Chapter VII: Book II: Three Potters (6)

A WEEK later, Julia, who had gone to bed early, woke up suddenly at midnight. For a moment she lay wondering what had awakened her, used as she was to the long unbroken sleep of youth. She became conscious of a steady rhythmical sound in the next room, quite different from the prosaic music to which she was accustomed. When she realized that it was her husband pacing back and forth, back and forth, like a captured beast of the forest, she trembled for a moment, then invoked her nerve, slipped on a dressing-gown, and opened the door.

The lights were blazing. France, his coat off, his hair on end, was pacing up the room as she entered, and when he reached the wall, he flung his hands against it as if to push it outward. Then he turned and saw his wife. His eyes were bloodshot.

“Go back to bed,” he said thickly. “I don’t want you.”

“What _do_ you want?” Julia walked toward him, fear lost in her curiosity. “What is the matter, Harold? Are you ill? If you are, I must take care of you.”

He stared at her for a moment. There were times when he hated her, others when he was quite mad about her; during the intervals of varying length he did not think about her at all. To-night he suddenly experienced a new sensation. He needed a friend badly, and it was her business to fill any office he chose to impose upon her.

“Look here,” he said. “Would you do me a good turn?”

“Why, of course.”

“And use all the brains you’ve got and hold your tongue?”

“Try me.”

“Think you could fool Kingsborough?”

“Oh, quite easily.”

“Well, it’s this: I’ve got to get away for a time—out of this. I ain’t a child, ain’t used to walkin’ a straight line. Never had so many rules to live by since I was a small boy. Navy was nothin’ to it—and two years! _Two years_—” He clutched his hair with both hands and shouted: “I’ve got to get away for a bit! Do you hear? Got to get away! Ain’t used—”

“Do you mean that you want to go away and drink?”

France’s jaw fell. He took a step forward.

“What d’you mean? Who’s ever said—”

“No one in particular. But one learns a good deal in two years. Didn’t you used to drink now and again—disappear—”

“What if I did? I’ll wring your neck if you peach—”

“I haven’t the least idea of telling any one. It is the sort of family secret one doesn’t share. Where do you intend to go?”

“I’d hardly thought—it doesn’t matter. How can I fool him? If he found me out, he’d chuck me, cut me down to the last penny, he’s such a damned milksop—and in my shoes, in my shoes! Think for me. My brain’s no good. It’s on fire. Let him find out and it’s all up with you, too, my lady. It’s your business to stand by me. Wonder I didn’t think of that before.”

“You’ll go to Paris to-morrow to consult a heart specialist—”

“I tell you I’ve got to get out of this to-night. If I don’t, the roof’ll be off before breakfast. Do you suppose I can wait for a lot of palaver? I’d have been off before this, but I can’t think of a ghost of an excuse.”

“You can’t find a better than that, and you can go to-night. He knows your heart is weak, or was. I’ll tell him I became terrified and packed you off without delay. Get out your portmanteau, and I’ll look up the trains in Bradshaw.”

XXI

“HOW very odd!” said the duke, in a tone of manifest annoyance. “How very odd!”

They were in the library and Julia had imparted her information.

“Not at all,” she replied indifferently. “He would have gone before this, but feared to worry you—thought he would feel better. Last night he was so bad that I put him out of the house.”

“You put Harold out?”

“Yes. That will give you an idea of how he was feeling, when he was willing to mind me!”

“Hm! Why didn’t you go with him? A wife should never leave her husband for a day, particularly when he is ill!”

“We neither thought of that until the last minute—he was so nervous and there was only time to pack and catch the train—I was racking my brain over Bradshaw. I offered to follow, of course, but he said he preferred I should remain and keep our engagements here—he’s developed such a love of society, poor Harold—he seems haunted by the fear that we might drop out—you see, he was once a little wild—”

“Never really!” said the duke, emphatically. “Why shouldn’t he sow a few oats—a fine young fellow? Not that I approve; but it is natural enough.”

“Of course, poor dear, and he fancies that people think him far worse than he was, and he has an idea that I am useful to him—”

“Quite so. That is what you charming young wives are for. But I cannot think why Harold should feel obliged to go to Paris. We have heart specialists here.”

“Oh, but no one to compare with—with—Corot. And Harold knows him, you see, and has such confidence in him. He should have gone a week earlier, when—the—ah—thumping began.”

“Thumping? Dear me! Is Harold as bad as that?”

“Oh, it only means that he needs the right kind of tonic—after so long a siege of fever—and all that sport—and the political campaign—you see, he should have had himself looked over sooner; but at Bosquith there was only the country doctor, and then—he hated to leave us. I don’t think he’d have gone this morning if I hadn’t insisted. And he was dreadfully worried for fear you’d be angry.”

“Oh, well,” said the duke, mollified; “after all, he knows his own affairs best. Ah—wait a moment.”

Julia, who was escaping, breathless with the lies she had told, and longing for fresh air, halted, and the duke swung round in his chair and laid the fingers of one hand over the back of the other.

“Sit down again for a moment, my dear,” he said, not unkindly, although he had assumed what Julia called his preaching manner and his praying voice.

She sat down on the edge of a chair. The duke resumed.

“There is a matter I have had in my mind since the night of the party. I don’t like to scold you, for in the main you are a very good child and a dutiful wife—really, I have little fault to find with you. But—ah—you must have seen that I was much annoyed when I learned, that without my consent, and in spite of my expressed distaste for those two young women, you had asked them to my house.”

“Of course I knew you would be annoyed.”

“Indeed? I supposed you merely thoughtless!”

“Oh, no.” Julia turned her large brilliant gaze upon the small slate-colored eyes whose dullness was lighting with indignation. “I told you—perhaps you have forgotten—that as you have made me your hostess, and expect me to devote a large part of my energies to acquitting myself creditably, I feel that the position carries with it certain rights. So I invited my best friends.”

“But you knew that I disapproved of them!”

“Without reason. They are of your own class, and their reputations are immaculate. Why should I snub my friends? The invitations went out in the names of all three of us.”

“That has nothing to do with it. I do not wish you to associate with these young women. Their tendencies are dangerous. They have stepped out of their class and must take the consequences. Old orders would not change if men were firmer—When Harold returns I shall ask him to put his foot down. I cannot expect you to obey me, but you are bound to obey your husband.”

“I shall not in the matter of my friends. I have told him that if he interferes with me in any way, I’ll leave him and go into Ishbel’s shop.”

“WHAT?”

The duke half rose from his chair, then fell back, gasping. Where was the responsive amenable child of two summers agone?

The child continued. “Yes, I am doing my best. I am a dutiful wife, and I try to look and act” (she almost said “like a future duchess,” but her nimble mind leaped aside in time) “as if I had been entertaining all my life. I listen to Lady Arabella’s lectures, and Aunt Maria’s, to say nothing of yours and Harold’s. Even Lady Arabella says I’ve done very well. But I have a few rights of my own, and if I’m interfered with I’ll do as I said. I don’t care so much for all this. I’d rather be free like Ishbel.”

“You have no comprehension of the duties of a wife,” gasped the outraged duke, “or of your position. That a member of my family—”

“It is not so much that I am asking. Lots of women have lovers—”

“Lovers!” The duke almost strangled. “What does a child like you know about lovers? And in my house—you have never heard such a subject mentioned.”

“Oh? I can tell you that a lot of the women that have visited us—”

“Hush! I shall listen to no insinuations about my guests. You wicked little thing!”

“No. I was about to tell you that I’ve no intention of being wicked. I should hate a lover.”

“Indeed! I am happy to be reassured.” The duke always felt at his best when sarcastic, and he sat erect and looked severely at this naughty child who did not in the least comprehend what she was talking about.

“You are too young to argue with,” he said. “Not that I should ever think of arguing with a woman of any age. As regards Bridgit Herbert and Ishbel Jones, if your husband upholds you in your friendship with them I have nothing further to say except that I absolutely refuse to have them in my house again. But if Harold does not—this is what you must understand once for all: your husband’s word is law.”

Julia smiled.

“What do you mean?” The duke had a curious sinking in the pit of his stomach, and wondered if he too should not consult a specialist.

“You men are so funny.”

“Funny! Madam!”

“Yes, that is the word. Ishbel told me they were when I first came over, and I’ve found it out since for myself.”

“Funny!”

“Terribly funny.”

“If you don’t explain yourself—”

“I mean—for one thing—just one!—that you never find out we have our own way in spite of you. You think you are tyrants, and there isn’t one of you that can’t be led round by the nose—managed. Well, I don’t like that method. I won’t bother to manage any man. You’re not worth the trouble, and it’s a confession of inferiority on our part, anyhow. The more I see of you, the less inferior I feel. Besides, I enjoy speaking out, having things understood without a lot of beating round the bush. I’ve discovered that I’ve good fighting blood, and I’ve learned that women have plenty of resources outside of husbands; all that is necessary is to find the courage and the energy to enjoy them. But so many don’t. They’re all in love with one thing or another—husbands, lovers, society, fine houses, clothes, luxury—so they ‘manage’; and it has spoiled men, flattered them for centuries that they were the stronger and wiser sex; and, of course, demoralized women. No one can expand without the courage that comes of being able to speak the truth. Men can afford to be truthful whether they are or not, so they have gone ahead of us. I shall become demoralized all right, but not in that way. Not in any way that I can help. I shan’t lie—for myself—and I shan’t employ crooked methods. My mother told me to marry, and I did, because at that time I thought it right and natural to obey. Besides, I suppose one man’s much the same as another. I am resigned. I shan’t cry as some women do. One woman down at Bosquith last summer used to come into my room when I wanted to sleep, and cry out, ‘I hate life! Oh, how I hate life!’ She was afraid her husband would find out about her lover and she was sick of the lover besides. Now she has a new lover—”

“Hold your tongue!” The duke for once in his life thundered. “I forbid you to say another word—”

“Oh, I’m not very much interested in those things. What I intended to say was that I’ll do my duty, since married I am, but I’ll also do as I choose in some things. You can’t stop me. You might have done so in the days when Bosquith was built, but a lot of you seem to forget that times have changed—they change every minute, if you did but know it.”

“So it seems! I should think they did! _Great_ heaven!”

The duke paused a moment as if he expected heaven to respond. Receiving no inspiration, he concluded with dignity: “I must think this matter over. You may go.”

Julia almost ran out of the library and up to her own room. Then could the duke have seen her he would first have received another shock, then misinterpreted what he saw, and plumed himself. For Julia sat down and wept. She had lied hideously, worse still, glibly. And for the first time she quite realized that of late she had developed a poise, a fertility of resource in dealing with the mean tyrant that dwelt in the men to whom she was almost subject, that for the moment horrified her. Was it true that she was growing hard? She wished she had talked more confidentially with Nigel instead of flippantly dancing away from the subject. Was she no longer young? She had a real passion for truth. Were there to be no conditions in which she could indulge it? She glanced back over the past two years. There had been a time when she spoke the literal truth on all occasions; now she spoke it when it was feasible, or impressive, but rarely without forethought. It was seldom that she let herself go. She felt a hatred of civilization stir, wondered if in the whole planetary system there was a world where truth was the standard, where every man was himself, where the petty lies which made the great ones inevitable were unknown. A prophetic ray suggested that such conditions might involve complications unless human nature itself were of a new brand; but she was not in the mood to follow the thought to its logical finish. She wanted freedom here, and it appeared to be impossible of attainment. But at least she would strive for independence. To both of the men who shadowed her life she had read what the Americans called the riot act. That, at least, was something accomplished. She could not be accused of deceit, despised because she paid the tribute of her sex to their superiority.

Suddenly her spirits darted upward on wings. She was free of her husband for a week, perhaps longer. She bathed her eyes and danced about the room. But when she realized the source of her exultation she turned hastily from it, dressed, and went to Ishbel’s shop.

XXII

DURING the fortnight of France’s wassail the duke and Julia avoided each other by tacit consent. His Grace found himself uncommonly absorbed in politics, attended no less than three important dinners; and, ascertaining Julia’s engagements, dined at the House upon the one occasion when she dined at home. Therefore, were there no elaborate and recurring explanations of Harold’s prolonged absence, and singular epistolary neglect of his cousin. Julia, as she passed the duke on the stair, mentioned casually once or twice that her husband was detained by his doctor’s orders, might be for six or eight days to come.

The duke had resolved that he would not be betrayed into another war of words with this or any woman, nor would he recur to the subject of Julia’s offences until he had fully determined what to say to her, what course to take. And as for the life of him he could not make up his mind, she was left to her own devices.

And these devices were many. Julia resolved to forget her husband’s existence, and enjoy herself in new ways. She went to nine parties and danced until dawn. She saw Bridgit, Ishbel, and Nigel every day, rode on the tops of omnibuses, and lunched in A B C’s, Italian restaurants, and the Cheshire Cheese; these last three dissipations in company with Mr. Herbert. He also took her frequently to the National Gallery, and administered her first lessons in art. They even visited the Bond Street exhibitions and one or two private studios.

Nigel made no attempt to flirt with her; he was by no means sure that he still cared for her, so changed was she, although her magnetic charm was unaffected. But she would seem to have lost the ideal and unique quality that had roused his deeper feeling, and that gone, he felt no desire for the residuum. Certainly, it was not worth the sacrifice of his career; although of course it was very jolly to be the chosen friend of such a radiant creature (of whom men were beginning to take much notice), and he made up his mind to remain in London during Julia’s period of liberty, then return to Switzerland and his new book. He was rather glad of this test than otherwise, the opportunity to make sure that the only rival of his work had been routed. Sometimes, however, he wished that he might love Julia frantically, these days, thus receiving an additional proof of the might of art; but that hard bright surface repelled him. He felt that he no longer knew her, should not until life had taught her a more thorough knowledge of herself. Meanwhile, poor child, if she was determined to enjoy herself to the limit while her beast was on the loose, it was the least he could do to help her; so he lectured her on art in the morning and danced with her at night, or saw to it that she had the best partners in the room. The fortnight passed very quickly, and Julia, exerting her strong will, felt eighteen once more and quite happy.

France returned one morning early, looking rather the worse for wear. After a coaching from his wife he sought the duke, and, in his bluffest sailor manner, apologized for his abrupt departure and his failure to write: he had been put to bed and commanded to rest, undergone a series of examinations, been so blue and bored that he should have made his cousin as bad as himself. The duke was quite satisfied, and when France took the precaution to add that sooner or later he should be forced to return for another examination, his affectionate relative sighed and hoped Julia would awake to her duty and present another heir to the house of France.

During the next two years France disappeared some five or six times. His departures were preceded by excessive irritability; he returned as complacent as a cat after canary. Intermediately he was much himself. Julia became expert in seeing little of him. During the season she dragged him about with an unflagging energy that caused him to welcome the few hours he was able to snatch for sleep, and the duke unwittingly assisted her by demanding his daily presence in the House of Commons. During the shooting and hunting seasons his sportman’s fever took care of itself, although she subtly persuaded him to take up the rod, and to go to Scotland for deerstalking. She realized that if she continued to live with him a certain amount of “management” was inevitable. To tell the whole truth and live under the same roof with France was manifestly impossible, and the feeling of destiny (planetary) was too strong to permit her to leave him and achieve a complete independence. She thought as little as possible, read and studied a great deal, and played to the top of her capacity.

There was political excitement from time to time, and Julia learned that one secret of content was to forget her deep and hopeless disappointment in herself by keeping her mind animated with the greater affairs of the nation. No doubt this is the most fruitful source of woman’s interest in politics as they exist to-day. Unlike art, which compels true oblivion, it is a wholly artificial interest, since mentally unproductive; and of secondary import, since women are not permitted to employ their abilities in the service of their country. But although, no doubt, the women of the future will look back with much amusement upon the futile, the pathetically egotistic activities, of their predecessors, there is no question that an interest in public affairs, no matter how impersonal and unremunerative, save to the spirit, has the advantage of dissociating the mind from those mean and petty interests that send the average woman to the scrap heap.

Julia, even without the hints of Bridgit and Ishbel (Nigel went abroad soon after France’s return), would no doubt have discovered this philosophy for herself, for she came of a family distinguished in colonial politics since the islands were inhabited by the white man, and her present atmosphere was almost wholly political. The duke fussed more than any woman, France was forced to assume an interest he did not feel, and the greater number of their guests believed themselves to be making history. The duke, since his health would not permit him to be prime minister, found his compensation in sitting at the head of a table surrounded by those eminent Conservatives and liberal-Unionists whose names were in every man’s mouth. Therefore was Julia not only obliged to listen intelligently, but soon began to feel a keen pleasure in sharpening the edge of her mind and in holding opinions and drawing conclusions of her own. When the war between Spain and the United States broke out she took the American side, partly out of perversity, as everybody she met was passionately for the sister European power, even after the Government policy declared itself and laid its heavy hand on the press, partly because the increasingly modern tendencies of her mind led her to sympathize with the fluid imperfections of youth as against the atrophied faults of age. But although she found her opponents in argument immovable in their sympathy for Spain, and (congenital) disapproval of the United States, the experience gave her the deepest insight she was likely to have of the fundamental good humor of the English, as well as their sense of fair play. Unequivocally as they resented the conduct of the United States and hoped for her humiliation, it never occurred to them to visit their indignation on the individual, and London was full of Americans at the moment. One afternoon Julia was taking tea with Mrs. Winstone when Mrs. Bode came rustling in, flushed and indignant.

“What do you think?” she demanded, before she had taken the chair Mr. Pirie hastened to place for her. “Hannah Macmanus asked me to go with her to the private view this afternoon, and when I arrived at her house I found her with the Spanish colors pinned on her chest! Wouldn’t that jar you? And I an American—her guest! When I exploded—asked her why she didn’t send me word not to come, she seemed quite surprised, said she never let politics interfere with private friendships. But I bolted, couldn’t contain myself. I do think you English are too odd!”

“Oh, we’re merely a bit hoary,” said Pirie; “we’ve really lived, you see.”

“Hope your history’s not all behind you,” retorted Mrs. Bode. “Well, I’ll take a cup of tea. If _you_ were wearing the Spanish colors, Maria Winstone—”

“They don’t become my own coloring,” said Mrs. Winstone. “But, mind you, I’m all for Spain and hope you are going to be whipped. If we were quite alone I should confide that I didn’t care a straw one way or another, but fashion is fashion, and I’d no more dare defy it than I’d dare indulge in an individual style of dress—must be strictly contemporary or run the risk of looking my age.”

“I never know when you English are joking,” said Mrs. Bode, discontentedly. “Your humor (if you really have any) isn’t the least bit like ours.”

“Our effects are got by telling the brutal truth,” said Pirie.

But the excitement afforded by this war was brief, and soon forgotten. Kitchener’s reconquest of the Soudan was picturesque enough in its details to compel the attention of far happier mortals than Julia, but was hardly of a nature to disturb the serenity to which Pirie had made allusion. Fashoda caused but another ripple on the surface, and even when the moving finger appeared on the South African horizon the prevailing feeling was annoyance, and astonishment at the temerity of the Boers. In spite of the warnings of Lord Wolsely and General Butler, England persisted in looking at the new republic through the wrong end of the opera glass. Early in August, Julia, at a county dinner party, sat next to one of the most intelligent of the South African millionnaires then living in England. He had lived his life in South Africa, and mainly among the Boers; he had made his fortune there, and taken a prominent part in politics. No man should have known the characters of the Boers better than he, nor the advantages possessed by a hard persistent race that had learned every trick of native warfare from the negroes they had subdued. And yet he made a speech to Julia that she never forgot.

“You know, Mrs. France,” he said pleasantly, “we don’t want to kill anybody. We’ll just walk quietly through the Transvaal and take it.”

It was shortly after this dinner and the feeling of renewed confidence in England’s destiny it induced, that Julia suddenly lost all interest in politics. She had found many compensations in her life, and looked forward to many more. The duke had shown uncommon tact in intimating that her husband was quite equal to the task of controlling her, never returning to it himself; Julia, on the other hand, having no desire to live alone with her husband, took pains to fill creditably the duties of her position, and showed her host the pretty deference due his age and rank. So had wagged life for two more years. And then the most unexpected, the most incredible, the most completely disorganizing, thing happened. The duke fell in love and married.