A Woman's Cross

Chapter I

Brooklands was a rural village, known generally among artists for its rustic beauty. A triangular green, with groups of thatched cottages — on one side was the old Norman church, with its ivied chancel and tower ; opposite, three giant elms stood sentinels before the quaint, tumbledown old inn. To the left of this a small stone bridge spanned the narrow, sluggish river Rumble; and for background there was a range of hills — woodland, pasture and cornfields, with here and there a lime quarry. A bright and peaceful retreat was Brooklands — its gardens ablaze with spring flowers, its orchards a mass of frail pink blossoms, its neatly-kept cottages snug and prosperous-looking. But in one of the largest dwellings around the green reigned sorrow and death. Blinds shrouded the windows. The church bell was tolling.

A group of black-clad men were waiting to be let in to the long, low house which stood back in the shadow of the three tall elms. ' The Lilacs ' was a pretty place — its walls A covered with roses. For the last two years it had been rented by a middle-aged widow and her young daughter. At first, the refined, still beauti ful woman had been regarded askance by the inhabitants — always exclusively inclined and dis trustful of strangers. But the clergyman, the Reverend Hugh Noel, and his wife, were soon intimate with the new-comers, and after a few months, Mrs Burney and her daughter Joan had been adopted by the leading members of the Brooklands social circle. Mrs Burney's sudden and alarming illness caused considerable disturb ance among the new acquaintances who were now her friends, and her death came as an unpleasant shock.

To-day was the funeral. In the drawing-room, among all the pretty nick-nacks and delicate draperies the mistress of the house had known so well how to arrange, lay the massive oak coffin, on trestles. Standing by it were Mrs Burney's sole mourners — Mr Doyle, a slim, little old man with a shrewd, kindly face — the lawyer, from London — and Joan, the motherless girl. She was a tall, willowy, graceful young creature, with a creamy skin, regular features, large, soft, startled brown eyes, and magnificent auburn hair, which seemed to have caught and imprisoned the sunshine — for in some lights it shone like burnished gold. To-day this halo of red gold — her tightly-bound plaits — accorded curiously with the dull, deep black of her first mourning. Mr Doyle had been nervously anxious as to how he should find his young client, who, in losing her mother, was losing all ; and in his ignorance of the out ward signs of inward feminine grief, had been relieved to find her seemingly apathetic, if pale as the corpse itself.

But as time went on, he began to suspect that Joan was too self-possessed, too calm. He wished she would cry. For the twentieth time, he urged her to remain in the house — not to follow the coffin to the grave. ' I must go ! ' she said, with suppressed passion, laying her slim white hand lovingly on the coffin lid. ' Oh — why, why is there no one else to go — as well — only you ? Where are they all, Mr Doyle ? There must be someone ! ' ' Where are they ? Who, my dear ? ' he stammered, reddening a little, and nervously crumpling his new black glove. ' She must have had someone belonging to her ! ' said Joan, miserably. ' I thought they would have come — with you. It seems so terrible — only you and I ! ' ' Surely you must know your mother's friends — relatives — I have only to do with her affairs,' said Mr Doyle, uneasily. ' Mrs Burney was, I under stand, an only child — but perhaps there were cousins — or an uncle or aunt — you might have summoned.' She turned her great eyes anxiously, scrutinis ingly upon him. ' We have lived abroad, as you know, till we came here,' she said. ' She never talked about them — we had so much else to talk about — oh ! ' It was a bitter wail of despair — the moan with which she laid her head on the coffin.

Mr Doyle fidgeted, and desperately cast about what to say, when there was a gentle knock at the door, and a nice-looking housemaid, her comely face red and swollen with weeping, beckoned the lawyer out. ' Mr Noel says, sir, will you please tell the men to wait a quarter of an hour, and step over to the rectory ? ' she said, in the low voice in which those speak who are in custody of the dead. ' I will go now — at once. Go in to Miss Joan, there's a good girl,' said the lawyer. ' And taking his hat, he went out, closed the door softly behind him, gave directions in an undertone to the principal of the men who were waiting to carry the coffin to its resting-place, then walked quickly across the green to the rectory, a gabled house next to the church. ' He is not satisfied with my letter and the en closures,' he thought. ' I expected this.

He will try and worm something out of me. He must not succeed.' He knocked at the rectory door, and was con ducted by a neat parlourmaid to the library, where the Honourable and Reverend Hugh Noel com posed those ornate and recondite sermons which lulled so many bucolic brains into soft slumber on Sunday mornings. The rector, a tall, dark-haired man, rose to receive him. 'We meet again on a most melancholy occasion,' he said, as he shook hands and waved the little lawyer to a chair. He had a courtly manner, and a deep-toned, sympathetic voice. ' Our charming friend was one of the sweetest, most gentle of women. And brilliant — undoubtedly brilliant. A great loss. But surely, surely there must be some misapprehension ? There cannot be the slightest need for the suppression of any facts connected with the life of one so spotless?

There cannot possibly — of that I feel absolutely convinced — be any episode in her past which cannot bear the fullest light of day.' Mr Doyle wriggled a little. ' Am I to under stand that you are dissatisfied with my communication of this morning?' he asked, somewhat stiffly. ' Of course — had Mrs Burney been a stranger — there might have been a difficulty,' said the rector, deprecatingly. 'As it is — why, I feel justified in proceeding with the last rites without the explana tions usual in such cases. Meanwhile, for other reasons — to me most important ones — I must be allowed to ask you a question or two.' ' I do not promise to answer them,' said Mr Doyle, gravely, although his principal anxiety — that Mr Noel might refuse to bury his client with out further disclosures — was relieved. The rector shrugged his shoulders with a faint smile. ' As you please,' he said. ' Meanwhile, I will be frank.

You are aware that I have an only son, Mr Doyle, who is heir to his uncle, my brother, Lord Woodleigh. I have good reason to suspect that he is attached to our young friend, Joan Burney. Indeed, I may say that I have not discouraged the liking which I saw was growing up between the young people — for I am fond of Joan, and greatly admired her poor mother. Be sides, although Mrs Burney was reluctant to speak of her family and friends, she acknowledged that the late Major-General Burney was Joan's great uncle. But — but — if there should be any difficulty in the past which would prevent Joan's introduction as my son's wife — you will admit that I ought to know it. Come, I will put it plainly to you. Is there any scandal in the lives of Joan's parents ? Any blotch or blur upon her name ? ' ' The name of Burney — is as clean as any in the kingdom,' said Mr Doyle, flushing a little. ' Mrs Burney was one of the best women alive.

That is all I am at liberty to say.' ' There is no stain on the name of Burney — and Mrs Burney was one of the best women alive,' repeated the rector, musingly. ' Burney is the father's name — and spotless — the mother is above reproach. Then why the mystery? Why their absolute friendlessness ? ' ' I am happy to tell you that Miss Burney is not altogether friendless,' said Mr Doyle, dryly. ' Sir Robert and Lady Boucher of Rutland Gate and " The Herons," Shropshire, have invited her to remain with them for an indefinite period. Are they relatives? Miss Burney is at this very moment ignorant of their existence. I have to propose this visit to her after the funeral. I am her guardian.' ' And you cannot — or will not — tell me what this presumed mystery really is?' asked Mr Noel, reluctantly rising as his visitor stood up to depart. ' I like Joan so much.

I fear my son's affections are really engaged. I should be so sorry to separ ate them — as I must inevitably do — unless I know more of the family affairs.' ' You must do exactly as you please, Mr Noel,' said the little lawyer, in a matter-of-fact manner, glancing at the clock, then bustling off. ' In ten minutes we shall be at the lychgate.' ' I shall be there,' said the rector, dryly. Then he went off to the vestry, where the clerk was already awaiting him, to don his surplice. What a peculiar thing it was, he mused, as he stood at the gate, seriously contemplating the little cortege — the oaken coffin borne by six men, followed by the slim girl in black and Mr Doyle only — that so attractive and refined a woman as Mrs Burney should have no fond relatives or friends to accompany her to the grave.

It was outrageous, horrible — or would be — unless, indeed, she had by some rash action in the past (wicked ness he could not credit her with) have forfeited her claims to the respect and affection of her fellow-creatures. ' I am the Resurrection and the Life.' Solemn words always, but they had never seemed more so to the rector than when, later on, he stood at the head of that narrow grave reading the beautiful words with which the remains of the departed are committed to the earth. The sun shone on Joan's set, pale face as she stood motionless, her large brown eyes fixed sternly on vacancy. A bird sang joyously on a tree close by. Little groups of Mr Noel's parishioners, some entirely in mourning, and Mrs Burney's poorer neighbours, all wearing some morsel of crape as a token of sympathy and regret, stood at a respectful distance.

It seemed to the rector that he was not only burying a senseless corpse, but the happiness of two young lives. He could not permit Ray mond's marriage with a girl who was under a cloud — he must not. And yet it went against him — that which lay before him — to refuse Raymond his consent to an engagement which he knew he intended to enter upon. (Captain Noel — he had but lately been gazetted — had not been able to obtain leave to be present at the funeral — but he was coming to Brooklands to-morrow. Mr Noel had had a short but impetuous letter from him that morning, which, as he informed his wife, ' pretty well told him which way the wind blew.') The service over, the rector went up to Joan. ' This is all very sad, my dear child,' he said, in sympathetic, fatherly tones. ' Believe me, we all mourn with you.

When may we come and see you ?' Joan's nerves were strained to the utmost. She heard the words, but hardly recognised their mean ing. Since that ominous, cruel rattle of the hand ful of earth upon the coffin she had felt vaguely maddened, as if she should shriek in her mute anguish. She looked somewhat wildly from Mr Noel to her only friend, the lawyer. ' She will be better to-morrow,' said Mr Doyle, apologetically. ' Come, dear, take my arm.' As the kindly little man — who, although an old bachelor who lived alone with only a couple of cats and their occasional broods of kittens as his com panions, felt a real paternal tenderness for his desolate young ward — supported the trembling girl across the green into the lonely house, Mr Noel gazed regretfully after them. ' What can it be ? ' he asked himself, as he hung up his surplice in the vestry and returned to the rectory.

He was as much puzzled as dismayed. There had been discrepancies and omissions in the proofs of Mrs Burney's identity sufficient to cause considerable delay in her burial had he been in clined to make difficulties. There was some secret in her life — there was something which must be hidden. He asked himself if he had not suspected this at times — and could not but admit that he had doubted the antecedents of his interesting parishioner — although, while he did so, he had reproached himself, especially when she had looked so frankly into his face with her pure, beautiful, fearless eyes. Meanwhile, Joan had walked straight into the little drawing-room, and had stared around with a vacant, hopeless gaze. Then she sank into a chair and sighed. Mr Doyle hesitated a moment. He must rouse her. It would be best to be commonplace, and to treat the inevitable as a matter of course.

He seated himself on a chair opposite her, and glanced, first at his watch, then at the marble clock on the mantelpiece, on which a gilt figure of Shakespeare reclined in an easy attitude, with a bland expression on its golden face. ' Your clock has stopped, I think,' he said cheerily. ' I must go back by the three o'clock train. You can give me something to eat before I go.' Joan rose and rang the bell. Then she glanced at the clock and shuddered. ' It stopped — on Saturday — an hour after she died,' she said. ' She always wound them. She did — everything.' ' Ah,' said the lawyer, sympathetically. Then he took out his letter-case and appeared to be looking for something, until Mary, the lachrymose housemaid, had come in, received orders for his luncheon, and had departed again, when he began briskly, — ' We have not much time to talk over our affairs, so let us get to business at once,' he said. ' I wonder, now, if your dear mother ever spoke to you of her financial position ?

Of her income ? ' Joan shook her head drearily. ' No,' she said, apathetically. To her, at that moment, finance and incomes were intolerably vapid and unin teresting subjects. ' H'm,' said Mr Doyle, stroking his chin. ' That is somewhat strange. You do not know that your mother's income ceases at her death ? ' Joan looked vacantly at him. ' No,' she said again, wearily. A Woman ' s Cross 10 ' H'm,' said the lawyer, doubtfully. ' There will be a trifling sum paid to you quarterly — ten pounds — for pin-money, clothes, travelling ex penses, and that sort of thing. But, of course, you cannot live upon that' Something in the tone of his voice aroused Joan from her stupor. She glanced up — her eyes were less dazed and filmy. 'You mean — I must leave here?' she asked sharply. A fresh pang had balanced the dull pain of loss.

She must leave the house where she had been so happy — the garden where she had talked and walked with Raymond — the lawn where he had lain at her feet reading Tennyson and Shelley while she worked — the river where they had boated and fished together. ' I am afraid you must,' he answered gently. ' But do not imagine you are homeless, or anything of that sort. Some old friends of your mother's wish to adopt you — to treat you quite as their own child. They are important people. Sir Robert Boucher is a member of Parliament — Lady Boucher is much esteemed in society.' Joan frowned, and thought deeply for a few moments. 'My mother's friends?' she asked, slowly, significantly. ' And I never heard her mention them. If they were her friends, why did they not follow her to the grave? At least they might have done that much ! ' ' Remember the distance from town,' said Mr Doyle, reddening a little. ' Then, Sir Robert is a busy man.

No doubt he would have offered to come if he had thought you would like it.' ' Why did he not come to see my mother when she was alive?' cried Joan, her great eyes kindling. ' Surely, surely if these people had been good friends to her, they would not have left her so utterly alone ! She did not want friends. She found them everywhere — everyone who saw her loved her. But why do they appear — first — when she is gone — when they can do nothing for her any more — never see or speak to her again ? ' 'You ask a very natural question,' he said soothingly. ' Very natural. I ought to have begun by telling you that years ago your mother and Sir Robert agreed to differ on certain matters con nected with her family affairs. He became her trustee — how that happened I do not know, nor have I cared to inquire.

Her income had to pass through his hands. There was a disagreement of some sort, and, quite amicably, they both thought that it would be better for me to be a go-between. I was a third party, who could not be suspected of any leaning to either side, and I believe I have given satisfaction to both my clients. Now you know.' ' And — I am to accept a home with a man she disliked ? ' said Joan, her pale cheeks crimsoning. ' Mr Doyle ! How can you ? ' ' You are wrong — your mother had the greatest possible esteem and respect for Sir Robert, who is one of the most upright, honourable men alive,' said Mr Doyle, warmly. ' If only she had lived to write her instructions, she would have named him your sole guardian. She had all confidence in him ! ' Joan smiled — a bitter, incredulous smile. ' She told me everything,' she said slowly. ' I knew all her sweet, beautiful thoughts — all her compassion and tenderness.

But never — once — did she mention these people ! As I told you, I did not know till now that they existed ! ' A Womati's Cross 12 ' When there is a quarrel of any sort — or rather when there are strained relations between persons, silence is always the best policy,' said he, sagely. ' Your mother, being one of the most sensible of women, evidently thought so. You are very young. She doubtless shielded you from every suggestion of unpleasantness, as well as from a knowledge of worldly matters which it was unnecessary for you to know. It is so easy to destroy the bloom upon a young life ! Yours, fortunately, need never be de stroyed. Sir Robert and Lady Boucher will watch over and cherish you — you will be very happy with them — ' ' Happy ! ' cried Joan, with a glance of horror and scorn. In the first vehemence of her youthful grief the word seemed to pierce her racked heart as a poisoned arrow.

She grew deadly pale — her eyes seemed to contract and recede in their sockets, then she burst into a storm of passionate sobs. Mr Doyle did what was the best thing to do. He stole from the room, and left her to weep out her sorrow alone, while he interviewed the gloomy, disgusted cook — who took her indulgent mistress's sudden death as a personal injury to herself on the part of Providence — and had a less irritating talk with the tearful Mary, whose regrets were less selfish. He arranged with them to leave when he gave up possession of 'The Lilacs' to its proprietor; then he occupied himself in writ ing business letters to expedite Joan's removal to town. ' The sooner she is out of that young man's way the better,' he thought, as he fastened up a letter to Sir Robert Boucher and placed it in his breast pocket to post in town. ' Of course, it can never A Woman s Cross 13 be.

The father is a bit of a Pharisee. Then Sir Robert would not hear of it for a moment. Dear me ! If I am not very much mistaken, Boucher will meet his match in Joan. I wonder how it will all end ! '

Chapter II

Joan was more herself after that outburst The horrible tension was relaxed. She was terribly un happy. Her loneliness in the house was indescrib able. But her surroundings lost the strange, eerie appearance they had assumed at her mother's death, and she no longer felt as if she were overwhelmed by some nightmare from whose clutches she could only be snatched by death itself. Next morning Mary brought her her breakfast in bed, and drew up the blind. The sunshine poured into the room ; outside she saw fresh rose blooms that were buds a few days ago. Birds sang in the young trees in the garden. Her first instinct was to spring up and begin the old, joyous life. Then — she remembered. It was very dreadful. She and her mother, who was barely eighteen years her senior, had led so perfectly harmonious a dual life, that she hardly knew how to gather up the broken threads and live alone.

She would have despaired, but that she remembered — Raymond. Raymond had only known her — she had only known him — for two years. And during that short time he had been much away — at least, he was only at home at intervals. But how well she knew him ! They had sympathised with each other so absolutely. He had told her all his thoughts and feelings ; he had made her his confessor, treating her as one by nature far above him. And how he had loved her mother ! She broke down again when she re membered those two together. And he was com ing to-day— he had written her a few hurried lines deploring that he could not be with her yesterday — but that she might expect him without fail to day. She smoothed out the crumpled note — un consciously crushed in her hand during one of those throes of agony — and read, with a faint smile, those consoling words, — ' Bear up, dear, dear Joan — for my sake ! ' Yes, the world, bereaved though she was, was not altogether empty.

She roused herself, and calmly began her duties for the day. She had ac quiesced in Mr Doyle's proposal. She had con sented to try a residence with these suddenly appeared friends, the Bouchers. She had consented to leave Brooklands ' for good ' in a few days. There was much to be done first. Each drawer and box and press in the house must be dis burdened of its contents, and those contents must be sorted and packed. Mr Doyle had somewhat nervously offered to save her the trouble of looking through her mother's papers. But she had declined his proffered help. To her, all that belonged to her dead parent was inexpressibly sacred, and to this delicate task of examining her mother's escritoire and the small safe which had been their constant companion dur ing their travels she at once betook herself, so that she might be free when Raymond came.

Both safe and escritoire were in the little, low ceilinged dining-room, where the light came dimly in spring and summer through the rose-covered verandah. The Burneys had never, in Joan's recollection, possessed household goods of their very own. They had lived mostly abroad, or at Eng lish watering-places, occupying furnished lodgings or someone else's house, let for a time. ' The Lilacs ' belonged to the widow of a persona grata at the court of the fourth George, and was massively, if anciently, furnished. In this dining-room, where they mostly sat in winter, the old mahogany Chip pendale furniture was black with age, and shone with a fine polish. Old Dutch paintings graced the wainscoted walls. The escritoire before which Joan seated herself creaked as she unlocked and let down the flap, displaying the pigeon-holes — its hinges were worn by time.

Her search and arrangement here was soon finished. The neat packets tied up with pink tape which occupied the pigeon-holes, proved to be the receipts and bills, also the correspondence of the last two years. There was Mrs Burney's account book, also her pass-book and cheque book — the latter with the foils neatly filled in in her graceful writing. Joan closed the secretaire and turned to the little safe which stood on a marble pedestal in the corner. She knew the key, a curious, patent one, and at once separating it from the others on the ring, applied it to the lock. But she had never been called upon to unlock this safe, which her mother only opened when she wanted her cash-box or one of the few documents she kept there — indeed, she had never, to her recollection, seen the interior of the massive receptacle.

It was quite a minute or two before the key turned in the lock. As she opened the heavy little door, which moved with difficulty on its hinges, a letter fell out. She stooped and picked it up. It had been torn open, and inside the envelope were the fragments of a letter. The address was in a large, peculiar handwriting she had not before seen. Her heart beat more quickly. Yesterday she had almost proudly boasted to Mr Doyle that she had shared her mother's innermost thoughts — and here — at the very outset of her investigations, she was confronted with a mysterious letter she knew nothing about ! She turned over the envelope and examined the postmark. The letter had been posted at a central office in London the day before her mother was taken suddenly and dangerously ill. Ought she to read it ?

She looked askance at the strange missive whose arrival her mother had kept to herself, and which — so Joan fancied when she saw the torn fragments — had something to do with her seizure. Slowly, reluctantly, she shook out the fragments upon the dark blue table-cover, and tried to piece them together. Some of the pieces were dis coloured at the edges. ' She was burning them, then she changed her mind,' thought Joan, as the scorched pieces crumbled at her touch. It was impossible to judge of the contents of the document by these surviving fragments, but they conclusively as serted its tenor. ' My ever dearest .... years and years ago . . . many a weary hour .... what an escape from a misery .... happiness is now possible .... be- B lieving in you as I ... . surely you will . . . . a cruel fate has.

That was all. But it was enough to make Joan's heart fail with a new, sickened loathing for life. Who, who could have dared to write to her mother — that queen among women, whom men in stinctively approached with unusual deference, and women with a sense of her superiority — in such a strain ? Little wonder that such a letter should have produced an illness — a fatal illness! But who — who could dare ? She turned the fragments carefully over, but the beginning and the end of the letter were both missing. ' Perhaps there will be some clue to the mystery in there,' she thought, gathering up the pieces and replacing them in the envelope. Then she turned eagerly, yet fearfully, to the safe and cautiously withdrew its contents. They were few. First came a triangular morocco case, which contained a pearl and garnet necklace and earrings.

There were some round cases, which, when she opened them, disclosed bracelets of more or less value set with diamonds and other gems. There was a small jewel-case full of rings, brooches and odds and ends; some old account books were tied to gether, and that was all. There were no documents or letters of any sort except that one. Not a scrap of writing, not a single photograph to give a clue to Mrs Burney's life before marriage, or before her husband's death. Of her father Joan knew nothing. Her old nurse, who died when she was seven years old, had once spoken very seriously to the young child about her dead papa when she began to be inquisitive. She had said that her mother grieved for him so much, that if she talked about him to her she would be very ill. So the child began a course of self-repression on the tabooed subject, which ended in indifference.