Various scenes to which Markland was all unaccustomed had been taking place in these days, alternations of rapture and gloom on the part of Warrender, of shrinking and eagerness on the part of Lady Markland, which made their intercourse one of perpetual vicissitude. From the quiet of her seclusion she had been roused into all the storms of passion, and though this was sweetened by the absolute devotion of the young man who adored her, there were yet moments in which she felt like Geoff that the position was becoming insupportable. Everything in her life was turned upside down by this new element in it, which came between her and her child, between her and her business, the work to which she had so lately made up her mind to devote herself as to the great object of her existence. All that was suspended now. When Theo was with her, he would not brook, nor did she desire, any interruption; and when he was not with her the bewildering thoughts that would rush upon her, the questions in her mind as to what she ought to do, whether it might not even now be better for everybody to break, if it was possible, those engagements which brought so much agitation, which hindered everything, which disturbed even the bond between herself and her child, would sometimes almost destroy her moral balance altogether. And then her young lover would arrive, and all the miseries and difficulties would be forgotten, and it would seem as if earthly conditions and circumstances had rolled away, and there were but these two in a new life, a new world, where no troubles were. Then Lady Markland would say to herself that it was the transition only that was painful, that they were all in a false position, but that afterwards, when the preliminaries were over and all accomplished, everything would be well. When she was his, and he hers, beyond drawing back or doubt, beyond the possibility of separation, then all that was over-anxious, over-sensitive in Theo would settle down in the sober certainty of happiness secured, and Geoff, who was so young, would reconcile himself to that which would so soon appear the only natural condition of life, and the new would seem as good, nay, better than the old. She trembled herself upon the verge of the new, fearing any change and shrinking from it as is natural for a woman, and yet in her heart felt that it would be better this great change should come and be accomplished rather than to look forward to it, to go through all its drawbacks, and pay its penalties every day.
A few days after these incidents Theo came to Markland one morning with brows more than usually cloudy. He had been annoyed about his house, the improvements about which had been going on very slowly: one of his tradespeople worse than another, the builder waiting for the architect, the carpenter for the builder, the new furniture and decorations naturally lagging behind all. And to make these things more easy to bear he had met Mrs. Wilberforce, who had told him that she wondered to see so much money being spent at the Warren, as she heard his home was to be at Markland, and so natural, as it was so much better a house: and that she had heard little Lord Markland was going to school immediately, which no doubt was the best thing that could be done, and would leave his mother free. After this he had rushed to Markland in hot impetuosity. "I am never told," he cried. "I do not wish to exact anything, but if you have made up your mind about Geoff, I think I might have heard it from yourself."
"Dear Theo!" Lady Markland said, and that was all.
Then he threw himself at her feet in sudden compunction, "I am a brute," he said. "I come to you with my idiotic stories and you listen to me with that sweet patience of yours, and never reprove me. Tell me I am a fool and not worthy of your trust; I am so, I am so! but it is because I can't bear this state of affairs—to be everything and yet nothing, to know that you are mine, and yet have a stranger informing me what you are going to do."
"No stranger need inform you, Theo. Geoff has asked me to send him to school. I can't tell how any one could know. He wishes to go—directly. He is not happy either. Oh, Theo, I think I make everybody unhappy instead of——"
"Not you," he cried, "not you, those men with their idiotic delays. Geoff is wise, wiser than they are. Let us follow his example, dearest. You don't distrust me; you know that whatever is best for you, even what they think best, all their ridiculous conditions, I will carry out. Don't you know, that the less my hands are bound, the more I should accept the fetters, all, as much as they please, that they think needful for you—but not as conditions of having you. That is what I cannot bear."
"You have me," she said, smiling upon him with a smile very close upon tears, "you know, without any conditions at all."
"Then let it be so," he cried. "Oh let it be so—directly, as Geoff wishes: dear little Geoff, wise Geoff—let him be our example."
"Theo—oh, try to love my boy!"
"I will make him my model, if you will take his example, directly, directly! The child is wise, he knows better than any of us. Darling, let us take his example, let us cut this knot. When the uncertainty is over, all these difficulties will melt away."
"He is wise, Theo—you don't know how right you are. Oh, my boy! and I am taking so little thought of him. I felt my heart leap when he asked to go away. Can you believe it? My own boy, my only one! I was glad, and I hate myself for it, though it was for you."
"All that," he said, eagerly addressing himself with all the arts he knew to comfort and reassure her, "is this state of miserable delay. We are in the transition from one to another. What good can we do to keep hanging on, to keep the whole county in talk, to make Geoff unhappy? He goes by instinct and he sees it—my own love, let us do so too. Let us do it—without a word to any one, my dearest!"
"Oh, Theo," she cried, "if you will but promise me to love my boy."
In the distracted state in which she was, this no-argument of Geoff's little example went to her heart. It seemed to bring him somehow into the decision, to make it look like a concession to Geoff, a carrying out of his wishes, and at the same time a supreme plea with Theo for love and understanding of Geoff. Yet it was with falterings and sinkings of soul indescribable that Lady Markland went through the two following days. They were days wonderful, not to be ever forgotten. Theo did not appear, he had gone away, she said, for a little while upon business, and Geoff and she were left alone. They went back into all the old habitudes as if nothing were changed; and the house fell again into a strange calm, a quietness almost unnatural. There were no lessons, no business, nothing to be done, but only an abandonment to that pleasure of being together which had been so long broken. He went with her for her drives, and she went with him for his walk. She called for Geoff whenever he disappeared for a moment, as if she could not bear him away from her side. They were as they had been before Theo existed for them, when they were all in all to each other. Alas, they were, yet were not, as they had been. When they drove through the fair country where the sheaves were standing in the fields and everything aglow with the mirth of harvest, they were both lost in long reveries, only calling themselves back by intervals, with a recollection of the necessity of saying something to each other. When they walked, though Geoff still clung to his mother's arm, his thoughts as well as hers were away. They discovered in this moment of close reunion that they had lost each other. Not only did the mother no longer belong to the child, but the child even, driven from her side he knew not how, was lost to the mother; they had set out unconsciously each upon a new and separate way. Geoff was not grieved, scarcely even startled, when she told him on the second evening that she was going to town next day —for shopping, she said. He did not ask to be taken with her, nor thought of asking; it appeared to Geoff that he had known all along that she would go. Lady Markland proposed to him that he should pay Mrs. Warrender a visit, and he consented, not asking why. He drove in with her to the station at Highcombe, where Chatty met him, and took leave of his mother, strangely, in a curious, dreamy way, as if he were not sure what he was doing. To be sure it was a parting of little importance. She was going to town, to do some shopping, and in less than a week she was to be back. It had never happened before, which gave the incident a distinguishing character, that was all. But she seated herself on the other side of the railway carriage and did not keep him in her eye till she could see him no more. And though she cried under her veil some tears which were salt and bitter, yet in her heart there was a feeling of relief—of relief to have parted with her boy! Could such a thing be possible? Geoff on his side went back with Chatty very quietly, saying little. He sat down in a corner of the drawing-room, with a book, his face twitching more than usual, his eyes puckered up tight: but afterwards became, as Chatty said, "very companionable," which was indeed the chief quality of this little forsaken boy.
It was not till nearly a week after that Lady Markland came back. She arrived suddenly, one evening, with Theo, unexpected, unannounced. Dinner was over, and they had all gone into the garden in the warm summer twilight when these unlooked-for visitors came. Lady Markland was clad from head to foot in gray, the colour of the twilight, she who had been for so long all black. Theo followed her closely, in light attire also, and with a face all alight with happiness, more bright than in all his life his face had ever been before. He took Geoff by the shoulders with a sort of tender roughness, which was almost like an embrace. "Is that you, my old boy?" he said, with an unsteady laugh, pushing him into his mother's arms. And then there was some crying and kissing, and Geoff heard it said that they had thought it better so, to avoid all fuss and trouble, and that it had taken place in town five days ago. To him no further explanations were made, but he seemed to understand it as well as the most grown-up person among them all.
This sudden step, which put all the power in Theo's hands to thwart the lawyers and regulate matters at his own pleasure, made him at once completely subservient to them, accepting everything which he had struggled against before. He took up his abode at Markland with his wife without so much as a protest; from thence he found it an amusement to watch the slow progress of the works at the Warren, riding over two or three times a week, sometimes accompanied by Geoff on his pony, sometimes by Geoff's mother, who it appeared could ride very well too. And when they went into society it was as Lady Markland and Mr. Warrender. Even on this point, without a word, Theo had given in.
There was, of course, a great outcry in the county about this almost runaway marriage. It was not dignified for Lady Markland, people said; but there were some good-natured souls who said they did not wonder, for that a widow's wedding was not a pretty spectacle like a young girl's, and of course there were always embarrassments, especially with a child so old as Geoff. What could his mother have done with him, had he been present at the wedding, and he must have been present at the wedding, if it had been performed in the ordinary way. Poor little Geoff! If only the new husband would be good to him, everybody said.