The Literary Sense

Tears choked her, and she was driven off in the station fly. And a new governess, young, commonplacely pretty, and entirely heart-whole, came to take her place, to the open relief of Mr. Despard, and the little less pronounced satisfaction of the little girls.

"She'll write to you by every post now, I suppose," said Mr. Despard when the conventional letter of thanks for kindness came to his wife. But Miss Eden did not write again till Christmas. Then she wrote to ask Mrs. Despard's advice. There was a gentleman, a retired tea-broker, in a very good position. She liked him – did Mrs. Despard think it would be fair to marry him when her heart was buried for ever in that grave at Elendslaagte?

"But I don't want to be selfish, and poor Mr. Cave is so devoted. My dear mother thinks he would never be the same again if I refused him."

Mr. Despard read the letter, and told his wife to tell the girl to take the tea-broker, for goodness' sake, and be thankful. She'd never get such another chance. His wife told him not to be coarse, and wrote a gentle, motherly letter to Miss Eden.

On New Year's Day came a beautiful and very expensive handkerchief-sachet for Mrs. Despard, and the news that Miss Eden was engaged. "And already," she wrote, "I feel that I can really become attached to Edward. He is goodness itself. Of course, it is not like the other. That only comes once in a woman's life, but I believe I shall really be happy in a quiet, humdrum way."

After that, news of Miss Eden came thick and fast. Edward was building a house for her. Edward had bought her a pony-carriage. Edward had to call his house No. 70, Queen's Road – a new Town Council resolution – and it wasn't in a street at all, but quite in the country, only there was going to be a road there some day. And she had so wanted to call it the Beeches, after dear Mrs. Despard's house, where she had been so happy. The wedding-day was fixed, and would Mrs. Despard come to the wedding? Miss Eden knew it was a good deal to ask; but if she only would!

"It would add more than you can possibly guess to my happiness," she said, "if you could come. There is plenty of room in my mother's little house. It is small, but very convenient, and it has such a lovely old garden, so unusual, you know, in the middle of a town; and if only dear Mabel and Gracie might be among my little bridesmaids! The dresses are to be half-transparent white silk over rose colour. Dear Edward's father insists on ordering them himself from Liberty's. The other bridesmaids will be Edward's little nieces – such sweet children. Mother is giving me the loveliest trousseau. Of course, I shall make it up to her; but she will do it, and I give way, just to please her. It's not pretentious, you know, but everything so good. Real lace on all the under things, and twelve of everything, and – "

The letter wandered on into a maze of lingerie and millinery and silk petticoats.

Mr. and Mrs. Despard were still debating the question of the bridesmaids whose dresses were to come from Liberty's when a telegraph boy crossed the lawn.

Mrs. Despard tore open the envelope.

"Oh – how frightfully sad!" she said. "I am sorry! 'Edward's father dangerously ill. Wedding postponed.'"

The next letter was black-edged, and was not signed "Eden." Edward's father had insisted on the marriage taking place before he died – it had, in fact, been performed by his bedside. It had been a sad time, but Mrs. Edward was very happy now.

"My husband is so good to me, his thoughtful kindness is beyond belief," she wrote. "He anticipates my every wish. I should be indeed ungrateful if I did not love him dearly. Dear Mrs. Despard, this gentle domestic love is very beautiful. I hope I am not treacherous to my dead in being as happy as I am with Edward. Ah! I hear the gate click – I must run and meet him. He says it is not like coming home unless my face is the first he sees when he comes in. Good-bye. A thousand thanks for ever for all your goodness.

    "Your grateful Ella Cave."

"Either their carriage drive is unusually long, or her face was not the first," said Mr. Despard. "Why didn't she go and meet the man, and not stop to write all that rot?"

"Don't, Bill," said his wife. "You were always so unjust to that girl."

"Girl!" said Mr. Despard.

And now the letters were full of detail: the late Miss Eden wrote a good hand, and expressed herself with clearness. Her letters were a pleasure to Mrs. Despard.

"Poor dear!" she said. "It really rejoices my heart to think of her being so happy. She describes things very well. I almost feel as though I knew every room in her house; it must be very pretty with all those Liberty muslin blinds, and the Persian rugs, and the chair-backs Edward's grandmother worked – and then the beautiful garden. I think I must go to see it all. I do love to see people happy."

"You generally do see them happy," said her husband; "it's a way people have when they're near you. Go and see her, by all means."

And Mrs. Despard would have gone, but a letter, bearing the same date as her own, crossed it in the post; it must have been delayed, for it reached her on the day when she expected an answer to her own letter, offering a visit. But the late Miss Eden had evidently not received this, for her letter was a mere wail of anguish.

"Edward is ill – typhoid. I am distracted. Write to me when you can. The very thought of you comforts me."

"Poor thing," said Mrs. Despard, "I really did think she was going to be happy."

Her sympathetic interest followed Edward through all the stages of illness and convalescence, as chronicled by his wife's unwearying pen.

Then came the news of the need of a miniature trousseau, and the letters breathed of head-flannels, robes, and the charm of tiny embroidered caps. "They were Edward's when he was a baby – the daintiest embroidery and thread lace. The christening cap is Honiton. They are a little yellow with time, of course, but I am bleaching them on the sweet-brier hedge. I can see the white patches on the green as I write. They look like some strange sort of flowers, and they make me dream of the beautiful future."

In due season Baby was born and christened; and then Miss Eden, that was, wrote to ask if she might come to the Beeches, and bring the darling little one.

Mrs. Despard was delighted. She loved babies. It was a beautiful baby – beautifully dressed, and it rested contentedly in the arms of a beautifully dressed lady, whose happy face Mrs. Despard could hardly reconcile with her recollections of Miss Eden. The young mother's happiness radiated from her, and glorified her lips and eyes. Even Mr. Despard owned, when the pair had gone, that marriage and motherhood had incredibly improved Miss Eden.

And now, the sudden departure of a brother for the other side of the world took Mrs. Despard to Southampton, whence his boat sailed, and where lived the happy wife and mother, who had been Miss Eden.

When the tears of parting were shed, and the last waving handkerchief from the steamer's deck had dwindled to a sharp point of light, and from a sharp point of light to an invisible point of parting and sorrow, Mrs. Despard dried her pretty eyes, and thought of trains. There was no convenient one for an hour or two.

"I'll go and see Ella Cave," said she, and went in a hired carriage. "No. 70, Queen's Road," she said. "I think it's somewhere outside the town."

"Not it," said the driver, and presently set her down in a horrid little street, at a horrid little shop, where they sold tobacco and sweets and newspapers and walking-sticks.

"This can't be it! There must be some other Queen's Road?" said Mrs. Despard.

"No there ain't," said the man. "What name did yer want?"

"Cave," said Mrs. Despard absently; "Mrs. Edward Cave."

The man went into the shop. Presently he returned.

"She don't live here," he said; "she only calls here for letters."

Mrs. Despard assured herself of this in a brief interview with a frowsy woman across a glass-topped show-box of silk-embroidered cigar-cases.

"The young person calls every day, mum," she said; "quite a respectable young person, mum, I should say – if she was after your situation."

"Thank you," said Mrs. Despard mechanically, yet with her own smile – the smile that still stamps her in the frowsy woman's memory as "that pleasant-spoken lady."

She paused a moment on the dirty pavement, and then gave the cabman the address of the mother and sister, the address of the little house – small, but very convenient – and with a garden – such a lovely old garden – and so unusual in the middle of a town.

The cab stopped at a large, sparkling, plate-glassy shop – a very high-class fruiterer's and greengrocer's.

The name on the elaborately gilded facia was, beyond any doubt, Eden – Frederick Eden.

Mrs. Despard got out and walked into the shop. To this hour the scent of Tangerine oranges brings to her a strange, sick, helpless feeling of disillusionment.

A stout well-oiled woman, in a very tight puce velveteen bodice with bright buttons and a large yellow lace collar, fastened with a blue enamel brooch, leaned forward interrogatively.

"Mrs. Cave?" said Mrs. Despard.

"Don't know the name, madam."

"Wasn't that the name of the gentleman Miss Eden married?"

"It seems to me you're making a mistake, madam. Excuse me, but might I ask your name?"

"I'm Mrs. Despard. Miss Eden lived with me as governess."

"Oh, yes" – the puce velvet seemed to soften – "very pleased to see you, I'm sure! Come inside, madam. Ellen's just run round to the fishmonger's. I'm not enjoying very good health just now" – the glance was intolerably confidential – "and I thought I could fancy a bit of filleted plaice for my supper, or a nice whiting. Come inside, do!"