The Captives | Page 6

in her carriage, in the
strong neck, the firm breasts, the mouth resolute and determined. She
had now the fine expectation of her youth, her health, her optimism, her
ignorance of the world. When these things left her she would perhaps
be a yet plainer woman. In her dress she was not clever. Her clothes
were ugly with the coarse drab grey of their material and the unskilful
workmanship that had created them. And yet there would be some
souls who would see in her health, her youth, the kind sympathy of her
eyes and mouth, the high nobility of her forehead from which her hair
was brushed back, an attraction that might hold them more deeply than
an obvious beauty.
Uncle Mathew although he was a silly man was one of these perceptive
souls, and had he not been compelled by his circumstances to think
continually about himself, would have loved his niece very dearly. As
it was, he thought her a fine girl when he thought of her at all, and
wished her more success in life than her "poor old uncle" had had. He
looked at her now across the fireplace with satisfaction. She was
something sure and pleasant in a world that swayed and was uncertain.
He was drunk enough to feel happy so long as he was not scolded. He
dreaded the moment when his brother Charles would appear, and he
strove to arrange in his mind the wise and unanswerable word with
which he would defend himself, but his thoughts slipped just as the
firelight slipped and the floors with the old threadbare carpet.
Then suddenly the hall door opened with a jangle, there were steps in

the hall, and Old Timmie Carthewe the sexton appeared in the
dining-room. He had a goat's face and a body like a hairpin.
"Rector's not been to service," he said. "There's Miss Dunnett and Mrs.
Giles and the two Miss Backshaws. I'm feared he's forgotten."
Maggie started up. Instantly to her mind came the memory of that
fancied sound from her father's room. She listened now, her head raised,
and the two men, their eyes bleared but their noses sniffing as though
they were dogs, listened also. There were certain sounds, clocks ticking,
the bough scraping on the wall, a cart's echo on the frozen road, the
maid singing far in the depths of the house. Maggie nodded her head.
"I'll go and see," she said.
She went into the hall and stood again listening. Then she called,
"Father! Father!" but there was no answer. She had never in all her life
been frightened by anything and she was not frightened now;
nevertheless, as she went up the stairs, she looked behind her to see
whether any one followed her.
She called again "Father!" then went to his door, pushed it open, and
looked in. The room was cold with a faint scent of tallow candle and
damp.
In the twilight she saw her father's body lying like a shadow stretched
right across the floor, with the grey dirty fingers of one hand clenched.
After that events followed swiftly. Maggie herself had no time nor
opportunity for any personal emotion save a dumb kind of wonder that
she did not feel more. But she saw all "through a glass darkly." There
had been first that moment when the sexton and Uncle Mathew, still
like dogs sniffing, had peered with their eyes through her father's door.
Then there had been the summoning of Dr. Bubbage from the village,
his self-importance, his continual "I warned him. I warned him. He
can't say I didn't warn him," and then (very dim and far away) "Thank
you, Miss Cardinal. I think I will have a glass if you don't mind." There
had been cook crying in the kitchen (her red roses intended for Sunday

must now be postponed) and the maid sniffing in the hall. There had
been Uncle Mathew, muddled and confused, but clinging to his one
idea that "the best thing you can do, my dear, is to send for your Aunt
Anne." There had been the telegram dispatched to Aunt Anne, and then
after that the house had seemed quite filled with people--ladies who
had--wished to know whether they could help her in any way and even
the village butcher who was there for no reason but stood in the hall
rubbing his hands on his thighs and sniffing. All these persons Maggie
surveyed through a mist. She was calm and collected and empty of all
personality; Maggie Cardinal, the real Maggie Cardinal, was away on a
visit somewhere and would not be back for a time or two.
Then suddenly as the house had filled so suddenly it emptied. Maggie
found that she was desperately tired. She went to