Jimmy Quixote: A Novel. Gallon Tom

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СКАЧАТЬ deeper into the heart of Old Paul, and to understand what that real intimate heart meant for her.

      Old Paul bent over her, and softly put back a long strand of dark hair from her face. Honora Jackman had taken the candle, and was shading the light carefully, so that it happened that Moira's flush of sudden pleasure at his touch was unseen. Honora was looking not at the child, but at him, and her eyes were laughing.

      "Why are you so afraid of me, Mr. Nannock?" she whispered, squeezing the warm top of the candle between a finger and thumb, and looking thoughtfully at the light.

      "I – I don't think I am," he breathed in reply.

      "Oh, yes, you are," she retorted. "So much afraid of me that you had once to set this baby between me and – shall we say – possible danger?" She gave a little quick laugh in her throat, and flashed a glance at him.

      "Oh – that was a whim – of hers and mine," he said steadily, still keeping his voice to the lowest. "Besides, if you come to that, I think she stands first – in all things."

      "Oh, I quite know that," she whispered. "But I wonder sometimes, as every woman wonders where a man who interests her is concerned – I wonder what you think of me."

      "Nothing but the best, I assure you."

      "That counts for nothing – and means nothing," she whispered sharply. "Lord, what fools we women are," she went on, in quite another tone. "I wonder what you'd think of me if I told you what was in my mind?"

      "Is it necessary?" he whispered gravely.

      "I think so," she said. "I came down here and heard about you, and set you down for a fool – a gaby. I thought all this business of the children was a pose – something to make you talked about; I know now that it isn't. And I like you for it – love you a little for it."

      "Shall we go downstairs?" he asked.

      "Not yet; there's something else to be said – and I may as well say it beside this child, who holds your heart in those slim fingers of hers, as anywhere else – better perhaps. I don't suppose you'll see me again – at any time; why should you?" She laughed that queer little laugh in her throat, and kept her bright eyes on the light of the candle. "So I'll say now that I would have sold my immortal soul to-night to have had you stand beside me as you've stood beside this baby – and touched my hair once like that – and looked at me with that softened look in your eyes. That's all. Now we can go down."

      They moved towards the door; there he stopped and turned towards her. "I think you might kiss the child," he said, with a nod back towards the bed. "I should like to remember that you did that."

      "Thank you," she whispered, and stole back to the bed.

      Moira had heard, and in some dim fashion had partly understood – was perhaps a little ashamed of her own triumph; therefore, it happened that when Honora Jackman bent over her, she reached up an arm in apparent half slumber and encircled Honora's neck. When the woman had settled the bed-clothes about the child she turned away quickly, and came back to where Paul stood, and handed him the candle. And she was smiling quite gaily.

      Outside the room they met Mrs. Baffall; the good woman had felt that after all she might as well come up and look after her guest. "So you've seen them?" she whispered. "Aren't they sweet?"

      "Oh – they're all right – for children," replied Honora, with a laugh. "And they always look better asleep, you know."

      She ran downstairs, leaving the others to follow at their leisure. Mrs. Baffall turned an anxious face to Paul, and spoke excusingly of her.

      "You mustn't think she's hard," she said. "I'm afraid it's her life – the people she's met, you know. There's some tenderness in her."

      "I believe there is," replied Paul.

      Honora Jackman was to leave the place the next day, so that this was a species of farewell. Paul presently insisted that a glass of wine should be drunk in her honour before they parted; and even Jimmy – blinking hard to keep his eyes open – was allowed a minute fraction of a glass wherewith to honour the toast. And by that time Honora Jackman, with nothing of that past tenderness and humility upon her, insisted upon clinking glasses with the boy, and drank to him specially, so that he blushed to the very ears.

      "Jimmy – I drink to you," she said, and her eyes were very soft. "I shan't forget you, Jimmy – and I'm going to ask Mr. Nannock to let you come to the station to see me off in the morning – and only you."

      The boy looked anxiously at Paul, and Paul nodded with a smile. Very soon after that they heard her voice calling back to them as they stood at the gate, and as she walked away with the Baffalls. The voice was high and strident and loud as ever.

      "She's a good woman, Jimmy," said Paul, as he closed and locked the gate.

      "She's wonderful!" said the boy, with a little catch in his voice.

      He was down at the station hours before the train could possibly start; he watched the clock anxiously; wished, as time went on, that she also might on this last occasion have found it in her heart to come early, and to talk to him before she went. He felt he could have braved the grins of the one porter and the station-master in that event.

      He had exhausted every nook and corner of the station, and had even wandered disconsolately outside in the road to watch for the coming carriage; but five minutes before the coming of the train there was still no sign of her. Then, when his heart was beginning to beat with the hope that after all she had decided not to go, the carriage came in sight, with the coachman flogging his horses. There was a minute and a half before the train was to come, but Honora Jackman got out of the carriage as serenely as ever, and began to give directions about her luggage. Jimmy, getting near to her, ventured to touch her hand; she looked round at him and said, quite in a tone of surprise: "Hullo, Jimmy! where did you come from?" just as though she had not expected him, or had not remembered that he was to meet her. Jimmy's one chance of a tender moment with her came when the anxious station-master, after fuming and fretting and grinding his teeth, had seen her into the train; and the one porter, red in the face from unaccustomed exertion, had got her luggage by superhuman efforts into the van. Then she dropped coppers to the porter, and held out a hand to Jimmy as the whistle sounded.

      "I got up late, Jimmy; I didn't think I'd start at all, as a matter of fact. Good-bye; there hasn't been time for a word – has there?"

      She might have leaned out of the window at the last; the boy waited until the very tail end of the train was disappearing under the bridge and round the curve. But by that time Honora Jackman was deep in a paper, and had forgotten his very existence.

      Jimmy trudged home, kicking up more dust than was really necessary on the road, and having his cap drawn down over his eyes. Subsequently he confessed to Old Paul that girls were beasts, and that for his part he had quite made up his mind never to marry. There were lots of things a fellow could do in the world; Jimmy seemed to suggest a sort of sardonic attitude, in which he stood with folded arms and a cynical expression, looking on at people making fools of themselves over women, and secretly pitying them. The change came at the end of a week, what time a letter arrived for "Master James Larrance"; the writing was big and sprawling, and quite a lot of Jimmy's unaccustomed name had been lost under the stamp and postmark.

      But it was from her; there was the signature at the end – "Honora Jackman" – with the "man" cramped up in a corner – pushed out of the way, as it were, by the first syllable. And above that wondrous name the words, "yours ever lovingly."

      Jimmy passed the thing off casually enough – quite СКАЧАТЬ