‘I don’t think so, dear; I am sure you were at your very best.’
‘Father,’ said Faith, ‘I think Mother is much more upset by this news than she shows.’
‘She has shown it to me,’ said Paul.
‘The best in you both is better than I have ever imagined,’ said Hope. ‘I am really comforted by it, and I did not know it ever did that. If Ridley’s is doing the same for Eleanor, I see what Fulbert meant.’
‘Well, now don’t you think we might consider if there is anything we can do, Mother?’
‘I think we might; I should agree with anything you said. If we don’t put ourselves forward, and don’t fancy we are the sort of people who could be tolerated at such a time, I think we might do what we can. But I don’t quite see what that is.’
‘Need we be quite so unsure of ourselves? If we took that line, we should never do anything for anyone.’
‘And that is too high a standard for us. So we will go and do the womanly duties that are borne at these times. I suppose people do put up with them. It is known that the well-meant offices aggravate sorrow, so no doubt they must. And we will leave your father to suffer in a man’s simplicity. I feel rather anxious about him, and it is the irritation in anxiety that is the worst part.’
‘I am coming with you,’ said Paul.
‘Now I can throw myself into serving others. I will make it all as easy to bear as possible. Ridley must be breaking the truth by now. I have heard that that is harder than hearing it, but I do not agree.’
Ridley had reached the Sullivans’ house and asked for Eleanor. He was shown to the drawing-room, where she was with Luce and Regan. He had depended on seeing her alone, and had to adjust his words. He met her eyes and then advanced and laid a hand on her shoulder. She looked up, alarmed, but her voice was forestalled by Regan’s.
‘He is dead, is he? He has gone after the others. Well, I can live in peace now. There is no one else.’
Eleanor was standing, pale and still, heedless of those about her. Luce took the letter from Regan’s hand, and went and put her arms about her mother. Regan spoke again, neither to herself nor the others.
‘It wasn’t much good to have them, for my husband to be left without a son. We have wasted it all, our time and our feeling. All our feeling has gone. And we have only each other at the end.’
‘Lady Sullivan,’ said Ridley, in a low tone, ‘we have to tell your husband.’
Regan made a movement that would have been a spring, if she had had youth and strength, and was gone from sight. It was not from Ridley’s hps that Sir Jesse would hear of the death of his son.
Daniel and Graham came from their grandfather, with the truth in their faces, and the thought in their minds that they were tied to Sir Jesse now. They gave their attention to their mother, while they imagined their own future; the full manhood, the loss of their father, the service to two generations; and saw the truth of their father’s life, which they had deemed so easy.
Eleanor looked up and spoke in her natural tones.
‘We had better send for the children. It is no good to put off their knowing.’
Her words revealed herself, and her children confronted their knowledge of her. She felt real grief, made no pretence of despair, tried to face her loss and her duty, could not follow children’s suffering. Luce looked in mute appeal at Ridley.
‘Mrs Sullivan,’ he said, bending towards her, ‘would you not leave them a while in their happiness? That is the way to spare yourself.’
‘I must not think of that. The thing will have to be done.’
The schoolroom children were summoned. They caught the threat in the message, and came with fear in their eyes. Their mother put her arms about them.
‘My little son and daughters, there is a great sorrow come to us today. Father will not return to us. We are to be alone.’
The children broke into weeping, at first without character or difference. James was the first to recover, and to try to realize his new life. Venice looked at her mother, as though with an instinct to help her. Isabel stood as if she were alone. Ridley remained with his eyes on Eleanor, and wore a look of venerating sympathy.
Regan returned to fetch the letter for her husband, took it from Ridley and went from the room. As she passed, she cast on the group a glance without hope or gentleness, almost without pity, a glance of hard resignation to the helpless suffering.
‘My children,’ said Eleanor, ‘will you do your first thing for your mother? Will you break it to the little ones for me? Will you begin to help?’
Venice went to the door, as if to fulfil the request. James made a movement to follow her, glancing at his mother. Isabel met her eyes, but seemed not to hear what she had said.
‘Is it too much for you, my dear?’ said Eleanor, looking at Isabel. ‘Then I will do it myself. Why should I put my duty on to those weaker than I? It is for their mother to spare them. James, will you bring them to me?’
James began to run from the room, checked himself and subdued his pace, and looked in appeal at his brothers.
‘I can go and tell them, Mother,’ said Graham.
‘No, Graham,’ said Luce, moving forward with her eyes on her mother. ‘It is natural for them to hear the truth amongst us all. It will make one shock and one memory, and will spare them the meetings afterwards. We must think of the things that make children suffer.’
‘We cannot save them the one thing,’ said Eleanor, with a faint smile. ‘I should not think those will count beside it. But do as you will, my dear. I am grateful for any help.’
A message was sent upstairs. Hatton entered with the children, and remained in the room, as though she would not withdraw the protection of her presence. James seemed to drift towards her, and stood at her side, suggesting the sphere with which he identified his life. Eleanor drew the children to her, and said the words she had said to the others. Honor wept in startled despair and grasp of a changed life; Nevill in abandonment to the general sorrow, and sympathy with it; Gavin did not weep, and looked at the older faces in resentment and question. Daniel put a hand on his head and said an encouraging word. His mother looked up, unsure of this line, but let her eyes fall, as if offering no judgement. Sir Jesse and Regan entered and went to their chairs by the hearth, acquiescing once again in the old customs in a different life. Sir Jesse laid his hand on Eleanor’s shoulder as he passed, and Regan gave her grandchildren a smile that did not touch her own experience beneath. Luce waited for the tension to relax, and then moved towards Daniel, who knew that she put him in his father’s place.
‘We must make an effort, Mother,’ he said. ‘It is the only thing. We must leave this moment behind. Life will not wait for us.’
‘When life has done what it has, it might have the grace just to do that,’ said Graham.
Gavin gave a loud laugh, and his mother turned her eyes on him. She did not know that he was hailing the first break in the oppression. Nevill left Hatton and went up to Daniel.
‘He won’t cry any more,’ he promised, and looked round the room. ‘All stop now.’
Venice took his hands as if in play, but he seemed to feel some lack in her, and returned to Hatton. Eleanor gave Venice the smile of approval that she gave to this child’s courage.
‘Did Father have an ordinary illness like an English one?’ said Gavin. ‘Or are the illnesses different there?’
‘We do not know yet, my boy,’ said Eleanor. ‘I think it was different. We shall hear soon.’
‘How do we know he is dead?’
‘He is not dead, my child. He is more alive than he has ever been.’
‘But how do we know he is what we call dead?’ said Gavin, with a faint frown.