Her uncle looked at her with great surprise; after his behaviour of last night he had not expected this.Reassured, he began a voluble explanation of his movements and plans, rubbing his hands together and turning one boot against the other.
He had a great deal to say, because he had seen neither of his sisters for a very long time.Then he wished to make a good impression because Maggie, the heiress, would be of importance now.
What an idiot he had been last night.What had he done? He could remember nothing.It was evident that it had been nothing very bad--Maggie bore him no grudge--good girl, Maggie.He felt affectionate towards her and would have told her so had her aunt not been present.These thoughts underlay his rambling history.He was aware suddenly that his audience was inattentive.He saw, indeed, that his sister was standing with her back half-turned, gazing on to the shining country beyond the window.He ceased abruptly, gave his niece a wink, and when this was unsuccessful, muttering a few words, stumbled out of the room.
The whole village attended the funeral, not because it liked the Rev.Charles, but because it liked funerals.Maggie was, in all probability, the only person present who thought very deeply about the late Vicar of St.Dreot's.The Rev.Tom Trefusis who conducted the ceremony was a large red-faced man who had played Rugby football for his University and spent most of his energy over the development of cricket and football clubs up and down the county.He could not be expected to have cared very greatly for the Rev.Charles, who had been at no period of his life and in no possible sense of the word a sportsman.As he conducted the service his mind speculated as to the next vicar (the Rev.Tom knew an excellent fellow, stroke of the Cambridge boat in '12, who would be just the man) the possibility of the frost breaking in time for the inter-county Rugby match at Truxe, the immediate return of his wife from London (he was very fond of his wife), and, lastly, a certain cramp in the stomach that sometimes "bowled him over" and of which the taking of a funeral--"here to-day and gone to-morrow"--always reminded him.
"Wonder how long I'll last," he thought as he stood over the grave of the Rev.Charles and let his eyes wander over the little white gravestones that ran almost into the dark wall of St.Dreot Woods as though they were trying to hide themselves."Wish the frost 'ud break--ground'll be as hard as nails." The soil fell, thump, thump upon the coffin.Rooks cawed in the trees; the bell tolled its cracked note.The Rev.Charles was crammed down with the soil by the eager spades of the sexton and his friend, who were cold and wanted a drink.
Maggie, meanwhile, watched the final disappearance of her father with an ever-growing remorse.Ever since her declaration to her uncle during their walk yesterday this new picture of her father had grown before her eyes.She had already forgotten many, many things that might now have made her resentful or at least critical.She saw him as a figure most disastrously misunderstood.Without any sentimentality in her vision she saw him lonely, proud, reserved, longing for her sympathy which she denied him.His greed for money she saw suddenly as a determination that his daughter should not be left in want.All those years he had striven and his apparent harshness, sharpness, unkindness had been that he might pursue his great object.
She did not cry (some of the villagers curiously watching her thought her a hard-hearted little thing), but her heart was full of tenderness as she stood there, seeing the humped grey church that was part of her life, the green mounds with no name, the dark wood, the grey roofs of the village clustered below the hill, hearing the bell, the rooks, the healthy voice of Mr.Trefusis, the bark of some distant dog, the creak of some distant wheel.
"I missed my chance," she thought."If only now I could have told him!"Her aunt stood at her side and once again Maggie felt irritation at her composure."After all, he was her brother," she thought.She remembered the feeling and passion with which her aunt had repeated the Twenty-third Psalm.She was puzzled.
A moment of shrinking came upon her as she thought of the coming London life.
Then the service was over.The villagers, with that inevitable disappointment that always lingers after a funeral, went to their homes.The children remained until night, under the illusion that it was Sunday.