessary. I had hoped to be in England before this, but was held up at Genoa, for the s.h.i.+p that brought me was not ready to sail. I believe I still have members of my own family, the Coryns, scattered about Cornwall, but knowing none of them I have no wish to intrude upon them. I would much prefer to be alone. Possibly, after I have rested here a little, I may travel up to London, and then make further plans.

”I will await instruction from you what to do with my husband's possessions.

”Most sincerely yours, ”RACHEL ASHLEY.”

I read the letter once, twice, perhaps three times, then gave it back to my G.o.dfather. He waited for me to speak. I did not say a word.

”You see,” he said at length, ”that after all she has kept nothing. Not so much as one book, or a pair of gloves. They are all for you.”

I did not answer.

”She doesn't even ask to see the house,” he went on, ”the house that would have been her home had Ambrose lived. That voyage she has just made, you realize, of course, that if things had been otherwise they would have made it together? This would have been her homecoming. What a difference, eh? All the people on the estate to welcome her, the servants agog with excitement, the neighbors calling-instead of which, a lonely hostelry in Plymouth. She may be pleasant or unpleasant-how can I tell, I have not met her. But the point is, she asks nothing, she demands nothing. Yet she is Mrs. Ashley. I'm sorry, Philip. I know your views, and you won't be shaken. But as Ambrose's friend, as his trustee, I cannot sit here and do nothing when his widow arrives alone and friendless in this country. We have a guest room in this house. She is welcome to it until her plans are formed.”

I went and stood by the window. Louise was not absent after all. She had a basket on her arm, and was snipping off the heads of the dead flowers in the border. She raised her head and saw me, waving her hand. I wondered if my G.o.dfather had read the letter to her.

”Well, Philip?” he said. ”You can write to her or not, just as you wish. I don't suppose you want to see her, and if she accepts my invitation I shall not ask you over whilst she is here. But some sort of message at least is due from you, an acknowledgment of the things she has brought back for you. I can put that in a postscript when I write.”

I turned away from the window, and looked back at him.

”Why should you imagine I don't wish to see her?” I asked. ”I do wish to see her, very much. If she is a woman of impulse, which she appears to be from that letter-I recollect Rainaldi telling me the same thing-then I can also act on impulse, which I propose to do. It was impulse that took me to Florence in the first place, wasn't it?”

”Well?” asked my G.o.dfather, his brows knitting, staring at me suspiciously.

”When you write to Plymouth,” I said, ”say that Philip Ashley has already heard the news of Ambrose's death. That he went to Florence on receipt of two letters, went to the villa Sangalletti, saw her servants, saw her friend and adviser, Signor Rainaldi, and is now returned. Say that he is a plain man, and lives in a plain fas.h.i.+on. That he has no fine manners, no conversation, and is little used to the society of women, or indeed of anyone. If, however, she wishes to see him and her late husband's home-Philip Ashley's house is at the disposal of his cousin Rachel, when she cares to visit it.” And I placed my hand upon my heart, and bowed.

”I never thought,” said my G.o.dfather slowly, ”to see you grow so hard. What has happened to you?”

”Nothing has happened to me,” I said, ”save that, like a young warhorse, I smell blood. Have you forgotten my father was a soldier?”

Then I went out into the garden to find Louise. Her concern at the news was greater than my own. I took her hand and dragged her to the summerhouse beside the lawn. We sat there together, like conspirators.

”Your house isn't fit to receive anyone,” she said at once, ”let alone a woman like the contessa-like Mrs. Ashley. You see, I can't help calling her contessa too, it comes more naturally. Why, Philip, there hasn't been a woman staying there for twenty years. What room will you put her in? And think of the dust! Not only upstairs but in the drawing room too. I noticed it last week.”

”None of that matters,” I said impatiently. ”She can dust the place herself, if she minds so much. The worse she finds it, the better pleased I shall be. Let her know at last the happy carefree life we led, Ambrose and I. Unlike that villa...”

”Oh, but you're wrong,” exclaimed Louise. ”You don't want to seem a boor, an ignoramus, like one of the hinds on the estate. That would be putting yourself at a disadvantage before you even spoke to her. You must remember she has lived on the continent all her life, has been used to great refinement, many servants-they say foreign ones are much better than ours-and she is certain to have brought a quant.i.ty of clothes, and jewels too, perhaps, besides Mr. Ashley's things. She will have heard so much about the house from him that she will expect something very fine, like her own villa. And to have it all untidy, dusty, smelling like a kennel-why, you would not want her to find it so, Philip, for his sake, surely?”

G.o.d d.a.m.n it, I was angry. ”What the devil do you mean,” I said, ”by my house smelling like a kennel? It's a man's house, plain and homely, and please G.o.d it always will be. Neither Ambrose nor I went in for fancy furnis.h.i.+ngs and little ornaments on tables that come cras.h.i.+ng to the ground if you brush your knee against them.”

She had the grace to look contrite, if not ashamed.

”I'm sorry,” she said, ”I did not mean to offend you. You know I love your house, I have a great affection for it and always will. But I can't help saying what I think, as to the way it's kept. Nothing new for so long, no real warmth about it, and lacking-well, lacking comfort, if you'll forgive that too.”

I thought of the bright trim parlor where she made my G.o.dfather sit of an evening, and I knew which I would prefer to have, and he too in all probability, faced with the choice of that and my library.

”All right,” I said, ”forget my lack of comfort. It suited Ambrose, and it suits me, and for the s.p.a.ce of a few days-however long she chooses so to honor me with her presence-it can suit my cousin Rachel too.”

Louise shook her head at me.

”You're quite incorrigible,” she said. ”If Mrs. Ashley is the woman I believe her to be she will take one look at the house and then seek refuge in St. Austell, or with us.”

”You're very welcome,” I replied, ”when I have done with her.”

Louise looked at me curiously. ”Will you really dare to question her?” she asked. ”Where will you begin?”

I shrugged my shoulders. ”I can't say until I have seen her. She'll try to bl.u.s.ter her way out, I have no doubt. Or maybe make a great play of emotion, swoon and have hysterics. That won't worry me. I shall watch her, and enjoy it.”

”I don't think she will bl.u.s.ter,” said Louise, ”nor have hysterics. She will merely sweep into the house and take command. Don't forget, she must be used to giving orders.”

”She won't give them in my house.”

”Poor Seecombe! What I would give to see his face. She will throw things at him, if he fails to come when she pulls her bell. Italians are very pa.s.sionate, you know, very quick-tempered. I have always heard so.”

”She's only half Italian,” I reminded her, ”and I think Seecombe is well able to take care of himself. Perhaps it will rain for three days, and she will be confined to bed with rheumatism.”

We laughed together in the summerhouse, like a pair of children, but for all that I was not so light of heart as I pretended. The invitation had been flung onto the air like a challenge, and already I think I had regretted it, though I did not say so to Louise. I regretted it more when I went home and looked about me. Dear heaven, it was a foolhardy thing to go and do, and had it not been for pride I think I would have ridden back to my G.o.dfather and told him to send no message from me, when he wrote to Plymouth.

What in the world was I to do with that woman in my house? What indeed should I say to her, what action should I take? If Rainaldi had been plausible, she would be ten times more so. Direct attack might not succeed, and what was it the Italian had said anyway about tenacity, and women fighting battles? If she should be loudmouthed, vulgar, I thought I knew how to shut her up. A fellow from one of the farms became entangled with such a one, who would have sued him for breach of promise, and I soon had her packing back to Devon, where she belonged. But sugary, insidious, with heaving bosom and sheep's eyes, could I deal with that? I believed so. I had met with some of these in Oxford, and I always found extreme bluntness of speech, amounting to brutality, sent them back to their holes in the ground with no bones broken. No, all things considered, I was pretty c.o.c.ksure, pretty confident, that when I had actual speech with my cousin Rachel I should find my tongue. But preparations for the visit, that was the deuce, the facade of courtesy before the salute to arms.

To my great surprise, Seecombe received the idea without dismay. It was almost as if he had expected it. I told him briefly that Mrs. Ashley had arrived in England, bringing with her Mr. Ambrose's effects, and that it was possible she would arrive for a short visit within the week. His underlip did not just forward, as it usually did when faced with any problem, and he listened to me with gravity.

”Yes, sir,” he said, ”very right and very proper. We shall all be glad to welcome Mrs. Ashley.”

I glanced at him over my pipe, amused at his pomposity.

”I thought,” I said, ”you were like me, and did not care for women in the house. You sang a different tune when I told you Mr. Ambrose had been married, and she would be mistress here.”

He looked shocked. This time the nether lip went forward.

”That was not the same, sir,” he said; ”there has been tragedy since then. The poor lady is widowed. Mr. Ambrose would have wished us to do what we can for her, especially as it seems”-he coughed discreetly-”that Mrs. Ashley has not benefited in any way from the decease.”

I wondered how the devil he knew that, and asked him.