The strong hours

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By MAUD DIVER

BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY THE RIVERSIDE PRESS CAMBRIDGE ie oe Ba * ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ay ay }

Chapter I

The cruellest lies are often told in silence. R.L.S.

Tue April sun shone full upon the easterly windows of Avonleigh Hall, transfiguring the stern, grizzled face of the house, where Blounts of Avonleigh had lived and died since the days of Coeur de Lion; caressing it with light and warmth, as a child caresses the face of an old man to make him smile and play at being young again.

And the house responded after its kind. Its rough stones looked a few shades less sombre than usual. Golden and winecoloured leaf-buds gleamed, half-open, on the thorny traceries of the Gloire de Dijon that framed the three tall windows of Lady Avonleigh’s morning room. Under the low, broad ledge daffodils made stars and splashes of brightness; and the centuries-old lawn, across the gravel pathway, was gay with grape hyacinth and blue scilla. The breeze brought a whiff of freshcut grass and a mowing machine purred steadily somewhere out of sight. The sun — that, for all his million years, alone possesses the secret of immortal youth — was luring the whole world to play at being young again on that radiant spring morning.

Suddenly there broke upon the stillness a patter of scurrying feet followed by the vision of a slim sturdy figure, in a brown jetsey suit, that dashed out of the shrubbery and sped along the gravel path toward the house. Faster and faster it sped;

shoulders squared, head flung back, hair flying, the small bluntfeatured face set in resolute lines. At eight years old it is a very serious matter to be a smuggler, caught red-handed, fleeing for dear life from the clutches of Outraged Authority; and Derek was always terribly in earnest over the game of the moment.

He had a fair start of Authority in the person of a tall boy in flannel shirt and trousers, who came loping after him with long strides. This was young Evan Trevanyon Blount, heir of Avonleigh; —a lordly schoolboy, with a soul above childish games, and not given to being terribly in earnest over anything. He had revived the smuggler drama —an invention of old standing — because he had nothing better to do and because it mildly amused him to work Derek up over it and give the youngster a pommelling. Not that he had an ounce of the bully in his nature; but it had been rubbed into him at school that his own early sufferings were entirely for his good: and it occurred to him that Derek might as well have a little benefit of that kind in advance. It enlivened the holidays and it didn’t hurt the ‘kid.’

His long legs were gaining steadily, now, on the short ones ahead of him; and Derek could feel his heart beating all over his body. As he came level with the morning-room windows a wild inspiration flashed through him. If he could touch wood it was ‘sanctuary.’ That was one of the unwritten laws of the game. With a sudden swerve to the right, and a flying leap, he landed on the broad window-sill — breathless, but safe.

There he stood in full sunlight, clutching the woodwork with one very square brown hand; his resolute lower lip thrust out; his eyes screwed up against the glare so that they almost vanished under the thick straight line of his brows — a sufficiently engaging picture of half-nervous defiance to soften any heart but that of a brother who was simply enjoying the joke.

“You can’t touch me now, Van. Yah!—TI’m sanctuary!”’ he cried as the older boy stood regarding him out of a pair of cool grey eyes.

“Can’t I?” Van drawled, looking him up and down with the air of an ogre mentally scrunching the bones of his predestined prey. It was a horrid moment for Derek; but his faith in Van was absolute and he stood his ground.

“You know you can’t — on your honour,” he retorted with an out-thrust of his chin; and, confident in security, the tip of a tongue appeared between his teeth. The joy it was, and the relief, even for a few moments to be master of the situation! Yet, come what might in the way of retribution, he would rather be the smuggler than Outraged Authority any day.

“Well, as to that,” Van answered suavely, “you can’t stand hanging on to the window frame forever; and when I do get at you I'll scalp you extra for your cheek. I’m in no hurry. I can wait!”

And seating himself on the grass, hands clasped round his knees, he proceeded to stare his small brother out of countenance.

As a mere game this was well enough and Derek could brazen it out with the best. But he was not playing a game. He was acting a thrilling drama. It was not Van who sat there staring at him. It was Authority, waiting tc pounce on him, to inflict punishment, merciless and condign. He had been ‘scalped’ once this morning, without the extra, and had no ambition to repeat the experience. ‘The joy of mastery had been brief indeed. He could not have explained why, but he felt ensnared; held fast by those immovable eyes. Queer small sensations began to creep down his spine. Stubborn though he was by nature, and no coward, he began to wonder how much longer he could hold out.

A bold attempt to spring clear of Van and dash off again seemed his only chance of salvation. But though he had regained his breath a little, he frankly shirked the risk and the terror of it. Still— even if things were hopeless he was not going to let himself be tamely caught; he, Dirk of the Red Hand, the terror of the country-side! As mere Derek Blount he had no business to be standing there with muddy boots on the window-sill of his mother’s morning room. If she or any one else came in, an undignified scolding would be his portion. He hovered, in very truth, between the devil and the deep sea.

The only alternative to a daring outward leap was sudden and swift retreat through the room behind and up the wide staircase to the schoolroom; for, according to the old rule of the game, if he could reach the schoolroom unscathed he was entitled to free pardon. Both the morning room and the staircase were forbidden ground and the mud of the shrubbery was on his boots. But the element of risk made retreat seem less ignominious; and the small person on the window-ledge had a good deal of pride in him, though he had not yet learnt to call it by that name.

Almost before Van was aware of it, he had taken a backward leap and was making for the door, fortified by a desperate resolve to lock it behind him.

Van, a punctilious person, lost a few seconds by hurriedly wiping his shoes on the grass. But he could be swift-footed when he chose and the Kid’s unexpected move had revived the excitement of pursuit.

Halfway across the room he pounced on Derek and pinioned him in a grasp that was firmly unyielding.

“Now then, young ’un, you may as well throw up the sponge,” he said with his slight drawl. “Give in with a good grace and it’ll be the better for you.”

“Shan’t!”’ Derek flashed out furiously, and fought like a wild thing so far as his imprisoned elbows would allow. |

He was hopelessly at a disadvantage, but pride and temper were now thoroughly aroused. He cared nothing for the result. He would die fighting. Foot by foot Van dragged his struggling victim back towards the window.

“Give over, you little fool, and come out of this. We’ve no business in here, you know,” he said at last, by way of bringing the boy to his senses.

There was no ansvyer. For a moment Derek ceased to struggle; and Van — who disliked all undue exertion — slightly relaxed his grip.

It was enough. With a fierce unexpected twist, Derek freed himself and fled behind a table on which stood a tall Satsuma vase.

ONE MERE DAY ”

**Pax — I’m safe!” he panted, clutching ‘wood’ with both hands.

But this time Van was angry — a rare event.

“You deliberately hoaxed me, you little devil. Nothing’ll save you now.”

With due caution he slipped a long arm half round the table. Derek jerked himself away, still clinging to it, and giving it so sharp a tilt that the vase fell crashing to the ground.

Disaster brought them to their senses. The game was forgotten in face of a reality that filled them both with dismay.

Derek stook motionless gazing at the murdered treasure. Tears pricked his eyeballs. Apart from fear of consequences, he felt — as always — a queer pang at sight of any newly broken object. He was also thinking ruefully that ‘things’ always went against him. If it was possible to get himself into trouble he never missed the chance. But this was a terribly serious business; only the knowledge that Van shared the responsibility gave him any hope that justice might be tempered with mercy.

Dimly, through the confusion in his brain, he heard his brother remark with quiet emphasis: ‘‘ Well — you’ve jolly well done for yourself this time”; saw him retreat towards the window; wondered, with a mental shiver, must they “go and tell .. .”

Then the door of the room opened and their mother stood before them, very tall and slender in a grey gown with a flounce that trailed upon the ground lending her added height and dignity. One saw at a glance whence Van derived his natural grace, his good looks and his cool grey eyes.

‘Boys! What’s the meaning of this?” she exclaimed, looking from one to the other — Van, placid and detached, half seated on the window-sill; Derek with flushed cheeks and bright eyes, obviously guilty, standing by the slaughtered vase.

The sharp note of reproach in her voice struck at his heart. In a swift impulse of remorse he ran to her, unmindful of muddy boots upon her trailing gown —they trailed copiously that year — and, being Derek, he promptly stumbled on a hidden foot.

Before a contrite word could be spoken, he found himself being scolded for clumsiness, his besetting fault. The words he had meant to speak fled from his brain. The injured toe and muddied flounce aggravated Lady Avonleigh’s vexation at his original offence; and there were tell-tale marks on the carpet.

“Really, Derek, I don’t know what to do with you,” she concluded with a sigh of weary impatience. “You don’t even try to improve. Direct disobedience to orders and my valuable vase smashed — ”’

““C-can’t it be mended?” the boy stammered, gulping down his tears.

“Tt doesn’t look much like it,” his mother answered, unmoved. ‘And it wouldn’t be the same thing if it could. Besides — you’ve no business to be in here at all. You know that perfectly well.”

“T—er—TI didn’t really mean to come in here,” Derek plunged — in a desperate attempt at self-defence. “It was a game ...and Van—I—”

He broke off, too loyal to implicate his brother, taking it for granted that Van would help him out and shoulder his share of the disaster.

Van, however, still sat there in the window swinging one leg, looking distressed and sympathetic, but entirely aloof. And in response to Derek’s appealing glance he said never a word. Nor did his mother dream of questioning him. In her eyes Van was sacrosanct. He could not possibly have any connection with breakages and mud-marks on the carpet. Things of that kind were Derek’s specialities; and they kept Lady Avonleigh in a chronic, half-despairing state of annoyance with her younger boy, who seemed to have nothing of herself in his composition.

Van’s silence fell on Derek’s heart like a stone. It took him several seconds to grasp all it implied; and while he floundered in stormy depths of bewilderment and protest, his mother stood awaiting further explanation, looking down upon her small son with curiously little of sympathy or understanding in her heart. It is to be feared that, just then, the broken vase affected her more than the child’s very evident confusion and remorse.

‘Well, Derek?’’ she said at last.

“T —I can’t prop’ly explain. I’m sorry,” he muttered with+ out looking up: and it is just possible that Van felt faintly remorseful when he perceived that Derek — though a mere kid — knew well how to play the game. But the meshes of his own silence entangled him. He could not, now, free himself without risk of falling in his mother’s esteem, a risk he was not prepared to take for the pluckiest kid in creation.

And Derek’s pluck was undeniable. Outwardly stoical, inwardly raging, he accepted the rest of his scolding and his sentence of punishment in a silence that simply appeared sullen and tended to aggravate his sin. It was hard on Derek, who never sulked, that his face, in moments of intense gravity, had a distinctly sulky look. _

He would be in disgrace for the rest of the day, his mother told him in her low even voice, which, to Derek, always sounded beautiful, even when pronouncing judgment. He would not come down to the dining-room for lunch. He was to stay alone in the schoolroom all the afternoon; have tea there by himself and go to bed at six. He would not be locked in. He was simply put on his honour. At least Lady Avonleigh did not make the mistake of distrusting this troublesome rebel of her own creating.

“But of course,” she concluded sternly, “‘no mere punishment can make up for the loss of my beautiful vase — a piece of rare old Japanese china —”’

This was too much for Derek’s feelings. ““You can take all the three-pennies out of my money-box, there’s quite a lot there now,” he murmured in a desperate rush that failed to hide the quiver in his voice.

That unconscious and pathetic touch of humour might well have disarmed a sterner monitor; but Lady Avonleigh — unhappily for herself and others — was almost impervious to humour. She merely saw, in Derek’s offer, the first real sign of remorse; and her voice was a shade gentler as she said with becoming gravity: “‘My dear child, I wouldn’t dream of such a thing. Besides, it would be useless, and I think you are being

Io THE STRONG HOURS sufficiently punished as it is. Now go upstairs, and if you want me to believe you are sorry, try —for once — to do exactly what you are told.”

That ‘for once’ hurt Derek like the flick of a whip. With one glance in Van’s direction, he went out of the room — no longer Dirk the Red-Handed, but just a discomfited small boy, smarting under the sting of injustice and his brother’s utterly unexpected desertion.

She who slays, is she who bears — who bears. ALICE MEYNELL

ALONE up in the schoolroom, he shut the door upon himself with a sort of tragic deliberation, and scrambled on to the low polished oak cupboard that ran round the bay window, forming a wide seat. There, huddled together, knees drawn up to his chin, he bowed his forehead on them and cried, hot passionate tears that seemed as if they would never come to an end: tears for the broken vase, for his mother’s distress, for the discovery that Van, his hero, could be cowardly and mean like any ordinary mortal; and not least for his own persistent ill-luck and the severe punishment meted out to him for an accidental sin.

To do Lady Avonleigh justice, she had too little imagination to realize how harsh was her sentence of imprisonment for a creature of eight years old, on a day of April sun and wind. But for Derek, the real tragedy of that eventful morning was _ Van’s behaviour. By flagrant disregard of the unwritten law, he had been indirectly responsible for the disaster; and, in the face of that —to let another bear all the blame! ...

Loyal little soul that he was, Derek would never have believed it possible. He could scarcely believe it now, except for the fact that his own sensations at the moment were too painfully vivid to be forgotten — or readily forgiven.

Nor was he alone in this exalted view of his elder brother. Faith in young Evan Blount was part of the Avonleigh creed. The entire household revolved round him, as planets round the sun. ‘True, there were heretics among them; notably Malcolm — Viscount Avonleigh’s land agent — and Mrs. Consbigh, the housekeeper; but, being wise in their generation, they revolved with the rest and kept their heresy to themselves.

Mrs. Consbigh, it is true, made no secret of her devotion to Master Derek: and she accepted — as part of the boy’s inherent masculinity —the fact that her motherly kindness evoked curiously little response.

It did not occur to her that the surreptitious affection she lavished on him emphasized all that was lacking in his mother’s rare and coveted caresses. Naturally it did not occur to Derek either. He felt it simply — with a child’s vague, unerring instinct for matters of the heart — as one of the many bewildering things in life that somehow hurt you and you couldn’t tell why. There were moods, as he grew older, when he almost hated the good woman who gave him, out of her large-hearted abundance, that which he craved from his mother and from no one else on earth.

And to-day, as the first passion of grief subsided into long, shivering sobs, the fear crept in that, when she heard of his disgrace, she would seek him out and try to comfort him. But in the main his thoughts circled round Van, his shattered idol, who would never again be perfect in his eyes. Probably, if he cared enough, Van would manage to patch things up in his persuasive fashion: but dimly Derek knew that within himself something had been broken that morning quite as precious as his mother’s vase and as impossible to mend.

A turn of the door handle brought back fhe Shea of Mrs. Consbigh. Hoping she would think he was asleep, he did not ,stir or lift his head. Then with a shock — half amazement, half anger — he realized that it was Van. Still he did not move. What right had Van, after basely deserting him, to come and gloat over his misery? He wished now that he had locked himself in.

Van paid no heed to his silent rebuff, but came straight to the window-seat; and the next moment Derek felt his thick shock of hair being lightly towselled and rubbed ‘every which way’ by Van’s long fingers. Derek set his teeth and remained motionless. He did not understand that Van, by coming to him, was implicitly confessing himself in the wrong.

“Tm scalping you! I told you I would!” he said at last in his gentlest voice, so like his mother’s that it went straight to Derek’s heart. But, in his childish fashion, he was inflexible. His emotions did not easily flare up or readily subside. Van — being pre-eminently flexible — had come too soon.

“Oh — go away!” was all the reponse he received in a voice of muffled misery, and Derek jerked his head ungraciously from under those caressing fingers that could neither reach nor heal his hidden wound.

Van drew himself up. “Thanks,” he said coolly. “TI think it was jolly decent of me tocome. But you’re the most obstinate little beggar in creation. If you weren’t, all this would never have happened. You deserved it — for hoaxing me. I just did it to punish you.”

That had been Van’s excuse to himself for a slip out of the straight path that had, in point of fact, been simply instinctive: and it was significant of the vital difference between the brothers, that the elder could not, or would not see — what the younger vaguely felt — that any reference to his own deserts was altogether wide of the mark.

“Oh, Van”’ — he flung up his head in sheer desperation, and pushed back the dark hair from his forehead — “that’s not fair — you can’t — just because of me. If I’m obst’nate, you can hammer me. But you can’t ... break rules and... sort of

Peau ten ites...”

It was a lifelong drawback for Derek that he could never call a spade an agricultural implement: and at that ill-judged word Van drew himself up sharply, a queer glint in his eyes.

““Confound your cheek!”’ he said; he was rather proud of the new swear. ‘‘D’you think I came here to be lectured by a chit of an infant like you? I just came to cheer you up because you got rather more than you bargained for; but I shan’t trouble to come again, and I wish you joy of your own company for the whole afternoon.” But as he turned to go a thought struck him. “You don’t go blabbing about this, mind — to old Con or Ina.”

Ina was the sister who came between them.

“Course not,” Derek retorted with scornful emphasis. “J wouldn’t tell any one — never!”’

IA THE STRONG HOURS

The patent sincerity of that asseveration softened the flexible Van. ‘‘You’re a game little beggar, Derek,” he said with his drawl. Then after a thoughtful investigation of his pockets. “Have some choc. Give you something to do.”

He proffered a whole stick of Suchard. Such unwonted generosity might have savoured of bribery but for Derek’s proud confidence that Van did not doubt his word. Probably the elder boy himself hardly realized that his impulse, like his visit, was prompted by an uneasy conscience.

In any case, a stick of Suchard was irresistible. It could comfort if it could not heal. Derek held out hishand. “Thank you, Van,” he said gravely.

Van deposited his peace offering, and for a moment his fingers closed over Derek’s open palm.

““You’re too much in earnest over things, little ’un,” he said lightly. “‘You must get the better of that or you'll have a rotten time at school.”

And Derek was left alone to digest, at leisure, that sagacious piece of advice.

The upper housemaid, who had removed the fragments from the morning room, brought him his lunch. Her attempt to convey mute sympathy was baulked by Derek, who looked steadily out of the window till. he heard the door close behind her. | :

Mrs. Consbigh appeared later with an offering of dried figs, and was not to be evaded by such simple means. Besides — Derek had a pronounced weakness for dried figs, as the good soul very well knew. She was a spacious, deep-breasted woman, with a frame as large as her heart and a rather gruff voice that was a sore trial to her because it ‘went against’ her with children; a natural-born mother of men, which could not be said of her mistress.

“In trouble again, are you, my lamb?” she greeted him, essaying a sympathetic note that only made her voice sound huskier than ever. ‘‘ Well, well, we’re all mortial, and accidents do happen to the best of us. You take it like a man an’ the worst’ll soon be over.”

~ Derek nodded — quite unconvinced. For him the five hours that loomed between dinner and bedtime seemed an eternity. But if Mrs. Consbigh’s philosophy was unconvincing, her figs were a very present help in trouble. Derek privately resolved to eke them out as long as possible by taking small bites and counting his ‘chews’ like a certain famous old gentleman whose name he had forgotten.

“T oughtn’t to have them, you know,” he murmured with his mouth full. “Because —it was very bad. It can’t be mended, Mother said.”

Mrs. Consbigh sighed. ‘Ah, that’s a pity. Still — there’s lots of things broken in this world, without intention, that can’t be mended; more vallible, too, than a vawse. You'll learn that, my pretty, one o’ these days.”

This time Derek’s nod was charged with conviction and a touch of tragic self-importance; but he consoled himself with another bite of his fig.

Mrs. Consbigh lingered, reluctant to esa him. She strolled towards the window and stood looking out. Derek watched her uneasily. She ought not to be there. Solitary confinement was his sentence, and he was to try and do, ‘for once,’ exactly what he had been told. Also she was interfering with the plan to count his ‘chews.’

_ “How long have you to stay here?” she asked suddenly, and Derek’s face clouded. He resented the painful question.

*Till six o’clock. And then — I’m to go to bed.”

Mrs. Consbigh stifled something that sounded like “Horrid shame!” Aloud, she said again — “It'll soon be over. Have you got a nice tale to read?”

“T’ve got my Hans Andersen.” A pause. Derek grew still more uneasy: and at last he spoke. _

“Please, Mrs. Con ... I’m afraid you mustn’t be here. Mother would be vexed. I’ve got to stay quite alone and... do what I’m told.”

That was too much for Mrs. Consbigh. She turned and swept towards him.

“Oh, bless your little heart!”? And to his unspeakable amazement — faintly tinged with wrath — she flung her arms round him and kissed the top of his head.

“You shan’t get into any further trouble through your old Con. But I'll bring you something for tea,” she assured him, as she went out.

With the help of the figs and the chocolate and Hans Andersen the interminable afternoon dragged itself to an end. The garden below him was full of sunshine and song; but the world seemed utterly empty of people. Van, having salved his conscience with a gift, had gone out riding with his father; and not even an under-gardener came within Derek’s range of vision. He tried to fancy he was Dirk the Red-Handed, in gaol, looking out for his accomplice to help him to escape. But the game had quite lost its hold on him. He felt he would never want to play it again. ...

At tea-time Mrs. Consbigh reappeared with two sugared cakes. But on this occasion she did not linger: nor did she outrage his dignity by further caresses.

Punctually at six, the young governess who taught him and Ina came and fetched him to bed. When that melancholy rite was over, she shut out the friendly daylight with blinds and curtains and left him with the pious hope that he would be a ‘better boy to-morrow.’

She was not sympathetic. He disliked and defied her; and she had endured a good deal at his hands. He was very thankful to be rid of her; in spite of the fact that being left alone in the dark, horribly wide-awake, was the worst part of his punishment.

Who — except a dog — could be expected to go to sleep at six o’clock?

In the hope of inducing weariness, he screwed up his eyes tight; because the sooner sleep came, the sooner it would be to-morrow. But after five minutes of vigorous screwing he only felt more wide awake than before. Evidently sleep could not be wooed; it must be waited for. And as he lay there waiting, a faint hope crept into his heart that perhaps his mother might come up to tell him he was forgiven, and then he could say properly how sorry he had been all along. It would be easier in the dark if she was holding his hand. And supposing she did come .. . and found him asleep —!

The fear of that calamity banished all attempts to coax weariness. He lay strained and tense, his eyes wide open, his ears alert to catch the first sound of her footsteps: while she, downstairs, sat in her favourite arm-chair, by the freshly lit fire, reading a novel. :

She had been writing letters till after six; and in signing the last but one, a vague idea of going up to see Derek had crossed her mind. She was not one of those mothers who make a regular rule of the good-night function either from duty or froma natural impulse of love. Only with her first-born it had been a matter of course; and when he grew too old for it, she became careless; simply followed the mood.

To-night, for obvious reasons, Derek had intruded once or twice upon her thoughts. After all, he had been punished severely and had taken it well. Hence the impulse to go up and see him. But that last letter had driven it from her mind, and the sight of her novel lying open at a critical point in the tale, had completed her oblivion of the troublesome small son, who was so curiously like his Scottish grandmother that at times he scarcely seemed her own.

Half an hour later, in a pause at the end of a chapter, she suddenly remembered him again. Perhaps the intensity of his longing found its way, by some mysterious process, into her brain.

She glanced at the clock and suffered a passing twinge of self-reproach. ‘‘Too late now,” she decided, half sorry, half relieved; for she was very comfortable and not strong and she hated stairs. He probably had not expected her, and by now he would be fast asleep. Not for a moment did she suppose that the morning’s disaster had made any deep impression on him. He was not sensitive like her dear Van —