The Three Sisters
May Sinclair
The Three Sisters XXII
Rowcliffe was now beginning to form that other habit (which was to make him even more remarkable than he was already), the hunting down of Gwendolen Cartaret in the open.
"I believe," he thought, "she's doing it on purpose. To avoid me."
* * * * *
"The doctor's very late this afternoon," said Mary. "I suppose he's been sent for somewhere."
Alice said nothing. She couldn't trust herself to speak. She lived in sickening fear that on some Wednesday afternoon he would be sent for. It had never happened yet, but that made it all the more likely that it had happened now.
They waited till five; till a quarter-past.
"I really can't wait any longer," said Mary, "for a man doesn't come."
* * * * *
By that time Rowcliffe and Gwenda were far on the road to Upthorne.
He had overtaken her about a hundred yards above the schoolhouse, before the road turned to Upthorne Moor.
"I say, how you do sprint up these hills!"
She turned.
"Is that you, Dr. Rowcliffe?"
"Upthorne. Anywhere."
"May I come too?"
"If you want to."
"Of course I want to."
"Have you had any tea?"
"No."
"Weren't they in?"
"I didn't stop to ask."
"Why not?"
"Because I saw you stampeding on in front of me, and I swore I'd overtake you before you got round that corner. And I have overtaken you."
"Shall we go back? We've time."
They went on at a terrific pace. And as she persisted in walking about half a foot in front of him he saw the movement of her fine long limbs and the little ripple of her shoulders under the gray tweed.
Presently he spoke.
"It wasn't you I heard playing the other night?"
"No. It must have been my youngest sister."
"I knew it wasn't you."
"It might have been for all you knew."
"It couldn't possibly. If you played you wouldn't play that way."
"What way?"
"Your sister's way. Whatever you wanted to do you'd do it beautifully or not at all."
"I don't mean to say," he said, "that your sister doesn't play beautifully."
She turned malignly. He liked her when she turned.
"I didn't mean to _say_ it."
"Why shouldn't you say it?"
"Because you don't say those things. It isn't polite."
"But I know Alice doesn't play well--not those big things. The wonder is she can play them at all."
"Why does she attempt--the big things?"
"Why does anybody? Because she loves them. She's never heard them properly played. So she doesn't know. She just trusts to her feeling."
"Is there anything else, after all, you _can_ trust?"
"I don't know. You see, Alice's feeling tells her it's all right to play like that, and _my_ feeling tells me it's all wrong."
"You can trust _your_ feelings."
"Why mine more than hers?"
"I know your type."
"My type isn't me. You can't tell by that."
"You can if you're a physiologist."
"Oh, won't it?"
"It can't."
"Why not?"
"How can it?"
"You think it can't tell me anything about your soul?"
"Oh--my soul----" shoulders expressed disdain for it.
"No; my poor soul has never done anything to get itself talked about."
"I only thought that as your father, perhaps, specialises in souls--"
"He doesn't specialise in mine. He knows nothing about it."
"The specialist never does. To know anything--the least little thing--about the soul, you must know everything--everything you _can_ know--about the body. So that you're wrong even about your soul. Being a physiologist tells me that your sort of body--a transparently clean and strong and utterly unconscious body--goes with a transparently clean and strong and utterly unconscious soul."
"Utterly unconscious?"
He was silent a moment and then answered:
"Utterly unconscious."
They walked on in silence till they came in sight of the marshes and the long gray line of Upthorne Farm.
"That's where I met you once," he said. "Do you remember? You were coming out of the door as I went in."
"Always meeting you. And then---always missing you. Just when I expected most to find you."
"If we go much farther in this direction," said Gwenda, "we shall meet Papa."
"Well--I suppose some day I shall have to meet him. Do you realise that I've never met him yet?"
"Haven't you?"
She smiled. He loved her smile.
"Why are you smiling?"
"I was only wondering whether the fate was really so malignant."
"You mean that if he met me he'd dislike me?"
"He always _has_ disliked anybody we like. You see, he's a very funny father."
"All fathers," said Rowcliffe, "are more or less funny."
She laughed. Her laughter enchanted him.
"Yes. But _my_ father doesn't mean to be as funny as he is."
"I see. He wouldn't really mean to dislike me. Then, perhaps, if I regularly laid myself out for it, by years of tender and untiring devotion I might win him over?"
She laughed again; she laughed as youth laughs, for the pure joy of laughter. She looked on her father as a persistent, delightful jest. He adored her laughter.
It proved how strong and sane she was--if she could take him like that. Rowcliffe had seen women made bitter, made morbid, driven into lunatic asylums by fathers who were as funny as Mr. Cartaret.
"You wouldn't, you wouldn't," she said. "He's funnier than you've any idea of."
"Is he ever ill?"
"Never."
"That of course makes it difficult."
"Except colds in his head. But he wouldn't have you for a cold in his head. He wouldn't have you for anything if he could help it."
"Well--perhaps--if he's as funny as all that, we'd better turn."
They were walking so fast now that they couldn't talk.
Presently they slackened and he spoke.
"I say, shall you ever get away from this place?"
"Never, I think."
"Do you never want to get away?"
"No. Never. You see, I love it."
"I know you do." He said it savagely, as if he were jealous of the place.
"So do you," she answered.
"If I didn't I suppose I should have to."
"Yes, it's better, if you've got to live in it."
"That wasn't what I meant."
After that they were silent for a long time. She was wondering what he did mean.
"Oh--aren't you coming in for tea?" she said.
He paused. "I've got what I wanted."
He stepped backward, facing her, raising his cap, then he turned and hurried down the hill.
Gwenda walked slowly up the flagged path to the house door. She stood there, thinking.
"He's got what he wanted. He only wanted to see what I was like."