The Great Miss Driver

It was an embarrassing question – from a daughter about her father – addressed to Cartmell who owed him much and to me who had eaten his bread. Besides – he was lying there in his room upstairs. Cartmell faced the difficulty with simple directness.

"He wasn't polished in manner; when he was opposed or got angry, he was rough. But he was honest and straight, upright and just, kind and – "

"Kind?" she interrupted, a note of indignation plain to hear in her voice. "Not to me!"

That was awkward again!

"My dear Miss Driver, for what may have been amiss he's made you the best amends he could." He waved his arm as though to take in all the great house in which we sat. "Handsome amends!"

"Yes," she assented – but her assent did not sound very hearty.

A long silence followed – an uncomfortable silence. She was looking toward the window, and I could watch her face unperceived. From our first meeting I had been haunted by a sense of having seen her before, but I soon convinced myself that this was a delusion. I had not seen her, nor anyone like her (she was not at all like her father), in the flesh, but I had seen pictures that were like her. Not modern pictures, but sixteenth- or seventeenth-century portraits. Her hair was brown with ruddy tips, her brows not arched but very straight, her nose fine-cut and high, her mouth not large but her lips very red. Her chin was rather long, and her face wore the smooth, almost waxy, pallor which the pictures I was reminded of are apt to exhibit. Her eyes were so pronounced and bright a hazel that, seeing them on a canvas, one might have suspected the painter of taking a liberty with fact for the sake of his composition.

Cartmell broke the silence. "Since he wrote you a letter, may I venture to ask – ?" He stopped and glanced at me. "Perhaps you wouldn't mind giving us five minutes to ourselves, Austin?"

I thought the request not unnatural, and rose promptly from my chair. But we had reckoned without our host – our new host.

"Why do you tell him to go?" she demanded of Cartmell with a sudden sharpness. "I don't ask him to go. I don't want him to go. Sit down, please, Mr. Austin."

Cartmell had his two elbows on the table; he bit his thumb as he glanced up at her from under raised brows. He was not often called to book so sharply as that. I thought that she would make apology, but she made none. As I obediently – and, I fear, hastily – sat down again, she took a letter from a little bag which hung at her waist.

"What did you want to ask?" she said to Cartmell in a tone which was smooth but by no means overconciliatory.

Cartmell's manner said "Have it if you want it!" as he inquired bluntly, "Does your father say anything about your mother?"

She took the letter from its envelope and unfolded it. "About my mother he says this: 'It is necessary for me to say a few words about your mother. Mr. Cartmell is in possession of all proofs necessary to establish your position as my daughter, and there is no need for you to trouble your head about that, as not the smallest difficulty can arise. The personal aspect of the case is that on which I must touch. Three years after your birth your mother left me under circumstances which made it impossible for me to have any further communication with her. She went to Australia, and died five years later in Melbourne from an attack of typhoid fever. I caused constant inquiry to be made as to her position and took measures to secure that she should suffer no hardship. The circumstances to which I have referred made it imperative that I should remove you from her charge. As she consented to give up all claim on you, I did not go to the trouble of obtaining a divorce – which she did not desire either, as matters had been kept quiet. You will ask, and with reason, why I did not bring you up myself, and why I have delayed publicly acknowledging you as my daughter till the hour of my death. I can give no reason good to the world. I can give none good to my own conscience, unless it is a good one to say that a man is what God made him and that there are some things impossible to some men. It will seem a hard saying, but I could not endure to have you with me. I know myself, and I can only assure you that, if your childhood has not been a very happy one as it is, it would have been no happier if spent under my roof. Now we have been only strangers – you would have been worse than a stranger then.'"

Miss Driver, who had read in a low but level and composed voice, paused here for a moment – perhaps in doubt whether to read more. Then she went on: "'With that much excuse – for I have none other – I must now, my daughter, say good-by, for I am dying. Though of my own choice I have not seen you since your infancy. I have not been without thought for you. I hesitated long before throwing on your shoulders all the burden which I have created for my own and carried on them. But in the end nature has seemed to say to me – and to speak more strongly as I grow weaker – that you are the person to whom it should belong and that, if things go wrong, it will be nature's fault, not mine. Don't spend more than two-thirds of your income – the other third should go back to work and bring in more. Give handsomely when you give, but don't be always dribbling out small sums; they mount up against you without aiding the recipients. Go to church unless you really dislike it. Be independent, but not eccentric. You have a great position; make it greater. Be a power in your world. About love and marriage, remember always that being sensible in general matters is no guarantee that you will act sensibly there. So be doubly on your guard. Suspect and fear marriage, even while you seek the best alliance you can find. Be you man or woman, by marriage you give another a power over you. Suspect it – suspect your lover – suspect yourself. You need fear no man except the man to whom you have given yourself. With earnest wishes for your welfare, I remain your affectionate father – Nicholas Driver.'"

During the reading Cartmell's face had been disturbed and sad; once or twice he fidgeted restively in his chair. I had listened intently, seeming again to hear the measured full voice, the hard clean-cut counsels, to which I had listened almost daily for the last four years. Fine sense! And a heart somewhere? I was inclined to answer yes – but how deep it lay, and what a lot of digging to get there! He had never given his daughter one chance of so much as putting her hand to the spade.

She tucked the letter away in her little bag; she was smiling again by now. I had smiled myself – my memories being so acutely touched; but she must have smiled for discernment, not for memory.

"Now I think I should like to go and see him."

Cartmell excused himself, as I knew he would.

"I've never seen him, that I can remember, you know," she said.

The meeting of the Catsford Corporation (the town had become a borough ten years before – largely owing to Mr. Driver's efforts) could not wait. But Cartmell had one thing to say before he went; it was not on business, nor arising out of the letter; he was to have a full business discussion with her on the morrow. He took her hand in both of his and pressed it – forgetful apparently of her sharp rebuke.

"You can't live in this great house all alone," he said. "I wonder your father said nothing about that!"

"Oh, that's all right. Chat's coming in a week. She'd have come with me, but Mrs. Simpson wouldn't let her go till a new governess could be got. Four girls, you see, and Mrs. Simpson thinks she's an invalid. Besides, Chat wouldn't come without a new black silk dress. So I had to give her most of that money – and she'll be here in a week – and I haven't got a new dress."

I noticed that her black dress was far from new. It was, in fact, rather rusty. Her black straw hat, however, appeared to be new. It was a large spreading sort of hat.

"Yes, Mr. Austin, the hat's new," she remarked.

The girl seemed to have a knack of noticing where one's eyes happened to be.

"I can give you lots of money," Cartmell assured her. "And – er – 'Chat' was governess at the Simpsons', was she?"

"Yes, she's been there for years, but she's very fond of me, and agreed to come and be my companion. She taught me all I know. I'm sure you'll like Chat."

"You can only try her," said he, rather doubtfully. I think that he would have preferred, Miss Driver, to cut loose from the old days altogether. "But, you know, we can't call her just 'Chat.' It must be short for something?"

"Short for Chatters – Miss Chatters. And she says Chatters is really – or was really – Charteris. That's pronounced Charters, isn't it?" She addressed the last question to me, and I said that I believed she was right. "I shall get on very well by myself till she comes." She questioned me again. "Do you live in the house?"

"No, I live down at the Old Priory. But I have my office in the house."

"Oh, yes. Now, if Mr. Cartmell must go, will you take me up?"

She stopped a moment, though, to look at the pictures – old Mr. Driver had bought some good ones – and so gave me one word with Cartmell.

"Depend upon it," he whispered. "Chat's a fool. People who keep telling you their names ought to be spelt like better names, when they aren't, are always fools. Why don't they spell 'em that way, or else let it alone?"

There seemed to be a good deal in that.

Cartmell gone, we went together up the broad staircase which sprang from the center of the hall. As we passed a chair, she took off her hat and flung it down. The rich masses old brown hair, coiled about her head, caught the sun of a bright spring afternoon; she ran swiftly and lightly up the stairs. "Nice, soft, thick, carpet!" she remarked. I began to perceive that she would enjoy the incidental luxuries of her new position – and that she did enjoy the one great luxury – life. I fancied that she enjoyed it enormously.

We trod another "nice, soft, thick, carpet" for the length of a long passage and came to his door. I opened it, let her pass in, and was about to close it after her. But as we reached his room, a sudden shadow of trouble or of fear had fallen upon her – grief it could hardly be.

"No," she said. "Come in, too. Remember – he's a stranger."

To be in the room with the dead seems to be itself a partaking of death; it is at least, for a moment, a suspension of life. Yet the still welcome is not unfriendly.

She walked toward the bed alone, but in an instant beckoned to me to follow her. She bent down and moved the covering. His broad strong face looked resolute and brave as ever. It looked – to speak truth – as hard as ever also.

Her eyes were set on him; suddenly she caught hold of my hand; "Don't go." I pressed her hand, for I heard her breathing quickly. I just caught her next words: "He might have given me a chance!"

"I believe he was sorry about that at the end." She shook her head. "He's given you a big chance now."

She nodded, but absently. "How strange to – to be his doing – and he there! And then – all this!" She let go my hand, took a step forward, bent and kissed his brow quickly. "How cold!" she murmured and grasped my hand tightly again. To my fancy she seemed surprised – and relieved – that the sleeper did not stir.

We were – as I say – out of the world; we were just two creatures, living for a little while, by the side of a third who lived no more.

"You shouldn't kiss him unless you forgive," I said.

She kissed him again and drew the sheet over his face.

"He must have been a fine man. I forgive. Come, let's go."

Outside, the world was with us – and I wondering whether that was what I had really said.

At least she seemed to bear me no ill-will. "Are you free to come for a walk?" she asked. "I should like some fresh air."

"Would you like to see the gardens?"