Chapter XXXII: A Decision

TOWARDS evening, Diana Fenwick said abruptly,—

"You have heard from Pearl to-day."

"Yes," Beryl answered.

"I don't wish to hear what she says. It is no concern of mine now. But I expect an answer soon as to your plans. My own arrangements depend in some measure upon it."

"You can't travel alone, Aunt Di," Beryl broke out. She had had the thought in her mind.

"Thanks. I am happily not dependent upon you for protection."

"I 'must' see Pearl," Beryl murmured half-unconsciously.

Diana rose to leave the room, as if not choosing at that moment to hear more. But she changed her mind before reaching the door, and turned back.

"It just comes to this, Beryl—do you love Pearl best, or me?"

Love! Beryl had no difficulty in answering that question to herself. And yet her heart sank at the thought of letting the little widow go away alone. If she did not greatly love Mrs. Fenwick, she had for her something of the kind of tender interest which a nurse feels for a sick person under her charge, fractious and trying as that sick person may be. To Beryl, the look-out seemed really more forlorn for Diana than for herself. She almost forgot at that moment her own position of threatened homelessness.

"The question hinges there," said Diana coldly, with a certain glitter in her eyes. "I do not see why I am to go on, year after year, lavishing money and thought upon girls who do not care a rap for me in return."

"I do care for you, Aunt Di," Beryl could truthfully say.

"As much as you care for Pearl?"

This answer came, truthfully too. "No one in the world can be to me what Pearl is. But, Aunt Di, the one doesn't hinder the other."

"And if the choice lies between Pearl and me?"

Beryl lifted a pale and troubled face. "I don't want to be a burden to you," she said. "I would gladly earn my own living, so far as money is concerned. But indeed I don't want to forsake you."

"If the choice lies between Pearl and me!" repeated Diana, with a strange expression, anger and pain struggling for the mastery.

"I should have to choose Pearl. I couldn't give her up," Beryl said sorrowfully.

"Very well. Then the matter is settled. You may find another home for yourself by next Tuesday,—or sooner if you like."

"I have nowhere to go. How 'can' I?" said Beryl, in distress.

Diana swept from the room without making a reply, her head thrown back in disdainful fashion.

Beryl had risen, and she stood now with her hands clenched together, and a feeling of despairing loneliness at her heart. Was she to lose all at one blow?

Yet probably the bitterness of suffering was keener with Diana than with Beryl. For Beryl was acting, as she believed, rightly, and was keeping the love of those for whom she most cared; whereas Diana was yielding to the sway of ungoverned passions, and was with her own hand severing the ties which united her past to her future life.

"What shall I do?" murmured Beryl. "Oh, it is cruel. I have nowhere to go—no one to take me in. Am I wrong? Ought I to have given way to her at once? Would that have been right? I wish I knew."

Then, under a sudden impulse, fearing to be hindered or forbidden, she hastened out of the room and into the garden.

It was a cold evening, but she would not delay to seek wraps.

A window opened in her rear, and a voice called, "Come back this minute, Beryl."

She heard almost without hearing, and the idea of turning back in obedience did not even occur to her mind.

"I want to see Miss Carmichael," she said eagerly to the servant who answered her ring, and scarcely waiting for a reply, she rushed into the drawing-room.

Hester had just made tea, and was beside the table, chatting to Miss Carmichael. Both looked up in surprise at Beryl's abrupt entrance.

"Not even a shawl!" said Miss Carmichael quietly. "Hettie, will you shut the door? Sit down, Beryl, and tell us what is wrong."

Beryl was too much excited to take the proffered seat. She grasped the back of it with her hands, and stood still, panting.

"I have come to see—to ask—" she said hurriedly, in her gruffest voice of stirred feeling—"I thought—I thought you would help me—would tell me what is right. I don't know what to do. Aunt Di is going abroad, and I shall have no home."

"Going abroad to-night," Hester exclaimed.

"No,—but she has only just told me. She is going away from Hurst next Tuesday. And Pearl comes home on Wednesday. And Aunt Di would take me with her, if I were willing to give up Pearl. But I can't—how can I? Pearl wants me, I know. How 'can' I give her up? Aunt Di says I must take my choice." A sob broke into the words. "It seems so cruel, when I have tried so hard to do my very best for her. And she thinks me ungrateful because I care for Pearl most. Of course I love Pearl best. I don't see how I can help it."

"Why should Mrs. Fenwick wish you to give up Pearl?" asked Miss Carmichael.

"I don't know—I mean, she was vexed with Pearl, first about the letter which I could not show her, and then about Pearl being engaged without asking her leave, and not coming home, and writing about Aunt Di as she did. I suppose Pearl was wrong—of course. But Aunt Di has never spoken kindly of Pearl since, and now she seems as if she were determined not to see her. I don't know whether it is only a sudden fancy, and whether she will keep to it: but she talks as if she meant to stay away an immense time, and meant never to live in Hurst again. I shouldn't like that. But indeed I do want to do what is right, and it can't be right to give up Pearl. It couldn't be,—and just now she wants me so much. And Aunt Di doesn't seem to want me at all,—at least, she talks of the expense."

Miss Carmichael asked questions gently, trying to obtain a clear understanding of the case; while Hester listened intently, with sympathising looks, and Beryl became calmer.

"You will feel better now you have told me all," Miss Carmichael said at length. "Cheer up, Beryl, and don't be downhearted. If you are to lose your home with Mrs. Fenwick, some other home will be provided for you."

"Do you think so?" asked Beryl. "Pearl can't take me in, I know. She would like it, I think; but Mr. Crosbie can't bear a full house, and he doesn't care for me either—he never did. Besides, Miss Crosbie will most likely have to go there now. I could work for my living. I have often thought of that. I am not clever enough to be a governess, but I might be a companion to some old lady,—or I might be a nurse. I should like nursing. But it can't be settled all in a moment, and I have nowhere to go."

"Can you stay to tea, and let us consider the matter quietly?"

Beryl hesitated. "Aunt Di would be angry," she said. "Do you think I ought?"

Miss Carmichael sat in grave thought. "No," she said at length. "Better to avoid giving unnecessary offence. I think I will go back with you, and see what Mrs. Fenwick really means."

"O Miss Carmichael!"

Beryl's face told of unspeakable gratitude. Tea was left to grow cold, as it might. Hettie offered no objections, but only wrapped up Miss Carmichael warmly, lent a shawl to Beryl, and watched the two across the road with eyes of eager interest.

"'My heart shall not fear,'" Miss Carmichael quoted softly, as they walked the little distance. "'When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up.'"

"It is easier to trust, now I have spoken to you," said Beryl.

"Don't, wait for that another time. Trust Him always—'at all times.'"

Diana received them coldly, biting her lip and reining up her head, with an air half-vexed, half-embarrassed. "Beryl seems to have fetched you without any warrant on my part," she said, extending two fingers. "I do not know what for. She is a great deal too much given to gossiping about home affairs out of the house."

"Beryl did not fetch me. It was entirely my own idea to come," said Miss Carmichael, quietly taking a seat unasked, since Diana showed no signs of offering one.

Diana bit her lip again, and sat down also.

"Beryl had scarcely a choice, under the circumstances, about mentioning the matter to some one, if she understood you rightly. I have come, in the hope of finding that there is some mistake."

"There is no mistake about the fact that I intend to leave Hurst next Tuesday. Whether Beryl accompanies me or not, is a matter of free choice on her part. If I am not mistaken, she has decided against doing so."

"I hardly think Beryl meant you to understand her words as decisive."

"I think she did. This is a matter which concerns her and me alone, Miss Carmichael."

"Pardon me! It concerns others also," said Miss Carmichael, in her gentlest tone. "Am I to understand that you do not wish to give Beryl a home any longer?"

"You may take it in what way you please," said Diana shortly. "The fact is, I am tired and sick of the state of things. Nobody knows the amount of worry connected with the care of other people's children. I am worn to death with fusses and discussions. Pearl has set herself up against me, and now Beryl is following in her steps. I am not going to have any more of it. If Beryl comes, she does so on my conditions. I don't want a 'managing partner.' If she is to form her own plans, and choose her own time for travelling, and act as an independent lady, and I am to have only the pleasure of paying for her expenses, the sooner we part the better."

"Beryl would be the last to wish for such a state of things. Still, after all these months of separation, is it not natural that the sisters should want to meet?"

"O yes, of course it is natural—highly natural," said Diana, in an irritated voice. "I suppose it is natural, too, that I should want to have my own way in the matter. And perhaps it is natural that I should not care to see Pearl Cumming next week, after the manner in which she has treated me. Everything is natural."

Miss Carmichael did not answer immediately. She seemed waiting either to consider the matter, or to give Diana time to cool.

"You are content to leave Beryl absolutely without a shelter for her head, after all these years of treating her as your own, Mrs. Fenwick?"

"The choice is Beryl's, not mine," Diana replied.

Yet Miss Carmichael's words were not without effect. Diana cared a good deal for the "look of things."

And after a moment's hesitation, she added, "Of course I have no intention of leaving her 'absolutely without a shelter.' If she does not choose to accompany me next Tuesday, I do not choose that she shall accompany me at all. But I am willing to pay for her board somewhere, during a few weeks, while she looks out for employment."

"I am glad to hear so much," Miss Carmichael said. "But it will be unnecessary. Beryl shall remain with me for the present, till we can decide upon her future course."

Diana muttered something which sounded like "preconcerted plan;" while Beryl's troubled face was lighted with a sudden gleam of happiness.

"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Fenwick. This is the first word that Beryl has heard of such a plan. I had not made up my own mind to the step when I came into your house. It is now a settled matter, however. Beryl shall pay me a visit of a few weeks, and I will take upon myself the responsibility of finding an opening for her—in or out of Hurst, as the case may be. She shall be a trouble to you no longer."

There was a slight pause.

"Would you prefer to keep her till next Tuesday, or shall she come to my house to-morrow?"

"I have nothing to do with the matter," said Mrs. Fenwick, her face changing strangely for an instant and then becoming hard. "Beryl has taken to independent action, and she may please herself."

"I think you wrong her. I believe Beryl to be acting conscientiously, and not in mere self-pleasing. But I should be sorry to help on a hasty decision. Will you tell me frankly—would you like two or three days' delay that you may consider the matter afresh?"

"No, thanks. I am sick of delays."

"Do you wish to have Beryl still to live with you, Mrs. Fenwick?"

Diana looked at her and then at Beryl, drew her brows together, and said, "No."

"The decision then is plainly yours, not hers," said Miss Carmichael, speaking gravely, and rising. "Mrs. Fenwick, you will some day regret this."

"I never wish to have people with me who do not wish it themselves," said Mrs. Fenwick.

"I do wish it—if only I need not give up Pearl," said Beryl.

Diana turned away her head.

"Then it is settled," said Miss Carmichael. "Whether Beryl shall come to me to-morrow, or wait until next Tuesday, you must please decide for her."

"To-morrow, if you like. I do not care," said Diana, looking haughty and white.

Her good-bye was of the slightest possible kind.

Beryl went into the hall, and clasped Miss Carmichael's hand with unspeakable gratitude.

"It is too much,—I can't thank you," she said.

Then she returned to a sombre and silent companion who vouchsafed scarcely a remark through the remainder of the evening.

But when they were retiring for the night, Diana said icily, "You may as well go to-morrow. I intend to leave on Saturday. And if ever I come to this place again—"

"I would rather stay and help you to pack up," said Beryl.

"No, thanks. I prefer to manage for myself."