The child, who had puckered up her face, was soon distracted by the dangling chain and the little case that opened and then closed with a snap.
"Training starts, you see, Tom?" winked Henry. "Molly wants sugar, but is fobbed off with something else! No complacency there. I would let her eat all the sugar her small stomach could hold, and then wait for the inevitable pain. That would teach her a lesson, and she would not eat sugar again."
"That's where you are wrong," said Katherine.
"Molly is too small to connect cause and effect. The pain, to her, would have nothing to do with the sugar. A baby must be distracted, then when reason dawns she must learn obedience, and the necessity of obedience."
"She has it all arranged," said Henry, "from the first lessons in A. b. c. down to the final examinations. I never knew anyone take the upbringing of children so seriously. I cannot remember my mother ever teaching us a thing. She certainly never corrected us."
"It's a wonder to me that you are fit for society at all," said Tom. "You take my advice, and leave the education of your offspring to Katherine."
"Very well," said Henry, "and if they don't come to heel quickly I'll flay the hides off 'em.
One thing at least, they'll never want for anything."
"The next deadly sin," murmured Tom-"too much money. Poor Katherine, you are going to be fully employed, I can see."
Henry threw a nutshell at his friend.
"Supposing you leave my sins alone," he said, "and give me a word of practical advice instead.
There's to be a by-election at Bronsea, as you know. Old Sir Nicholas Venning has died.
I'm thinking of contesting the seat in the Conservative interest."
"Are you indeed?"
"It would give me a lot of fun, if nothing else, and the Brodricks have had connections in that county ever since 1820."
"And what does Katherine think?" said Tom.
"Katherine thinks that her husband's energy is such," smiled Henry's wife, "that if he does not plunge into politics it might be something worse.
And it will keep him out of mischief."
"A truly wifely remark," said Henry.
"No high ambitions for me, you observe, Tom.
No hope or even suggestion that I might become Prime Minister. Just a kindly smile that it may "keep me out of mischief."?
"I agree with Katherine," said his friend. "Go ahead by all means, make your speeches, give your dinners, kiss the Bronsea babies, and accept the rotten eggshells with a bow. I wish you all the luck in the world. And if you do succeed in finding your way to Westminster, I will cross the water too and listen to your maiden speech, and tell the people sitting next me that Henry Brodrick is my oldest friend. You might get me a bishopric in twenty years."
"Seriously, though," said Henry, "I might easily win the seat by a handsome majority, although it has been held by a Liberal for so long. The family will rally round me. Herbert at Lletharrog-I told you he had the living there, didn't I, and is living at the old house? — and Aunt Eliza at Saunby. I can spin a good yarn about my Bronsea connections, although perhaps I won't say much about my step-grandmother who lives in the village and curtseys whenever she sees Herbert."
"I believe you are a snob after all," laughed Tom.
"Indeed I am not, but it doesn't do to produce the skeleton in the cupboard on a political platform. I tell you what, we'll take a house in London for the season, whether I win or not, and you shall come and stay with us. It will look well to be seen about with you, and will show that I have a respect for the Church."
"Can't you damp his ardour, Tom?" said Katherine. "We were talking of complacency, and there he stands before you, more pleased with himself than anyone living. Come, Molly, we will leave your papa and your uncle to discuss the world, and go and play with your beads by the fire in the drawing-room."
Later in the day, when Tom Callaghan had gone back to take Evensong in Doonhaven, and Molly had been put to bed, and the long curtains were drawn across the windows, Katherine lay on the sofa that had been Barbara's and was now moved close to the fire, and Henry sat on the floor beside her, her hand against his lips.
"Am I really complacent?" he said anxiously.
"Are you getting tired of me?"
She smiled, and ran her fingers through his hair.
"To the first question "yes,"? she answered, "to the second "no." Oh, I don't mean complacent, dear one. But when a person is very happy he is apt to become less sensitive, less aware. And I would not like you to become too worldly, too preoccupied with business, and money, and the success of Henry Brodrick."
"I can't help being happy," he said, "married to you. Every day I love you a little more. And whatever I do, whatever I accomplish, is because of you; don't you know that?"
"Yes, dearest, I do, and it makes me very proud, but a bit worried too. You put me first in life, before God, and that is not right."
"God is not real to me as He is to you," said Henry. "You I can touch, I can hold, I can kiss, I can love. God is something mysterious, intangible. And so, in a humble way, you take the place of God."
"Yes, sweetheart, but people pass away, and God is eternal."
"Damn eternity. I don't want eternity.
I want you, and the present, forever and forever." He leant across the sofa, and buried his head against her.
"I can't help it," he repeated, "I can't help loving you. It's in my blood. My father was just the same about my mother, and although I barely remember him-I was only four years old when he died-I can recollect him standing by the creek, watching her as she played with Johnnie, and Fanny, and myself, and I shall never forget the expression in His eyes. My aunt Jane was another. If she had not been killed in an accident she would have died of a broken heart, grieving over some fellow on Doon Island. It's no use, Katherine, we Brodricks are made like this; you must accept it."
She held him close to her, and kissed the top of his head.
"I do accept it," she said, "but it makes me afraid, all the same."
He leant back, his head against her knee, and stared into the fire.
"I often wonder," he said thoughtfully, "whether poor Johnnie's despair was not due to a love affair gone wrong. Oh, not that Donovan woman, that was merely a sordid interlude, but something deeper. But who the devil could he have been fond of? I never heard him mention anyone."
Katherine did not answer. She went on stroking his hair.
"If only he could have married and settled down, it would have been the saving of him," continued Henry.
"That ghastly end could have been avoided. Perhaps if you had met him first you might have married him instead of me."
He turned, half smiling, half sadly, to look at his wife. Her eyes were filled with tears, and she was staring into the fire.
"Sweetheart, what is it?" he said. "I've hurt you, I've made you unhappy? Selfish, careless brute that I am. I ought to remember you are not well. And here I've been, tiring you with family history. My poor darling, your face is white and miserable, what have I done?"
"Nothing," she said, "it's nothing, I promise you. Just a sudden foolishness."
"It's been a long day," he said. "You should have rested this afternoon, instead of walking with us through the woods.
I thought it was too far for you at the time. And then lifting Molly about here, after tea. She is too heavy for you now. Does the other little one make a heaviness?"
"The other little one is quiet."
"I shall carry you to bed, then," he said. "Come, put your arms round my neck, and hold me close.
Where is your book? That one, by the window there?
Reach down for it, then. Mr. Dickens again. What would you do without him? I shall read a chapter aloud to you, and then you must close your eyes and go to sleep, and have all the rest you can. Don't worry about the lamps.