IV + 

As she left the room to follow him she stopped for a moment to say to Sybil, вАЬAre you happy, my dear? YouвАЩre not sorry that you arenвАЩt going back to school in Saint-Cloud?вАЭ + 

вАЬNo, Mama; why shouldnвАЩt I be happy here? I love it, more than anything in the world.вАЭ + 

The girl thrust her hands into the pockets of her riding-coat. + 

вАЬYou donвАЩt think I was wrong to send you to France to schoolвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ away from everyone here?вАЭ + 

Sybil laughed and looked at her mother in the frank, half-mocking way she had when she fancied she had uncovered a plot. + 

вАЬAre you worrying about marrying me off? IвАЩm only eighteen. IвАЩve lots of time.вАЭ + 

вАЬIвАЩm worrying because I think youвАЩll be so hard to please.вАЭ + 

Again she laughed. вАЬThatвАЩs true. ThatвАЩs why IвАЩm going to take my time.вАЭ + 

вАЬAnd youвАЩre glad to have Th√©r√®se here?вАЭ + 

вАЬOf course. You know I like Th√©r√®se awfully, Mama.вАЭ + 

вАЬVery wellвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ run along now. I must speak to your grandfather.вАЭ + 

And the girl went out onto the terrace where Jack stood waiting in the sun for the trap. He always followed the sun, choosing to sit in it even in midsummer, as if he were never quite warm enough. + 

She was worried over Sybil. She had begun to think that perhaps Aunt Cassie was right when she said that Sybil ought to go to a boarding-school with the girls she had always known, to grow loud and noisy and awkward and play hockey and exchange silly notes with the boys in the boarding-school in the next village. Perhaps it was wrong to have sent Sybil away to a school where she would meet girls from France and England and Russia and South AmericaвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ half the countries of the world; a school where, as Aunt Cassie had said bitterly, she would be forced to associate with the вАЬdaughters of dancers and opera singers.вАЭ She knew now that Sybil hadnвАЩt liked the ball any more than Th√©r√®se, who had run away from it without a word of explanation. Only with Th√©r√®se it didnвАЩt matter so much, because the dark stubborn head was filled with all sorts of wild notions about science and painting and weird books on psychology. There was a loneliness about Th√©r√®se and her mother, Sabine Callendar, only with them it didnвАЩt matter. They had, too, a hardness, a sense of derision and scorn which protected them. Sybil hadnвАЩt any such protections. Perhaps she was even wrong in having made of Sybil a ladyвБ†вАФa lady in the old sense of the wordвБ†вАФbecause there seemed to be no place for a lady in the scheme of life as it had existed at the dance the night before. It was perilous, having a lady on oneвАЩs hands, especially a lady who was certain to take life as passionately as Sybil. + 

She wanted the girl to be happy, without quite understanding that it was because Sybil seemed the girl she had once been herself, a very part of herself, the part which had never lived at all. + 

She found her father-in-law seated at his great mahogany desk in the high narrow room walled with books which was kept sacred to him, at the desk from which he managed the farm and watched over a fortune, built up bit by bit shrewdly, thriftily over three hundred years, a fortune which he had never brought himself to trust in the hands of his son. It was, in its gloomy, cold way, a pleasant room, smelling of dogs and apples and woodsmoke, and sometimes of whisky, for it was here that the old man retired when, in a kind of baffled frenzy, he drank himself to insensibility. It was here that he would sometimes sit for a day and a night, even sleeping in his leather chair, refusing to see anyone save Higgins, who watched over him, and Olivia. And so it was Olivia and Higgins who alone knew the spectacle of this solitary drinking. The world and even the family knew very little of itвБ†вАФonly the little which sometimes leaked out from the gossip of servants straying at night along the dark lanes and hedges about Durham. + 

He sat with his coffee and a glass of Courvoisier before him while he smoked, with an air of being lost in some profound worry, for he did not look up at once when she entered, but sat staring before him in an odd, enchanted fashion. It was not until she had taken a cigarette from the silver box and lighted it that he looked up at the sound of the striking match and, focusing the burning black eyes, said to her, вАЬJack seems very well today.вАЭ + 

вАЬYes, better than he has been in a long time.вАЭ + 

вАЬPerhaps, after all, the doctors are wrong.вАЭ + 

Olivia sighed and said quietly, вАЬIf we had believed the doctors we should have lost him long ago.вАЭ + 

вАЬYes, thatвАЩs true.вАЭ + 

She poured her coffee and he murmured, вАЬItвАЩs about Horace Pentland I wanted to speak. HeвАЩs dead. I got the news this morning. He died in Mentone and now itвАЩs a question whether we shall bring him home here to be buried in Durham with the rest of the family.вАЭ + 

Olivia was silent for a moment and then, looking up, said вАЬWhat do you think? How long has it been that he has lived in Mentone?вАЭ + 

вАЬItвАЩs nearly thirty years now that IвАЩve been sending him money to stay there. HeвАЩs only a cousin. Still, we had the same grandfather and heвАЩd be the first of the family in three hundred years who isnвАЩt buried here.вАЭ + 

вАЬThere was Savina Pentland.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶вАЭ + 

вАЬYes.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ But sheвАЩs buried out there, and she would have been buried here if it had been possible.вАЭ + 

And he made a gesture in the direction of the sea, beyond the marshes where the beautiful Savina Pentland, almost a legend now, lay, somewhere deep down in the soft white sand at the bottom of the ocean. + 

вАЬWould he want to be buried here?вАЭ asked Olivia. + 

вАЬHe wrote and asked meвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ a month or two before he died. It seemed to be on his mind. He put it in a strange way. He wrote that he wanted to come home.вАЭ + 

Again Olivia was thoughtful for a time. вАЬStrangeвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶вАЭ she murmured presently, вАЬwhen people were so cruel to him.вАЭ + 

The lips of the old man stiffened a little. + 

вАЬIt was his own fault.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶вАЭ + 

вАЬStillвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ thirty years is a long time.вАЭ + 

He knocked the ash from his cigar and looked at her sharply. вАЬYou mean that everything may have been forgotten by now?вАЭ + 

Olivia made a little gesture with her white, ringless hands. вАЬWhy not?вАЭ + 

вАЬBecause people donвАЩt forget things like thatвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ not in our world, at any rate.вАЭ + 

Quietly, far back in her mind, Olivia kept trying to imagine this Horace Pentland whom she had never seen, this shadowy old man, dead now, who had been exiled for thirty years. + 

вАЬYou have no reason for not wanting him here among all the others?вАЭ + 

вАЬNoвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ Horace is dead now.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ It canвАЩt matter much whether whatвАЩs left of him is buried here or in France.вАЭ + 

вАЬExcept, of course, that they may have been kinder to him over there.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ TheyвАЩre not so harsh.вАЭ + 

A silence fell over them, as if in some way the spirit of Horace Pentland, the sinner whose name was never spoken in the family save between Olivia and the old man, had returned and stood between them, waiting to hear what was to be done with all that remained of him on this earth. It was one of those silences which, descending upon the old house, sometimes filled Olivia with a vague uneasiness. They had a way of descending upon the household in the long evenings when all the family sat reading in the old drawing-roomвБ†вАФas if there were figures unseen who stood watching. + 

вАЬIf he wanted to be buried here,вАЭ said Olivia, вАЬI can see no reason why he should not be.вАЭ + 

вАЬCassie will object to raking up an old scandal that has been forgotten.вАЭ + 

вАЬSurely that canвАЩt matter nowвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ when the poor old man is dead. We can be kind to him nowвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ surely we can be kind to him now.вАЭ + 

John Pentland sighed abruptly, a curious, heartbreaking sigh that seemed to have escaped even his power of steely control; and presently he said, вАЬI think you are right, Olivia.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ I will do as you sayвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ only weвАЩll keep it a secret between us until the time comes when itвАЩs necessary to speak. And thenвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ then weвАЩll have a quiet funeral.вАЭ + 

She would have left him then save that she knew from his manner that there were other things he wanted to say. He had a way of letting you know his will without speaking. Somehow, in his presence you felt that it was impossible to leave until he had dismissed you. He still treated his own son, who was nearly fifty, as if he were a little boy. + 

Olivia waited, busying herself by rearranging the late lilacs which stood in a tall silver vase on the polished mahogany desk. + 

вАЬThey smell good,вАЭ he said abruptly. вАЬTheyвАЩre the last, arenвАЩt they?вАЭ + 

вАЬThe last until next spring.вАЭ + 

вАЬNext springвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶вАЭ he repeated with an air of speaking to himself. вАЬNext spring.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶вАЭ And then abruptly, вАЬThe other thing was about Sabine. The nurse tells me she has discovered that Sabine is here.вАЭ He made the family gesture toward the old north wing. вАЬShe has asked to see Sabine.вАЭ + 

вАЬWho told her that Sabine had returned? How could she have discovered it?вАЭ + 

вАЬThe nurse doesnвАЩt know. She must have heard someone speaking the name under her window. The nurse says that people in her condition have curious ways of discovering such thingsвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ like a sixth sense.вАЭ + 

вАЬDo you want me to ask Sabine? SheвАЩd come if I asked her.вАЭ + 

вАЬIt would be unpleasant. Besides, I think it might do harm in some way.вАЭ + 

Olivia was silent for a moment. вАЬHow? She probably wouldnвАЩt remember Sabine. When she saw her last, Sabine was a young girl.вАЭ + 

вАЬSheвАЩs gotten the idea now that weвАЩre all against her, that weвАЩre persecuting her in some way.вАЭ He coughed and blew a cloud of smoke out of his thin-drawn lips. вАЬItвАЩs difficult to explain what I mean.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ I mean that Sabine might encourage that feelingвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ quite without meaning to, that Sabine might give her the impression that she was an ally. ThereвАЩs something disturbing about Sabine.вАЭ + 

вАЬAnson thinks so, too,вАЭ said Olivia softly. вАЬHeвАЩs been talking to me about it.вАЭ + 

вАЬShe ought never to have come back here. ItвАЩs difficultвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ what I am trying to say. Only I feel that sheвАЩs up to some mischief. I think she hates us all.вАЭ + 

вАЬNot all of us.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶вАЭ + 

вАЬNot perhaps you. You never belonged here. ItвАЩs only those of us who have always been here.вАЭ + 

вАЬBut sheвАЩs fond of you.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶вАЭ + 

вАЬHer father and I were good friends. He was very like herвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ disagreeable and given to speaking unpleasant truths.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ He wasnвАЩt a popular man. Perhaps thatвАЩs why sheвАЩs friendly toward meвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ on account of him.вАЭ + 

вАЬNo, itвАЩs more than that.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶вАЭ + 

Slowly Olivia felt herself slipping back into that state of confused enchantment which had overwhelmed her more and more often of late. It seemed that life grew more and more tenuous and complicated, more blurred and indistinct, until at times it became simply a morass of minute problems in which she found herself mired and unable to act. No one spoke directly any more. It was like living in a world of shadows. And this old man, her father-in-law, was the greatest puzzle of all, because it was impossible ever to know how much he understood of what went on about him, how much he chose to ignore in the belief that by denying its existence it would cease to exist. + 

Sitting there, puzzled, she began to pull a leaf from the cluster of lilacs into tiny bits. + 

вАЬSometimes,вАЭ she said, вАЬI think Sabine is unhappy.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶вАЭ + 

вАЬNoвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ not that.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ SheвАЩs beyond happiness or unhappiness. ThereвАЩs something hard in her and unrelentingвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ as hard as a cut diamond. SheвАЩs a clever woman and a queer one. SheвАЩs one of those strange creatures that are thrown off now and then by people like us. ThereвАЩs nothing else quite like them in the world. They go to strange extremes. Horace was the sameвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ in a different, less creditable fashion.вАЭ + 

Olivia looked at him suddenly, astonished by the sudden flash of penetration in the old man, one of those sudden, quick gleams which led her to believe that far down, in the depths of his soul, he was far more profound, far more intelligent, unruly and defiant of tradition than he ever allowed the world to suppose. It was always the old question. How much did he know? How much did he not knowвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ far back, behind the lined, severe, leathery old face? Or was it a sort of clairvoyance, not of eternal illness, like JackвАЩs, but of old age? + 

вАЬI shall ask Sabine,вАЭ she began. + 

вАЬItвАЩs not necessary at the moment. She appears to have forgotten the matter temporarily. But sheвАЩll remember it again and then I think it will be best to humor her, whatever comes. She may not think of it again for monthsвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ until Sabine has gone.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ I only wanted to ask youвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ to consult you, Olivia. I thought you could arrange it.вАЭ + 

She rose and, turning to go, she heard him saying, вАЬShe might like some lilacs in her room.вАЭ He hesitated and in a flat, dead voice, added, вАЬShe used to be very fond of flowers.вАЭ + 

Olivia, avoiding the dark eyes, thought, вАЬShe used to be very fond of flowers.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ That means forty years agoвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ forty long years. Oh, my God!вАЭ But after a second she said simply, вАЬShe has taken a dislike to flowers. She fancies they take up the air and stifle her. The sight of them is very bad for her.вАЭ + 

вАЬI should have known youвАЩd already thought of it.вАЭ + 

For an instant the old man stood facing her with a fixed and searching expression which made her feel shy and led her to turn away from him a little; and then all at once, with an air strangely timid and frightened in a man so grim in appearance, he took her hand and kissing her on the forehead murmured, вАЬYouвАЩre a good girl, Olivia. TheyвАЩre right in what they say of you. YouвАЩre a good girl. I donвАЩt know how I should have managed without you all these years.вАЭ + 

Smiling, she looked at him, and then, touching his hand affectionately, she went out without speaking again, thinking, as she had thought a thousand times, what a terrible thing it must be to have been born so inarticulate and so terrified of feeling as John Pentland. It must be, she thought, like living forever imprisoned in a shell of steel from which one might look out and see friends but never touch or know them. + 

From the doorway she heard a voice behind her, saying almost joyfully: вАЬThe doctors must have been wrong about Jack. You and I together, Olivia, have defeated them.вАЭ + 

She said, вАЬYes,вАЭ and smiled at him, but when she had turned away again there was in her mind a strange, almost gruesome thought. + 

вАЬIf only Jack lives until his grandfather is dead, the old man will die happy. If only he can be kept alive until then.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶вАЭ + 

She had a strange way of seeing things in the hard light of reality, and an unreal, lonely childhood had fostered the trait. She had been born thus, and now as a woman she found that in a way it was less a curse than a blessing. In a world which survived only by deceiving itself, she found that seeing the truth and knowing it made her strong. Here, perhaps, lay the reason why all of them had come to depend upon her. But there were times, too, when she wanted passionately to be a poor weak feminine creature, a woman who might turn to her husband and find in him someone stronger than herself. She had a curious feeling of envy for Savina Pentland, who was dead before she was born.вБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ Savina Pentland who had been the beauty of the family, extravagant, reckless, feminine, who bought strings of pearls and was given to weeping and fainting. + 

But she (Olivia) had only Anson to lean upon. + 

After she had gone away the old man sat for a long time smoking and drinking his brandy, enveloped by a loneliness scarcely more profound than it had been a little while before when he sat talking with Olivia. It was his habit to sit thus sometimes for an hour at a time, unconscious, it seemed, of all the world about him; Olivia had come in more than once at such moments and gone away again, unwilling to shatter the enchantment by so much as a single word. + 

At last, when the cigar had burned to an end, he crushed out the ember with a short, fierce gesture and, rising, went out of the tall narrow room and along the corridor that led to the dark stairway in the old north wing. These steps he had climbed every day since it had become necessary to keep her in the country the year roundвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ every day, at the same hour, step by step his big heavy-shod boots had trod the same worn stair carpet. It was a journey begun years ago as a kind of pleasure colored by hope, which for a long time now, bereft of all hope, had become merely a monotonous dreary duty. It was like a journey of penance made by some pilgrim on his knees up endless nights of stairs. + 

For more than twenty years, as far back as Olivia could remember, he had been absent from the house for a night but twice, and then only on occasions of life and death. In all that time he had been twice to New York and never once to the Europe he had not seen since, as a boy, he had made the grand tour on a plan laid out by old General CurtisвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ a time so remote now that it must have seemed part of another life. In all those years he had never once escaped from the world which his family found so perfect and complete and which to him must have seemed always a little cramped and inadequate. Fate and blood and circumstance, one might have said, had worn him down bit by bit until in the end he had come to worship the same gods they worshiped. Now and then he contrived to escape them for a little while by drinking himself into insensibility, but always he awakened again to find that nothing had changed, to discover that his prison was the same. And so, slowly, hope must have died. + 

But no one knew, even Olivia, whether he was happy or unhappy; and no one would ever really know what had happened to him, deep inside, behind the gray, leathery old face. + 

The world said, when it thought of him: вАЬThere never was such a devoted husband as John Pentland.вАЭ + 

Slowly and firmly he walked along the narrow hall to the end and there halted to knock on the white door. He always knocked, for there were times when the sight of him, entering suddenly, affected her so that she became hysterical and beyond all control. + 

In response to the knock, the door was opened gently and professionally by Miss Egan, an automaton of a nurseвБ†вАФneat, efficient, inhuman and incredibly starched, whose very smile seemed to come and go by some mechanical process, like the sounds made by squeezing a mechanical doll. Only it was impossible to imagine squeezing anything so starched and jagged as the red-faced Miss Egan. It was a smile which sprang into existence upon sight of any member of the family, a smile of false humility which said, вАЬI know very well that you cannot do without meвАЭвБ†вАФthe smile of a woman well enough content to be paid three times the wages of an ordinary nurse. In three or four more years she would have enough saved to start a sanatorium of her own. + 

Fixing her smile, she faced the old man, saying, вАЬShe seems quite well todayвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ very quiet.вАЭ + 

The whole hallway had been flooded at the opening of the door by a thick and complicated odor arising from innumerable medicines that stood row upon row in the obscurity of the dark room. The old man stepped inside, closing the door quickly behind him, for she was affected by too much light. She could not bear to have a door or a window open near her; even on this bright day the drawn shades kept the room in darkness. + 

She had got the idea somehow that there were people outside who waited to leer at herвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ hundreds of them all pressing their faces against the panes to peep into her bedroom. There were days when she could not be quieted until the window-shades were covered by thick layers of black cloth. She would not rise from her bed until nightfall lest the faces outside might see her standing there in her nightdress. + 

It was only when darkness had fallen that the nurse was able by means of trickery and wheedling to air the room, and so it smelled horribly of the medicines she never took, but kept ranged about her, row upon row, like the fetishes of witch-doctors. In this they humored her as they had humored her in shutting out the sunlight, because it was the only way they could keep her quiet and avoid sending her away to some place where she would have been shut behind bars. And this John Pentland would not even consider. + 

When he entered she was lying in the bed, her thin, frail body barely outlined beneath the bedclothesвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ the mere shadow of a woman who must once have been pretty in a delicate way. But nothing remained now of the beauty save the fine modeling of the chin and nose and brow. She lay there, a queer, unreal old woman, with thin white hair, skin like parchment and a silly, vacant face as unwrinkled as that of a child. As he seated himself beside her, the empty, round blue eyes opened a little and stared at him without any sign of recognition. He took one of the thin, blue-veined hands in his, but it only lay there, lifeless, while he sat, silent and gentle, watching her. + 

Once he spoke, calling her wistfully by name, вАЬAgnesвАЭ; but there was no sign of an answer, not so much as a faint flickering of the white, transparent lids. + 

And so for an eternity he sat thus in the thick darkness, enveloped by the sickly odor of medicines, until he was roused by a knock at the door and the sudden glare of daylight as it opened and Miss Egan, fixing her flashing and teethy smile, came in and said: вАЬThe fifteen minutes is up, Mr.¬†Pentland.вАЭ + 

When the door had closed behind him he went away again, slowly, thoughtfully, down the worn stairs and out into the painfully brilliant sunlight of the bright New England spring. Crossing the green terrace, bordered with great clumps of iris and peonies and a few late tulips, he made his way to the stable-yard, where Higgins had left the red mare in charge of a Polish boy who did odd tasks about the farm. The mare, as beautiful and delicate as a fine steel spring, stood nervously pawing the gravel and tossing her handsome head. The boy, a great lout with a shock of yellow hair, stood far away from her holding the reins at armвАЩs length. At the sight of the two the old man laughed and said, вАЬYou mustnвАЩt let her know youвАЩre afraid of her, Ignaz.вАЭ + 

The boy gave up the reins and retired to a little distance, still watching the mare resentfully. вАЬWell, she tried to bite me!вАЭ he said sullenly. + 

Quickly, with a youthful agility, John Pentland swung himself to her backвБ†вАКвБ†вА¶ quickly enough to keep her from sidling away from him. There was a short, fierce struggle between the rider and the horse, and in a shower of stones they sped away down the lane that led across the meadows, past the thicket of black pines and the abandoned gravel-pit, toward the house of Mrs.¬†Soames. + 