Mrs. Brent

“ Grant, "and I also like her better than I did, although I never disliked her."
"The person I don't like so well," said Miss Minster, "is Mrs. Brent. I hope we've seen the last of her here for the present."
But they had not, for almost immediately she had spoken a telegram was brought in from Mrs. Brent, announcing her arrival that afternoon, and asking Mrs. Grant to take her in, as there was nobody at the Castle. She also asked Mrs. Grant to meet her at Burport, which seemed to indicate that she had something of importance to disclose to her. ”

“ Born to love and be loved, Nan Brent's soul beat against her environment even as a wild bird, captured and loosed in a room, beats against the window-pane. From the moment she had felt within her the vague stirrings of womanhood, she had been wont to gaze upon the blue-back hills to the east, to the horizon out west, wondering what mysteries lay beyond, and yearning to encounter them. ”

“ He looked up in surprise: "The world wouldn't talk if we were married!"
"Don't you believe it, Brent," she said quietly. "The world 'd talk if you married a girl like me, moh'n it would if you didn't. I've been awake for seven days, Brent, an' I ain't a girl no moh in some ways. An' Brent," her cheeks were flaming now, "I might give you anythin' if we honest loved, an' not be ashamed;—but as we don't, a thousand marriages couldn't keep me from shrivelin' up whenever you looked at me! We'd despise each other in no time," she added, with another forced laugh. ”

“ These conversations, and the revelations—which had transpired during their course, led Brent into a new train of thought. Ever since his coming to Hathelsborough, he had been aware of an atmosphere of intrigue and mystery; and every new development seemed to thicken it. Here, again, was more intrigue, centering in a domestic imbroglio.
There was nothing much to be wondered—at in it, he thought. Mallett was the sort of man to attract a certain type of woman, and, from all Brent had heard in the town, a man given to adventure. Mrs. Saumarez was clearly a woman fond of men's society. ”

“ Brent murmured.
"Condemn! Why, sir, I admire him for it! I was early taught to love the truth and shame the devil!"
Brent laughed softly. He got a great deal of fun out of ragging the old gentleman a bit at times.
"If shaming the devil were all," he said; "but think of your neighbors!"
"I think of no one, sir!" The Colonel was fuming now, and glaring impartially at everything about him.
"Then I wonder you've got a friend left. But, all joking aside, I wouldn't take anything for Dale, and have really grown to like him a whole lot. If he could just get over giving me the creeps! ”

“ Why did not she accept the opening of escape that now presented itself and marry Bowen? He could rescue her from all this and what it meant.
"And shall we all be asked to the wedding, Lord Bowen?"
It was again Miss Sikkum's thin voice that broke through the curtain of Patricia's thoughts.
"I hope all Miss Brent's friends will be there," replied Bowen diplomatically.
"And now we shall all have to fetch and carry for Miss Brent," laughed Mr. Bolton. "Am I your friend, Miss Brent?" he enquired.
"She always laughs at your jokes when nobody else can," snapped Miss Pilkington. ”

“ Reed experienced a sudden wave of physical nausea, as he watched it.
"I wish that I could believe you, Mrs. Brenton," he said dryly. "Unfortunately, it is quite impossible."
Katharine did her best to make her smile more luminous.
"You think so, Mr. Opdyke? So long as you will not believe, you will not throw off your weakness of the body. You must face disease, not yield to it. You must lift yourself above it, must plant your feet upon it in firm disdain, and, using it as a footstool, arise from its ugly foundations to a perfect and sinless state of health." ”

“ The woman who can be bought had always thought Brent a fool, because he had made a mystery where no mystery existed. Brent was an incorrigible romanticist, and your material woman detests romance. She suffers it in novels, but finds the thing a damnable nuisance when it comes gesturing and dreaming and getting itself mixed up with the very obvious furniture of her very obvious little life. The woman who could not be bought understood Brent at once. She was ready to trust him—but that did not help Brent to understand Manon Latour. ”

“ But you're worse than David in making up twopence coloured stories. I don't think we need worry ourselves about the Brents till we get down there. Then we shall be able to judge for ourselves. No man ever knows what a woman is really like the first time he sees her. Whatever Lady Brent and Mrs. Brent are like, you may depend upon it that we shan't find them in the least as David has described them. Now read what he says about the Vicarage again, and see if we can make anything of that, beyond that it is embowered in massy trees. ”

“ I've been missing my niggers!—and was going to tell Jane about it!"
"Don't," Brent said seriously, "I want—I just had [Pg 210] an idea, that maybe it would be nice to finish up for—well, about the time of her birthday this summer. So, if you've noticed any especial activity, you'll have to respect my confidence."
"Why, sir, I call that handsome, sir!" he cried. "Ladies might not object to birthdays if cavaliers laid railroads at their feet! Tell me more!"
"Well," Brent flushed, "the line is short and surprisingly simple: distance from Buckville to the coal, sixteen miles. ”

“ Harper had gone, but one of his subordinates waited upon her with great importance. Mrs. Brenton talked on pleasantly and brightly, and her thoughts were busy.
"She looks awfully thin," she said to herself; "if she had a little more flesh on her bones she would be rather pretty. As it is, she is decidedly interesting. Poor little soul! She makes my heart ache, and she is only a type after all, one of thousands who have to go out and fight the world when they have only just left their cradle, as it were. ”

“ He turned to Queenie as the man went away. "When shall I see you again?" he asked.
"I always come here every afternoon," she answered. "It's the only change I get. I come here to read."
"Till to-morrow—or the next day, then," said Brent. He nodded and laughed. "Keep smiling! You'll maybe play Juliet, or some other of those old games, yet." ”

“ How——" Miss Brent paused wordless.
"I am prepared to accept you as an aunt," continued Patricia, outwardly calm; but almost stifled by the pounding of her heart. "It is God's will; but if you persist in assuming the mantle of Mrs. Grundy, combined with the Infallibility of the Pope, then I must protest."
"Protest!" repeated Miss Brent, repeating the word as if not fully comprehending its meaning.
"If I am able to earn my own living, then I am able to conduct my own love affairs."
"But——" began Miss Brent.
"I am sorry to appear rude, Aunt Adelaide, but it is much better to be frank. ”

“ Her eyes a violet-blue with long dark lashes and eyebrows.
"You're not so bad, Patricia Brent," she remarked as she turned from the glass. "But you will probably be a secretary to the end of your days, drink cold weak tea, keep a cat and get hard and angular, skinny most likely. You're just the sort that runs to skin and bone." ”

“ Brent swung at the upraised arm. The bar caught the forearm bones about two inches above the wrist, and he heard them crack. The knife fell; Bibi’s hand sagged over like the absurd stuffed hand of a dummy. But Brent’s gorge was rising over this filthy scramble, this savagery of animals in a cage. He steadied himself, brought the bar down over Bibi’s head, and saw him crumple to the floor.
Brent stood, staring. He felt sick, unsteady, a man who had got up to the neck in some foul ditch. There was no exultation in him, yet no pity. He had downed a mad beast, and he was grim and cautious. ”

“ XI Brent went back to his hotel, to find the town clerk of Hathelsborough waiting for him in his private sitting room. His visitor, a sharp-eyed man whose profession was suggested in every look and movement, greeted him with a suavity of manner which set Brent on his guard.
“I am here, Mr. Brent,” said he, with an almost deprecating smile, “as—well, as a sort of informal deputation—very informal indeed.”
“Deputations represent somebody or something,” retorted Brent, in his brusquest fashion. “Whom do you represent?” ”

“ She regarded her niece as if she had been a two-tailed giraffe, or a double-headed mastodon. Had she been American she would have known it to be brain-storm; as it was she decided that Patricia was sickening for some serious illness that had produced a temperature.
In all her experience of "the Family" never once had Miss Brent been openly defied in this way, and she had no reserves upon which to fall back. She held personal opinion and inclination must always take secondary place to "the Family." The individual must be sacrificed to the group, provided the individual were not herself. ”

“ London has done you no good. What would your poor dear father have said?"
"I'm sorry, Aunt Adelaide; but please remember I've had a very tiring week, trying to leaven an unleavenable politician. Shall we drop the subject of Colonel Bowen for the time being?"
"Certainly not," snapped Miss Brent. "It is my duty as your sole surviving relative," how Patricia deplored that word "surviving," why had her Aunt Adelaide survived? "As your sole surviving relative," repeated Miss Brent, "it is my duty to look after your welfare." ”

“ Beside the village parson, there had been three young clergymen in attendance and more or less in active service while the nuptial knot was being tied. Indeed, so many were there of them and so active were they in their ministrations that poor Mrs. Brenton, down in the front pew and painfully shiny between her proud maternal tears and the reflected lustre of her new black satin frock, was never quite certain in her mind which one of them, in the end, had pronounced her son and Catia man and wife. For the sake of the ancestral Wheelers, she hoped it was the broadcloth-coated village parson ”

“ During those long days and nights up in the woods, he had fought the issue with himself and made up his mind that Nan Brent was the one woman in the world for him, that there could never, by God's grace, be any other, and that he would have her, come what might and be the price what it would. ”

“ Brent explained that the will, in force so far as he knew, left Harrison’s fortune jointly to his two daughters, Isabelle and Anita. It was left to them as a trust until they were twenty-five, at which times they would receive their share of the principal.
“How old are they now?” inquired Bernard.
“Isabelle is twenty-four, I think, and Anita twenty-one or twenty-two. They won’t suffer on the income in the meantime!” Brent concluded with heavy playfulness. ”

“ The man continued to stand, growing more and more excited. Had he been a keener observer he would have seen that under Brent's suavity there was a scarcely hidden nervousness.
Finally Brent leaned over and spoke in a whisper, looking about as though the very walls might have ears.
"My dear fellow," he confided, "for some time I have been considering your water-motor. I will return the model to you—release the patent to the world."
He drew back to watch the effect on the aged inventor. Could it be that Brent was lying? Or was it fear? ”

“ He is very anxious to meet you," continued Lady Tanagra as they moved towards the door. "I would not let him come here as I thought, from that Patricia has told me, that you would not care—to——" She paused.
"You are quite right, Lady Tanagra," said Miss Brent with decision. "I do not like boarding-houses. They are not the places for the discussion of family affairs."
Patricia descended the steps of Galvin House, not quite sure whether this were reality or a dream. She watched Miss Brent seat herself beside Lady Tanagra, whilst she herself entered the tonneau of the car. ”

“ Brent died, had come to keep house for Mr. John Brent and take care of his five-year-old daughter. In her aunt Patricia found a woman soured by life. What it was that had soured her Patricia could never gather; but Aunt Adelaide was for ever emphasizing the fact that men were beasts. ”

“ That Caroline Graniger should remain in his house was, of course, impossible; but it was equally impossible that this young creature could be turned outside to find some lodging for herself at this late hour of the night. He knew Mrs. Brenton to be a practical woman, a woman of resource, and this was essentially a matter for a woman to deal with. ”

“ I remember your words, sir.”
“Very well,” said Brent. “Raise the curtain, Harwood. This room is dim enough to put me to sleep again whether I will or no.”
He drew himself up on one elbow as the light slanted into the room, struck a glimmering reflection from the tall mirror, and glinted on the polished woodwork of the foot of the bed. It fell upon Brent, and showed a lean, pallid face, square chinned, with expressionless eyes.
He was one of those men who at thirty-five look twenty-five, and who at twenty-five might well be considered thirty-five. ”

“ If Lady Brent was sometimes criticized, as she was, for keeping the boy away from the intercourse that prepared other boys of his age and rank for playing their part in the world, and the criticism had reached her ears, she need have done no more than point to him as he was at the threshold of his manhood, for justification. ”