Colonel Quaritch, V.C.: Chapter 42

Chapter 42

IDA GOES TO MEET HER FATE

Most people of a certain age and a certain degree of sensitiveness, in
looking back down the vista of their lives, whereon memory's
melancholy light plays in fitful flashes like the alternate glow of a
censer swung in the twilight of a tomb, can recall some one night of
peculiar mental agony. It may have come when first we found ourselves
face to face with the chill and hopeless horror of departed life;
when, in our soul's despair, we stretched out vain hands and wept,
called and no answer came; when we kissed those beloved lips and
shrunk aghast at contact with their clay, those lips more eloquent now
in the rich pomp of their unutterable silence than in the brightest
hour of their unsealing. It may have come when our honour and the hope
of all our days lay at our feet shattered like a sherd on the world's
hard road. It may have come when she, the star of our youth, the type
of completed beauty and woman's most perfect measure, she who held the
chalice of our hope, ruthlessly emptied and crushed it, and, as became
a star, passed down our horizon's ways to rise upon some other sky. It
may have come when Brutus stabbed us, or when a child whom we had
cherished struck us with a serpent-fang of treachery and left the
poison to creep upon our heart. One way or another it has been with
most of us, that long night of utter woe, and all will own that it is
a ghastly thing to face.

And so Ida de la Molle had found it. The shriek of the great gale
rushing on that Christmas Eve round the stout Norman towers was not
more strong than the breath of the despair which shook her life. She
could not sleep--who could sleep on such a night, the herald of such a
morrow? The wail and roar of the wind, the crash of falling trees, and
the rattle of flying stones seemed to form a fit accompaniment to the
turmoil of her mind.

She rose, went to the window, and in the dim light watched the trees
gigantically tossing in struggle for their life. An oak and a birch
were within her view. The oak stood the storm out--for a while.
Presently there came an awful gust and beat upon it. It would not
bend, and the tough roots would not give, so beneath the weight of the
gale the big tree broke in two like a straw, and its spreading top was
whirled into the moat. But the birch gave and bent; it bent till its
delicate filaments lay upon the wind like a woman's streaming hair,
and the fierceness of the blast wore itself away and spared it.

"See what happens to those who stand up and defy their fate," said Ida
to herself with a bitter laugh. "The birch has the best of it."

Ida turned and closed the shutters; the sight of the tempest affected
her strained nerves almost beyond bearing. She began to walk up and
down the big room, flitting like a ghost from end to end and back
again, and again back. What could she do? What should she do? Her fate
was upon her: she could no longer resist the inevitable--she must
marry him. And yet her whole soul revolted from the act with an
overwhelming fierceness which astonished even herself. She had known
two girls who had married people whom they did not like, being at the
time, or pretending to be, attached to somebody else, and she had
observed that they accommodated themselves to their fate with
considerable ease. But it was not so with her; she was fashioned of
another clay, and it made her faint to think of what was before her.
And yet the prospect was one on which she could expect little
sympathy. Her own father, although personally he disliked the man whom
she must marry, was clearly filled with amazement that she should
prefer Colonel Quaritch, middle-aged, poor, and plain, to Edward
Cossey--handsome, young, and rich as Croesus. He could not comprehend
or measure the extraordinary gulf which her love dug between the two.
If, therefore, this was so with her own father, how would it be with
the rest of the world?

She paced her bedroom till she was tired; then, in an access of
despair, which was sufficiently distressing in a person of her
reserved and stately manner, flung herself, weeping and sobbing, upon
her knees, and resting her aching head upon the bed, prayed as she had
never prayed before that this cup might pass from her.

She did not know--how should she?--that at this very moment her prayer
was being answered, and that her lover was then, even as she prayed,
lifting the broken stone and revealing the hoard of ruddy gold. But so
it was; she prayed in despair and agony of mind, and the prayer
carried on the wild wings of the night brought a fulfilment with it.
Not in vain were her tears and supplications, for even now the
deliverer delved among

             "The dust and awful treasures of the dead,"

and even now the light of her happiness was breaking on her tortured
night as the cold gleams of the Christmas morning were breaking over
the fury of the storm without.

And then, chilled and numb in body and mind, she crept into her bed
again and at last lost herself in sleep.

By half-past nine o'clock, when Ida came down to breakfast, the gale
had utterly gone, though its footprints were visible enough in
shattered trees, unthatched stacks, and ivy torn in knotty sheets from
the old walls it clothed. It would have been difficult to recognise in
the cold and stately lady who stood at the dining-room window, noting
the havoc and waiting for her father to come in, the lovely,
passionate, dishevelled woman who some few hours before had thrown
herself upon her knees praying to God for the succour she could not
win from man. Women, like nature, have many moods and many aspects to
express them. The hot fit had passed, and the cold fit was on her now.
Her face, except for the dark hollows round the eyes, was white as
winter, and her heart was cold as winter's ice.

Presently her father came in.

"What a gale," he said, "what a gale! Upon my word I began to think
that the old place was coming down about our ears, and the wreck among
the trees is dreadful. I don't think there can have been such a wind
since the time of King Charles I., when the top of the tower was blown
right off the church. You remember I was showing you the entry about
it in the registers the other day, the one signed by the parson and
old Sir James de la Molle. The boy who has just come up with the
letters tells me he hears that poor old Mrs. Massey's summer-house on
the top of Dead Man's Mount has been blown away, which is a good
riddance for Colonel Quaritch. Why, what's the matter with you, dear?
How pale you look!"

"The gale kept me awake. I got very little sleep," answered Ida.

"And no wonder. Well, my love, you haven't wished me a merry Christmas
yet. Goodness knows we want one badly enough. There has not been much
merriment at Honham of late years."

"A merry Christmas to you, father," she said.

"Thank you, Ida, the same to you; you have got most of your
Christmases before you, which is more than I have. God bless me, it
only seems like yesterday since the big bunch of holly tied to the
hook in the ceiling there fell down on the breakfast table and smashed
all the cups, and yet it is more than sixty years ago. Dear me! how
angry my poor mother was. She never could bear the crockery to be
broken--it was a little failing of your grandmother's," and he laughed
more heartily than Ida had heard him do for some weeks.

She made no answer but busied herself about the tea. Presently,
glancing up she saw her father's face change. The worn expression came
back upon it and he lost his buoyant bearing. Evidently a new thought
had struck him, and she was in no great doubt as to what it was.

"We had better get on with breakfast," he said. "You know that Cossey
is coming up at ten o'clock."

"Ten o'clock?" she said faintly.

"Yes. I told him ten so that we could go to church afterwards if we
wished to. Of course, Ida, I am still in the dark as to what you have
made up your mind to do, but whatever it is I thought that he had
better once and for all hear your final decision from your own lips.
If, however, you feel yourself at liberty to tell it to me as your
father, I shall be glad to hear it."

She lifted her head and looked him full in the face, and then paused.
He had a cup of tea in his hand, and held it in the air half way to
his mouth, while his whole face showed the over-mastering anxiety with
which he was awaiting her reply.

"Make your mind easy, father," she said, "I am going to marry Mr.
Cossey."

He put the cup down in such a fashion that he spilt half the tea, most
of it over his own clothes, without even noticing it, and then turned
away his face.

"Well," he said, "of course it is not my affair, or at least only
indirectly so, but I must say, my love, I congratulate you on the
decision which you have come to. I quite understand that you have been
in some difficulty about the matter; young women often have been
before you, and will be again. But to be frank, Ida, that Quaritch
business was not at all suitable, either in age, fortune, or in
anything else. Yes, although Cossey is not everything that one might
wish, on the whole I congratulate you."

"Oh, pray don't," broke in Ida, almost with a cry. "Whatever you do,
pray do not congratulate me!"

Her father turned round again and looked at her. But Ida's face had
already recovered its calm, and he could make nothing of it.

"I don't quite understand you," he said; "these things are generally
considered matters for congratulation."

But for all he might say and all that he might urge in his mind to the
contrary, he did more or less understand what her outburst meant. He
could not but know that it was the last outcry of a broken spirit. In
his heart he realised then, if he had never clearly realised it
before, that this proposed marriage was a thing hateful to his
daughter, and his conscience pricked him sorely. And yet--and yet--it
was but a woman's fancy--a passing fancy. She would become reconciled
to the inevitable as women do, and when her children came she would
grow accustomed to her sorrow, and her trouble would be forgotten in
their laughter. And if not, well it was but one woman's life which
would be affected, and the very existence of his race and the very
cradle that had nursed them from century to century were now at stake.
Was all this to be at the mercy of a girl's whim? No! let the
individual suffer.

So he argued. And so at his age and in his circumstances most of us
would argue also, and, perhaps, considering all things, we should be
right. For in this world personal desires must continually give way to
the welfare of others. Did they not do so our system of society could
not endure.

No more was said upon the subject. Ida made pretence of eating a piece
of toast; the Squire mopped up the tea upon his clothes, and then
drank some more.

Meanwhile the remorseless seconds crept on. It wanted but five minutes
to the hour, and the hour would, she well knew, bring the man with it.

The five minutes passed slowly and in silence. Both her father and
herself realised the nature of the impending situation, but neither of
them spoke of it. Ah! there was the sound of wheels upon the gravel.
So it had come.

Ida felt like death itself. Her pulse sunk and fluttered; her vital
forces seemed to cease their work.

Another two minutes went by, then the door opened and the parlour-maid
came in.

"Mr. Cossey, if you please, sir."

"Oh," said the Squire. "Where is he?"

"In the vestibule, sir."

"Very good. Tell him I will be there in a minute."

The maid went.

"Now, Ida," said her father, "I suppose that we had better get this
business over."

"Yes," she answered, rising; "I am ready."

And gathering up her energies, she passed out to meet her fate.

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