Chapter XI: Book II (3)

“You must understand,” he said, “that, in my view, you are no wiser to put your body in a cage than your mind. Both must be free. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that a woman who breaks our law of property in one way is worse than the shop thief who breaks it in another. To wound the feelings of a good and generous man is a serious thing—but not to take bread when you are starving. At least, that is how I look at it. But—you must be very sure you _are_ starving. Sincerity is the supreme virtue, and insincerity the only deadly sin.”

She nursed her cheek, while dreams showed themselves in her grave eyes. Whether she was pondering what he said or no, there’s no doubt she was giving it personal application again. Tristram was in her mind—her morose, exclusive lover. Was her friend giving a benediction to Tristram’s plain desires? What was she to do then? Was she to be possessed by Tristram—at last? Sincerity, he said, was all. Was she sincere? Could she ask—dared she? She knew that what he told her she should believe—Yes; and she juggled. She did not want to know what he would say—because she knew it already. Blame her as you will—that’s the fact.

Very woman that she was, she went about and about the thing she dared not—peering for the assurance of her fears. She looked softly at him as he sat there, plucking the grass by handfuls or making mounts of torn plantains—she looked wistfully. “You are my friend then—whatever happens to me?”

He met her melting eyes candidly. “Depend upon me.”

“Ah,” she said, “but I do! Well, then, I must do what seems to me best—I must be brave.” He smiled.

“Have your adventures, of course. Don’t be afraid of them. Be true to yourself, though—at every cost.”

“Yes, yes, I promise you that. . . . When shall I see you again?”

He gazed blankly at the sky. “I don’t know, really. I’m a wanderer, you know. But the Land’s End finds me from November to February mostly. I begin to work West about October. I am due in the North now—in the Lakes. Wastwater will find me—somewhere thereabouts. I shall be there till September. I leave London to-night—no, to-morrow—” Their eyes met again, without embarrassment. He was the only man she could have commerce with in this way. “I shall see you at Land’s End some day or other,” she told him. “When I’m wounded——”

“Caught in a wire by the foot,” he laughed. “All right—I’ll set you free.”

“But suppose you were in Berkshire when I was there—How should I know that you were there? Would you call at Southover?”

He laughed. “No, indeed I shouldn’t. I’m a hedgerow chap. I move by night mostly.”

“Well, but—you might be within a mile of me, and I should never know it.”

“Yes, you would, of course,” he said, simply. “You’d know by the trail.”

“What trail?”

“Don’t you know that? I’ll show you. Old Borrow calls it the _patteran_, and swears he got it from a gipsy girl called Ursula. You needn’t believe him; I don’t. But the trail is certain. A woman who lived in a cave at Granada showed it to me. Look here.” He plucked up a handful of grass. “Here’s a four-went way”—he marked it with his finger in the dust. “Now watch”—he scattered the grass, which took, roughly, the form of a curved pointer. “You see that on a road—it means the way I am gone. But I do mine with leaves, when leaves there are—with leaves from the sunny side of a hedgerow. You can always tell them.” Her brows inquired—she was intensely interested. “Dunce, they are bigger of course, and darker. I use them because the gipsies, who are everywhere, use leaves, too, but never take the trouble to select them. Now you’ll always know _my_ trail by that. Do you see?”

She clasped her hands together—her eyes danced. “How splendid! How glorious! Then we have a language. I can find you whenever I want you. For if I wanted you very badly, I could set a _patteran_ for you, couldn’t I?” He nodded. She said in a low voice, “You don’t know how strong you have made me—you can never know. Thank you a thousand times.”

“Not a bit,” he said, lightly. “If we’re friends, you are entitled to know my little games.”

“And may I speak to you like that—when I go anywhere?”

“Do. We share.”

She sighed. “How can I ever thank you!”

The sun was low when she got up, saying that she must go home. It was discovered to be seven o’clock. “Why,” she cried, “they had forgotten to have any tea!”

“Poor girl! Will you have some now?”

“No, no. I don’t want it. But I must go. Will you come with me? Or are you engaged?”

“You know I’m never engaged. I shall come with you, of course. Will you drive?”

She shook her head. “No, that’s too quick. Let’s walk over the grass. It’s no distance.”

She talked to him of her friends—of all her friends but Duplessis. This he observed. Did he know Mr. Horace Wing? By repute only, it seemed. He could be seen in photograph shops—a very “pretty fellow”; too pretty, Palmer Lovell? Unlicked, he judged. Then he tried her. “I know young Bramleigh,” he said with one of his straight looks into the deep of you. “I met him yesterday.”

She received the shock unfaltering. “Lord Bramleigh? I hardly know him.” He had failed. Lord Kesteven—for she went on blandly with her list—he had never heard of. He asked “What he did?” and made her open her eyes. “Do!” she said, with a comical air of being shocked. “He’s a Marquis.” This made Senhouse perfectly happy, but he apologized for laughing. “I’ve nothing against him, you know. I believe it’s an honest calling. Does he do nothing else but be a kind marquis to you?”

She affected scorn. “He’s an Ambassador—in Paris. I hope that’s honest enough for you.”

“I hope so, too,” said Senhouse, “but I’d rather be a marquis. Is he your friend?”

“He says so. I think he means to be.” All of a sudden she leaned towards him; he felt her urgency. “You are my friend. I have no others. You have promised me your friendship.”

“You have it, my dear,” said Senhouse. They walked the rest of the way in silence; but he stopped once, and interested her again. It was in Mount-street—of all places. He stopped short, as if he was listening; his head high, eyes closed. He was sensing the air, listening to it, smelling it. Narrow Mount-street took the semblance of a forest path, brambled, dusty, hemmed with bracken fronds and silvered roots. “There’s rain—there’s rain,” he said—“I can hear it coming. May be a day off, but it’s on the way.” She watched him incredulous. “Are you a magician? What are you?” He laughed. “I’ve got feelers, that’s all.”

At the door in Hill-street he left her. She was inclined to be tremulous, tender—but he was completely cheerful. He would have gone with a wave of the hand had she not held out her own. As it was, she had prepared a little formal speech—“I cannot tell you how glad I am that we met—I——”

“Don’t try to tell me,” he said. “I know it. One takes that for granted—among friends, you know. That’s the privilege of the estate.”

“Yes, yes—of course. Well, I won’t thank you for doing what pleases you. I am sure that it _has_ pleased you.” She fished for an answer.

“Take it for granted,” he repeated.

That braced her. “I will. I do. Good-bye.” This time he did wave his hand.

“Mr. Duplessis have called, Madame,” said Greatorex at the door. “He have left a parcel. Lord Kesteven have called—and Mr. Wing.”

The parcel—discreetly phrased—proved to be most palpably a truss of roses. She unfastened it herself, and found a slip of paper pinned to the stalk of one. “Forgive,” was written on it. Smiling wisely, she went upstairs to dress, her bouquet in her hand.

VII
SHE GLOSSES THE TEXT

Had Duplessis, flowers in hand, sued his forgiveness at any time, she was not the woman to be stern. That was not in her; she was at once too sensitive to the flattery of the prayer, and too generous to refuse it. But at this particular time she felt very strong; fresh from communion with her friend, secure in him, she felt equal to judging a dozen Tristrams—and to judging them leniently. “They know not what they do.” That was why she had smiled so wisely to herself on her way upstairs; and it may have been why she wore some of his flowers in the waistband of her gown that night. It was one of her most charming gowns, too; mouse-coloured tulle. In the belt of this she set crimson roses, of Tristram’s offering.

She dined out, and went on to a party. Duplessis was waiting for her at the foot of the stairs; they went up together. He had never yet taken possession of her in that manner, and cannot be excused of brutality. But he was quick to presume; was not at all a good object for generosity. Her eyes had answered his inquiry—“Forgiven?” before he touched her hand; she had said “Of course,” and the rest followed as a matter of course. He assumed from it his right to be offensive, and her privilege to be unoffended. She went upstairs by his side, so far as he was concerned, possessed to all intents and purposes—under his protection. She did not know it then or even feel it; her lightness of heart buoyed her up. Had she not been encouraged in adventure?

By the time they were well past their hostess at the door Tristram had resumed this air of the vaguely irritated lion. He looked grandly about him over heads—his height gave him pretence.

“What are we to do here—? All these people—a wilderness of monkeys—” When a young man, sure of welcome, had come up on toe-tips to shake hands with Mrs. Germain—had bowed, prattled, bowed and gone, Duplessis showed more than fatigue. He had seen his crimson flowers at her belt, and they bretrayed him. “I want to talk to you. Let’s go and sit down somewhere. It can’t be here.” He spoke shortly, as if he meant it.

She took his arm without question, and he pushed a way through a couple of full rooms. Beyond these was a little boudoir, beyond that a library, empty. She sat, and he stood fidgeting with reviews on the table, taking up and throwing aside like a child sick of toys. And she sat softly there with cast-down eyes, waiting until he chose to remember her.

She was very conscious of his mood, and not unsatisfied with it. The whole thing was a game, an adventure, say, and this a recognized move in it. “Have your adventures—don’t shirk them. Sincerity is the great matter. Be yourself whatever happens.” He had been plucking up the grass at her feet as he told her that, and she had not been able to see his face, though she had tried. He spoke deliberately, as if he was screwing the words out one by one—as if they ought to be said, cost him what they might to say. Had they cost him anything? Ah, if she could have known that!

But—“Be yourself whatever happens!” Had she a self? What was it? Was it that of a young woman who—of one of those women who like to be coveted, are ready to be owned, who indeed always are owned by one or another? “His servant or his maid, his ox or his ass—” Must she be property, personal property? Ah, but let her never forget that, such as she was, Jack Senhouse was to be her friend—always—at the call of her need. Then she remembered the _patteran_, and smiled to herself.

Presently she looked up at Tristram, scowling over the _Deux Mondes_. “What are you going to do with me, now I am here?” she asked him lightly; whereupon he turned short, and sat down near her.

“What _can_ I do with you? What’s possible? What am I allowed to say? I feel like a caged cat. Am I to pay you compliments, ask you if all’s well? Has it come to that? I know what you would say if I did. You are not happy. It’s evident.”

It was only in this man’s company that she failed of self-possession. With men far greater than he, such as Kesteven; with men defter than he, men of the Wing vein, she could, as it were, hold the reins, and feel the mouth. With Duplessis she was always liable to strike back upon former days. At any moment, had he but known it, he could have put her, so to speak, into a white muslin frock, turned her into the fluttered village coquette. Oddly enough, with all his wits, he had never known it until this moment; he had always read her new position into her old ways. But now it was too plain to mistake; he had but to lift his hand and—! The discovery ran through his veins like a strong wind—to make him shiver.

She was looking down at her hands in her lap, picking up her fan plumes one by one, and running them between her fingers. A latent trembling possessed her, which he felt rather than saw. The same fever caught him.

“Where’s Germain?” He spoke masterfully.

Her reply was studiously simple. “He’ll come for me by-and-by. He’s at the Speaker’s dinner.”

“He’s always somewhere else.” Mischief prompted her to ask if he complained of that; but he was not to be drawn.

“If you were my wife,” he told her, “I should never leave your side. If you were my wife, I should be your lover always.”

Here was a lie, obvious even to her; but the devout imagination in it was enough to thrill her. Watching her closely, he saw that she was thrilled.

“You’re not happy,” he said, “and I’m not happy. You made a frightful mistake—but mine was worse.”

It was hardly the moment to assure him that he was quite wrong. If a gentleman does you the honour to discern misery, even where none exists, it proves attention, at least, to your circumstances. It’s an oblique compliment.

She said gravely, “I don’t think we ought to talk about such things. I have never given you any reason to think me dissatisfied with——”

“Oh,” he broke in, “we’re not considering the creature comforts, I imagine. You came here in a carriage from your big house—and you’ll go back to a big house in your carriage. I can understand that these are pleasant arrangements; and after two years of them, for what they are worth, you may well confuse them with the real thing. But that—! A full cup, nodding at the brim! Life together! No world, nobody in the world but two souls—ours! And work: work together! Good God, it’s ghastly to think of.”

He looked haggard, and there was a hollow ring in his voice, the hoarseness of a consumptive. Her heart went out to him in pity, and her hand was laid for a moment on his sleeve. “You are not well—you work too hard. Please don’t.”

“Work!” he said, “I have none. I wish I had. I’ve quarrelled with Jess.”

“I know. I’m very sorry. I wish that we—that I——”

He suddenly and squarely faced her. “Look here, Molly,” he said, and made her heart beat and her eyes quail. He, and he only, had called her Molly. “You know what’s the matter. There has hardly been a day since you’ve been in town that I haven’t seen you—I’ve found out where you were to be—and I’ve been, too. You possess my mind; I think of nothing else, can’t sleep for thinking. I believed that I should get over it, and perhaps I should if I hadn’t seen you again last autumn. There was the mischief. I vow to you I didn’t want to come, shouldn’t have come if Jess hadn’t insisted. A confounded ass—! It all began again then—and now, I tell you fairly I shan’t get over it. I’m not going to try. It’s stronger than I. . . . And I believe that you care, too. I do believe that, I know you do. You wouldn’t sit there so still if you didn’t—you wouldn’t hide your eyes if you didn’t. You dare not show me how bright they are. Ah, but I know how bright they can be, and what makes them shine! No, no, you and I belong——”

“Oh, don’t, don’t—please don’t!” The cry was wrung from her, and the courage to look at him came. But then, as she turned her head away, she said faintly, “You mustn’t,” and made things ten times worse.

His next words beat her back. “I love you, do you hear? I adore you—I care for nobody, no rights or claims in the world; I can’t live without you. If you won’t listen to me, if you drive me too hard, I shall—No, no, that’s wicked. Molly, I’ll do you no harm, I swear to that. But you and I have got to be together, or I shall go mad. Now you know it all.”

She rose, and he with her. Both were shaking; but she spoke first.

“Let me go now, please—take me back. I mustn’t be found here.” He was ready.

“I’ll take you away, now. I’m glad I’ve had it out with you. Now you know the facts at least.”

She put her face in her hands. “It’s dreadful. I ought not to have listened to you. It was very wrong. What are we to do?”

“Love each other dearly,” said Tristram, and took her in his arms and kissed her. She shuddered and shut her eyes, but did not try to move. Her lips were parted; there came a long sigh. “My darling, my darling girl,” he said, and kissed her again. They heard steps, and sprang apart. Her terror was manifest. “Come,” he said, “we must get out of this.”

She took his arm—she looked as sleek as a stroked dove. They went into the rooms without another word. She was almost at once confronted with people whom she knew, and Duplessis left her with the first group she encountered. She saw him shoulder his way through, nodding to right and left in his grand, careless way; she saw him go out and knew that he would not come back. Engaged in the chatter usual to such times, she talked at random, laughed without knowing what amused her. When she was told that Mr. Germain had been seen—was here looking for her, she gathered her wits at once and went to find him.

He was talking in his calm, superior way to a great lady. His Court dress suited him—he looked like his ancestor, Sir William, pictured in the dining-room at Southover.

The great lady put up her glasses and smiled at Mary. “Here comes that pretty person you’ve given us. How d’ye do, my dear. What’s the secret of your bright eyes? Late hours agree with you, it’s plain; but this poor man of yours wants care.”

“Yes, indeed,” said she, thankful of the turn-off.

Mr. Germain made her a bow. “If you have come to take me away, my dear, I shall not deny you the pleasure. The whole duty of a wife in the season is to take her husband from parties. Am I not right, Duchess?”

“My dear man,” said she, “I don’t pretend to such privileges. My husband has been in bed these two hours. Good-night, you happy pair. Now, my dear, when will you come to me? The 20th, of course—my ball. I trust you for that. But do come in to luncheon—positively any day except to-morrow and Thursday—oh, and Saturday. Saturday is hopeless.” She tapped Mary’s cheek with her fan—“What a dawn colour!”—and smiled herself onwards, fat, satiny, and benevolent. The Germains gained their carriage, and he was asleep before they were in Carlos-place. She sat absorbed, gazing out of the window, still under the spell of Tristram’s love-making. She went to bed—lay wide-eyed in the dark for a while; then sighed deeply, and smiled, and slept. Her last waking thought was sophistical. “He told me to have adventures—and to be myself. And he’s my friend, whatever happens.” Entrenched behind her philosopher, she had no dreams.

VIII
ADVENTURE CROWDS ADVENTURE

Odd thing! The rain nosed out by the man of weather came to pass. But it delayed for a week or more, which was time enough for many other prophecies to be fulfilled. When, however, it did come it struck her imagination. She awoke late from a night of deep sleep to hear it thudding on roof and balcony and to see, when she looked out, the heavy trees of Berkeley-square streaming like waterweed under a sluice. Here and there a cruising hansom thrashed a way through, now and again a milk-cart. The butcher-boys wore their baskets on their heads. Her first conscious thought was of Senhouse, bare-crested to the wild weather. It would be wild in the open, and, of course, he was in the open. On some wide common, perhaps, facing the gale, with the rolling collar of his jersey flacking like ship’s cordage. Ah, to be there with him, sharing the joy of battle!

It was with a sense of suddenly leaving the wholesome, great air for that of a hot-house that she turned to her breakfast tray and pile of letters. She picked up the first of them; the hand was Tristram’s. A letter from him, and a visit, were now daily events. A letter to him, also, must be written daily, and somehow delivered.

This one was cavalier in tone. “Sweetheart,—I must see you, if only to arrange how best we may meet. What a storm last night! But what a clear blue promise before us! I shall be in the Burlington Arcade—Gardens end—at noon. Come.” “Tr.”

Even she, never yet free from her early subjection to him, felt that this was not how lovers write to their sovereign ladies. An assignation—and in such a place—proposed to Mrs. Germain! She coloured high and clear. He had done what she could never have believed possible; he had really offended her. Nothing in the whole world could have persuaded her to go.

But by-and-by that sophistry which is ever at hand to clinch a woman’s argument the way she wants it to travel, modified her view, suggested a duty. Insolent, arrogant, exorbitant lover that he was, he must be taught his place. He should see her inaccessible; he should see her cold profile as she drove by him without so much as a turn of the head. Perhaps then he would know that she was not a village girl at his disposal. Perhaps. Thus, at least, she reasoned—and thus she did. The brougham was ordered for a quarter to twelve—she kept it fifteen minutes, and then gave the order, “Bank.” Her bank was that of England, and stands in Burlington Gardens.

She had no real errand there, but she feigned one. A cheque was to be cashed. The footman was to take it—and even as she gave it him she saw Tristram at the mouth of the Arcade—in an overcoat to his ankles, his wet umbrella in his hand.

She sat rigid in her place, wide-eyed for events. While looking at Musters’s careful back it was perfectly possible to see her lover at his post. He was watching her intently, she knew; but he did not move. He did not intend to go a step out of his way to meet her. True, he had walked to the Arcade—he, who lived in the Albany! A most cavalier lover, this.

The game went on . . . the minutes passed. The footman came back with her money and waited for orders. She named a shop—a jeweller’s close by, in Vigo-street. Jinny Middleham was to be married, to a Mr. Podmore, a clergyman, and must have a present. How happily things turned out; the cheque would serve. The touch of Musters’s whip caused the hoofs to clatter on the asphalt; the brougham lunged forward and swept her by the shameful trysting-place. She peered sideways as she passed; Duplessis, looking full upon her, did not even lift his hat. Nor, during the hour she spent, fingering enamels, rivières, and rings, did he appear at the shop-door. When she went by the Arcade on her return he was not there. She felt strongly the sensation of escape, and was surprised to be so free from disappointment. Senhouse came back to his own place in her thoughts—he and the wind on the heath. Both good things.

But in the afternoon, at about six o’clock, her cavalier was ushered into her drawing-room, where she sat alone, and stood by the door looking at her until the man had gone out. Then he crossed the room quickly, came straight to her, knelt, took both her hands and kissed them.

He humbled himself. She hardly knew him for the same man. And he did the thing handsomely, too, named himself grievous things, exalted her, wouldn’t hear of any excuse. Her generosity, easily moved, was all on his side in a few minutes. She could not hear him accuse himself. Perhaps he had been thoughtless; but she had had no right, she said, to be so angry.

Finally, she wouldn’t listen. “If you go on talking so wildly,” she told him, “I shall begin to think you don’t mean it.” And then he did explain.

It appeared that there had been reason in what he had proposed. A certain delicacy taught him that he could not continue calling at the house after what had happened. That could hardly fail to appease her. His seeming insult, then, had really been intensely prompted by his fear of insulting her. She considered this with hanging head.

“Mind you, Molly,” he went on, being master of her hand, “I can’t withdraw one word of what was forced out of me that night; I can’t wish undone one single act. I adore you, and I must tell you so; I love you, and must show my love.” Here he kissed her. “The question is, how and when am I to see you. See you I must and will. I wanted to talk to you about that—and how was I to do it? Would you have had me ask you to my rooms?”

It did occur to her here that a better place could have been found, since they met most nights in the week in somebody’s house; but she put the cavil by as unworthy. Since he was in her husband’s house, however, not disturbed unduly by the delicacy which had troubled him overnight, it would be as well to hear what he suggested.

“I’m not going to be unreasonable,” he told her; “I shall settle down presently, and things will jog along, no doubt, for a bit. But at this moment, when I have just won you—after two years, Molly, after two years—I must have you more or less alone for a few days. Upon my soul, I think you owe me that.”

He made her feel that she really did; but he frightened her, too. She looked quickly into his face, where he knelt gazing at hers. “You must tell me what you mean,” she said. “I don’t understand. Alone? For a few days? That is surely impossible.”

He explained with eagerness. “Of course, of course! Don’t, for God’s sake, misunderstand. I would not ask you to do anything which would cause you discomfort. Heaven forbid. I said, ‘more or less alone.’ Isn’t that plain enough? If I can’t see you here, it can only be at some of these infernal crowds we all flock to—and how can we be sure of a moment there? Look here, my dearest, think of this plan. I should like you to go and stay with your people for a bit.”

That did sound feasible. Her quick mind jumped after his instantly. “My people?” she said, wondering. “Yes, I should love to see them all again. Jinny, my sister, is going to be married. I should have gone for that in any event. Yes, of course, I could go there if——”

He poured out his plans. She should go to Blackheath at once, and he would take her down, leave her at the door. He should take rooms in Greenwich: there was an hotel there, not bad at all. You looked over the river; the shipping was magnificent. Every day he would meet her somewhere—they would both be unknown. Every day they would spend together: Greenwich Park, the river; they could sail to the Nore, round the Mouse. It would be Heaven, he said. And then he pleaded—his love, his misery, his longing. “Without you I’m a lost soul, Mary; if I’m worth saving, come and save me. In the sight of Heaven you were mine on the day I kissed you first. Do you remember when that was? How long ago? Do you think I have forgotten it? Never, never. That kiss sealed you mine—mine for ever. And what am I asking of you now? A few days’ human companionship—a sop which you are to throw to a starving man. Haven’t you charity enough for that? Ah, but I see that you have—you can’t hide it from me.” She could not.

He went on from strength to strength. “I save the proprieties by this plan; I secure you absolutely from prying eyes and profane tongues. You will have your people, your mother, to fall back upon if I could be—if you could fear me scoundrel enough—My beloved! I wrong you to name such a thought. You may disapprove of me—you may be hurt—God forgive me! by things that I say, do, look. They are things wrung from me by this throttling passion—for three years I have been gripped by the throat. Ah, and it must end, or be the end of me! Well—Molly, look at me. What will you tell me?”

She did look at him then—for one dewy moment. Pity, kindness, infinite wistfulness, pride—mingled in the fire, melted, and lay gleaming in her eyes. Wonderingly she searched his face, ready to quail before the savagery she expected to read there; but he was wise—she could find nothing there but honesty, frank and manly desire; for he saw to it that she should not. Before she turned her head she had given him her hand. He stooped and kissed it softly; then went away.

Before dinner she went to her husband in the library where he sat, with his reading-lamp, blue-books, and spectacles. “Come in,” he had called in answer to her knock, but did not turn when she entered. As she approached his desk, approached his studious back, she felt like a school-girl, coming to ask if she might leave early—with a fibbing reason for the teacher, which disguised the secret, fearful joy of the real reason. The school-girl showed in every halting word, in every flicker of the covering eyelids. . . .

“I was going to ask you—Would you mind if I were to go to my people for a few days—soon? Would you be able to spare me, do you think?”

He turned quickly, hurt by her meekness. “My love! Of course! Can you ask me such things?”

She could not afford tenderness from him just now. She took a business-like tone.

“My sister is to be married shortly, as you know. There is a good deal to do. I could help mother, you know. Jinny is staying with Mr. Podmore’s family.”

He nodded approvingly. “Quite so, quite so. It would be only kind. You have engagements, no doubt—but nothing pressing, I suppose. Have we not people here, by the way?”

“Not until the 26th. This is the 11th.”

“Yes, yes, my dear. Make whatever arrangements suit you. When do you think of going?”

“I thought, the day after to-morrow. But——”

“Well, my love?”

“I should not care to go, if I thought—that you might want me.”

He turned to his desk. “Want you!” he said under his breath. “Want you!” So careful was he that she could never have guessed the bitterness of that soft cry.

But she lingered yet. “Of course—it is quite close to town. You could write—or telegraph—I could come in a moment.”

“Yes, my dear one, yes,” he said, his face averted. “It would be easy enough. But I am not likely to disturb you in your happiness.”

This would never do. “It would be my duty to come.”

He groaned. “Oh, my dearest, spare me!”

She must misconstrue that, or she must fail; she must gulp it down, and she did—but it turned her sick.

“Thank you,” she said staidly. “Then I will write to mother.” Her fingers were within an inch of his shoulder; they hovered over, almost touched it. Then she went. He covered his face with his hands. I think he prayed.

IX
THE PATTERAN

As she lay watchful in her bed the night before her escapade, she vowed that she had no love for Tristram, none whatever. At the same moment she protested with a cry that she had none for her husband either; indeed, it was rather the other way. Surely, surely, she was entitled to resentment against that poor gentleman. For what reason under Heaven had he broken in upon her laborious days if, now that he had her, she was to be no more to him than a figure at his table? Was this the whole duty of wives? She knew better than that. Nay, then, had wives no rights? Was she bought to be a nun? She declared to herself that she would be willing, should that enable her to help him in his work. But she knew that nothing would enable her; she had insight enough into character to read what manner of man he was. “He can tell me nothing—nothing. And the more he needs me the less he can say so. If I went to him on my knees and begged him to be open with me, he would shrivel before my face. No, no, he must be for ever bestowing favours—he loves to be the benefactor—and that’s all he loves. If he could pity me he would love me again—in his way. But—” and she clenched her little hands and stiffened her arms—“he shall never pity me—never.” And then she blushed all over to feel how she had crept to him to ask his leave of absence, and how she had cowered there, with drooping eyelids too heavy to be raised. Alas! and how she had fibbed.

A thought of Tristram here, of his kisses and strong arms about her, made her heart beat. The wild joy of being possessed by so fine a creature was not to be denied, once you blinked the truth that in the very act of taking possession he would despise you for suffering it. That had to be blinked, though. Whatever she might have become by right of marriage, by intercourse with Tristram’s own world, by familiarity with its ways—to Tristram she was still a little governess, sent into this world to be kissed and fondled—but no possible companion for a gentleman, or man of parts. Formerly, if she had felt this, she had accepted it; but now—well, it had to be blinked. Mary was no fool. She knew quite well that she had learned the ways of the great. She knew that she was a success. She had been clever enough from the beginning to see that safety lay only in being absolutely herself. While she had gone in and out of Misperton Brand, from school-house to church and back, she had turned her eyes and ears—all her senses—upon these lords of the earth who were lords without effort. Her Cantacutes, James Germains, and their friends—every gesture of theirs had been a study to her. By instinct she had bored into the very marrow of these people. They alone in the world could afford to be themselves. And directly she could afford it she put that into practice—with success, as she knew very well. Tristram Duplessis, however, would have none of that, ignored it. He was entirely himself, too, and never allowed her to forget that she was his inferior. Every look he gave her was, in its way, an insult, implied “You are mine, my dear, for the picking up.” She knew that she ought to be offended—but she was _not_ offended. She knew that such a homage as his was not flattering—and yet she was flattered by it. Then why should she run away from what pleased her? As she asked herself this question, to which the answer had been so easy a little while before, she found herself now echoing more faintly her “Why, indeed?” Was not love a necessity to women? Was she to have none of it? Was she to be an unwedded wife for ever, and unloved? What had her friend told her, that wonderful day in the Park when, it had seemed, the scales fell from her eyes and she saw men and women where before she had seen herds, dressed by the milliner and marshalled by the police? Love, he had said, is a real thing—one of the few real things we have; and it has been turned by the lawyers into a means of securing real property. “It’s bad enough that women should lend themselves to that; but worse things are done in love’s name, I believe.” Well then, if Tristram loved her, in his way, was she not justified in giving him what she had left to give? At that moment she felt his arms about her, his breath upon her cheeks. Yes, yes, he loved her—he had always loved her. Let come what might of that.

She turned on the light and left her bed; she sat at her writing-table and scribbled a few words on a sheet—“I am going to Blackheath to-morrow—by train. I shall leave Charing-cross at 4.15.” She put that in an envelope, wrote his name and address, stamped it. Now, what was the time? Two o’clock? It could still be posted so that he would get it at eight. Dressing gown, slippers, a hasty twist to her hair, a cloak and hood—she opened her door noiselessly and crept downstairs.

She was some time unfastening the front door—time enough to cool; time enough to decide with a leaden heart that she had no love for Tristram. The keen pale air tempered her still further. “Be yourself,” she had been told; and “Sincerity is the whole matter.” Insincerity! There lay the sin. She had to go to the corner of the Square to the pillar-box; but not a soul was in sight: it could be done. Gathering her cloak about her, she ventured out, and walked tiptoe forward, with eyes all astare for a policeman or late cab. . . .

The houses seemed made of eyes; there was not a blind window but had a witness in it. Mocking, leering, incredulous, curious, heavily reproving she dragged before them her load of shame. Oh, that it should have come to this, that she was a spectacle for all London’s reproach! But she sped onwards on light feet, her letter in her hand.

Where Hill-street broadens into the Square stands a great lamp, the centre, as it were, of a pool of light. There had been a storm of wind and rain in the early part of that night, and the surface of the road was fretted with gleaming reflections where mud and water had been blown up into billows. As she stood for a second or two by the pillar-box, her letter not yet posted, her eyes, painfully acute, fell upon this wide, dimpled and cresseted bay, and, although her mind was disturbed, took some sort of interest in the effect. Following the light inwards, she found her looks arrested by something else—a torn spray of a tree, blown, no doubt, from one of the planes in the Square garden—which lay by the pillar-box, almost at her feet. It was about eighteen inches long, bent in the midst, and pointed to the north. Strictly, it pointed north-west.

Immediately she remembered the _patteran_ which Senhouse had explained to her. Wonderful thing—if he had passed this way while she was contending with her sin, and had laid this sure sign in the road to show her where he was to be found! It pointed to the north—no! to the north-west. That seemed to make a certainty of it. Her heart beat high, and the flood of happiness rose within her until she seemed to be bathed in it to the chin. She stood alone in that great glaring emptiness, unconscious of everything but her triumphant release from bondage. To the north—safety was in the north, comradeship, health, freedom to breathe and move her limbs! Smiling to herself, she dropped her letter into the pillar-box, picked up the _patteran_ and returned swiftly to the house, to bed and to happy sleep. Absolved! She was absolved.

In the morning she arose with the feeling of elation one has at the opening of an honest adventure; the day is before you, the world lies mapped out; you are not to fail—you cannot. She dressed, breakfasted and read her letters. There was one from Tristram, which she had not even the curiosity to open. She lit the corner of it at the spirit-lamp and held it daintily out while it curled and blackened under the flame and dropped in charred flakes into the slop basin. Ghosts of words in silver characters flickered as they perished—she saw “homage,” “heart’s queen,” “kiss,” and “my arms.” She wrote to her mother at Blackheath that she was unexpectedly delayed but hoped to come soon. She would write again, she said, or send a telegram. Meantime a trunk would arrive and might wait for her. At eleven she asked if Mr. Germain was up, and being told that he was, went in to see him.

If he had been in the mood to notice anything but his own troubles, he must have remarked upon her altered habit. She was radiantly well, self-possessed, and cool. She kissed his forehead lightly, asked how he had slept, and then told him that she was lunching out and should have her luggage sent down to Blackheath. She had given orders to her maid, and should not want the carriage.

Mr. Germain listened heavily, fingering a blue-book and a pencil. He made no inquiries, had no suggestions to offer. She anticipated what he might have had to say as to an approaching visit of the James Germains by telling him that all arrangements had been made—and then she said, “I won’t disturb you again. I know that you are very busy.”

“Yes, yes,” he said. “My work presses upon me.” He sighed, and then asked with studied politeness, “You go to-day?”

She laughed. “I’ve just been telling you about it.” She stooped and kissed his forehead again. “Good-bye,” she said, “I’ll write, of course—if you’ll promise to read what I send you.”

He caught his breath, and shut his eyes tightly as if something hurt him; but he did not move from his chair. Nor did he once seek to meet her eyes. She could see that he was deeply depressed, but felt no pity for him just then. Her youth was too strong within her, her adventure too near, and her freedom too certain. Yet she hovered above him looking down at him drooped in his chair, quivering over him, as it were, like some gossamer insect new-dawning to the sun. A word, a sigh, a look would have netted her in; but nothing came. He sat stonily astare, his face hidden by his hand—the other keeping his page in the blue-book. Looking down, as from the battlements of heaven an archangel might survey the earth, she touched his shoulder with her finger-tips, and was gone.

In reasoning it all out, or rather in flashing her instinct upon events—for that was her way—she knew that Senhouse could not himself have laid the _patteran_ for her guidance. None the less, she was sure it was intended for her, and that it pointed truly to where he was. It was June; he would be in Cumberland. Wastwater would find him, he had said. Her plan, as she worked it out, was to take train to Kendal and inquire.

This she did. While her trunk and dressing-case were being delivered at Heath View, and while Duplessis was biting his nails under the clock at Charing Cross Station, she was being carried smoothly to the north, snugly in a corner of a third-class carriage, her cheek to the window-pane, and her bright unwinking eyes watching the landscape as it rushed up to meet her. The villa gardens and hedgerows of Herts, the broad Leicestershire cornfields, Bletchley with its spire, Rugby, Crewe, then the dark over all; but scarcely for a moment did her eyes leave the nearing north. She arrived at Kendal at midnight, and had some tea. Then she found the ladies’ waiting-room, lay on the sofa, and slept.

X
THE BROTHERS TOUCH BOTTOM

The James Germains paid a visit to Hill-street in June. It was most unfortunate that it was so wet, but the time was otherwise convenient, since Mary was away on a visit to her people. This was how Mrs. James put it—she was never remarkable for tact. Nor did she care to be. Surely, she would say, openness is best. Mary once departed, then, Mrs. James was installed the very next day. The Rector followed her.

From the first he did not like his brother’s looks. John, he thought, was ailing—ailing and ageing. He showed an unwholesome white in the cheeks, a flabby quality in the flesh, poor appetite, low spirits. Vitality was low; he was feeble. He ate hardly anything, and betrayed a tendency to fall asleep in pauses of the conversation. Yet he talked, in flashes, during dinner of his projects, with something of the old hopefulness. He had lately been asking a series of questions, agricultural questions, “somewhat carefully framed”; he had pressed the Minister in charge of such matter. He was “not without hope” that some good might result. Then a deputation of tenant-farmers had been talked of; he “should not be unwilling” to introduce that. It was very characteristic of him to talk negatively; the Rector used to trace it to a Scots ancestress—a Forbes of Lochgour. But he owned to being weary—alas, that a legislator should admit that in June! and said that he looked forward to the recess “like any schoolboy.” Mrs. James, who loved “plans,” asked him his. He had none, it seemed. “Time has pressed upon us both of late; my work and her dissipations! But I must talk it over with Mary so soon as she returns. Her wishes must carry weight with me. I should delight in showing her Switzerland—or Norway——”

“You would not, perhaps, delight in the thousands of people doing the same thing?” Here was Mrs. James, with her challenging note. The Rector marked with concern that John let it go.

She inquired whether he would resume his visits to Misperton Brand. “The Cantacutes often speak of you,” she told him, and then remembered that of course he saw the Cantacutes here in town. He bowed his head.

“Then you know, of course, that Tristram’s affair—if it ever was an affair—with Hertha is quite at an end?”

No—Mr. Germain had not known that. “I see very little of Tristram,” he told her, and resumed the question of holiday-making.

Mary had great leanings to Cornwall. She had been attracted to it upon her first visit, had often talked of it, and lately had seemed to prefer it to Switzerland. She would like to be there later in the year; spoke of November as a good month. “I cannot say that it agrees with me,” he added. “A languid, relaxing air—and in November! To my mind a visit to the Land’s End in November would be the act of a suicide. But Mary is young and strong; and her wishes are naturally mine—and her pleasures also . . . her pleasures also.” If he sighed he was not aware of it. A silence fell upon the table, which became painful to two of the three, though not to be broken. The Rector plunged back into politics. “They tell me at the clubs that Lord Craye leaves India. . . .” But it would not do. Mrs. James had the good taste to rise. The carriage was ordered at 10 to take her to a party.

When she had gone the brothers sat without speaking for some minutes. The Rector drank his claret; John Germain was in a brooding stare. The younger broke the silence.

“Dear old boy, I wish that we could have stopped up a few more days—but the Diocesan Inspector can’t be put off. I tried him with my silkiest—he’s inexorable—adamant. And then there’s Constantia, with a bazaar on her conscience. A bazaar—in July!”

John Germain did not lift his head from the hand that propped it. “My dear fellow, I understand you perfectly. We all have our duties. We must all face them . . . whatever it cost . . . whatever it cost us.”

The Rector looked keenly at him. “You are not yourself, John—that’s as clear as day. I do wish that Mary had not left you. It was not like her. She should have known—” His goaded brother sat up sharply—like one who lifts his gory head from the press of battle, descrying fresh foes.

“Mary wished to go. I could not deny her. Indeed, I wished it also. Her parents are alone, and she is useful to them. I believe, nay, I am sure that she is happy there.”

“Your belief,” said the Rector, “is as pious as the fact, and as rare. The fashion of the day is for children to tolerate their parents. The cry is, ‘You brought us into the world, Monsieur et Dame; yes, and thank you for nothing!’ Thank God, Mary hasn’t caught that trick. But I do think that, if she is needed here, a hint from you——”

“But I will give her no such hints,” Germain said fiercely. “I am not so self-engrossed. I am inured to a solitary life, and she is not. I remember her youth, I remember her activity.”

“One would have thought that London in June—” the Rector began, and was checked at once. Germain said shortly that the activity excited by London in June was not wholesome. “She is better there than here,” he added, and snapped his lips together.

James Germain, having raised his eyebrows at this oracle, immediately lowered them again, and his eyes with them. After a pause he spoke more intimately, feeling his way along a dark, surmised passage.

“I believe you to mean that all this whirl is very new to her, and over-exciting. Must you not be patient, must you not lead? Accustom her to it by degrees? You know what I think of Mary, and that I have followed her steps with interest. You have told me how bravely she held her own in the country; and you aren’t likely to forget that she had two years in which to do it. You speak of our duties—meaning, I take it, your own among others? Well, where do these lie, these duties? Where we find ourselves, or where we may choose to put ourselves? You may tell me that public life is, in a sense, your sphere—and so it is, I grant you. But when you entered Mary’s little sphere—as you did, something of the suddenest—had you not then to inquire whether that could be made elastic enough to include your own? Surely you had. This Parliamentary career of yours, now. Nobody is more naturally at Westminster than yourself: that’s of course. I wish there were more like you, men of sober judgment, weighted with their private responsibilities. Upon my conscience, Parliament seems a place for buccaneering now-a-days—a high sea. I rejoiced, I say, when you stood up. But whether you could fairly ask a girl of Mary’s training to take over such work with you—by your side—” Here John Germain held up his hand.

“One moment. You are right, James. I could not. I acted for the best, so far as I could see my way. I listened to my hopes. It was important that I should do something to interest her in—in our life together. There were reasons, serious reasons, into which I cannot now enter. Her life at Southover. . . . She was not happy, she was not contented. She could not be.”

James had now nothing to say. He frowned, to conceal his pain. John spoke on slowly, as if labouring both words and breath.