lady anne garland was sitting by a rosewood writing-desk in her morning-room. she had finished her letters, and was now sitting idle, gazing through the window on to the terrace, and away to the distant woods and hills, which lay serenely blue in the sunlight.
she was dreaming rather than thinking, and a pleasant little dream it would seem, by the half smile in her grey eyes. the sunshine lay along the floor in a broad, vivid patch. it fell across her white dress and on her dark hair, which held the blue-black sheen of a rook’s plumage. her skin was creamy-white, and her mouth, modelled like the mouth of a greek statue, was of geranium red. in fine, lady anne was beautiful.
the sound of the door opening made her turn her head. a small thin woman entered. she [pg 95]was dressed in a tailor-made dress of some pepper-and-salt material, and wore a black straw hat, rather floppy, and distinctly out of keeping with her otherwise tailor-made appearance. her hair was grey, and her skin somewhat like parchment, but her eyes and mouth were kindly.
“finished your letters?” she asked.
“yes,” said anne, getting up from her desk. “come into the garden. it is too lovely a day to waste indoors.”
she led the way through the french window on to the terrace, and sat down on one of two deck-chairs. miss haldane followed her example.
“you should have a hat,” she said abruptly.
“no,” replied anne lazily, “i like the sun. i think my skin is too thick to burn. look at the blueness on those woods and hills; isn’t it glorious?”
miss haldane put up her eyeglasses and looked at the landscape.
“very nice, my dear. jabez said the hay harvest was unusually good this year.”
jabez was the head gardener.
anne laughed softly. “you are so delightfully practical, matty dear. if the sun shines [pg 96]you think of the crops, if the rain falls you think of the crops, if the wind blows you still think of the crops. you missed your vocation when you took up the post of companion to a sentimental dreamer; you should have been a farmer.”
“had the good lord made me a man, i should have been one,” replied miss haldane instantly. “as it is, i take an interest in the farming of your tenants. and you must allow that weather is of the first importance to them.” she dropped her eyeglasses and looked at anne.
“i know,” owned anne; “but turnips do not appeal to me. i love my flowers to have their needs supplied, however; and that shows that i am selfish enough to be merely interested in what interests me.”
there was a pause.
“the cottage in the copse has found an inhabitant,” said miss haldane suddenly and abruptly. “i can’t call him a tenant because the man pays no rent. i suppose no one knows to whom the rent would be due.”
“really!” exclaimed anne, replying to the first part of miss haldane’s speech. “who has been bold enough to venture there?”
“a vagabond of sorts, i believe,” said miss haldane. “of course, the villagers are looking upon him with suspicion and distrust. he wears a peacock feather in his hat and plays the penny whistle.”
“how pleasant!” said anne.
miss haldane snorted. “can’t you have him turned out?” she demanded. “i don’t think it is a good plan to have a vagabond settling in the village.”
“the cottage is not mine,” replied anne; “as far as i know, it is no man’s property. besides, does he do any harm—poach, or anything like that?”
“not that i know of,” returned miss haldane. “in fact, they say he buys, and pays for, certain provisions at the village shop.”
“then,” said anne lazily, “he is not a vagabond. a vagabond is one without visible means of subsistence; this man evidently has visible means. i wonder what he is like. i fancied no man would have braved that cottage after nightfall even if he had ventured within at daylight. at all events, superstition has been very rife around it.”
“they say he plays the penny whistle beautifully,” remarked miss haldane.
anne’s eyes twinkled. “you have culled much information since our arrival last night, matty dear. the man shall come and give us a concert.”
“my dear!”
“why not?” asked anne carelessly. “an unstudied simple concert on the penny whistle would, i am sure, be full of charm. burton shall go down to-morrow and request him from me to come up to the terrace.”
miss haldane was shocked, perturbed. in a word, she fluttered in a manner not unlike an elderly hen with a duckling chick.
“you cannot do it, anne. you cannot send a footman to the cottage and ask the man to come up here. in the first place, he is probably a socialist, and wouldn’t come. in the second place—well, it isn’t nice.”
anne laughed outright. “dear matty, your favourite adjective! with the negative prefix it applies equally to a burnt pudding, or to a woman who leaves her husband in order to run away with another man. but you’re a dear, and i won’t laugh at you; and you [pg 99]shan’t be present at the concert if you’d rather not.”
miss haldane spoke a little stiffly. “if you will be foolish, anne, i must be present at your folly. it is the only way in which i can merit the liberal salary you give me.”
“dear matty, what nonsense!” said anne.
again there was silence, and it lasted some time. butterflies flitted in the still air, bees droned lazily in a lime-tree to the west of the terrace, and once or twice a dragonfly skimmed past with a flash of iridescent wings.
miss haldane looked at anne lying back in the deck-chair, which was placed at its lowest angle. her own was as upright as was consistent with its nature. she had a piece of crochet in her hands, and was working industriously. matilda haldane was never idle, and she never lolled. from her earliest years she had been told to “get something useful to do,” if there happened to be a single spare moment in the ordinary routine of walks, meals, and lessons. later she was obliged, on her own account, to get something useful to do, and to keep doing it, if she was to live in the smallest degree as she [pg 100]imagined a lady should live. there had been nothing extravagant about miss haldane’s ideas, either, but they had included a seat in a church where sittings were rented and threepence to be placed sunday morning and evening in the offertory-bag.
the useful occupation which provided her with a means of livelihood had been monotonous—how monotonous only miss haldane knew. then suddenly, and by some intervention of providence, lady anne garland came across her path, and at a moment when lady anne was—to use her own parlance—tired of companions who were either entirely opinionated or entirely deprecating, or, worse still, who dissolved into floods of injured tears if told that anne wished to receive a guest alone.
something about the little dried-up woman—probably her quiet and indomitable pluck under adverse conditions—appealed to anne. a month after their first meeting, miss haldane found herself transplanted to anne’s london house, with a salary that far exceeded her wildest dreams. the only fly in her ointment was the thought that she did nothing to merit it. merely to [pg 101]live in a house, to be waited upon by servants, to eat dainty food, and to drive with anne in the parks, seemed to her an utterly inadequate return for the money she received. it was, however, all that lady anne wished her to do. after a time she grew accustomed to the fact that this was all that was expected of her. her own innate dignity and anne’s charming and frank manner prevented her from feeling herself a dependent, and an odd but very sincere friendship was the result.
this was now the third summer that she had sat on the terrace and watched anne lazing in the sunlight. her beauty, her youthful vigour, in spite of her present indolent pose, struck miss haldane anew.
suddenly miss haldane spoke. “anne,” she said, “i wonder you have never married.”
the sound of the luncheon gong followed on the speech. anne rose from her chair with panther-like grace.
“so do i, matty dear—sometimes.”
“but why don’t you?” asked miss haldane.
anne walked to the window. at the window she turned. “because,” she said, mock-solemnity [pg 102]in her voice, “though few people realize it, i have a soul.”
“of course you have,” replied miss haldane seriously; “but what has that got to do with marriage?”
anne laughed. “nothing, of course,” she replied; “and all the men i happen to know would agree with you. don’t look puzzled, matty dear, but come and have lunch.”
