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We're in honour bound to take the house now, whether or not we use it without Jim. I don't know what we shall do, I'm sure! All I know is, I feel as if it would kill me to turn round and go home with our broken hearts." "We've got new obligations right here, Jenny. You mustn't forget that," said Mr. Beckett. "Remember we've just adopted a daughter and a son, too.
He thought we might be taken in and made fairly comfortable; and to be sure we didn't miss the house, he rode on the step of the car, to show us the way. It was a sad way, for we had to pass hillocks of plaster and stone which had once been streets, but we had eyes only for Mother Beckett's face, Father Beckett and I: and even Brian seemed to look at her.
I'm not a screaming girl, but I'm afraid I did give a shriek, for Mother Beckett started up, and cried out: "What's the matter?" I didn't answer her. I hardly heard. I forgot everyone except Brian and that girl. It was only when the thing was over, and we were all talking at once, that I realized how the others had shared my fright.
"The only thing so far which I know for a fact," I said, "is that you had no right to talk to the man at all. You should have sent for me at once." "You couldn't have come if I had. Dierdre had told me about five minutes before that you were putting Mrs. Beckett to bed, and giving her a massage treatment with a rub-down of alcohol." "Why didn't you ask the man to wait?"
"A shock of joy why, that gives life not death!" sobbed and laughed Mother Beckett. "But it was right to let Molly know first. She's more to him than we are now. Oh, Father Father our Jim's alive alive! I think in my soul I knew it all the time. I never felt he was gone. He must have sent me thoughts. Dear ones, I want to pray.
'He is as ill as he can be to be alive, said Charlotte, actuated at once by the importance of being the repository of such tidings, and by the excitement of communicating them to one so deeply concerned. 'Mr. Poynings came in to fetch Mrs. Beckett he would have no one else to nurse him and he says the old Lord and Missus have never had their clothes off these two nights.
But it was only an impulse, such an impulse as lures one to jump from a height. I caught myself back from yielding, as I would have caught myself back from the precipice, lest in another moment I should lie crushed in a dark gulf. I waved before my eyes the flag of Brian's need, and my bad courage came back. I let Mr. Beckett lead me to the sofa.
I wasn't sure where we were: only I was sure " She stopped, with a catch in her voice. But Father Beckett took up the sentence where she let it drop. "Sure of Jim?" "Yes. He was so real!" "Well then, Mother darling, I guess the dream ought not to have been back home, but here, in this very house. For here's where Jim will come."
This made Father Beckett visibly regret that he had brought us, though he had been assured that it was a "safe time." However, his was not the kind of regret which tempts a man to turn back: it only makes his upper lip look long. I never saw Rheims in palmy days of peace. Now I wish I had seen it!
Besides, business no longer seemed vitally important to him as of old. Money mattered little now that Jim was gone. He would have abandoned his visit to the British front, since Mother Beckett could not have the glimpse half promised by the authorities. But she would not let him give it up. "Molly" would take good care of her. When she could move, we would all go to Amiens.
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