Part 49 (1/2)

”My darling!” she whispered, almost inaudibly, with closed eyes. ”Thank you. Thank you. But leave me to myself now....”

He kissed her, with his manly tenderness, and then went out and shut the door. She opened her eyes, looked round the room. But it was as though she was ashamed before everything, before the walls of the room and the furniture around her; for she now closed her eyes again and hid her face in her hands.

And she sat like that for long, as though lost in thanksgiving for the mercy vouchsafed her by life....

But, between the two of them, the boy now brightened, strong in the power of truth and certainty, even though window after window had opened before him, giving him a glimpse into the world. Between the two of them, he recovered his former self, his former voice, his childish tempers even, became once more the consolation and the aim of their two existences. She went for walks on his arm; he went bicycling with him for long distances, full of air and s.p.a.ce. The house resounded with his young, serious, no longer treble voice. When she looked at him, however, she thought that he had grown, had become broader; that the shape of his head, the curve of his cheeks were losing the childish softness that still belonged to his years....

And, when Van der Welcke felt bored in his smoking-room and went and sat with Addie in the ”turret,” always first punctiliously asking his son if he was interrupting him in his work, he no longer took him on his knee....

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

It was one morning during the summer holidays that old Mr. van der Welcke said to his wife:

”Why not ask the little boy to come and stay with us?”

There was never much said between the old people, but each understood without words, or from a single word, the thought that was pa.s.sing in the other's mind.

Not until the evening did the old lady ask:

”The little boy alone?”

”Yes, alone ... or with Henri.”

Two days after that, she suggested:

”Oughtn't we to invite them, all three, in that case? Constance as well?”

The old man said nothing and went on reading, as though he had not heard; and his wife did not press for an answer. But, at nightfall, when they sat staring at the dark summer evening outside, old Mr. van der Welcke said:

”No, I don't like her. Let us ask Henri and Adriaan.”

She said nothing. She was used to obeying her husband's wishes; and she had brought up Henri also, long ago, to obey his parents' wishes. And Henri had obediently given up his life, given up himself, at their command, to that woman. Which of the two was more to blame, whether he had been the tempter or she the temptress, they did not know, they did not wish to know, because all temptation sprang from the evil one; but Henri was a man; and so the responsibility fell upon him. He being responsible, they had commanded him to sacrifice himself and thus to atone for his sin, in the face of G.o.d and man. That was how they had seen it at the time, how they had commanded, how it had come to pa.s.s.

But he, the father, had lost his son through that command; and the loss always rankled....

”Henri and Adriaan alone,” the old man repeated.

Now that he was repeating his few words, she knew that his will was irrevocable. She was sorry for it: the voices which spoke to her now and then, on nights when the wind blew, had gradually brought her to a gentler mood, as though they had been soothing music to her listening soul. Those voices had told her to go to the Hague; and there she had for the second time seen that woman, the bane of their life as parents, and met that woman's mother; and it was as though that meeting between mother and mother had been a gentle balm, as gentle and healing as the magic music of the voices, a balm that brought about a softer mood, that caused more to be understood, that caused much to be forgiven, in a gradual approach towards reconciliation, after so many, many dismal years of silent rancour and antagonism. In her, the old woman, the rancour had as it were melted away, since she had read the strange book, since she had heard the voices on gusty nights, since she had seen that woman's mother and known her sadness. In the old woman it was a gentle wish not only for reconciliation, but for some measure of friends.h.i.+p with that woman, the wife of her son, the mother of her grandchild. But she felt that there was no trace of any such wish in her husband's heart; and, because she could only obey, she said nothing and merely told him wordlessly that she did not think as he thought.

He heard her saying it without words, but he did not give in.

And, when they went to bed, he said:

”I shall write to Henri to-morrow.”

He wrote to ask if Henri and Adriaan would come and spend a week at Driebergen, before Adriaan's holidays were over. Van der Welcke felt in the laboured words of that old man who was not used to writing that his father was implacable towards Constance. Constance felt it and so did Addie. And, when Addie, offended on his mother's behalf, said, angrily, that she was being left behind alone, she replied:

”It's better that you should go with Papa, my boy.”