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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/3075-0.txt b/3075-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..144703c --- /dev/null +++ b/3075-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9116 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Return, by Walter de la Mare + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you +will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before +using this eBook. + +Title: The Return + +Author: Walter de la Mare + +Release Date: December 15, 2000 [eBook #3075] +[Most recently updated: November 19, 2022] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +Produced by: Eve Sobol and David Widger + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RETURN *** + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +The Return + +By Walter de la Mare + + + + + “Look not for roses in Attalus his garden, or wholesome flowers in + a venomous plantation. And since there is scarce any one bad, but + some others are the worse for him; tempt not contagion by proximity + and hazard not thyself in the shadow of corruption.”—SIR THOMAS + BROWNE. + + + + +CONTENTS + + CHAPTER ONE + CHAPTER TWO + CHAPTER THREE + CHAPTER FOUR + CHAPTER FIVE + CHAPTER SIX + CHAPTER SEVEN + CHAPTER EIGHT + CHAPTER NINE + CHAPTER TEN + CHAPTER ELEVEN + CHAPTER TWELVE + CHAPTER THIRTEEN + CHAPTER FOURTEEN + CHAPTER FIFTEEN + CHAPTER SIXTEEN + CHAPTER SEVENTEEN + CHAPTER EIGHTEEN + CHAPTER NINETEEN + CHAPTER TWENTY + CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE + CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO + CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE + + + + +CHAPTER ONE + + +The churchyard in which Arthur Lawford found himself wandering that +mild and golden September afternoon was old, green, and refreshingly +still. The silence in which it lay seemed as keen and mellow as the +light—the pale, almost heatless, sunlight that filled the air. Here and +there robins sang across the stones, elvishly shrill in the quiet of +harvest. The only other living creature there seemed to Lawford to be +his own rather fair, not insubstantial, rather languid self, who at the +noise of the birds had raised his head and glanced as if between +content and incredulity across his still and solitary surroundings. An +increasing inclination for such lonely ramblings, together with the +feeling that his continued ill-health had grown a little irksome to his +wife, and that now that he was really better she would be relieved at +his absence, had induced him to wander on from home without much +considering where the quiet lanes were leading him. And in spite of a +peculiar melancholy that had welled up into his mind during these last +few days, he had certainly smiled with a faint sense of the irony of +things on lifting his eyes in an unusually depressed moodiness to find +himself looking down on the shadows and peace of Widderstone. + +With that anxious irresolution which illness so often brings in its +train he had hesitated for a few minutes before actually entering the +graveyard. But once safely within he had begun to feel extremely loth +to think of turning back again, and this not the less at remembering +with a real foreboding that it was now drawing towards evening, that +another day was nearly done. He trailed his umbrella behind him over +the grass-grown paths; staying here and there to read some time-worn +inscription; stooping a little broodingly over the dark green graves. +Not for the first time during the long laborious convalescence that had +followed apparently so slight an indisposition, a fleeting sense almost +as if of an unintelligible remorse had overtaken him, a vague thought +that behind all these past years, hidden as it were from his daily +life, lay something not yet quite reckoned with. How often as a boy had +he been rapped into a galvanic activity out of the deep reveries he +used to fall into—those fits of a kind of fishlike day-dream. How +often, and even far beyond boyhood, had he found himself bent on some +distant thought or fleeting vision that the sudden clash of +self-possession had made to seem quite illusory, and yet had left so +strangely haunting. And now the old habit had stirred out of its long +sleep, and, through the gate that Influenza in departing had left ajar, +had returned upon him. + +‘But I suppose we are all pretty much the same, if we only knew it,’ he +had consoled himself. ‘We keep our crazy side to ourselves; that’s all. +We just go on for years and years doing and saying whatever happens to +come up—and really keen about it too’—he had glanced up with a kind of +challenge in his face at the squat little belfry—‘and then, without the +slightest reason or warning, down you go, and it all begins to wear +thin, and you get wondering what on earth it all means.’ Memory slipped +back for an instant to the life that in so unusual a fashion seemed to +have floated a little aloof. Fortunately he had not discussed these +inward symptoms with his wife. How surprised Sheila would be to see him +loafing in this old, crooked churchyard. How she would lift her dark +eyebrows, with that handsome, indifferent tolerance. He smiled, but a +little confusedly; yet the thought gave even a spice of adventure to +the evening’s ramble. + +He loitered on, scarcely thinking at all now, stooping here and there. +These faint listless ideas made no more stir than the sunlight gilding +the fading leaves, the crisp turf underfoot. With a slight effort he +stooped even once again;— + +‘Stranger, a moment pause, and stay; +In this dim chamber hidden away +Lies one who once found life as dear +As now he finds his slumbers here: +Pray, then, the Judgement but increase +His deep, everlasting peace!’ + + +‘But then, do you _know_ you lie at peace?’ Lawford audibly questioned, +gazing at the doggerel. And yet, as his eyes wandered over the blunt +green stone and the rambling crimson-berried brier that had almost +encircled it with its thorns, the echo of that whisper rather jarred. +He was, he supposed, rather a dull creature—at least people seemed to +think so—and he seldom felt at ease even with his own small +facetiousness. Besides, just that kind of question was getting very +common. Now that cleverness was the fashion most people were +clever—even perfect fools; and cleverness after all was often only a +bore: all head and no body. He turned languidly to the small +cross-shaped stone on the other side: + +‘Here lies the body of Ann Hard, who died in child-bed. +Also of James, her infant son.’ + + +He muttered the words over with a kind of mournful bitterness. ‘That’s +just it—just it; that’s just how it goes!’... He yawned softly; the +pathway had come to an end. Beyond him lay ranker grass, one and +another obscurer mounds, an old scarred oak seat, shadowed by a few +everlastingly green cypresses and coral-fruited yew-trees. And above +and beyond all hung a pale blue arch of sky with a few voyaging clouds +like silvered wool, and the calm wide curves of stubble field and +pasture land. He stood with vacant eyes, not in the least aware how +queer a figure he made with his gloves and his umbrella and his hat +among the stained and tottering gravestones. Then, just to linger out +his hour, and half sunken in reverie, he walked slowly over to the few +solitary graves beneath the cypresses. + +One only was commemorated with a tombstone, a rather unusual +oval-headed stone, carved at each corner into what might be the heads +of angels, or of pagan dryads, blindly facing each other with worn-out, +sightless faces. A low curved granite canopy arched over the grave, +with a crevice so wide between its stones that Lawford actually bent +down and slid in his gloved fingers between them. He straightened +himself with a sigh, and followed with extreme difficulty the +well-nigh, illegible inscription: + +‘Here lie ye Bones of one, +Nicholas Sabathier, a Stranger to this Parish, +who fell by his own Hand on ye +Eve of Ste. Michael and All Angels. +MDCCXXXIX + + +Of the date he was a little uncertain. The ‘Hand’ had lost its ‘n’ and +‘d’; and all the ‘Angels’ rain had erased. He was not quite sure even +of the ‘Stranger.’ There was a great rich ‘S,’ and the twisted tail of +a ‘g’; and, whether or not, Lawford smilingly thought, he is no +Stranger now. But how rare and how memorable a name! French evidently; +probably Huguenot. And the Huguenots, he remembered vaguely, were a +rather remarkable ‘crowd.’ He had, he thought, even played at +‘Huguenots’ once. What was the man’s name? Coligny; yes, of course, +Coligny. ‘And I suppose,’ Lawford continued, muttering to himself, ‘I +suppose this poor beggar was put here out of the way. They might, you +know,’ he added confidentially, raising the ferrule of his umbrella, +‘they might have stuck a stake through you, and buried you at the +crossroads.’ And again, a feeling of ennui, a faint disgust at his poor +little witticism, clouded over his mind. It was a pity thoughts always +ran the easiest way, like water in old ditches. + +‘“Here lie ye bones of one, Nicholas Sabathier,”’ he began murmuring +again—‘merely bones, mind you; brains and heart are quite another +story. And it’s pretty certain the fellow had some kind of brains. +Besides, poor devil! he killed himself. That seems to hint at brains... +Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ he cried out; so loud that the sound of his +voice alarmed even a robin that had perched on a twig almost within +touch, with glittering eye intent above its dim red breast on this +other and even rarer stranger. + +‘I wonder if it is XXXIX.; it might be LXXIX.’ Lawford cast a cautious +glance over his round grey shoulder, then laboriously knelt down beside +the stone, and peeped into the gaping cranny. There he encountered +merely the tiny, pale-green, faintly conspicuous eyes of a large +spider, confronting his own. It was for the moment an alarming, and yet +a faintly fascinating experience. The little almost colourless fires +remained so changeless. But still, even when at last they had actually +vanished into the recesses of that quiet habitation, Lawford did not +rise from his knees. An utterly unreasonable feeling of dismay, a +sudden weakness and weariness had come over him. + +‘What is the good of it all?’ he asked himself inconsequently—this +monotonous, restless, stupid life to which he was soon to be returning, +and for good. He began to realize how ludicrous a spectacle he must be, +kneeling here amid the weeds and grass beneath the solemn cypresses. +‘Well, you can’t have everything,’ seemed loosely to express his +disquiet. + +He stared vacantly at the green and fretted gravestone, dimly aware +that his heart was beating with an unusual effort. He felt ill and +weak. He leant his hand on the stone and lifted himself on to the low +wooden seat nearby. He drew off his glove and thrust his bare hand +under his waistcoat, with his mouth a little ajar, and his eyes fixed +on the dark square turret, its bell sharply defined against the evening +sky. + +‘Dead!’ a bitter inward voice seemed to break into speech; ‘Dead!’ The +viewless air seemed to be flocking with hidden listeners. The very +clearness and the crystal silence were their ambush. He alone seemed to +be the target of cold and hostile scrutiny. There was not a breath to +breathe in this crisp, pale sunshine. It was all too rare, too thin. +The shadows lay like wings everlastingly folded. The robin that had +been his only living witness lifted its throat, and broke, as if from +the uttermost outskirts of reality, into its shrill, passionless song. +Lawford moved heavy eyes from one object to another—bird—sun-gilded +stone—those two small earth-worn faces—his hands—a stirring in the +grass as of some creature labouring to climb up. It was useless to sit +here any longer. He must go back now. Fancies were all very well for a +change, but must be only occasional guests in a world devoted to +reality. He leaned his hand on the dark grey wood, and closed his eyes. +The lids presently unsealed a little, momentarily revealing astonished, +aggrieved pupils, and softly, slowly they again descended.... + +The flaming rose that had swiftly surged from the west into the zenith, +dyeing all the churchyard grass a wild and vivid green, and the +stooping stones above it a pure faint purple, waned softly back like a +falling fountain into its basin. In a few minutes, only a faint orange +burned in the west, dimly illuminating with its band of light the +huddled figure on his low wood seat, his right hand still pressed +against a faintly beating heart. Dusk gathered; the first white stars +appeared; out of the shadowy fields a nightjar purred. But there was +only the silence of the falling dew among the graves. Down here, under +the ink-black cypresses, the blades of the grass were stooping with +cold drops; and darkness lay like the hem of an enormous cloak, whose +jewels above the breast of its wearer might be in the unfathomable +clearness the glittering constellations.... + +In his small cage of darkness Lawford shuddered and raised a furtive +head. He stood up and peered eagerly and strangely from side to side. +He stayed quite still, listening as raptly as some wandering +night-beast to the indiscriminate stir and echoings of the darkness. He +cocked his head above his shoulder and listened again, then turned upon +the soundless grass towards the hill. He felt not the faintest +astonishment or strangeness in his solitude here; only a little +chilled, and physically uneasy; and yet in this vast darkness a faint +spiritual exaltation seemed to hover. + +He hastened up the narrow path, walking with knees a little bent, like +an old labourer who has lived a life of stooping, and came out into the +dry and dusty lane. One moment his instinct hesitated as to which turn +to take—only a moment; he was soon walking swiftly, almost trotting, +downhill with this vivid exaltation in the huge dark night in his +heart, and Sheila merely a little angry Titianesque cloud on a scarcely +perceptible horizon. He had no notion of the time; the golden hands of +his watch were indiscernible in the gloom. But presently, as he passed +by, he pressed his face close to the cold glass of a little +shop-window, and pierced that out by an old Swiss cuckoo-clock. He +would if he hurried just be home before dinner. + +He broke into a slow, steady trot, gaining speed as he ran on, vaguely +elated to find how well his breath was serving him. An odd smile +darkened his face at remembrance of the thoughts he had been thinking. +There could be little amiss with the heart of a man who could shamble +along like this, taking even pleasure, an increasing pleasure in this +long, wolf-like stride. He turned round occasionally to look into the +face of some fellow-wayfarer whom he had overtaken, for he felt not +only this unusual animation, this peculiar zest, but that, like a boy +on some secret errand, he had slightly disguised his very presence, was +going masked, as it were. Even his clothes seemed to have connived at +this queer illusion. No tailor had for these ten years allowed him so +much latitude. He cautiously at last opened his garden gate and with +soundless agility mounted the six stone steps, his latch-key ready in +his gloveless hand, and softly let himself into the house. + +Sheila was out, it seemed, for the maid had forgotten to light the +lamp. Without pausing to take off his greatcoat, he hung up his hat, +ran nimbly upstairs, and knocked with a light knuckle on his bedroom +door. It was closed, but no answer came. He opened it, shut it, locked +it, and sat down on the bedside for a moment, in the darkness, so that +he could scarcely hear any other sound, as he sat erect and still, like +some night animal, wary of danger, attentively alert. Then he rose from +the bed, threw off his coat, which was clammy with dew, and lit a +candle on the dressing-table. + +Its narrow flame lengthened, drooped, brightened, gleamed clearly. He +glanced around him, unusually contented—at the ruddiness of the low +fire, the brass bedstead, the warm red curtains, the soft silveriness +here and there. It seemed as if a heavy and dull dream had withdrawn +out of his mind. He would go again some day, and sit on the little hard +seat beside the crooked tombstone of the friendless old Huguenot. He +opened a drawer, took out his razors, and, faintly whistling, returned +to the table and lit a second candle. And still with this strange +heightened sense of life stirring in his mind, he drew his hand gently +over his chin and looked unto the glass. + +For an instant he stood head to foot icily still, without the least +feeling, or thought, or stir—staring into the looking-glass. Then an +inconceivable drumming beat on his ear. A warm surge, like the onset of +a wave, broke in him, flooding neck, face, forehead, even his hands +with colour. He caught himself up and wheeled deliberately and +completely round, his eyes darting to and fro, suddenly to fix +themselves in a prolonged stare, while he took a deep breath, caught +back his self-possession and paused. Then he turned and once more +confronted the changed strange face in the glass. + +Without a sound he drew up a chair and sat down, just as he was, frigid +and appalled, at the foot of the bed. To sit like this, with a kind of +incredibly swift torrent of consciousness, bearing echoes and images +like straws and bubbles on its surface, could not be called thinking. +Some stealthy hand had thrust open the sluice of memory. And words, +voices, faces of mockery streamed through without connection, tendency, +or sense. His hands hung between his knees, a deep and settled frown +darkened the features stooping out of the direct rays of the light, and +his eyes wandered like busy and inquisitive, but stupid, animals over +the floor. + +If, in that flood of unintelligible thoughts, anything clearly recurred +at all, it was the memory of Sheila. He saw her face, lit, +transfigured, distorted, stricken, appealing, horrified. His lids +narrowed; a vague terror and horror mastered him. He hid his eyes in +his hands and cried without sound, without tears, without hope, like a +desolate child. He ceased crying; and sat without stirring. And it +seemed after an age of vacancy and meaninglessness he heard a door shut +downstairs, a distant voice, and then the rustle of some one slowly +ascending the stairs. Some one turned the handle; in vain; tapped. ‘Is +that you, Arthur?’ + +For an instant Lawford paused, then like a child listening for an echo, +answered, ‘Yes, Sheila.’ And a sigh broke from him; his voice, except +for a little huskiness, was singularly unchanged. + +‘May I come in?’ Lawford stood softly up and glanced once more into the +glass. His lips set tight, and a slight frown settled between the long, +narrow, intensely dark eyes. + +‘Just one moment, Sheila,’ he answered slowly, ‘just one moment.’ + +‘How long will you be?’ + +He stood erect and raised his voice, gazing the while impassively into +the glass. + +‘It’s no use,’ he began, as if repeating a lesson, ‘it’s no use your +asking me, Sheila. Please give me a moment, a...I am not quite myself, +dear,’ he added quite gravely. + +The faintest hint of vexation was in the answer. + +‘What is the matter? Can’t I help? It’s so very absurd—’ + +‘What is absurd?’ he asked dully. + +‘Why, standing like this outside my own bedroom door. Are you ill? I +will send for Dr. Simon.’ + +‘Please, Sheila, do nothing of the kind. I am not ill. I merely want a +little time to think in.’ There was again a brief pause, and then a +slight rattling at the handle. + +‘Arthur, I insist on knowing at once what’s wrong; this does not sound +a bit like yourself. It is not even quite like your own voice.’ + +‘It is myself,’ he replied stubbornly, staring fixedly into the glass. +You must give me a few moments, Sheila. Something has happened. My +face. Come back in an hour.’ + +‘Don’t be absurd; it’s simply wicked to talk like that. How do I know +what you are doing? As if I can leave you for an hour in uncertainty! +Your face! If you don’t open at once I shall believe there’s something +seriously wrong: I shall send Ada for assistance.’ + +‘If you do that, Sheila, it will be disastrous. I cannot answer for the +con—. Go quietly downstairs. Say I am unwell; don’t wait dinner for me; +come back in an hour; oh, half an hour!’ + +The answer broke out angrily. ‘You must be mad, beside yourself, to ask +such a thing. I shall wait in the next room until you call.’ + +‘Wait where you please,’ Lawford replied, ‘but tell them downstairs.’ + +‘Then if I tell them to wait until half-past eight, you will come down? +You say you are not ill: the dinner will be ruined. It’s absurd.’ + +Lawford made no answer. He listened a while, then he deliberately sat +down once more to try to think. Like a squirrel in a cage his mind +seemed to be aimlessly, unceasingly astir. ‘What is it really? What is +it really?—really?’ He sat there and it seemed to him his body was +transparent as glass. It seemed he had no body at all—only the memory +of an hallucinatory reflection in the glass, and this inward voice +crying, arguing, questioning, threatening out of the silence—‘What is +it really—really—_really_?’ And at last, cold, wearied out, he rose +once more and leaned between the two long candle-flames, and stared +on—on—on, into the glass. + +He gave that long, dark face that had been foisted on him tricks to +do—lift an eyebrow, frown. There was scarcely any perceptible pause +between the wish and its performance. He found to his discomfiture that +the face answered instantaneously to the slightest emotion, even to his +fainter secondary thoughts; as if these unfamiliar features were not +entirely within control. He could not, in fact, without the glass +before him, tell precisely what that face _was_ expressing. He was +still, it seemed, keenly sane. That he would discover for certain when +Sheila returned. Terror, rage, horror had fallen back. If only he felt +ill, or was in pain: he would have rejoiced at it. He was simply caught +in some unheard-of snare—caught, how? when? where? by whom? + + + + +CHAPTER TWO + + +But the coolness and deliberation of his scrutiny, had to a certain +extent calmed Lawford’s mind and given him confidence. Hitherto he had +met the little difficulties of life only to vanquish them with ease and +applause. Now he was standing face to face with the unknown. He burst +out laughing, into a long, low, helpless laughter. Then he arose and +began to walk softly, swiftly, to and fro across the room—from wall to +wall seven paces, and at the fourth, that awful, unseen, brightly-lit +profile passed as swiftly over the tranquil surface of the +looking-glass. The power of concentration was gone again. He simply +paced on mechanically, listening to a Babel of questions, a conflicting +medley of answers. But above all the confusion and turmoil of his +brain, as a boatswain’s whistle rises above a storm, so sounded that +same infinitesimal voice, incessantly repeating another question now, +‘What are you going to do? What are you going to do?’ + +And in the midst of this confusion, out of the infinite, as it were, +came another sharp tap at the door, and all within sank to utter +stillness again. + +‘It’s nearly half-past eight, Arthur; I can’t wait any longer.’ + +Lawford cast a last fleeting look into the glass, turned, and +confronted the closed door. ‘Very well, Sheila, you shall _not_ wait +any longer.’ He crossed over to the door, and suddenly a swift crafty +idea flashed into his mind. + +He tapped on the panel. ‘Sheila,’ he said softly, ‘I want you first, +before you come in, to get me something out of my old writing-desk in +the smoking-room. Here is the key.’ He pushed a tiny key—from off the +ring he carried—beneath the door. ‘In the third little drawer from the +top, on the left side, is a letter; please don’t say anything now. It +is the letter you wrote me, you will remember, after I had asked you to +marry me. You scribbled in the corner under your signature the initials +“Y.S.O.A.”—do you remember? They meant, You Silly Old Arthur!—do you +remember? Will you please get that letter at once?’ + +‘Arthur,’ answered the voice from without, empty of all expression, +‘what does all this mean, this mystery, this hopeless nonsense about a +silly letter? What has happened? Is this a miserable form of +persecution? Are you mad?—I refuse to get the letter.’ + +Lawford stooped, black and angular, against the door. ‘I am not mad. +Oh, I am in the deadliest earnest, Sheila. You _must_ get the letter, +if only for your own peace of mind.’ He heard his wife hesitate as she +turned. He heard a sob. And once more he waited. + +‘I have brought the letter,’ came the low toneless voice again. + +‘Have you opened it?’ + +There was a rustle of paper. ‘Are the letters there underlined three +times—“Y.S.O.A.”?’ + +‘The letters are there.’ + +‘And the date of the month is underneath, “April 3rd.” No one else in +the whole world, living or dead, could know of this but ourselves, +Sheila?’ + +‘Will you please open the door?’ + +‘No one?’ + +‘I suppose not—no one.’ + +‘Then come in.’ He unlocked the door and opened it. A dark, rather +handsome woman, with sleek hair, in a silk dress of a dark rich colour +entered. Lawford closed the door. But his face was in shadow. He had +still a moment’s respite. + +‘I need not ask you to be patient,’ he began quickly; ‘if I could +possibly have spared you—if there had been anybody in the world to go +to... I am in horrible, horrible trouble, Sheila. It is inconceivable. +I said I was sane: so I am, but the fact is—I went out for a walk; it +was rather stupid, perhaps, so soon: and I think I was taken ill, or +something—my heart. A kind of fit, a nervous fit. Possibly I am a +little unstrung, and it’s all, it’s mainly fancy: but I think, I can’t +help thinking it has a little distorted—changed my face; everything, +Sheila; except, of course, myself. Would you mind looking?’ He walked +slowly and with face averted towards the dressing-table. + +‘Simply a nervous—to make such a fuss, to scare!...’ began his wife, +following him. + +Without a word he took up the two old china candlesticks, and held +them, one in each lank-fingered hand, before his face, and turned. + +Lawford could see his wife—every tint and curve and line as distinctly +as she could see him. Her cheeks never had much colour; now her whole +face visibly darkened, from pallor to a dusky leaden grey, as she +gazed. It was not an illusion then; not a miserable hallucination. The +unbelievable, the inconceivable, had happened. He replaced the candles +with trembling fingers and sat down. + +‘Well,’ he said, ‘what is it really; what is it really, Sheila? What on +earth are we to do?’ + +‘Is the door locked?’ she whispered. He nodded. With eyes fixed +stirlessly on his face, Sheila unsteadily seated herself, a little out +of the candlelight, in the shadow. Lawford rose and put the key of the +door on his wife’s little rose-wood prayer-desk at her elbow, and +deliberately sat down again. + +‘You said “a fit”—where?’ + +‘I suppose—is—is it very different—hopeless? You will understand my +being... O Sheila, what am I to do?’ His wife sat perfectly still, +watching him with unflinching attention. + +‘You gave me to understand—“a nervous fit”; where?’ + +Lawford took a deep breath, and quietly faced her again. ‘In the old +churchyard, Widderstone; I was looking at—at the gravestones.’ + +‘A fit; in the old churchyard, Widderstone—you were “looking at the +gravestones”?’ + +Lawford shut his mouth. ‘I suppose so—a fit,’ he said presently. ‘My +heart went a little queer, and I sat down and fell into a kind of +doze—a stupor, I suppose. I don’t remember anything more. And then I +woke; like this.’ + +‘How do you know?’ + +‘How do I know what?’ + +‘“Like that”?’ + +He turned slowly towards the looking-glass. ‘Why, here I am!’ + +She gazed at him steadily; and a hard, incredulous, almost cunning +glint came into her wide blue eyes. She took up the key carelessly, +glanced at it; glanced at him. ‘It has made me—I mean the first shock, +you know—it has made me a little faint.’ She walked slowly, +deliberately to the door, and unlocked it. ‘I’ll get a little sal +volatile.’ She softly drew out the key, and without once removing her +eyes from his face, opened the door and pushed the key noiselessly in +on the other side. ‘Please stay there; I won’t be a minute.’ + +Lawford’s face smiled—a rather desperate, yet for all that a patient, +resolute smile. ‘Oh yes, of course,’ he said, almost to himself, ‘I had +not foreseen—at least—you must do precisely what you please, Sheila. +You were going to lock me in. You will, however, before taking any +final step, please think over what it will entail. I did not think you +would, after such proof, in this awful trouble—I did not think you +would simply disbelieve me, Sheila. Who else is there to help me? You +have the letter in your hand. Isn’t that sufficient proof? It was +overwhelming proof to me. And even I doubted too; doubted myself. But +never mind; why I should have dreamed you would believe me; or taken +this awful thing differently, I don’t know. It’s rather awful to have +to go on alone. But there, think it over. I shall not stir until I hear +the voices. And then: honestly, Sheila, I couldn’t face quite that. I’d +sooner give up altogether. Any proof you can think of—I will... O God, +I cannot bear it!’ He covered his face with his hands; but in a moment +looked up, unmoved once more. ‘Why, for that matter,’ he added slowly, +and, as it were, with infinite pains, a faint thin smile again stealing +into his face, ‘I think,’ he turned wearily to the glass, ‘I think, +it’s almost an improvement!’ + +Something deep in those dark clear pupils, out of that lean adventurous +face, gleamed back at him, the distant flash of a heliograph, as it +were, height to height, flashing ‘Courage!’ He shuddered, and shut his +eyes. ‘But I would really rather,’ he added in a quiet childlike way, +‘I would really rather, Sheila, you left me alone now.’ + +His wife stood irresolute. ‘I understand you to explain,’ she said, +‘that you went out of this house, just your usual self, this afternoon, +for a walk; that for some reason you went to Widderstone—“to read the +tombstones,” that you had a heart attack, or, as you said at first, a +fit, that you fell into a stupor, and came home like—like this. Am I +likely to believe all that? Am I likely to believe such a story as +that? Whoever you are, whoever you may be, is it likely? I am not in +the least afraid. I thought at first it was some silly practical joke. +I thought that at first.’ She paused, but no answer came. ‘Well, I +suppose in a civilised country there is a remedy even for a joke as +wicked as that.’ + +Lawford listened patiently. ‘She is pretending; she is trying me; she +is feeling her way,’ he kept repeating to himself. ‘She knows I _am_ I, +but hasn’t the courage... Let her talk!’ + +‘I shall leave the door open,’ Sheila continued. ‘I am not, as you no +doubt very naturally assumed—I am not going to do anything either +senseless or heedless. I am merely going to ask your brother Cecil to +come in, if he is at home, and if not, no doubt our old friend Mr. +Montgomery would—would help us.’ Her scrutiny was still and +concentrated, like that of a cat above a mouse’s hole. + +Lawford sat crouched together in the candle-light. ‘By all means, +Sheila,’ he said slowly choosing his words, ‘if you think poor old +Cecil, who next January will have been three years in his grave, will +be of any use in our difficulty. Who Mr. Montgomery is...’ His voice +dropped in utter weariness. ‘You did it very well, my dear,’ he added +softly. + +Sheila gently closed the door and sat down on the bed. He heard her +softly crying, he heard the bed shaken with her sobs. But a slow glance +towards the steady candle-flames restrained him. He let her cry on +alone. When she had become a little more composed he stood up. ‘You +have had no dinner,’ he managed to blurt out at last, ‘you will be +faint. It’s useless to talk, even to think, any more to-night. Leave me +to myself for a while. Don’t look at me any more. Perhaps I can sleep: +perhaps if I sleep it will come right again. When the servants are gone +up, I will come down. Just let me have some—some medical book, or +other; and some more candles. Don’t think, Sheila; don’t even think!’ + +Sheila paid him no attention for a while. ‘You tell me not to think,’ +she began, in a low, almost listless voice; ‘why—I wonder I am in my +right mind. And “eat”! How can you have the heartlessness to suggest +it? You don’t seem in the least to _realize_ what you say. You seem to +have lost all—all consciousness. I quite agree, it is useless for me to +burden you with my company while you are in your present condition of +mind. But you will at least promise me that you won’t take any further +steps in this awful business.’ She could not, try as she would, bring +herself again to look at him. She rose softly, paused a moment with +sidelong eyes, then turned deliberately towards the door, ‘What, what +have I done to deserve all this?’ + +From behind her that voice, so extraordinarily like—and yet in some +vague fashion more arresting, more resonant than her husband’s, broke +incredibly out once more. ‘You will please leave the key, Sheila. I am +ill, but I am not yet in the padded room. And please understand, I take +no further steps in “this awful business” until I hear a strange voice +in the house.’ Sheila paused, but the quiet voice rang in her ear, +desperately yet convincingly. She took the key out of the lock, placed +it on the bed, and with a sigh, that was not quite without a hint of +relief in its misery, she furtively extinguished the gas-light on the +landing and rustled downstairs. + +She speedily returned. ‘I have brought the book.’ she said hastily. ‘I +could only find the one volume. I have said you have taken a fresh +chill. No one will disturb you.’ + +Lawford took the book without a word. And once more, with eyes stonily +averted, his wife left him to his own company and that of the face in +the glass. + +When completely deserted, Lawford with fumbling fingers opened Quain’s +‘Dictionary of Medicine.’ He had never had much curiosity, and had +always hated what he disbelieved, but none the less he had heard +occasionally of absurd and questionable experiments. He remembered even +to have glanced over reports of cases in the newspapers concerning +disappearances, loss of memory, dual personality. Cranks... Oh yes, he +thought now, with a sense of cold humiliating relief, there _had_ been +such cases as his before. They were no doubt curable. They must be +comparatively common in America—that land of jangled nerves. Possibly +bromide, rest, a battery. But Quain, it seemed, shared his prejudices, +at least in this edition, or had hidden away all such apocryphal matter +beneath technical terms, where no sensible man could find it, +‘Besides,’ he muttered angrily, ‘what’s the good of your one volume?’ +He flung it down and strode to the bed, and rang the bell. Then +suddenly recollecting himself, he paused and listened. There came a tap +on the door. ‘Is that you, Sheila?’ he called, doubtfully. + +‘No, sir, it’s me,’ came the answer. + +‘Oh, don’t trouble; I only wanted to speak to your mistress. It’s all +right.’ + +‘Mrs. Lawford has gone out, sir,’ replied the voice. + +‘Gone out?’ + +‘Yes, sir; she told me not to mention it; but I suppose as you asked—’ + +‘Oh, that’s all right; never mind; I didn’t ring.’ He stood with face +uplifted, thinking. + +‘Can I do anything, sir?’ came the faint, nervous question after a long +pause. + +‘One moment, Ada,’ he called in a loud voice. He took out his +pocket-book, sat down, and scribbled a little note. He hardly noticed +how changed his handwriting was—the clear round letters crabbed and +irregular. + +‘Are you there, Ada?’ he called. ‘I am slipping a note beneath the +door; just draw back the mat; that’s it. Take it at once, please, to +Mr. Critchett’s, and be sure to wait for an answer. Then come back +direct to me, up here. I don’t think, Ada, your mistress believes much +in Critchett; but I have fully explained what I want. He has made me up +many prescriptions. Explain that to his assistant if he is not there. +Go at once, and you will be back before she is. I should be so very +much obliged, tell him. “Mr Arthur Lawford.”’ + +The minutes slowly drifted by. He sat quite still in the clear +untroubled light, waiting in the silence of the empty house. And for +the first time he was confronted with the cold incredible horror of his +ordeal. Who would believe, who could believe, that behind this strange +and awful, yet how simple mask, lay himself? What test; what heaped-up +evidence of identity would break it down? It was all a loathsome +ignominy. It was utterly absurd. It was— + +Suddenly, with a kind of ape-like cunning, he deliberately raised a +long lean forefinger and pointed it at the shadowy crystal of the +looking-glass. Perhaps he was dead, was really and indeed changed in +body, was fated really and indeed to change in soul, into That. ‘It’s +that beastly voice again,’ Lawford cried out loud, looking vacantly at +his upstretched finger. And then, hand and arm, not too willingly, as +it were, obeyed; relaxed and fell to his side. ‘You must keep a tight +hold, old man,’ he muttered to himself. ‘Once, once you lose +yourself—the least symptom of that—the least symptom, and it’s all up!’ +And the fools, the heartless, preposterous fools had brought him one +volume! + +When on earth was Ada coming back? She was lagging on purpose. She was +in the conspiracy too. Oh, it should be a lesson to Sheila! Oh, if only +daylight would come! ‘What are you going to do—to do—to DO?’ He rose +once more and paced his silent cage. To and fro, thinking no more; just +using his eyes, compelling them to wander from picture to picture, +bedpost to bedpost; now counting aloud his footsteps; now humming; +only, only to keep himself from thinking. At last he took out a drawer +and actually began arranging its medley of contents; ties, letters, +studs, concert and theatre programmes—all higgledy-piggledy. And in the +midst of this childish strategem he heard a faint sound, as of heavy +water trickling from a height. He turned. A thief was in one of the +candles. It was guttering out. He would be left in darkness. He turned +hastily without a moment’s heed, to call for light, flung the door open +and full in the flare of a lamp, illuminating her pale forehead and +astonished face beneath her black straw hat, stood face to face with +Ada. + +With one swift dexterous movement he drew the door to after him, +looking straight into her almost colourless steady eyes. ‘Ah,’ he said +instantly, in a high faint voice, ‘the powder, thank you; yes, Mr +Lawford’s powder; thank you, thank you. He must be kept absolutely +quiet—absolutely. Mrs Lawford is following. Please tell her that I am +here, when she returns. Mr Critchett was in, then? Thank you. Extreme, +extreme silence, please.’ Again that knotted, melodramatic finger +raised itself on high; and within that lean, cadaverous body the soul +of its lodger quailed at this spectral boldness. But it was triumphant. +The maid at once left him and went downstairs. He heard faint voices in +muffled consultation. And in a moment Sheila’s silks rustled once more +on the staircase. Lawford put down the lamp, and watched her +deliberately close the door. + +‘What does this mean?’ she began swiftly, ‘I understand that—Ada tells +me a stranger is here; giving orders, directions. Who is he? where is +he? You bound yourself on your solemn promise not to stir till I +returned. You... How can I, how can we get decently through this +horrible business if you are so wretchedly indiscreet? You sent Ada to +the chemist’s. What for? What for? I say.’ + +Lawford watched his wife with an almost extraneous interest. She was +certainly extremely interesting from that point of view, that very +novel point of view. ‘It’s quite useless,’ he said, ‘to get in the +least nervous or hysterical. I don’t care for the darkness just now. +That was all. Tell the girl I am a strange doctor—Dr Simon’s new +partner. You are clever at conventionalities, Sheila. Invent! I said +our patient must be kept quiet—I really think he must. That is all, so +far as Ada is concerned.... What on earth else _are_ we to say?’ he +broke out. ‘That, for the present to _everybody_, is our only possible +story. It will give us what we must have—time. And next—where is the +second volume of Quain? I want that. And next—why have you broken faith +with me?’ Mrs Lawford sat down. This sudden and baffling outburst had +stupefied her. + +‘I can’t, I can’t make head or tail of what you say. And as for having +broken faith, as you call it, would any wife, would any sane woman face +what you have brought on us, a situation like this, without seeking +advice and help? Mr Bethany will be perfectly discreet—if he thinks +discretion desirable. He is the only available friend we have close +enough to ask at once. And things of this kind are, I suppose, if +anybody’s concern, his. It’s certain to leak out. Everybody will hear +of it. Don’t flatter yourself you are going to hush up a thing like +this for long. You can’t keep _living_ skeletons in a cupboard. You +think only of yourself, only of your own misfortune. But who’s to know, +pray, that you really are my husband—if you are? The sooner I get the +vicar on my side the better for us both. Who in the whole of the +parish—I ask you—and you must have the sense left to see that—who will +believe that a respectable man, a gentleman, a Churchman, would +deliberately go out to seek an afternoon’s amusement in a poky little +country churchyard? Why, apart from everything else, _that_ was +absolutely mad to start with. Can you really wonder at the result?’ + +Probably because she still steadfastly refused to look at him, her +memory kept losing its hold on the appalling fact facing them. She +realised fully only that she was in a great, unwarrantable, and +insurmountable difficulty, but until she actually lifted her eyes for a +moment she had not fully realised what that difficulty was. She got up +with a sudden and horrible nausea. ‘One moment,’ she said, ‘I will see +if the servants have gone to bed.’ + +That long saturnine face, behind which Lawford lay in a dull and +desperate ambush, smiled. Something partaking of its clay, some reflex +ghost of its rather remarkable features, was even a little amused at +Sheila. + +She returned in a moment, and stood in profile in the doorway. ‘Will +you come down?’ she remarked distantly. + +‘One moment, Sheila,’ Lawford began miserably. ‘Before we take this +irrevocable step, a step I implore you to postpone awhile—for what +comes, I suppose, may go—what precisely have you told the vicar? I must +in fairness know that.’ + +‘In fairness,’ she began ironically, and suddenly broke off. Her +husband had turned the flame of the lamp low down in the vacant room +behind them; the corridor was lit obscurely by the chandelier far down +in the hall below. A faint, inexplicable dread fell softly and coldly +on her heart. ‘Have you no trust in me?’ she murmured a little +bitterly. ‘I have simply told him the truth.’ + +They softly descended the stairs; she first, the dark figure following +close behind her. + + + + +CHAPTER THREE + + +Mr Bethany sat awaiting them in the dining-room, a large, +heavily-furnished room with a great benign looking-glass on the +mantelpiece, a marble clock, and with rich old damask curtains. Fleecy +silver hair was all that was visible of their visitor when they +entered. But Mr Bethany rose out of his chair when he heard them, and +with a little jerk, turned sharply round. Thus it was that the +gold-spectacled vicar and Lawford first confronted each other, the one +brightly illuminated, the other framed in the gloom of the doorway. Mr +Bethany’s first scrutiny was timid and courteous, but beneath it he +tried to be keen, and himself hastened round the table almost at a +trot, to obtain, as delicately as possible, a closer view. But Lawford, +having shut the door behind him, had gone straight to the fire and +seated himself, leaning his face in his hands. Mr Bethany smiled +faintly, waved his hand almost as if in blessing, but certainly in +peace, and tapped Mrs Lawford into the chair upon the other side. But +he himself remained standing. + +‘Mrs Lawford has, I declare, been telling family secrets,’ he began, +and paused, peering. ‘But there, you will forgive an old friend’s +intrusion—this little confidence about a change, my dear fellow—about a +ramble and a change?’ He sat down, put up his kind little puckered face +and peered again at Lawford, and then very hastily at his wife. But all +her attention was centred on the bowed figure opposite to her. Lawford +responded to this cautious advance without raising his head. + +‘You do not wish me to repeat all that my wife tells me she has told +you?’ + +‘Dear me, no,’ said Mr Bethany cheerfully, ‘I wish nothing, nothing, +old friend. You must not burden yourself with me. If I may be of any +help, here I am.... Oh, no, no....’ he paused, with blinking eyes, but +wits still shrewd and alert. Why doesn’t the man raise his head? he +thought. A mere domestic dispute! + +‘I thought,’ he went on ruminatingly, ‘I thought on Tuesday, yes, on +Tuesday, that you weren’t looking quite the thing. Indeed, I remarked +on it. But now, I understand from Mrs Lawford that the malady has taken +a graver turn—eh, Lawford, an heretical turn? I hear you have been +wandering from the true fold.’ Mr Bethany leaned forward with what +might be described as a very large smile in a very small compass. ‘And +that, of course, entailed instant retribution.’ He broke off solemnly. +‘I know Widderstone churchyard well; a most verdant and beautiful spot. +The late rector, a Mr Strickland, was a very old friend of mine. And +his wife, dear good Alicia, used to set out her babies, in the morning, +to sleep and to play there, twenty, dear me, perhaps twenty-five years +ago. But I did not know, my dear Lawford, that you—’ and suddenly, +without an instant’s warning, something seemed to shout at him, ‘Look, +look! He is looking at you!’ He stopped, faltered, and a slight warmth +came into his face. ‘And and you were taken ill there?’ His voice had +fallen flat and faint. + +‘I fell asleep—or something of that sort,’ came the stubborn reply. + +‘Yes,’ said Mr Bethany, brightly, ‘so your wife was saying. “Fell +asleep,” so have I too—scores of times’; he beamed, with beads of sweat +glistening on his forehead. ‘And then? I’m not, I’m not persisting?’ + +‘Then I woke; refreshed, I think, as it seemed—I felt much better and +came home.’ + +‘Ah, yes,’ said his visitor. And after that there was a long, brightly +lit, intense pause; at the end of which Lawford raised his face and +again looked firmly at his friend. + +Mr Bethany was now a shrunken old man; he sat perfectly still, his head +craned a little forward, and his veined hands clutching his bent, spare +knees. + +There wasn’t the least sign of devilry, or out-facingness, or insolence +in that lean shadowy steady head; and yet he himself was compelled to +sidle his glance away, so much the face shook him. He closed his eyes, +too, as a cat does after exchanging too direct a scrutiny with human +eyes. He put out towards, and withdrew, a groping hand from Mrs +Lawford. + +‘Is it,’ came a voice from somewhere, ‘is it a great change, sir? I +thought perhaps I may have exaggerated—candle-light, you know.’ + +Mr Bethany remained still and silent, striving to entertain one thought +at a time. His lips moved as if he were talking to himself. And again +it was Lawford’s faltering voice that broke the silence. ‘You see,’ he +said, ‘I have never... no fit, or anything of that kind before. I +remember on Tuesday... oh yes, quite well. I did feel seedy, very. And +we talked, didn’t we?—Harvest Festival, Mrs Wine’s flowers, the new +offertory-bags, and all that. For God’s sake, Vicar, it is not as bad +as—as they make out?’ + +Mr Bethany woke with a start. He leaned forward, and stretched out a +long black wrinkled sleeve, just managing to reach far enough to tap +Lawford’s knee. ‘Don’t worry, don’t worry,’ he said soothingly. ‘We +believe, we believe.’ + +It was, none the less, a sheer act of faith. He took off his spectacles +and took out his handkerchief. ‘What we must do, eh, my dear,’ he half +turned to Mrs Lawford, ‘what we must do is to consult, yes, consult +together. And later—we must have advice—medical advice; unless, as I +very much suspect, it is merely a little quite temporary physical +aberration. Science, I am told, is making great strides, experimenting, +groping after things which no sane man has ever dreamed of +before—without being burned alive for it. What’s in a name? Nerves, +especially, Lawford.’ + +Mrs Lawford sat perfectly still, absorbedly listening, turning her face +first this way, then that, to each speaker in turn. ‘That is what I +thought,’ she said, and cast one fleeting glance across at the +fireplace, ‘but—’ + +The little old gentleman turned sharply with half-blind eyes, and lips +tight shut. ‘I think,’ he said, with a hind of austere humour, ‘I +think, do you know, I see no “but.”’ He paused as if to catch the echo +and added, ‘It’s our only course.’ He continued to polish round and +round his glasses. Mrs Lawford rather magnificently rose. + +‘Perhaps if I were to leave you together awhile? I shall not be far +off. It is,’ she explained, as if into a huge vacuum, ‘it is a terrible +visitation.’ She moved gravely round the table and very softly and +firmly closed the door after her. + +Lawford took a deep breath. ‘Of course,’ he said, ‘you realise my wife +does not believe me. She thinks,’ he explained naively, as if to +himself, ‘she thinks I am an imposter. Goodness knows what she does +think. I can’t think much myself—for long!’ + +The vicar rubbed busily on. ‘I have found, Lawford,’ he said smoothly, +‘that in all real difficulties the only feasible plan is—is to face the +main issue. The others right themselves. Now, to take a plunge into +your generosity. You have let me in far enough to make it impossible +for me to get out—may I hear then exactly the whole story? All that I +know now, so far as I could gather from your wife, poor soul, is of +course inconceivable: that you went out one man and came home another. +You will understand, my dear man, I am speaking, as it were, by rote. +God has mercifully ordered that the human brain works slowly; first the +blow, hours afterwards the bruise. Oh, dear me, that man Hume—“on +miracles”—positively amazing! So that too, please, you will be quite +clear about. Credo_—not quia impossible est_, but because you, Lawford, +have told me. Now then, if it won’t be too wearisome to you, the whole +story.’ He sat, lean and erect in his big chair, a hand resting loosely +on each knee, in one spectacles, in the other a dangling pocket +handkerchief. And the dark, sallow, aquiline, formidable figure, with +its oddly changing voice, re-told the whole story from the beginning. + +‘You were aware then of nothing different, I understand, until you +actually looked into the glass?’ + +‘Only vaguely. I mean that after waking I felt much better, more alert. +And my thoughts—’ + +‘Ah, yes, your thoughts?’ + +‘I hardly know—oh, clear as if I had had a real long rest. It was just +like being a boy again. Influenza dispirits one so.’ + +Mr Bethany gazed without stirring. ‘And yet, you know,’ he said, ‘I can +hardly believe, I mean conceive, how—You have been taking no drugs, no +quackery, Lawford?’ + +‘I never dose myself,’ said Lawford, with sombre pride. + +‘God bless me, that’s Lawford to the echo,’ thought his visitor. ‘And +before—?’ he went on gently; ‘I really cannot conceive, you see, how a +mere fit could... Before you sat down you were quite alone?’ He stuck +out his head. ‘There was nobody with you?’ + +‘With me? Oh no,’ came the soft answer. + +‘What had you been thinking of? In these days of faith-cures, and +hypnotism, and telepathy, and subliminalities—why, the simple old world +grows very confusing. But rarely, very rarely novel. You were thinking, +you say; do you remember, perhaps, just the drift?’ + +‘Well,’ began Lawford ruminatingly, ‘there was something curious even +then, perhaps. I remember, for instance, I knelt down to read an old +tombstone. There was a little seat—no back. And an epitaph. The sun was +just setting; some French name. And there was a long jagged crack in +the stone, like the black line you know one sees after lightning, I +mean it’s as clear as that even now, in memory. Oh yes, I remember. And +then, I suppose, came the sleep—stupid, sluggish: and then; well, here +I am.’ + +‘You are absolutely certain, then,’ persisted Mr Bethany almost +querulously, ‘there was no living creature near you? Bless me, Lawford, +I see no unkindness in believing what the Bible itself relates. There +_are_ powers supernatural. Saul, and so on. We are all convinced of +that. No one?’ + +‘I remember distinctly,’ replied Lawford, in a calm, stubborn voice, ‘I +looked up all around me, while I was kneeling there, and there wasn’t a +soul to be seen. Because, you see, it even then occurred to me that it +would have looked rather queer—my wandering about like that, I mean. +Facing me there were some cypress-trees, and beyond, a low sunken +fence, and then, just open country. Up above there were the gravestones +toppling down the hill, where I had just strolled down, and sunshine!’ +He suddenly threw up his hand. ‘Oh, marvellous! streaming in +gold—flaming, like God’s own ante-chamber.’ + +There was a very pregnant pause. Mr Bethany shrunk back a little into +his chair. His lips moved; he folded his spectacles. + +‘Yes, yes,’ he said. And then very quietly he stole one mole-like look +into his sidesman’s face. + +‘What is Dr Simon’s number?’ he said. Lawford was gazing gloomily into +the fire. ‘Oh, Annandale,’ he replied absently. ‘I don’t know the +number.’ + +‘Do you believe in him? Your wife mentioned him. Is he clever?’ + +‘Oh, he’s new,’ said Lawford; ‘old James was our doctor. He—he killed +my father.’ He laughed out shamefacedly. + +‘A sound, lovable man,’ said Mr Bethany, ‘one of the kindest men I ever +knew; and a very old friend of mine.’ + +And suddenly the dark face turned with a shudder from the fire, and +spoke in a low trembling voice. ‘Only one thing—only one thing—my +sanity, my sanity. If once I forget, who will believe me?’ He thrust +his long lean fingers beneath his coat. ‘And mad,’ he added; ‘I would +sooner die.’ + +Mr Bethany deliberately adjusted his spectacles. ‘May I, may I +experiment?’ he said boldly. There came a tap on the door. + +‘Bless me,’ said the vicar, taking out his watch, ‘it is a quarter to +twelve. ‘Yes, yes, Mrs Lawford,’ he trotted round to the door. ‘We are +beginning to see light—a ray!’ + +‘But I—_I_ can see in the dark,’ whispered Lawford, as if at a cue, +turning with an inscrutable smile to the fire. + +The vicar came again, wrapped up in a little tight grey great-coat, and +a white silk muffler. He looked up unflinching into Lawford’s face, and +tears stood in his eyes. ‘Patience, patience, my dear fellow,’ he +repeated gravely, squeezing his hand. ‘And rest, complete rest, is +imperative. Just till the first thing to-morrow. And till then,’ he +turned to Mrs Lawford, where she stood looking in at the doorway, ‘oh +yes, complete quiet; and caution!’ + +Mrs Lawford let him out. He shook his head once or twice, holding her +fingers. ‘Oh yes,’ he whispered, ‘it is your husband, not the smallest +doubt. I tried: for _myself_. But something—something has happened. +Don’t fret him now. Have patience. Oh yes, it is incredible... the +change! But there, the very first thing to-morrow.’ She closed the door +gently after him, and stepping softly back to the dining-room, peered +in. Her husband’s back was turned, but he could see her in the +looking-glass, stooping a little, with set face watching him, in the +silvery stillness. + +‘Well,’ he said, ‘is the old—’ he doggedly met the fixed eyes facing +him there, ‘is our old friend gone?’ + +‘Yes,’ said Sheila, ‘he’s gone.’ Lawford sighed and turned round. ‘It’s +useless talking now, Sheila. No more questions. I cannot tell you how +tired I am. And my head—’ + +‘What is wrong with your head?’ inquired his wife discreetly. + +The haggard face turned gravely and patiently. ‘Only one of my old +headaches,’ he smiled, ‘my old bilious headaches—the hereditary Lawford +variety.’ But his voice fell low again. ‘We must get to bed.’ + +With a rather pretty and childish movement, Sheila gently drew her +hands across her silk skirts. ‘Yes, dear,’ she said, ‘I have made up a +bed for you in the large spare room. It is thoroughly aired.’ She came +softly in, hastened over to a closed work-table that stood under the +curtains, and opened it. + +Lawford watched her, utterly expressionless, utterly motionless. He +opened his mouth and shut it again, still watching his wife as she +stooped with ridiculously too busy fingers, searching through her +coloured silks. + +Again he opened his mouth. ‘Yes,’ he said, and stalked slowly towards +the door. But there he paused. ‘God knows,’ he said, strangely and +meekly, ‘I am sorry, sorry for all this. You will forgive me, Sheila?’ + +She looked up swiftly. ‘It’s very tiresome, I can’t find anywhere,’ she +murmured, ‘I can’t find anywhere the—the little red box key.’ + +Lawford’s cheek turned more sallow than ever. ‘You are only pretending +to look for it,’ he said, ‘to try me. We both know perfectly well the +lock is broken. Ada broke it.’ + +Sheila let fall the lid; and yet for a while her eyes roved over it as +if in violent search for something. Then she turned: ‘I am so very glad +the vicar was at home,’ she said brightly. ‘And mind, mind you rest, +Arthur. There’s nothing so bad but it might be worse.... Oh, I can’t, I +can’t bear it!’ She sat down in the chair and huddled her face between +her hands, sobbing on and on, without a tear. + +Lawford listened and stared solemnly. ‘Whatever it may be, Sheila, I +will be loyal,’ he said. + +Her sobs hushed, and again cold horror crept over her. Nobody in the +whole world could have said that ‘I will be loyal’ quite like +that—nobody but Arthur. She stood up, patting her hair. ‘I don’t think +my brain would bear much more. It’s useless to talk. If you will go up; +I will put out the lamp.’ + + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + + +One solitary and tall candle burned on the great dressing-table. Faint, +solitary pictures broke the blankness of each wall. The carpet was +rich, the bed impressive, and the basins on the washstand as uninviting +as the bed. Lawford sat down on the edge of it in complete isolation. +He sat without stirring, listening to his watch ticking in his pocket. +The china clock on the chimney piece pointed cheerfully to the hour of +dawn. It was exactly, he computed carefully, five hours and seven +minutes fast. Not the slightest sound broke the stillness, until he +heard, very, very softly and gradually, the key of his door turn in the +oiled wards, and realized that he was a prisoner. + +Women were strange creatures. How often he had heard that said, he +thought lamely. He felt no anger, no surprise or resentment, at the +trick. It was only to be expected. He could sit on till morning; easily +till morning. He had never noticed before how empty a well-furnished +room could seem. It was his own room too; his best visitors’ room. His +father-in-law had slept here, with his whiskers on that pillow. His +wife’s most formidable aunt had been all night here, alone with these +pictures. She certainly was... ‘But what are _you_ doing here?’ cried a +voice suddenly out of his reverie. + +He started up and stretched himself, and taking out the neat little +packet that the maid had brought from the chemist’s, he drew up a +chair, and sat down once more in front of the glass. He sighed +vacantly, rose and lifted down from the wall above the fireplace a +tinted photograph of himself that Sheila had had enlarged about twelve +years ago. It was a brighter, younger, hairier, but unmistakably the +same dull indolent Lawford who had ventured into Widderstone churchyard +that afternoon. The cheek was a little plumper, the eyes not quite so +full-lidded, the hair a little more precisely parted, the upper lip +graced with a small blonde moustache. He tilted the portrait into the +candlelight, and compared it with this reflection in the glass of what +had come out of Widderstone, feature with feature, with perfect +composure and extreme care. Then he laid down the massive frame on the +table, and gazed quietly at the tiny packet. + +It was to be a day of queer experiences. He had never before realized +with how many miracles mere everyday life is besieged. Here in this +small punctilious packet lay a Sesame—a power of transformation beside +which the transformation of that rather flaccid face of the noonday +into this tense, sinister face of midnight was but as a moving from +house to house—a change just as irrevocable and complete, and yet so +very normal. Which should it be, that, or—his face lifted itself once +more to the ice-like gloom of the looking-glass—that, or this? + +It simply gazed back with a kind of quizzical pity on its lean features +under the scrutiny of eyes so deep, so meaningful, so desolate, and yet +so indomitably courageous. In the brain behind them a slow and stolid +argument was in progress; the one baffling reply on the one side to +every appeal on the other being still simply. ‘What dreams may come?’ + +Those eyes surely knew something of dreams, else, why this violent and +stubborn endeavour to keep awake. + +Lawford did indeed once actually frame the question, ‘But who the devil +are you?’ And it really seemed the eyes perceptibly widened or +brightened. The mere vexation of his unparalleled position. Sheila’s +pathetic incredulity, his old vicar’s laborious kindness, the tiresome +network of experience into which he would be dragged struggling on the +morrow, and on the morrow after that, and after that—the thought of all +these things faded for the moment from his mind, lost if not their +significance, at least their instancy. + +He simply sat face to face with the sheer difficulty of living on at +all. He even concluded in a kind of lethargy that if nothing had +occurred, no ‘change,’ he might still be sitting here, Arthur Rennet +Lawford, in his best visitor’s room, deciding between inscrutable life +and just—death. He supposed he was tired out. His thoughts hadn’t even +the energy to complete themselves. None cared but himself and this—this +Silence. + +‘But what does it all mean?’ the insistent voice he was getting to know +so well began tediously inquiring again. And every time he raised his +eyes, or, rather, as in many cases it seemed, his eyes raised +themselves, they saw this haunting face there—a face he no longer +bitterly rebelled at, nor dimmed with scrutiny, but a face that was +becoming a kind of hold on life, even a kind of refuge, an ally. It was +a face that might have come out of a rather flashy book; or such as is +revered on the stage. ‘A rotten bad face,’ he whispered at it in his +own familiar slang, after some such abrupt encounter; a fearless, +packed, daring, fascinating face, with even—what?—a spice of genius in +it. Whose the devil’s face was it? What on earth was the matter?... +‘Brazen it out,’ a jubilant thought cried suddenly; ‘follow it up; play +the game! give me just one opening. Think—think what I’ve risked!’ + +And all these voices thought Lawford, in deadly lassitude, meant only +one thing—insanity. A blazing, impotent indignation seized him. He +leaned near, peering as it were out of a red dusky mist. He snatched up +the china candlestick, and poised it above the sardonic reflection, as +if to throw. Then slowly, with infinite pains, he drew back from the +glass and replaced the candlestick on the table; stuffed his paper +packet into his pocket, took off his boots and threw himself on to the +bed. In a little while, in the faint, still light, he opened drowsily +wondering eyes. ‘Poor old thing!’ his voice murmured, ‘Poor old +Sheila!’ + + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + + +It was but little after daybreak when Mrs Lawford, after listening at +his door a while, turned the key and looked in on her husband. +Blue-grey light from between the venetian blinds just dusked the room. +She stood in a bluish dressing-gown, her hand on her bosom, looking +down on the lean impassive face. For the briefest instant her heart had +leapt with an indescribable surmise; to fall dull as lead once more. +Breathing equably and quietly, the strange figure lay stretched upon +the bed. ‘How can he sleep? How can he sleep?’ she whispered with a +black and hopeless indignation. What a night she had had! And he! + +She turned noiselessly away. The candle had guttered to extinction. The +big glass reflected her, voluminous and wan, her dark-ringed eyes, full +lips, rich, glossy hair, and rounded chin. ‘Yes, yes,’ it seemed to +murmur mournfully. She turned away, and drawing stealthily near stooped +once more quite low, and examined the face on the pillow with lynx-like +concentration. And though every nerve revolted at the thought, she was +finally convinced, unwillingly, but assuredly, that her husband was +here. Indeed, if it were not so, how could she for a single moment have +accepted the possibility that he was a stranger? He seemed to haunt, +like a ghostly emanation, this strange, detestable face—as memory +supplies the features concealed beneath a mask. The face was still and +stony, like one dead or imaged in wax, yet beneath it dreams were +passing—silly, ordinary Lawford dreams. She was almost alarmed at the +terribly rancorous hatred she felt for the face... ‘It was just like +Arthur to be so taken in!’ + +Then she too remembered Quain, and remembered also in the slowly paling +dusk that the house would soon be stirring. She went out and +noiselessly locked the door again. But it was useless to begin looking +for Quain now—her husband had a good many dull books, most of them his +‘eccentric’ father’s. What must the servants be thinking? and what was +all that talk about a mysterious visitor? She would have to question +Ada—diplomatically. She returned to her room and sat down in an +arm-chair, and waited. In sheer weariness she fell into a doze, and +woke at the sound of dustpan and broom. She rang the bell, and asked +for hot water, tea, and a basin of cornflour. + +‘And please, Ada, be as quiet as possible over your work; your master +is in a nice sleep, and must not be disturbed on any account. In the +front bedroom.’ She looked up suddenly. ‘By the way, who let Dr +Ferguson in last night?’ It was dangerous, but successful. + +‘Dr Ferguson, ma’am? Oh, you mean... He _was_ in.’ + +Sheila smiled resignedly. ‘Was in? What do you mean, “was in”? And +where were you, then?’ + +‘I had been sent out to Critchett’s, the chemist’s.’ + +‘Of course, of course. So cook let Dr Ferguson in, then? Why didn’t you +say so before, Ada? And did you bring the medicine with you?’ + +‘It was a packet in an envelope, ma’am. But Cook is sure she heard no +knock—not while I was out. So Dr Ferguson must have come in quite +unbeknown.’ + +‘Well, really,’ said Sheila, ‘it seems very difficult to get at the +truth sometimes. And when illness is in the house I cannot understand +why there should be no one available to answer the door. You must have +left it ajar, unsecured, when you went out. And pray, what if Dr +Ferguson had been some common tramp? That would have been a nice +thing.’ + +‘I am quite certain,’ said Ada a little flatly, ‘that I did shut the +door. And cook says she never so much as stirred from the kitchen till +I came down the area steps with the packet. And that’s all I know about +it, ma’am; except that he was here when I came back. I did not know +even there was a Dr Ferguson; and my mother has lived here nineteen +years.’ + +‘We must be thankful your mother enjoys such good health,’ replied Mrs +Lawford suavely. ‘Please tell cook to be very careful with the +cornflour—to be sure it’s well mixed and thoroughly done.’ + +Mrs Lawford’s eyes followed with a certain discomfort those narrow +print shoulders descending the stairs. And this abominable ruse +was—Arthur’s! She ran up lightly and listened with her ear to the panel +of his door. And just as she was about to turn away again, there came a +little light knock at the front door. + +Mrs Lawford paused at the loop of the staircase; and not altogether +with gratitude or relief she heard the voice of Mr Bethany, inquiring +in cautious but quite audible tones after her husband. + +She dressed quickly and went down. The little white old man looked very +solitary in the long, fireless, drawing-room. + +‘I could not sleep,’ he said; ‘I don’t think I grasped in the least, I +don’t indeed, until I was nearly home, the complexity of our problem. I +came, in fact, to a lamppost. It was casting a peculiar shadow. And +then—you know how such thoughts seize us, my dear—like a sudden +inspiration, I realised how tenuous, how appallingly tenuous a hold we +every one of us have on our mere personality. But that,’ he continued +rapidly, ‘that’s only for ourselves—and after the event. Ours, just +now, is to act. And first—?’ + +‘You really do, then—you really are convinced—’ began Mrs Lawford. + +But Mr Bethany was too quick. ‘We must be _most_ circumspect. My dear +friend, we must be _most_ circumspect, for all our sakes. And this, +you’ll say,’ he added, smiling, stretching out his arms, his soft hat +in one hand, his umbrella in the other—‘this is being circumspect—a +seven o’clock in the morning call! But you see, my dear, I have come, +as I took the precaution of explaining to the maid, because it’s now or +never to-day. It does so happen that I have to take a wedding for an +old friend’s niece at Witchett; so when in need, you see, Providence +enables us to tell even the conventional truth. Now really, how is he? +has he slept? has he recalled himself at all? is there any change?—and, +dear me, how are _you_?’ + +Mrs Lawford sighed. ‘A broken night is really very little to a mother,’ +she said. ‘He is still asleep. He hasn’t, I think, stirred all night.’ + +‘Not stirred!’ Mr Bethany repeated. ‘You baffle me. And you have +watched?’ + +‘Oh no,’ was the cheerful answer; ‘I felt that quiet, solitude; space, +was everything; he preferred it so. He—he changed alone, I suppose. +Don’t you think it almost stands to reason that he will be alone...when +he comes back? Was I right? But there, it’s useless, it’s worse than +useless, to talk like this. My husband is gone. Some terrible thing has +happened. Whatever the mystery may be, he will never come back alive. +My only fear is that I am dragging you into a matter that should from +the beginning have been entrusted to—Oh, it’s monstrous!’ It appeared +for a moment as if she were blinking to keep back her tears, yet her +scrutiny seemed merely to harden. + +Only the merest flicker of the folded eyelids over the greenish eyes of +her visitor answered the challenge. He stood small and black, peeping +fixedly out of the window at the sunflecked laurels. + +‘Last night,’ he said slowly, ‘when I said good-bye to your husband, on +the tip of my tongue were the words I have used, in season and out of +season, for nearly forty-five years—“God knows best.” Well, my dear +lady, a sense of humour, a sense of reverence, or perhaps even a taint +of scepticism—call it what you will—just intercepted them. Oh no, not +any of these, my child; just pity, overwhelming pity. God does know +best; but in a matter like this it is not even my place to say so. It +would be good for none of us to endanger our souls even with _verbal_ +cant. Now, if, do you think, I had just five minutes’ talk—five +minutes; would it disquiet him?’ + +Only by an almost undignified haste, for the vicar was remarkably +agile, Sheila managed to unlock the bedroom door without apparently his +perceiving it, and with a warning finger she preceded him into the +great bedroom. ‘Oh, yes, yes,’ he was whispering to himself; +‘alone—well, well!’ He hung his hat on his umbrella and leaned it in a +corner, and then he turned. + +‘I don’t think, you know, an old friend does him any wrong; but last +night I had no real oppor—’ He firmly adjusted his spectacles, and +looked long into the dark, dispassioned face. + +‘H’m!’ he said, and fidgeted, and peered again. Mrs Lawford watched him +keenly. + +‘Do you still—’ she began. + +But at the same moment he too broke silence, suddenly stepping back +with the innocent remark, ‘Has he—has he asked for anything?’ + +‘Only for Quain.’ + +‘“Quain”?’ + +‘The medical Dictionary.’ + +‘Oh, yes; bless me; of course.... A calm, complete sleep of utter +prostration—utter nervous prostration. And can one wonder? Poor fellow, +poor fellow!’ He walked to the window and peered between the blinds. +‘Sparrows, sunshine—yes, and here’s the postman,’ he said, as if to +himself. Then he turned sharply round, with mind made up. + +‘Now, do you leave me here,’ he said. ‘Take half an hour’s quiet rest. +He will be glad of a dull old fellow like me when he wakes. And as for +my pretty bride, if I miss the train, she must wait till the next. Good +discipline, my dear. Oh, dear me! _I_ don’t change. What a precious +experience now this would have been for a tottery, talkative, owlish +old parochial creature like me. But there, there. Light words make +heavy hearts, I see. I shall be quite comfortable. No, no, I +breakfasted at home. There’s hat and umbrella; at 9.3 I can fly.’ + +Mrs Lawford thanked him mutely. He smilingly but firmly bowed her out +and closed the door. + +But eyes and brain had been very busy. He had looked at the gutted +candle; at the tinted bland portrait on the dressing-table; at the +chair drawn-up; at the boots; and now again he turned almost with a +groan towards the sleeper. Then he took out an envelope, on which he +had jotted various memoranda, and waited awhile. Minutes passed and at +last the sleeper faintly stirred, muttering. + +Mr Bethany stooped quickly. ‘What is it, what is it?’ he whispered. + +Lawford sighed. ‘I was only dreaming, Sheila,’ he said, and softly, +peacefully opened his eyes. ‘I dreamed I was in the—’ His lids +narrowed, his dark eyes fixed themselves on the anxious spectacled face +bending over him. ‘Mr Bethany! Where? What’s wrong?’ + +His friend put out his hand. ‘There, there,’ he said soothingly, ‘do +not be disturbed; do not disquiet yourself.’ + +Lawford struggled up. Slowly, painfully consciousness returned to him. +He glanced furtively round the room, at his clothes, slinkingly at the +vicar; licked his lips; flushed with extraordinary rapidity; and +suddenly burst into tears. + +Mr Bethany sat without movement, waiting till he should have spent +himself. ‘Now, Lawford,’ he said gently, ‘compose yourself, old friend. +We must face the music—like men.’ He went to the window, drew up the +blind, peeped out, and took off his spectacles. + +‘The first thing to be done,’ he said, returning briskly to his chair, +‘is to send for Simon. Now, does Simon know you _well?_’ Lawford shook +his head. ‘Would he recognise you?... I mean...’ + +‘I have only met him once—in the evening.’ + +‘Good; let him come immediately, then. Tell him just the facts. If I am +not mistaken, he will pooh-pooh the whole thing; tell you to keep +quiet, not to worry, and so on. My dear fellow, if we realised, say, +typhoid, who’d dare to face it? That will give us time; to wait a +while, to recover our breath, to see what happens next. And if—as I +don’t believe for a moment—Why, in that case I heard the other day of a +most excellent man—Grosser, of Wimpole Street; nerves. He would be +absorbed. He’ll bottle you in spirit, Lawford. We’ll have him down +quietly. You see? But there won’t be any necessity. Oh no. By then +light will have come. We shall remember. What I mean is this.’ He +crossed his legs and pushed out his lips. ‘We are on quaky ground; and +it’s absolutely essential that you keep cool, and trust. I am yours, +heart and soul—you know that. I own frankly, at first I was shaken. And +I have, I confess, been very cunning. But first, faith, then evidence +to bolster it up. The faith was absolute’—he placed one firm hand on +Lawford’s knee—‘why, I cannot explain; but it was. The evidence is +convincing. But there are others to think of. The shock, the +incredibleness, the consequences; we must not scan too closely. Think +_with_; never against: and bang go all the arguments. Your wife, poor +dear, believes; but of course, of course, she is horribly—’ he broke +off; ‘of course she is _shaken_, you old simpleton! Time will heal all +that. Time will wear out the mask. Time will tire out this detestable +physical witchcraft. The mind, the self’s the thing. Old fogey though I +may seem for saying it—that must be kept unsmirched. We won’t go +wearily over the painful subject again. You told me last night, dear +old friend, that you were absolutely alone at Widderstone. That is +enough. But here we have visible facts, tangible effects, and there +must have been a definite reason and a cause for them. I believe in the +devil, in the Powers of Darkness, Lawford, as firmly as I believe he +and they are powerless—in the long run. They—what shall we say?—have +surrendered their intrinsicality. You can just go through evil, as you +can go through a sewer, and come out on the other side too. A loathsome +process too. But there—we are not speaking of any such monstrosities, +and even if we were, you and I with God’s help would just tire them +out. And that ally gone, our poor dear old Mrs Grundy will at once +capitulate. Eh? Eh?’ + +Through all this long and arduous harangue, consciousness, like the +gradual light of dawn, had been flooding that other brain. And the face +that now confronted Mr Bethany, though with his feeble unaided sight he +could only very obscurely discern it, was vigilant and keen, in every +sharp-cut hungry feature. + +A rather prolonged silence followed, the visitor peering mutely. The +black eyes nearly closed, the face turned slowly towards the window, +saw burnt-out candle, comprehensive glass. + +‘Yes, yes.’ he said; ‘I’ll send for Simon at once.’ + +‘Good,’ said Mr Bethany, and more doubtfully repeated ‘good.’ ‘Now +there’s only one thing left,’ he went on cheerfully. ‘I have jotted +down a few test questions here; they are questions no one on this earth +could answer but you, Lawford. They are merely for external proofs. You +won’t, you can’t, mistake my motive. We cannot foretell or foresee what +need may arise for just such jog-trot primitive evidence. I propose +that you now answer them here, in writing.’ + +Lawford stood up and walked to the looking-glass, and paused. He put +his hand to his head, ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘of course; it’s a rattling good +move. I’m not quite awake; myself, I mean. I’ll do it now.’ He took out +a pencil case and tore another leaf from his pocket-book. ‘What are +they?’ + +Mr Bethany rang the bell. Sheila herself answered it. She stood on the +threshold and looked across through a shaft of autumnal sunshine at her +husband, and her husband with a quiet strange smile looked across +through the sunshine at his wife. Mr Bethany waited in vain. + +‘I am just going to put the arch-impostor through his credentials,’ he +said tartly. ‘Now then, Lawford!’ He read out the questions, one by +one, from his crafty little list, pursing his lips between each; and +one by one, Lawford, seated at the dressing-table, fluently scribbled +his answers. Then question and answer were rigorously compared by Mr +Bethany, with small white head bent close and spectacles poised upon +the powerful nose, and signed and dated, and passed to Mrs Lawford +without a word. + +Mrs Lawford read question and answer where she stood, in complete +silence. She looked up. ‘Many of these questions I don’t know the +answers to myself,’ she said. + +‘It is immaterial,’ said Mr Bethany. + +‘One answer is—is inaccurate. ‘Yes, yes, quite so: due to a mistake in +a letter from myself.’ + +Mrs Lawford read quietly on, folded the papers, and held them out +between finger and thumb. ‘The—handwriting...’ she remarked very +softly. + +‘Wonderful, isn’t it?’ said Mr Bethany warmly; ‘all the general look +and run of the thing different, but every real essential feature +unchanged. Now into the envelope. And now a little wax?’ + +Mrs Lawford stood waiting. ‘There’s a green piece of sealing-wax,’ +almost drawled the quiet voice, ‘in the top right drawer of the nest in +the study, which old James gave me the Christmas before last.’ He +glanced with lowered eyelids at his wife’s flushed cheek. Their eyes +met. + +‘Thank you,’ she said. + +When she returned the vicar was sitting in a chair, leaning his chin on +the knobbed handle of his umbrella. He rose and lit a taper for her +with a match from a little green pot on the table. And Mrs Lawford, +with trembling fingers, sealed the letter, as he directed, with his own +seal. + +‘There!’ he said triumphantly, ‘how many more such brilliant lawyers, I +wonder, lie dormant in the Church? And who shall keep this?... Why, all +three, of course.’ He went on without pausing. ‘Some little drawer now, +secret and undetectable, with a lock.’ Just such a little drawer that +locked itself with a spring lay by chance in the looking-glass. There +the letter was hidden. And Mr Bethany looked at his watch. ‘Nineteen +minutes,’ he said. ‘The next thing, my dear child—we’re getting on +swimmingly—and it’s astonishing how things are simplified by mere +use—the next thing is to send for Simon.’ + +Sheila took a deep breath, but did not look up. ‘I am entirely in your +hands,’ she replied. + +‘So be it,’ said he crisply. ‘Get to bed, Lawford; it’s better so. And +I’ll look in on my way back from Witchett. I came, my dear fellow, in +gloomy disturbance of mind. It was getting up too early; it fogs old +brains. Good-bye, good-bye.’ + +He squeezed Lawford’s hand. Then, with umbrella under his arm, his hat +on his head, his spectacles readjusted, he hurried out of the room. Mrs +Lawford followed him. For a few minutes Lawford sat motionless, with +head bent a little, and eyes restlessly scanning the door. Then he rose +abruptly, and in a quarter of an hour was in bed, alone with his slow +thoughts: while a basin of cornflour stood untasted on a little table +at his bedside, and a cheerful fire burned in the best visitors’ room’s +tiny grate. + +At half-past eleven Dr Simon entered this soundless seclusion. He sat +down beside Lawford, and took temperature and pulse. Then he half +closed his lids, and scanned his patient out of an unusually dark, +un-English face, with straight black hair, and listened attentively to +his rather incoherent story. It was a story very much modified and +rounded off. Nor did Lawford draw Dr Simon’s attention to the portrait +now smiling conventionally above their heads from the wall over the +fireplace. + +‘It was rather bleak—the wind; and, I think, perhaps, I had had a touch +of influenza. It was a silly thing to do. But still, Dr Simon, one +doesn’t expect—well, there, I don’t feel the same man—physically. I +really cannot explain how great a change has taken place. And yet I +feel perfectly fit in myself. And if it were not for—for being laughed +at, go back to town, to-day. Why my wife scarcely recognised me.’ + +Dr Simon continued his scrutiny. Try as he would, Lawford could not +raise his downcast eyes to meet direct the doctor’s polite attention. + +‘And what,’ said Dr Simon, ‘what precisely is the nature of the change? +Have you any pain?’ + +‘No, not the least pain,’ said Lawford; ‘I think, perhaps, or rather my +face _is_ a little shrunken—and yet lengthened; at least it feels so; +and a faint twinge of rheumatism. But my hair—well, I don’t know; it’s +difficult to say one’s self.’ He could get on so very much better, he +thought, if only his mind would be at peace and these preposterous +promptings and voices were still. + +Dr Simon faced the window, and drew his hand softly over his head. ‘We +never can be too cautious at a certain age, and especially after +influenza,’ he said. ‘It undermines the whole system, and in particular +the nervous system; leaving the mind the prey of the most melancholy +fancies. I should astound you, Mr Lawford, with the devil influenza +plays.... A slight nervous shock and a chill; quite slight, I hope. A +few days’ rest and plenty of nourishment. There’s nothing; temperature +inconsiderable. All perfectly intelligible. Most certainly reassure +yourself! And as for the change you speak of’—he looked steadily at the +dark face on the pillow and smiled amiably—‘I don’t think we need worry +much about that. It certainly was a bleak wind yesterday—and a +cemetery, my dear sir! It was indiscreet—yes, very.’ He held out his +hand. ‘You must not be alarmed,’ he said, very distinctly with the +merest trace of an accent; ‘air, sunshine, quiet, nourishment; +sleep—that is all. The little window might be a few inches open, +and—and any light reading.’ + +He opened the door and joined Mrs Lawford on the staircase. He talked +to her quietly over his shoulder all the way downstairs. ‘It was, it +was sporting with Providence—a wind, believe me, nearly due east, in +spite of the warm sunshine.’ + +‘But the change—the change!’ Mrs Lawford managed to murmur tragically, +as he strode to the door. Dr Simon smiled, and gracefully tapped his +forehead with a red-gloved forefinger. + +‘Humour him, humour him,’ he repeated indulgently. ‘Rest and quiet will +soon put that little trouble out of his head. Oh yes, I did notice +it—the set drawn look, and the droop: quite so. Good morning.’ + +Mrs Lawford gently closed the door after him. A glimpse of Ada, +crossing from room to room, suggested a precaution. She called out in +her clearest notes. ‘If Dr Ferguson should call while I am out, Ada, +will you please tell him that Dr Simon regretted that he was unable to +wait? Thank you.’ She paused with hand on the balusters, then slowly +ascended the stairs. Her husband’s face was turned to the ceiling, his +hands clasped above his head. She took up her stand by the fireplace, +resting one silk-slippered foot on the fender. ‘Dr Simon is +reassuring,’ she said, ‘but I do hope, Arthur, you will follow his +advice. He looks a fairly clever man.... But with a big practice.... Do +you think, dear, he quite realised the extent of the—the change?’ + +‘I told him what happened,’ said her husband’s voice out of the +bed-clothes. + +‘Yes, yes, I know,’ said Sheila soothingly; ‘but we must remember he is +comparatively a stranger. He would not detect—’ + +‘What did he tell you?’ asked the voice. + +Mrs Lawford deliberately considered. If only he would always thus keep +his face concealed, how much easier it would be to discuss matters +rationally. ‘You see, dear,’ she said softly, ‘I know, of course, +nothing about the nerves; but personally, I think his suggestion +absurd. No mere fancy, surely, can make a lasting alteration in one’s +face. And your hair—I don’t want to say anything that may seem +unkind—but isn’t it really quite a distinct shade darker, Arthur?’ + +‘Any great strain will change the colour of a man’s hair,’ said Lawford +stolidly; ‘at any rate, to white. Why, I read once of a fellow in +India, a Hindoo, or something, who—’ + +‘But have you _had_ any intense strain, or anxiety?’ broke in Sheila. +‘You might, at least, have confided in me; that is, unless—But there, +don’t you think really, Arthur, it would be much more satisfactory in +every way if we had further advice at once? Alice will be home next +week. To-morrow is the Harvest Festival, and next week, of course, the +Dedication; and, in any case, the Bazaar is out of the question. They +will have to find another stall-holder. We must do our utmost to avoid +comment or scandal. Every minute must help to—to fix a thing like that. +I own even now I cannot realise what this awful calamity means. It’s +useless to brood on it. We must, as the poor dear old vicar said only +last night, keep our heads clear. But I am sure Dr Simon was under a +misapprehension. If, now, it was explained to him, a little more fully, +Arthur—a photograph. Oh, anything on earth but this dreadful wearing +uncertainty and suspense! Besides ...is Simon quite an English name?’ + +Lawford drew further into his pillow. ‘Do as you think best, Sheila,’ +he said. ‘For my own part, I believe it may be as he suggests—partly an +illusion, a touch of nervous breakdown. It simply can’t be as bad as I +think it is. If it were, you would not be here talking like this; and +Bethany wouldn’t have believed a word I said. Whatever it is, it’s no +good crying it on the housetops. Give me time, just time. Besides, how +do we know what he really thought? Doctors don’t tell their patients +everything. Give the poor chap a chance, and more so if he is a +foreigner. He’s’—his voice sank almost to a whisper—‘he’s no darker +than this. And do, please, Sheila, take this infernal stuff away, and +let me have something solid. I’m not ill—in that way. All I want is +peace and quiet, time to think. Let me fight it out alone. It’s been +sprung on me. The worst’s not over. But I’ll win through; wait! And if +not—well, you shall not suffer, Sheila. Don’t be afraid. There are +other ways out.’ + +Sheila broke down. ‘Any one would think to hear you talk, that I was +perfectly heartless. I told Ada to be most careful about the cornflour. +And as for other ways out, it’s a positively wicked thing to say to me +when I’m nearly distracted with trouble and anxiety. What motive could +you have had for loitering in an old cemetery? And in an east wind! +It’s useless for me to remain here, Arthur, to be accused of every +horrible thing that comes into a morbid imagination. I will leave you, +as you suggest, in peace.’ + +‘One moment, Sheila,’ answered the muffled voice. ‘I have accused you +of nothing. If you knew all; if you could read my thoughts, you would +be surprised, perhaps, at my—But never mind that. On the other hand, I +really do think it would be better for the present to discuss the thing +no more. To-day is Friday. Give this miserable face a week. Talk it +over with Bethany if you like. But I forbid’—he struggled up in bed, +sallow and sinister—‘I flatly forbid, please understand, any other +interference till then. Afterwards you must do exactly as you please. +Send round the Town Crier! But till then, silence!’ + +Sheila with raised head confronted him. ‘This, then, is your gratitude. +So be it. Silence, no doubt! Until it’s too late to take action. Until +you have wormed your way in, and think you are safe. To have believed! +Where is my husband? that is what I am asking you now. When and how you +have learned his secrets God only knows, and your conscience! But he +always was a simpleton at heart. I warn you, then. Until next Thursday +I consent to say nothing provided you remain quiet; make no +disturbance, no scandal here. The servants and all who inquire shall +simply be told that my husband is confined to his room with—with a +nervous breakdown, as you have yourself so glibly suggested. I am at +your mercy, I own it. The vicar believes your preposterous story—with +his spectacles off. You would convince anybody with the wicked cunning +with which you have cajoled and wheedled him, with which you have +deceived and fooled a foreign doctor. But you will not convince me. You +will not convince Alice. I have friends in the world, though you may +not be aware of it, who will not be quite so apt to believe any +cock-and-bull story you may see fit to invent. That is all I have to +say. To-night I tell the vicar all that I have just told you. And from +this moment, please, we are strangers. I shall come into the room no +more than necessity dictates. On Friday we resume our real parts. My +husband—Arthur—to—to connive at... Phh!’ + +Rage had transfigured her. She scarcely heard her own words. They +poured out senselessly, monotonously, one calling up another, as if +from the lips of a Cassandra. Lawford sank back into bed, clutching the +sheets with both lean hands. He took a deep breath and shut his mouth. + +‘It reminds me, Sheila,’ he began arduously, ‘of our first quarrel +before we were married, the evening after your aunt Rose died at +Llandudno—do you remember? You threw open the window, and I think—I +saved your life.’ A pause followed. Then a queer, almost inarticulate +voice added, ‘At least, I am afraid so.’ + +A cold and awful quietness fell on Sheila’s heart. She stared fixedly +at the tuft of dark hair, the only visible sign of her husband, on the +pillow. Then, taking up the basin of cold cornflour, she left the room. +In a quarter of an hour she reappeared carrying a tray, with ham and +eggs and coffee and honey invitingly displayed. She laid it down. + +‘There is only one other question,’ she said, with perfect +composure—‘that of money. Your signature as it appears on the—the +document drawn up this morning, would, of course, be quite useless on a +cheque. I have taken all the money I could find; it is in safety. You +may, however, conceivably be in need of some yourself; here is five +pounds. I have my own cheque-book, and shall therefore have no need to +consider the question again for—for the present. So far as you are +concerned, I shall be guided solely by Mr Bethany. He will, I do not +doubt, take full responsibility.’ + +‘And may the Lord have mercy on my soul!’ uttered a stifled, unfamiliar +voice from the bed. Mrs Lawford stooped. ‘Arthur!’ she cried faintly, +‘Arthur!’ + +Lawford raised himself on his elbow with a sigh that was very near to +being a sob. ‘Oh, Sheila, if you’d only be your real self! What is the +use of all this pretence? Just consider _my_ position a little. The +fear and horror are not all on your side. You called me Arthur even +then. I’d willingly do anything you wish to save you pain; you know +that. Can’t we be friends even in this—this ghastly—Won’t you, Sheila?’ + +Mrs Lawford drew back, struggling with a doubtful heart. + +‘I think,’ she said, ‘it would be better not to discuss that now.’ + +The rest of the morning Lawford remained in solitude. + + + + +CHAPTER SIX + + +There were three books in the room—Jeremy Taylor’s ‘Holy Living and +Dying,’ a volume of the Quiver, and a little gilded book on +wildflowers. He read in vain. He lay and listened to the uproar of his +thoughts on which an occasional sound—the droning of a fly, the cry of +a milkman, the noise of a passing van—obtruded from the workaday world. +The pale gold sunlight edged softly over the bed. He ate up everything +on his tray. He even, on the shoals of nightmare, dreamed awhile. But +by and by as the hours wheeled slowly on he grew less calm, less +strenuously resolved on lying there inactive. Every sparrow that +twittered cried reveille through his brain. He longed with an ardour +strange to his temperament to be up and doing. + +What if his misfortune was, as he had in the excitement of the moment +suggested to Sheila, only a morbid delusion of mind; shared too in part +by sheer force of his absurd confession? Even if he was going mad, who +knows how peaceful a release that might not be? Could his shrewd old +vicar have implicitly believed in him if the change were as complete as +he supposed it? He flung off the bedclothes and locked the door. He +dressed himself, noticing, he fancied, with a deadly revulsion of +feeling, that his coat was a little too short in the sleeves, his +waistcoat too loose. In the midst of his dressing came Sheila bringing +his luncheon. ‘I’m sorry,’ he called out, stooping quickly beside the +bed, ‘I can’t talk now. Please put the tray down.’ + +About half an hour afterwards he heard the outer door close, and +peeping from behind the curtains saw his wife go out. All was drowsily +quiet in the house. He devoured his lunch like a schoolboy. That +finished to the last crumb, without a moment’s delay he covered his +face with a towel, locked the door behind him, put the key in his +pocket, and ran lightly downstairs. He stuffed the towel into an ulster +pocket, put on a soft, wide-brimmed hat, and noiselessly let himself +out. Then he turned with an almost hysterical delight and ran—ran like +the wind, without pausing, without thinking, straight on, up one +turning, down another, until he reached a broad open common, thickly +wooded, sprinkled with gorse and hazel and may, and faintly purple with +fading heather. There he flung himself down in the beautiful sunlight, +among the yellowing bracken, to recover his breath. + +He lay there for many minutes, thinking almost with composure. Flight, +it seemed, had for the moment quietened the demands of that other +feebly struggling personality which was beginning to insinuate itself +into his consciousness, which had so miraculously broken in and taken +possession of his body. He would not think now. All he needed was a +little quiet and patience before he threw off for good and all his +right to be free, to be his own master, to call himself sane. + +He scrambled up and turned his face towards the westering sun. What was +there in the stillness of its beautiful splendour that seemed to +sharpen his horror and difficulty, and yet to stir him to such a daring +and devilry as he had never known since he was a boy? There was little +sound of life; somewhere an unknown bird was singing, and a few late +bees were droning in the bracken. All these years he had, like an old +blind horse, stolidly plodded round and round in a dull self-set +routine. And now, just when the spirit had come for rebellion, the mood +for a harmless truancy, there had fallen with them too this hideous +enigma. He sat there with the dusky silhouette of the face that was now +drenched with sunlight in his mind’s eye. He set off again up the stony +incline. + +Why not walk on and on? In time real wholesome weariness would come; he +could sleep at ease in some pleasant wayside inn, without once meeting +the eyes that stood as it were like a window between himself and a +shrewd incredulous scoffing world that would turn him into a +monstrosity and his story into a fable. And in a little while, perhaps +in three days, he would awaken out of this engrossing nightmare, and +know he was free, this black dog gone from his back, and (as the old +saying expressed it without any one dreaming what it really meant) his +own man again. How astonished Sheila would be; how warmly she would +welcome him!... Oh yes, of course she would. + +He came again to a standstill. No voice answered him out of that +illimitable gold and blue. Nothing seemed aware of him. But as he stood +there, doubtful as Cain on the outskirts of the unknown, he caught the +sound of a footfall on the lonely and stone-strewn path. + +The ground sloped steeply away to the left, and slowly mounting the +hillside came mildly on an old lady he knew, a Miss Sinnet, an old +friend of his mother’s. There was just such a little seat as that other +he knew so well, on the brow of the hill. He made his way to it, +intending to sit quietly there until the little old lady had passed by. +Up and up she came. Her large bonnet appeared, and then her mild white +face, inclined a little towards him as she ascended. Evidently this +very seat was her goal; and evasion was impossible. Evasion!... Memory +rushed back and set his pulses beating. He turned boldly to the sun, +and the old lady, with a brief glance into his face, composed herself +at the other end of the little seat. She gazed out of a gentle reverie +into the golden valley. And so they sat a while. And almost as if she +had felt the bond of acquaintance between them, she presently sighed, +and addressed him: ‘A very, very, beautiful view, sir.’ + +Lawford paused, then turned a gloomy, earnest face, gilded with +sunshine. ‘Beautiful, indeed,’ he said, ‘but not for me. No, Miss +Sinnet, not for me.’ + +The old lady gravely turned and examined the aquiline profile. ‘Well, I +confess,’ she remarked urbanely, ‘you have the advantage of me.’ + +Lawford smiled uneasily. ‘Believe me, it is little advantage.’ + +‘My sight,’ said Miss Sinnet precisely, ‘is not so good as I might +wish; though better perhaps than I might have hoped; I fear I am not +much wiser; your face is still unfamiliar to me.’ + +‘It is not unfamiliar to me,’ said Lawford. Whose trickery was this? he +thought, putting such affected stuff into his mouth. + +A faint lightening of pity came into the silvery and scrupulous +countenance. ‘Ah, dear me, yes,’ she said courteously. + +Lawford rested a lean hand on the seat. ‘And have you,’ he asked, ‘not +the least recollection in the world of my face?’ + +‘Now really,’ she said, smiling blandly, ‘is that quite fair? Think of +all the scores and scores of faces in seventy long years; and how very +treacherous memory is. You shall do me the service of _reminding_ me of +one whose name has for the moment escaped me.’ + +‘I am the son of a very old friend of yours, Miss Sinnet,’ said Lawford +quietly ‘a friend that was once your schoolfellow at Brighton.’ + +‘Well, now,’ said the old lady, grasping her umbrella, ‘that is +undoubtedly a clue; but then, you see, all but one of the friends of my +girlhood are dead; and if I have never had the pleasure of meeting her +son, unless there is a decided resemblance, how am I to recollect _her_ +by looking at _him?_’ + +‘There is, I believe, a likeness,’ said Lawford. + +She nodded her great bonnet at him with gentle amusement. ‘You are +insistent in your fancy. Well, let me think again. The last to leave me +was Fanny Urquhart, that was—let me see—last October. Now you are +certainly not Fanny Urquhart’s son,’ she stooped austerely, ‘for she +never had one. Last year, too, I heard that my dear, dear Mrs Jameson +was dead. _Her_ I hadn’t met for many, many years. But, if I may +venture to say so, yours is not a Scottish face; and she not only +married a Scottish husband, but was herself a Dunbar. No, I am still at +a loss.’ + +A miserable strife was in her chance companion’s mind, a strife of +anger and recrimination. He turned his eyes wearily to the fast +declining sun. ‘You will forgive my persistency, but I assure you it is +a matter of life or death to me. Is there no one my face recalls? My +voice?’ + +Miss Sinnet drew her long lips together, her eyebrows lifted with the +faintest perturbation. ‘But he certainly knows my name,’ she said to +herself. She turned once more, and in the still autumnal beauty, +beneath that pale blue arch of evening, these two human beings +confronted one another again. She eyed him blandly, yet with a certain +grave directness. + +‘I don’t really think,’ she said, ‘you _can_ be Mary Lawford’s son. I +could scarcely have mistaken _him_.’ + +Lawford gulped and turned away. He hardly knew what this surge of +feeling meant. Was it hope, despair, resentment; had he caught even the +echo of an unholy joy? His mind for a moment became confused as if in +the tumult of a struggle. He heard himself expostulate, ‘Ah, Miss +Bennett, I fear I set you too difficult a task.’ + +The old lady drew abruptly in, like a trustful and gentle snail into +its shocked house. ‘Bennett, sir; but my name is not Bennett.’ + +And again Lawford accepted the miserable prompting. ‘Not Bennett!... +How can I ever then apologise for so frantic a mistake?’ + +The little old lady took firm hold of her umbrella. She did not answer +him. ‘The likeness, the likeness!’ he began unctuously, and stopped, +for the glance that dwelt fleetingly on him was cold with the +formidable dignity and displeasure of age. He raised his hat and turned +miserably home. He strode on out of the last gold into the blue +twilight. What fantastic foolery of mind was mastering him? He cast a +hurried look over his shoulder at the kindly and offended old figure +sitting there, solitary, on the little seat, in her great bonnet, with +back turned resolutely upon him—the friend of his dead mother who might +have proved in his need a friend indeed to him. And he had by this +insane caprice hopelessly estranged her. + +She would remember this face well enough now, he thought bitterly, and +would take her place among his quiet enemies, if ever the day of +reckoning should come. It was scandalous, it was banal to have abused +her trust and courtesy. Oh, it was hopeless to struggle any more! The +fates were against him. They had played him a trick. He was to be their +transitory sport, as many a better man he could himself recollect had +been before him. He would go home and give in; let Sheila do with him +what she pleased. No one but a lunatic could have acted as he had, with +just that frantic hint of method so remarkable in the insane. + +He left the common. A lamplighter was lighting the lamps. A thin +evening haze was on the air. If only he had stayed at home that fateful +afternoon! Who, what had induced him, enticed him to venture out? And +even with the thought welled up into his mind an intense desire to go +to the old green time-worn churchyard again; to sit there contentedly +alone, where none heeded the completest metamorphosis, down beside the +yew-trees. What a fool he had been. There alone, of course, lay his +only possible chance of recovery. He would go to-morrow. Perhaps Sheila +had not yet discovered his absence; and there would be no difficulty in +repeating so successful a stratagem. + +Remembrance of his miserable mistake, of Miss Sinnet, faintly returned +to him as he swiftly mounted the steps to his porch. Poor old lady. He +would make amends for his discourtesy when he was quite himself again. +She should some day hear, perhaps, his infinitely tragic, infinitely +comic experience from his own lips. He would take her some flowers, +some old keepsake of his mother’s. What would he not do when the old +moods and brains of the stupid Arthur Lawford, whom he had appreciated +so little and so superficially, came back to him. + +He ran up the steps and stopped dead, his hand in his pocket, chilled +and aghast. Sheila had taken his keys. He stood there, dazed and still, +beneath the dim yellow of his own fanlight; and once again that inward +spring flew back. ‘Brazen it out; brazen it out! Knock and ring!’ + +He knocked flamboyantly, and rang. + +There came a quiet step and the door opened. ‘Dr Simon, of course, has +called?’ he inquired suavely. + +‘Yes, sir.’ + +‘Ah, and gone’—as I feared. And Mrs Lawford?’ + +‘I think Mrs Lawford is in, sir.’ + +Lawford put out a detaining hand. ‘We will not disturb her; we will not +disturb her. I can find my way up; oh yes, thank you!’ + +But Ada still palely barred the way. ‘I think, sir,’ she said, ‘Mrs +Lawford would prefer to see you herself; she told me most particularly +“all callers.” And Mr Lawford was not to be disturbed on any account.’ + +‘Disturbed? God forbid!’ said Lawford, but his dark eyes failed to move +these lightest hazel. ‘Well,’ he continued nonchalantly, +‘perhaps—perhaps it—_would_ be as well if Mrs Lawford should know that +I am here. No, thank you, I won’t come in. Please go and tell—’ But +even as the maid turned to obey, Sheila herself appeared at the +dining-room door in hat and veil. + +Lawford hesitated an immeasurable moment. In one swift glance he +perceived the lamplit mystery of evening, beckoning, calling, +pleading—Fly, fly! Home’s here for you. Begin again, begin again. And +there before him in quiet and hostile decorum stood maid and mistress. +He took off his hat and stepped quickly in. + +‘So late, so very late, I fear,’ he began glibly. ‘A sudden call, a +perfectly impossible distance. Shall we disturb him, do you think?’ + +‘Wouldn’t it,’ began Sheila softly, ‘be rather a pity perhaps? Dr Simon +seemed to think.... But, of course, you must decide that.’ + +Ada turned quiet small eyes. + +‘No, no, by no means,’ he almost mumbled. + +And a hard, slow smile passed over Sheila’s face. ‘Excuse me one +moment,’ she said; ‘I will see if he is awake.’ She swept swiftly +forward, superb and triumphant, beneath the gaze of those dark, +restless eyes. But so still was home and street that quite distinctly a +clear and youthful laughter was heard, and light footsteps approaching. +Sheila paused. Ada, in the act of closing the door, peered out. ‘Miss +Alice, ma’am,’ she said. + +And in this infinitesimal advantage of time Dr Ferguson had seized his +vanishing opportunity, and was already swiftly mounting the stairs. Mrs +Lawford stood with veil half raised and coldly smiling lips and, as if +it were by pre-arrangement, her daughter’s laughing greeting from the +garden, and from the landing above her, a faint ‘Ah, and how are we +now?’ broke out simultaneously. And Ada, silent and discreet, had +thrown open the door again to the twilight and to the young people +ascending the steps. + +Lawford was still sitting on his bed before a cold and ashy hearth when +Sheila knocked at the door. + +‘Yes?’ he said; ‘who’s there?’ No answer followed. He rose with a +shuddering sigh and turned the key. His wife entered. + +‘That little exhibition of finesse was part of our agreement, I +suppose?’ + +‘I say—’ began Lawford. + +‘To creep out in my absence like a thief, and to return like a +mountebank; that was part of our compact?’ + +‘I say,’ he stubbornly began again, ‘did you _wire_ for Alice?’ + +‘Will you please answer my question? Am I to be a mere catspaw in your +intrigues, in this miserable masquerade before the servants? To set the +whole place ringing with the name of a doctor that doesn’t exist, and a +bedridden patient that slips out of the house with his bedroom key in +his pocket! Are you aware that Ada has been hammering at your door +every half-hour of your absence? Are you aware of that? How much,’ she +continued in a low, bitter voice, ‘how much should I offer for her +discretion?’ + +‘Who was that with Alice?’ inquired the same toneless voice. + +‘I refuse to be ignored. I refuse to be made a child of. Will you +please answer me?’ + +Lawford turned. ‘Look here, Sheila,’ he began heavily, ‘what about +Alice? If you wired: well, it’s useless to say anything more. But if +you didn’t, I ask you just this one thing. Don’t tell her!’ + +‘Oh, I perfectly appreciate a father’s natural anxiety.’ + +Her husband drew up his shoulders as if to receive a blow. ‘Yes, yes,’ +he said, ‘but you won’t?’ + +The sound of a young laughing voice came faintly up from below. ‘How +did Jimmie Fortescue know she was coming home to-day?’ + +‘Will you not inquire of Jimmie Fortescue for yourself?’ + +‘Oh, what is the use of sneering?’ began the dull voice again. ‘I am +horribly tired, Sheila. And try how you will, you can’t convince me +that you believe for a moment that I am not myself, that you are as +hard as you pretend. An acquaintance, even a friend might be deceived; +but husband and wife—oh no! It isn’t only a man’s face that’s +himself—or even his hands.’ He looked at them, straightened them slowly +out, and buried them in his pockets. ‘All I care about now is Alice. Is +she, or is she not going to be told? I am simply asking you to give her +just a chance.’ + +‘“Simply asking me to give Alice a chance”; now isn’t that really just +a little...?’ + +Lawford slowly shook his head. ‘You know in your heart it isn’t, +Sheila; you understand me quite well, although you persistently pretend +not to. I can’t argue now. I can’t speak up for myself. I am just about +as far down as I can go. It’s only Alice.’ + +‘I see; a lucid interval?’ suggested his wife in a low, trembling +voice. + +‘Yes, yes, if you like,’ said her husband patiently, ‘“a lucid +interval.” Don’t please look at my face like that, Sheila. Think—think +that it’s just lupus, just some horrible disfigurement.’ + +Not much light was in the large room, and there was something so +extraordinarily characteristic of her husband in those stooping +shoulders, in the head hung a little forward, and in the +preternaturally solemn voice, that Sheila had to bend a little over the +bed to catch a glimpse of the sallow and keener face again. She sighed; +and even on her own strained ear her sigh sounded almost like one of +relief. + +‘It’s useless, I know, to ask you anything while you are in this mood,’ +continued Lawford dully; ‘I know that of old.’ + +The white, ringed hands clenched, ‘“Of old!”’ + +‘I didn’t mean anything. Don’t listen to what I say. It’s only—it’s +just Alice knowing, that was all; I mean at once.’ + +‘Don’t for a moment suppose I am not perfectly aware that it is only +Alice you think of. You were particularly anxious about my feelings, +weren’t you? You broke the news to me with the tenderest solicitude. I +am glad our—our daughter shares my husband’s love.’ + +‘Look here,’ said Lawford densely, ‘you know that I love you as much as +ever; but with this—as I am; what would be the good of my saying so?’ +Mrs Lawford took a deep breath. + +And a voice called softly at the door, ‘Mother, are you there? Is +father awake? May I come in?’ + +In a flash the memory returned to her; twenty-four hours ago she was +asking that very question of this unspeakable figure that sat +hunched-up before her. + +‘One moment, dear,’ she called. And added in a very low voice, ‘Come +here!’ + +Lawford looked up. ‘What?’ he said. + +‘Perhaps, perhaps,’ she whispered, ‘it isn’t quite so bad.’ + +‘For mercy’s sake, Sheila,’ he said, ‘don’t torture me; tell the poor +child to go away.’ + +She paused. ‘Are you there, Alice? Would you mind, father says, waiting +a little? He is so very tired.’ + +‘Too tired to.... Oh, very well, mother.’ + +Mrs Lawford opened the door, and called after her, ‘Is Jimmie gone?’ + +‘Oh, yes, hours.’ + +‘Where did you meet?’ + +‘I couldn’t get a carriage at the station. He carried my dressing-bag; +I begged him not to. The other’s coming on. You know what Jimmie is. +How very, very lucky I _did_ come home. I don’t know what made me; just +an impulse; they did laugh at me so. Father dear—do speak to me; how +are you now?’ + +Lawford opened his mouth, gulped, and shook his head. + +‘Ssh, dear!’ whispered Sheila, ‘I think he has fallen asleep. I will be +down in a minute.’ Mrs Lawford was about to close the door when Ada +appeared. + +‘If you please, ma’am,’ she said, ‘I have been waiting, as you told me, +to let Dr Ferguson out, but it’s nearly seven now; and the table’s not +laid yet.’ + +‘I really should have thought, Ada,’ Sheila began, then caught back the +angry words, and turned and looked over her shoulder into the room. ‘Do +you think you will need anything more, Dr Ferguson?’ she asked in a +sepulchral voice. + +Again Lawford’s lips moved; again he shook his head. + +‘One moment, Ada,’ she said closing the door. ‘Some more medicine—what +medicine? Quick! She mustn’t suspect.’ + +‘“What medicine?”’ repeated Lawford stolidly. + +‘Oh, vexing, vexing; don’t you _see_ we must send her out? Don’t you +see? What was it you sent to Critchett’s for last night? Tell him +that’s gone: we want more of _that_.’ + +Lawford stared heavily. Oh, yes, yes,’ he said thickly, ‘more of +that....’ + +Sheila, with a shrug of extreme distaste and vexation, hastily opened +the door. ‘Dr Ferguson wants a further supply of the drug which Mr +Critchett made up for Mr Lawford yesterday evening. You had better go +at once, Ada, and please make as much haste as you possibly can.’ + +‘I say, I say,’ began Lawford; but it was too late, the door was shut. + +‘How I detest this wretched falsehood and subterfuge. What could have +induced you....?’ + +‘Yes,’ said her husband, ‘what! I think I’ll be getting to bed again, +Sheila; I forgot I had been ill. And now I do really feel very tired. +But I should like to feel—in spite of this hideous—I should like to +feel we are friends, Sheila.’ + +Sheila almost imperceptibly shuddered, crossed the room, and faced the +still, almost lifeless mask. ‘I spoke,’ she said, in a low, cold, +difficult voice—‘I spoke in a temper this morning. You must try to +understand what a shock it has been to me. Now, I own it frankly, I +know you are—Arthur. But God only knows how it frightens me, +and—and—horrifies me.’ She shut her eyes beneath her veil. They waited +on in silence a while. + +‘Poor boy!’ she said at last, lightly touching the loose sleeve; ‘be +brave; it will all come right, soon. Meanwhile, for Alice’s sake, if +not for mine, don’t give way to—to caprices, and all that. Keep quietly +here, Arthur. And—and forgive my impatience.’ + +He put out his hand as if to touch her. ‘Forgive you!’ he said humbly, +pushing it stubbornly back into his pocket again. ‘Oh, Sheila, the +forgiveness is all on your side. You know _I_ have nothing to forgive.’ +A long silence fell between them. + +‘Then, to-night,’ at last began Sheila wearily, drawing back, ‘we say +nothing to Alice, except that you are too tired—just nervous +prostration—to see her. What we should do without this influenza, I +cannot conceive. Mr Bethany will probably look in on his way home; and +then we can talk it over—we can talk it over again. So long as you are +like this, yourself, in mind, why I—What is it now?’ she broke off +querulously. + +‘If you please, ma’am, Mr Critchett says he doesn’t know Dr Ferguson, +his name’s not in the Directory, and there must be something wrong with +the message, and he’s sorry, but he must have it in writing because +there was more even in the first packet than he ought by rights to +send. What shall I do, if you please?’ + +Still looking at her husband. Sheila listened quietly to the end, and +then, as if in inarticulate disdain, she deliberately shrugged her +shoulders, and went out to play her part unaided. + + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + + +Her husband turned wearily once more, and drawing up a chair sat down +in front of the cold grate. He realised that Sheila thought him as much +of a fool now as she had for the moment thought him an impostor, or +something worse, the night before. That was at least something gained. +He realised, too, in a vague way that the exuberance of mind that had +practically invented Dr Ferguson, and outraged Miss Sinnet, had quite +suddenly flickered out. It was astonishing, he thought, with gaze fixed +innocently on the black coals, that he should ever have done such +things. He detested that kind of ‘rot’; that jaunty theatrical pose so +many men prided their jackdaw brains on. + +And he sat quite still, like a cat at a cranny, listening, as it were, +for the faintest remotest stir that might hint at any return of +this—activity. It was the first really sane moment he had had since the +‘change.’ Whatever it was that had happened at Widderstone was now +distinctly weakening in effect. Why, now, perhaps? He stole a thievish +look over his shoulder at the glass, and cautiously drew finger and +thumb down that beaked nose. Then he really quietly smiled, a smile he +felt this abominable facial caricature was quite unused to, the +superior Lawford smile of guileless contempt for the fanatical, the +fantastic, and the bizarre: _He_ wouldn’t have sat with his feet on the +fender before a burnt-out fire. + +And the animosity of that ‘he,’ uttered only just under his breath, +surprised even himself. It actually did seem as if there were a chance; +if only he kept cool and collected. If the whole mind of a man was bent +on being one thing, surely no power on earth, certainly not on earth, +could for long compel him to look another, any more (followed the +resplendent thought) than vice versa. + +That, in fact, was the trick that had been in fitful fashion played him +since yesterday. Obviously, and apart altogether from his promise to +Sheila, the best possible thing he could do would be to walk quietly +over to Widderstone to-morrow and like a child that has lost a penny, +just make the attempt to reverse the process: look at the graves, read +the inscriptions on the weather-beaten stones, compose himself once +more to sleep on the little seat. + +Magic, witchcraft, possession, and all that—well, Mr Bethany might +prefer to take it on the authority of the Bible if it was his duty. But +it was at least mainly Old Testament stuff, like polygamy, Joshua, and +the ‘unclean beasts.’ The ‘unclean beasts.’ It was simply, as Simon had +said, mainly an affair of the nerves, like Indian jugglery. He had +heard of dozens of such cases, or similar cases. And it was hardly +likely that cases even remotely like his own would be much bragged +about, or advertised. All those mysterious ‘disappearances,’ too, which +one reads about so repeatedly? What of them? Even now, he felt (and +glanced swiftly behind him at the fancy), it would be better to think +as softly as possible, not to hope too openly, certainly not to triumph +in the least degree, just in case of—well—listeners. + +He would wrap up too. And he wouldn’t tell Sheila of the project till +he had come safely back. What an excellent joke it would be to confess +meekly to his escapade, and to be scolded, and then suddenly to reveal +himself. He sat back and gazed with an almost malignant animosity at +the face in the portrait, comely and plump. + +An inarticulate, unfathomable depression rolled back on him, like a +mist out of the sea. He hastily undressed, put watch and door-key and +Critchett’s powder under his pillow, paused, vacantly ruminated, and +then replaced the powder in his waistcoat pocket, said his prayers, and +got shivering to bed. He did not feel hurt at Sheila’s leaving him like +this. So long as she really believed in him. And now—Alice was home. He +listened, trying not to shiver, for her voice; and sometimes heard, he +fancied, the clear note. It was this beastly influenza that made him +feel so cold and lifeless. But all would soon come right—that is, if +only that face, luminous against the floating darkness within, would +not appear the instant he closed his eyes. + +But legions of dreams are Influenza’s allies. He fell into a chill +doze, heard voices innumerable, and one above the rest, shouting them +down, until there fell a lull. And another, as it were, from afar said +quite clearly and distinctly, ‘But surely, my dear, you have heard the +story of the poor old charwoman who talked Greek in her delirium? A +little school French need not alarm us.’ And Lawford opened his eyes +again on Mr Bethany standing at his bed. + +‘Tt, tt! There, I’ve been and waked him. And yet they say men make such +excellent nurses in time of war. But you see, Lawford, what did I tell +you? Wasn’t I now an infallible prophet? Your wife has been giving me a +most glowing account. Quite your old self, she tells me, except for +just this—this touch of facial paralysis. And I think, do you know’ +(the kind old creature stooped over the bed, but still, Lawford noticed +bitterly, still without his spectacles)—‘yes, I really think there is a +decided improvement. Not quite so—drawn. We must make haste slowly. +Wedderburn, you know, believes profoundly in Simon; he pulled his wife +through a dangerous confinement. And here’s pills and tonics and +liniments—a whole chemist’s shop. Oh, we are getting on swimmingly.’ + +Flamelight was flickering in the candled dusk. Lawford turned his head +and saw Sheila’s coiled, beautiful hair in the firelight. + +‘You haven’t told Alice?’ he asked. + +‘My dear good man,’ said Mr Bethany, ‘of course we haven’t. You shall +tell her yourself on Monday. What an incredible tradition it will be! +But you mustn’t worry; you mustn’t even think. And no more of these +jaunts, eh? That Ferguson business—that was too bad. What are we going +to do with the fellow now we have created him? He will come home to +roost—mark my words. And as likely as not down the Vicarage chimney. I +wouldn’t have believed it of you, my dear fellow.’ He beamed, but +looked, none the less, very lean and fagged and depressed. + +‘How did the wedding go off?’ Lawford managed to think of inquiring. + +‘Oh, A1,’ said Mr Bethany. ‘I’ve just been describing it to Alice—the +bride, her bridegroom, mother, aunts, cake, presents, finery, blushes, +tears, and everything that was hers. We’ve been in fits, haven’t we, +Mrs Lawford? And Alice says I’m a Worth in a clerical collar—didn’t +she? And that it’s only Art that has kept me out of an apron. Now look +here; quiet, quiet, quiet; no excitement, no pranks. What is there to +worry about, pray? And now Little Dorrit’s down with influenza too. And +Craik and I will have double work to do. Well, well; good-bye, my dear. +God bless you, Lawford. I can’t tell you how relieved, how unspeakably +relieved I am to find you so much—so much better. Feed him up, my other +dear; body and mind and soul and spirit. And there goes the bell. I +must have a biscuit. I’ve swallowed nothing but a Cupid in plaster of +Paris since breakfast. Goodnight; we shall miss you both—both.’ + +But when Sheila returned, her husband was sunk again into a quiet +sleep, from which not even the many questions she fretted to put to him +seemed weighty enough to warrant his disturbance. + +So when Lawford again opened his eyes he found himself lying wide +awake, clear and refreshed, and eager to get up. But upon the air lay +the still hush of early morning. He tried in vain to catch back sleep +again. A distant shred of dream still floated in his mind, like a cloud +at evening. He rarely dreamed, but certainly something immensely +interesting had but a moment ago eluded him. He sat up and looked at +the clear red cinders and their maze of grottoes. He got out of bed and +peeped through the blinds. To the east and opposite to him gardens and +an apple-orchard lay, and there in strange liquid tranquillity hung the +morning star, and rose, rifling into the dusk of night, the first grey +of dawn. The street beneath its autumn leaves was vacant, charmed, +deserted. + +Hardly since childhood had Lawford seen the dawn unless over his winter +breakfast-table. Very much like a child now he stood gazing out of his +bow-window—the child whom Time’s busy robins had long ago covered over +with the leaves of numberless hours. A vague exultation fumed up into +his brain. Still on the borders of sleep, he unlocked the great +wardrobe and took out an old faded purple and crimson dressing-gown +that had belonged to his grandfather, the chief glory of every +Christmas charade. He pulled the cowl-like hood over his head and +strode majestically over to the looking-glass. + +He looked in there a moment on the strange face, like a child dismayed +at its own excitement, and a fit of sobbing that was half +uncontrollable laughter swept over him. He threw off the hood and +turned once more to the window. Consciousness had flooded back indeed. +What would Sheila have said to see him there? The unearthly beauty and +stillness, and man’s small labours, garden and wall and roof-tree idle +and smokeless in the light of daybreak—there seemed to be some +half-told secret between them. What had life done with him to leave a +reality so clouded? He put on his slippers, and, gently opening the +door, crept with extreme caution up the stairs. At a long, narrow +landing window he confronted a panorama of starry night-gardens, +sloping orchards; and beyond them fields, hills, Orion, the Dogs, in +the clear and cloudless darkness. + +‘My God, how beautiful!’ a voice whispered. And a cock crowed mistily +afar. He stood staring like a child into the wintry brightness of a +pastry-cook’s. Then once more he crept stealthily on. He stooped and +listened at a closed door, until he fancied that above the beating of +his own heart he could hear the breathing of the sleeper within. Then, +taking firm hold of the handle with both hands, he slowly noiselessly +turned it, and peeped in on Alice. + +The moon was long past her faint shining here. The blind was down. And +yet it was not pitch dark. He stood with eyes fixed, waiting. Then he +edged softly forward and knelt down beside the bed. He could hear her +breathing now: long, low, quiet, unhastening—the miracle of life. He +could just dimly discern the darkness of her hair against the pillow. +Some long-sealed spring of tenderness seemed to rise in his heart with +a grief and an ache he had never known before. Here at least he could +find a little peace, a brief pause, however futile and stupid all his +hopes of the night had been. He leant his head on his hands on the +counterpane and refused to think. He felt a quick tremor, a startled +movement, and knew that eyes wide open with fear were striving to +pierce the gloom between them. + +‘There, there, dearest,’ he said in a low whisper, ‘it’s only me, only +me.’ He stroked the narrow hand and gazed into the shadowiness. Her +fingers lay quiet and passive in his, with that strange sense of +immateriality that sleep brings to the body. + +‘You, you!’ she answered with a deep sigh. ‘Oh, dearest, how you +frightened me. What is wrong? why have you come? Are you worse, +dearest, dearest?’ + +He kissed her hand. ‘No, Alice, not worse. I couldn’t sleep, that was +all.’ + +‘Oh, and I came so utterly miserable to bed because you would not see +me. And Mother would tell me only so very little. I didn’t even know +you had been ill.’ She pressed his hand between her own. ‘But this, you +know, is very, very naughty—you will catch cold, you bad thing. What +_would_ Mother say?’ + +‘I think we mustn’t tell her, dear. I couldn’t help it; I felt much I +wanted to see you. I have been rather miserable.’ + +‘Why?’ she said, stroking his hand from wrist to fingertips with one +soft finger. ‘You mustn’t be miserable. You and me have never done such +a thing before; have we? Was it that wretched old Flu?’ + +It was too dark in the little fragrant room even to see her face so +close to his own. And yet he feared. ‘Dr Simon,’ she went on softly, +‘said it was. But isn’t your voice a little hoarse, and it sounds so +melancholy in the dark. And oh’—she squeezed his wrist—‘you have grown +so thin! You do frighten me. Whatever should I do if you were really +ill? And it was so odd, dear. When first I woke I seemed to be still +straining my eyes in a dream, at such a curious, haunting face—not very +nice. I am glad, I am glad you were here.’ + +‘What was the dream-face like?’ came the muttered question. + +‘Dark and sharp, and rather dwelling eyes; you know those long faces +one sees in dreams: like a hawk, like a conjuror’s.’ + +Like a conjuror’s!—it was the first unguarded and ungarbled criticism. +‘Perhaps, dear, if you find my voice different, and my hand shrunk up, +you will find my face changed, too—like a conjuror’s.... What then?’ + +She laughed gaily and tenderly. ‘You silly silly; I should love you +more than ever. Your hands are icy cold. I can’t warm them nohow.’ + +Lawford held tight his daughter’s hand. ‘You do love me, Alice? You +would not turn against me, whatever happened? Ah, you shall see, you +shall see.’ A sudden burning hope sprang up in him. Surely when all was +well again, these last few hours would not have been spent in vain. +Like the shadow of death they had been, against whose darkness the +green familiar earth seems beautiful as the plains of paradise. Had he +but realized before how much he loved her—what years of life had been +wasted in leaving it all unsaid! He came back from his reverie to find +his hand wet with her tears. He stroked her hair, and touched gently +her eyelids without speaking. + +‘You will let me come in to-morrow?’ she pleaded; ‘you won’t keep me +out?’ + +‘Ah, but, dear, you must remember your mother. She gets so anxious, and +every word the doctor says is law. How would you like me to come again +like this, perhaps?—like Santa Claus?’ + +‘You know how I love having you,’ she said, and stopped. ‘But—but...’ +He leaned closer. ‘Yes, yes, come,’ she said, clutching his hand and +hiding her eyes; ‘it is only my dream—that horrible, dwelling face in +the dream; it frightened me so.’ + +Lawford rose very slowly from his knees. He could feel in the dark his +brows drawn down; there came a low, sullen beating on his ear; he saw +his face as it were in dim outline against the dark. Rage and rebellion +surged up in him; even his love could be turned to bitterness. Well, +two could play at any game! Alice sprang up in bed and caught his +sleeve. ‘Dearest, dearest, you must not be angry with me now!’ + +He flung himself down beside the bed. Anger, resentment died away. ‘You +are all I have left,’ he said. + +He stole back, as he had come, in the clear dawn to his bedroom. + +It was not five yet. He put a few more coals on his fire and blew out +the night-light, and lay down. But it was impossible to rest, to remain +inactive. He would go down and search for that first volume of Quain. +Hallucination, Influenza, Insanity—why, Sheila must have purposely +mislaid it. A rather formidable figure he looked, descending the stairs +in the grey dusk of daybreak. The breakfast-room was at the back of the +house. He tilted the blind, and a faint light flowed in from the +changing colours of the sky. He opened the glass door of the little +bookcase to the right of the window, and ran eye and finger over the +few rows of books. But as he stood there with his back to the room, +just as the shadow of a bird’s wing floats across the moonlight of a +pool, he became suddenly conscious that something, somebody had passed +across the doorway, and in passing had looked in on him. + +He stood motionless, listening; but no sound broke the morning +slumbrousness, except the faraway warbling of a thrush in the first +light. So sudden and transitory had been the experience that it seemed +now to be illusory; yet it had so caught him up, it had with so furtive +and sinister a quietness broken in on his solitude, that for a moment +he dared not move. A cold, indefinite sensation stole over him that he +was being watched; that some dim, evil presence was behind him biding +its time, patient and stealthy, with eyes fixed unmovingly on him where +he stood. But, watch and wait as silently as he might, only the day +broadened at the window, and at last a narrow ray of sunlight stole +trembling up into the dusky bowl of the sky. + +At any rate Quain was found, with all the ills of life, from A to I; +and Lawford turned back to his bondage with the book under his arm. + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + + +The Sabbath, pale with September sunshine, and monotonous with chiming +bells, had passed languidly away. Dr Simon had come and gone, +optimistic and urbane, yet with a faint inward dissatisfaction over a +patient behind whose taciturnity a hint of mockery and subterfuge +seemed to lurk. Even Mrs Lawford had appeared to share her husband’s +reticence. But Dr Simon had happened on other cases in his experience +where tact was required rather than skill, and time than medicine. + +The voices and footsteps, even the frou-frou_ of worshippers going to +church, the voices and footsteps of worshippers returning from church, +had floated up to the patient’s open window. Sunlight had drawn across +his room in one pale beam, and vanished. A few callers had called. +Hothouse flowers, waxen and pale, had been left with messages of +sympathy. Even Dr Critchett had respectfully and discreetly made +inquiries on his way home from chapel. + +Lawford had spent most of his time in pacing to and fro in his soft +slippers. The very monotony had eased his mind. Now and again he had +lain motionless, with his face to the ceiling. He had dozed and had +awakened, cold and torpid with dream. He had hardly been aware of the +process, but every hour had done something, it seemed, towards +clarifying his point of view. A consciousness had begun to stir in him +that was neither that of the old, easy Lawford, whom he had never been +fully aware of before, nor of this strange ghostly intelligence that +haunted the hawklike, restless face, and plucked so insistently at his +distracted nerves. He had begun in a vague fashion to be aware of them +both, could in a fashion discriminate between them, almost as if there +really were two spirits in stubborn conflict within him. It would, of +course, wear him down in time. There could be only one end to such a +struggle—_the_ end. + +All day he had longed for freedom, on and on, with craving for the open +sky, for solitude, for green silence, beyond these maddening walls. +This heedful silken coming and going, these Sunday voices, this +reiterant yelp of a single peevish bell—would they never cease? And +above all, betwixt dread and an almost physical greed, he hungered for +night. He sat down with elbows on knees and head on his hands, thinking +of night, its secrecy, its immeasurable solitude. + +His eyelids twitched; the fire before him had for an instant gone black +out. He seemed to see slow-gesturing branches, grass stooping beneath a +grey and wind-swept sky. He started up; and the remembrance of the +morning returned to him—the glassy light, the changing rays, the +beaming gilt upon the useless books. Now, at last, at the windows; +afternoon had begun to wane. And when Sheila brought up his tea, as if +Chance had heard his cry, she entered in hat and stole. She put down +the tray, and paused at the glass, looking across it out of the window. + +‘Alice says you are to eat every one of those delicious sandwiches, and +especially the tiny omelette. You have scarcely touched anything +to-day, Arthur. I am a poor one to preach, I am afraid; but you know +what that will mean—a worse breakdown still. You really must try to +think of—of us all.’ + +‘Are you going to church?’ he asked in a low voice. + +‘Not, of course, if you would prefer not. But Dr Simon advised me most +particularly to go out at least once a day. We must remember, this is +not the beginning of your illness. Long-continued anxiety, I suppose, +does tell on one in time. Anyhow, he said that I looked worried and +run-down. I _am_ worried. Let us both try for each other’s sakes, or +even if only for Alice’s, to—to do all we can. I must not harass you; +but is there any—do you see the slightest change of any kind?’ + +‘You always look pretty, Sheila; to-night you look prettier: _that_ is +the only change, I think.’ + +Mrs Lawford’s attitude intensified in its stillness. ‘Now, speaking +quite frankly, what is it in you suggests these remarks at such a time? +That’s what baffles me. It seems so childish, so needlessly blind.’ + +‘I am very sorry, Sheila, to be so childish. But I’m not, say what you +like, blind. You _are_ pretty: I’d repeat it if I was burning at the +stake.’ + +Sheila lowered her eyes softly on to the rich-toned picture in the +glass. ‘Supposing,’ she said, watching her lips move, ‘supposing—of +course, I know you are getting better and all that—but supposing you +don’t change back as Mr Bethany thinks, what will you do? Honestly, +Arthur, when I think over it calmly, the whole tragedy comes back on me +with such a force it sweeps me off my feet; I am for the moment +scarcely my own mistress. What would you do?’ + +‘I think, Sheila,’ replied a low, infinitely weary voice, ‘I think I +should marry again.’ It was the same wavering, faintly ironical voice +that had slightly discomposed Dr Simon that same morning. + +‘“Marry again”!’ exclaimed incredulously the full lips in the +looking-glass. ‘Who?’ + +‘_You_, dear!’ + +Sheila turned softly round, conscious in a most humiliating manner that +she had ever so little flushed. + +Her husband was pouring out his tea, unaware, apparently, of her change +of position. She watched him curiously. In spite of all her reason, of +her absolute certainty, she wondered even again for a moment if this +really could be Arthur. And for the first time she realised the power +and mastery of that eager and far too hungry face. Her mind seemed to +pause, fluttering in air, like a bird in the wind. She hastened rather +unsteadily to the door. + +‘Will you want anything more, do you think, for an hour?’ she asked. + +Her husband looked up over his little table. ‘Is Alice going with you?’ + +‘Oh yes; poor child, she looks so pale and miserable. We are going to +Mrs Sherwin’s, and then on to Church. You will lock your door?’ + +‘Yes, I will lock my door.’ + +‘And I do hope Arthur—nothing rash!’ + +A change, that seemed almost the effect of actual shadow, came over his +face. ‘I wish you could stay with me,’ he said slowly. ‘I don’t think +you have any idea what—what I go through.’ + +It was as if a child had asked on the verge of terror for a candle in +the dark. But an hour’s terror is better than a lifetime of timidity. +Sheila sighed. + +‘I think,’ she said, ‘I too might say that. But there; giving way will +do nothing for either of us. I shall be gone only for an hour, or two +at the most. And I told Mr Bethany I should have to come out before the +sermon: it’s only Mr Craik.’ + +‘But why Mrs Sherwin? She’d worm a secret out of one’s grave.’ + +‘It’s useless to discuss that, Arthur; you have always consistently +disliked my friends. It’s scarcely likely that you would find any +improvement in them now.’ + +‘Oh, well—’ he began. But the door was already closed. + +‘Sheila!’ he called in a burst of anger. + +‘Well, Arthur?’ + +‘You have taken my latchkey.’ + +Sheila came hastily in again. ‘Your latchkey?’ + +‘I am going out.’ + +‘“Going out!”—you will not be so mad, so criminal; and after your +promise!’ + +He stood up. ‘It is useless to argue. If I do not go out, I shall +certainly go mad. As for criminal—why, that’s a woman’s word. Who on +earth is to know me?’ + +‘It is of no consequence, then, that the servants are already gossiping +about this impossible Dr Ferguson; that you are certain to be seen +either going or returning; that Alice is bound to discover that you are +well enough to go out, and yet not even enough to say good-night to +your own daughter—oh, it’s monstrous, it’s a frantic, a heartless thing +to do!’ Her voice vaguely suggested tears. + +Lawford eyed her coldly and stubbornly—thinking of the empty room he +would leave awaiting his return, its lamp burning, its fire-flames +shining. It was almost a physical discomfort, this longing unspeakable +for the twilight, the green secrecy and the silence of the graves. +‘Keep them out of the way,’ he said in a low voice; ‘it will be dark +when I come in.’ His hardened face lit up. ‘It’s useless to attempt to +dissuade me.’ + +‘Why must you always be hurting me? why do you seem to delight in +trying to estrange me?’ Husband and wife faced each other across the +clear-lit room. He did not answer. + +‘For the last time,’ she said in a quiet, hard voice, ‘I ask you not to +go.’ + +He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Ask me not to come back,’ he said; ‘that’s +nearer your hope.’ He turned his face to the fire. Without moving he +heard her go out, return, pause, and go out again. And when he +deliberately wheeled round in his chair the little key lay conspicuous +there on the counterpane. + + + + +CHAPTER NINE + + +The last light of sunset lay in the west; and a sullen wrack of cloud +was mounting into the windless sky when Lawford entered the country +graveyard again by its dark weather-worn lych-gate. The old stone +church with its square tower stood amid trees, its eastern window +faintly aglow with crimson and purple. He could hear a steady, rather +nasal voice through its open lattices. But the stooping stones and the +cypresses were out of sight of its porch. He would not be seen down +there. He paused a moment, however; his hat was drawn down over his +eyes; he was shivering. Far over the harvest fields showed a growing +pallor in the sky. He would have the moon to go home by. + +‘Home!’—these trees, this tongueless companionship, this heavy winelike +air, this soundless turf—these in some obscure desolate fashion seemed +far rather really home. His eyes wandered towards the fading crimson. +And with that on his right hand he began softly, almost on tiptoe, +descending the hill. It seemed to him that the steady eyes of the dead +were watching him in his slow progress. The air was echoing with little +faint, clear calls. He turned and snapped his fingers at a robin that +was stalking him with its stony twittering from bush to bush. + +But when after some little time he actually came out of the narrow +avenue and looked down, his heart misgave him, for some one was already +sitting there on his low and solitary seat beneath the cypresses. He +stood hesitating, gazing steadily and yet half vacantly at the +motionless figure, and in a while a face was lifted in his direction, +and undisconcerted eyes calmly surveyed him. + +‘I am afraid,’ called Lawford rather nervously—‘I hope I am not +intruding?’ + +‘Not at all, not at all,’ said the stranger. ‘I have no privileges +here; at least as yet.’ + +Lawford again hesitated, then slowly advanced. ‘It’s astonishingly +quiet and beautiful,’ he said. + +The stranger turned his head to glance over the fields. ‘Yes, it is, +very,’ he replied. There was the faintest accent, a little drawl of +unfriendliness in the remark. + +‘You often sit here?’ Lawford persisted. + +The stranger raised his eyebrows. ‘Oh yes, often.’ He smiled. ‘It is my +own modest fashion of attending divine service. The congregation is +rapt.’ + +‘_My_ visits,’ said Lawford, ‘have been very few—in fact, so far as I +know, I have only once been here before.’ + +‘I envy you the novelty.’ There was again the same faint unmistakable +antagonism in voice and attitude; and yet so deep was the relief in +talking to a fellow creature who hadn’t the least suspicion of anything +unusual in his appearance that Lawford was extremely disinclined to +turn back. He made another effort—for conversation with strangers had +always been a difficulty to him—and advanced towards the seat. ‘You +mustn’t please let me intrude upon you,’ he said, ‘but really I am very +interested in this queer old place. Perhaps you would tell me something +of its history?’ He sat down. His companion moved slowly to the other +side of the broken gravestone. + +‘To tell you the truth,’ he replied, picking his way as it were from +word to word, ‘it’s “history,” as people call it, does not interest me +in the least. After all, it’s not _when_ a thing is, but _what_ it is, +that much matters. What this is’—he glanced, with head bent, across the +shadowy stones, ‘is pretty evident. Of course, age has its charms.’ + +‘And is this very old?’ + +‘Oh yes, it’s old right enough, as things go; but even age, perhaps, is +mainly an affair of the imagination. There’s a tombstone near that +little old hawthorn, and there are two others side by side under the +wall, still even legibly late seventeenth century. That’s pretty good +weathering.’ He smiled faintly. ‘Of course, the church itself is +centuries older, drenched with age. But she’s still sleep-walking while +these old tombstones dream. Glow-worms and crickets are not such bad +bedfellows.’ + +‘What interested me most, I think,’ said Lawford haltingly, ‘was this.’ +He pointed with his stick to the grave at his feet. + +‘Ah, yes, Sabathier’s,’ said the stranger; ‘I know his peculiar history +almost by heart.’ + +Lawford found himself staring with unusual concentration into the +rather long and pale face. ‘Not, I suppose,’ he resumed faintly—‘not, I +suppose, beyond what’s there.’ + +His companion leant his hand on the old stooping tombstone. ‘Well, you +know, there’s a good deal there’—he stooped over—‘if you read between +the lines. Even if you don’t.’ + +‘A suicide,’ said Lawford, under his breath. + +‘Yes, a suicide; that’s why our Christian countrymen have buried him +outside of the fold. Dead or alive, they try to keep the wolf out.’ + +‘Is this, then, unconsecrated ground?’ said Lawford. + +‘Haven’t you noticed,’ drawled the other, ‘how green the grass grows +down here, and how very sharp are poor old Sabathier’s thorns? Besides, +he was a stranger, and they—kept him out.’ + +‘But, surely,’ said Lawford, ‘was it so entirely a matter of choice—the +laws of the Church? If he did kill himself, he did.’ + +The stranger turned with a little shrug. ‘I don’t suppose it’s a matter +of much consequence to _him_. I fancied I was his only friend. May I +venture to ask why you are interested in the poor old thing?’ + +Lawford’s mind was as calm and shallow as a millpond. ‘Oh, a rather +unusual thing happened to me here,’ he said. ‘You say you often come?’ + +‘Often,’ said the stranger rather curtly. + +‘Has anything—ever—occurred?’ + +‘“Occurred?”’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘I wish it had. I come here +simply, as I have said, because it’s quiet; because I prefer the +company of those who never answer me back, and who do not so much as +condescend to pay me the least attention.’ He smiled and turned his +face towards the quiet fields. + +Lawford, after a long pause, lifted his eyes. ‘Do you think,’ he said +softly, ‘it is possible one ever could?’ + +‘“One ever could?”’ + +‘Answer back?’ + +There was a low rotting wall of stone encompassing Sabathier’s grave; +on this the stranger sat down. He glanced up rather curiously at his +companion. ‘Seldom the time and the place and the _revenant_ +altogether. The thought has occurred to others,’ he ventured to add. + +‘Of course, of course,’ said Lawford eagerly. ‘But it is an absolutely +new one to me. I don’t mean that I have never had such an idea, just in +one’s own superficial way; but’—he paused and glanced swiftly into the +fast-thickening twilight—‘I wonder: are they, do you think, really, all +quite dead?’ + +‘Call and see!’ taunted the stranger softly. + +‘Ah, yes, I know,’ said Lawford. ‘But I believe in the resurrection of +the body; that is what we say; and supposing, when a man dies—supposing +it was most frightfully against one’s will; that one hated the awful +inaction that death brings, shutting a poor devil up like a child +kicking against the door in a dark cupboard; one might surely one +might—just quietly, you know, try to get out? wouldn’t you?’ he added. + +‘And, surely,’ he found himself beginning gently to argue again, +‘surely, what about, say, him?’ He nodded towards the old and broken +grave that lay between them. + +‘What, Sabathier?’ the other echoed, laying his hand upon the stone. + +And a sheer enormous abyss of silence seemed to follow the unanswerable +question. + +‘He was a stranger; it says so. Good God!’ said Lawford, ‘how he must +have wanted to get home! He killed himself, poor wretch, think of the +fret and fever he must have been in—just before. Imagine it.’ + +‘But it might, you know,’ suggested the other with a smile—‘might have +been sheer indifference.’ + +‘“Nicholas Sabathier, Stranger to this parish”—no, no,’ said Lawford, +his heart beating as if it would choke him, ‘I don’t fancy it was +indifference.’ + +It was almost too dark now to distinguish the stranger’s features but +there seemed a faint suggestion of irony in his voice. ‘And how do you +suppose your angry naughty child would set about it? It’s narrow +quarters; how would he begin?’ + +Lawford sat quite still. ‘You say—I hope I am not detaining you—you say +you have come here, sat here often, on this very seat; have you ever +had—have you ever fallen asleep here?’ + +‘Why do you ask?’ inquired the other curiously. + +‘I was only wondering,’ said Lawford. He was cold and shivering. He +felt instinctively it was madness to sit on here in the thin gliding +mist that had gathered in swathes above the grass, milk-pale in the +rising moon. The stranger turned away from him. + +‘“For in that sleep of death what dreams may come must give us pause,”’ +he said slowly, with a little satirical catch on the last word. ‘What +did _you_ dream?’ + +Lawford glanced helplessly about him. The moon cast lean grey beams of +light between the cypresses. But to his wide and wandering eyes it +seemed that a radiance other than hers haunted these mounds and leaning +stones. ‘Have you ever noticed it?’ he said, putting out his hand +towards his unknown companion; ‘this stone is cracked from head to +foot?... But there’—he rose stiff and chilled—‘I am afraid I have bored +you with my company. You came here for solitude, and I have been trying +to convince you that we are surrounded with witnesses. You will forgive +my intrusion?’ There was a kind of old-fashioned courtesy in his manner +that he himself was dimly aware of. He held out his hand. + +‘I hope you will think nothing of the kind,’ said the other earnestly; +‘how could it be in any sense an intrusion? It’s the old story of +Bluebeard. And I confess I too should very much like a peep into his +cupboard. Who wouldn’t? But there, it’s merely a matter of time, I +suppose.’ He paused, and together they slowly ascended the path already +glimmering with a heavy dew. At the porch they paused once more. And +now it was the stranger that held out his hand. + +‘Perhaps,’ he said, ‘you will give me the pleasure of some day +continuing our talk. As for our friend below, it so happens that I +_have_ managed to pick up a little more of his history than the sexton +seems to have heard of—if you would care some time or other to share +it. I live only at the foot of the hill, not half a mile distant. +Perhaps you could spare the time now?’ + +Lawford took out his watch, ‘You are really very kind,’ he said. ‘But, +perhaps—well, whatever that history may be, I think you would agree +that mine is even—but, there, I’ve talked too much about myself +already. Perhaps to-morrow?’ + +‘Why, to-morrow, then,’ said his companion. ‘It’s a flat wooden house, +on the left-hand side. Come at any time of the evening’; he paused +again and smiled—‘the third house after the Rectory, which is marked up +on the gate. My name is Herbert—Herbert Herbert to be precise.’ + +Lawford took out his pocket-book and a card. ‘Mine,’ he said, handing +it gravely to his companion. ‘is Lawford—at least...’ It was really the +first time that either had seen the other’s face at close quarters and +clear-lit; and on Lawford’s a moon almost at the full shone dazzlingly. +He saw an expression—dismay, incredulity, overwhelming +astonishment—start suddenly into the dark, rather indifferent eyes. + +‘What is it?’ he cried, hastily stooping close. + +‘Why,’ said the other, laughing and turning away, ‘I think the moon +must have bewitched me too.’ + + + + +CHAPTER TEN + + +Lawford listened awhile before opening his door. He heard voices in the +dining-room. A light shone faintly between the blinds of his bedroom. +He very gently let himself in, and unheard, unseen, mounted the stairs. +He sat down in front of the fire, tired out and bitterly cold in spite +of his long walk home. But his mind was wearier even than his body. He +tried in vain to catch up the thread of his thoughts. He only knew for +certain that so far as his first hope and motives had gone his errand +had proved entirely futile. ‘How could I possibly fall asleep with that +fellow talking there?’ he had said to himself angrily; yet knew in his +heart that their talk had driven every other idea out of his mind. He +had not yet even glanced into the glass. His every thought was vainly +wandering round and round the one curious hint that had drifted in, but +which he had not yet been able to put into words. + +Supposing, though, that he had really fallen into a deep sleep, with +none to watch or spy—what then? However ridiculous that idea, it was +not more ridiculous, more incredible than the actual fact. If he had +remained there, he might, it was just possible that he would by now, +have actually awakened just his own familiar every-day self again. And +the thought of that—though he hardly realised its full import—actually +did send him on tip-toe for a glance that more or less effectually set +the question at rest. And there looked out at him, it seemed, the same +dark sallow face that had so much appalled him only two nights +ago—expressionless, cadaverous, with shadowy hollows beneath the +glittering eyes. And even as he watched it, its lips, of their own +volition, drew together and questioned him—‘Whose?’ + +He was not to be given much leisure, however, for fantastic reveries +like this. As he leaned his head on his hands, gladly conscious that he +could not possibly bear this incessant strain for long, Sheila opened +the door. He started up. + +‘I wish you would knock,’ he said angrily; ‘you talk of quiet; you tell +me to rest, and think; and here you come creeping and spying on me as +if I was a child in a nursery. I refuse to be watched and guarded and +peeped on like this.’ He knew that his hands were trembling, that he +could not keep his eyes fixed, that his voice was nearly inarticulate. + +Sheila drew in her lips. ‘I have merely come to tell you, Arthur, that +Mr Bethany has brought Mr Danton in to supper. He agrees with me it +really would be advisable to take such a very old and prudent and +practical friend into our confidence. You do nothing I ask of you. I +simply cannot bear the burden of this incessant anxiety. Look, now, +what your night walk has done for you! You look positively at death’s +door.’ + +‘What—what an instinct you have for the right word,’ said Lawford +softly. ‘And Danton, of all people in the world! It was surely rather a +curious, a thoughtless choice. Has he had supper?’ + +‘Why do you ask?’ + +‘He won’t believe: too—bloated.’ + +‘I think,’ said Sheila indignantly, ‘it is hardly fair to speak of a +very old and a very true friend of mine in such—well, vulgar terms as +that. Besides, Arthur, as for believing—without in the least desiring +to hurt your feelings—I must candidly warn you, some people won’t.’ + +‘Come along,’ said Lawford, with a faint gust of laughter; ‘let’s see.’ + +They went quickly downstairs, Sheila with less dignity, perhaps, than +she had been surprised into since she had left a slimmer girlhood +behind. She swept into the gaze of the two gentlemen standing together +on the hearthrug; and so was caught, as it were, between a rain of +conflicting glances, for her husband had followed instantly, and stood +now behind her, stooping a little, and with something between contempt +and defiance confronting an old fat friend, whom that one brief +challenging instant had congealed into a condition of passive and +immovable hostility. + +Mr Danton composed his chin in his collar, and deliberately turned +himself towards his companion. His small eyes wandered, and +instantaneously met and rested on those of Mrs Lawford. + +‘Arthur thought he would prefer to come down and see you himself.’ + +‘You take such formidable risks, Lawford,’ said Mr Bethany in a dry, +difficult voice. + +‘Am I really to believe,’ Danton began huskily. ‘I am sure, Bethany, +you will—My dear Mrs Lawford!’ said he, stirring vaguely, glancing +restlessly. + +‘It was not my wish, Vicar, to come at all,’ said a voice from the +doorway. ‘To tell you the truth, I am too tired to care a jot either +way. And’—he lifted a long arm—‘I must positively refuse to produce the +least, the remotest proof that I am not, so far as I am personally +aware, even the Man in the Moon. Danton at heart was always an +incorrigible sceptic. Aren’t you, T. D.? You pride your dear old brawn +on it in secret?’ + +‘I really—’ began Danton in a rich still voice. + +‘Oh, but you know you are,’ drawled on the slightly hesitating +long-drawn syllables; ‘it’s your parochial métier_. Firm, unctuous, +subtle, scepticism; and to that end your body flourishes. You were born +fat; you became fat; and fat, my dear Danton, has been deliberately +thrust on you—in layers! Lampreys! You’ll perish of surfeit some day, +of sheer Dantonism. And fat, postmortem, Danton. Oh, what a basting’s +there!’ + +Mr Bethany, with a convulsive effort, woke. He turned swiftly on Mrs +Lawford. ‘Why, why, could you not have seen?’ he cried. + +‘It’s no good, Vicar. She’s all sheer Laodicean. Blow hot, blow cold. +North, south, east, west—to have a weathercock for a wife is to marry +the wind. There’s nothing to be got from poor Sheila but...’ + +‘Lawford!’ the little man’s voice was as sharp as the crack of a whip; +‘I forbid it. Do you hear me? I forbid it. Some self-command; my dear +good fellow, remember, remember it’s only the will, the will that keeps +us breathing.’ + +Lawford peered as if out of a gathering dusk, that thickened and +flickered with shadows before his eyes. ‘What’s he mean, then,’ he +muttered huskily, ‘coming here with his black, still carcase—peeping, +peeping—what’s he mean, I say?’ There was a moment’s silence. Then with +lifted brows and wide eyes that to every one of his three witnesses +left an indelible memory of clear and wolfish light within their glassy +pupils, he turned heavily, and climbed back to his solitude. + +‘I suppose,’ began Danton, with an obvious effort to disentangle +himself from the humiliation of the moment, ‘I suppose he +was—wandering?’ + +‘Bless me, yes,’ said Mr Bethany cordially—‘fever. We all know what +that means.’ + +‘Yes,’ said Danton, taking refuge in Mrs Lawford’s white and intent +gaze. + +‘Just think, think, Danton—the awful, incessant strain of such an +ordeal. Think for an instant what such a thing _means_!’ + +Danton inserted a plump, white finger between collar and chin. ‘Oh yes. +But—eh?—needlessly abusive? I never _said_ I disbelieved him.’ + +‘Do you?’ said Mrs Lawford’s voice. + +He poised himself, as if it were, on the monolithic stability of his +legs. ‘Eh?’ he said. + +Mr Bethany sat down at the table. ‘I rather feared some such temporary +breakdown as this, Danton. I think I foresaw it. And now, just while we +are all three alone here together in friendly conclave, wouldn’t it be +as well, don’t you think, to confront ourselves with the difficulties? +I know—we all know, that that poor half-demented creature _is_ Arthur +Lawford. This morning he was as sane, as lucid as I hope I am now. An +awful calamity has suddenly fallen upon him—this change. I own frankly +at the first sheer shock it staggered me as I think for the moment it +has staggered you. But when I had seen the poor fellow face to face, +heard him talk, and watched him there upstairs in the silence stir and +awake and come up again to his trouble out of his sleep. I had no more +doubt in my own mind and heart that he was he than I have in my mind +that I—am I. We do in some mysterious way, you’ll own at once, grow so +accustomed, so inured, if you like, to each other’s faces (masks though +they be) that we hardly realise we see them when we are speaking +together. And yet the slightest, the most infinitesimal change is +instantly apparent.’ + +‘Oh yes, Vicar; but you see—’ + +Mr Bethany raised a small lean hand: ‘One moment, please. I have heard +Lawford’s own account. Conscious or unconscious, he has been through +some terrific strain, some such awful conflict with the unseen powers +that we—thank God!—have only read about, and never perhaps, until death +is upon us, shall witness for ourselves. What more likely, more +inevitable than that such a thing should leave its scar, its cloud, its +masking shadow?—call it what you will. A smile can turn a face we dread +into a face we’d die for. Some experience, which would be nothing but a +hideous cruelty and outrage to ask too closely about—one, perhaps, +which he could, even if he would, poor fellow, give no account of—has +put him temporarily at the world’s mercy. They made him a nine days’ +wonder, a byword. And that, my dear Danton, is just where we come in. +We know the man himself; and it is to be our privilege to act as a +buffer-state, to be intermediaries between him and the rest of this +deadly, craving, sheepish world—for the time being; oh yes, just for +the time being. Other and keener and more knowledgeable minds than mine +or yours will some day bring him back to us again. We don’t attempt to +explain; we can’t. We simply believe.’ + +But Danton merely continued to stare, as if into the quiet of an +aquarium. + +‘My dear good Danton,’ persisted Mr Bethany with cherubic patience, +‘how old are you?’ + +‘I don’t see quite...’ smiled Danton with recovered ease, and rapidly +mobilising forces. ‘Excuse the confidence, Mrs Lawford, I’m +forty-three.’ + +‘Good,’ said Mr Bethany; ‘and I’m seventy-one, and this child here’—he +pointed an accusing finger at Sheila—is youth perpetual. So,’ he +briskly brightened, ‘say, between us we’re six score all told. Are +we—can _we_, deliberately, with this mere pinch of years at our command +out of the wheeling millions that have gone—can we say, “This is +impossible,” to any single phenomenon? _Can_ we?’ + +‘No, we can’t, of course,’ said Danton formidably. ‘Not finally. That’s +all very well, but’—he paused, and nodded, nodding his round head +upward as if towards the inaudible overhead, ‘I suppose he can’t +_hear?_’ + +Mr Bethany rose cheerfully. ‘All right, Danton; I am afraid you are +exactly what the poor fellow in his delirium solemnly asseverated. And, +jesting apart, it is in delirium that we tell our sheer, plain, +unadulterated truth: you’re a nicely covered sceptic. Personally, I +refuse to discuss the matter. Mere dull, stubborn prejudice; bigotry, +if you like. I will only remark just this—that Mrs Lawford and I, in +our inmost hearts, _know_. You, my dear Danton, forgive the freedom, +merely incredulously grope. Faith versus Reason—that prehistoric +Armageddon. Some day, and a day not far distant either, Lawford will +come back to us. This—this shutter will be taken down as abruptly as by +some inconceivably drowsy heedlessness of common Nature it has been put +up. He’ll win through; and of his own sheer will and courage. But now, +because I ask it, and this poor child here entreats it, you will say +nothing to a living soul about the matter, say, till Friday? What +step-by-step creatures we are, to be sure! I say Friday because it will +be exactly a week then. And what’s a week?—to Nature scarcely the +unfolding of a rose. But still, Friday be it. Then, if nothing has +occurred, we will, we shall _have_ to call a friendly gathering, we +shall be compelled to have a friendly consultation.’ + +‘I’m not, I hope, a brute, Bethany,’ said Danton apologetically; ‘but, +honestly, speaking for myself, simply as a man of the world, it’s a big +risk to be taking on—what shall we call it?—on mere intuition. +Personally, and even in a court of law—though Heaven forbid it ever +reaches that stage—personally, I could swear that the fellow that stood +abusing me there, in that revolting fashion, was not Lawford. It would +be easier even to believe in him, if there were not that—that glaze, +that shocking simulation of the man himself, the very man. But then, I +am a sceptic; I own it. And ‘pon my word, Mrs Lawford, there’s plenty +of room for sceptics in a world like this.’ + +‘Very well,’ said Mr Bethany crisply, ‘that’s settled, then. With your +permission, my dear,’ he added, turning untarnishably clear childlike +eyes on Sheila, ‘I will take all risks—even to the foot of the gibbet: +accessory, Danton, _after_ the fact.’ And so direct and cloudless was +his gaze that Sheila tried in vain to evade it and to catch a glimpse +of Danton’s small agate-like eyes, now completely under mastery, and +awaiting confidently the meeting with her own. + +‘Of course,’ she said, ‘I am entirely in your hands, dear Mr Bethany.’ + + + + +CHAPTER ELEVEN + + +Lawford slept far into the cloudy Monday morning, to wake steeped in +sleep, lethargic, and fretfully haunted by inconclusive remembrances of +the night before. When Sheila, with obvious and capacious composure, +brought him his breakfast tray, he watched her face for some time +without speaking. + +‘Sheila,’ he began, as she was about to leave the room again. + +She paused, smiling. + +‘Did anything happen last night? Would you mind telling me, Sheila? Who +was it was here?’ + +Her lids the least bit narrowed. ‘Certainly, Arthur; Mr Danton was +here.’ + +‘Then it was not a dream?’ + +‘Oh no,’ said Sheila. + +‘What did I say? What did _he_ say? It was hopeless, anyhow.’ + +‘I don’t quite understand what you mean by “hopeless,” Arthur. And must +I answer the other questions?’ + +Lawford drew his hand over his face, like a tired child. ‘He +didn’t—believe?’ + +‘No, dear,’ said Sheila softly. + +‘And you, Sheila?’ came the subdued voice. + +Sheila crossed slowly to the window. ‘Well, quite honestly, Arthur, I +was not very much surprised. Whatever we are agreed about on the whole, +you were scarcely yourself last night.’ + +Lawford shut his eyes, and re-opened them full on his wife’s calm +scrutiny, who had in that moment turned in the light of the one drawn +blind to face him again. + +‘Who is? Always?’ + +‘No,’ said Sheila; ‘but—it was at least unfortunate. We can’t, I +suppose, rely on Dr Bethany alone.’ + +Lawford crouched over his food. ‘Will he blab?’ + +‘Blab! Mr Danton is a gentleman, Arthur.’ + +Lawford rolled his eyes as if in temporary vertigo. ‘Yes,’ he said. And +Sheila once more prepared to make a reposeful exit. + +‘I don’t think I can see Simon this morning.’ + +‘Oh. Who, then?’ + +‘I mean I would prefer to be left alone.’ + +‘Believe me, I had no intention to intrude.’ And this time the door +really closed. + +‘He is in a quiet, soothing sleep,’ said Sheila a few minutes later. + +‘Nothing could be better,’ said Dr Simon; and Lawford, to his +inexpressible relief, heard the fevered throbbing of the doctor’s car +reverse, and turned over and shut his eyes, dulled and exhausted in the +still unfriendliness of the vacant room. His spirits had sunk, he +thought, to their lowest ebb. He scarcely heeded the fragments of +dreams—clear, green landscapes, amazing gleams of peace, the sudden +broken voices, the rustling and calling shadowiness of +subconsciousness—in this quiet sunlight of reality. The clouds had +broken, or had been withdrawn like a veil from the October skies. One +thought alone was his refuge; one face alone haunted him with its +peace; one remembrance soothed him—Alice. Through all his scattered and +purposeless arguments he strove to remember her voice, the +loving-kindness of her eyes, her untroubled confidence. + +In the afternoon he got up and dressed himself. He could not bring +himself to stand before the glass and deliberately shave. He even +smiled at the thought of playing the barber to that lean chin. He +dressed by the fireplace. + +‘I couldn’t rest,’ he told Sheila, when she presently came in on one of +her quiet, cautious, heedful visits; ‘and one tires of reading even +Quain in bed.’ + +‘Have you found anything?’ she inquired politely. + +‘Oh yes,’ said Lawford wearily; ‘I have discovered that infinitely +worse things are infinitely commoner. But that there’s nothing quite so +picturesque.’ + +‘Tell me,’ said Sheila, with refreshing naivete. ‘How does it feel? +does it even in the slightest degree affect your mind?’ + +He turned his back and looked up at his broad gilt portrait for +inspiration. ‘Practically, not at all,’ he said hollowly. ‘Of course, +one’s nerves—that fellow Danton—when one’s overtired. You have’—his +voice, in spite of every effort, faintly quavered—‘_you_ haven’t +noticed anything? My mind?’ + +‘Me? Oh dear, no! I never was the least bit observant; you know that, +Arthur. But apart from that, and I hope you will not think me +unsympathetic—but don’t you think we must sooner or later be thinking +of what’s to be done? At present, though I fully agree with Mr Bethany +as to the wisdom of hushing this unhappy business up as long as +possible, at least from the gossiping outside world, still we are only +standing still. And your malady, dear, I suppose, isn’t. You _will_ +help me, Arthur? You will try and think? Poor Alice!’ + +‘What about Alice?’ + +‘She mopes, dear, rather. She cannot, of course, quite understand why +she must not see her father, and yet his not being, or, for the matter +of that, even if he was, at death’s door.’ + +‘At death’s door,’ murmured Lawford under his breath; ‘who was it was +saying that? Have you ever, Sheila, in a dream, or just as one’s +thoughts go sometimes, seen that door?...its ruinous stone lintel +carved into lichenous stone heads...stonily silent in the last thin +sunlight, hanging in peace unlatched. Heated, hunted, in agony—in that +cold, green-clad shadowed porch is haven and sanctuary....But beyond—O +God, beyond!’ + +Sheila stood listening with startled eyes. ‘And was all that in Quain?’ +she inquired rather flutteringly. + +Lawford turned a sidelong head, and looked steadily at his wife. + +She shook herself, with a slight shiver. ‘Very well, then,’ she said +and paused in the silence. + +Her husband yawned, and smiled, and almost as if lit with that thin +last sunshine seemed the smile that passed for an instant across the +reverie of his shadowy face. He drew a hand wearily over his eyes. +‘What has he been saying now?’ he inquired like a fretful child. + +Sheila stood very quiet and still, as if in fear of scaring some rare, +wild, timid creature by the least stir. ‘Who?’ she merely breathed. + +Lawford paused on the hearth-rug with his comb in his hand. ‘It’s just +the last rags of that beastly influenza,’ he said, and began vigorously +combing his hair. And yet, simple and frank though the action was, it +moved Sheila, perhaps, more than any other of the congested occurrences +of the last few days. Her forehead grew suddenly cold, the palms of her +hands began to ache, she had to hasten out of the room to avoid +revealing the sheer physical repulsion she had experienced. + +But Lawford, quite unmindful of the shock, continued in a kind of +heedless reverie to watch, as he combed, the still visionary thoughts +that passed in tranced stillness before his eyes. He longed beyond +measure for freedom that until yesterday he had not even dreamed +existed outside the covers of some old impossible romance—the magic of +the darkening sky, the invisible flocking presences of the dead, the +shock of imaginations that had no words, of quixotic emotions which the +stranger had stirred in that low, mocking, furtive talk beside the +broken stones of the Huguenot. Was the ‘change’ quite so monstrous, so +meaningless? How often, indeed, he remembered curiously had he seemed +to be standing outside these fast-shut gates of thought, that now had +been freely opened to him. + +He drew ajar the door, and leant his ear to listen. From far away came +a rich, long-continued chuckle of laughter, followed by the clatter of +a falling plate, and then, still more uncontrollable laughter. There +was a faint smell of toast on the air. Lawford ventured out on to the +landing and into a little room that had once, in years gone by, been +Alice’s nursery. He stood far back from the strip of open window that +showed beneath the green blind, craning forward to see into the +garden—the trees, their knotted trunks, and then, as he stole nearer, a +flower-bed, late roses, geraniums, calceolarias, the lawn and—yes, +three wicker chairs, a footstool, a work-basket, a little table on the +smooth grass in the honey-coloured sunshine; and Sheila sitting there +in the autumnal sunlight, her hands resting on the arms of her chair, +her head bent, evidently deeply engrossed in her thoughts. He crept an +inch or two forward, and stooped. There was a hat on the grass—Alice’s +big garden hat—and beside it lay Flitters, nose on paws, long ears +sagging. He had forgotten Flitters. Had Flitters forgotten him? Would +he bark at the strange, distasteful scent of a—Dr Ferguson? The coast +was clear, then. He turned even softlier yet, to confront, rapt, still, +and hovering betwixt astonishment and dread, the blue calm eyes of his +daughter, looking in at the door. It seemed to Lawford as if they had +both been suddenly swept by some unseen power into a still, unearthly +silence. + +‘We thought,’ he began at last, ‘we thought just to beckon Mrs Lawford +from the window. He—he is asleep.’ + +Alice nodded. Her whole face was in a moment flooded with red. It ebbed +and left her pale. ‘I will go down and tell mother you want to see her. +It was very silly of me. I did not quite recognise at first...I +suppose, thinking of my father—’ The words faltered, and the eyes were +lifted to his face again with a desolate, incredulous appeal. Lawford +turned away heartsick and trembling. + +‘Certainly, certainly, by no means,’ he began, listening vaguely to the +glib patter that seemed to come from another mouth. ‘Your father, my +dear young lady, I venture to think is now really on the road to +recovery. Dr Simon makes excellent progress. But, of course—two heads, +we know, are so much better than one when there’s the least—the least +difficulty. The great thing is quiet, rest, isolation, no possibility +of a shock, else—’ His voice fell away, his eloquence failed. + +For Alice stood gazing stirlessly on and on into this infinitely +strange, infinitely familiar shadowy, phantasmal face. ‘Oh yes,’ she +replied, ‘I quite understand, of course; but if I might just peep even, +it would—I should be so much, much happier. Do let me just see him, Dr +Ferguson, if only his head on the pillow! I wouldn’t even breathe. +Couldn’t it possibly help—even a faith-cure?’ She leant forward +impulsively, her voice trembling, and her eyes still shining beneath +their faint, melancholy smile. + +‘I fear, my dear...it cannot be. He longs to see you. But with his +mind, you know, in this state, it might—?’ + +‘But mother never told me,’ broke in the girl desperately, ‘there was +anything wrong with his _mind_. Oh, but that was quite unfair. You +don’t mean, you don’t mean—that—?’ + +Lawford scanned swiftly the little square beloved and memoried room +that fate had suddenly converted for him into a cage of unspeakable +pain and longing. ‘Oh no; believe me, no! Not his brain, not that, not +even wandering; really: but always thinking, always longing on and on +for you, dear, only. Quite, quite master of himself, but—’ + +‘You talk,’ she broke in again angrily, ‘only in pretence! You are +treating me like a child; and so does mother, and so it has been ever +since I came home. Why, if mother can, and you can, why may not I? Why, +if he can walk and talk in the night....’ + +‘But who—who “can walk and talk in the night?”’ inquired a low stealthy +voice out of the quietness behind her. + +Alice turned swiftly. Her mother was standing at a little distance, +with all the calm and moveless concentration of a waxwork figure, +looking up at her from the staircase. + +‘I was—I was talking to Dr Ferguson, mother.’ + +‘But as I came up the stairs I understood you to be inquiring something +of Dr Ferguson, “if,” you were saying, “he can walk and talk in the +night”: you surely were not referring to your father, child? That could +not possibly be, in his state. Dr Ferguson, I know, will bear me out in +that at least. And besides, I really must insist on following out +medical directions to the letter. Dr Ferguson I know, will fully +concur. Do, pray, Dr Ferguson,’ continued Sheila, raising her voice +even now scarcely above a rapid murmur—‘do pray assure my daughter that +she must have patience; that however much even he himself may desire +it, it is impossible that she should see her father yet. And now, my +dear child, come down, I want to have a moment’s talk with Dr Ferguson. +I feared from his beckoning at the window that something was amiss.’ + +Alice turned, dismayed, and looked steadily, almost with hostility, at +the stranger, so curiously transfixed and isolated in her small old +play-room. And in this scornful yet pleading confrontation her eye fell +suddenly on the pin in his scarf—the claw and the pearl she had known +all her life. From that her gaze flitted, like some wild demented +thing’s, over face, hair, hands, clothes, attitude, expression, and her +heart stood still in an awful, inarticulate dread of the unknown. She +turned slowly towards her mother, groped forward a few steps, turned +once more, stretching out her hands towards the vague still figure +whose eyes had called so piteously to her out of their depths, and fell +fainting in the doorway. Lawford stood motionless, vacantly watching +Sheila, who knelt, chafing the cold hands. ‘She has fainted?’ he said; +‘oh, Sheila, tell me—only fainted?’ + +Sheila made no answer; did not even raise her eyes. + +‘Some day, Sheila’ he began in a dull voice, and broke off, and without +another word, without even another glance at the still face and blue, +twitching lids, he passed her rapidly by, and in another instant Sheila +heard the house-door shut. She got up quickly, and after a glance into +the vacant bedroom turned the key; then she hastened upstairs for sal +volatile and eau de cologne.... + +It was yet clear daylight when Lawford appeared beneath the portico of +his house. With a glance of circumspection that almost seemed to +suggest a fear of pursuit, he descended the steps, only to be made +aware in so doing that Ada was with a kind of furtive eagerness +pointing out the mysterious Dr Ferguson to a steadily gazing cook. One +or two well-known and many a well-remembered face he encountered in the +thin stream of City men treading blackly along the pavement. It was a +still, high evening, and something very like a forlorn compassion rose +in his mind at sight of their grave, rather pretentious, rather dull, +respectable faces. + +He found himself walking with an affectation of effrontery, and smiling +with a faint contempt on all alike, as if to keep himself from +slinking, and the wolf out of his eyes. He felt restless, and watchful, +and suspicious, as if he had suddenly come down in the world. His, +then, was a disguise as effectual as a shabby coat and a glazing eye. +His heart sickened. Was it even worth while living on a crust of social +respectability so thin and so exquisitely treacherous? He challenged no +one. One or two actual acquaintances raised and lowered a faintly +inquiring eyebrow in his direction. One even recalled in his confusion +a smile of recognition just a moment too late. There was, it seemed, a +peculiar aura in Lawford’s presence, a shadow of a something in his +demeanour that proved him alien. + +None the less green Widderstone kept calling him, much as a bell in the +imagination tolls on and on, the echo of reality. If the worst should +come to the worst, why—there is pasture in the solitary by-ways for the +beast that strays. He quickened his pace along lonelier streets, and +soon strode freely through the little flagged and cobbled village of +shops, past the same small jutting window whose clock had told him the +hour on that first dark hurried night. All was pale and faint with +dying colours now; and decay was in the leaf, and the last swallows +filled the gold air with their clashing stillness. No one heeded him +here. He looked from side to side, exulting in the strangeness. Shops +were left behind, the last milestone passed, and in a little while he +was descending the hill beneath the elm boughs, which he remembered had +stood like a turreted wall against the sunset when first he had +wandered down into the churchyard. + +At the foot of the hill he passed by the green and white Rectory, and +there was the parson, a short fat, pursy man with wrists protruding +from his jacket sleeves as he stood on tip-toe tying up a rambling +rose-shoot on his trim cedared lawn. The next house barely showed its +old red chimney-tops, above its bowers; the next was empty, with +windows vacantly gazing, its paths peopled with great bearded weeds +that stood mutely watching and guarding the seldom-opened gate. Then +came more lofty grandmotherly elms, a dense hedge of every leaf that +pricks, and then Lawford found himself standing at the small canopied +gate of the queer old wooden house that the stranger of his talk had in +part described. + +It stood square and high and dark in a small amphitheatre of verdure. +Roses here and there sprang from the grass, and a narrow box-edged path +led to a small door in a low green-mantled wing, with its one square +window above the porch. And while, with vacant mind, Lawford stood +waiting, as one stands forebodingly upon the eve of a new experience he +heard as if at a distance the sound of falling water. He still paused +on the country roadside, scrutinising this strange, still, wooden +presence; but at last with an effort he pushed open the gate, followed +the winding path, and pulled the old iron hanging bell. There came +presently a quiet tread, and Herbert himself opened the door which led +into a little square wood-panelled hall, hung with queer old prints and +obscure portraits in dark frames. + +‘Ah, yes, come in, Mr Lawford,’ he drawled; ‘I was beginning to be +afraid you were not coming.’ + +Lawford laid hat and walking-stick on an oak bench, and followed his +churchyard companion up a slightly inclined corridor and a staircase +into a high room, covered far up the yellowish walls with old books on +shelves and in cases, between which hung in little black frames, mezzo +tints, etchings, and antiquated maps. A large table stood a few paces +from the deep alcove of the window, which was surrounded by a low, +faded, green seat, and was screened from the sunshine by wooden +shutters. And here the tranquil surge of falling water shook +incessantly on the air, for the three lower casements stood open to the +fading sunset. On a smaller table were spread cups, old earthenware +dishes of fruit, and a big bowl of damask roses. + +‘Please sit down; I shan’t be a moment; I am not sure that my sister is +in; but if so, I will tell her we are ready for tea.’ Left to himself +in this quiet, strange old room, Lawford forgot for a while everything +else, he was for the moment so taken up with his surroundings. + +What seized on his fancy and strangely affected his mind was this +incessant changing roar of falling water. It must be the Widder, he +said to himself, flowing close to the walls. But not until he had had +the boldness to lean head and shoulders out of the nearest window did +he fully realize how close indeed the Widder was. It came sweeping dark +and deep and begreened and full with the early autumnal rains, actually +against the lower walls of the house itself, and in the middle suddenly +swerved in a black, smooth arch, and tumbled headlong into a great +pool, nodding with tall slender water-weeds, and charged in its bubbled +blackness here and there with the last crimson of the setting sun. To +the left of the house, where the waters floated free again, stood vast, +still trees above the clustering rushes; and in glimpses between their +spreading boughs lay the far-stretching countryside, now dimmed with +the first mists of approaching evening. So absorbed he became as he +stood leaning over the wooden sill above the falling water, that eye +and ear became enslaved by the roar and stillness. And in the faint +atmosphere of age that seemed like a veil to hang about the odd old +house and these prodigious branches, he fell into a kind of waking +dream. + +When at last he did draw back into the room it was perceptibly darker, +and a thin keen shaft of recollection struck across his mind—the +recollection of what he was, and of how he came to be there, his +reasons for coming and of that dark indefinable presence which like a +raven had begun to build its dwelling in his mind. He sat on, his eyes +restlessly wandering, his face leaning on his hands; and in a while the +door opened and Herbert returned, carrying an old crimson and green +teapot and a dish of hot cakes. + +‘They’re all out,’ he said; ‘sister, Sallie, and boy; but these were in +the oven, so we won’t wait. I hope you haven’t been very much bored.’ + +Lawford dropped his hands from his face and smiled. ‘I have been +looking at the water,’ he said. + +‘My sister’s favorite occupation; she sits for hours and hours, with +not even a book for an apology, staring down into the black old roaring +pot. It has a sort of hypnotic effect after a time. And you’d be +surprised how quickly one gets used to the noise. To me it’s even less +distracting than sheer silence. You don’t know, after all, what on +earth sheer silence means—even at Widderstone. But one can just realize +a water-nymph. They chatter; but, thank Heaven, it’s not articulate.’ +He handed Lawford a cup with a certain niceness and self-consciousness, +lifting his eyebrows slightly as he turned. + +Lawford found himself listening out of a peculiar stillness of mind to +the voice of this suave and rather inscrutable acquaintance. ‘The +curious thing is, do you know,’ he began rather nervously, ‘that though +I must have passed your gate at least twice in the last few months, I +have never noticed it before, never even caught the sound of the +water.’ + +‘No, that’s the best of it; nobody ever does. We are just buried alive. +We have lived here for years, and scarcely know a soul—not even our +own, perhaps. Why on earth should one? Acquaintances, after all, are +little else than a bad habit.’ + +‘But then, what about me?’ said Lawford. + +‘But that’s just it,’ said Herbert. ‘I said _acquaintances_; that’s +just exactly what I’m going to prove—what very old friends we are. +You’ve no idea! It really is rather queer.’ He took up his cup and +sauntered over to the window. + +Lawford eyed him vacantly for a moment, and, following rather his own +curious thoughts than seeking any light on this somewhat vague +explanation, again broke the silence. ‘It’s odd, I suppose, but this +house affects me much in the same way as Widderstone does. I’m not +particularly fanciful—at least, I used not to be. But sitting here I +seem, I hope it isn’t a very frantic remark, it seems as though, if +only my ears would let me, I should hear—well, voices. It’s just what +you said about the silence. I suppose it’s the age of the place; it +_is_ very old?’ + +‘Pretty old, I suppose; it’s worm-eaten and rat-eaten and tindery +enough in all conscience; and the damp doesn’t exactly foster it. It’s +a queer old shanty. There are two or three accounts of it in some old +local stuff I have. And of course there’s a ghost.’ + +‘A ghost?’ echoed Lawford, looking up. + + + + +CHAPTER TWELVE + + +‘What’s in a name?’ laughed Herbert. ‘But it really is a queer show-up +of human oddity. A fellow comes in here, searching; that’s all.’ His +back was turned, as he stood staring absently out, sipping his tea +between his sentences. ‘He comes in—oh, it’s a positive fact, for I’ve +seen him myself, just sitting back in my chair here, you know, watching +him as one would a tramp in one’s orchard.’ He cast a candid glance +over his shoulder. ‘First he looks round, like a prying servant. Then +he comes cautiously on—a kind of grizzled, fawn-coloured face, +middle-size, with big hands; and then just like some quiet, groping, +nocturnal creature, he begins his precious search—shelves, drawers that +are not here, cupboards gone years ago, questing and nosing no end, and +quite methodically too, until he reaches the window. Then he stops, +looks back, narrows his foxy lids, listens—quite perceptibly, you know, +a kind of gingerish blur; then he seems to open this corner bookcase +here, as if it were a door and goes out along what I suppose might at +some time have been an outside gallery or balcony, unless, as I rather +fancy, the house extended once beyond these windows. Anyhow, out he +goes quite deliberately, treading the air as lightly as Botticelli’s +angels, until, however far you lean out of the window, you can’t follow +him any further. And then—and this is the bit that takes one’s +fancy—when you have contentedly noddled down again to whatever you may +have been doing when the wretch appeared, or are sitting in a cold +sweat, with bolting eyes awaiting developments, just according to your +school of thought, or of nerves, the creature comes back—comes back; +and with what looks uncommonly like a lighted candle in his hand. That +really is a thrill, I assure you.’ + +‘But you’ve seen this—you’ve really seen this yourself?’ + +‘Oh yes, twice,’ replied Herbert cheerfully. ‘And my sister, quite by +haphazard, once saw him from the garden. She was shelling peas one +evening for Sallie, and she distinctly saw him shamble out of the +window here, and go shuffling along, mid-air, across the roaring +washpot down below, turn sharp round the high corner of the house, +sheer against the stars, in a kind of frightened hurry. And then, after +five minutes’ concentrated watching over the shucks, she saw him come +shuffling back again—the same distraction, the same nebulous snuff +colour, and a candle trailing its smoke behind him as he whisked in +home.’ + +‘And then?’ + +‘Ah, then,’ said Herbert, lagging along the bookshelves, and scanning +the book-backs with eyes partially closed: he turned with lifted +teapot, and refilled his visitor’s cup; ‘then, wherever you are—I +mean,’ he added, cutting up a little cake into six neat slices, +‘wherever the chance inmate of the room happens to be, he comes +straight for you, at a quite alarming velocity, and fades, vanishes, +melts, or, as it were, silts inside.’ + +Lawford listened in a curious hush that had suddenly fallen over his +mind. ‘“Fades inside? silts?”—I’m awfully stupid, but what on earth do +you mean?’ The room had slowly emptied itself of daylight; its own +darkness, it seemed, had met that of the narrowing night, and Herbert +deliberately lit a cigarette before replying. His clear pale face, with +its smooth outline and thin mouth and rather long dark eyes, turned +with a kind of serene good-humour towards his questioner. + +‘Why,’ he said, ‘I mean frankly just that. Besides, it’s Grisel’s own +phrase; and an old nurse we used to have said much the same. He comes, +or _it_ comes towards you, first just walking, then with a kind of +gradually accelerated slide or glide, and sweeps straight into you,’ he +tapped his chest, ‘me, whoever it may be is here. In a kind of panic, I +suppose, to hide, or perhaps simply to get back again.’ + +‘Get back where?’ + +‘Be resumed, as it were, via you. You see, I suppose he is compelled to +regain his circle, or Purgatory, or Styx, whatever you like to call it, +via consciousness. No one present, then no revenant or spook, or astral +body, or hallucination: what’s in a name? And of course even an +hallucination is mind-stuff, and on its own, as it were. What I mean is +that the poor devil must have some kind of human personality to get +back through in order to make his exit from our sphere of consciousness +into his. And naturally, of course to make his entrance too. If like a +tenuous smoke he can get in, the probability is that he gets out in +precisely the same fashion. For really, if you weren’t consciously +expecting the customary impact (you actually jerk forward in the act of +resistance unresisted), you would not notice his going. I am afraid I +must be horribly boring you with all these tangled theories. All I mean +is, that if you were really absorbed in what you happened to be doing +at the time, the thing might come and go, with your mind for entrance +and exit, as it were, without your being conscious of it at all.’ There +was a longish pause, in which Herbert slowly inhaled and softly +breathed out his smoke. + +‘And what—what is the poor wretch searching _for?_ And what—why, what +becomes of him when he does go?’ + +‘Ah, there you have me! One merely surmises just as one’s temperament +or convictions lean. Grisel says it’s some poor derelict soul in search +of peace—that the poor beggar wants finally to die, in fact, and can’t. +Sallie smells crime. After all, what is every man?’ he talked on; ‘a +horde of ghosts—like a Chinese nest of boxes—oaks that were acorns that +were oaks. Death lies behind us, not in front—in our ancestors, back +and back, until—’ + +‘“Until?”’ Lawford managed to remark. + +‘Ah, that settles me again. Don’t they call it an amoeba? But really I +am abjectly ignorant of all that kind of stuff. We are _all_ we are, +and all in a sense we care to dream we are. And for that matter, +anything outlandish, bizarre, is a godsend in this rather stodgy life. +It is after all just what the old boy said—it’s only the impossible +that’s credible; whatever credible may mean....’ + +It seemed to Lawford as if the last remark had wafted him bodily into +the presence of his kind, blinking, intensely anxious old friend, Mr +Bethany. And what leagues asunder the two men were who had happened on +much the same words to express their convictions. + +He drew his hand gropingly over his face, half rose, and again seated +himself. ‘Whatever it may be,’ he said, ‘the whole thing reminds me, +you know—it is in a way so curiously like my own—my own case.’ + +Herbert sat on, a little drawn up in his chair, quietly smoking. The +crash of the falling water, after seeming to increase in volume with +the fading of evening, had again died down in the darkness to a low +multitudinous tumult as of countless inarticulate, echoing voices. + +‘“Bizarre,” you said; God knows _I_ am.’ But Herbert still remained +obdurately silent. ‘You remember, perhaps,’ Lawford faintly began +again, ‘our talk the other night?’ + +‘Oh, rather,’ replied the cordial voice out of the dusk. + +‘I suppose you thought I was insane?’ + +‘Insane!’ There was a genuinely amused astonishment in the echo. ‘You +were lucidity itself. Besides—well, honestly, if I may venture, I don’t +put very much truck in what one calls one’s sanity: except, of course, +as a bond of respectability and a means of livelihood.’ + +‘But did you realise in the least from what I said how I really stand? +That I went down into that old shadowy hollow one man, and came +back—well—this?’ + +‘I gathered vaguely something like that. I thought at first it was +merely an affectation—that what you said was an affectation, I +mean—until—well, to be frank, it was the “this” that so immensely +interested me. Especially,’ he added almost with a touch of gaiety, +‘especially the last glimpse. But if it’s really not a forbidden +question, what precisely _was_ the other? What precise manner of man, I +mean, came down into Widderstone?’ + +‘It is my face that is changed, Mr Herbert. If you’ll try to understand +me—my _face_. What you see now is not what I really am, not what I was. +Oh, it is all quite different. I know perfectly well how absurd it must +sound. And you won’t press me further. But that’s the truth: that’s +what they have done for me.’ + +It seemed to Lawford as if a remote tiny shout of laughter had been +suddenly caught back in the silence that had followed this confession. +He peered in vain in the direction of his companion. Even his cigarette +revealed no sign of him. ‘I know, I know,’ he went gropingly on; ‘I +felt it would sound to you like nothing but frantic incredible +nonsense. _You_ can’t see it. _You_ can’t feel it. _You_ can’t hear +these hooting voices. It’s no use at all blinking the fact; I am simply +on the verge, if not over it, of insanity.’ + +‘As to that, Mr Lawford,’ came the still voice out of the darkness; +‘the very fact of your being able to say so seems to me all but proof +positive that you’re not. Insanity is on another plane, isn’t it? in +which one can’t compare one’s states. As for what you say being +credible, take our precious noodle of a spook here! Ninety-nine +hundredths of this amiable world of ours would have guffawed the poor +creature into imperceptibility ages ago. To such poor credulous +creatures as my sister and I he is no more and no less a fact, a +personality, an amusing reality than—well, this teacup. Here we are, +amazing mysteries both of us in any case; and all round us are scores +of books, dealing just with life, pure, candid, and unexpurgated; and +there’s not a single one among them but reads like a taradiddle. Yet +grope between the lines of any autobiography, it’s pretty clear what +one has got—a feeble, timid, creeping attempt to describe the +indescribable. As for what you say _your_ case is, the bizarre—that +kind very seldom gets into print at all. In all our make-believe, all +our pretence, how, honestly, could it? But there, this is immaterial. +The real question is, may I, can I help? What I gather is this: You +just trundled down into Widderstone all among the dead men, and—but one +moment, I’ll light up.’ + +A light flickered up in the dark. Shading it in his hand from the night +air straying through the open window, Herbert lit the two candles that +stood upon the little chimneypiece behind Lawford’s head. Then +sauntering over to the window again, almost as if with an affectation +of nonchalance, he drew one of the shutters, and sat down. ‘Nothing +much struck me,’ he went on, leaning back on his hands, ‘I mean on +Sunday evening, until you said good-bye. It was then that I caught in +the moon a distinct glimpse of your face.’ + +‘This,’ said Lawford, with a sudden horrible sinking of the heart. + +Herbert nodded. ‘The fact is, I have a print of it,’ he said. + +‘A print of it?’ + +‘A miserable little dingy engraving.’ + +‘Of this?’ Herbert nodded, with eyes fixed. ‘Where?’ + +‘That’s the nuisance. I searched high and low for it the instant I got +home. For the moment it has been mislaid; but it must be somewhere in +the house and it will turn up all in good time. It’s the frontispiece +of one of a queer old hotchpotch of pamphlets, sewn up together by some +amateur enthusiast in a marbled paper cover—confessions, travels, +trials and so on. All eighteenth century, and all in French.’ + +‘And mine?’ said Lawford, gazing stonily across the candlelight. + +Herbert, from a head slightly stooping, gazed back in an almost +birdlike fashion across the room at his visitor. + +‘Sabathier’s,’ he said. + +‘Sabathier’s!’ + +‘A really curious resemblance. Of course, I am speaking only from +memory; and perhaps it’s not quite so vivid in this light; but still +astonishingly clear.’ + +Lawford sat drawn up, staring at his companion’s face in an intense and +helpless silence. His mouth opened but no words came. + +‘Of course,’ began Herbert again, ‘I don’t say there’s anything in +it—except the—the mere coincidence,’ he paused and glanced out of the +open casement beside him. ‘But there’s just one obvious question. Do +you happen to know of any strain of French blood in your family?’ + +Lawford shut his eyes, even memory seemed to be forsaking him at last. +‘No,’ he said, after a long pause, ‘there’s a little Dutch, I think, on +my mother’s side, but no French.’ + +‘No Sabathier, then?’ said Herbert, smiling. ‘And then there’s another +question—this change; is it really as complete as you suppose? Has +it—please just warn me off if I am in the least intruding—has it been +noticed?’ + +Lawford hesitated. ‘Oh, yes,’ he said slowly, ‘it has been noticed—my +wife, a few friends.’ + +‘Do you mind this infernal clatter?’ said Herbert, laying his fingers +on the open casement. + +‘No, no. And you think?’ + +‘My dear fellow, I don’t think anything. It’s all the craziest +conjecture. Stranger things even than this have happened. There are +dozens here—in print. What are we human beings after all? Clay in the +hands of the potter. Our bodies are merely an inheritance, packed tight +and corded up. We have practically no control over their main +functions. We can’t even replace a little finger-nail. And look at the +faces of us—what atrocious mockeries most of them are of _any_ kind of +image! But we know our bodies change—age, sickness, thought, passion, +fatality. It proves they are amazingly plastic. And merely even as a +theory it is not in the least untenable that by force of some violent +convulsive effort from outside one’s body _might_ change. It answers +with odd voluntariness to friend or foe, smile or snarl. As for what we +call the laws of Nature, they are pure assumptions to-day, and may be +nothing better than scrap-iron tomorrow. Good Heavens, Lawford, +consider man’s abysmal impudence.’ He smoked on in silence for a +moment. ‘You say you fell asleep down there?’ + +Lawford nodded. Herbert tapped his cigarette on the sill. ‘Just +following up our ludicrous conjecture, you know,’ he remarked musingly, +‘it wasn’t such a bad opportunity for the poor chap.’ + +‘But surely,’ said Lawford, speaking as it were out of a dream of +candle-light and reverberating sound and clearest darkness, towards +this strange deliberate phantom with the unruffled clear-cut +features—‘surely then, in that case, he is here now? And yet, on my +word of honour, though every friend I ever had in the world should deny +it, I am the same. Memory stretches back clear and sound to my +childhood. I can see myself with extraordinary lucidity, how I think, +my motives and all that; and in spite of these voices that I seem to +hear, and this peculiar kind of longing to break away, as it were, just +to press on—it is I,—I myself, that am speaking to you now out of +this—this mask.’ + +Herbert glanced reflectively at his companion. ‘You mustn’t let me tire +you,’ he said; ‘but even on our theory it would not necessarily follow +that you yourself would be much affected. It’s true this fellow +Sabathier really was something of a personality. He had a rather +unusual itch for life, for trying on and on to squeeze something out of +experience that isn’t there; and he seemed never to weary of a +magnificent attempt to find in his fellow-creatures, especially in the +women he met, what even—if they have it—they cannot give. The little +book I wanted to show you is partly autobiographical and really does +manage to set the fellow on his feet. Even there he does absolutely +take one’s imagination. I shall never forget the thrill of picking him +up in the Charing Cross Road. You see, I had known the queer old +tombstone for years. He’s enormously vivid—quite beyond my feebleness +to describe, with a kind of French verve and rapture. Unluckily we +can’t get nearer than two years to his death. I shouldn’t mind guessing +some last devastating dream swept over him, held him the breath of an +instant too long beneath the wave, and he caved in. We know he killed +himself; and perhaps lived to regret it ever after. + +‘After all, what is this precious dying we talk so much about?’ Herbert +continued after a while, his eyes restlessly wandering from shelf to +shelf. ‘You remember our talk in the churchyard? We all know that the +body fades quick enough when its occupant is gone. Supposing even in +the sleep of the living it lies very feebly guarded. And supposing in +that state some infernally potent thing outside it, wandering +disembodied, just happens on it—like some hungry sexton beetle on the +carcase of a mouse. Supposing—I know it’s the most outrageous +theorising—but supposing all these years of sun and dark, Sabathier’s +emanation, or whatever you like to call it, horribly restless, by some +fatality longing on and on just for life, or even for the face, the +voice, of some “impossible she” whom he couldn’t get in this muddled +world, simply loathing all else; supposing he has been lingering in +ambush down beside those poor old dusty bones that had poured out for +him such marrowy hospitality—oh, I know it; the dead do. And then, by a +chance, one quiet autumn evening, a veritable godsend of a little Miss +Muffet comes wandering down under the shade of his immortal cypresses, +half asleep, fagged out, depressed in mind and body, perhaps: imagine +yourself in his place, and he in yours!’ Herbert stood up in his +eagerness, his sleek hair shining. ‘The one clinching chance of a +century! Wouldn’t you have made a fight for it? Wouldn’t you have +risked the raid? I can just conceive it—the amazing struggle in that +darkness within a darkness; like some dazed alien bee bursting through +the sentinels of a hive; one mad impetuous clutch at victory; then the +appalling stirring on the other side; the groping back to a house +dismantled, rearranged, not, mind you, disorganised or +disintegrated....’ He broke off with a smile, as if of apology for his +long, fantastic harangue. + +Lawford sat listening, his eyes fixed on Herbert’s colourless face. +There was not a sound else, it seemed, than that slightly drawling +scrupulous voice poking its way amid a maze of enticing, baffling +thoughts. Herbert turned away with a shrug. ‘It’s tempting stuff,’ he +said, choosing another cigarette. ‘But anyhow, the poor beggar failed.’ + +‘Failed?’ + +‘Why, surely; if he had succeeded I should not now be talking to a mere +imperfect simulacrum, to the outward illusion of a passing likeness to +the man, but to Sabathier himself!’ His eyes moved slowly round and +dwelt for a moment with a dark, quiet scrutiny on his visitor. + +‘You say a passing likeness; do you _mean_ that?’ + +Herbert smiled indulgently. ‘If one _can_ mean what is purely a +speculation. I am only trying to look at the thing dispassionately, you +see. We are so much the slaves of mere repetition. Here is life—yours +and mine—a kind of plenum in vacuo_. It is only when we begin to play +the eavesdropper; when something goes askew; when one of the sentries +on the frontier of the unexpected shouts a hoarse “Qui vive?”_—it is +only then we begin to question; to prick our aldermen and pinch the +calves of our kings. Why, who is there can answer to anybody’s but his +own satisfaction just that one fundamental question—Are we the +prisoners, the slaves, the inheritors, the creatures, or the creators +of our bodies? Fallen angels or horrific dust? As for identity or +likeness or personality, we have only our neighbours’ nod for them, and +just a fading memory. No, the old fairy tales knew better; and +witchcraft’s witchcraft to the end of the chapter. Honestly, and just +of course on that one theory, Lawford, I can’t help thinking that +Sabathier’s raid only just so far succeeded as to leave his impression +in the wax. It doesn’t, of course, follow that it will necessarily end +there. It might—it may be even now just gradually fading away. It may, +you know, need driving out—with whips and scorpions. It might, perhaps, +work in.’ + +Lawford sat cold and still. ‘It’s no good, no good,’ he said, ‘I don’t +understand; I can’t follow you. I was always stupid, always bigoted and +cocksure. These things have never seemed anything but old women’s tales +to me. And now I must pay for it. And this Nicholas Sabathier; you say +he was a blackguard?’ + +‘Well,’ said Herbert with a faint smile, ‘that depends on your +definition of the word. He wasn’t a flunkey, a fool, or a prig, if +that’s what you mean. He wasn’t perhaps on Mrs Grundy’s visiting list. +He wasn’t exactly gregarious. And yet in a sense that kind of +temperament is so rare that Sappho, Nelson, and Shelley shared it. To +the stodgy, suety world of course it’s little else than sheer +moonshine, midsummer madness. Naturally, in its own charming and stodgy +way the world kept flickering cold water in his direction. Naturally it +hissed.... I shall find the book. You shall have the book; oh yes.’ + +‘There’s only one more question,’ said Lawford in a dull, slow voice, +stooping and covering his face with his hands. ‘I know it’s impossible +for you to realise—but to me time seems like that water there, to be +heaping up about me. I wait, just as one waits when the conductor of an +orchestra lifts his hand and in a moment the whole surge of brass and +wood, cymbal and drum will crash out—and sweep me under. I can’t tell +you Herbert, how it all is, with just these groping stirrings of that +mole in my mind’s dark. You say it may be this face, working in! God +knows. I find it easy to speak to you—this cold, clear sense, you know. +The others feel too much, or are afraid, or—Let me think—yes, I was +going to ask you a question. But no one can answer it.’ He peered +darkly, with white face suddenly revealed between his hands. ‘What +remains now? Where do _I_ come in? What is there left for _me_ to do?’ + +And at that moment there sounded, even above the monotonous roar of the +water beyond the window—there fell the sound of a light footfall +approaching along the corridor. + +‘Listen,’ said Herbert; ‘here’s my sister coming; we’ll ask her.’ + + + + +CHAPTER THIRTEEN + + +The door opened. Lawford rose, and into the further rays of the +candlelight entered a rather slim figure in a light summer gown. + +‘Just home?’ said Herbert. + +‘We’ve been for a walk—’ + +‘My sister always forgets everything,’ said Herbert, turning to +Lawford; ‘even tea-time. This is Mr Lawford, Grisel. We’ve been arguing +no end. And we want you to give a decision. It’s just this: Supposing +if by some impossible trick you had come in now, not the charming +familiar sister you are, but shorter, fatter, fair and round-faced, +quite different, physically, you know—what would you do?’ + +‘What nonsense you talk, Herbert!’ + +‘Yes, but supposing: a complete transmogrification—by some unimaginable +ingression or enchantment, by nibbling a bunch of roses, or whatever +you like to call it?’ + +‘_Only_ physically?’ + +‘Well, yes, actually; but potentially, why—that’s another matter.’ + +The dark eyes passed slowly from her brother’s face and rested gravely +on their visitor’s. + +‘Is he making fun of me?’ + +Lawford almost imperceptibly shook his head. + +‘But what a question! And I’ve had no tea.’ She drew her gloves slowly +through her hand. ‘The thing, of course, isn’t possible, I know. But +shouldn’t I go mad, don’t you think?’ + +Lawford gazed quietly back into the clear, grave, deliberate eyes. +‘Suppose, suppose, just for the sake of argument—_not_,’ he suggested. + +She turned her head and reflected, glancing from one to the other of +the pure, steady candle-flames. + +‘And what was _your_ answer?’ she said, looking over her shoulder at +her brother. + +‘My dear child, you know what _my_ answers are like!’ + +‘And yours?’ + +Lawford took a deep breath, gazing mutely, forlornly, into the lovely +untroubled peace of her eyes, and without the least warning tears swept +up into his own. With an immense effort he turned, and choking back +every sound, beating back every thought, groped his way towards the +square black darkness of the open door. + +‘I must think, I must think,’ he managed to whisper, lifting his hand +and steadying himself. He caught over his shoulder the glimpse of a +curiously distorted vision, a lifted candle, and a still face gazing +after him with infinitely grieved eyes, then found himself groping and +stumbling down the steep, uneven staircase into the darkness of the +queer old wooden and hushed and lonely house. The night air cold on his +face calmed his mind. He turned and held out his hand. + +‘You’ll come again?’ Herbert was saying, with a hint of anxiety, even +of apology in his voice. + +Lawford nodded, with eyes fixed blankly on the candle, and turning once +more, made his way slowly down the narrow green-bordered path upon +which the stars rained a scattered light so feeble it seemed but as a +haze that blurred the darkness. He pushed open the little white wicket +and turned his face towards the soundless, leaf-crowned hill. He had +advanced hardly a score of steps in the thick dust when almost as if +its very silence had struck upon his ear he remembered the black broken +grave with its sightless heads that lay beyond the leaves. And fear, +vast and menacing, fear such as only children know, broke like a sea of +darkness on his heart. He stopped dead—cold, helpless, trembling. And, +in the silence he heard a faint cry behind him and light footsteps +pursuing him. He turned again. In the thick close gloom beneath the +enormous elm-boughs the grey eyes shone clearly visible in the face +upturned to him. ‘My brother,’ she began breathlessly—‘the little +French book. It was I who—who mislaid it.’ + +The set, stricken face listened unmoved. + +‘You are ill. Come back! I am afraid you are very ill.’ + +‘It’s not that, not that,’ Lawford muttered; ‘don’t leave me; I am +alone. Don’t question me,’ he said strangely, looking down into her +face, clutching her hand; ‘only understand that I can’t, I can’t go +on.’ He swept a lean arm towards the unseen churchyard. ‘I am afraid.’ + +The cold hand clasped his closer. ‘Hush, don’t speak! Come back; come +back. I am with you, a friend, you see; come back.’ + +Lawford clutched her hand as a blind man in sudden peril might clutch +the hand of a child. He saw nothing clearly; spoke almost without +understanding his words. + +‘Oh, but it’s _must_,’ he said; ‘I _must_ go on. You see—why, +everything depends on struggling through: the future! But if you only +knew—There!’ Again his arm swept out, and the lean terrified face +turned shuddering from the dark. + +‘I do know; believe me, believe me! I can guess. See, I am coming with +you; we will go together. As if, as if I did not know what it is to be +afraid. Oh, believe me; no one is near; we go on; and see! it +gradually, gradually lightens. How thankful I am I came.’ + +She had turned and they were steadily ascending as if pushing their +way, battling on through some obstacle of the mind rather than of the +senses beneath the star-powdered callous vault of night. And it seemed +to Lawford as if, as they pressed on together, some obscure detestable +presence as slowly, as doggedly had drawn worsted aside. He could see +again the peaceful outspread branches of the trees, the lych-gate +standing in clear-cut silhouette against the liquid dusk of the sky. A +strange calm stole over his mind. The very meaning and memory of his +fear faded out and vanished, as the passed-away clouds of a storm that +leave a purer, serener sky. + +They stopped and stood together on the brow of the little hill, and +Lawford, still trembling from head to foot, looked back across the +hushed and lightless countryside. ‘It’s all gone now,’ he said wearily, +‘and now there’s nothing left. You see, I cannot even ask your +forgiveness—and a stranger!’ + +‘Please don’t say that—unless—unless—a “pilgrim” too. I think, surely, +you must own we did have the best of it that time. Yes—and I don’t care +_who_ may be listening—but we _did_ win through.’ + +‘What can I say? How shall I explain? How shall I make you understand?’ + +The clear grey eyes showed not the faintest perturbation. ‘But I do; I +do indeed, in part; I do understand, ever so faintly.’ + +‘And now I will come back with _you_.’ + +They paused in the darkness face to face, the silence of the sky, +arched in its vastness above the little hill, the only witness of their +triumph. + +She turned unquestioningly. And laughing softly almost as children do, +the stalking shadows of a twilight wood behind them—they trod in +silence back to the house. They said good-bye at the gate, and Lawford +started once more for home. He walked slowly, conscious of an almost +intolerable weariness, as if his strength had suddenly been wrested +away from him. And at some distance beyond the top of the hill he sat +down on the bank beside a nettled ditch, and with his book pressed down +upon the wayside grass struck a match, and holding it low in the +scented, windless air turned slowly the cockled leaf. + +Few of them were alike except for the dinginess of the print and the +sinister smudge of the portraits. All were sewn roughly together into a +mould-stained, marbled cover. He lit a second match, and as he did so +glanced as if inquiringly over his shoulder. And a score or so of pages +before the end he came at last upon the name he was seeking, and turned +the page. + +It was a likeness even more striking in its crudeness of ink and line +and paper than the most finished of portraits could have been. It +repelled, and yet it fascinated him. He had not for a moment doubted +Herbert’s calm conviction. And yet as he stooped in the grass, closely +scrutinising the blurred obscure features, he felt the faintest +surprise not so much at the significant resemblance but at his own +composure, his own steady, unflinching confrontation with this sinister +and intangible adversary. The match burned down to his fingers. It +hissed faintly in the grass. + +He stuffed the book into his pocket, and stared into the pale dial of +his watch. It was a few minutes after eleven. Midnight, then, would +just see him in. He rose stiffly and yawned in sheer exhaustion. Then, +hesitating, he turned his head and looked back towards the hollow. But +a vague foreboding held him back. A sour and vacuous incredulity swept +over him. What was the use of all this struggling and vexation. What +gain in living on? Once dead _his_ sluggish spirit at least would find +its rest. Dust to dust it would indeed be for him. What else, in sober +earnest, had he been all his daily stolid life but half dead, scarce +conscious, without a living thought, or desire, in head or heart? + +And while he was still gloomily debating within himself he had turned +towards home, and soon was walking in a kind of reverie, even his +extreme tiredness in part forgotten, and only a far-away dogged +recollection in his mind that in spite of shame, in spite of all his +miserable weakness, the words had been uttered once for all, and in all +sincerity, ‘We _did_ win through.’ + +Yet a desolate and odd air of strangeness seemed to drape his unlighted +house as he stood looking up in a kind of furtive communion with its +windows. It affected him with that discomforting air of extreme and +meaningless novelty that things very familiar sometimes take upon +themselves. In this leaden tiredness no impression could be +trustworthy. His lids shut of themselves as he softly mounted the +steps. It seemed a needlessly wide door that soundlessly admitted him. +But however hard he pressed the key his bedroom door remained +stubbornly shut until he found that it was already unlocked and he had +only to turn the handle. A night-light burned in a little basin on the +washstand. The room was hung, as it were, with the stillness of night. +And half lying on the bed in her dressing-gown, her head leaning on the +rail at the foot, was Alice, just as sleep had overtaken her. + +Lawford returned to the door and listened. It seemed he heard a voice +talking downstairs, and yet not talking, for it ran on and on in an +incessant slightly argumentative monotony that had neither break nor +interruption. He closed the door, and stooping laid his hand softly on +Alice’s narrow, still childish hand that lay half-folded on her knee. +Her eyes opened instantly and gazed widely into his face. A slow vacant +smile of sleep came and went and her fingers tightened gently over his +as again her lids drooped down over the drowsy blue eyes. + +‘At last, at last, dear,’ she said; ‘I have been waiting such a time. +But we mustn’t talk much. Mother is waiting up, reading.’ + +Faintly through the close-shut door came the sound of that distant +expressionless voice monotonously rising and falling. + +‘Why didn’t you tell me, dear?’ Alice still sleepily whispered. ‘Would +I have asked a single question? How could I? Oh, if you had only +trusted me!’ + +‘But the change—the change, Alice! You must have seen that. You spoke +to me, you did think I was only a stranger; and even when you knew, it +was only fear on your face, dearest, and aversion; and you turned to +your mother first. Don’t think, Alice, that I am...God only knows—I’m +not complaining. But truth is best whatever it is. I do feel that. You +mustn’t be afraid of hurting me, my dear.’ + +Her very hands seemed to quicken in his as now, with sleep quite gone, +the fret of memory returned, and she must reassure both herself and +him. ‘But you see, dear, mother had told me that you—besides, I did +know you at once, really; quite inside, you know, deep down. I know I +was perplexed; I didn’t understand; but that was all. Why, even when +you came up in the dark, and we talked—if you only knew how miserable I +had been—though I knew even then there was something different, still I +was not a bit afraid. Was I? And shouldn’t I have been afraid, horribly +afraid, if _you_ had not been _you?_’ She repressed a little shudder, +and clasped his hand more closely. ‘Don’t let us say anything more +about it, she implored him; ‘we are just together again, you and I; +that is all that matters.’ But her words were like brave soldiers who +have fought their way through an ambuscade but have left all confidence +behind them. + +Lawford listened; and that was enough just now—that she still, in spite +of doubt, believed in him, and thought and cared for him. He was too +tired to have refused the least kindness. He made no answer, but leant +his head on the cool, slender fingers in gratitude and peace. And, just +as he was, he almost instantly fell asleep. He woke in the darkness to +find himself alone. He groped his way heavily to the door and turned +the handle. But now it was really locked. Energy failed him. ‘I +suppose—Sheila...’ he muttered. + + + + +CHAPTER FOURTEEN + + +Sheila, calm, alert, reserved, was sitting at the open window when he +awoke again. His breakfast tray stood on a little table beside the bed. +He raised himself on his elbow and looked at his wife. The morning +light shone full on her features as she turned quickly at sound of his +stirring. + +‘You have slept late,’ she said, in a low, mellow voice. + +‘Have I, Sheila? I suppose I was tired out. It is very kind of you to +have got everything ready like this.’ + +‘I am afraid, Arthur, I was thinking rather of the maids. I like to +inconvenience them as little as possible; in their usual routine, I +mean. How are you feeling, do you think, this morning?’ + +‘I—I haven’t seen the glass, Sheila.’ + +She paused to place a little pencil tick at the foot of the page of her +butcher’s book. ‘And did you—did you try?’ + +‘Did I try? Try what?’ + +‘I understood,’ she said, turning slowly in her chair, ‘you gave me to +understand that you went out with the specific intention of trying to +regain.... But there, forgive me, Arthur; I think I must be getting a +little bit hardened to the position, so far at least as any hope is in +my mind of rather amateurish experiments being of much help. I may seem +unsympathetic in saying frankly what I feel. But amateurish or no, you +are curiously erratic. Why, if you really were the Dr Ferguson whose +part you play so admirably you could scarcely spend a more active +life.’ + +‘All you mean, Sheila, I suppose, is that I have failed.’ + +‘“Failed” did not enter my mind. I thought, looking at you just now in +your clothes on the bed, one might for the moment be deceived into +thinking there was a slight—quite the slightest improvement. There was +not quite that’—she hovered for the right word—‘that tenseness. Whether +or not, whether you desired any such change or didn’t, I should have +supposed in any case it would have been better to act as far as +possible like any ordinary person. You were certainly in an +extraordinarily sound sleep. I was almost alarmed; until I remembered +that it was a little after two when I looked up from reading aloud to +keep myself awake and discovered that you had only just come home. I +had no fire. You know how easily late hours bring on my headaches; a +little thought might possibly have suggested that I should be anxious +to hear. But no; it seems I cannot profit by experience, Arthur. And +even now you have not answered surely a very natural question. You do +not recollect, perhaps, exactly what did happen last night? Did you go +in the direction even of Widderstone?’ + +‘Yes, Sheila, I went to Widderstone.’ + +‘It was of course absurd to suppose that sitting on a seat beside the +broken-down grave of a suicide would have the slightest effect on +one’s—one’s physical condition; though possibly it might affect one’s +brain. It would mine; I am at least certain of that. It was your own +prescription, however; and it merely occurred to me to inquire whether +the actual experience has not brought you round to my own opinion.’ + +‘Yes, I think it has,’ Lawford answered calmly. ‘But I don’t quite see +what suicide has got to do with it; unless—You know Widderstone, then, +Sheila?’ + +‘I drove there last Saturday afternoon.’ + +‘For prayer or praise?’ Although Lawford had not actually raised his +head, he became conscious rather of the wonderfully adjusted mass of +hair than of the pained dignity in the face that was now closely +regarding him. + +‘I went,’ came the rigidly controlled retort, ‘simply to test an +inconceivable story.’ + +‘And returned?’ + +‘Convinced, Arthur, of its inconceivability. But if you would kindly +inform me what precise formula you followed at Widderstone last night, +I would tell you why I think the explanation, or rather your first +account of the matter, is not an explanation of the facts.’ + +Lawford shot a rather doglike glance over his toast. ‘Danton?’ he said. + +‘Candidly, Arthur, Mr Danton doubts the whole story. Your very +conduct—well, it would serve no useful purpose to go into that. +Candidly, on the other hand, Mr. Danton did make some extremely helpful +suggestions—basing them, of course, on the _truth_ of your account. He +has seen a good deal of life; and certainly very mysterious things do +occur to quite innocent and well-meaning people without the faintest +shadow of warning, and as Mr. Bethany himself said, evil birds do come +home to roost, and often out of a clear sky, as it were. But there, +every fresh solution that occurs to me only makes the thing more +preposterous, more, I was going to say, disreputable—I mean, of course, +to the outside world. And we have our duties to perform to them too, I +suppose. Why, what can we say? What plausible account of ourselves have +we? We shall never be able to look anybody in the face again. I can +only—I am compelled to believe that God has been pleased to make this +precise visitation upon us—an eye for an eye, I suppose, _somewhere_. +And to that conviction I shall hold until actual circumstances convince +me that it’s false. What, however, and this is all that I have to say +now, what I cannot understand are your amazing indiscretions.’ + +‘Do you understand your own, Sheila?’ + +‘My indiscretions, Arthur?’ + +‘Well,’ said Lawford, ‘wasn’t it indiscreet, don’t you think, to risk +divine retribution by marrying me? Shouldn’t you have inquired? Wasn’t +it indiscreet to allow me to remain here in—in my “visitation?” Wasn’t +it indiscreet to risk the moral stigma this unhappy face of mine must +cast on its surroundings? I am not sure whether such a change as this +constitutes cruelty.... Oh, what is the use of fretting and babbling on +like this?’ + +‘Am I to understand, then, that you refuse positively to discuss this +horrible business any more? You are doing your best to drive me away, +Arthur; you must see that. Will you be very disappointed if I refuse to +go?’ + +Lawford rose from the bed. ‘Listen just this once,’ he said, seating +himself on the corner of the dressing-table. ‘Imagine all this—whatever +you like to call it—obliterated. Take this,’ he nodded towards the +glass, ‘entirely for itself, on its own merits, as it were. Let the +dead past bury its dead. Which, now, precisely, _really_ do you +prefer—him,’ he jerked his head in the direction of the dispassionate +youthful picture on the wall, ‘him or me?’ + +He was so close to her now that he could see the faintest tremor on the +face that had suddenly become grey and still in the thin clear +sunshine. + +‘I own it, I own it,’ he went on, slowly; ‘the change is more than +skin-deep now. One can’t go through what I have gone through these last +few terrifying days, Sheila, unchanged. They have played the devil with +my body; now begins the tampering with my mind. Not even Danton knows +how it will end. But shall I tell you why you won’t, why you can’t +answer me that one question—him or me? Shall I tell you?’ + +Sheila slowly raised her eyes. + +‘It is because, my dear, you don’t care the ghost of a straw for +either. That one—he was worn out long ago, and we never knew it. I know +it now. Time and the sheer going-on of day by day, without either of us +guessing at it, wore that down till it had no more meaning for you or +me than any other faded remembrance in this interminable footling with +truth that we call life. And this one—the whole abject meaning of it +lies simply in the fact that it has pierced down and shown us up. I had +no courage. I couldn’t see how feeble a hold I had on life—just one’s +friends’ opinions. It was all at second hand. What I want to know now +is—leave me out; don’t think, or care, or regard my living-on one +shadow of an iota—all I ask is, What am I to do for you?’ He turned +away and stood staring down at the cinders in the fireless grate. + +‘I answer that mad wicked outburst with one plain question,’ said a +low, trembling voice; ‘did you or did you not go to Widderstone +yesterday?’ + +‘I did go.’ + +‘You sat there, just as you said you sat before; and with all your +heart and soul strove to regain—yourself?’ + +Lawford lifted a still, colourless face into the sunlight. ‘No,’ he +said; ‘I spent the evening at the house of a friend.’ + +‘Then I say it is infamous. You cast all this on me. You have brought +me into contempt and poisoned Alice’s whole life. You dream and idle on +just as you used to do, without the least care or thought or +consideration for others; and go out in this condition—go out +absolutely unashamed—to spend the evening at a friend’s. Peculiar +friends they must be. Why, really, Arthur, you must be mad!’ + +Lawford paused. Like a flock of sheep streaming helter-skelter before +the onset of a wolf were the thoughts that a moment before had seemed +so orderly and sober. + +‘Not mad—possessed,’ he said softly. + +‘And I add this,’ cried Sheila, as it were out of a tragic mask, +‘somewhere in the past, whether of your own life, or of the lives of +those who brought you into the world—the world which you pretend so +conveniently to despise—somewhere is hidden some miserable secret. God +visits all sins. On you has fallen at last the payment. _That_ I +believe. You can’t run away, any more than a child can run away from +the cupboard it has been locked into for a punishment. Who’s going to +hear you now? You have deliberately refused to make a friend of me. +Fight it out alone, then!’ + +Lawford heard the door close, and the dying away of the sound that had +been the unceasing accompaniment of all these later years—the rustling +of his wife’s skirts, her crisp, authoritative footstep. And he turned +towards the flooding sunlight that streamed in on the upturned surface +of the looking-glass. No clear decisive thought came into his mind, +only a vague recognition that so far as Sheila was concerned this was +the end. No regret, no remorse visited him. He was just alone again, +that was all—alone, as in reality he had always been alone, without +having the sense or power to see or to acknowledge it. All he had said +had been the mere flotsam of the moment, and now it stood stark and +irrevocable between himself and the past. + +He sat down dazed and stupid. Again and again a struggling recollection +tried to obtrude itself; again and again he beat it back. And rather +for something to distract his attention than for any real interest or +enlightenment he might find in its pages, he took out the grimy +dog’s-eared book that Herbert had given him, and turned slowly over the +leaves till he came to Sabathier once more. Snatches of remembrance of +their long talk returned to him, but just as that dark, water-haunted +house had seemed to banish remembrance and the reality of the room in +which he now sat, and of the old familiar life; so now the house, the +faces of yesterday seemed in their turn unreal, almost spectral, and +the thick print on the smudgy page no more significant than a story one +reads and throws away. + +But a moment’s comparison in the glass of the two faces side by side +suddenly sharpened his attention—the resemblance was so oddly +arresting, and yet, and yet, so curiously inconclusive. There was then +something of the stolid old Saxon left, he thought. Or had it been +regained? Which was it? Not merely the complexity of the question, but +a half-conscious distaste of attempting to face it, set him reading +very slowly and laboriously, for his French was little more than +fragmentary recollection, the first few pages of the life of this +buried Sabathier. But with a disinclination almost amounting to +aversion he made very slow progress. Many of the words were meaningless +to him, and every other moment he found himself listening with intense +concentration for the least hint of what Sheila was doing, of what was +going on in the house beneath him. He had not very long to wait. He was +sitting with his head leaning on his hand, the book unheeded beneath +the other on the table, when the door opened again behind him, and +Sheila entered. She stood for a moment, calm and dignified, looking +down on him through her veil. + +‘Please understand, Arthur, that I am not taking this step in pique, or +even in anger. It would serve no purpose to go on like this—this +incessant heedlessness and recrimination. There have been mistakes, +misconceptions, perhaps, on both sides. To me naturally yours are most +conspicuous. That need not, however, blind me to my own.’ + +She paused in vain for an answer. + +‘Think the whole thing over candidly and quietly,’ she began again in a +quiet rapid voice. ‘Have you really shown the slightest regard, I won’t +say for me, or even for Alice, but for just the obvious difficulties +and—and proprieties of our position? I have given up as far as I can +brooding on and on over the same horrible impossible thoughts. I +withdraw unreservedly what I said just now about punishment. Whatever +the evidence, it is not even a wife’s place to judge like that. You +will forgive me that?’ + +Lawford did not turn his head. ‘Of course,’ he said, looking rather +vacantly out of the window, ‘it was only in the heat of the moment, +Sheila; though, who knows? it may be true.’ + +‘Well,’ she took hold of the great brass knob at the foot of the bed +with one gloved hand—‘well, I feel it is my duty to withdraw it. Apart +from it, I see only too clearly that even though all that has happened +in these last few days was in reality nothing but a horrible nightmare, +I see that even then what you have said about our married life together +can never be recalled. You have told me quite deliberately that for +years past your life has been nothing but a pretence—a sham. You +implied that mine had been too. Honestly, I was not aware of it, +Arthur. But supposing all that has happened to you had been merely what +might happen at any moment to anybody, some actual defacement (you will +forgive me suggesting such a horrible thing)—why, if what you say is +true, even in that case my sympathy would have been only a continual +fret and annoyance to you. And this—this change, I own, is infinitely +harder to bear. It would be an outrage on common sense and on all that +we hold seemly and—and sacred in life, even in some trumpery story. You +do, you must see all that, Arthur?’ + +‘Oh yes,’ said Lawford, narrowing his eyes to pierce through the +sunlight, ‘I see all that.’ + +‘Then we need not go over it all again. Whatever others may say, or +think, I shall still, at least so long as nothing occurs to the +contrary, keep firmly to my present convictions. Mr Bethany has assured +me repeatedly that he has no—no misgivings; that he understands. And +even if I still doubted, which I don’t, Arthur, though it would be +rather trying to have to accept one’s husband at second-hand, as it +were, I should have to be satisfied. I dare say even such an unheard-of +thing as what we are discussing now, or something equally ghastly, does +occur occasionally. In foreign countries, perhaps. I have not studied +such things enough to say. We were all very much restricted in our +reading as children, and I honestly think, not unwisely. It is enough +for the present to repeat that I do believe, and that whatever may +happen—and I know absolutely nothing about the procedure in such +cases—but whatever may happen, I shall still be loyal; I shall always +have your interests at heart.’ Her words faltered and she turned her +head away. ‘You did love me once, Arthur, I can’t forget that.’ The +contralto voice trembled ever so little, and the gloved hand smoothed +gently the brass knob beneath. + +‘If,’ said Lawford, resting his face on his hands, and curiously +watching the while his moving reflection in the looking-glass before +him—‘if I said I still loved you, what then? + +‘But you have already denied it, Arthur.’ + +‘Yes; but if I said that that too was said only in haste, that brooding +over the trouble this—this metamorphosis was bringing on us all had +driven me almost beyond endurance: supposing that I withdrew all that, +and instead said now that I do still love you, just as I—’ he turned a +little, and turned back again, ‘like this?’ + +Sheila paused. ‘Could _any_ woman answer such a question?’ she almost +sighed at last. + +‘Yes, but,’ Lawford pressed on, in a voice almost naive and stubborn as +a child’s, ‘If I tried to—to make you? I did once, Sheila.’ + +‘I can’t, I can’t conceive such a position. Surely that alone is almost +as frantic as it is heartless! Is it, is it even right?’ + +‘Well, I have not actually asked it. I own,’ he added moodily, almost +under his breath, ‘it would be—dangerous.... But there, Sheila, this +poor old mask of mine is wearing out. I am somehow convinced of that. +What will be left, God only knows. You were saying—’ He rose abruptly. +‘Please, please sit down,’ he said; ‘I did not notice you were +standing.’ + +‘I shall not keep you a moment,’ she answered hurriedly; ‘I will sit +here. The truth is, Arthur,’ she began again almost solemnly, ‘apart +from all sentiment and—and good intentions, my presence here only +harasses you and keeps you back. I am not so bound up in myself that I +cannot realise _that_. The consequence is that after calmly—and I hope +considerately—thinking the whole thing over, I have come to the +conclusion that it would arouse very little comment, the least possible +perhaps in the circumstances, if I just went away for a few days. You +are not in any sense ill. In fact, I have never known you so—so robust, +so energetic. You will be alone: Mr Bethany, perhaps.... You could go +out and come in just as you pleased. Possibly,’ Sheila smiled frankly +beneath her veil, ‘even this Dr Ferguson you have invented will be a +help. It’s only the servants that remain to be considered.’ + +‘I should prefer to be quite alone.’ + +‘Then do not worry about _them_. I can easily explain. And if you would +not mind letting her in, Mrs Gull can come in every other day or so +just to keep things in order. She’s entirely trustworthy and discreet. +Or perhaps, if you would prefer—’ + +‘Mrs Gull will do nicely, Sheila. It’s very good of you to have given +me so much thought.’ A long and rather arduous pause followed. + +‘Oh, one other thing, Arthur. You sent out to Mr Critchett—do you +remember?—the night you first came home. I think, too, after the first +awful shock, when we were sitting in our bedroom, you actually referred +to—to violent measures. You will promise me, I may perhaps at least ask +that, you will promise me on your word of honour, for Alice’s sake, if +not for mine, to do nothing rash.’ + +‘Yes, yes,’ said Lawford, sinking lower even than he had supposed +possible into the thin and lightless chill of ennui—‘nothing rash.’ + +Sheila rose with a sigh only in part suppressed. ‘I have not seen Mr +Bethany again. I think, however, it would be better to let Harry know; +I mean, dear, of your derangement. After all, he is one of the +family—at least, of mine. He will not interfere. He would, perhaps +quite naturally, be hurt if we did not take him into our confidence. +Otherwise there is no pressing cause for haste, at least for another +week or so. After that, I suppose, something will have to be done. Then +there’s Mr Wedderburn; wouldn’t it be as well to let him know that at +least for the present you are quite unable to think of returning to +town? That, too, in time will have to be arranged, I suppose, if +nothing happens meanwhile; I mean if things don’t come right. And I do +hope, Arthur, you will not set your mind too closely on what may only +prove false hopes. This is all intensely painful to me; of course, to +us both.’ + +Again Lawford, even though he did not turn to confront it, became +conscious of the black veil turned towards him tentatively, +speculatively, impenetrably. + +‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I’ll write to Wedderburn; he’s had his ups and downs +too.’ + +‘I always rather fancied so,’ said Sheila reflectively, ‘he looks +rather a—a restless man. Oh, and then again,’ she broke off quickly, +‘there’s the question of money. I suppose—it is only a conjecture—I +suppose it would be better to do nothing in that direction just for the +present. Ada has now gone to the Bank. Fifty pounds, Arthur; it is out +of my own private account—do you think that will be enough, just, of +course, for your _present_ needs?’ + +‘As a bribe, hush-money, or a thank-offering, Sheila?’ murmured her +husband wearily. + +‘I don’t follow you,’ replied the discreet voice from beneath the veil. + +He did actually turn this time and glance steadily over his shoulder. +‘How long are you going for? and where?’ + +‘I proposed to go to my cousin’s, Bettie Lovat’s; that is, of course, +if you have no objection. It’s near; it will be a long-deferred visit; +and she need know very little. And, of course, if for the least thing +in the world you should want me, there I am within call, as it were. +And you will write? We _are_ acting for the best, Arthur?’ + +‘So long as it is your best, Sheila.’ + +Sheila pondered. ‘You think, you mean, they’ll all say I ought to have +stayed. Candidly, I can’t see it in that light. Surely every experience +of life proves that in intimate domestic matters, and especially in +those between husband and wife, only the parties concerned have any +means of judging what is best for them? It has been our experience at +any rate: though I must in fairness confess that, outwardly at least, I +haven’t had much of that kind of thing to complain of.’ Sheila paused +again for a reply. + +‘What kind of thing?’ + +‘Domestic experience, dear.’ + +The house was quiet. There was not a sound stirring in the still sunny +road of orchards and discreet and drowsy villas. A long silence +followed, immensely active and alert on the one side, almost morbidly +lethargic so far as the stooping figure in front of the looking-glass +was concerned. At last the last haunting question came in a kind of +croak, as if only by a supreme effort could it be compelled to produce +itself for consideration. + +‘And Alice, Sheila?’ + +‘Alice, dear, of course goes with _me_.’ + +‘You realise,’ he stirred uneasily, ‘you realise it may be final.’ + +‘My dear Arthur,’ cried Sheila, ‘it is surely, apart from mere +delicacy, a parental obligation to screen the poor child from the +shock. Could she be at such a time in any better keeping than her +mother’s? At present she only vaguely guesses. To know definitely that +her father, infinitely worse than death, had—had—Oh, is it possible to +realise anything in this awful cloud? It would kill her outright.’ + +Lawford made no stir. The quietest of raps came at the door. ‘The money +from the Bank, ma’am,’ said a faint voice. + +Sheila carefully opened the door a few inches. She laid the blue +envelope on the dressing-table at her husband’s elbow. ‘You had better +perhaps count it,’ she said in a low voice—‘forty in notes, the rest in +gold,’ and narrowed her eyes beneath her veil upon her husband’s very +peculiar method of forgetting his responsibilities. + +‘French?’ she said with a nod. ‘How very quaint.’ + +Lawford’s eyes fell and rested gravely on the dingy page of Herbert’s +mean-looking bundle of print. A queer feeling of cold crept over him. +‘Yes,’ he said vaguely, ‘French,’ and hopelessly failed to fill in the +silence that seemed like some rather sleek nocturnal creature quietly +waiting to be fed. + +Sheila swept softly towards the door. ‘Well, Arthur, I think that is +all. The servants will have gone by this evening. I have ordered a +carriage for half-past twelve. Perhaps you would first write down +anything that occurs to you to be necessary? Perhaps, too, it would be +better if Dr Simon were told that we shall not need him any more, that +you are thinking of a complete change of scene, a voyage. He is +obviously useless. Besides, Mr Bethany, I think, is going to discuss a +specialist with you. I have written him a little note, just briefly +explaining. Shall I write to Dr Simon too?’ + +‘You remember everything,’ said Lawford, and it seemed to him it was a +remark he had heard ages and ages ago. ‘It’s only this money, Sheila; +will you please take that away?’ + +‘Take it away?’ + +‘I think, Sheila, if I do take a voyage I should almost prefer to work +my passage. As for a mere “change of scene,” that’s quite uncostly.’ + +‘It is only your face, Arthur,’ said Sheila solemnly, ‘that suggest +these wicked stabs. Some day you will perhaps repent of every one.’ + +‘It is possible, Sheila; we none of us stand still, you know. One rips +open a lid sometimes and the wax face rots before one’s eyes. Take back +your blue envelope; and thank you for thinking of me. It’s always the +woman of the house that has the head.’ + +‘I wish,’ said Sheila almost pathetically, and yet with a faint quaver +of resignation, ‘I wish it could be said that the man of the house +sometimes has the heart. Think it over, Arthur!’ + +Sheila, with her husband’s luncheon tray, brought also her farewells. +Lawford surveyed, not without a faint, shy stirring of incredulity, the +superbly restrained presence. He stood before her dry-lipped, +inarticulate, a schoolboy caught redhanded in the shabbiest of +offences. + +‘It is your wish then that I go, Arthur?’ she said pleadingly. + +He handed her her money without a word. + +‘Very well, Arthur; if you won’t take it,’ she said. ‘I should scarcely +have thought this the occasion for mere pride.’ + +‘The tenth,’ she continued, as she squeezed the envelope into her +purse, with only the least hardening of voice, ‘although I daresay you +have not troubled to remember it—the tenth will be the eighteenth +anniversary of our wedding-day. It makes parting, however advisable, +and though only for the few days we should think nothing of in happier +circumstances, a little harder to bear. But there, all will come right. +You will see things in a different light, perhaps. Words may wound, but +time will heal.’ But even as she now looked closely into his colourless +sunken face some distant memory seemed to well up irresistibly—the +memory of eyes just as ingenuous, and as unassuming that even in +claiming her love had expressed only their stolid unworthiness. + +‘Did you know it? have you seen it?’ she said, stooping forward a +little. ‘I believe in spite of all....’ He gazed on solemnly, almost +owlishly, out of his fading mask. + +‘Wait till Mr Bethany tells you; you will believe it perhaps from him.’ +He saw the grey-gloved hand a little reluctantly lifted towards him. + +‘Good-bye, Sheila,’ he said, and turned mechanically back to the +window. + +She hesitated, listening to a small far-away voice that kept urging her +with an almost frog-like pertinacity to do, to say something, and yet +as stubbornly would not say what; and she was gone. + + + + +CHAPTER FIFTEEN + + +Raying and gleaming in the sunlight the hired landau drove up to the +gate. Lawford, peeping between the blinds, looked down on the coachman, +with reins hanging loosely from his red squat-thumbed hand, seated in +his tight livery and indescribable hat on the faded cushions. One thing +only was in his mind; and it was almost with an audible cry that he +turned towards the figure that edged, white and trembling, into the +chill room, to fling herself into his arms. ‘Don’t look at me,’ he +begged her, ‘only remember, dearest, I would rather have died down +there and been never seen again than have given you pain. Run—run, your +mother’s calling. Write to me, think of me; good-bye!’ + +He threw himself on the bed and lay there till evening—till the door +had shut gently behind the last rat to leave the sinking ship. All the +clearness, the calmness were gone again. Round and round in dizzy +sickening flare and clatter his thoughts whirled. Contempt, fear, +loathing, blasphemy, laughter, longing: there was no end. Death was no +end. There was no meaning, no refuge, no hope, no possible peace. To +give up was to go to perdition: to go forward was to go mad. And even +madness—he sat up with trembling lips in the twilight—madness itself +was only a state, only a state. You might be bereaved, and the pain and +hopelessness of that would pass. You might be cast out, betrayed, +deserted, and still be you, still find solitude lovely and in a brave +face a friend. But madness!—it surged in on him with all the clearness +and emptiness of a dream. And he sat quite still, his hand clutching +the bedclothes, his head askew, waiting for the sound of footsteps, for +the presences and the voices that have their thin-walled dwelling +beneath the shallow crust of consciousness. + +Inky blackness drifted up in wisps, in smoke before his eyes; he was +powerless to move, to cry out. There was no room to turn; no air to +breathe. And yet there was a low, continuous, never-varying stir as of +an enormous wheel whirling in the gloom. Countless infinitesimal faces +arched like glimmering pebbles the huge dim-coloured vault above his +head. He heard a voice above the monstrous rustling of the wheel, +clamouring, calling him back. He was hastening headlong, muttering to +himself his own flat meaningless name, like a child repeating as he +runs his errand. And then as if in a charmed cold pool he awoke and +opened his eyes again on the gathering darkness of the great bedroom, +and heard a quick, importunate, long-continued knocking on the door +below, as of some one who had already knocked in vain. + +Cramped and heavy-limbed, he felt his way across the room and lit a +candle. He stood listening awhile: his eyes fixed on the door that hung +a little open. All in the room seemed acutely fantastically still. The +flame burned dim, enisled in the sluggish air. He stole slowly to the +door, looked out, and again listened. Again the knocking broke out, +more impetuously and yet with a certain restraint and caution. +Shielding the flame of his candle in the shell of his left hand, +Lawford moved slowly, with chin uplifted, to the stairs. He bent +forward a little, and stood motionless and drawn up, the pupils of his +eyes slowly contracting and expanding as he gazed down into the +carpeted vacant gloom; past the dim louring presence that had fallen +back before him. + +His mouth opened. ‘Who’s there?’ at last he called. + +‘Thank God, thank God!’ he heard Mr Bethany mutter. ‘I mustn’t call, +Lawford,’ came a hurried whisper as if the old gentleman were pressing +his lips to speak through the letter-box. ‘Come down and open the door; +there’s a good fellow! I’ve been knocking no end of a time.’ + +‘Yes, I am coming,’ said Lawford. He shut his mouth and held his +breath, and stair by stair he descended, driving steadily before him +the crouching, gloating menacing shape, darkly lifted up before him +against the darkness, contending the way with him. + +‘Are you ill? Are you hurt? Has anything happened, Lawford?’ came the +anxious old voice again, striving in vain to be restrained. + +‘No, no,’ muttered Lawford. ‘I am coming; coming slowly.’ He paused to +breathe, his hands trembling, his hair lank with sweat, and still with +eyes wide open he descended against the phantom lurking in the +darkness—an adversary that, if he should but for one moment close his +lids, he felt would master sanity and imagination with its evil. ‘So +long as you don’t get in,’ he heard himself muttering, ‘so long as you +don’t get _in_, my friend!’ + +‘What’s that you’re saying?’ came up the muffled, querulous voice; ‘I +can’t for the life of me hear, my boy.’ + +‘Nothing, nothing,’ came softly the answer from the foot of the stairs. +‘I was only speaking to myself.’ + +Deliberately, with candle held rigidly on a level with his eyes, +Lawford pushed forward a pace or two into the airless, empty +drawing-room, and grasped the handle of the door. He gazed in awhile, a +black oblique shadow flung across his face, his eyes fixed like an +animal’s, then drew the door steadily towards him. And suddenly some +power that had held him tense seemed to fail. He thrust out his head, +and, his face quivering with fear and loathing, spat defiance as if in +a passion of triumph into the gloom. + +Still muttering, he shut the door and turned the key. In another moment +his light was gleaming out on the grey perturbed face and black narrow +shoulders of his visitor. + +‘You gave me quite a fright,’ said the old man almost angrily; ‘have +you hurt your foot, or something?’ + +‘It was very dark,’ said Lawford, ‘down the stairs.’ + +‘What!’ said Mr Bethany still more angrily, blinking out of his +unspectacled eyes; ‘has she cut off the gas, then?’ + +‘You got the note?’ said Lawford, unmoved. + +‘Yes, yes; I got the note.... Gone?’ + +‘Oh, yes; all gone. It was my choice. I preferred it so.’ + +Mr Bethany sat down on one of the hard old wooden chairs that stood on +either side of the lofty hall, and breathing rather thickly, rested his +hands on his knees. ‘What’s happened?’ he inquired, looking up into the +candle. ‘I forgot my glasses, old fool that I am, and can’t, my dear +fellow, see you very plainly. But your voice—’ + +‘I think,’ said Lawford, ‘I think it’s beginning to come back.’ + +‘What, the whole thing! Oh no, my dear, dear man; be frank with me; not +the whole thing?’ + +‘Yes,’ said Lawford, ‘the whole thing—very, very gradually, +imperceptibly. I think even Sheila noticed. But I rather feel it than +see it; that is all.... I’m cornering him.’ + +‘Him?’ + +Lawford jerked his candle as if towards some definite goal. ‘In time,’ +he said. + +The two faces with the candle between them seemed as it were to gain +light each from the other. + +‘Well, well,’ said Mr Bethany, ‘every man for himself, Lawford; it’s +the only way. But what’s going to be done? We must be cautious; must +think of—of the others?’ + +‘Oh, that,’ said Lawford; ‘she’s going to squeeze me out.’ + +‘You’ve—squabbled? Oh, but my dear, honest old, _honest_ old idiot, +there are scores of families here in this parish, within a stone’s +throw, that squabble, wrangle, all but politely tear each other’s eyes +out, every day of their earthly lives. It’s perfectly natural. Where +should we poor old busybodies be else. Peace on earth we bring, and +it’s mainly between husband and wife.’ + +‘Yes,’ said Lawford, ‘but you see, this was not our earthly life. It +was between _us_.’ + +‘Listen, listen to the dear mystic!’ exclaimed the old creature +scoffingly. ‘What depths we’re touching. Here’s the first serious break +of his lifetime, and he’s gone stark staring transcendental. Ah well.’ +He paused and glanced quickly about him, with his curious bird-like +poise of head. ‘But you’re not alone here?’ he inquired suddenly; ‘not +absolutely alone?’ + +‘Yes,’ said Lawford. ‘But there’s plenty to think about—and read. I +haven’t thought or read for years.’ + +‘No, nor I; after thirty, my dear boy, one merely annotates, and the +book’s called Life. Bless me, his solemn old voice is grinding epigrams +out of even this poor old parochial barrel-organ. You don’t suppose, +you cannot be supposing you are the only serious person in the world? +What’s more, it’s only skin deep.’ + +Lawford smiled. ‘Skin deep. But think quietly over it; you’ll see I’m +done.’ + +‘Come here,’ said Mr Bethany. ‘Where’s the whiskey, where’s the cigars? +You shall smoke and drink, and I’ll watch. If it weren’t for a pitiful +old stomach, I’d join you. Come on!’ He led the way into the +dining-room. + +He looked sparer, more wizened and sinewy than ever as he stooped to +open the sideboard. ‘Where on earth do they keep everything?’ he was +muttering to himself. + +Lawford put the candlestick down on the table. ‘There’s only one +thing,’ he said, watching his visitor’s rummaging; ‘what precisely do +you think they will do with me?’ + +‘Look here, Lawford,’ snapped Mr Bethany; ‘I’ve come round here, +hooting through your letter-box, to talk sense, not sentiment. Why has +your wife deserted you? Without a servant, without a single—It’s +perfectly monstrous.’ + +‘On my word of honour, I prefer it so. I couldn’t have gone on. Alone I +all but forget this—this lupus. Every turn of her little finger +reminded me of it. We are all of us alone, whether we know it or not; +you said so yourself. And it’s better to realize it stark and +unconfused. Besides, you have no idea what—what odd things.... There +may be; there _is_ something on the other side. I’ll win through to +that.’ + +Mr Bethany had been listening attentively. He scrambled up from his +knees with a half-empty syphon of sodawater. ‘See here, Lawford,’ he +said; ‘if you really want to know what’s your most insidious and most +dangerous symptom just now, it is spiritual pride. You’ve won what you +think a domestic victory; and you can scarcely bear the splendour. Oh, +you may shrug! Pray, what _is_ this “other side” which the superior +double-faced creature’s going to win through to now?’ He rapped it out +almost bitterly, almost contemptuously. + +Lawford hardly heard the question. Before his eyes had suddenly arisen +the peace, the friendly unquestioning stillness, the thunderous lullaby +old as the grave. ‘It’s only a fancy. It seemed I could begin again.’ + +‘Well, look here,’ said Mr Bethany, his whole face suddenly lined and +grey with age. ‘You can’t. It’s the one solitary thing I’ve got to say, +as I’ve said it to myself morn, noon, and night these scores of years. +You can’t begin again; it’s all a delusion and a snare. You say we’re +alone. So we are. The world’s a dream, a stage, a mirage, a rack, call +it what you will—but _you_ don’t change, _you’re_ no illusion. There’s +no crying off for _you_ no ravelling out, no clean leaves. You’ve got +this—this trouble, this affliction—my dear, dear fellow what shall I +say to tell you how I grieve and groan for you oh yes, and actually +laughed, I confess it, a vile hysterical laughter, to think of it. +You’ve got this almost intolerable burden to bear; it’s come like a +thief in the night; but bear it you must, and _alone!_ They say death’s +a going to bed; I doubt it; but anyhow life’s a long undressing. We +came in puling and naked, and every stitch must come off before we get +out again. We must stand on our feet in all our Rabelaisian nakedness, +and watch the world fade. Well then, and not another word of sense +shall you worm out of my worn-out old brains after today—all I say is, +don’t give in! Why, if you stood here now, freed from this devilish +disguise, the old, fat, sluggish fellow that sat and yawned his head +off under my eyes in his pew the Sunday before last, if I know anything +about human nature I’d say it to your face, and a fig for your vanity +and resignation—your last state would be worse than the first. There!’ + +He bunched up a big white handkerchief and mopped it over his head. +‘That’s done,’ he said, ‘and we won’t go back. What I want to know now +is what are you going to do? Where are you sleeping? What are you going +to think about? I’ll stay—yes, yes, that’s what it must be: I must +stay. And I detest strange beds. I’ll stay, you _sha’n’t_ be alone. Do +you hear me, Lawford?—you _sha’n’t_ be alone!’ + +Lawford gazed gravely. ‘There is just one little thing I want to ask +you before you go. I’ve wormed out an extraordinary old French book; +and—just as you say—to pass the time, I’ve been having a shot at +translating it. But I’m frightfully rusty; it’s old French; would you +mind having a look?’ + +Mr Bethany blinked and listened. He tried for the twentieth time to +judge his friend’s eyes, to gain as best he could some sustained and +unobserved glance at this baffling face. ‘Where is your precious French +book?’ he said irritably. + +‘It’s upstairs.’ + +‘Fire away, then!’ Lawford rose and glanced about the room. ‘What, no +light there either?’ snapped Mr Bethany. ‘Take this; _I_ don’t mind the +dark. There’ll be plenty of that for me soon.’ + +Lawford hesitated at the door, looking rather strangely back. ‘No,’ he +said, ‘there are matches upstairs.’ He shut the door after him. The +darkness seemed cold and still as water. He went slowly up, with eyes +fixed wide on the floating luminous gloom, and out of memory seemed to +gather, as faintly as in the darkness which they had exorcised for him, +the strange pitiful eyes of the night before. And as he mounted a +chill, terrible, physical peace seemed to steal over him. + +Mr Bethany was sitting as he had left him, looking steadily on the +floor, when Lawford returned. He flattened out the book on the table +with a sniff of impatience. And dragging the candle nearer, and +stooping his nose close to the fusty print, he began to read. + +‘Was this in the house?’ he inquired presently. + +‘No,’ said Lawford; ‘it was lent to me by a friend—Herbert.’ + +‘H’m! don’t know him. Anyhow, precious poor stuff this is. This +Sabathier, whoever he is, seems to be a kind of clap-trap +eighteenth-century adventurer who thought the world would be better +off, apparently, for a long account of all his sentimental amours. +Rousseau, with a touch of Don Quixote in his composition, and an echo +of that prince of bogies, Poe! What, in the name of wonder, induced you +to fix on this for your holiday reading?’ + +‘Sabathier’s alive, isn’t he?’ + +‘I never said he wasn’t. He’s a good deal too much alive for my old +wits, with his Mam’selle This and Madame the Other; interesting enough, +perhaps, for the professional literary nose with a taste for +patchouli.’ + +‘Yet I suppose even that is not a very rare character?’ Mr Bethany +peered up from the dingy book at his ingenuous questioner. ‘I should +say decidedly that the fellow was a _very_ rare character, so long as +by rare you don’t mean good. It’s one of the dullest stupidities of the +present day, my dear fellow, to dote on a man simply because he’s +different from the rest of us. Once a man strays out of the common +herd, he’s more likely to meet wolves in the thickets than angels. From +what I can gather in just these few pages this Sabathier appears to +have been an amorous, adventurous, emotional Frenchman, who went to the +dogs as easily and as rapidly as his own nature and his period allowed. +And I should say, Lawford, that he made precious bad reading for a poor +old troubled hermit like yourself at the present moment.’ + +‘There’s a portrait of him a few pages back.’ + +Mr Bethany, with some little impatience, turned back to the engraving. +‘“Nicholas de Sabathier,”’s he muttered. ‘“De,” indeed!’ He poked in at +the foxy print with narrowed eyes. ‘I don’t deny it’s a striking, even +perhaps, a rather taking face. I don’t deny it.’ He gazed on with an +even more acute concentration, and looked up sharply. ‘Look here, +Lawford, what in the name of wonder—what trick are you playing on me +now?’ + +‘Trick?’ said Lawford; and the world fell with the tiniest plash in the +silence, like a vivid little float upon the surface of a shadowy pool. + +The old face flushed. ‘What conceivable bearing, I say, has this dead +and gone old roué on us now?’ + +‘You don’t think, then, you see any resemblance—_any_ resemblance at +all?’ + +‘Resemblance?’ repeated Mr Bethany in a flat voice, and without raising +his face again to meet Lawford’s direct scrutiny. ‘Resemblance to +whom?’ + +‘To me? To me, as I am?’ + +‘But even, my dear fellow (forgive my dull old brains!), even if there +was just the faintest superficial suggestion of—of that; what then?’ + +‘Why,’ said Lawford, ‘he’s buried in Widderstone.’ + +‘Buried in Widderstone?’ The keen childlike blue eyes looked almost +stealthily up across the book; the old man sat without speaking, so +still that it might even be supposed he himself was listening for a +quiet distant footfall. + +‘He is buried in the grave beside which I fell asleep,’ said Lawford; +‘all green and still and broken,’ he added faintly. ‘You remember,’ he +went on in a repressed voice—‘you remember you asked me if there was +anybody else in sight, any eavesdropper? You don’t think—him?’ + +Mr. Bethany pushed the book a few inches away from him. ‘Who, did you +say—who was it you said put the thing into your head? A queer friend +surely?’ he paused helplessly. ‘And how, pray, do you know,’ he began +again more firmly, ‘even if there is a Sabathier buried at Widderstone, +how do you know it is this Sabathier? It’s not, I think,’ he added +boldly, ‘a very uncommon name; with two _b_’s at any rate. Whereabouts +is the grave?’ + +‘Quite down at the bottom, under the trees. And the little seat I told +you of is there, too, where I fell asleep. You see,’ he explained, ‘the +grave’s almost isolated; I suppose because he killed himself.’ + +Mr Bethany clasped his knuckled fingers on the tablecloth. ‘It’s no +good,’ he concluded after a long pause; ‘the fellow’s got up into my +head. I can’t think him out. We must thrash it out quietly in the +morning with the blessed sun at the window; not this farthing dip. To +me the whole idea is as revolting as it is incredible. Why, above a +century—no, no! And on the other hand, how easily one’s fancy builds! A +few straws and there’s a nest and squawking fledglings, all complete. +Is that why—is that why that good, practical wife of yours and all your +faithful household have absconded? Does it’—he threw up his head as if +towards the house above them—‘does it _reek_ with him?’ + +Lawford shook his head. ‘She hasn’t seen him: not—not apart. I haven’t +told her.’ + +Mr Bethany tossed the hugger-mugger of pamphlets across the table. +‘Then, for simple sanity’s sake, don’t. Hide it; burn it; put the thing +completely out of your mind. A friend! Who, where is this wonderful +friend?’ + +‘Not very far from Widderstone. He lives—practically alone.’ + +‘And all that stumbling and muttering on the stairs?’ he leant forward +almost threateningly. ‘There isn’t anybody here, Lawford?’ + +‘Oh, no,’ said Lawford. ‘We are practically alone with this, you know,’ +he pointed to the book, and smiled frankly, however faintly. + +Again Mr Bethany sank into a fixed yet uneasy reverie, and again shook +himself and raised his eyes. + +‘Well then,’ he said, in a voice all but morose in its fretfullness, +‘what I suggest is that first you keep quiet here; and next, that you +write and get your wife back. You say you are better. I think you said +she herself noticed a slight improvement. Isn’t it just exactly as I +foresaw? And yet she’s gone! But that’s not our business. Get her back. +And don’t for a single instant waste a thought on the other; not for a +single instant, I implore you, Lawford. And in a week the whole thing +will be no more than a dreary, preposterous dream.... You don’t +_answer_ me!’ he cried impulsively. + +‘But can one so easily forget a dream like this?’ + +‘You don’t speak out, Lawford; you mean _she_ won’t.’ + +‘It must at least seem to have been in part of my own seeking, or +contriving; or at any rate—she said it—of my own hereditary or +unconscious deserving.’ + +‘She said that!’ Mr Bethany sat back. ‘I see, I see,’ he said. ‘I’m +nothing but a fumbling old meddler. And there was I, not ten minutes +ago, preaching for all I was worth on a text I knew nothing about. God +bless me, Lawford, how long we take a-learning. I’ll say no more. But +what an illusion. To think this—this—he laid a long lean hand at arm’s +length flat upon the table towards his friend—‘to think this is our old +jog-trot Arthur Lawford! From henceforth I throw you over, you old wolf +in sheep’s wool. I wash my hands of you. And now where am I going to +sleep?’ + +He covered up his age and weariness for an instant with a small crooked +hand. + +Lawford took a deep breath. ‘You’re going, old friend, to sleep at +home. And I—I’m going to give you my arm to the Vicarage gate. Here I +am, immeasurably relieved, fitter than I’ve been since I was a dolt of +a schoolboy. On my word of honour: I can’t say why, but I am. I don’t +care _that_, vicar, honestly—puffed up with spiritual pride. If a man +can’t sleep with pride for a bed-fellow, well, he’d better try +elsewhere. It’s no good; I’m as stubborn as a mule; that’s at least a +relic of the old Adam. I care no more,’ he raised his voice firmly and +gravely—‘I don’t care a jot for solitude, not a jot for all the ghosts +of all the catacombs!’ + +Mr. Bethany listened, grimly pursed up his lips. ‘Not a jot for all the +ghosts of all the catechisms!’ he muttered. ‘Nor the devil himself, I +suppose?’ He turned once more to glance sharply in the direction of the +face he could so dimly—and of set purpose—discern; and without a word +trotted off into the hall. Lawford followed with the candle. + +‘’Pon my word, you haven’t had a mouthful of supper. Let me forage; +just a quarter of an hour, eh?’ + +‘Not me,’ said Mr Bethany; ‘if you won’t have me, home I go. I refuse +to encourage this miserable grass-widowering. What _would_ they say? +What would the busybodies say? Ghouls and graves and shocking +mysteries—Selina! Sister Anne! Come on.’ + +He shuffled on his hat and caught firm hold of his knobbed umbrella. +‘Better not leave a candle,’ he said. + +Lawford blew out the candle. + +‘What? What?’ called the old man suddenly. But no voice had spoken. + +A thin trickle of light from the lamp in the street stuck up through +the fanlight as, with a smile that could be described neither as +mischievous, saturnine, nor vindictive, and was yet faintly suggestive +of all three, Lawford quietly opened the drawing-room door and put down +the candlestick on the floor within. + +‘What on earth, my good man, are you fumbling after now?’ came the +almost fretful question from under the echoing porch. + +‘Coming, coming,’ said Lawford, and slammed the door behind them. + + + + +CHAPTER SIXTEEN + + +The first faint streaks of dawn were silvering across the stars when +Lawford again let himself into his deserted house. He stumbled down to +the pantry and cut himself a crust of bread and cheese, and ate it, +sitting on the table, watching the leafy eastern sky through the +painted bars of the area window. He munched on, hungry and tired. His +night walk had cooled head and heart. Having obstinately refused Mr +Bethany’s invitation to sleep at the Vicarage, he had sat down on an +old low wall, and watched until his light had shone out at his bedroom +window. Then he had simply wandered on, past rustling glimmering +gardens, under the great timbers of yellowing elms, hardly thinking, +hardly aware of himself except as in a far-away vision of a sluggish +insignificant creature struggling across the tossed-up crust of an old, +incomprehensible world. + +The secret of his content in that long leisurely ramble had been that +repeatedly by a scarcely realised effort it had not lain in the +direction of Widderstone. And now, as he sat hungrily devouring his +breakfast on the table in the kitchen, with the daybreak comforting his +eyes, he thought with a positive mockery of that poor old night-thing +he had given inch by inch into the safe keeping of his pink and white +drawing-room. Don Quixote, Poe, Rousseau—they were familiar but not +very significant labels to a mind that had found very poor +entertainment in reading. But they were at least representative enough +to set him wondering which of their influences it was that had inflated +with such a gaseous heroism the Lawford of the night before. He thought +of Sheila with a not unkindly smile, and of the rest. ‘I wonder what +they’ll do?’ had been a question almost as much in his mind during +these last few hours as had ‘What am I to do?’ in the first bout of his +‘visitation.’ + +But the ‘they’ was not very precisely visualised. He saw Sheila, and +Harry, and dainty pale-blue Bettie Lovat, and cautious old Wedderburn, +and Danton, and Craik, and cheery, gossipy Dr Sutherland, and the +verger, Mr Dutton, and Critchett, and the gardener, and Ada, and the +whole vague populous host that keep one as definitely in one’s place in +the world’s economy as a firm-set pin the camphored moth. What his +place was to be only time could show. Meanwhile there was in this +loneliness at least a respite. + +Solitude!—he bathed his weary bones in it. He laved his eyelids in it, +as in a woodland brook after the heat of noon. He sat on in calmest +reverie till his hunger was satisfied. Then, scattering out his last +crumbs to the birds from the barred window, he climbed upstairs again, +past his usual bedroom, past his detested guest room, up into the +narrow sweetness of Alice’s, and flinging himself on her bed fell into +a long and dreamless sleep. + +By ten next morning Lawford had bathed and dressed. And at half-past +ten he got up from Sheila’s fat little French dictionary and his +Memoirs to answer Mrs Gull’s summons on the area bell. The little woman +stood with arms folded over an empty and capacious bag, with an air of +sustained melancholy on her friendly face. She wished him a very +nervous ‘Good morning,’ and dived down into the kitchen. The hours +dragged slowly by in a silence broken only by an occasional ring at the +bell. About three she emerged from the house and climbed the area steps +with her bag hooked over her arm. He watched the little black figure +out of sight, watched a man in a white canvas hat ascend the steps to +push a blue-printed circular through the letter-box. It had begun to +rain a little. He returned to the breakfast-room and with the window +wide open to the rustling coolness of the leaves, edged his way very +slowly across from line to line of the obscure French print. + +Sabathier none the less, and in spite of his unintelligible +literariness, did begin to take shape and consistency. The man himself, +breathing, and thinking, began to live for Lawford even in those few +half-articulate pages, though not in quite so formidable a fashion as +Mr Bethany had summed him up. But as the west began to lighten with the +declining sun, the same old disquietude, the same old friendless and +foreboding ennui stole over Lawford’s solitude once more. He shut his +books, placed a candlestick and two boxes of matches on the hall table, +lit a bead of gas, and went out into the rainy-sweet streets again. + +At a mean little barber’s with a pole above his lettered door he went +in to be shaved. And a few steps further on he sat down at the +crumb-littered counter of a little baker’s shop to have some tea. It +pleased him almost to childishness to find how easily he could listen +and even talk to the oiled and crimpy little barber, and to the pretty, +consumptive-looking, print-dressed baker’s wife. Whatever his face +might now be conniving at, the Arthur Lawford of last week could never +have hob-nobbed so affably with his social ‘inferiors.’ + +For no reason in the world, unless to spend a moment or two longer in +the friendly baker’s shop, he bought six-penny-worth of cakes. He +watched them as they were deposited one by one in the bag, and even +asked for one sort to be exchanged for another, flushing a little at +the pretty compliment he had ventured on. + +He climbed out of the shop, and paused on the wooden doorstep. ‘Do you +happen to know Mr Herbert Herbert’s?’ he said. + +The baker’s wife glanced up at him with clear, reflective eyes. ‘Mr +Herbert’s?—that must be some little way off, sir. I don’t know any such +name, and I know most, just round about like.’ + +‘Well, yes, it is,’ said Lawford, rather foolishly; ‘I hardly know why +I asked. It’s past the churchyard at Widderstone.’ + +‘Oh yes, sir,’ she encouraged him. + +‘A big, wooden-looking house.’ + +‘Really, sir. Wooden?’ + +Lawford looked into her face, but could find nothing more to say, so he +smiled again rather absently, and ascended into the street. + +He sat down outside the churchyard gate on the very bank where he had +in the sourness of the nettles first opened Sabathier’s Memoirs. The +world lay still beneath the pale sky. Presently the little fat rector +walked up the hill, his wrists still showing beneath his sleeves. +Lawford meditatively watched him pass by. A small boy with a switch, a +tiny nose, and a swinging gallipot, his cheeks lit with the sunset, +followed soon after. Lawford beckoned him with his finger and held out +the bag of tarts. He watched him, half incredulous of his prize, and +with many a cautious look over his shoulder, pass out of sight. For a +long while he sat alone, only the evening birds singing out of the +greenness and silence of the churchyard. What a haunting inescapable +riddle life was. + +Colour suddenly faded out of the light streaming between the branches. +And depression, always lying in ambush of the novelty of his freedom, +began like mist to rise above his restless thoughts. It was all so +devilish empty—this raft of the world floating under evening’s shadow. +How many sermons had he listened to, enriched with the simile of the +ocean of life. Here they were, come home to roost. He had fallen +asleep, ineffectual sailor that he was, and a thief out of the cloudy +deep had stolen oar and sail and compass, leaving him adrift amid the +riding of the waves. + +‘Are they worth, do you think, quite a penny?’ suddenly inquired a +quiet voice in the silence. He looked up into the almost colourless +face, into the grey eyes beneath their clear narrow brows. + +‘I was thinking,’ he said, ‘what a curious thing life is, and +wondering—’ + +‘The first half is well worth the penny—its originality! I can’t afford +twopence. So you must _give_ me what you were wondering.’ + +Lawford gazed rather blankly across the twilight fields. ‘I was +wondering,’ he said with an oddly naive candour, ‘how long it took one +to sink.’ + +‘They say, you know,’ Grisel replied solemnly, ‘drowned sailors float +midway, suffering their sea change; purgatory. But what a splendid +pennyworth. All pure philosophy!’ + +‘“Philosophy!”’ said Lawford; ‘I am a perfect fool. Has your brother +told you about me?’ + +She glanced at him quickly. ‘We had a talk.’ + +‘Then you do know—?’ He stopped dead, and turned to her. ‘You really +realise it, looking at me now?’ + +‘I realise,’ she said gravely, ‘that you look even a little more pale +and haggard than when I saw you first the other night. We both, my +brother and I, you know, thought for certain you’d come yesterday. In +fact, I went into the Widderstone in the evening to look for you, +knowing your nocturnal habits....’ She glanced again at him with a kind +of shy anxiety. + +‘Why—why is your brother so—why does he let me bore him so horribly?’ + +‘Does he? He’s tremendously interested; but then, he’s pretty easily +interested when he’s interested at all. If he can possibly twist +anything into the slightest show of a mystery, he will. But, of course, +you won’t, you can’t, take all he says seriously. The tiniest pinch of +salt, you know. He’s an absolute fanatic at talking in the air. +Besides, it doesn’t really matter much.’ + +‘In the air?’ + +‘I mean if once a theory gets into his head—the more far-fetched, so +long as it’s original, the better—it flowers out into a positive +miracle of incredibilities. And of course you can rout out evidence for +anything under the sun from his dingy old folios. Why did he lend you +that _particular_ book?’ + +‘Didn’t he tell you that, then?’ + +‘He said it was Sabathier.’ She seemed to think intensely for the +merest fraction of a moment, and turned. ‘Honestly, though, I think he +immensely exaggerated the likeness. As for...’ + +He touched her arm, and they stopped again, face to face. ‘Tell me what +difference exactly you see,’ he said. ‘I am quite myself again now, +honestly; please tell me just the very worst you think.’ + +‘I think, to begin with,’ she began, with exaggerated candour, ‘his is +rather a detestable face.’ + +‘And mine?’ he said gravely. + +‘Why—very troubled; oh yes—but his was like some bird of prey. +Yours—what mad stuff to talk like this!—not the least symptom, that I +can see, of—why, the “prey,” you know.’ + +They had come to the wicket in the dark thorny hedge. ‘Would it be very +dreadful to walk on a little—just to finish?’ + +‘Very,’ she said, turning as gravely at his side. + +‘What I wanted to say was—’ began Lawford, and forgetting altogether +the thread by which he hoped to lead up to what he really wanted to +say, broke off lamely; ‘I should have thought you would have absolutely +despised a coward.’ + +‘It would be rather absurd to despise what one so horribly well +understands. Besides, we weren’t cowards—we weren’t cowards a bit. My +childhood was one long, reiterated terror—nights and nights of it. But +I never had the pluck to tell any one. No one so much as dreamt of the +company I had. Ah, and you didn’t see either that my heart was +absolutely in my mouth, that I was shrivelled up with fear, even at +sight of the fear on your face in the dark. There’s absolutely nothing +so catching. So, you see, I _do_ know a little what nerves are; and +dream too sometimes, though I don’t choose charnelhouses if I can get a +comfortable bed. A coward! May I really say that to ask my help was one +of the bravest things in a man I ever heard of. Bullets—that kind of +courage—no real woman cares twopence for bullets. An old aunt of mine +stared a man right out of the house with the thing in her face. Anyhow, +whether I may or not, I do say it. So now we are quits.’ + +‘Will you—’ began Lawford, and stopped. ‘What I wanted to say was,’ he +jerked on, ‘it is sheer horrible hypocrisy to be talking to you like +this—though you will never have the faintest idea of what it has meant +and done for me. I mean... And yet, and yet, I do feel when just for +the least moment I forget what I am, and that isn’t very often, when I +forget what I have become and what I must go back to—I feel that I +haven’t any business to be talking with you at all. “Quits!” And here I +am, an outcast from decent society. Ah, you don’t know—’ + +She bent her head and laughed under her breath. ‘You do really stumble +on such delicious compliments. And yet, do you know, I think my brother +would be immensely pleased to think you were an outcast from decent +society if only he could be thought one too. He has been trying half +his life to wither decent society with neglect and disdain—but it +doesn’t take the least notice. The deaf adder, you know. Besides, +besides; what is all this meek talk? I detest meek talk—gods or men. +Surely in the first and last resort all we are is ourselves. Something +has happened; you are jangled, shaken. But to us, believe me, you are +simply one of fewer friends—and I think, after struggling up +Widderstone Lane hand in hand with you in the dark, I have a right to +say “friends”—than I could count on one hand. What are we all if we +only realized it? We talk of dignity and propriety, and we are like so +many children playing with knucklebones in a giant’s scullery. Come +along, he will, some suppertime, for us, each in turn—and how many even +will so much as look up from their play to wave us good-bye? that’s +what I mean—the plot of _silence_ we are all in. If only I had my +brother’s lucidity, how much better I would have said all this. It is +only, believe me, that I want ever so much to help you, if I may—even +at risk, too,’ she added, rather shakily, ‘of having that help—well—I +know it’s little good.’ + +The lane had narrowed. They had climbed the arch of a narrow stone +bridge that spanned the smooth dark Widder. A few late starlings were +winging far above them. Darkness was coming on apace. They stood for +awhile looking down into the black flowing water, with here and there +the mild silver of a star dim leagues below. ‘I am afraid,’ said +Grisel, looking quietly up, ‘you have led me into talking most pitiless +nonsense. How many hours, I wonder, did I lie awake in the dark last +night, thinking of you? Honestly, I shall never, _never_ forget that +walk. It haunted me, on and on.’ + +‘Thinking of me? Do you really mean that? Then it was not all +imagination; it wasn’t just the drowning man clutching at a straw?’ + +The grey eyes questioned him. ‘You see,’ he explained in a whisper, as +if afraid of being overheard, ‘it—it came back again, and—I don’t mind +a bit how much you laugh at me! I had been asleep, and had had a most +awful dream, one of those dreams that seem to hint that some day _that_ +will be our real world, that some day we may awake where dreaming then +will be of this; and I woke—came back—and there was a tremendous +knocking going on downstairs. I knew there was no one else in the +house—’ + +‘No one else in the house? And you like this?’ + +‘Yes,’ said Lawford, stolidly, ‘they were all out as it happened. And, +of course,’ he went on quickly, ‘there was nothing for me to do but +simply to go down and open the door. And yet, do you know, at first I +simply couldn’t move. I lit a candle, and then—then somehow I got to +know that waiting for me was just—but there,’ he broke off +half-ashamed, ‘I mustn’t bother you with all this morbid stuff. Will +your brother be in now, do you think?’ + +‘My brother will be in, and, of course, expecting you. But as for +“bother,” believe me—well, did I quite deserve it?’ She stooped towards +him. ‘You lit a candle—and then?’ + +They turned and retraced their way slowly up the hill. + +‘It came again.’ + +‘It?’ + +‘That—that presence, that shadow. I don’t mean, of course, it’s a real +shadow. It comes, doesn’t it, from—from within? As if from out of some +unheard-of hiding place, where it has been lurking for ages and ages +before one’s childhood; at least, so it seems to me now. And yet +although it does come from within, there it is, too, in front of you, +before your eyes, feeding even on your fear, just watching, waiting +for—What nonsense all this must seem to you!’ + +‘Yes, yes; and then?’ + +‘Then, and you must remember the poor old boy had been knocking all +this time—my old friend—Mr Bethany, I mean—knocking and calling through +the letter-box, thinking I was in extremis_, or something; then—how +shall I describe it?—well _you_ came, your eyes, your face, as clear as +when, you know, the night before last, we went up the hill together. +And then...’ + +‘And then?’ + +‘And then, we—you and I, you know—simply drove him downstairs, and I +could hear myself grunting as if it was really a physical effort; we +drove him, step by step, downstairs. And—’ He laughed outright, and +boyishly continued his adventure. ‘What do you think I did then, +without the ghost of a smile, too, at the idiocy of the thing? I locked +the poor beggar in the drawing-room. I saw him there, as plainly as I +ever saw anything in my life, and the furniture glimmering, though it +was pitch dark: I can’t describe it. It all seemed so desperately real, +absolutely vital then. It all seems so meaningless and impossible now. +And yet, although I am utterly played out and done for, and however +absurd it may _sound_, I wouldn’t have lost it; I wouldn’t go back for +any bribe there is. I feel just as if a great bundle had been rolled +off my back. Of course, the queerest, the most detestable part of the +whole business is that _it_—the thing on the stairs—was this’—he lifted +a grave and haggard face towards her again—‘or rather _that_,’ he +pointed with his stick towards the starry churchyard. ‘Sabathier,’ he +said. + +Again they had paused together before the white gate, and this time +Lawford pushed it open, and followed his companion up the narrow path. + +She stayed a moment, her hand on the bell. ‘Was it my brother who +actually put that horrible idea into your mind?—about Sabathier?’ + +‘Oh no, not really put it into my head,’ said Lawford hollowly. ‘He +only found it there; lit it up.’ + +She laid her hand lightly on his arm. ‘Whether he did or not,’ she said +with an earnestness that was almost an entreaty, ‘of course, you _must_ +agree that we every one of us have some such experience—that kind of +visitor, once at least, in a lifetime.’ ‘Ah, but,’ began Lawford, +turning forlornly away, ‘you didn’t see, you can’t have realized—the +change.’ + +She pulled the bell almost as if in some inward triumph. ‘But don’t you +think,’ she suggested, ‘that that, like the other, might be, as it +were, partly imagination too? If now you thought _back._...’ + +But a little old woman had opened the door, and the sentence, for the +moment, was left unfinished. + + + + +CHAPTER SEVENTEEN + + +There was no one in the room, and no light, when they entered. For a +moment Grisel stood by the open window, looking out. Then she turned +impulsively. ‘My brother, of course, will ask you too,’ she said; ‘we +had made up our minds to do so if you came again; but I want you to +promise me now that you won’t dream of going back to-night. That surely +would be tempting—well, not Providence. I couldn’t rest if I thought +you might be alone; like that again.’ Her voice died away into the +calling of the waters. A light moved across the dingy old rows of books +and as his sister turned to go out Herbert appeared in the doorway, +carrying a green-shaded lamp, with an old leather quarto under his arm. + +‘Ah, here you are,’ he said. ‘I guessed you had probably met.’ He drew +up, burdened, before his visitor. But his clear black glance, instead +of wandering off at his first greeting, had intensified. And it was +almost with an air of absorption that he turned away. He dumped his +book on to a chair and it turned over with scattered leaves on to the +floor. He put the lamp down and stooped after it, so that his next +words came up muffled, and as if the remark had been forced out of him. +‘You don’t feel worse, I hope?’ He got up and faced his visitor for the +answer. And for the moment Lawford stood considering his symptoms. + +‘No,’ he said almost gaily; ‘I feel enormously better.’ But Herbert’s +long, oval, questioning eyes beneath the sleek black hair were still +fixed on his face. ‘I am afraid, my dear fellow,’ he said, with +something more than his usual curiously indifferent courtesy, ‘the +struggle has frightfully pulled you to pieces.’ + +‘The question is,’ answered Lawford, with a kind of tired yet whimsical +melancholy in his voice, ‘though I am not sure that the answer very +much matters—what’s going to put me together again? It’s the old story +of Humpty Dumpty, Herbert. Besides, one thing you said has stuck out in +a quite curious way in my memory. I wonder if you will remember?’ + +‘What was that?’ said Herbert with unfeigned curiosity. + +‘Why, you said even though Sabathier had failed, though I was still my +own old stodgy self, that you thought the face—the face, you know, +might work in. Somehow, sometimes I think it has. It does really rather +haunt me. In that case—well, what then?’ Lawford had himself listened +to this involved explanation much as one watches the accomplishment of +a difficult trick, marvelling more at its completion at all than at the +difficulty involved in the doing of it. + +‘“Work in,”’ repeated Herbert, like a rather blasé child confronted +with a new mechanical toy; ‘did I really say that? well, honestly, it +wasn’t bad; it’s what one would expect on that hypothesis. You see, we +are only different, as it were, in our differences. Once the foot’s +over the threshold, it’s nine points of the law! But I don’t remember +saying it.’ He shamefacedly and naively confessed it: ‘I say such an +awful lot of things. And I’m always changing my mind. It’s a standing +joke against me with my sister. She says the recording angel will have +two sides to my account: Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays; and +Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays—diametrically opposite convictions, +and both kinds wrong. On Sundays I am all things to all men. As for +Sabathier, by the way, I do want particularly to have another go at +him. I’ve been thinking him over, and I’m afraid in some ways he won’t +quite wash. And that reminds me, did you read the poor chap?’ + +‘I just grubbed through a page or two; but most of my French was left +at school. What I did do, though, was to show the book to an old friend +of ours—my wife’s and mine—just to skim—a Mr Bethany. He’s an old +clergyman—our vicar, in fact.’ + +Herbert had sat down, and with eyes slightly narrowed was listening +with peculiar attention. He smiled a little magnanimously. ‘His +verdict, I should think, must have been a perfect joy.’ + +‘He said,’ said Lawford, in his rather low, monotonous voice, ‘he said +it was precious poor stuff, that it reminded him of patchouli; and that +Sabathier—the print I mean—looked like a foxy old roué. They were, I +think, his exact words. We were alone together, last night.’ + +‘You don’t mean that he simply didn’t see the faintest resemblance?’ + +Lawford nodded. ‘But then,’ he added simply, ‘whenever he comes to see +me now he leaves his spectacles at home.’ + +And at that, as if at some preconcerted signal, they both went off into +a simple shout of laughter, unanimous and sustained. + +But this first wild bout of laughter over, the first real bursting of +the dam, perhaps, for years, Lawford found himself at a lower ebb than +ever. + +‘You see,’ he said presently, and while still his companion’s face was +smiling around the remembrance of his laughter like ripples after the +splash of a stone, ‘Bethany has been absolutely my sheet-anchor right +through. And I was—it was—you can’t possibly realise what a ghastly +change it really was. I don’t think any one ever will.’ + +Herbert opened his hand and looked reflectively into its palm before +allowing himself to reply. ‘I wonder, you know; I have been wondering a +good deal; simply taking the other point of view for a moment; _was_ +it? I don’t mean “ghastly” exactly (like, say, smallpox, G.P.I., +elephantiasis), but was it quite so complete, so radical, as in the +first sheer gust of astonishment you fancied?’ + +Lawford thought on a little further. ‘You know how one sees oneself in +a passion—why, how a child looks—the whole face darkened and drawn and +possessed? That was the change. That’s how it seems to come back to me. +And something, somebody, dodging behind the eyes. Yes; more that than +even any excessive change of feature, except, of course, that I also +seemed—Shall I ever forget that first cold, stifling stare into the +looking-glass! I certainly was much darker, even my hair. But I’ve told +you all this before,’ he added wearily, ‘and the scores and scores of +times I’ve thought it. I used to sit up there in the big spare bedroom +my wife put me up in, simply gloating. My flesh seemed nothing more +than an hallucination: there I was, haunting my body, an old grinning +tenement, and all that I thought I wanted, and couldn’t do without, all +I valued and prided myself on—stacked up in the drizzling street below. +Why, Herbert, our bodies _are_ only glass or cloud. They melt, don’t +they, like wax in the sun once we’re out. But those first few days +don’t make very pleasant thinking. Friday night was the first, when I +sat there like a twitching waxwork, soberly debating between Bedlam +here and Bedlam hereafter. I even sometimes wonder whether its very +repetition has not dulled the memory or distorted it. My wife,’ he +added ingenuously, ‘seems to think there are signs of a slight +improvement—a going back, I mean. But I’m not sure whether she meant +it.’ + +Herbert surveyed his visitor critically. ‘You say “dark,” he said; ‘but +surely, Lawford, your hair now is nearly grey; well-flecked at least.’ + +Although the remark carried nothing comparatively of a shock with it, +yet it seemed to Lawford as if an electric current had passed over his +scalp, coldly stirring every hair upon his head. But somehow or other +it was easier to sit quietly on, to express no surprise, to let them do +or say what they liked. ‘Well’ he retorted with an odd, crooked smile, +‘you must remember I am a good deal older than I was last Saturday. I +grew grey in the grave, Herbert.’ + +‘But it’s like this, you know,’ said Herbert, rising excitedly, and at +the next moment, on reflection, composedly reseating himself. ‘How many +of your people actually _saw_ it? How many owned to its being as bad, +as complete, as you made out? I don’t want for a moment to cut right +across what you said last night—our talk—but there are two million +sides to every question, and as often as not the less conspicuous have +sounder—well—roots. That’s all.’ + +‘I think really, do you know, I would rather not go over the detestable +thing again. Not many; my wife, though, and a man I know called Danton, +who—who’s prejudiced. After all, I have myself to think about too. And +right through, right through—there wasn’t the least doubt of that—they +all in their hearts knew it was me. They knew I was behind. I could +feel that absolutely always; it’s not just eyes and ears we use, +there’s us ourselves to consider, though God alone knows what that +means. But the password was there, as you might say; and they all knew +I knew it, all—except’—he looked up as if in bewilderment—‘except just +one, a poor old lady, a very old friend of my mother’s, whom I—I +Sabathiered!’ + +‘Whom—you—Sabathiered!’ repeated Herbert carefully, with infinite +relish, looking sidelong at his visitor. ‘And it is just precisely +that....’ + +But at that moment his sister appeared in the doorway to say that +supper was ready. And it was not until Herbert was actually engaged in +carving a cold chicken that he followed up his advantage. ‘Mr. Lawford, +Grisel,’ he said, ‘has just enriched our jaded language with a new +verb—to Sabathier. And if I may venture to define it in the presence of +the distinguished neologist himself, it means, “To deal with +histrionically”; or, rather, that’s what it will mean a couple of +hundred years hence. For the moment it means, “To act under the +influence of subliminalization; To perplex, or bemuse, or estrange with +_otherness_.” Do tell us, Lawford, more about the little old lady.’ He +passed with her plate a little meaningful glance at his sister, and +repeated, ‘Do!’ + +‘But I’ve been plaguing your sister enough already. You’ll wish...’ +Lawford began, and turned his tired-out eyes towards those others +awaiting them so frankly they seemed in their perfect friendliness a +rest from all his troubles. ‘You see,’ he went on, ‘what I kept on +thinking and thinking of was to get a quite unbiased and unprejudiced +view. She had known me for years, though we had not actually met more +than once or twice since my mother’s death. And there she was sitting +with me at the other end of just such another little seat as’—he +turned—to Herbert ‘as ours, at Widderstone. It was on Bewley Common: I +can see it all now; it was sunset. And I simply turned and asked her in +a kind of a whining affected manner if she remembered me; and when +after a long time she came round to owning that to all intents and +purposes she did not—I professed to have made a mistake in recognising +_her_. I think,’ he added, glancing up from one to the other of his two +strange friends, ‘I think it was the meanest trick I can remember.’ + +‘H’m,’ said Herbert solemnly: ‘I wish I had as sensitive a conscience. +But as your old friend didn’t recognise you, who’s the worse? As for +her not doing so, just think of the difference a few years makes to a +man, and _any_ severe shock. Life wears so infernally badly. Who, for +that matter, does not change, even in character and yet who professes +to see it? Mind, I don’t say in essence! But then how many of the human +ghosts one meets does one know in essence? One doesn’t want to. It +would be positively cataclysmic. And that’s what brings me around to +feel, Lawford, if I may venture to say so, that you may have brooded a +little too keenly on—on your own case. Tell any one you feel ill; he +will commiserate with you to positive nausea. Tell any priest your soul +is in danger; will he wait for proof? It’s misereres and penances world +without end. Tell any woman you love her; will she, can she, should +she, gainsay you? There you are. The cat’s out of the bag, you see. My +sister and I sat up half the night talking the thing over. I said I’d +take the plunge. I said I’d risk appearing the crassest, +contradictoriest wretch that ever drew breath. I don’t deny that what I +hinted at the other night must seem in part directly contrary to what +I’m going to say now.’ + +He wheeled his black eyes as if for inspiration, and helped himself to +salad. ‘It’s this,’ he said. ‘Isn’t it possible, isn’t it even probable +that being ill, and overstrung, moping a little over things more or +less out of the common ruck, and sitting there in a kind of +trance—isn’t it possible that you may have very largely _imagined_ the +change? Hypnotised yourself into believing it much worse—more profound, +radical, acute—and simply absolutely hypnotizing others into thinking +so, too. Christendom is just beginning to rediscover that there is such +a thing as faith, that it is just possible that, say, megrims or +melancholia may be removed at least as easily as mountains. The +converse, of course, is obvious on the face of it. A man fails because +he thinks himself a failure. It’s the men that run away that lose the +battle. Suppose then, Lawford’—he leaned forward, keen and +suave—‘suppose you have been and “Sabathiered” yourself!’ + +Lawford had grown accustomed during the last few days to finding +himself gazing out like a child into reality, as if from the windows of +a dream. He had in a sense followed this long, loosely stitched, +preliminary argument; he had at least in part realised that he sat +there between two clear friendly minds acting in the friendliest and +most obvious collusion. But he was incapable of fixing his attention +very closely on any single fragment of Herbert’s apology, or of rousing +himself into being much more than a dispassionate and not very +interested spectator of the little melodrama that Fate, it appeared, +had at the last moment decided rather capriciously to twist into a +farce. He turned with a smile to the face so keenly fixed and +enthusiastic with the question it had so laboriously led up to: ‘But +surely, I don’t quite see...’ + +Herbert lifted his glass as if to his visitor’s acumen and set it down +again without tasting it. ‘Why, my dear fellow,’ he said triumphantly, +‘even a dream must have a peg. Yours was this unforgettable old +suicide. Candidly now, how much of Sabathier was actually yours? In +spite of all that that fantastical fellow, Herbert, said last night, +dead men _don’t_ tell tales. The last place in the world to look for a +ghost is where his traitorous bones lie crumbling. Good heavens, think +what irrefutable masses of evidence there would be at our finger-tips +if every tombstone hid its ghost! No; the fellow just arrested you with +his creepy epitaph: an epitaph, mind you, that is in a literary sense +distinctly fertilizing. It catches one’s fancy in its own crude way, as +pages and pages of infinitely more complicated stuff take possession +of, germinate, and sprout in one’s imagination in another way. We are +all psychical parasites. Why, given his epitaph, given the +surroundings, I wager any sensitive consciousness could have guessed at +his face; and guessing, as it were, would have feigned it. What do you +think, Grisel?’ + +‘I think, dear, you are talking absolute nonsense; what do they call +it—“darkening counsel”? It’s “the hair of the dog,” Mr Lawford.’ + +‘Well, then, you see,’ said Herbert over a hasty mouthful, and turning +again to his victim—‘then you see, when you were just in the pink of +condition to credit any idle tale you heard, then I came in. What, with +the least impetus, can one _not_ see by moonlight? The howl of a dog +turns the midnight into a Brocken; the branch of a tree stoops out at +you like a Beelzebub crusted with gadflies. I’d, mind you, sipped of +the deadly old Huguenot too. I’d listened to your innocent prattle +about the child kicking his toes out on death’s cupboard door; what +more likely thing in the world, then, than that with that moon, in that +packed air, I should have swallowed the bait whole, and seen Sabathier +in every crevice of your skin? I don’t say there wasn’t any +resemblance; it was for the moment extraordinary; it was even when you +were here the other night distinctly arresting. But now (poor old +Grisel, I’m nearly done) all I want to say is this: that if we had the +“foxy old roué” here now, and Grisel played Paris between the three of +us, she’d hand over the apple not to you but to me.’ + +‘I don’t quite see where poor Paris comes in,’ suggested Grisel meekly. + +‘No, nor do I,’ said Herbert. ‘All that I mean, sagacious child, is, +that Mr Lawford no more resembles the poor wretch now than I resemble +the Apollo Belvedere. If you had only heard my sister scolding me, +railing at me for putting such ideas into your jangled head! They don’t +affect _me_ one iota. I have, I suppose, what is usually called +imagination; which merely means that I can sup with the devil, spoon +for spoon, and could sleep in Bluebeard’s linen-closet without turning +a hair. You, if I am not very much mistaken, are not much troubled with +that very unprofitable quality, and so, I suppose, when a crooked and +bizarre fancy does edge into your mind it roots there.’ + +And that said, not without some little confusion, and covert glance of +inquiry at his sister, Herbert made all the haste he could to catch up +the course that his companions had already finished. + +If only, Lawford thought, this insufferable weariness would lift awhile +he could enjoy the quiet, absurd, heedless talk, and this very friendly +topsy-turvy effort to ease his mind and soothe his nerves. He might +even take an interest again in his ‘case.’ + +‘You see,’ he said, turning to Grisel, ‘I don’t think it really very +much matters how it all came about. I never could believe it would +last. It may perhaps—some of it at least may be fancy. But then, what +isn’t? What _is_ trustworthy? And now your brother tells me my hair’s +turning grey. I suppose I have been living too slowly, too sluggishly, +and they thought it was high time to stir me up.’ + +He saw with extraordinary vividness the low panelled room; the still +listening face; the white muslin shoulders and dark hair; and the eyes +that seemed to recall some far-off desolate longing for home and +childhood. It was all a dream. That was the end of the matter. Even +now, perhaps, his tired old stupid body was lying hunched up, drenched +with dew upon the little old seat under the mist-wreathed branches. +Soon it would bestir itself and wake up and go off home—home to Sheila, +to the old deadly round that once had seemed so natural and inevitable, +to the old dull Lawford—eyes and brain and heart. + +They returned up the dark shallow staircase to Herbert’s book-room, and +he talked on to very quiet and passive listeners in his own fantastic +endless fashion. And ever and again Lawford would find himself +intercepting fleeting and anxious glances at his face, glances almost +of remorse and pity; and thought he detected beneath this irresponsible +contradictory babble an unceasing effort to clear the sky, to lure away +too pressing memories, to put his doubts and fears completely to rest. + +Herbert even went so far as to plead guilty, when Grisel gave him the +cue, of having a little heightened and overcoloured his story of the +restless phantasmal old creature that haunted their queer wooden +hauntable old house. And when they rose, laughing and yawning to take +up their candles, it was, after all, after a rather animated +discussion, with many a hair-raising ghost story brought in for proof +between brother and sister, as to exactly how many times that +snuff-coloured spectre had made his appearance; and, with less +unanimity still, as to the precise manner in which he was in the habit +of making his precipitant exit. + +‘You do at any rate acknowledge, Grisel, that the old creature does +appear, and that you saw him yourself step out into space when you were +sitting down there under the willow shelling peas. I’ve seen him twice +for certain, once rather hazily; Sallie saw him so plainly she asked +his business: that’s five. I resign.’ + +‘Acknowledge!’ said Grisel; ‘of course I do. I’d acknowledge anything +in the world to save argument. Why, I don’t know what I should do +without him. If only, now Mr Lawford would give him a fair chance to +show himself reading quietly here about ten minutes to one, or shelling +peas even, if he prefers it. If only he’d stay long enough for _that_. +Wouldn’t it be the very thing for them both!’ + +‘Of course,’ said Herbert cordially, ‘the very thing.’ + +Lawford looked up at neither of them. He shook his head. + +But he needed little persuasion to stay at least one night. The +prospect of that long solitary walk, of that tired stupid stooping +figure dragging itself along the interminable country roads seemed a +sheer impossibility. ‘It is not—it isn’t, I swear it—the other that +keeps me back,’ he had solemnly assured the friend that half smiled her +relief at his acceptance, ‘but—if you only knew how empty it’s all got +now; all reason gone even to go on at all.’ + +‘But doesn’t it follow? Of course it’s empty. And now life is going to +begin again. I assure you it is, I do indeed. Only, only have +courage—just the will to win on.’ + +He said good-night; shut-to the latched door of his long low room, +ceilinged with rafters close under the steep roof, its brown walls hung +with quiet, dark, pondering and beautiful faces looking gravely across +at him. And with his candle in his hand he sat down on the bedside. All +speculation was gone. The noisy clock of his brain had run down again. +He turned towards the old oval looking-glass on the dressing-table +without the faintest stirring of interest, suspense, or anxiety. What +did it matter what a man looked like—a now familiar but enfeebled and +deprecating voice seemed to say. He knew that a change had come. Even +Sheila had noticed it. And since then what had he not gone through? +What now was here seemed of little moment, so far at least as this +world was concerned. + +At last with an effort he rose, crossed the uneven floor, and looked in +unmovedly on what was his own poor face come back to him: changed +indeed almost beyond belief from the sleek self-satisfied genial yet +languid Arthur Lawford of the past years, and still haunted with some +faint trace of the set and icy sharpness, and challenge, and affront of +the dark Adventurer, but that—how immeasurably dimmed and blunted and +faded. He had expected to find it so. Would it (the thought vanished +across his mind) would it have been as unmistakably there had he come +hot-foot, fearing, expecting to find the other? But—was he +disappointed! + +He hardly knew how long he stood there, leaning on his hands, surveying +almost listlessly in the candle-light that lined, bedraggled, grey, +hopeless countenance, those dark-socketed, smouldering eyes, whose +pupils even now were so dilated that a casual glance would have failed +to detect the least hint of any iris. ‘It must have been something +pretty bad you were, you know, or something pretty bad you did,’ they +seemed to be trying to say to him, ‘to drag us down to this.’ + +He knelt down by force of habit to say his prayers; but no words came. +Well, between earthly friends a betrayal such as this would have caused +a livelong estrangement and hostility. The God the old Lawford used to +pray to would forgive him, he thought wearily, if just for the present +he was a little too sore at heart to play the hypocrite. But if, while +kneeling, he said nothing, he saw a good many things in such +tranquillity and clearness as the mere eyes of the body can share but +rarely with their sisters of the imagination. And now it was Alice who +looked mournfully out of the dark at him; and now the little old +charwoman, Mrs Gull, with her bag hooked over her arm, climbed +painfully up the area steps; and now it was the lean vexed face of a +friend, nursing some restless and anxious grievance against him—Mr +Bethany; and then and ever again it was the face of one who seemed pure +dream and fantasy and yet... He listened intently and fancied even now +he could hear the voices of brother and sister talking quietly and +circumspectly together in the room beneath. + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHTEEN + + +A quiet knocking aroused him in the long, tranquil bedroom; and +Herbert’s head was poked into the room. ‘There’s a bath behind that +door over there,’ he whispered, ‘or if you like I’m off for a bathe in +the Widder. It’s a luscious day. Shall I wait? All right,’ and the head +was withdrawn. ‘Don’t put much on,’ came the voice at the panel; ‘we’ll +be home again in twenty minutes.’ + +The green and brightness of the morning must have been prepared for +overnight by spiders and the dew. Everywhere the gleaming nets were +hung, and everywhere there rose a tiny splendour from the waterdrops, +so clear and pure and changeable it seemed with their fire and colour +they shook a tiny crystal music in the air. Herbert led the way along a +clayey downward path beneath hazels tossing softly together their twigs +of nuts, until they came out into a rounded hollow that, mounded with +thyme, sloped gently down to the green banks of the Widder. The water +poured like clearest glass beneath a rain of misty sunbeams. + +‘My sister always says that this is the very dell Boccaccio had in his +mind’s eye when he wrote the “Decameron.” There really is something +almost classic in those pines. And I’d sometimes swear with my eyes +just out of the water I’ve seen Dryads half in hiding peeping between +those beeches. Good Lord, Lawford, what a world we wretched moderns +have made, and missed!’ + +The water was violently cold. It seemed to Lawford, as it swept up over +his body, and as he plunged his night-distorted eyes beneath its +blazing surface, that it was charged with some strange, powerful +enchantment to wash away in its icy clearness even the memory of the +dull and tarnished days behind him. If one could but tie up anyhow that +stained bundle of inconsequent memories called life, and fling it into +a cupboard remoter even than Bluebeard’s, and lock the door, and drop +the quickly-rusting key into these living waters! + +He dressed himself with window thrown open to the blackbirds and +thrushes, and the occasional shrill solitary whistling of a robin. But, +like the sour-sweet fragrance of the brier, its wandering desolate +burst of music had power to wake memory, and carried him instantly back +to that first aimless descent into the evening gloom of Widderstone +from which it was in vain to hope ever to climb again. Surely never a +more ghoulish face looked out on its man before than that which +confronted him as with borrowed razor he stood shaving those sunken +chaps, that angular chin. + +And even now, beneath the lantern of broad daylight, just as within +that other face had lurked the undeniable ghost and presence of +himself, so beneath the sunken features seemed to float, tenuous as +smoke, scarcely less elusive than a dream, between eye and object, the +sinister darkness of the face that in those two bouts with fear he had +by some strange miracle managed to repel. + +‘Work in,’ the chance phrase came back. It had worked in in sober +earnest; and so far as the living of the next few weeks went, surely it +might prove an ally without which he simply could not conceive himself +as struggling on at all. + +But as dexterous minds as even restless Sabathier’s had him just now in +safe and kindly keeping. All the quiet October morning Herbert kept him +talking and stooping over his extraordinary collection of books. + +‘The point is,’ he explained to Lawford, standing amid a positive +archipelago of precious ‘finds,’ with his foot hoisted onto a chair and +a patched-up, sea-stained folio on his knee, ‘I honestly detest the +mere give and take of what we are fools enough to call life. I don’t +deny Life’s there,’ he swept his hand towards the open window—‘in that +frantic Tophet we call London; but there’s no focus, no point of +vantage. Even a scribbler only gets it piecemeal and through a dulled +medium. We learn to read before we know how to see; we swallow our +tastes, convictions, and emotions whole; so that nine-tenths of the +world’s nectar is merely honeydew.’ He smiled pleasantly into the fixed +vacancy of his visitor’s face. ‘That’s why I’ve just gone on,’ he +continued amiably, ‘collecting this particular kind of stuff—what you +might call riff-raff. There’s not a book here, Lawford, that hasn’t at +least a glimmer of the real thing in it—just Life, seen through a +living eye, and felt. As for literature, and style, and all that +gallimaufry, don’t fear for them if your author has the ghost of a hint +of genius in his making.’ + +‘But surely,’ said Lawford, trying for the twentieth time to pretend to +himself that these endless books carried the faintest savour of the +delight to him which they must, he rather forlornly supposed, shower +upon Herbert, ‘surely genius is a very rare thing!’ + +‘Rare! the world simply swarms with it. But before you can bottle it up +in a book it’s got to be articulate. Just for a single instant imagine +yourself Falstaff, and if there weren’t hundreds of Falstaffs in every +generation, to be examples of his ungodly life, he’d be as dead as a +doornail to-morrow—imagine yourself Falstaff, and being so, sitting +down to write “Henry IV,” or “The Merry Wives.” It’s simply +preposterous. You wouldn’t be such a fool as to waste the time. A mere +Elizabethan scribbler comes along with a gift of expression and an +observant eye, lifts the bloated old tippler clean out of life, and +swims down the ages as the greatest genius the world has ever seen. +Whereas, surely, though you mustn’t let me bore you with all this +piffle, it’s Falstaff is the genius, and W. S. merely a talented +reporter. + +‘Lear, Macbeth, Mercutio—they live on their own, as it were. The +newspapers are full of them, if we were only the Shakespeares to see +it. Have you ever been in a Police Court? Have you ever _watched_ +tradesmen behind their counters? My soul, the secrets walking in the +streets! You jostle them at every corner. There’s a Polonius in every +first-class railway carriage, and as many Juliets as there are +boarding-schools. What the devil are _you_, my dear chap, but genius +itself, with all the world brand new upon your shoulders? And who’d +have thought it of you ten days ago? + +‘It’s simply and solely because we’re all, poor wretches, dumb—dumb as +butts of Malmsez; dumb as drummerless drums. Here am I, ass that I am, +trickling out this—this whey that no more expresses me than Tupper does +Sappho. But that’s what I want to mean. How inexhaustibly rich +everything is, if you only stick to life. Here it is packed away behind +these rotting covers, just the real thing, no respectable stodge; no +mere parasitic stuff; not more than a dozen poets; scores of outcasts +and vagabonds—and the real thing in vagabonds is pretty rare in print, +I can tell you. We’re all, every one of us, sodden with facts, drugged +with the second-hand, and barnacled with respectability until—until the +touch comes. Goodness knows where from; but there’s no mistaking it; oh +no!’ + +‘But what,’ said Lawford uneasily, ‘what on earth do you mean by the +touch?’ + +‘I mean when you cease to be a puppet only and sit up in the gallery +too. When you squeeze through to the other side. When you suffer a kind +of conversion of the mind; become aware of your senses. When you get a +living inkling. When you become articulate to yourself. When you +_see_.’ + +‘I am awfully stupid,’ Lawford murmured, ‘but even now I don’t really +follow you a bit. But when, as you say, you do become articulate to +yourself, what happens then?’ + +‘Why, then,’ said Herbert with a shrug almost of despair, ‘then begins +the weary tramp back. One by one drop off the truisms, and the +Grundyisms, and the pedantries, and all the stillborn claptrap of the +marketplace sloughs off. Then one can seriously begin to think about +saving one’s soul.’ + +‘Saving one’s soul,’ groaned Lawford; ‘why, I am not even sure of my +own body yet.’ He walked slowly over to the window and with every +thought in his head as quiet as doves on a sunny wall, stared out into +the garden of green things growing, leaves fading and falling water. ‘I +tell you what,’ he said, turning irresolutely, ‘I wonder if you could +possibly find time to write me out a translation of Sabathier. My +French is much too hazy to let me really get at the chap. He’s gone +now; but I really should like to know what kind of stuff exactly he has +left behind.’ + +‘Oh, Sabathier!’ said Herbert, laughing. ‘What do you think of that, +Grisel?’ he asked, turning to his sister, who at that moment had looked +in at the door. ‘Here’s Mr Lawford asking me to make a translation of +Sabathier. Lunch, Lawford.’ + +Lawford sighed. And not until he had slowly descended half the narrow +uneven stairs that led down to the dining-room did he fully realise the +guile of a sister that could induce a hopeless bookworm to waste a +whole morning over the stupidest of companions, simply to keep his +tired-out mind from rankling, and give his Sabathier a chance to go to +roost. + +‘I think, do you know,’ he managed to blurt out at last ‘I think I +ought to be getting home again. The house is empty—and—’ + +‘You shall go this evening,’ said Herbert, ‘if you really must insist +on it. But honestly, Lawford, we both think that after what the last +few days must have been, it is merely common sense to take a rest. How +can you possibly rest with a dozen empty rooms echoing every thought +you think? There’s nothing more to worry about; you agree to that. Send +your people a note saying that you are here, safe and sound. Give them +a chance of lighting a fire, and driving in the fatted calf. Stay on +with us just the week out.’ + +Lawford turned from one to the other of the two friendly faces. But +what was dimly in his mind refused to express itself. ‘I think, you +know, I—’ he began falteringly. + +‘But it’s just this thinking that’s the deuce—this preposterous habit +of having continually to make up one’s mind. Off with his head, Grisel! +My sister’s going to take you for a picnic; we go every other fine +afternoon; and you can argue it out with her.’ + +Once alone again with Grisel, however, Lawford found talking +unnecessary. Silences seemed to fall between them as quietly and +restfully as evening flows into night. They walked on slowly through +the fading woods, and when they had reached the top of the hill that +sloped down to the dark and foamless Widder they sat down in the +honey-scented sunshine on a knoll of heather and bracken, and Grisel +lighted the little spirit-kettle she had brought with her, and busied +herself very methodically over making tea. + +That done, she clasped her hands round her knees, and sat now +gossiping, now silent, in the pale autumnal beauty. There was a bird +wistfully twittering in the branches overhead, and ever and again a +withered leaf would slip circling down from the motionless beech boughs +arched in their stillness above their heads beneath the thin blue sky. + +‘Men, you know,’ she began again suddenly, starting out of reverie, +‘really are absurdly blind; and just a little bit absurdly kindly +stupid. How many times have I been at the point of laughing out at my +brother’s delicious naive subtleties. But you do, you will, understand, +Mr Lawford, that he was, that we are both “doing our best”—to make +amends?’ + +‘I understand—I do indeed—a tenth part of all your kindness.’ + +‘Yes, but that’s just it—that horrible word “kindness”! If ever there +were two utterly self-absorbed people, without a trace, with an +absolute horror of kindness, it is just my brother and I. It’s most of +it false and most of it useless. We all surely must take what comes in +this topsy-turvy world. I believe in saying out:—that the more one +thinks about life the worse it becomes. There are only two kinds of +happiness in this world—a wooden post’s and Prometheus’s. And who ever +heard of any one having the impudence to be kind to Prometheus? As for +a miserable “medium” like me, not quite a post and leagues and leagues +from even envying a Prometheus, she’s better for the powder without the +jam. But that’s all nothing. What I can’t help thinking—and it’s not a +bit giving my brother away, because we both think it—that it was partly +our thoughtlessness that added at least something to—to the rest. It +was perfectly absurd. He saw you were ill; he saw—he must have seen +even in that first Sunday talk—that your nerves were all askew. And who +doesn’t know what “nerves” means nowadays? And yet he deliberately +chattered. He loves it—just at large, you know, like me. I told him +before I came out that I intended, if I could, to say all this. And now +it’s said you’ll please forgive me for going back to it.’ + +‘Please don’t talk about forgiveness. But when you say he chattered, +you mean about Sabathier, of course. And that, you know, I don’t care a +fig for now. We can settle all that between ourselves—him and me, I +mean. And now tell me candidly again—Is there any “prey” in my face +now?’ + +She looked up fleetingly into his eyes, leant back her head and +laughed. ‘“Prey,” there never was a glimpse.’ + +‘And “change”?’ Their eyes met again in an infinitely brief, infinitely +bewildering argument. + +‘Really, really, scarcely perceptible,’ she assured him, ‘except, of +course, how horribly, horribly ill you look. And that only seems to +prove to me you must be hiding something else. No illusion on earth +could—could have done that to your face.’ + +‘You think, I know,’ he persisted, ‘that I must be persuaded and +cosseted and humoured. Yes, you do; it’s my poor old sanity that’s +really in both your minds. Perhaps I am—not absolutely sound. Anyhow. +I’ve been watching it in your looks at each other all the time. And I +can never, never say, never tell you what you have done for me. But you +see, after all, we did win through; I keep on telling myself that. So +that now it’s purely from the most selfish and practical motives that I +want you to be perfectly frank with me. I have to go back, you know; +and some of them, one or two of my friends I mean, are not all on my +side. Think of me as I was when you came into the room, three centuries +ago, and you turned and looked, frowning at me in the candle-light; +remember that and look at me now. What is the difference? Does it shock +you? Does it make the whole world seem a trick, a sham? Does it simply +sour your life to think such a thing possible? Oh, the hours I’ve spent +gloating on Widderstone’s miserable mask of skin and bone, as I was +saying to your brother only last night, and never knew until they +shuffled me that the old self too was nothing better than a stifling +suffocating mask.’ + +‘But don’t you see,’ she argued softly, turning her face away a little, +‘you were a stranger then (though I certainly didn’t _mean_ to frown). +And then a little while after we were, well, just human beings, +shoulder to shoulder, and if friendship does not mean that, I don’t +know what it does mean. And now, you are—well, just you: the you, you +know, of three centuries ago! And if you mean to ask me whether at any +precise moment I have been conscious that this you I am now speaking to +was not the you of last night, or of that dark climb up the hill, why, +it is simply frantic to think it could ever be necessary to say over +and over again, No. But if you mean, Have you changed else? All I could +answer is, Don’t we all change as we grow to know one another? What +were just features, what just dingily represented one, as it were, is +forgotten, or rather gets remembered. Of course, the first glimpse is +the landscape under lightning as it were. But afterwards isn’t it +surely like the alphabet to a child; what was first a queer angular +scrawl becomes A, and is always ever after A, undistinguished, +half-forgotten, yet standing at last for goodness knows what real +wonderful things—or for just the dry bones of soulless words? Is that +it?’ She stole a sidelong glance into his brooding face, leaning her +head on her hand. + +‘Yes, yes,’ came the rather dissatisfied reply. ‘I do agree; perfectly. +But then, you see—I told you I was going to talk of nothing but +myself—what did at first happen to me was something much worse, and, I +suppose, something quite different from that.’ + +‘And yet, didn’t you tell us, that of all your friends not one really +denied in their hearts your—what they would call, I suppose—your +_identity_; except that poor little offended old lady. And even she, if +my intuition is worth a penny piece, even she when you go soon and talk +to her will own that she did know you, and that it was not because you +were a stranger that she was offended, but because you so ungenerously +pretended to be one. That was a little mad, now, if you like!’ + +‘Oh yes,’ said Lawford, ‘I am going to ask her forgiveness. I don’t +know what I didn’t vow to take her for a peace-offering if the chance +should ever come—and the courage—to make my peace with her. But now +that the chance has come, and I think the courage, it is the desire +that’s gone. I don’t seem to care either way. I feel as if I had got +past making my peace with any one.’ + +But this time no answer helped him out. + +‘After all,’ he went plodding on, ‘there is more than just the mere day +to day to consider. And one doesn’t realise that one’s face actually +_is_ one’s fortune without a shock. And that _that_ gone, one is, as +your brother said, just like a bee come back to the wrong hive. It +undermines,’ he smiled rather bitterly, ‘one’s views rather. And it +certainly shifts one’s friends. If it hadn’t been just for my old’—he +stopped dead, and again pushed slowly on—‘if it hadn’t been for our old +friend, Mr Bethany, I doubt if we should now have had a soul on our +side. I once read somewhere that wolves always chase the old and weak +and maimed out of the pack. And after all, what do _we_ do? Where do we +keep the homeless and the insane? And yet, you know,’ he added +ruminatingly, ‘it is not as if mine was ever a particularly lovely or +lovable face! While as for the poor wretch behind it, well, I really +cannot see what meaning, or life even, he had before—’ + +‘Before?’ + +Lawford met bravely the clear whimsical eyes. ‘Before, I was +Sabathiered.’ + +Grisel laughed outright. + +‘You think,’ he retorted almost bitterly, ‘you think I am talking like +a child.’ + +‘Yes,’ she sighed cheerfully, ‘I was quite envying you.’ + +‘Well, there I am,’ said Lawford inconsequently. ‘And now; well, now, I +suppose, the whole thing’s to begin again. I can’t help beginning to +wonder what the meaning of it all is; why one’s duty should always seem +so very stupid a thing. And then, too, what _can_ there be on earth +that even a buried Sabathier could desire?’ He glanced up in a really +animated perplexity at the still, dark face turned in the evening light +towards the darkening valley. And perplexity deepened into a disquieted +frown—like that of a child who is roused suddenly from a daydream by +the half-forgotten question of a stranger. He turned his eyes almost +furtively away as if afraid of disturbing her; and for awhile they sat +in silence... At last he turned again almost shyly. ‘I hope some day +you will let me bring my daughter to see you.’ + +‘Yes, yes,’ said Grisel eagerly; ‘we should both _love_ it, of course. +Isn’t it curious?—I simply _knew_ you had a daughter. Sheer intuition!’ + +‘I say “some day,”’ said Lawford; ‘I know, though, that that some day +will never come.’ + +‘Wait; just wait,’ replied the quiet confident voice, ‘that will come +too. One thing at a time, Mr Lawford. You’ve won your old self back +again; you’ll win your old love of life back again in a little while; +never fear. Oh, don’t I know that awful Land’s End after illness; and +that longing, too, that gnawing longing, too, for Ultima Thule. So, +it’s a bargain between us that you bring your daughter soon.’ She +busied herself over the tea things. ‘And, of course,’ she added, as if +it were an afterthought, looking across at him in the pale green +sunlight as she knelt, ‘you simply won’t think of going back +to-night.... Solitude, I really do think, solitude just now would be +absolute madness. You’ll write to-day and go, perhaps, to-morrow!’ + +Lawford looked across in his mind at his square ungainly house, +full-fronting the afternoon sun. He tried to repress a shudder. ‘I +think, do you know, I ought to go to-day.’ + +‘Well, why not? Why not? Just to reassure yourself that all’s well. And +come back here to sleep. If you’d really promise that I’d drive you in. +I’d love it. There’s the jolliest little governess-cart we sometimes +hire for our picnics. May I? You’ve no idea how much easier in our +minds my brother and I would be if you would. And then to-morrow, or at +any rate the next day, you shall be surrendered, whole and in your +right mind. There, that’s a bargain too. Now we must hurry.’ + + + + +CHAPTER NINETEEN + + +Herbert himself went down to order the governess cart, and packed them +in with a rug. And in the dusk Grisel set Lawford down at the corner of +his road and drove on to an old bookseller’s with a commission from her +brother, promising to return for him in an hour. Dust and a few straws +lay at rest as if in some abstruse arrangement on the stones of the +porch just as the last faint whirling gust of sunset had left them. +Shut lids of sightless indifference seemed to greet the wanderer from +the curtained windows. + +He opened the door and went in. For a moment he stood in the vacant +hall; then he peeped first into the blind-drawn dining-room, faintly, +dingily sweet, like an empty wine-bottle. He went softly on a few paces +and just opening the door looked in on the faintly glittering twilight +of the drawing-room. But the congealed stump of candle that he had set +in the corner as a final rancorous challenge to the beaten Shade was +gone. He slowly and deliberately ascended the stairs, conscious of a +peculiar sense of ownership of what in even so brief an absence had +taken on so queer a look of strangeness. It was almost as if he might +be some lone heir come in the rather mournful dusk to view what +melancholy fate had unexpectedly bestowed on him. + +‘Work in’—what on earth else could this chill sense of strangeness +mean? Would he ever free his memory from that one haphazard, haunting +hint? And as he stood in the doorway of the big, calm room, which +seemed even now to be stirring with the restless shadow of these last +few far-away days; now pacing sullenly to and fro; now sitting +hunched-up to think; and now lying impotent in a vain, hopeless +endeavour only for the breath of a moment to forget—he awoke out of +reverie to find himself smiling at the thought that a changed face was +practically at the mercy of an incredulous world, whereas a changed +heart was no one’s deadly dull affair but its owner’s. The merest +breath of pity even stole over him for the Sabathier who after all had +dared and had needed, perhaps, nothing like so arrogant and merciless a +coup de grâce_ to realise that he had so ignominiously failed. + +‘But there, that’s done!’ he exclaimed out loud, not without a tinge of +regret that theories, however brilliant and bizarre, could never now be +anything else—that now indeed that the symptoms had gone, the ‘malady,’ +for all who had not been actually admitted into the shocked circle, was +become nothing more than an inanely ‘tall’ story; stuffing not even +savoury enough for a goose. How wide exactly, he wondered, would +Sheila’s discreet, shocked circle prove? He stood once more before the +looking-glass, hearing again Grisel’s words in the still green shadow +of the beech-tree, ‘Except of course, horribly, horribly ill.’ ‘What a +fool, what a coward she thinks I am!’ + +There was still nearly an hour to be spent in this great barn of faded +interests. He lit a candle and descended into the kitchen. A mouse went +scampering to its hole as he pushed open the door. The memory of that +ravenous morning meal nauseated him. It was sour and very still here; +he stood erect; the air smelt faint of earth. In the breakfast-room the +bookcase still swung open. Late evening mantled the garden; and in +sheer ennui again he sat down to the table, and turned for a last not +unfriendly hob-a-nob with his poor old friend Sabathier. He would take +the thing back. Herbert, of course, was going to translate it for him. +Now if the patient old Frenchman had stormed Herbert instead—that +surely would have been something like a coup! Those frenzied books. The +absurd talk of the man. Herbert was perfectly right—he could have +entertained fifty old Huguenots without turning a hair. ‘I’m such an +awful stodge.’ + +He turned the woolly leaves over very slowly. He frowned impatiently, +and from the end backwards turned them over again. Then he laid the +book softly down on the table and sat back. He stared with narrowed +lids into the flame of his quiet friendly candle. Every trace, every +shred of portrait and memoir were gone. Once more, deliberately, +punctiliously, he examined page by page the blurred and unfamiliar +French—the sooty heads, the long, lean noses, the baggy eyes passing +like figures in a peepshow one by one under his hand—to the last +fragmentary and dexterously mended leaf. Yes, Sabathier was gone. Quite +the old slow Lawford smile crept over his face at the discovery. It was +a smile a little sheepish too, as he thought of Sheila’s quiet +vigilance. + +And the next instant he had looked up sharply, with a sudden peculiar +shrug, and a kind of cry, like the first thin cry of an awakened child, +in his mind. Without a moment’s hesitation he climbed swiftly upstairs +again to the big sepulchral bedroom. He pressed with his fingernail the +tiny spring in the looking-glass. The empty drawer flew open. There +were finger-marks still in the dust. + +Yet, strangely enough, beneath all the clashing thoughts that came +flocking into his mind as he stood with the empty drawer in his hand, +was a wounding yet still a little amused pity for his old friend Mr +Bethany. So far as he himself was concerned the discovery—well, he +would have plenty of time to consider everything that could possibly +now concern himself. Anyhow, it could only simplify matters. + +He remembered waking to that old wave of sickening horror on the first +unhappy morning; he remembered the keen yet owlish old face blinking +its deathless friendliness at him, and the steady pressure of the cold, +skinny hand. As for Sheila, she had never done anything by halves; +certainly not when it came to throwing over a friend no longer +necessary to one’s social satisfaction. But she would edge out +cleverly, magnanimously, triumphantly enough, no doubt, when the day of +reckoning should come, the day when, her nets wide spread, her bait +prepared, he must stand up before her outraged circle and positively +prove himself her lawful husband, perhaps even to the very imprint of +his thumb. + +‘Poor old thing!’ he said again; and this time his pity was shared +almost equally between both witnesses to Mr Bethany’s ingenuous little +document, the loss of which had fallen so softly and pathetically that +he felt only ashamed of having discovered it so soon. + +He shut back the tell-tale drawer, and after trying to collect his +thoughts in case anything should have been forgotten, he turned with a +deep trembling sigh to descend the stairs. But on the landing he drew +back at the sound of voices, and then a footstep. Soon came the sound +of a key in the lock. He blew out his candle and leant listening over +the balusters. + +‘Who’s there?’ he called quietly. + +‘Me, sir,’ came the feeble reply out of the darkness. + +‘What is it, Ada? What have you come for?’ + +‘Only, sir, to see that all was safe, and you were in, sir.’ + +‘Yes,’ he said. ‘All’s safe; and I am in. What if I had been out?’ It +was like dropping tiny pebbles into a deep well—so long after came the +answering feeble splash. + +‘Then I was to go back, sir.’ And a moment after the discreet voice +floated up with the faintest tinge of effrontery out of the hush. ‘Is +that Dr Ferguson, too sir?’ + +‘No, Ada; and please tell your mistress from me that Dr Ferguson is +unlikely to call again.’ A keen but rather forlorn smile passed over +his face. ‘He’s dining with friends no doubt at Holloway. But of course +if she should want to see him he will see her to-morrow at any hour at +Mrs Lovat’s. And—Ada!’ + +‘Yes, sir?’ + +‘Say that I’m a little better; your mistress will be relieved to hear +that I’m a little better; still not _quite_ myself say, but, I think, a +little better.’ + +‘Yes, sir; and I’m sure I’m very glad to hear it,’ came fainter still. + +‘What voice was that I heard just now?’ + +‘Miss Alice’s, sir; but she came quite against my wishes, and I hope +you won’t repeat it, sir. She promised if she came that mistress +shouldn’t know. I was only afraid she might disturb you, or—or Dr +Ferguson. And did you say, sir, that I was to tell mistress that he +_might_ be coming back?’ + +‘Ah, that I don’t know; so perhaps it would be as well not to mention +him at all. Is Miss Alice there?’ + +‘I said I would tell her if you were alone. But I hope you’ll +understand that it was only because she begged so. Mistress has gone to +St Peter’s bazaar; and that’s how it was.’ + +‘I quite understand. Beckon to her.’ + +There came a hasty step in the hall and a hurried murmur of +explanation. Lawford heard her call as she ran up the stairs; and the +next moment he had Alice’s hand in his and they were groping together +through the gloaming back into the solitude of the empty room again. + +‘Don’t be alarmed, dear,’ he heard himself imploring. ‘Just hold tight +to that clear common sense, and above all you won’t tell? It must be +our secret; a dead, dead secret from every one, even your mother, for +just a little while; just a mere two days or so—in case. I’m—I’m +better, dear.’ + +He fumbled with the little box of matches, dropped one, broke another; +but at last the candle-flame dipped, brightened, and with the door shut +and the last pale blueness of dusk at the window Lawford turned and +looked at his daughter. She stood with eyes wide open, like the eyes of +a child walking in its sleep; then twisted her fingers more tightly +within his. ‘Oh, dearest, how ill, how ill you look,’ she whispered. +‘But there, never mind—never mind. It was all a miserable dream, then; +it won’t, it can’t come back? I don’t think I could bear its coming +back. And mother told me such curious things; as if I were a child and +understood nothing. And even after I knew that you were you—I mean +before I sat up here in the dark to see you—she said that you were gone +and would never come back; that a terrible thing had happened—a +disgrace which we must never speak of; and that all the other was only +a pretence to keep people from talking. But I did not believe then, and +how could I believe afterwards?’ + +‘There, never mind now, dear, what she said. It was all meant for the +best, perhaps. But here I am; and not nearly so ill as I look, Alice; +and there’s nothing more to trouble ourselves about; not even if it +should be necessary for me to go away for a time. And this is our +secret, mind; ours only; just a dead secret between you and me.’ + +They sat for awhile without speaking or stirring. And faintly along the +hushed road Lawford heard in the silence a leisurely indolent beat of +little hoofs approaching, and the sound of wheels. A sudden wave of +feeling swept over him. He took Alice’s quiet loving face in his hands +and kissed her passionately. ‘Do not so much as think of me yet, or +doubt, or question: only love me, dearest. And soon—and soon—’ + +‘We’ll just begin again, just begin again, won’t we? all three of us +together, just as we used to be. I didn’t mean to have said all those +horrid things about mother. She was only dreadfully anxious and meant +everything for the best. You’ll let me tell her soon?’ + +The haggard face turned slowly, listening. ‘I hear, I understand, but I +can’t think very clearly now, Alice; I can’t, dear; my miserable old +tangled nerves. I just stumble along as best I can. You’ll understand +better when you get to be a poor old thing like me. We must do the best +we can. And of course you’ll see, Dillie, how awfully important it is +not to raise false hopes. You understand? I mustn’t risk the least +thing in the world, must I? And now goodbye; only for a few hours now. +And not a word, not a word to a single living soul.’ + +He extinguished the candle again, and led the way to the top of the +stairs. ‘Are you there, Ada?’ + +‘Yes, sir,’ answered the quiet imperturbable voice from under the black +straw brim. Alice went slowly down, but at the foot of the stairs, +looking out into the cold, blue, lamplit street she paused as if at a +sudden recollection, and ran hastily up again. + +‘There was nothing more, dear?’ She said, leaning back to peer up. + +‘“Nothing more?” What?’ + +She stood panting a little in the darkness, listening to some cautious +yet uneasy thought that seemed to haunt her mind. ‘I thought—it seemed +there was something we had not said, something I could not understand. +But there, it is nothing! You know what a fanciful old silly I am. You +do love me? Quite as much as ever?’ + +‘More, sweetheart, more!’ + +‘Good-night again, then; and God bless you, dear.’ + +The outer door closed softly, the footsteps died away. Lawford still +hesitated. He took hold of the stairs above his head as he stood on the +landing and leaned his head upon his hands, striving calmly to +disentangle the perplexity of his thoughts. His pulses were beating in +his ear with a low muffled roar. He looked down between the blinds to +where against the blue of the road beneath the straggling yellow beams +of the lamp stood the little cart and drooping, shaggy pony, and Grisel +sitting quietly there awaiting him. He shut his eyes as if in hope by +some convulsive effort of mind to break through this subtle glasslike +atmosphere of dream that had stolen over consciousness, and blotted out +the significance, almost the meaning of the past. He turned abruptly. +Empty as the empty rooms around him, unanswering were mind and heart. +Life was a tale told by an idiot—signifying nothing. + +He paused at the head of the staircase. And even then the doubt +confronted him: Would he ever come back? Who knows? he thought; and +again stood pondering, arguing, denying. At last he seemed to have come +to a decision. He made his way downstairs, opened and left ajar a long +narrow window in a passage to the garden beyond the kitchen. He turned +on his heel as he reached the gate and waved his hand as if in a kind +of forlorn mockery towards the darkly glittering windows. The drowsy +pony awoke at touch of the whip. + +Grisel lifted the rug and squeezed a little closer into the corner. She +had drawn a veil over her face, so that to Lawford her eyes seemed to +be dreaming in a little darkness of their own as he laid his hand on +the side of the cart. ‘It’s a most curious thing,’ he said, ‘but +peeping down at you just now when the sound of the wheels came, a +memory came clearly back to me of years and years ago—of my mother. She +used to come to fetch me at school in a little cart like this, and a +little pony just like this, with a thick dusty coat. And once I +remember I was simply sick of everything, a failure, and fagged out, +and all that, and was looking out in the twilight; I fancy even it was +autumn too. It was a little side staircase window; I was horribly +homesick. And she came quite unexpectedly. I shall never forget it—the +misery, and then, her coming.’ He lifted his eyes, cowed with the +incessant struggle, and watched her face for some time in silence. +‘Ought I to stay?’ + +‘I see no “ought,”’ she said. ‘No one is there?’ + +‘Only a miserable broken voice out of a broken cage—called Conscience.’ + +‘Don’t you think, perhaps, that even _that_ has a good many +disguises—convention, cowardice, weakness, ennui; they all take their +turn at hooting in its feathers? You must, you really must have rest. +You don’t know; you don’t see; I do. Just a little snap, some one last +exquisite thread gives way, and then it is all over. You see I have +even to try to frighten you, for I can’t tell you how you distress me.’ + +‘Why do I distress you?—my face, my story you mean?’ + +‘No; I mean you: your trouble, that horrible empty house, and—oh, dear +me, yes, your courage too.’ + +‘Listen,’ said Lawford, stooping forward. He could scarcely see the +pale, veiled face through this mist that had risen up over his eyes. ‘I +have no courage apart from you; no courage and no hope. Ask me to +come!—a stranger with no history, no mockery, no miserable rant of a +grave and darkness and fear behind me. Are we not all haunted—every +one? That forgotten, and the fool I was, and the vacillating, and the +pretence—oh, how it all sweeps clear before me; without a will, without +a hope or glimpse or whisper of courage. Be just the memory of my +mother, the face, the friend I’ve never seen; the voice that every +dream leaves echoing. Ask me to come.’ + +She sat unstirring; and then as if by some uncontrollable impulse +stooped a little closer to him and laid her gloved hand on his. + +‘I hear, you know; I hear too,’ she whispered. ‘But we mustn’t listen. +Come now. It’s growing late.’ + +The little village echoed back from its stone walls the clatter of the +pony’s hoofs. Night had darkened to its deepest when their lamp shone +white on the wicket in the hedge. They had scarcely spoken. Lawford had +simply watched pass by, almost without a thought, the arching trees, +the darkening fields; had watched rise up in a mist of primrose light +the harvest moon to shine in saffron on the faces and shoulders of the +few wayfarers they met, or who passed them by. The still grave face +beneath the shadow of its veil had never turned, though the moon poured +all her flood of brilliance upon the dark profile. And once when as if +in sudden alarm he had lifted his head and looked at her, a sudden +doubt had assailed him so instantly that he had half put out his hand +to touch her, and had as quickly withdrawn it, lest her beauty and +stillness should be, even as the moment’s fancy had suggested, only a +far-gone memory returned in dream. + +Herbert hailed them from the darkness of an open window. He came down, +and they talked a little in the cold air of the garden. He lit a +cigarette, and climbed languidly into the cart, and drove the drowsy +little pony off into the moonlight. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY + + +It was a quiet supper the three friends sat down to. Herbert sat +narrowing his eyes over his thoughts, which, when the fancy took him, +he scattered out upon the others’ silence. Lawford apparently had not +yet shaken himself free from the sorcery of the moonlight. His eyes +shone dark and full like those of a child who has trespassed beyond its +hour for bed, and sits marvelling at reality in a waking dream. + +Long after they had bidden each other good-night, long after Herbert +had trodden on tiptoe with his candle past his closed door, Lawford sat +leaning on his arms at the open window, staring out across the +motionless moonlit trees that seemed to stand like draped and dreaming +pilgrims, come to the peace of their Nirvana at last beside the +crashing music of the waters. And he himself, the self that never +sleeps beneath the tides and waves of consciousness, was listening, +too, almost as unmovedly and unheedingly to the thoughts that clashed +in conflict through his brain. + +Why, in a strange transitory life was one the slave of these small +cares? What if even in that dark pit beneath, which seemed to whisper +Lethe to the tumultuous, swirling waters—what if there, too, were +merely a beginning again, and to seek a slumbering refuge there merely +a blind and reiterated plunge into the heat and tumult of another day? +Who was that poor, dark, homeless ghoul, Sabathier? Who was this Helen +of an impossible dream? Her face with its strange smile, her eyes with +their still pity and rapt courage had taken hope away. ‘Here’s not your +rest,’ cried one insistent voice; ‘she is the mystery that haunts day +and night, past all the changing of the restless hours. Chance has +given you back eyes to see, a heart that can be broken. Chance and the +stirrings of a long-gone life have torn down the veil age spins so +thick and fast. Pride and ambition; what dull fools men are! Effort and +duty, what dull fools men are!’ He listened on and on to these phantom +pleadings and to the rather coarse old Lawford conscience grunting them +mercilessly down, too weary even to try to rest. + +Rooks at dawn came sweeping beneath the turquoise of the sky. He saw +their sharp-beaked heads turn this way, that way, as they floated on +outspread wings across the misty world. Except for the hoarse roar of +the water under the huge thin-leafed trees, not a sound was stirring. +‘One thing,’ he seemed to hear himself mutter as he turned with a +shiver from the morning air, ‘it won’t be for long. You can, at least, +poor devil, wait the last act out.’ If in this foolish hustling mob of +the world, hired anywhere and anywhen for the one poor dubious wage of +a penny—if it was only his own small dull part to carry a mock spear, +and shout huzza with the rest—there was nothing for it, he grunted +obstinately to himself, shout he would with the loudest. + +He threw himself on to the bed with eyes so wearied with want of sleep +it seemed they had lost their livelong skill in finding it. Not the +echo of triumph nor even a sigh of relief stirred the torpor of his +mind. He knew vaguely that what had been the misery and madness of the +last few days was gone. But the thought had no power to move him now. +Sheila’s good sense, and Mr Bethany’s stubborn loyalty were alike old +stories that had lost their savour and meaning. Gone, too, was the need +for that portentous family gathering that had sat so often in his fancy +during these last few days around his dining-room table, discussing +with futile decorum the problem of how to hush him up, to muffle him +down. Half dreaming, half awake, he saw the familiar door slowly open +and, like the timely hero in a melodrama, his own figure appear before +the stricken and astonished company. His eyes opened half-fearfully, +and glanced up in the morning twilight. Their perplexity gave place to +a quiet, almost vacant smile; the lids slowly closed again, and at last +the lean hands twitched awhile in sleep. + +Next morning he spent rummaging among the old books, dipping listlessly +here and there as the tasteless fancy took him, while Herbert sat +writing with serene face and lifted eyebrows at his open window. But +the unfamiliar long S’s, the close type, and the spelling of the musty +old books wearied eye and mind. What he read, too, however far-fetched, +or lively, or sententious, or gross, seemed either to be of the same +texture as what had become his everyday experience, and so baffled him +with its nearness, or else was only the meaningless ramblings of an +idle pen. And this, he thought to himself, looking covertly up at the +spruce clear-cut profile at the window, this is what Herbert had called +Life. + +‘Am I interrupting you, Herbert; are you very busy?’ he asked at last, +taking refuge on a chair in a far corner of the room. + +‘Bless me, no; not a bit—not a bit,’ said Herbert amiably, laying down +his pen. ‘I’m afraid the old leatherjackets have been boring you. It’s +a habit this beastly reading; this gorge and glint and fever all at +second-hand—purely a bad habit, like morphia, like laudanum. But once +in, you know there’s no recovery. Anyhow, I’m neck-deep, and to +struggle would be simply to drown.’ + +‘I was only going to say how sorry I am for having left Sabathier at +home.’ + +‘My dear fellow—’ began Herbert reassuringly. + +‘It was only because I wanted so very much to have your translation. I +get muddled up with other things groping through the dictionary.’ + +Herbert surveyed him critically. ‘What exactly is your interest now, +Lawford? You don’t mean that my old “theory” has left any sting now?’ + +‘No sting; oh no. I was only curious. But you yourself still think it +really, don’t you?’ + +Herbert turned for a moment to the open window. + +‘I was simply trying then to find something to fit the facts as you +experienced them. But now that the facts have gone—and they have, +haven’t they?—exit, of course, my theory!’ + +‘I see,’ was the cryptic answer. ‘And yet, Herbert,’ Lawford solemnly +began again, ‘it has changed me; even in my way of thinking. When I +shut my eyes now—I only discovered it by chance—I see immediately faces +quite strange to me; or places, sometimes thronged with people; and +once an old well with some one sitting in the shadow. I can’t tell you +how clearly, and yet it is all altogether different from a dream. Even +when I sit with my eyes open, I am conscious, as it were, of a kind of +faint, colourless mirage. In the old days—I mean before Widderstone, +what I saw was only what I’d seen already. Nothing came uncalled for, +unexplained. This makes the old life seem so blank; I did not know what +extraordinarily _real_ things I was doing without. And whether for that +reason or another, I can’t quite make out what in fact I did want then, +and was always fretting and striving for. I can see no wisdom or +purpose in anything now but to get to one’s journey’s end as quickly +and bravely as one can. And even then, even if we do call life a +journey, and death the inn we shall reach at last in the evening when +it’s over; that, too, I feel will be only as brief a stopping-place as +any other inn would be. Our experience here is so scanty and +shallow—nothing more than the moment of the continual present. Surely +that must go on, even if one does call it eternity. And so we shall all +have to begin again. Probably Sabathier himself.... But there, what on +earth _are_ we, Herbert, when all is said? Who is it has—has done all +this for us—what kind of self? And to what possible end? Is it that the +clockwork has been wound up and must still jolt on a while with jarring +wheels? Will it never run down, do you think?’ + +Herbert smiled faintly, but made no answer. + +‘You see,’ continued Lawford, in the same quiet, dispassionate +undertone, ‘I wouldn’t mind if it was only myself. But there are so +many of us, so many selves, I mean; and they all seem to have a voice +in the matter. What is the reality to this infernal dream?’ + +‘The reality is, Lawford, that you are fretting your life out over this +rotten illusion. Be guided by me just this once. We’ll go, all three of +us, a good ten-mile walk to-day, and thoroughly tire you out. And +to-night you shall sleep here—a really sound, refreshing sleep. Then +to-morrow, whole and hale, back you shall go; honestly. It’s only +professional strong men should ask questions. Babes like you and me +must keep to slops.’ + +So, though Lawford made no answer, it was agreed. Before noon the three +of them had set out on their walk across the fields. And after rambling +on just as caprice took them, past reddening blackberry bushes and +copses of hazel, and flaming beech, they sat down to spread out their +meal on the slope of a hill, overlooking quiet ploughed fields and +grazing cattle. Herbert stretched himself with his back to the earth, +and his placid face to the pale vacant sky, while Lawford, even more +dispirited after his walk, wandered up to the crest of the hill. + +At the foot of the hill, upon the other side, lay a farm and its +out-buildings, and a pool of water beneath a group of elms. It was +vacant in the sunlight, and the water vividly green with a scum of +weed. And about half a mile beyond stood a cluster of cottages and an +old towered church. He gazed idly down, listening vaguely to the +wailing of a curlew flitting anxiously to and fro above the broken +solitude of its green hill. And it seemed as if a thin and dark cloud +began to be quietly withdrawn from over his eyes. Hill and wailing cry +and barn and water faded out. And he was staring as if in an endless +stillness at an open window against which the sun was beating in a +bristling torrent of gold, while out of the garden beyond came the +voice of some evening bird singing with such an unspeakable ecstasy of +grief it seemed it must be perched upon the confines of another world. +The light gathered to a radiance almost intolerable, driving back with +its raining beams some memory, forlorn, remorseless, remote. His body +stood dark and senseless, rocking in the air on the hillside as if +bereft of its spirit. Then his hands were drawn over his eyes. He +turned unsteadily and made his way, as if through a thick, drizzling +haze, slowly back. + +‘What is that—there?’ he said almost menacingly, standing with +bloodshot eyes looking down upon Herbert. + +‘“That!”—what?’ said Herbert, glancing up startled from his book. ‘Why, +what’s wrong, Lawford?’ + +‘That,’ said Lawford sullenly, yet with a faintly mournful cadence in +his voice; ‘those fields and that old empty farm—that village over +there? Why did you bring me here?’ + +Grisel had not stirred. ‘The village...’ + +‘Ssh!’ she said, catching her brother’s sleeve; ‘that’s Detcham, yes, +Detcham.’ + +Lawford turned wide vacant eyes on her. He shook his head and +shuddered. ‘No, no; not Detcham. I know it; I know it; but it has gone +out of my mind. Not Detcham; I’ve been there before; don’t look at me. +Horrible, horrible. It takes me back—I can’t think. I stood there, +trying, trying; it’s all in a blur. Don’t ask me—a dream.’ + +Grisel leaned forward and touched his hand. ‘Don’t think; don’t even +try. Why should you? We can’t; we _mustn’t_ go back.’ + +Lawford, still gazing fixedly, turned again a darkened face towards the +steep of the hill. ‘I think, you know,’ he said, stooping and +whispering, ‘_he_ would know—the window and the sun and the singing. +And oh, of course it was too late. You understand—too late. And once... +you can’t go back; oh no. You won’t leave me? You see, if you go, it +would only be all. I could not be quite so alone. But Detcham—Detcham? +perhaps you will not trust me—tell me? That was not the name.’ He +shuddered violently and turned dog-like beseeching eyes. +‘To-morrow—yes, to-morrow,’ he said, ‘I will promise anything if you +will not leave me now. Once—’ But again the thread running so faintly +through that inextricable maze of memory eluded him. ‘So long as you +won’t leave me now!’ he implored her. + +She was vainly trying to win back her composure, and could not answer +him at once.... + +In the evening after supper Grisel sat her guest down in front of a big +wood fire in the old book-room, where, staring into the playing flames, +he could fall at peace into the almost motionless reverie which he +seemed merely to harass and weary himself by trying to disperse. She +opened the little piano at the far end of the room and played on and on +as fancy led—Chopin and Beethoven, a fugue from Bach, and lovely +forlorn old English airs, till the music seemed not only a voice +persuading, pondering, and lamenting, but gathered about itself the +hollow surge of the water and the darkness; wistful and clear, as the +thoughts of a solitary child. Ever and again a log burnt through its +strength, and falling amid sparks, stirred, like a restless animal, the +stillness; or Herbert in his corner lifted his head to glance towards +his visitor, and to turn another page. At last the music, too, fell +silent, and Lawford stood up with his candle in his hand and eyed with +a strange fixity brother and sister. His glance wandered slowly round +the quiet flame-lit room. + +‘You won’t,’ he said, stooping towards them as if in extreme +confidence, ‘you won’t much notice? They come and go. I try not to—to +speak. It’s the only way through. It is not that I don’t know they’re +only dreams. But if once the—the others thought there had been any +tampering’—he tapped his forehead meaningly—‘here: if once they thought +_that_, it would, you know, be quite over then. How could I prove...?’ +He turned cautiously towards the door, and with laborious significance +nodded his head at them. + +Herbert bent down and held out his long hands to the fire. ‘Tampering, +my dear chap: That’s what the lump said to the leaven.’ + +‘Yes, yes,’ said Lawford, putting out his hand, ‘but you know what I +mean, Herbert. Anything I tried to do then would be quite, quite +hopeless. That would be poisoning the wells.’ + +They watched him out of the room, and listened till quite distinctly in +the still night-shaded house they heard his door gently close. Then, as +if by consent, they turned and looked long and questioningly into each +other’s faces. + +‘Then you are not afraid?’ Herbert said quietly. + +Grisel gazed steadily on, and almost imperceptibly shook her head. + +‘You mean?’ he questioned her; but still he had again to read her +answer in her eyes. + +‘Oh, very well, Grisel,’ he said quietly, ‘you know best,’ and returned +once more to his writing. + +For an hour or two Lawford slept heavily, so heavily that when a little +after midnight he awoke, with his face towards the uncurtained window, +though for many minutes he lay brightly confronting all Orion, that +from blazing helm to flaming dog at heel filled high the glimmering +square, he could not lift or stir his cold and leaden limbs. He rose at +last and threw off the burden of his bedclothes, and rested awhile, as +if freed from the heaviness of an unrememberable nightmare. But so +clear was his mind and so extraordinarily refreshed he seemed in body +that sleep for many hours would not return again. And he spent almost +all the remainder of the lagging darkness pacing softly to and fro; one +face only before his eyes, the one sure thing, the one thing +unattainable in a world of phantoms. + +Herbert waited on in vain for his guest next morning, and after +wandering up and down the mossy lawn at the back of the house, went off +cheerfully at last alone for his dip. When he returned Lawford was in +his place at the breakfast-table. He sat on, moody and constrained, +until even Herbert’s haphazard talk trickled low. + +‘I fancy my sister is nursing a headache,’ he said at last, ‘but she’ll +be down soon. And I’m afraid from the looks of you, Lawford, your night +was not particularly restful.’ He felt his way very heedfully. ‘Perhaps +we walked you a little too far yesterday. We are so used to tramping +that—’ Lawford kept thoughtful eyes fixed on the deprecating face. + +‘I see what it is, Herbert—you are humouring me again. I have been +wracking my brains in vain to remember what exactly _did_ happen +yesterday. I feel as if it was all sunk oceans deep in sleep. I get so +far—and then I’m done. It won’t give up a hint. But you really mustn’t +think I’m an invalid, or—or in my second childhood. The truth is,’ he +added, ‘it’s only my _first_, come back again. But now that I’ve got so +far, now that I’m really better, I—’ He broke off rather vacantly, as +if afraid of his own confidence. ‘I must be getting on,’ he summed up +with an effort, ‘and that’s the solemn fact. I keep on forgetting +I’m—I’m a ratepayer!’ + +Herbert sat round in his chair. ‘You see, Lawford, the very term is +little else than Double-Dutch to me. As a matter of fact Grisel sends +all my hush-money to the horrible people that do the cleaning up, as it +were. I can’t catch their drift. Government to me is merely the +spectacle of the clever, or the specious, managing the dull. It deals +merely with the physical, and just the fringe of consciousness. I am +not joking. I think I follow you. All I mean is that the +obligations—mainly tepid, I take it—that are luring you back to the +fold would be the very ones that would scare me quickest off. The +imagination, the appeal faded: we’re dead.’ + +Lawford opened his mouth; ‘_Temporarily_ tepid,’ he at last all but +coughed out. + +‘Oh yes, of course,’ said Herbert intelligently. ‘Only temporarily. +It’s this beastly gregariousness that’s the devil. The very thought of +it undoes me—with an absolute shock of sheepishness. I suddenly realise +my human nakedness: that here we are, little better than naked animals, +bleating behind our illusory wattles on the slopes of—of infinity. And +nakedness, after all, is a wholesome thing to realize only when one +thinks too much of one’s clothes. I peer sometimes, feebly enough, out +of my wool, and it seems to me that all these busybodies, all these +fact-devourers, all this news-reading rabble, are nothing brighter than +very dull-witted children trying to play an imaginative game, much too +deep for their poor reasons. I don’t mean that _your_ wanting to go +home is anything gregarious, but I do think _their_ insisting on your +coming back at once might be. And I know you won’t visit this stuff on +me as anything more than just my “scum,” as Grisel calls the fine +flower of my maiden meditations. All that I really _want_ to say is +that we should both be more than delighted if you’d stay just as long +as it will not be a bore for you to stay. Stay till you’re heartily +tired of us. Go back now, if you _must_; tell them how much better you +are. Bolt off to a nerve specialist. He’ll say complete rest—change of +scene, and all that. They all do. Instinct via intellect. And why not +take your rest here? We are such miserably dull company to one another +it would be a greater pleasure to have you with us than I can say. I +mean it from the very bottom of my heart. Do!’ + +Lawford listened. ‘I wish—,’ he began, and stopped dead again. ‘Anyhow, +I’ll go back. I am afraid, Herbert, I’ve been playing truant. It was +all very well while—To tell you the truth I can’t think _quite_ +straight yet. But it won’t last for ever. Besides—well, anyhow, I’ll go +back.’ + +‘Right you are,’ said Herbert, pretending to be cheerful. ‘You can’t +expect, you really can’t, everything to come right straight away. Just +have patience. And now, let’s go out and sit in the sun. They’ve mixed +September up with May.’ + +And about half an hour afterwards he glanced up from his book to find +his visitor fast asleep in his garden chair. + +Grisel had taken her brother’s place, with a little pile of needlework +beside her on the grass, when Lawford again opened his eyes under the +rosy shade of a parasol. He watched her for a while, without speaking. + +‘How long have I been asleep?’ he said at last. + +She started and looked up from her needle. + +‘That depends on how long you have been awake,’ she said, smiling. ‘My +brother tells me,’ she went on, beginning to stitch, ‘that you have +made up your mind to leave us to-day. Perhaps we are only flattering +ourselves it has been a rest. But if it has—is that, do you think, +quite wise?’ + +He leant forward and hid his face in his hands. ‘It’s because—it’s +because it’s the only “must” I can see.’ + +‘But even “musts”—well, we have to be sure even of “musts,” haven’t we? +Are _you_?’ She glanced up and for an instant their eyes met, and the +falling water seemed to be sounding out of a distance so remote it +might be but the echo of a dream. She stooped once more over her work. + +‘Supposing,’ he said very slowly, and almost as if speaking to himself, +‘supposing Sabathier—and you know he’s merely like a friend now one +mustn’t be seen talking to—supposing he came back; what then?’ + +‘Oh, but Sabathier’s gone: he never really came. It was only a fancy—a +mood. It was only you—another you.’ + +‘Who was that yesterday, then?’ + +She glanced at him swiftly and knew the question was but a venture. + +‘Yesterday?’ + +‘Oh, very well,’ he said fretfully, ‘you too! But if he did, if he did, +come really back: “prey” and all?’ + +‘What is the riddle?’ she said, taking a deep breath and facing him +brightly. + +‘Would _my_ “must” still be _his_?’ The face he raised to her, as he +leaned forward under the direct light of the sun, was so colourless, +cadaverous and haggard, the thought crossed her mind that it did indeed +seem little more than a shadowy mask that but one hour of darkness +might dispel. + +‘You said, you know, we did win through. Why then should we be even +thinking of defeat now?’ + +‘“We”!’ + +‘Oh no, you!’ she cried triumphantly. + +‘You do not answer my question.’ + +‘Nor you mine! It _was_ a glorious victory. Is there the ghost of a +reason why you should cast your mind back? Is there, now?’ + +‘Only,’ said Lawford, looking patiently up into her face, ‘only because +I love you’: and listened in the silence to the words as one may watch +a bird that has escaped for ever and irrevocably out of its cage, +steadily flying on and on till lost to sight. + +For an instant the grey eyes faltered. ‘But that, surely,’ she began in +a low voice, still steadily sewing, ‘that was our compact last +night—that you should let me help, that you should trust me just as you +trusted the mother years ago who came in the little cart with the +shaggy dusty pony to the homesick boy watching at the window. Perhaps,’ +she added, her fingers trembling, ‘in this odd shuffle of souls and +faces, I _am_ that mother, and most frightfully anxious you should not +give in. Why, even because of the tiredness, even because the cause +seems vain, you must still fight on—wouldn’t she have said it? Surely +there are prizes, a daughter, a career, no end! And even they +gone—still the self undimmed, undaunted, that took its drubbing like a +man.’ + +‘I know you know I’m all but crazed; you see this wretched mind all +littered and broken down; look at me like that, then. Forget even you +have befriended me and pretended—Why must I blunder on and on like +this? Oh, Grisel, my friend, my friend, if only you loved me!’ + +Tears clouded her eyes. She turned vaguely as if for a hiding-place. +‘We can’t talk here. How mad the day is. Listen, listen! I do—I do love +you—mother and woman and friend—from the very moment you came. It’s all +so clear, so clear: _that_, and your miserable “must,” my friend. Come, +we will go away by ourselves a little, and talk. That way. I’ll meet +you by the gate.’ + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE + + +She came out into the sunlight, and they went through the little gate +together. She walked quickly, without speaking, over the bridge, past a +little cottage whose hollyhocks leaned fading above its low flint wall. +Skirting a field of stubble, she struck into a wood by a path that ran +steeply up the hillside. And by and by they came to a glen where the +woodmen of a score of years ago had felled the trees, leaving a green +hollow of saplings in the midst of their towering neighbours. + +‘There,’ she said, holding out her hand to him, ‘now we are alone. Just +six hours or so—and then the sun will be there,’ she pointed to the +tree-tops to the west, ‘and then you will have to go; for good, for +good—you your way, and I mine. What a tangle—a tangle is this life of +ours. Could I have dreamt we should ever be talking like this, you and +I? Friends of an hour. What will you think of me? Does it matter? Don’t +speak. Say nothing—poor face, poor hands. If only there were something +to look to—to pray to!’ She bent over his hand and pressed it to her +breast. ‘What worlds we’ve seen together, you and I. And then—another +parting.’ + +They wandered on a little way, and came back and listened to the first +few birds that flew up into the higher branches, noonday being past, to +sing. + +They talked, and were silent, and talked again with out question, or +sadness, or regret, or reproach; she mocking even at themselves, +mocking at this ‘change’—‘Why, and yet without it, would you ever even +have dreamed once a poor fool of a Frenchman went to his restless grave +for me—for me? Need we understand? Were we told to pry? Who made us +human must be human too. Why must we take such care, and make such a +fret—this soul? I know it, I know it; it is all we have—“to save,” they +say, poor creatures. No, never to _spend_, and so they daren’t for a +solitary instant lift it on the finger from its cage. Well, we have; +and now, soon, back it must go, back it must go, and try its best to +whistle the day out. And yet, do you know, perhaps the very freedom +does a little shake its—its monotony. It’s true, you see, they have +lived a long time; these Worldly Wisefolk they were wise before they +were swaddled.... + +‘There, and you are hungry?’ she asked him, laughing in his eyes. ‘Of +course, of course you are—scarcely a mouthful since that first still +wonderful supper. And you haven’t slept a wink, except like a tired-out +child after its first party, on that old garden chair. I sat and +watched, and yes, almost hoped you’d never wake in case—in case. Come +along, see, down there. I can’t go home just yet. There’s a little old +inn—we’ll go and sit down there—as if we were really trying to be +romantic! I know the woman quite well; we can talk there—just the day +out.’ + +They sat at a little table in the garden of ‘The Cherry Trees,’ its +thick green apple branches burdened with ripened fruit. And Grisel +tried to persuade him to eat and drink, ‘for to-morrow we die,’ she +said, her hands trembling, her face as it were veiled with a faint +mysterious light. + +‘There are dozens and dozens of old stories, you know,’ she said, +leaning on her elbows, ‘dozens and dozens, meaning only us. You must, +you must eat; look, just an apple. We’ve got to say good-bye. And +faintness will double the difficulty.’ She lightly touched his hand as +if to compel him to smile with her. ‘There, I’ll peel it; and this is +Eden; and soon it will be the cool of the evening. And then, oh yes, +the voice will come. What nonsense I am talking. Never mind.’ + +They sat on in the quiet sunshine, and a spider slid softly through the +air and with busy claws set to its nets; and those small ghosts the +robins went whistling restlessly among the heavy boughs. + +A child presently came out of the porch of the inn into the garden, and +stood with its battered doll in its arms, softly watching them awhile. +But when Grisel smiled and tried to coax her over, she burst out +laughing and ran in again. + +Lawford stooped forward on his chair with a groan. ‘You see,’ he said, +‘the whole world mocks me. You say “this evening”; need it be, must it +be this evening? If you only knew how far they have driven me. If you +only knew what we should only detest each other for saying and for +listening to. The whole thing’s dulled and staled. Who wants a +changeling? Who wants a painted bird? Who does not loathe the +converted?—and I’m converted to Sabathier’s God. Should we be sitting +here talking like this if it were not so? I can’t, I can’t go back.’ + +She rose and stood with her hand pressed over her mouth, watching him. + +‘Won’t you understand?’ he continued. ‘I am an outcast—a felon caught +red-handed, come in the flesh to a hideous and righteous judgment. I +hear myself saying all these things; and yet, Grisel, I do, I do love +you with all the dull best I ever had. Not now, then; I don’t ask new +even. I can, I would begin again. God knows my face has changed enough +even as it is. Think of me as that poor wandering ghost of yours; how +easily I could hide away—in your memory; and just wait, wait for you. +In time even this wild futile madness too would fade away. Then I could +come back. May I try?’ + +‘I can’t answer you. I can’t reason. Only, still, I do know, talk, put +off, forget as I may, must is must. Right and wrong, who knows what +_they_ mean, except that one’s to be done and one’s to be forsworn; +or—forgive, my friend, the truest thing I ever said—or else we lose the +savour of both. Oh, then, and I know, too, you’d weary of me. I know +you, Monsieur Nicholas, better than you can ever know yourself, though +you have risen from your grave. You follow a dream, no voice or face or +flesh and blood; and not to do what the one old raven within you cries +you _must,_ would be in time to hate the very sound of my footsteps. +You shall go back, poor turncoat, and face the clearness, the utterly +more difficult, bald, and heartless clearness, as together we faced the +dark. Life is a little while. And though I have no words to tell what +always are and must be foolish reasons because they are not reasons at +all but ghosts of memory, I know in my heart that to face the worst is +your only hope of peace. Should I have staked so much on your finding +that, and now throw up the game? Don’t let us talk any more. I’ll walk +half the way, perhaps. Perhaps I will walk _all_ the way. I think my +brother guesses—at least _my_ madness. I’ve talked and talked him +nearly past his patience. And then, when you are quite safely, oh yes, +quite safely and soundly gone, then I shall go away for a little, so +that we can’t even hear each other speak, except in dreams. Life!—well, +I always thought it was much too plain a tale to have as dull an +ending. And with us the powers beyond have played a newer trick, that’s +all. Another hour, and we will go. Till then there’s just the solitary +walk home and only the dull old haunted house that hoards as many +ghosts as we ourselves to watch our coming.’ + +Evening began to shine between the trees; they seemed to stand aflame, +with a melancholy rapture in their uplifted boughs above their fading +coats. The fields of the garnered harvest shone with a golden +stillness, awhir with shimmering flocks of starlings. And the old birds +that had sung in the spring sang now amid the same leaves, grown older +too to give them harbourage. + +Herbert was sitting in his room when they returned, nursing his teacup +on his knee while he pretended to be reading, with elbow propped on the +table. + +‘Here’s Nicholas Sabathier, my dear, come to say goodbye awhile,’ said +Grisel. She stood for a moment in her white gown, her face turned +towards the clear green twilight of the open window. ‘I have promised +to walk part of the way with him. But I think first we must have some +tea. No; he flatly refuses to be driven. We are going to walk.’ + +The two friends were left alone, face to face with a rather difficult +silence, only the least degree of nervousness apparent, so far as +Herbert was concerned, in that odd aloof sustained air of impersonality +that had so baffled his companion in their first queer talk together. + +‘Your sister said just now, Herbert,’ blurted Lawford at last. ‘“Here’s +Nicholas Sabathier come to say good-bye” well, I—what I want you to +understand is that it _is_ Sabathier, the worst he ever was; but also +that it _is_ “good-bye.”’ + +Herbert slowly turned. ‘I don’t quite see why “goodbye,” Lawford. +And—frankly, there is nothing to explain. We have chosen to live such a +very out-of-the-way life,’ he went on, as if following up a train of +thought.... ‘The truth is if one wants to live at all—one’s own life, I +mean—there’s no time for many friends. And just steadfastly regarding +your neighbour’s tail as you follow it down into the Nowhere—it’s that +that seems to me the deadliest form of hypnotism. One must simply go +one’s own way, doing one’s best to free one’s mind of cant—and I dare +say clearing some excellent stuff out with the rubbish. One consequence +is that I don’t think, however foolhardy it may be to say so, I don’t +think I care a groat for any opinion as human as my own, good or bad. +My sister’s a million times a better woman than I am a man. What +possibly could there be, then, for me to say?’ He turned with a nervous +smile. ‘Why should it be good-bye?’ + +Lawford glanced involuntarily towards the door that stood in shadow +duskily ajar. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘we have talked, and we think it must be +that, until, at least,’ he smiled faintly, ‘I can come as quietly as +your old ghost you told me of; and in that case it may not be so very +long to wait.’ + +Their eyes met fleetingly across the still, listening room. ‘The more I +think of it,’ Lawford pushed slowly on, ‘the less I understand the +frantic purposelessness of all that has happened to me. Until I went +down, as you said, “a godsend of a little Miss Muffet,” and the +inconceivable farce came off, I was fairly happy, fairly contented to +dance my little wooden dance and wait till the showman should put me +down into his box again. And now—well, here I am. The whole thing has +gone by and scarcely left a trace of its visit. Here I am for all my +friends to swear to; and yet, Herbert, if you’ll forgive me troubling +you with this stuff about myself, not a single belief, or thought, or +desire remains unchanged. You will remember all that, I hope. It’s not, +of course, the ghost of an apology, only the mere facts.’ + +Herbert rose and paced slowly across to the window. ‘The longer I live, +Lawford, the more I curse this futile gift of speech. Here am I, +wanting to tell you, to say out frankly what, if mind could appeal +direct to mind, would be merely as the wind passing through the leaves +of a tree with just one—one multitudinous rustle, but which, if I tried +to put into words—well, daybreak would find us still groping on....’ He +turned; a peculiar wry smile on his face. ‘It’s a dumb world: but there +we are. And some day you’ll come again.’ + +‘Well,’ said Lawford, as if with an almost hopeless effort to turn +thought into such primitive speech, ‘that’s where we stand, then.’ He +got up suddenly like a man awakened in the midst of unforeseen danger, +‘Where is your sister?’ he cried, looking into the shadow. And as if in +actual answer to his entreaty, they heard the clinking of the cups on +the little, old, green lacquer tray she was at that moment carrying +into the room. She sat down on the window seat and put the tray down +beside her. ‘It will be before dark even now,’ she said, glancing out +at the faintly burning skies. + +They had trudged on together with almost as deep a sense of physical +exhaustion as peasants have who have been labouring in the fields since +daybreak. And a little beyond the village, before the last, long road +began that led in presently to the housed and scrupulous suburb, she +stopped with a sob beside an old scarred milestone by the wayside. +‘This—is as far as I can go,’ she said. She stooped, and laid her hand +on the cold moss-grown surface of the stone. ‘Even now it’s wet with +dew.’ She rose again and looked strangely into his face. ‘Yes, yes, +here it is,’ she said, ‘oh, and worse, worse than any fear. But nothing +now can trouble you again of that. We’re both at least past that.’ + +‘Grisel,’ he said, ‘forgive me, but I can’t—I can’t go on.’ + +‘Don’t think, don’t think,’ she said, taking his hands, and lifting +them to her bosom. ‘It’s only how the day goes; and it has all, my one +dear, happened scores and scores of times before—mother and child and +friend—and lovers that are all these too, like us. We mustn’t cry out. +Perhaps it was all before even we could speak—this sorrow came. Take +all the hope and all the future: and then may come our chance.’ + +‘What’s life to me now. You said the desire would come back; that I +should shake myself free. I could if you would help me. I don’t know +what you are or what your meaning is, only that I love you; care for +nothing, wish for nothing but to see you and think of you. A flat, dull +voice keeps saying that I have no right to be telling you all this. You +will know best. I know I am nothing. I ask nothing. If we love one +another, what is there else to say?’ + +‘Nothing, nothing to say, except only good-bye. What could you tell me +that I have not told myself over and over again? Reason’s gone. +Thinking’s gone. Now I am only sure.’ She smiled shadowily. ‘What peace +did _he_ find who couldn’t, perhaps, like you, face the last good-bye?’ + +They stood in utter solitude awhile in the evening gloom. The air was +as still and cold as some grey unfathomable untraversed sea. Above them +uncountable clouds drifted slowly across space. + +‘Why do they all keep whispering together?’ he said in a low voice, +with cowering face. ‘Oh if you knew, Grisel, how they have hemmed me +in; how they have come pressing in through the narrow gate I left ajar. +Only to mock and mislead. It’s all dark and unintelligible.’ + +He touched her hand, peering out of the shadows that seemed to him to +be gathering between their faces. He drew her closer and touched her +lips with his fingers. Her beauty seemed to his distorted senses to +fill earth and sky. This, then, was the presence, the grave and lovely +overshadowing dream whose surrender made life a torment, and death the +near fold of an immortal, starry veil. She broke from him with a faint +cry. And he found himself running and running, just as he had run that +other night, with death instead of life for inspiration, towards his +earthly home. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO + + +He was utterly wearied, but he walked on for a long while with a dogged +unglancing pertinacity and without looking behind him. Then he rested +under the dew-sodden hedgeside and buried his face in his hands. Once, +indeed, he did turn and grind his way back with hard uplifted face for +many minutes, but at the meeting with an old woman who in the late dusk +passed him unheeded on the road, he stopped again, and after standing +awhile looking down upon the dust, trying to gather up the tangled +threads of his thoughts, he once more set off homewards. + +It was clear, starry, and quite dark when he reached the house. The +lamp at the roadside obscurely lit its breadth and height. Lamp-light +within, too, was showing yellow between the Venetian blinds; a cold +gas-jet gleamed out of the basement window. He seemed bereft now of all +desire or emotion, simply the passive witness of things external in a +calm which, though he scarcely realised its cause, was an exquisite +solace and relief. His senses were intensely sharpened with +sleeplessness. The faintest sound belled clear and keen on his ear. The +thinnest beam of light besprinkled his eyes with curious brilliance. + +As quietly as some nocturnal creature he ascended the steps to the +porch, and leaning between stone pilaster and wall, listened intently +for any rumour of those within. + +He heard a clear, rather languid and delicate voice quietly speak on +until it broke into a little peal of laughter, followed, when it fell +silent by Sheila’s—rapid, rich, and low. The first speaker seemed to be +standing. Probably, then, his evening visitors had only just come in, +or were preparing to depart. He inserted his latchkey and gently pushed +at the cumbersome door. It was locked against him. With not the +faintest thought of resentment or surprise, he turned back, stooped +over the balustrade and looked down into the kitchen. Nothing there was +visible but a narrow strip of the white table, on which lay a black +cotton glove, and beyond, the glint of a copper pan. What made all +these mute and inanimate things so coldly hostile? + +An extreme, almost nauseous distaste filled him at the thought of +knocking for admission, of confronting Ada, possibly even Sheila, in +the cold echoing gloom of the detestable porch; of meeting the first +wild, almost metallic, flash of recognition. He swept softly down +again, and paused at the open gate. Once before the voices of the night +had called him: they would not summon him forever in vain. He raised +his eyes again towards the window. Who were these visitors met together +to drum the alien out? He narrowed his lids and smiled up at the +vacuous unfriendly house. Then wheeling, on a sudden impulse he groped +his way down the gravel path that led into the garden. As he had left +it, the long white window was ajar. + +With extreme caution he pushed it noiselessly up, and climbed in, and +stood listening again in the black passage on the other side. When he +had fully recovered his breath, and the knocking of his heart was +stilled, he trod on softly, till turning the corner he came in sight of +the kitchen door. It was now narrowly open, just enough, perhaps, to +admit a cat; and as he softly approached, looking steadily in, he could +see Ada sitting at the empty table, beneath the single whistling +chandelier, in her black dress and black straw hat. She was reading +apparently; but her back was turned to him and he could not distinguish +her arm beyond the elbow. Then almost in an instant he discovered, as, +drawn up and unstirring he gazed on, that she was not reading, but had +covertly and instantaneously raised her eyes from the print on the +table beneath, and was transfixedly listening too. He turned his eyes +away and waited. When again he peered in she had apparently bent once +more over her magazine, and he stole on. + +One by one, with a thin remote exultation in his progress, he mounted +the kitchen stairs, and with each deliberate and groping step the +voices above him became more clearly audible. At last, in the darkness +of the hall, but faintly stirred by the gleam of lamplight from the +chink of the dining-room door, he stood on the threshold of the +drawing-room door and could hear with varying distinctness what those +friendly voices were so absorbedly discussing. His ear seemed as +exquisite as some contrivance of science, registering passively the +least sound, the faintest syllable, and like it, in no sense meddling +with the thought that speech conveyed. He simply stood listening, fixed +and motionless, like some uncouth statue in the leafy hollow of a +garden, stony, unspeculating. + +‘Oh, but you either refuse to believe, Bettie, or you won’t understand +that it’s far worse than that.’ Sheila seemed to be upbraiding, or at +least reasoning with, the last speaker. ‘Ask Mr Danton—he actually +_saw_ him.’ + +‘“Saw him,”’ repeated a thick, still voice. ‘He stood there, in that +very doorway, Mrs Lovat, and positively railed at me. He stood there +and streamed out all the names he could lay his tongue to. I +wasn’t—unfriendly to the poor beggar. When Bethany let me into it I +thought it was simply—I did indeed, Mrs Lawford—a monstrous +exaggeration. Flatly, I didn’t believe it; shall I say that? But when I +stood face to face with him, I could have taken my oath that that was +no more poor old Arthur Lawford than—well, I won’t repeat what +particular word occurred to me. But there,’ the corpulent shrug was +almost audible, ‘we all know what old Bethany is. A sterling old chap, +mind you, so far as mere character is concerned; the right man in the +right place; but as gullible and as soft-hearted as a tom-tit. I’ve +said all this before, I know, Mrs Lawford, and been properly snubbed +for my pains. But if I had been Bethany I’d have sifted the whole story +at the beginning, the moment he put his foot into the house. Look at +that Tichborne fellow—went for months and months, just picking up one +day what he floored old Hawkins—wasn’t it?—with the next. But of +course,’ he added gloomily, ‘now that’s all too late. He’s moaned +himself into a tolerably tight corner. I’d just like to see, though, a +British jury comparing this claimant with his photograph, ‘pon my word +I would. Where would he be then, do you think?’ + +‘But my dear Mr Danton,’ went on the clear, languid voice Lawford had +heard break so light-heartedly into laughter, ‘you don’t mean to tell +me that a woman doesn’t know her own husband when she sees him—or, for +the matter of that, when she doesn’t see him? If Tom came home from a +ramble as handsome as Apollo to-morrow, I’d recognise him at the very +first blush—literally! He’d go nuzzling off to get his slippers, or +complain that the lamps had been smoking, or hunt the house down for +last week’s paper. Oh, besides, Tom’s Tom—and there’s an end of it.’ + +‘That’s precisely what I think, Mrs Lovat; one is saturated with one’s +personality, as it were.’ + +‘You see, that’s just it! That’s just exactly every woman’s husband all +over; he is saturated with his personality. Bravo, Mr Craik!’ + +‘Good Lord,’ said Danton softly. ‘I don’t deny it!’ + +‘But that,’ broke in Sheila crisply—‘that’s just precisely what I asked +you all to come in for. It’s because I know now, apart altogether from +the mere evidence, that—that he is Arthur. Mind, I don’t say I ever +really doubted. I was only so utterly shocked, I suppose. I positively +put posers to him; but his memory was perfect in spite of the shock +which would have killed a—a more sensitive nature.’ She had risen, it +seemed, and was moving with all her splendid impressiveness of silk and +presence across the general line of vision. But the hall was dark and +still; her eyes were dimmed with light. Lawford could survey her there +unmoved. + +‘Are you there, Ada?’ she called discreetly. + +‘Yes, ma’am,’ answered the faint voice from below. + +‘You have not heard anything—no knock?’ + +‘No, ma’am, no knock.’ + +‘The door is open if you should call.’ + +‘Yes, ma’am.’ + +‘The girl’s scared out of her wits,’ said Sheila returning to her +audience. ‘I’ve told you all that miserable Ferguson story—a piece of +calm, callous presence of mind I should never have dreamed my husband +capable of. And the curious thing is—at least, it is no longer curious +in the light of the ghastly facts I am only waiting for Mr Bethany to +tell you—from the very first she instinctively detested the very +mention of his name.’ + +‘I believe, you know,’ said Mr Craik with some decision, ‘that servants +must have the same wonderful instinct as dogs and children; they are +natural, _intuitive_ judges of character.’ + +‘Yes,’ said Sheila gravely, ‘and it’s only through that that I got to +hear of the—the mysterious friend in the little pony-carriage. Ada’s +magnificently loyal—I will say that.’ + +‘I don’t want to suggest anything, Mrs Lawford,’ began Mr Craik rather +hurriedly, ‘but wouldn’t it perhaps be wiser not to wait for Mr +Bethany? It is not at all unusual for him to be kept a considerable +time in the vestry after service, and to-day is the Feast of St +Michael’s and all Angels, you know. Mightn’t your husband be—er—coming +back, don’t you think?’ + +‘Craik’s right, Mrs Lawford; it’s not a bit of good waiting. Bethany +would stick there till midnight if any old woman’s spiritual state +could keep her going so long. Here we all are, and at any moment we may +be interrupted. Mind you, I promise nothing—only that there shall be no +scene. But here I am, and if he does come knocking and ringing and +lunging out in the disgusting manner he—well, all I ask is permission +to speak for _you_. ‘Pon my soul, to think what you must have gone +through! It isn’t the place for ladies just now—honestly it ain’t.’ + +‘Besides, supposing the romantic lady of the pony-carriage has friends? +Are _you_ a pugilist, Mr Craik?’ + +‘I hope I could give some little account of myself, Mrs Lovat; but you +need have no anxiety about that.’ + +‘There, Mr Danton. So as there is not the least cause for anxiety even +if poor Arthur _should_ return to his earthly home, may we share your +dreadful story at once, Sheila; and then, perhaps, hear Mr Bethany’s +exposition of it when he _does_ arrive? We are amply guarded.’ + +‘Honestly, you know, you are a bit of a sceptic, Mrs Lovat,’ pleaded +Danton playfully. ‘I’ve _seen_ him.’ + +‘And seeing is disbelieving, I suppose. Now then, Sheila.’ + +‘I don’t think there’s the least chance of Arthur returning to-night,’ +said Sheila solemnly. ‘I am perfectly well aware it’s best to be as +cheerful as one can—and as resolved; but I think, Bettie, when even you +know the whole horrible secret, you won’t think Mr Danton was—was +horrified for nothing. The ghastly, the awful truth is that my +husband—there is no other word for it—is—possessed!’ + +‘“Possessed,” Sheila! What in the name of all the creeps is that?’ + +‘Well, I dare say Mr Craik will explain it much better than I can. By a +devil, dear.’ The voice was perfectly poised and restrained, and Mr +Craik did not see fit for the moment to embellish the definition. + +Lawford, with an almost wooden immobility, listened on. + +‘But _the_ devil, or _a_ devil? Isn’t there a distinction?’ inquired +Mrs Lovat. + +‘It’s in the Bible, Bettie, over and over again. It was quite a common +thing in the Middle Ages; I think I’m right in saying that, am I not, +Mr Craik?’ Mr Craik must have solemnly nodded or abundantly looked his +unwilling affirmation. ‘And what _has_ been,’ continued Sheila +temperately, ‘I suppose may be again.’ + +‘When the fellow began raving at me the other night,’ began Danton +huskily, as if out of an unfathomable pit of reflection, ‘among other +things he said that I haven’t any wish to remember was that I was a +sceptic. And Bethany said _ditto_ to it. I don’t mind being called a +sceptic: why, I said myself Mrs Lovat was a sceptic just now! But when +it comes to “devils,” Mrs Lawford—I may be convinced about the other, +but “devils”! Well, I’ve been in the City nearly twenty-five years, and +it’s my impression human nature can raise all the devils _we_ shall +ever need. And another thing,’ he added, as if inspired, and with an +immensely intelligent blink, ‘is it just precisely that word in the +Revised Version—eh, Craik?’ + +‘I’ll certainly look it up, Danton. But I take it that Mrs Lawford is +not so much insisting on the word, as on the—the manifestation. And I’m +bound to confess that the Society for Psychical Research, which has +among its members quite eminent and entirely trustworthy men of +_science_—I am bound to admit they have some very curious stories to +tell. The old idea was, you know, that there are seventy-two princely +devils, and as many as seven million—er—commoners. It may very well +sound quaint to _our_ ears, Mrs Lovat; but there it is. But whether +that has any bearing on—on what you were saying, Danton, I can’t say. +Perhaps Mrs Lawford will throw a little more light on the subject when +she tells us on what precise facts her—her distressing theory is +based.’ + +Lawford had soundlessly stolen a pace or two nearer, and by stooping +forward a little he could, each in turn, scrutinise the little intent +company sitting over his story around the lamp at the further end of +the table; squatting like little children with their twigs and pins, +fishing for wonders on the brink of the unknown. + +‘Yes,’ Mrs Lovat was saying, ‘I quite agree, Mr Craik. Seventy-two +princes, and no princesses. Oh, these masculine prejudices! But do +throw a little more _modern_ light on the subject, Sheila.’ + +‘I mean this,’ said Sheila firmly. ‘When I went in for the last time to +say good-bye—and of course it was at his own wish that I did leave him; +and precisely _why_ he wished it is now unhappily only too apparent—I +had brought him some money from the bank—fifty pounds, I think; yes, +fifty pounds. And quite by the merest chance I glanced down, in +passing, at a book he had apparently been reading, a book which he +seemed very anxious to conceal with his hand. Arthur is not a great +reader, though I believe he studied a little before we were married, +and—well, I detest anything like subterfuge, and I said it out without +thinking, “Why, you’re reading French, Arthur!” He turned deathly white +but made no answer.’ + +‘And can’t you even confide to us the title, Sheila?’ sighed Mrs Lovat +reproachfully. + +‘Wait a minute,’ said Sheila; ‘you shall make as much fun of the thing +as you like, Bettie, when I’ve finished. I don’t know why, but that +peculiar, stealthy look haunted me. “Why French?” I kept asking myself. +“Why French?” Arthur hasn’t opened a French book for years. He doesn’t +even approve of the entente_. His argument was that we ought to be +friends with the Germans because they are more hostile. Never mind. +When Ada came back the next evening and said he was out, I came the +following morning—by myself—and knocked. No one answered, and I let +myself in. His bed had not been slept in. There were candles and +matches all over the house—one even burnt nearly to the stick on the +floor in the corner of the drawing-room. I suppose it was foolish, but +I was alone, and just that, somehow, horrified me. It seemed to point +to such a peculiar state of mind. I hesitated; what was the use of +looking further? Yet something seemed to say to me—and it was surely +providential—“Go downstairs!” And there in the breakfast-room the first +thing I saw on the table was this book—a dingy, ragged, bleared, +patched-up, oh, a horrible, a loathsome little book (and I have read +bits too here and there); and beside it was my own little school +dictionary, my own child’s——’ She looked up sharply. ‘What was that? +Did anybody call?’ + +‘Nobody _I_ heard,’ said Danton, staring stonily round. + +‘It may have been the passing of the wind,’ suggested Mr Craik, after a +pause. + +‘Peep between the blinds, Mr Craik; it may be poor Mr Bethany +confronting Pneumonia in the porch.’ + +‘There’s no one there, Mrs Lovat,’ said the curate, returning softly +from his errand. ‘Please continue your—your narrative, Mrs Lawford.’ + +‘We are panting for the “devil,” my dear.’ + +‘Well, I sat down and, very much against my inclination, turned over +the pages. It was full of the most revolting confessions and trials, so +far as I could see. In fact, I think the book was merely an amateur +collection of—of horrors. And the faces, the portraits! Well, then, can +you imagine my feelings when towards the end of the book about thirty +pages from the end, I came upon this—gloating up at me from the table +in my house before my very eyes?’ + +She cast a rapid glance over her shoulder, and gathering up her silk +skirt, drew out, from the pocket beneath, the few crumpled pages, and +passed them without a word to Danton. Lawford kept him plainly in view, +as, lowering his great face, he slowly stooped, and holding the loose +leaves with both fat hands between his knees, stared into the portrait. +Then he truculently lifted his cropped head. + +‘What did I say?’ he said. ‘What did I _say?_ What did I tell old +Bethany in this very room? What d’ye think of that, Mrs Lovat, for a +portrait of Arthur Lawford? What d’ye make of that, Craik—eh? +Devil—eh?’ + +Mrs Lovat glanced with arched eyebrows, and with her finger-tips handed +the sheets on to her neighbour, who gazed with a settled and mournful +frown and returned them to Sheila. + +She took the pages, folded them and replaced them carefully in her +pocket. She swept her hands over her skirts, and turned to Danton. + +‘You agree,’ she inquired softly, ‘it’s like?’ + +‘Like! It’s the livin’ livid image. The livin’ image,’ he repeated, +stretching out his arm, ‘as he stood there that very night.’ + +‘What will you say, then,’ said Sheila, quietly, ‘What will you say if +I tell you that that man, Nicholas de Sabathier, has been in his grave +for over a hundred years?’ + +Danton’s little eyes seemed, if anything, to draw back even further +into his head. ‘I’d say, Mrs Lawford, if you’ll excuse the word, that +it might be a damn horrible coincidence—I’d go farther, an almost +incredible coincidence. But if you want the sober truth, I’d say it was +nothing more than a crafty, clever, abominable piece of trickery. +That’s what I’d say. Oh, you don’t know, Mrs Lovat. When a scamp’s a +scamp, he’ll stop at nothing. _I_ could tell you some tales.’ + +‘Ah, but that’s not all,’ said Sheila, eyeing them steadfastly one by +one. ‘We all of us know that my husband’s story was that he had gone +down to Widderstone—into the churchyard, for his convalescent ramble; +that story’s true. We all know that he said he had had a fit, a heart +attack, and that a kind of—of stupor had come over him. I believe on my +honour that’s true too. But no one knows but he himself and Mr Bethany +and I, that it was a wretched broken grave, quite at the bottom of the +hill, that he chose for his resting place, nor—and I can’t get the +scene out of my head—nor that the name on that one solitary tombstone +down there was—was...this!’ + +Danton rolled his eyes. ‘I don’t begin to follow,’ he said stubbornly. + +‘You don’t mean,’ said Mr Craik, who had not removed his gaze from +Sheila’s face, ‘I am not to take it that you mean, Mrs Lawford, the—the +other?’ + +‘Yes,’ said Sheila, ‘_his_’—she patted her skirts—‘Sabathier’s.’ + +‘You mean,’ said Mrs Lovat crisply, ‘that the man in the grave is the +man in the book, and that the man in the book is—is poor Arthur’s +changed face?’ + +Sheila nodded. + +Danton rose cumbrously from his chair, looking beadily down on his +three friends. + +‘Oh, but you know, it isn’t—it isn’t right,’ he began. ‘Lord! I can see +him now. Glassy—yes, that’s the very word I said—glassy. It won’t do, +Mrs Lawford; on my solemn honour, it won’t do. I don’t deny it, call it +what you like; yes, devils, if you like. But what I say as a practical +man is that it’s just rank—that’s what it is! Bethany’s had too much +rope. The time’s gone by for sentiment and all that foolery. Mercy’s +all very well, but after all it’s justice that clinches the bargain. +There’s only one way: we must catch him; we must lay the poor wretch by +the heels before it’s too late. No publicity, God bless me, no. We’d +have all the rags in London on us. They’d pillory us nine days on end. +We’d never live it down. No, we must just hush it up—a home or +something; an asylum. For my part,’ he turned like a huge toad, his +chin low in his collar—‘and I’d say the same if it was my own brother, +and, after all, he is your husband, Mrs Lawford—I’d sooner he was in +his grave. It takes two to play at that game, that’s what I say. To lay +himself open! I can’t stand it—honestly, I can’t stand it. And yet,’ he +jerked his chin over the peak of his collar towards the ladies, ‘and +yet you say he’s being fetched; comes creeping home, and is fetched at +dark by a—a lady in a pony-carriage. God bless me! It’s rank. What,’ he +broke out violently again, ‘what was he doing there in a cemetery after +dark? Do you think that beastly Frenchman would have played such a +trick on Craik here? Would he have tried his little game on me? +Deviltry be it, if you prefer the word, and all deference to you, Mrs +Lawford. But I know this—a couple of hundred years ago they would have +burnt a man at the stake for less than a tenth of this. Ask Craik here. +I don’t know how, and I don’t know when: his mother, I’ve always heard +say, was a little eccentric; but the truth is he’s managed by some +unholy legerdemain to get the thing at his finger’s ends; that’s what +it is. Think of that unspeakable book. Left open on the table! Look at +his Ferguson game. It’s our solemn duty to keep him for good and all +out of mischief. It reflects all round. There’s no getting out of it; +we’re all in it. And tar sticks. And then there’s poor little Alice to +consider, and—and you yourself, Mrs. Lawford: I wouldn’t give the +fellow—friend though he was, in a way—it isn’t safe to give him five +minutes’ freedom. We’ve simply got to save you from yourself, Mrs +Lawford; that’s what it is—and from old-fashioned sentiment. And I only +wish Bethany was here now to dispute it!’ + +He stirred himself down, as it were, into his clothes, and stood in the +middle of the hearthrug, gently oscillating, with his hands behind his +back. But at some faint rumour out of the silent house his posture +suddenly stiffened, and he lifted a little, with heavy, steady lids, +his head. + +‘What is the matter, Danton?’ said Mr Craik in a small voice; ‘why are +you listening?’ + +‘I wasn’t listening,’ said Danton stoutly, ‘I was thinking.’ + +At the same moment, at the creak of a footstep on the kitchen stairs, +Lawford also had drawn soundlessly back into the darkness of the empty +drawing-room. + +‘While Mr Danton is “thinking,” Sheila,’ Mrs Lovat was softly +interposing, ‘do please listen a moment to _me_. Do you mean really +that that Frenchman—the one you’ve pocketed—is the poor creature in the +grave?’ + +‘Yes, Mrs Lawford,’ said Mr Craik, putting out his face a little, ‘are +we to take it that you mean that?’ + +‘It’s the same date, dear, the same name even to the spelling; what +possibly else can I think?’ + +‘And that the poor creature in the grave actually climbed up out of the +darkness and—well, what?’ + +‘I know no more than you do _now_, Bettie. But the two faces—you must +remember you haven’t seen my husband _since_.’ You must remember you +haven’t heard the peculiar—the most peculiar things he—Arthur +himself—has said to me. Things such as a wife... And not in jest, +Bettie; I assure you....’ + +‘And Mr Bethany?’ interpolated Mr Craik modestly, feeling his way. + +‘Pah, Bethany, Craik! He’d back Old Nick himself if he came with a good +tale. We’ve got to act; we’ve got to settle his hash before he does any +mischief.’ + +‘Well,’ began Mrs Lovat, smiling a little remorsefully beneath the arch +of her raised eyebrows, ‘I sincerely hope you’ll all forgive me; but I +really am, heart and soul, with Old Nick, as Mr Danton seems on +intimate terms enough to call him. Dead, he is really immensely +alluring; and alive, I think, awfully—just awfully pitiful and—and +pathetic. But if I know anything of Arthur he won’t be beaten by a +Frenchman. As for just the portrait, I think, do you know, I almost +prefer dark men’—she glanced up at the face immediately in front of the +clock—‘at least,’ she added softly, ‘when they are not looking very +vindictive. I suppose people are fairly often possessed, Mr Craik? +_How_ many “deadly sins” are there?’ + +‘As a matter of fact, Mrs Lovat, there are seven. But I think in this +case Mrs Lawford intends to suggest not so much that—that her husband +is in that condition; habitual sin, you know—grave enough, of course, I +own—but that he is actually being compelled, even to the extent of a +more or less complete change of physiognomy, to follow the biddings of +some atrocious spiritual influence. It is no breach of confidence to +say that I have myself been present at a death-bed where the struggle +against what I may call the end was perfectly awful to witness. I don’t +profess to follow all the ramifications of the affair, but though +possibly Mr Danton may seem a little harsh, such harshness, if I may +venture to intercede, is not necessarily “vindictive.” And—and personal +security is a consideration.’ + +‘If you only knew the awful fear, the awful uncertainty I have been in, +Bettie! Oh, it is worse, infinitely worse, than you can possibly +imagine. I have myself heard the Voice speak out of him—a high, hard, +nasal voice. I’ve seen what Mr Danton calls the “glassiness” come into +his face, and an expression so wild and so appallingly depraved, as it +were, that I have had to hurry downstairs to hide myself from the +thought. I’m willing to sacrifice everything for my own husband and for +Alice; but can it be expected of me to go on harbouring....’ Lawford +listened on in vain for a moment; poor Sheila, it seemed, had all but +broken down. + +‘Look here, Mrs Lawford,’ began Danton huskily, ‘you really mustn’t +give way; you really mustn’t. It’s awful, unspeakably awful, I admit. +But here we are; friends, in the midst of friends. And there’s +absolutely nothing—What’s that? Eh? Who is it?... Oh, the maid!’ + +Ada stood in the doorway looking in. ‘All I’ve come to ask, ma’am,’ she +said in a low voice, ‘is, am I to stay downstairs any longer? And are +you aware there’s somebody in the house?’ + +‘What’s that? What’s that you’re saying?’ broke out the husky voice +again. ‘Control yourself! Speak gently! What’s that?’ + +‘Begging your pardon, sir, I’m perfectly under control. And all I say +is that I can’t stay any longer alone downstairs there. There’s +somebody in the house.’ + +A concentrated hush seemed to have fallen on the little assembly. + +‘“Somebody”—but who?’ said Sheila out of the silence. ‘You come up +here, Ada, with these idle fancies. Who’s in the house? There has been +no knock—no footstep.’ + +‘No knock, no footstep, ma’am, that I’ve heard. It’s Dr Ferguson, +ma’am. He was here that first night; and he’s been here ever since. He +was here when I came on Tuesday; and he was here last night. And he’s +here now. I can’t be deceived by my own feelings. It’s not right, it’s +not out-spoken to keep me in the dark like this. And if you have no +objection, I would like to go home.’ + +Lawford in his utter weariness had nearly closed the door and now sat +bent up on a chair, wondering vaguely when this poor play was coming to +an end, longing with an intensity almost beyond endurance for the keen +night air, the open sky. But still his ears drank in every tiniest +sound or stir. He heard Danton’s lowered voice muttering his arguments. +He heard Ada quietly sniffing in the darkness of the hall. And this was +his world! This was his life’s panorama, creaking on at every jolt. +This was the ‘must’ Grisel had sent him back to—these poor fools packed +together in a panic at an old stale tale! Well, they would all come out +presently, and cluster; and the crested, cackling fellow would lead +them safely away out of the haunted farmyard. + +He started out of his reverie at Danton’s voice close at hand. + +‘Look here, my good girl, we haven’t the least intention of keeping you +in the dark. If you want to leave your mistress like this in the midst +of her anxieties she says you can go and welcome. But it’s not a bit of +good in the world coming up with these cock-and-bull stories. The truth +is your master’s mad, that’s the sober truth of it—hopelessly insane, +you understand; and we’ve got to find him. But nothing’s to be said, +d’ye see? It’s got to be done without fuss or scandal. But if there’s +any witness wanted, or anything of that kind, why, here you are; and,’ +he dropped his voice to an almost inaudible hoot, ‘and well worth your +while! You did see him, eh? Step into the trap, and all that?’ + +Ada stood silent a moment. ‘I don’t know, sir,’ she began quietly, ‘by +what right you speak to me about what you call my cock-and-bull +stories. If the master is mad, all I can say to _anybody_ is I’m very +sorry to hear it. I came to my mistress, sir, if you please; and I +prefer to take my orders from one who has a right to give them. Did I +understand you to say, ma’am, that you wouldn’t want me any more this +evening?’ + +Sheila had swept solemnly to the door. ‘Mr Danton meant all that he +said quite kindly, Ada. I can perfectly understand your +feelings—perfectly. And I’m very much obliged to you for all your +kindness to me in very trying circumstances. We are all agreed—we are +forced to the terrible conclusion which—which Mr Danton has +just—expressed. And I know I can rely on your discretion. Don’t stay on +a moment if you really are afraid. But when you say “some one” Ada, do +you mean—some one like you or me; or do you mean—the other?’ + +‘I’ve been sitting in the kitchen, ma’am, unable to move. I’m watched +everywhere. The other evening I went into the drawing-room—I was alone +in the house—and... I can’t describe it. It wasn’t dark; and yet it was +all still and black, like the ruins after a fire. I don’t mean I saw +it, only that it was like a scene. And then the watching—I am quite +aware to some it may sound all fancy. But I’m not superstitious, never +was. I only mean—that I can’t sit alone here. I daren’t. Else, I’m +quite myself. So if so be you don’t want me any more; if I can’t be of +any further use to you or to—to Mr. Lawford, I’d prefer to go home.’ + +‘Very well, Ada; thank you. You can go out this way.’ + +The door was unchained and unbolted, and ‘Good-night’ said. And Sheila +swept back in sombre pomp to her absorbed friends. + +‘She’s quite a good creature at heart,’ she explained frankly, as if to +disclaim any finesse, ‘and almost quixotically loyal. But what really +did she mean, do you think? She is so obstinate. That maddening “some +one”! How they do repeat themselves. It can’t be my husband; not Dr +Ferguson, I mean. You don’t suppose—oh surely, not “some one” else!’ +Again the dark silence of the house seemed to drift in on the little +company. + +Mr Craik cleared his throat. ‘I failed to catch quite all that the maid +said,’ he murmured apologetically; ‘but I certainly did gather it was +to some kind of—of emanation she was referring. And the “ruin,” you +know. I’m not a mystic; and yet do you know, that somehow seemed to me +almost offensively suggestive of—of demonic influence. You don’t +suppose, Mrs Lawford—and of course I wouldn’t for a moment venture on +such a conjecture unsupported—but even if this restless spirit (let us +call it) did succeed in making a footing, it might possibly be rather +in the nature of a lodging than a permanent residence. Moreover we are, +I think, bound to remember that probably in all spheres of existence +like attracts like; even the Gadarene episode seems to suggest a +possible _multiplication!_’ he peered largely. ‘You don’t suppose, Mrs +Lawford...?’ + +‘I think Mr Craik doesn’t quite relish having to break the news, Sheila +dear,’ explained Mrs Lovat soothingly, ‘that perhaps Sabathier’s _out_. +Which really is quite a heavenly suggestion, for in that case your +husband would be in, wouldn’t he? Just our old stolid Arthur again, you +know. And next Mr Craik is suggesting, and it certainly does seem +rather fascinating, that poor Ada’s got mixed up with the Frenchman’s +friends, or perhaps, even, with one of the seventy-two Princes Royal. I +know women can’t, or mustn’t reason, Mr Danton, but you do, I hope, +just catch the drift?’ + +Danton started. ‘I wasn’t really listening to the girl,’ he explained +nonchalantly, shrugging his black shoulders and pursing up his eyes. +‘Personally, Mrs Lovat, I’d pack the baggage off to-night, box and all. +But it’s not my business.’ + +‘You mustn’t be depressed—must he, Mr Craik? After all, my dear man, +the business, as you call it, is not exactly entailed. But really, +Sheila, I think it must be getting very late. Mr Bethany won’t come +now. And the dear old thing ought certainly to have his say before we +go any further; _oughtn’t_ he, Mr Danton? So what’s the use of +worriting poor Ada’s ghost any longer. And as for poor Arthur—I haven’t +the faintest desire in the world to hear the little cart drive up, +simply in case it should be to leave your unfortunate husband behind +it, Sheila. What it must be to be alone all night in this house with a +dead and buried Frenchman’s face—well, I shudder, dear!’ + +‘And yet, Mrs Lovat,’ said Mr Craik, with some little show of returning +bravado, ‘as we make our bed, you know.’ + +‘But in this case, you see,’ she replied reflectively, ‘if all accounts +are true, Mr Craik, it’s manifestly the wicked Frenchman who has made +the bed, and Sheila who refu—— But look; Mr Danton is fretting to get +home.’ + +‘If you’ll all go to the door,’ said Danton, seizing a fleeting +opportunity to raise his eyebrows more expressively even than if he had +again shrugged his shoulders at Sheila, ‘I’ll put out the light.’ + +The night air flowed into the dark house as Danton hastily groped his +way out of the dining-room. + +‘There’s only one thing,’ said Sheila slowly. ‘When I last saw my +husband, you know, he was, I think, the least bit better. He was always +stubbornly convinced it would all come right in time. That’s why, I +think, he’s been spending his—his evenings away from home. But +supposing it did?’ + +‘For my part,’ said Mrs Lovat, breathing the faint wind that was rising +out of the west, ‘I’d sigh; I’d rub my eyes; I’d thank God for such an +exciting dream; and I’d turn comfortably over and go to sleep again. +I’m all for Arthur—absolutely—back against the wall.’ + +‘For my part,’ said Danton, looming in the dusk, ‘friend or no friend, +I’d cut the—I’d cut him dead. But don’t fret, Mrs Lawford, devil or no +devil, he’s gone for good.’ + +‘And for my part—’ began Mr Craik; but the door at that moment slammed. + +Voices, however, broke out almost immediately in the porch. And after a +hurried consultation, Lawford in his stagnant retreat heard the door +softly reopen, and the striking of a match. And Mr Craik, followed +closely by Danton’s great body, stole circumspectly across his dim +chink, and the first adventurer went stumbling down the kitchen +staircase. + +‘I suppose,’ muttered Lawford, turning his head in the darkness, ‘they +have come back to put out the kitchen gas.’ + +Danton began a busy tuneless whistle between his teeth. + +‘Coming, Craik?’ he called thickly, after a long pause. + +Apparently no answer had been returned to his inquiry: he waited a +little longer, with legs apart, and eyeballs enveloped in brooding +darkness. ‘I’ll just go and tell the ladies you’re coming,’ he suddenly +bawled down the hollow. ‘Do you hear, Craik? They’re alone, you know.’ +And with that he resolutely wheeled and rapidly made his way down the +steps into the garden. Some few moments afterwards Mr Craik shook +himself free of the basement, hastened at a spirited trot to rejoin his +companions, and in his absence of mind omitted to shut the front door. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE + + +Lawford sat on in the darkness, and now one sentence and now another of +their talk would repeat itself in his memory, in much the same way as +one listlessly turns over an antiquated diary, to read here and there a +flattened and almost meaningless sentiment. Sometimes a footstep passed +echoing along the path under the trees, then his thoughts would leave +him, and he would listen and listen till it had died quite out. It was +all so very far away. And they too—these talkers—so very far away; as +remote and yet as clear as the characters in a play when they have made +their final bow, and have left the curtained stage, and one is standing +uncompanioned and nearly the last of the spectators, and the lights +that have summoned back reality again are being extinguished. It was +only by painful effort of mind that he kept recalling himself to +himself—why he was here; what it all meant; that this was indeed +actuality. + +Yet, after all, this by now was his customary loneliness: there was +little else he desired for the present than the hospitality of the +dark. He glanced around him in the clear, black, stirless air. Here and +there, it seemed, a humped or spindled form held against all comers its +passive place. Here and there a tiny faintness of light played. Night +after night these chairs and tables kept their blank vigil. Why, he +thought, pleased as an overtired child with the fancy, in a sense they +were always alone, shut up in a kind of senselessness—just like us all. +But what—what, he had suddenly risen from his chair to ask himself—what +on earth are they alone with? No precise answer had been forthcoming to +that question. But as in turning in the doorway, he looked out into the +night, flashing here and there in dark spaces of the sky above the +withering apple leaves—the long dark wall and quiet untrodden road—with +the tumultuous beating of the stars—one thing at least he was conscious +of having learned in these last few days: he knew what kind of a place +he was alone _in_. + +It seemed to weave a spell over him, to call up a nostalgia he had lost +all remembrance of since childhood. And that queer homesickness, at any +rate, was all Sabathier’s doing, he thought, smiling in his rather +careworn fashion. Sabathier! It was this mystery, bereft now of all +fear, and this beauty together, that made life the endless, changing +and yet changeless, thing it was. And yet mystery and loveliness alike +were only really appreciable with one’s legs, as it were, dangling down +over into the grave. + +Just with one’s lantern lit, on the edge of the whispering unknown, and +a reiterated going back out of the solitude into the light and warmth, +to the voices and glancing of eyes, to say good-bye:—that after all was +this life on earth for those who watched as well as acted. What if +one’s earthly home were empty?—still the restless fretted traveller +must tarry; ‘for the horrible worst of it is, my friend,’ he said, as +if to some silent companion listening behind him, ‘the worst of it is, +_your_ way was just simply, solely suicide.’ What was it Herbert had +called it? Yes, a cul-de-sac—black, lofty, immensely still and old and +picturesque, but none the less merely a contemptible cul-de-sac; no +abiding place, scarcely even sufficing with its flagstones for a groan +from the fugitive and deluded refugee. There was no peace for the +wicked. The question of course then came in—Was there any peace +anywhere, for anybody? + +He smiled at a sudden odd remembrance of a quiet, sardonic old aunt +whom he used to stay with as a child. ‘Children should be seen and not +heard,’ she would say, peering at him over his favourite pudding. + +His eyes rested vacantly on the darkling street. He fell again into +reverie, gigantically brooded over by shapes only imagination dimly +conceived of: the remote alleys of his mind astir with a shadowy and +ceaseless traffic which it wasn’t at least _this_ life’s business to +hearken after, or regard. And as he stood there in a mysteriously +thronging peaceful solitude such as he had never known before, faintly +out of the silence broke the sound of approaching hoofs. His heart +seemed to gather itself close; a momentary blindness veiled his eyes, +so wildly had his blood surged up into cheek and brain. He remained, +caught up, with head slightly inclined, listening, as, with an +interminable tardiness, measureless anguished hope died down into +nothing in his mind. + +Cold and heavy, his heart began to beat again, as if to catch up those +laggard moments. He turned with an infinite revulsion of feeling to +look out on the lamps of the old fly that had drawn up at his gate. + +He watched incuriously a little old lady rather arduously alight, +pause, and look up at his darkened windows, and after a momentary +hesitation, and a word over her shoulder to the cabman, stoop and +fumble at the iron latch. He watched her with a kind of wondering +aversion, still scarcely tinged with curiosity. She had succeeded in +lifting the latch and in pushing her way through, and was even now +steadily advancing towards him along the tiled path. And a minute after +he recognised with the strangest reactions the quiet old figure that +had shared a sunset with him ages and ages ago—his mother’s old +schoolfellow, Miss Sinnet. + +He was already ransacking the still faintly-perfumed dining-room for +matches, and had just succeeded in relighting the still-warm lamp, when +he heard her quiet step in the porch, even felt her peering in, in the +gloom, with all her years’ trickling customariness behind her, a little +dubious of knocking on a wide-open door. + +But the lamp lit Lawford went out again and welcomed his visitor. ‘I am +alone,’ he was explaining gravely, ‘my wife’s away and the whole house +topsy-turvy. How very, very kind of you!’ + +The old lady was breathing a little heavily after her ascent of the +steep steps, and seemed not to have noticed his outstretched hand. None +the less she followed him in, and when she was well advanced into the +lighted room, she sighed deeply, raised her veil over the front of her +bonnet, and leisurely took out her spectacles. + +‘I suppose,’ she was explaining in a little quiet voice, ‘you _are_ Mr +Arthur Lawford, but as I did not catch sight of a light in any of the +windows I began to fear that the cabman might have set me down at the +wrong house.’ + +She raised her head, and first through, and then over her spectacles +she deliberately and steadfastly regarded him. + +‘Yes,’ she said to herself, and turned, not as it seemed entirely with +satisfaction, to look for a chair. He wheeled the most comfortable up +to the table. + +‘I have been visiting my old friend Miss Tucker—Rev W. Tucker’s +daughter—she, I knew, could give me your address; and sure enough she +did. Your road, d’ye see, was on my way home. And I determined, in +spite of the hour, just to inquire. You must understand, Mr Lawford, +there was something that I rather particularly wanted to say to you. +But there!—you’re looking sadly, sadly ill; and,’ she glanced round a +little inquisitively, ‘I think my story had better wait for a more +convenient occasion.’ + +‘Not at all, Miss Sinnet; please not,’ Lawford assured her, ‘really. I +have been ill, but I’m now practically quite myself again. My wife and +daughter have gone away for a few days; and I follow to-morrow, so if +you’ll forgive such a very poor welcome, it may be my—my only chance. +Do please let me hear.’ + +The old lady leant back in her chair, placed her hands on its arms and +softly panted, while out of the rather broad serenity of her face she +sat blinking up at her companion as if after a long talk, instead of at +the beginning of one. ‘No,’ she repeated reflectively, ‘I don’t like +your looks at all; yet here we are, enjoying beautiful autumn weather, +Mr Lawford, why not make use of it?’ + +‘Oh yes,’ said Lawford, ‘I do. I have been making tremendous use of +it.’ + +Her eyelid flickered at his candid glance. ‘And does your business +permit of much walking?’ + +‘Well, I’ve been malingering these last few days idling at home; but I +am usually more or less my own man, Miss Sinnet. I walk a little.’ + +‘H’m, but not much in my direction, Mr Lawford?’ she quizzed him. + +‘All horrible indolence, Miss Sinnet. But I often—often think of you; +and especially just lately.’ + +‘Well, now,’ she wriggled round her head to get a better view of him +rather stiffly seated on his chair, ‘that’s very peculiar; because I +too have been thinking lately a great deal of you. And yet—I fancy I +shall succeed in mystifying you presently—not precisely of you, but of +somebody else!’ + +‘You do mystify me—“somebody else”!’ he replied gallantly. ‘And that is +the story, I suppose?’ + +‘That’s the story,’ repeated Miss Sinnet with some little triumph. +‘Now, let me see; it was on Saturday last—yes, Saturday evening; a +wonderful sunset; Bewley Heath.’ + +‘Oh yes; my daughter’s favourite walk.’ + +‘And your daughter’s age now?’ + +‘She’s nearly sixteen; Alice, you know.’ + +‘Ah, yes, Alice; to be sure. It _is_ a beautiful walk, and if fine, I +generally take mine there too. It’s near; there’s shade; it’s very +little frequented; and I can wander and muse undisturbed. And that I +think is pretty well all that an old woman like me is fit for, Mr +Lawford. “Nearly sixteen!” Is it possible? Dear, dear me? But let me +get on. On my way home from the Heath, you may be aware, before one +reaches the road again, there’s a somewhat steep ascent. I haven’t the +strength I had, and whether I’m fatigued or not, I have always made it +a rule to rest awhile on a most convenient little seat at the summit, +admire the view—what I can see of it—and then make my way quietly, +quietly home. On Saturday, however, and it most rarely occurs—once, I +remember, when a very civil nursemaid was sitting with two charmingly +behaved little children in the sunshine, and I heard they were my old +friend Major Loder’s _son’s_ children—on Saturday, as I was saying, my +own particular little haunt was already occupied.’ She glanced back at +him from out of her thoughts, as it were. ‘By a gentleman. I say, +gentleman; though I must confess that his conduct—perhaps, too, a +little something even in his appearance, somewhat belied the term. +Anyhow, gentleman let us call him.’ + +Lawford, all attention, nodded, and encouragingly smiled. + +‘I’m not one of those tiresome, suspicious people, Mr Lawford, who +distrust strangers. I have never been molested, and I have enjoyed many +and many a most interesting, and sometimes instructive, talk with an +individual whom I’ve never seen in my life before, and this side of the +grave perhaps, am never likely to see again.’ She lifted her head with +pursed lips, and gravely yet still flickeringly regarded him once more. +‘Well, I made some trifling remark—the weather, the view, what-not,’ +she explained with a little jerk of her shoulder—‘and to my extreme +astonishment he turned and addressed me by name—Miss Sinnet. +Unmistakably—Sinnet. Now, perhaps, and very rightly, you won’t +considered _that_ a very peculiar thing to do? But you will recollect, +Mr Lawford, that I had been sitting there a considerable time. Surely, +now, if you had recognised my face you would have addressed me at +once?’ + +‘Was he, do you think, Miss Sinnet, a little uncertain, perhaps?’ + +‘Never mind, never mind; let me get on with my story first. The next +thing my gentleman does is more mysterious still. His whole manner was +a little peculiar, perhaps—a certain restlessness, what, in fact, one +might be almost tempted to call a certain furtiveness of behaviour. +Never mind. What he does next is to ask me a riddle! Perhaps you won’t +think _that_ was peculiar either?’ + +‘What was the riddle?’ smiled Lawford. + +‘Why, to be sure, to guess his name! Simply guided, so I surmised, by +some very faint resemblance in his face to his _mother_, who was, he +assured me, an old schoolfellow of mine at _Brighton_. I thought and +thought. I confess the adventure was beginning to be a little +perplexing. But of course, very, very few of my old schoolfellows +remain distinctly in my memory now; and I fear _that_ grows more +treacherous the longer I live. Their faces as girls are clear enough. +But later in life most of them drifted out of sight—many, alas, are +dead; and, well, at last I narrowed my man down to one. And who now, do +you suppose _that_ was?’ + +Lawford sustained an expression of abysmal mystification. ‘Do tell +me—who?’ + +‘Your own poor dear mother, Mr Lawford.’ + +‘_He_ said so?’ + +‘No, no,’ said the old lady, with some vexation, closing her eyes. ‘_I_ +said so. He asked me to guess. And I guessed Mary Lawford; now do you +see?’ + +‘Yes, yes. But _was_ he like her, Miss Sinnet? That was really very, +very extraordinary. Did you see _any_ likeness in his face?’ + +Miss Sinnet very deliberately took her spectacles out of their case +again. ‘Now, see here, sir; this is being practical, isn’t it? I’m just +going to take a leisurely glance at yours. But you mustn’t let me +forget the time. You must look after the time for me.’ + +‘It’s about a quarter to ten,’ said Lawford, having glanced first at +the stopped clock on the chimney-piece and then at his watch. He then +sat quite still and endeavoured to sit at ease, while the old lady +lifted her bonneted head and ever so gravely and benignly surveyed him. + +‘H’m,’ she said at last. ‘There’s no mistaking _you_. It’s Mary’s chin, +and Mary’s brow—with just a little something, perhaps, of her dreamy +eye. But you haven’t all her looks, Mr Lawford, by any manner of means. +She was a very beautiful girl, and so vivacious, so fanciful—it was, I +suppose the foreign strain showing itself. Even marriage did not quite +succeed in spoiling her.’ + +‘The foreign strain?’ Lawford glanced with a kind of fleeting fixity at +the quiet old figure. ‘The foreign strain?’ + +Your mother’s maiden name, my dear Mr Lawford, surely memory does not +deceive me in that, was van der Gucht. _That_, I believe, is a foreign +name.’ + +‘Ah, yes,’ said Lawford, his rising thoughts sinking quietly to rest +again. ‘Van der Gucht, of course. I—how stupid of me!’ + +‘As a matter of fact, your mother was very proud of her Dutch blood. +But there,’ she flung out little fin-like sleeves, ‘if you don’t let me +keep to my story I shall go back as uneasy as I came. And you didn’t,’ +she added even more fretfully, ‘you didn’t tell me the time.’ + +Lawford stared at his watch again for some few moments without +replying. ‘It’s a few minutes to ten,’ he said at last. + +‘Dear me! And I’m keeping the cabman! I must hurry on. Well, now, I put +it to you; you shall be my father confessor—though I detest the idea in +real life—was I wrong? Was I justified in professing to the poor fellow +that I detected a likeness when there was extremely little likeness +there?’ + +‘What! None at all!’ cried Lawford; ‘not the faintest trace?’ + +‘My dear good Mr Lawford,’ she expostulated, patting her lap, ‘there’s +very little more than a trace of my dear beautiful Mary in _you_, her +own son. How could there be—how could you expect it in him, a complete +stranger? No, it was nothing but my own foolish kindliness. It might +have been Mary’s son for all that I could recollect. I haven’t for +years, please remember, had the pleasure of receiving a visit from +_you_. I am firmly of opinion that I was justified. My motive was +entirely benevolent. And then—to my positive amazement—well, I won’t +say hard things of the absent; but he suddenly turns round on me with a +“Thank you, Miss Bennett.” Bennett, hark ye! Perhaps you won’t agree +that I had any justification in being vexed and—and affronted at +_that_.’ + +‘I think, Miss Sinnet,’ said Lawford solemnly, ‘that you were perfectly +justified. Oh, perfectly. I wonder even you had the patience to give +the real Arthur Lawford a chance to ask your forgiveness for—for the +stranger.’ + +‘Well, candidly,’ said Miss Sinnett severely. ‘I was very much +scandalised; and I shouldn’t be here now telling you my story if it +hadn’t been for your mother.’ + +‘My mother!’ + +The old lady rather grimly enjoyed his confusion. ‘Yes, Mr Lawford, +your mother. I don’t know why—something in his manner, something in his +face—so dejected, so unhappy, so—if it is not uncharitablnesse to say +it—so wild: it has haunted me: I haven’t been able to put the matter +out of my mind. I have lain awake in my bed thinking of him. Why did he +speak to me, I keep asking myself. Why did he play me so very aimless a +trick? How had he learned my name? Why was he sitting there so solitary +and so dejected? And worse even than that, what has become of him? A +little more patience, a little more charity, perhaps—what might I not +have done for him? The whole thing has harassed and distressed me more +than I can say. Would you believe it, I have actually twice, and on one +occasion, three times in a day made my way to the seat—hoping to see +him there. And I am not so young as I was. And then, as I say, to crown +all, I had a most remarkable dream about your mother. But that’s my own +affair. Elderly people like me are used—well, perhaps I won’t say +used—we’re not surprised or disturbed by visits from those who have +gone before. We live, in a sense, among the tombs; though I would not +have you fancy it’s in any way a morbid or unhappy life to lead. We +don’t talk about it—certainly not to young people. Let them enjoy their +Eden while they can; though there’s plenty of apples, I fear, on the +Tree yet, Mr Lawford.’ + +She leant forward and whispered it with a big, simple smile:—‘We don’t +even discuss it much among ourselves. But as one gets nearer and nearer +to the wicket-gate there’s other company around one than you’ll find +in—in the directory. And that is why I have just come on here tonight. +Very probably my errand may seem to have no meaning for you. You look +ill, but you don’t appear to be in any great trouble or adversity, as I +feared in my—well, there—as I feared you might be. I must say, though, +it seems a terribly empty house. And no lights, too!’ + +She slowly, with a little trembling nodding of her bonnet, turned her +head and glanced quietly, fixedly, and unflinchingly, out of the +half-open door. ‘But that’s not my affair.’ And again she looked at him +for a little while. + +Then she stooped forward and touched him kindly and trustingly on the +knee. ‘Trouble or no trouble,’ she said, ‘it’s never too late to remind +a man of his mother. And I’m sure, Mr Lawford, I’m very glad to hear +you are struggling up out of your illness again. We must keep a brave +heart, forty or seventy, whichever we may be: “While the evil days come +not nor the years draw nigh when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in +them,” though they have not come to me even yet; and I trust from the +bottom of my heart, not to _you_.’ + +She looked at him without a trace of emotion or constraint in her +large, quiet face, and their eyes met for a moment in that brief, +fixed, baffling fashion that seems to prove that mankind is after all +but a dumb masked creature saddled with the vain illusion of speech. + +‘And now that I’ve eased my conscience,’ said the old lady, pulling +down her veil, ‘I must beg pardon for intruding at such an hour of the +evening. And may I have your arm down those dreadful steps? Really, Mr +Lawford, judging from the houses they erect for us, the builders must +have a very peculiar notion of mankind. Is the fly still there? I +expressly told the man to wait, and what I am going to do if—!’ + +‘He’s there,’ Lawford reassured her, craning his neck in their slow +progress to catch a peep into the quiet road. And like a flock of birds +scared by a chance comer at their feeding in some deserted field, a +whirring cloud of memories swept softly up in his mind—memories whose +import he made no effort to discover. None the less, the leisurely +descent became in their company something of a real experience even in +such a brimming week. + +‘I hope, some day, you will really tell me your dream?’ he said, +pushing the old lady’s silk skirts in after her as she slowly climbed +into the carriage. + +‘Ah, my dear Lawford, when you are my age,’ she called back to him, +groping her way into the rather musty gloom, ‘you’ll dream such dreams +for yourself. Life’s not what’s just the fashion. And there are queerer +things to be seen and heard just quietly in one’s solitude than this +busy life gives us time to discover. But as for my mystifying Bewley +acquaintance—I confess I cannot make head or tail of him.’ + +‘Was he,’ said Lawford rather vaguely, looking up into the dim white +face that with its plumes filled nearly the whole carriage window, ‘was +his face very unpleasing?’ + +She raised a gloved hand. ‘It has haunted me, haunted me, Mr Lawford; +its—its conflict! Poor fellow; I hope, I do hope, he faced his trouble +out. But I shall never see him again.’ + +He squeezed the trembling, kindly old hand. ‘I bet, Miss Sinnet,’ he +said earnestly, ‘even your having _thought_ kindly of the poor beggar +eased his mind—whoever he may have been. I assure you, assure you of +that.’ + +‘Ay, but I did more than _think_,’ replied the old lady with a chuckle +that might have seemed even a little derisive if it had not been so +profoundly magnanimous. + +He watched the old black fly roll slowly off, and still smiling at Miss +Sinnet’s inscrutable finesse went back into the house. ‘And now, my +friend,’ he said, addressing peacefully the thronging darkness, ‘the +time’s nearly up for me to go too.’ + +He had made up his mind. Or, rather, it seemed as if in the unregarded +silences of this last long talk his mind had made up itself. Only among +impossibilities had he the shadow of a choice. In this old haunted +house, amid this shallow turmoil no practicable clue could show itself +of a way out. He would go away for a while. + +He left the door ajar behind him for the moments still left, and stood +for a while thinking. Then, lamp in hand, he descended into the +breakfast-room for pen, ink, and paper. He sat for some time in that +underground calm, nibbling his pen like a harassed and self-conscious +schoolboy. At last he began: + +‘MY DEAR SHEILA,—I must tell you, to begin with, that the _change_ has +now all passed away. I am—as near as man can be—completely myself +again. And next: that I overheard all that was said to-night in the +dining-room. + +‘I’m sorry for listening; but it’s no good going over all that now. +Here I am, and, as you said, for Alice’s sake we must make the best of +it. I am going away for a while, to get, if I can, a chance to quiet +down. I suppose every one comes sooner or later to a time in life when +there is nothing else to be done but just shut one’s eyes and blunder +on. And that’s all I can do now—blunder on....’ + +He paused, and suddenly, at the echo of the words in his mind, a +revulsion of feeling—shame and hatred of himself surged up, and he tore +his letter into tiny pieces. Once more he began, ‘my dear Sheila,’ +dropped his pen, sat on for a long time, cold and inert, harbouring +almost unendurably a pitiful, hopeless longing.... He would write to +Grisel another day. + +He leant back in his chair, his fingers pressed against his eyelids. +And clearer than those which myriad-hued reality can ever present, +pictures of the imagination swam up before his eyes. It seemed, indeed, +that even now some ghost, some revenant of himself was sitting there, +in the old green churchyard, roofed only with a thousand thousand +stars. The breath of darkness stirred softly on his cheek. Some little +scampering shape slipped by. A bird on high cried weirdly, solemnly, +over the globe. He shuddered faintly, and looked out again into the +small lamplit room. + +Here, too, was quite as inexplicable a coming and going. A fly was +walking on the table beneath his eyes, with the uneasy gait of one that +has outlived his hour and most of his companions. Mice were scampering +and shrieking in the empty kitchen. And all about him, in the viewless +air, the phantoms of another life passed by, unmindful of his +motionless body. He fell into a lethargy of the senses, and only +gradually became aware after a while of the strange long-drawn sigh of +rain at the window. He rose and opened it. The night air flowed in, +chilled with its waters and faintly fragrant of the dust. It soothed +away all thought for a while. He turned back to his chair. He would +wait until the rain had lulled before starting.... + +A little before midnight the door was softly, and with extreme care, +pushed open, and Mr Bethany’s old face, with an intense and sharpened +scrutiny, looked in on the lamplit room. And as if still intent on the +least sound within the empty walls around him, he came near, and +stooping across the table, stared through his spectacles at the +sidelong face of his friend, so still, with hands so lightly laid on +the arms of his chair that the old man had need to watch closely to +detect in his heavy slumber the slow measured rise and fall of his +breast. + +He turned wearily away muttering a little, between an immeasurable +relief and a now almost intolerable medley of vexations. What _was_ +this monstrous web of Craik’s? What _had_ the creature been nodding and +ducketing about?—those whisperings, that tattling? And what in the end, +when you were old and sour and out-strategied, what was the end to be +of this urgent dream called Life? He sat quietly down and drew his +hands over his face, pushed his lean knotted fingers up under his +spectacles, then sat blinking—and softly slowly deciphered the solitary +‘My dear Sheila’ on Lawford’s note-paper. ‘H’m,’ he muttered, and +looked up again at the dark still eyelids that in the strange torpor of +sleep might yet be dimly conveying to the dreaming brain behind them +some hint of his presence. ‘I wish to goodness, you wonderful old +creature,’ he muttered, wagging his head, ‘I wish to goodness you’d +wake up.’ + +For some time he sat on, listening to the still soft downpour on the +fading leaves. ‘They don’t come to _me_,’ he said softly again; with a +tiny smile on his old face. ‘It’s that old medieval Craik: with a face +like a last year’s rookery!’ And again he sat, with head a little +sidelong, listening now to the infinitesimal sounds of life without, +now to the thoughts within, and ever and again he gazed steadfastly on +Lawford. + +At last it seemed in the haunted quietness other thoughts came to him. +A cloud, as it were of youth, drew over the wrinkled skin, composed the +birdlike keenness; his head nodded. Once, like Lawford in the darkness +at Widderstone, he glanced up sharply across the lamplight at his +phantasmagorical shadowy companion, heard the steady surge of +multitudinous rain-drops, like the roar of Time’s winged chariot +hurrying near; then he too, with spectacles awry, bobbed on in his +chair, a weary old sentinel on the outskirts of his friend’s denuded +battlefield. + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RETURN *** + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the +United States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online +at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: The Return</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Walter de la Mare</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: December 15, 2000 [eBook #3075]<br /> +[Most recently updated: November 19, 2022]</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Eve Sobol and David Widger</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RETURN ***</div> + +<div class="fig" style="width:55%;"> +<img src="images/cover.jpg" style="width:100%;" alt="[Illustration]" /> +</div> + +<h1>The Return</h1> + +<h2 class="no-break">By Walter de la Mare</h2> + +<hr /> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<p class="letter"> +“Look not for roses in Attalus his garden, or wholesome flowers in a venomous +plantation. And since there is scarce any one bad, but some others are the +worse for him; tempt not contagion by proximity and hazard not thyself in the +shadow of corruption.”—SIR THOMAS BROWNE. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<table summary="" style=""> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap01">CHAPTER ONE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap02">CHAPTER TWO</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap03">CHAPTER THREE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap04">CHAPTER FOUR</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap05">CHAPTER FIVE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap06">CHAPTER SIX</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap07">CHAPTER SEVEN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap08">CHAPTER EIGHT</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap09">CHAPTER NINE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap10">CHAPTER TEN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap11">CHAPTER ELEVEN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap12">CHAPTER TWELVE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap13">CHAPTER THIRTEEN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap14">CHAPTER FOURTEEN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap15">CHAPTER FIFTEEN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap16">CHAPTER SIXTEEN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap17">CHAPTER SEVENTEEN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap18">CHAPTER EIGHTEEN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap19">CHAPTER NINETEEN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap20">CHAPTER TWENTY</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap21">CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap22">CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap23">CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE</a></td> +</tr> + +</table> + +<hr /> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap01"></a> +CHAPTER ONE</h2> + +<p> +The churchyard in which Arthur Lawford found himself wandering that mild and +golden September afternoon was old, green, and refreshingly still. The silence +in which it lay seemed as keen and mellow as the light—the pale, almost +heatless, sunlight that filled the air. Here and there robins sang across the +stones, elvishly shrill in the quiet of harvest. The only other living creature +there seemed to Lawford to be his own rather fair, not insubstantial, rather +languid self, who at the noise of the birds had raised his head and glanced as +if between content and incredulity across his still and solitary surroundings. +An increasing inclination for such lonely ramblings, together with the feeling +that his continued ill-health had grown a little irksome to his wife, and that +now that he was really better she would be relieved at his absence, had induced +him to wander on from home without much considering where the quiet lanes were +leading him. And in spite of a peculiar melancholy that had welled up into his +mind during these last few days, he had certainly smiled with a faint sense of +the irony of things on lifting his eyes in an unusually depressed moodiness to +find himself looking down on the shadows and peace of Widderstone. +</p> + +<p> +With that anxious irresolution which illness so often brings in its train he +had hesitated for a few minutes before actually entering the graveyard. But +once safely within he had begun to feel extremely loth to think of turning back +again, and this not the less at remembering with a real foreboding that it was +now drawing towards evening, that another day was nearly done. He trailed his +umbrella behind him over the grass-grown paths; staying here and there to read +some time-worn inscription; stooping a little broodingly over the dark green +graves. Not for the first time during the long laborious convalescence that had +followed apparently so slight an indisposition, a fleeting sense almost as if +of an unintelligible remorse had overtaken him, a vague thought that behind all +these past years, hidden as it were from his daily life, lay something not yet +quite reckoned with. How often as a boy had he been rapped into a galvanic +activity out of the deep reveries he used to fall into—those fits of a kind of +fishlike day-dream. How often, and even far beyond boyhood, had he found +himself bent on some distant thought or fleeting vision that the sudden clash +of self-possession had made to seem quite illusory, and yet had left so +strangely haunting. And now the old habit had stirred out of its long sleep, +and, through the gate that Influenza in departing had left ajar, had returned +upon him. +</p> + +<p> +‘But I suppose we are all pretty much the same, if we only knew it,’ he had +consoled himself. ‘We keep our crazy side to ourselves; that’s all. We just go +on for years and years doing and saying whatever happens to come up—and really +keen about it too’—he had glanced up with a kind of challenge in his face at +the squat little belfry—‘and then, without the slightest reason or warning, +down you go, and it all begins to wear thin, and you get wondering what on +earth it all means.’ Memory slipped back for an instant to the life that in so +unusual a fashion seemed to have floated a little aloof. Fortunately he had not +discussed these inward symptoms with his wife. How surprised Sheila would be to +see him loafing in this old, crooked churchyard. How she would lift her dark +eyebrows, with that handsome, indifferent tolerance. He smiled, but a little +confusedly; yet the thought gave even a spice of adventure to the evening’s +ramble. +</p> + +<p> +He loitered on, scarcely thinking at all now, stooping here and there. These +faint listless ideas made no more stir than the sunlight gilding the fading +leaves, the crisp turf underfoot. With a slight effort he stooped even once +again;— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +‘Stranger, a moment pause, and stay;<br/> +In this dim chamber hidden away<br/> +Lies one who once found life as dear<br/> +As now he finds his slumbers here:<br/> +Pray, then, the Judgement but increase<br/> +His deep, everlasting peace!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But then, do you <i>know</i> you lie at peace?’ Lawford audibly questioned, +gazing at the doggerel. And yet, as his eyes wandered over the blunt green +stone and the rambling crimson-berried brier that had almost encircled it with +its thorns, the echo of that whisper rather jarred. He was, he supposed, rather +a dull creature—at least people seemed to think so—and he seldom felt at ease +even with his own small facetiousness. Besides, just that kind of question was +getting very common. Now that cleverness was the fashion most people were +clever—even perfect fools; and cleverness after all was often only a bore: all +head and no body. He turned languidly to the small cross-shaped stone on the +other side: +</p> + +<p class="center"> +‘Here lies the body of Ann Hard, who died in child-bed.<br/> +Also of James, her infant son.’ +</p> + +<p> +He muttered the words over with a kind of mournful bitterness. ‘That’s just +it—just it; that’s just how it goes!’... He yawned softly; the pathway had come +to an end. Beyond him lay ranker grass, one and another obscurer mounds, an old +scarred oak seat, shadowed by a few everlastingly green cypresses and +coral-fruited yew-trees. And above and beyond all hung a pale blue arch of sky +with a few voyaging clouds like silvered wool, and the calm wide curves of +stubble field and pasture land. He stood with vacant eyes, not in the least +aware how queer a figure he made with his gloves and his umbrella and his hat +among the stained and tottering gravestones. Then, just to linger out his hour, +and half sunken in reverie, he walked slowly over to the few solitary graves +beneath the cypresses. +</p> + +<p> +One only was commemorated with a tombstone, a rather unusual oval-headed stone, +carved at each corner into what might be the heads of angels, or of pagan +dryads, blindly facing each other with worn-out, sightless faces. A low curved +granite canopy arched over the grave, with a crevice so wide between its stones +that Lawford actually bent down and slid in his gloved fingers between them. He +straightened himself with a sigh, and followed with extreme difficulty the +well-nigh, illegible inscription: +</p> + +<p class="center"> +‘Here lie ye Bones of one,<br/> +Nicholas Sabathier, a Stranger to this Parish,<br/> +who fell by his own Hand on ye<br/> +Eve of Ste. Michael and All Angels.<br/> +MDCCXXXIX +</p> + +<p> +Of the date he was a little uncertain. The ‘Hand’ had lost its ‘n’ and ‘d’; and +all the ‘Angels’ rain had erased. He was not quite sure even of the ‘Stranger.’ +There was a great rich ‘S,’ and the twisted tail of a ‘g’; and, whether or not, +Lawford smilingly thought, he is no Stranger now. But how rare and how +memorable a name! French evidently; probably Huguenot. And the Huguenots, he +remembered vaguely, were a rather remarkable ‘crowd.’ He had, he thought, even +played at ‘Huguenots’ once. What was the man’s name? Coligny; yes, of course, +Coligny. ‘And I suppose,’ Lawford continued, muttering to himself, ‘I suppose +this poor beggar was put here out of the way. They might, you know,’ he added +confidentially, raising the ferrule of his umbrella, ‘they might have stuck a +stake through you, and buried you at the crossroads.’ And again, a feeling of +ennui, a faint disgust at his poor little witticism, clouded over his mind. It +was a pity thoughts always ran the easiest way, like water in old ditches. +</p> + +<p> +‘“Here lie ye bones of one, Nicholas Sabathier,”’ he began murmuring +again—‘merely bones, mind you; brains and heart are quite another story. And +it’s pretty certain the fellow had some kind of brains. Besides, poor devil! he +killed himself. That seems to hint at brains... Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ he +cried out; so loud that the sound of his voice alarmed even a robin that had +perched on a twig almost within touch, with glittering eye intent above its dim +red breast on this other and even rarer stranger. +</p> + +<p> +‘I wonder if it is XXXIX.; it might be LXXIX.’ Lawford cast a cautious glance +over his round grey shoulder, then laboriously knelt down beside the stone, and +peeped into the gaping cranny. There he encountered merely the tiny, +pale-green, faintly conspicuous eyes of a large spider, confronting his own. It +was for the moment an alarming, and yet a faintly fascinating experience. The +little almost colourless fires remained so changeless. But still, even when at +last they had actually vanished into the recesses of that quiet habitation, +Lawford did not rise from his knees. An utterly unreasonable feeling of dismay, +a sudden weakness and weariness had come over him. +</p> + +<p> +‘What is the good of it all?’ he asked himself inconsequently—this monotonous, +restless, stupid life to which he was soon to be returning, and for good. He +began to realize how ludicrous a spectacle he must be, kneeling here amid the +weeds and grass beneath the solemn cypresses. ‘Well, you can’t have +everything,’ seemed loosely to express his disquiet. +</p> + +<p> +He stared vacantly at the green and fretted gravestone, dimly aware that his +heart was beating with an unusual effort. He felt ill and weak. He leant his +hand on the stone and lifted himself on to the low wooden seat nearby. He drew +off his glove and thrust his bare hand under his waistcoat, with his mouth a +little ajar, and his eyes fixed on the dark square turret, its bell sharply +defined against the evening sky. +</p> + +<p> +‘Dead!’ a bitter inward voice seemed to break into speech; ‘Dead!’ The viewless +air seemed to be flocking with hidden listeners. The very clearness and the +crystal silence were their ambush. He alone seemed to be the target of cold and +hostile scrutiny. There was not a breath to breathe in this crisp, pale +sunshine. It was all too rare, too thin. The shadows lay like wings +everlastingly folded. The robin that had been his only living witness lifted +its throat, and broke, as if from the uttermost outskirts of reality, into its +shrill, passionless song. Lawford moved heavy eyes from one object to +another—bird—sun-gilded stone—those two small earth-worn faces—his hands—a +stirring in the grass as of some creature labouring to climb up. It was useless +to sit here any longer. He must go back now. Fancies were all very well for a +change, but must be only occasional guests in a world devoted to reality. He +leaned his hand on the dark grey wood, and closed his eyes. The lids presently +unsealed a little, momentarily revealing astonished, aggrieved pupils, and +softly, slowly they again descended.... +</p> + +<p> +The flaming rose that had swiftly surged from the west into the zenith, dyeing +all the churchyard grass a wild and vivid green, and the stooping stones above +it a pure faint purple, waned softly back like a falling fountain into its +basin. In a few minutes, only a faint orange burned in the west, dimly +illuminating with its band of light the huddled figure on his low wood seat, +his right hand still pressed against a faintly beating heart. Dusk gathered; +the first white stars appeared; out of the shadowy fields a nightjar purred. +But there was only the silence of the falling dew among the graves. Down here, +under the ink-black cypresses, the blades of the grass were stooping with cold +drops; and darkness lay like the hem of an enormous cloak, whose jewels above +the breast of its wearer might be in the unfathomable clearness the glittering +constellations.... +</p> + +<p> +In his small cage of darkness Lawford shuddered and raised a furtive head. He +stood up and peered eagerly and strangely from side to side. He stayed quite +still, listening as raptly as some wandering night-beast to the indiscriminate +stir and echoings of the darkness. He cocked his head above his shoulder and +listened again, then turned upon the soundless grass towards the hill. He felt +not the faintest astonishment or strangeness in his solitude here; only a +little chilled, and physically uneasy; and yet in this vast darkness a faint +spiritual exaltation seemed to hover. +</p> + +<p> +He hastened up the narrow path, walking with knees a little bent, like an old +labourer who has lived a life of stooping, and came out into the dry and dusty +lane. One moment his instinct hesitated as to which turn to take—only a moment; +he was soon walking swiftly, almost trotting, downhill with this vivid +exaltation in the huge dark night in his heart, and Sheila merely a little +angry Titianesque cloud on a scarcely perceptible horizon. He had no notion of +the time; the golden hands of his watch were indiscernible in the gloom. But +presently, as he passed by, he pressed his face close to the cold glass of a +little shop-window, and pierced that out by an old Swiss cuckoo-clock. He would +if he hurried just be home before dinner. +</p> + +<p> +He broke into a slow, steady trot, gaining speed as he ran on, vaguely elated +to find how well his breath was serving him. An odd smile darkened his face at +remembrance of the thoughts he had been thinking. There could be little amiss +with the heart of a man who could shamble along like this, taking even +pleasure, an increasing pleasure in this long, wolf-like stride. He turned +round occasionally to look into the face of some fellow-wayfarer whom he had +overtaken, for he felt not only this unusual animation, this peculiar zest, but +that, like a boy on some secret errand, he had slightly disguised his very +presence, was going masked, as it were. Even his clothes seemed to have +connived at this queer illusion. No tailor had for these ten years allowed him +so much latitude. He cautiously at last opened his garden gate and with +soundless agility mounted the six stone steps, his latch-key ready in his +gloveless hand, and softly let himself into the house. +</p> + +<p> +Sheila was out, it seemed, for the maid had forgotten to light the lamp. +Without pausing to take off his greatcoat, he hung up his hat, ran nimbly +upstairs, and knocked with a light knuckle on his bedroom door. It was closed, +but no answer came. He opened it, shut it, locked it, and sat down on the +bedside for a moment, in the darkness, so that he could scarcely hear any other +sound, as he sat erect and still, like some night animal, wary of danger, +attentively alert. Then he rose from the bed, threw off his coat, which was +clammy with dew, and lit a candle on the dressing-table. +</p> + +<p> +Its narrow flame lengthened, drooped, brightened, gleamed clearly. He glanced +around him, unusually contented—at the ruddiness of the low fire, the brass +bedstead, the warm red curtains, the soft silveriness here and there. It seemed +as if a heavy and dull dream had withdrawn out of his mind. He would go again +some day, and sit on the little hard seat beside the crooked tombstone of the +friendless old Huguenot. He opened a drawer, took out his razors, and, faintly +whistling, returned to the table and lit a second candle. And still with this +strange heightened sense of life stirring in his mind, he drew his hand gently +over his chin and looked unto the glass. +</p> + +<p> +For an instant he stood head to foot icily still, without the least feeling, or +thought, or stir—staring into the looking-glass. Then an inconceivable drumming +beat on his ear. A warm surge, like the onset of a wave, broke in him, flooding +neck, face, forehead, even his hands with colour. He caught himself up and +wheeled deliberately and completely round, his eyes darting to and fro, +suddenly to fix themselves in a prolonged stare, while he took a deep breath, +caught back his self-possession and paused. Then he turned and once more +confronted the changed strange face in the glass. +</p> + +<p> +Without a sound he drew up a chair and sat down, just as he was, frigid and +appalled, at the foot of the bed. To sit like this, with a kind of incredibly +swift torrent of consciousness, bearing echoes and images like straws and +bubbles on its surface, could not be called thinking. Some stealthy hand had +thrust open the sluice of memory. And words, voices, faces of mockery streamed +through without connection, tendency, or sense. His hands hung between his +knees, a deep and settled frown darkened the features stooping out of the +direct rays of the light, and his eyes wandered like busy and inquisitive, but +stupid, animals over the floor. +</p> + +<p> +If, in that flood of unintelligible thoughts, anything clearly recurred at all, +it was the memory of Sheila. He saw her face, lit, transfigured, distorted, +stricken, appealing, horrified. His lids narrowed; a vague terror and horror +mastered him. He hid his eyes in his hands and cried without sound, without +tears, without hope, like a desolate child. He ceased crying; and sat without +stirring. And it seemed after an age of vacancy and meaninglessness he heard a +door shut downstairs, a distant voice, and then the rustle of some one slowly +ascending the stairs. Some one turned the handle; in vain; tapped. ‘Is that +you, Arthur?’ +</p> + +<p> +For an instant Lawford paused, then like a child listening for an echo, +answered, ‘Yes, Sheila.’ And a sigh broke from him; his voice, except for a +little huskiness, was singularly unchanged. +</p> + +<p> +‘May I come in?’ Lawford stood softly up and glanced once more into the glass. +His lips set tight, and a slight frown settled between the long, narrow, +intensely dark eyes. +</p> + +<p> +‘Just one moment, Sheila,’ he answered slowly, ‘just one moment.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘How long will you be?’ +</p> + +<p> +He stood erect and raised his voice, gazing the while impassively into the +glass. +</p> + +<p> +‘It’s no use,’ he began, as if repeating a lesson, ‘it’s no use your asking me, +Sheila. Please give me a moment, a...I am not quite myself, dear,’ he added +quite gravely. +</p> + +<p> +The faintest hint of vexation was in the answer. +</p> + +<p> +‘What is the matter? Can’t I help? It’s so very absurd—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What is absurd?’ he asked dully. +</p> + +<p> +‘Why, standing like this outside my own bedroom door. Are you ill? I will send +for Dr. Simon.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Please, Sheila, do nothing of the kind. I am not ill. I merely want a little +time to think in.’ There was again a brief pause, and then a slight rattling at +the handle. +</p> + +<p> +‘Arthur, I insist on knowing at once what’s wrong; this does not sound a bit +like yourself. It is not even quite like your own voice.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It is myself,’ he replied stubbornly, staring fixedly into the glass. You must +give me a few moments, Sheila. Something has happened. My face. Come back in an +hour.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Don’t be absurd; it’s simply wicked to talk like that. How do I know what you +are doing? As if I can leave you for an hour in uncertainty! Your face! If you +don’t open at once I shall believe there’s something seriously wrong: I shall +send Ada for assistance.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘If you do that, Sheila, it will be disastrous. I cannot answer for the con—. +Go quietly downstairs. Say I am unwell; don’t wait dinner for me; come back in +an hour; oh, half an hour!’ +</p> + +<p> +The answer broke out angrily. ‘You must be mad, beside yourself, to ask such a +thing. I shall wait in the next room until you call.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Wait where you please,’ Lawford replied, ‘but tell them downstairs.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Then if I tell them to wait until half-past eight, you will come down? You say +you are not ill: the dinner will be ruined. It’s absurd.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford made no answer. He listened a while, then he deliberately sat down once +more to try to think. Like a squirrel in a cage his mind seemed to be +aimlessly, unceasingly astir. ‘What is it really? What is it really?—really?’ +He sat there and it seemed to him his body was transparent as glass. It seemed +he had no body at all—only the memory of an hallucinatory reflection in the +glass, and this inward voice crying, arguing, questioning, threatening out of +the silence—‘What is it really—really—<i>really</i>?’ And at last, cold, +wearied out, he rose once more and leaned between the two long candle-flames, +and stared on—on—on, into the glass. +</p> + +<p> +He gave that long, dark face that had been foisted on him tricks to do—lift an +eyebrow, frown. There was scarcely any perceptible pause between the wish and +its performance. He found to his discomfiture that the face answered +instantaneously to the slightest emotion, even to his fainter secondary +thoughts; as if these unfamiliar features were not entirely within control. He +could not, in fact, without the glass before him, tell precisely what that face +<i>was</i> expressing. He was still, it seemed, keenly sane. That he would +discover for certain when Sheila returned. Terror, rage, horror had fallen +back. If only he felt ill, or was in pain: he would have rejoiced at it. He was +simply caught in some unheard-of snare—caught, how? when? where? by whom? +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap02"></a> +CHAPTER TWO</h2> + +<p> +But the coolness and deliberation of his scrutiny, had to a certain extent +calmed Lawford’s mind and given him confidence. Hitherto he had met the little +difficulties of life only to vanquish them with ease and applause. Now he was +standing face to face with the unknown. He burst out laughing, into a long, +low, helpless laughter. Then he arose and began to walk softly, swiftly, to and +fro across the room—from wall to wall seven paces, and at the fourth, that +awful, unseen, brightly-lit profile passed as swiftly over the tranquil surface +of the looking-glass. The power of concentration was gone again. He simply +paced on mechanically, listening to a Babel of questions, a conflicting medley +of answers. But above all the confusion and turmoil of his brain, as a +boatswain’s whistle rises above a storm, so sounded that same infinitesimal +voice, incessantly repeating another question now, ‘What are you going to do? +What are you going to do?’ +</p> + +<p> +And in the midst of this confusion, out of the infinite, as it were, came +another sharp tap at the door, and all within sank to utter stillness again. +</p> + +<p> +‘It’s nearly half-past eight, Arthur; I can’t wait any longer.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford cast a last fleeting look into the glass, turned, and confronted the +closed door. ‘Very well, Sheila, you shall <i>not</i> wait any longer.’ He +crossed over to the door, and suddenly a swift crafty idea flashed into his +mind. +</p> + +<p> +He tapped on the panel. ‘Sheila,’ he said softly, ‘I want you first, before you +come in, to get me something out of my old writing-desk in the smoking-room. +Here is the key.’ He pushed a tiny key—from off the ring he carried—beneath the +door. ‘In the third little drawer from the top, on the left side, is a letter; +please don’t say anything now. It is the letter you wrote me, you will +remember, after I had asked you to marry me. You scribbled in the corner under +your signature the initials “Y.S.O.A.”—do you remember? They meant, You Silly +Old Arthur!—do you remember? Will you please get that letter at once?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Arthur,’ answered the voice from without, empty of all expression, ‘what does +all this mean, this mystery, this hopeless nonsense about a silly letter? What +has happened? Is this a miserable form of persecution? Are you mad?—I refuse to +get the letter.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford stooped, black and angular, against the door. ‘I am not mad. Oh, I am +in the deadliest earnest, Sheila. You <i>must</i> get the letter, if only for +your own peace of mind.’ He heard his wife hesitate as she turned. He heard a +sob. And once more he waited. +</p> + +<p> +‘I have brought the letter,’ came the low toneless voice again. +</p> + +<p> +‘Have you opened it?’ +</p> + +<p> +There was a rustle of paper. ‘Are the letters there underlined three +times—“Y.S.O.A.”?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘The letters are there.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And the date of the month is underneath, “April 3rd.” No one else in the whole +world, living or dead, could know of this but ourselves, Sheila?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Will you please open the door?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No one?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I suppose not—no one.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Then come in.’ He unlocked the door and opened it. A dark, rather handsome +woman, with sleek hair, in a silk dress of a dark rich colour entered. Lawford +closed the door. But his face was in shadow. He had still a moment’s respite. +</p> + +<p> +‘I need not ask you to be patient,’ he began quickly; ‘if I could possibly have +spared you—if there had been anybody in the world to go to... I am in horrible, +horrible trouble, Sheila. It is inconceivable. I said I was sane: so I am, but +the fact is—I went out for a walk; it was rather stupid, perhaps, so soon: and +I think I was taken ill, or something—my heart. A kind of fit, a nervous fit. +Possibly I am a little unstrung, and it’s all, it’s mainly fancy: but I think, +I can’t help thinking it has a little distorted—changed my face; everything, +Sheila; except, of course, myself. Would you mind looking?’ He walked slowly +and with face averted towards the dressing-table. +</p> + +<p> +‘Simply a nervous—to make such a fuss, to scare!...’ began his wife, following +him. +</p> + +<p> +Without a word he took up the two old china candlesticks, and held them, one in +each lank-fingered hand, before his face, and turned. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford could see his wife—every tint and curve and line as distinctly as she +could see him. Her cheeks never had much colour; now her whole face visibly +darkened, from pallor to a dusky leaden grey, as she gazed. It was not an +illusion then; not a miserable hallucination. The unbelievable, the +inconceivable, had happened. He replaced the candles with trembling fingers and +sat down. +</p> + +<p> +‘Well,’ he said, ‘what is it really; what is it really, Sheila? What on earth +are we to do?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Is the door locked?’ she whispered. He nodded. With eyes fixed stirlessly on +his face, Sheila unsteadily seated herself, a little out of the candlelight, in +the shadow. Lawford rose and put the key of the door on his wife’s little +rose-wood prayer-desk at her elbow, and deliberately sat down again. +</p> + +<p> +‘You said “a fit”—where?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I suppose—is—is it very different—hopeless? You will understand my being... O +Sheila, what am I to do?’ His wife sat perfectly still, watching him with +unflinching attention. +</p> + +<p> +‘You gave me to understand—“a nervous fit”; where?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford took a deep breath, and quietly faced her again. ‘In the old +churchyard, Widderstone; I was looking at—at the gravestones.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘A fit; in the old churchyard, Widderstone—you were “looking at the +gravestones”?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford shut his mouth. ‘I suppose so—a fit,’ he said presently. ‘My heart went +a little queer, and I sat down and fell into a kind of doze—a stupor, I +suppose. I don’t remember anything more. And then I woke; like this.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘How do you know?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘How do I know what?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“Like that”?’ +</p> + +<p> +He turned slowly towards the looking-glass. ‘Why, here I am!’ +</p> + +<p> +She gazed at him steadily; and a hard, incredulous, almost cunning glint came +into her wide blue eyes. She took up the key carelessly, glanced at it; glanced +at him. ‘It has made me—I mean the first shock, you know—it has made me a +little faint.’ She walked slowly, deliberately to the door, and unlocked it. +‘I’ll get a little sal volatile.’ She softly drew out the key, and without once +removing her eyes from his face, opened the door and pushed the key noiselessly +in on the other side. ‘Please stay there; I won’t be a minute.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford’s face smiled—a rather desperate, yet for all that a patient, resolute +smile. ‘Oh yes, of course,’ he said, almost to himself, ‘I had not foreseen—at +least—you must do precisely what you please, Sheila. You were going to lock me +in. You will, however, before taking any final step, please think over what it +will entail. I did not think you would, after such proof, in this awful +trouble—I did not think you would simply disbelieve me, Sheila. Who else is +there to help me? You have the letter in your hand. Isn’t that sufficient +proof? It was overwhelming proof to me. And even I doubted too; doubted myself. +But never mind; why I should have dreamed you would believe me; or taken this +awful thing differently, I don’t know. It’s rather awful to have to go on +alone. But there, think it over. I shall not stir until I hear the voices. And +then: honestly, Sheila, I couldn’t face quite that. I’d sooner give up +altogether. Any proof you can think of—I will... O God, I cannot bear it!’ He +covered his face with his hands; but in a moment looked up, unmoved once more. +‘Why, for that matter,’ he added slowly, and, as it were, with infinite pains, +a faint thin smile again stealing into his face, ‘I think,’ he turned wearily +to the glass, ‘I think, it’s almost an improvement!’ +</p> + +<p> +Something deep in those dark clear pupils, out of that lean adventurous face, +gleamed back at him, the distant flash of a heliograph, as it were, height to +height, flashing ‘Courage!’ He shuddered, and shut his eyes. ‘But I would +really rather,’ he added in a quiet childlike way, ‘I would really rather, +Sheila, you left me alone now.’ +</p> + +<p> +His wife stood irresolute. ‘I understand you to explain,’ she said, ‘that you +went out of this house, just your usual self, this afternoon, for a walk; that +for some reason you went to Widderstone—“to read the tombstones,” that you had +a heart attack, or, as you said at first, a fit, that you fell into a stupor, +and came home like—like this. Am I likely to believe all that? Am I likely to +believe such a story as that? Whoever you are, whoever you may be, is it +likely? I am not in the least afraid. I thought at first it was some silly +practical joke. I thought that at first.’ She paused, but no answer came. +‘Well, I suppose in a civilised country there is a remedy even for a joke as +wicked as that.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford listened patiently. ‘She is pretending; she is trying me; she is +feeling her way,’ he kept repeating to himself. ‘She knows I <i>am</i> I, but +hasn’t the courage... Let her talk!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I shall leave the door open,’ Sheila continued. ‘I am not, as you no doubt +very naturally assumed—I am not going to do anything either senseless or +heedless. I am merely going to ask your brother Cecil to come in, if he is at +home, and if not, no doubt our old friend Mr. Montgomery would—would help us.’ +Her scrutiny was still and concentrated, like that of a cat above a mouse’s +hole. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford sat crouched together in the candle-light. ‘By all means, Sheila,’ he +said slowly choosing his words, ‘if you think poor old Cecil, who next January +will have been three years in his grave, will be of any use in our difficulty. +Who Mr. Montgomery is...’ His voice dropped in utter weariness. ‘You did it +very well, my dear,’ he added softly. +</p> + +<p> +Sheila gently closed the door and sat down on the bed. He heard her softly +crying, he heard the bed shaken with her sobs. But a slow glance towards the +steady candle-flames restrained him. He let her cry on alone. When she had +become a little more composed he stood up. ‘You have had no dinner,’ he managed +to blurt out at last, ‘you will be faint. It’s useless to talk, even to think, +any more to-night. Leave me to myself for a while. Don’t look at me any more. +Perhaps I can sleep: perhaps if I sleep it will come right again. When the +servants are gone up, I will come down. Just let me have some—some medical +book, or other; and some more candles. Don’t think, Sheila; don’t even think!’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila paid him no attention for a while. ‘You tell me not to think,’ she +began, in a low, almost listless voice; ‘why—I wonder I am in my right mind. +And “eat”! How can you have the heartlessness to suggest it? You don’t seem in +the least to <i>realize</i> what you say. You seem to have lost all—all +consciousness. I quite agree, it is useless for me to burden you with my +company while you are in your present condition of mind. But you will at least +promise me that you won’t take any further steps in this awful business.’ She +could not, try as she would, bring herself again to look at him. She rose +softly, paused a moment with sidelong eyes, then turned deliberately towards +the door, ‘What, what have I done to deserve all this?’ +</p> + +<p> +From behind her that voice, so extraordinarily like—and yet in some vague +fashion more arresting, more resonant than her husband’s, broke incredibly out +once more. ‘You will please leave the key, Sheila. I am ill, but I am not yet +in the padded room. And please understand, I take no further steps in “this +awful business” until I hear a strange voice in the house.’ Sheila paused, but +the quiet voice rang in her ear, desperately yet convincingly. She took the key +out of the lock, placed it on the bed, and with a sigh, that was not quite +without a hint of relief in its misery, she furtively extinguished the +gas-light on the landing and rustled downstairs. +</p> + +<p> +She speedily returned. ‘I have brought the book.’ she said hastily. ‘I could +only find the one volume. I have said you have taken a fresh chill. No one will +disturb you.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford took the book without a word. And once more, with eyes stonily averted, +his wife left him to his own company and that of the face in the glass. +</p> + +<p> +When completely deserted, Lawford with fumbling fingers opened Quain’s +‘Dictionary of Medicine.’ He had never had much curiosity, and had always hated +what he disbelieved, but none the less he had heard occasionally of absurd and +questionable experiments. He remembered even to have glanced over reports of +cases in the newspapers concerning disappearances, loss of memory, dual +personality. Cranks... Oh yes, he thought now, with a sense of cold humiliating +relief, there <i>had</i> been such cases as his before. They were no doubt +curable. They must be comparatively common in America—that land of jangled +nerves. Possibly bromide, rest, a battery. But Quain, it seemed, shared his +prejudices, at least in this edition, or had hidden away all such apocryphal +matter beneath technical terms, where no sensible man could find it, ‘Besides,’ +he muttered angrily, ‘what’s the good of your one volume?’ He flung it down and +strode to the bed, and rang the bell. Then suddenly recollecting himself, he +paused and listened. There came a tap on the door. ‘Is that you, Sheila?’ he +called, doubtfully. +</p> + +<p> +‘No, sir, it’s me,’ came the answer. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, don’t trouble; I only wanted to speak to your mistress. It’s all right.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Mrs. Lawford has gone out, sir,’ replied the voice. +</p> + +<p> +‘Gone out?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, sir; she told me not to mention it; but I suppose as you asked—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, that’s all right; never mind; I didn’t ring.’ He stood with face uplifted, +thinking. +</p> + +<p> +‘Can I do anything, sir?’ came the faint, nervous question after a long pause. +</p> + +<p> +‘One moment, Ada,’ he called in a loud voice. He took out his pocket-book, sat +down, and scribbled a little note. He hardly noticed how changed his +handwriting was—the clear round letters crabbed and irregular. +</p> + +<p> +‘Are you there, Ada?’ he called. ‘I am slipping a note beneath the door; just +draw back the mat; that’s it. Take it at once, please, to Mr. Critchett’s, and +be sure to wait for an answer. Then come back direct to me, up here. I don’t +think, Ada, your mistress believes much in Critchett; but I have fully +explained what I want. He has made me up many prescriptions. Explain that to +his assistant if he is not there. Go at once, and you will be back before she +is. I should be so very much obliged, tell him. “Mr Arthur Lawford.”’ +</p> + +<p> +The minutes slowly drifted by. He sat quite still in the clear untroubled +light, waiting in the silence of the empty house. And for the first time he was +confronted with the cold incredible horror of his ordeal. Who would believe, +who could believe, that behind this strange and awful, yet how simple mask, lay +himself? What test; what heaped-up evidence of identity would break it down? It +was all a loathsome ignominy. It was utterly absurd. It was— +</p> + +<p> +Suddenly, with a kind of ape-like cunning, he deliberately raised a long lean +forefinger and pointed it at the shadowy crystal of the looking-glass. Perhaps +he was dead, was really and indeed changed in body, was fated really and indeed +to change in soul, into That. ‘It’s that beastly voice again,’ Lawford cried +out loud, looking vacantly at his upstretched finger. And then, hand and arm, +not too willingly, as it were, obeyed; relaxed and fell to his side. ‘You must +keep a tight hold, old man,’ he muttered to himself. ‘Once, once you lose +yourself—the least symptom of that—the least symptom, and it’s all up!’ And the +fools, the heartless, preposterous fools had brought him one volume! +</p> + +<p> +When on earth was Ada coming back? She was lagging on purpose. She was in the +conspiracy too. Oh, it should be a lesson to Sheila! Oh, if only daylight would +come! ‘What are you going to do—to do—to DO?’ He rose once more and paced his +silent cage. To and fro, thinking no more; just using his eyes, compelling them +to wander from picture to picture, bedpost to bedpost; now counting aloud his +footsteps; now humming; only, only to keep himself from thinking. At last he +took out a drawer and actually began arranging its medley of contents; ties, +letters, studs, concert and theatre programmes—all higgledy-piggledy. And in +the midst of this childish strategem he heard a faint sound, as of heavy water +trickling from a height. He turned. A thief was in one of the candles. It was +guttering out. He would be left in darkness. He turned hastily without a +moment’s heed, to call for light, flung the door open and full in the flare of +a lamp, illuminating her pale forehead and astonished face beneath her black +straw hat, stood face to face with Ada. +</p> + +<p> +With one swift dexterous movement he drew the door to after him, looking +straight into her almost colourless steady eyes. ‘Ah,’ he said instantly, in a +high faint voice, ‘the powder, thank you; yes, Mr Lawford’s powder; thank you, +thank you. He must be kept absolutely quiet—absolutely. Mrs Lawford is +following. Please tell her that I am here, when she returns. Mr Critchett was +in, then? Thank you. Extreme, extreme silence, please.’ Again that knotted, +melodramatic finger raised itself on high; and within that lean, cadaverous +body the soul of its lodger quailed at this spectral boldness. But it was +triumphant. The maid at once left him and went downstairs. He heard faint +voices in muffled consultation. And in a moment Sheila’s silks rustled once +more on the staircase. Lawford put down the lamp, and watched her deliberately +close the door. +</p> + +<p> +‘What does this mean?’ she began swiftly, ‘I understand that—Ada tells me a +stranger is here; giving orders, directions. Who is he? where is he? You bound +yourself on your solemn promise not to stir till I returned. You... How can I, +how can we get decently through this horrible business if you are so wretchedly +indiscreet? You sent Ada to the chemist’s. What for? What for? I say.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford watched his wife with an almost extraneous interest. She was certainly +extremely interesting from that point of view, that very novel point of view. +‘It’s quite useless,’ he said, ‘to get in the least nervous or hysterical. I +don’t care for the darkness just now. That was all. Tell the girl I am a +strange doctor—Dr Simon’s new partner. You are clever at conventionalities, +Sheila. Invent! I said our patient must be kept quiet—I really think he must. +That is all, so far as Ada is concerned.... What on earth else <i>are</i> we to +say?’ he broke out. ‘That, for the present to <i>everybody</i>, is our only +possible story. It will give us what we must have—time. And next—where is the +second volume of Quain? I want that. And next—why have you broken faith with +me?’ Mrs Lawford sat down. This sudden and baffling outburst had stupefied her. +</p> + +<p> +‘I can’t, I can’t make head or tail of what you say. And as for having broken +faith, as you call it, would any wife, would any sane woman face what you have +brought on us, a situation like this, without seeking advice and help? Mr +Bethany will be perfectly discreet—if he thinks discretion desirable. He is the +only available friend we have close enough to ask at once. And things of this +kind are, I suppose, if anybody’s concern, his. It’s certain to leak out. +Everybody will hear of it. Don’t flatter yourself you are going to hush up a +thing like this for long. You can’t keep <i>living</i> skeletons in a cupboard. +You think only of yourself, only of your own misfortune. But who’s to know, +pray, that you really are my husband—if you are? The sooner I get the vicar on +my side the better for us both. Who in the whole of the parish—I ask you—and +you must have the sense left to see that—who will believe that a respectable +man, a gentleman, a Churchman, would deliberately go out to seek an afternoon’s +amusement in a poky little country churchyard? Why, apart from everything else, +<i>that</i> was absolutely mad to start with. Can you really wonder at the +result?’ +</p> + +<p> +Probably because she still steadfastly refused to look at him, her memory kept +losing its hold on the appalling fact facing them. She realised fully only that +she was in a great, unwarrantable, and insurmountable difficulty, but until she +actually lifted her eyes for a moment she had not fully realised what that +difficulty was. She got up with a sudden and horrible nausea. ‘One moment,’ she +said, ‘I will see if the servants have gone to bed.’ +</p> + +<p> +That long saturnine face, behind which Lawford lay in a dull and desperate +ambush, smiled. Something partaking of its clay, some reflex ghost of its +rather remarkable features, was even a little amused at Sheila. +</p> + +<p> +She returned in a moment, and stood in profile in the doorway. ‘Will you come +down?’ she remarked distantly. +</p> + +<p> +‘One moment, Sheila,’ Lawford began miserably. ‘Before we take this irrevocable +step, a step I implore you to postpone awhile—for what comes, I suppose, may +go—what precisely have you told the vicar? I must in fairness know that.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘In fairness,’ she began ironically, and suddenly broke off. Her husband had +turned the flame of the lamp low down in the vacant room behind them; the +corridor was lit obscurely by the chandelier far down in the hall below. A +faint, inexplicable dread fell softly and coldly on her heart. ‘Have you no +trust in me?’ she murmured a little bitterly. ‘I have simply told him the +truth.’ +</p> + +<p> +They softly descended the stairs; she first, the dark figure following close +behind her. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap03"></a> +CHAPTER THREE</h2> + +<p> +Mr Bethany sat awaiting them in the dining-room, a large, heavily-furnished +room with a great benign looking-glass on the mantelpiece, a marble clock, and +with rich old damask curtains. Fleecy silver hair was all that was visible of +their visitor when they entered. But Mr Bethany rose out of his chair when he +heard them, and with a little jerk, turned sharply round. Thus it was that the +gold-spectacled vicar and Lawford first confronted each other, the one brightly +illuminated, the other framed in the gloom of the doorway. Mr Bethany’s first +scrutiny was timid and courteous, but beneath it he tried to be keen, and +himself hastened round the table almost at a trot, to obtain, as delicately as +possible, a closer view. But Lawford, having shut the door behind him, had gone +straight to the fire and seated himself, leaning his face in his hands. Mr +Bethany smiled faintly, waved his hand almost as if in blessing, but certainly +in peace, and tapped Mrs Lawford into the chair upon the other side. But he +himself remained standing. +</p> + +<p> +‘Mrs Lawford has, I declare, been telling family secrets,’ he began, and +paused, peering. ‘But there, you will forgive an old friend’s intrusion—this +little confidence about a change, my dear fellow—about a ramble and a change?’ +He sat down, put up his kind little puckered face and peered again at Lawford, +and then very hastily at his wife. But all her attention was centred on the +bowed figure opposite to her. Lawford responded to this cautious advance +without raising his head. +</p> + +<p> +‘You do not wish me to repeat all that my wife tells me she has told you?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Dear me, no,’ said Mr Bethany cheerfully, ‘I wish nothing, nothing, old +friend. You must not burden yourself with me. If I may be of any help, here I +am.... Oh, no, no....’ he paused, with blinking eyes, but wits still shrewd and +alert. Why doesn’t the man raise his head? he thought. A mere domestic dispute! +</p> + +<p> +‘I thought,’ he went on ruminatingly, ‘I thought on Tuesday, yes, on Tuesday, +that you weren’t looking quite the thing. Indeed, I remarked on it. But now, I +understand from Mrs Lawford that the malady has taken a graver turn—eh, +Lawford, an heretical turn? I hear you have been wandering from the true fold.’ +Mr Bethany leaned forward with what might be described as a very large smile in +a very small compass. ‘And that, of course, entailed instant retribution.’ He +broke off solemnly. ‘I know Widderstone churchyard well; a most verdant and +beautiful spot. The late rector, a Mr Strickland, was a very old friend of +mine. And his wife, dear good Alicia, used to set out her babies, in the +morning, to sleep and to play there, twenty, dear me, perhaps twenty-five years +ago. But I did not know, my dear Lawford, that you—’ and suddenly, without an +instant’s warning, something seemed to shout at him, ‘Look, look! He is looking +at you!’ He stopped, faltered, and a slight warmth came into his face. ‘And and +you were taken ill there?’ His voice had fallen flat and faint. +</p> + +<p> +‘I fell asleep—or something of that sort,’ came the stubborn reply. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ said Mr Bethany, brightly, ‘so your wife was saying. “Fell asleep,” so +have I too—scores of times’; he beamed, with beads of sweat glistening on his +forehead. ‘And then? I’m not, I’m not persisting?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Then I woke; refreshed, I think, as it seemed—I felt much better and came +home.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, yes,’ said his visitor. And after that there was a long, brightly lit, +intense pause; at the end of which Lawford raised his face and again looked +firmly at his friend. +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany was now a shrunken old man; he sat perfectly still, his head craned +a little forward, and his veined hands clutching his bent, spare knees. +</p> + +<p> +There wasn’t the least sign of devilry, or out-facingness, or insolence in that +lean shadowy steady head; and yet he himself was compelled to sidle his glance +away, so much the face shook him. He closed his eyes, too, as a cat does after +exchanging too direct a scrutiny with human eyes. He put out towards, and +withdrew, a groping hand from Mrs Lawford. +</p> + +<p> +‘Is it,’ came a voice from somewhere, ‘is it a great change, sir? I thought +perhaps I may have exaggerated—candle-light, you know.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany remained still and silent, striving to entertain one thought at a +time. His lips moved as if he were talking to himself. And again it was +Lawford’s faltering voice that broke the silence. ‘You see,’ he said, ‘I have +never... no fit, or anything of that kind before. I remember on Tuesday... oh +yes, quite well. I did feel seedy, very. And we talked, didn’t we?—Harvest +Festival, Mrs Wine’s flowers, the new offertory-bags, and all that. For God’s +sake, Vicar, it is not as bad as—as they make out?’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany woke with a start. He leaned forward, and stretched out a long black +wrinkled sleeve, just managing to reach far enough to tap Lawford’s knee. +‘Don’t worry, don’t worry,’ he said soothingly. ‘We believe, we believe.’ +</p> + +<p> +It was, none the less, a sheer act of faith. He took off his spectacles and +took out his handkerchief. ‘What we must do, eh, my dear,’ he half turned to +Mrs Lawford, ‘what we must do is to consult, yes, consult together. And +later—we must have advice—medical advice; unless, as I very much suspect, it is +merely a little quite temporary physical aberration. Science, I am told, is +making great strides, experimenting, groping after things which no sane man has +ever dreamed of before—without being burned alive for it. What’s in a name? +Nerves, especially, Lawford.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford sat perfectly still, absorbedly listening, turning her face first +this way, then that, to each speaker in turn. ‘That is what I thought,’ she +said, and cast one fleeting glance across at the fireplace, ‘but—’ +</p> + +<p> +The little old gentleman turned sharply with half-blind eyes, and lips tight +shut. ‘I think,’ he said, with a hind of austere humour, ‘I think, do you know, +I see no “but.”’ He paused as if to catch the echo and added, ‘It’s our only +course.’ He continued to polish round and round his glasses. Mrs Lawford rather +magnificently rose. +</p> + +<p> +‘Perhaps if I were to leave you together awhile? I shall not be far off. It +is,’ she explained, as if into a huge vacuum, ‘it is a terrible visitation.’ +She moved gravely round the table and very softly and firmly closed the door +after her. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford took a deep breath. ‘Of course,’ he said, ‘you realise my wife does not +believe me. She thinks,’ he explained naively, as if to himself, ‘she thinks I +am an imposter. Goodness knows what she does think. I can’t think much +myself—for long!’ +</p> + +<p> +The vicar rubbed busily on. ‘I have found, Lawford,’ he said smoothly, ‘that in +all real difficulties the only feasible plan is—is to face the main issue. The +others right themselves. Now, to take a plunge into your generosity. You have +let me in far enough to make it impossible for me to get out—may I hear then +exactly the whole story? All that I know now, so far as I could gather from +your wife, poor soul, is of course inconceivable: that you went out one man and +came home another. You will understand, my dear man, I am speaking, as it were, +by rote. God has mercifully ordered that the human brain works slowly; first +the blow, hours afterwards the bruise. Oh, dear me, that man Hume—“on +miracles”—positively amazing! So that too, please, you will be quite clear +about. <i lang="la">Credo</i>—not <i lang="la">quia impossible est</i>, but +because you, Lawford, have told me. Now then, if it won’t be too wearisome to +you, the whole story.’ He sat, lean and erect in his big chair, a hand resting +loosely on each knee, in one spectacles, in the other a dangling pocket +handkerchief. And the dark, sallow, aquiline, formidable figure, with its oddly +changing voice, re-told the whole story from the beginning. +</p> + +<p> +‘You were aware then of nothing different, I understand, until you actually +looked into the glass?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Only vaguely. I mean that after waking I felt much better, more alert. And my +thoughts—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, yes, your thoughts?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I hardly know—oh, clear as if I had had a real long rest. It was just like +being a boy again. Influenza dispirits one so.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany gazed without stirring. ‘And yet, you know,’ he said, ‘I can hardly +believe, I mean conceive, how—You have been taking no drugs, no quackery, +Lawford?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I never dose myself,’ said Lawford, with sombre pride. +</p> + +<p> +‘God bless me, that’s Lawford to the echo,’ thought his visitor. ‘And before—?’ +he went on gently; ‘I really cannot conceive, you see, how a mere fit could... +Before you sat down you were quite alone?’ He stuck out his head. ‘There was +nobody with you?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘With me? Oh no,’ came the soft answer. +</p> + +<p> +‘What had you been thinking of? In these days of faith-cures, and hypnotism, +and telepathy, and subliminalities—why, the simple old world grows very +confusing. But rarely, very rarely novel. You were thinking, you say; do you +remember, perhaps, just the drift?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well,’ began Lawford ruminatingly, ‘there was something curious even then, +perhaps. I remember, for instance, I knelt down to read an old tombstone. There +was a little seat—no back. And an epitaph. The sun was just setting; some +French name. And there was a long jagged crack in the stone, like the black +line you know one sees after lightning, I mean it’s as clear as that even now, +in memory. Oh yes, I remember. And then, I suppose, came the sleep—stupid, +sluggish: and then; well, here I am.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You are absolutely certain, then,’ persisted Mr Bethany almost querulously, +‘there was no living creature near you? Bless me, Lawford, I see no unkindness +in believing what the Bible itself relates. There <i>are</i> powers +supernatural. Saul, and so on. We are all convinced of that. No one?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I remember distinctly,’ replied Lawford, in a calm, stubborn voice, ‘I looked +up all around me, while I was kneeling there, and there wasn’t a soul to be +seen. Because, you see, it even then occurred to me that it would have looked +rather queer—my wandering about like that, I mean. Facing me there were some +cypress-trees, and beyond, a low sunken fence, and then, just open country. Up +above there were the gravestones toppling down the hill, where I had just +strolled down, and sunshine!’ He suddenly threw up his hand. ‘Oh, marvellous! +streaming in gold—flaming, like God’s own ante-chamber.’ +</p> + +<p> +There was a very pregnant pause. Mr Bethany shrunk back a little into his +chair. His lips moved; he folded his spectacles. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, yes,’ he said. And then very quietly he stole one mole-like look into his +sidesman’s face. +</p> + +<p> +‘What is Dr Simon’s number?’ he said. Lawford was gazing gloomily into the +fire. ‘Oh, Annandale,’ he replied absently. ‘I don’t know the number.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Do you believe in him? Your wife mentioned him. Is he clever?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, he’s new,’ said Lawford; ‘old James was our doctor. He—he killed my +father.’ He laughed out shamefacedly. +</p> + +<p> +‘A sound, lovable man,’ said Mr Bethany, ‘one of the kindest men I ever knew; +and a very old friend of mine.’ +</p> + +<p> +And suddenly the dark face turned with a shudder from the fire, and spoke in a +low trembling voice. ‘Only one thing—only one thing—my sanity, my sanity. If +once I forget, who will believe me?’ He thrust his long lean fingers beneath +his coat. ‘And mad,’ he added; ‘I would sooner die.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany deliberately adjusted his spectacles. ‘May I, may I experiment?’ he +said boldly. There came a tap on the door. +</p> + +<p> +‘Bless me,’ said the vicar, taking out his watch, ‘it is a quarter to twelve. +‘Yes, yes, Mrs Lawford,’ he trotted round to the door. ‘We are beginning to see +light—a ray!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But I—<i>I</i> can see in the dark,’ whispered Lawford, as if at a cue, +turning with an inscrutable smile to the fire. +</p> + +<p> +The vicar came again, wrapped up in a little tight grey great-coat, and a white +silk muffler. He looked up unflinching into Lawford’s face, and tears stood in +his eyes. ‘Patience, patience, my dear fellow,’ he repeated gravely, squeezing +his hand. ‘And rest, complete rest, is imperative. Just till the first thing +to-morrow. And till then,’ he turned to Mrs Lawford, where she stood looking in +at the doorway, ‘oh yes, complete quiet; and caution!’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford let him out. He shook his head once or twice, holding her fingers. +‘Oh yes,’ he whispered, ‘it is your husband, not the smallest doubt. I tried: +for <i>myself</i>. But something—something has happened. Don’t fret him now. +Have patience. Oh yes, it is incredible... the change! But there, the very +first thing to-morrow.’ She closed the door gently after him, and stepping +softly back to the dining-room, peered in. Her husband’s back was turned, but +he could see her in the looking-glass, stooping a little, with set face +watching him, in the silvery stillness. +</p> + +<p> +‘Well,’ he said, ‘is the old—’ he doggedly met the fixed eyes facing him there, +‘is our old friend gone?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ said Sheila, ‘he’s gone.’ Lawford sighed and turned round. ‘It’s useless +talking now, Sheila. No more questions. I cannot tell you how tired I am. And +my head—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What is wrong with your head?’ inquired his wife discreetly. +</p> + +<p> +The haggard face turned gravely and patiently. ‘Only one of my old headaches,’ +he smiled, ‘my old bilious headaches—the hereditary Lawford variety.’ But his +voice fell low again. ‘We must get to bed.’ +</p> + +<p> +With a rather pretty and childish movement, Sheila gently drew her hands across +her silk skirts. ‘Yes, dear,’ she said, ‘I have made up a bed for you in the +large spare room. It is thoroughly aired.’ She came softly in, hastened over to +a closed work-table that stood under the curtains, and opened it. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford watched her, utterly expressionless, utterly motionless. He opened his +mouth and shut it again, still watching his wife as she stooped with +ridiculously too busy fingers, searching through her coloured silks. +</p> + +<p> +Again he opened his mouth. ‘Yes,’ he said, and stalked slowly towards the door. +But there he paused. ‘God knows,’ he said, strangely and meekly, ‘I am sorry, +sorry for all this. You will forgive me, Sheila?’ +</p> + +<p> +She looked up swiftly. ‘It’s very tiresome, I can’t find anywhere,’ she +murmured, ‘I can’t find anywhere the—the little red box key.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford’s cheek turned more sallow than ever. ‘You are only pretending to look +for it,’ he said, ‘to try me. We both know perfectly well the lock is broken. +Ada broke it.’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila let fall the lid; and yet for a while her eyes roved over it as if in +violent search for something. Then she turned: ‘I am so very glad the vicar was +at home,’ she said brightly. ‘And mind, mind you rest, Arthur. There’s nothing +so bad but it might be worse.... Oh, I can’t, I can’t bear it!’ She sat down in +the chair and huddled her face between her hands, sobbing on and on, without a +tear. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford listened and stared solemnly. ‘Whatever it may be, Sheila, I will be +loyal,’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +Her sobs hushed, and again cold horror crept over her. Nobody in the whole +world could have said that ‘I will be loyal’ quite like that—nobody but Arthur. +She stood up, patting her hair. ‘I don’t think my brain would bear much more. +It’s useless to talk. If you will go up; I will put out the lamp.’ +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap04"></a> +CHAPTER FOUR</h2> + +<p> +One solitary and tall candle burned on the great dressing-table. Faint, +solitary pictures broke the blankness of each wall. The carpet was rich, the +bed impressive, and the basins on the washstand as uninviting as the bed. +Lawford sat down on the edge of it in complete isolation. He sat without +stirring, listening to his watch ticking in his pocket. The china clock on the +chimney piece pointed cheerfully to the hour of dawn. It was exactly, he +computed carefully, five hours and seven minutes fast. Not the slightest sound +broke the stillness, until he heard, very, very softly and gradually, the key +of his door turn in the oiled wards, and realized that he was a prisoner. +</p> + +<p> +Women were strange creatures. How often he had heard that said, he thought +lamely. He felt no anger, no surprise or resentment, at the trick. It was only +to be expected. He could sit on till morning; easily till morning. He had never +noticed before how empty a well-furnished room could seem. It was his own room +too; his best visitors’ room. His father-in-law had slept here, with his +whiskers on that pillow. His wife’s most formidable aunt had been all night +here, alone with these pictures. She certainly was... ‘But what are <i>you</i> +doing here?’ cried a voice suddenly out of his reverie. +</p> + +<p> +He started up and stretched himself, and taking out the neat little packet that +the maid had brought from the chemist’s, he drew up a chair, and sat down once +more in front of the glass. He sighed vacantly, rose and lifted down from the +wall above the fireplace a tinted photograph of himself that Sheila had had +enlarged about twelve years ago. It was a brighter, younger, hairier, but +unmistakably the same dull indolent Lawford who had ventured into Widderstone +churchyard that afternoon. The cheek was a little plumper, the eyes not quite +so full-lidded, the hair a little more precisely parted, the upper lip graced +with a small blonde moustache. He tilted the portrait into the candlelight, and +compared it with this reflection in the glass of what had come out of +Widderstone, feature with feature, with perfect composure and extreme care. +Then he laid down the massive frame on the table, and gazed quietly at the tiny +packet. +</p> + +<p> +It was to be a day of queer experiences. He had never before realized with how +many miracles mere everyday life is besieged. Here in this small punctilious +packet lay a Sesame—a power of transformation beside which the transformation +of that rather flaccid face of the noonday into this tense, sinister face of +midnight was but as a moving from house to house—a change just as irrevocable +and complete, and yet so very normal. Which should it be, that, or—his face +lifted itself once more to the ice-like gloom of the looking-glass—that, or +this? +</p> + +<p> +It simply gazed back with a kind of quizzical pity on its lean features under +the scrutiny of eyes so deep, so meaningful, so desolate, and yet so +indomitably courageous. In the brain behind them a slow and stolid argument was +in progress; the one baffling reply on the one side to every appeal on the +other being still simply. ‘What dreams may come?’ +</p> + +<p> +Those eyes surely knew something of dreams, else, why this violent and stubborn +endeavour to keep awake. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford did indeed once actually frame the question, ‘But who the devil are +you?’ And it really seemed the eyes perceptibly widened or brightened. The mere +vexation of his unparalleled position. Sheila’s pathetic incredulity, his old +vicar’s laborious kindness, the tiresome network of experience into which he +would be dragged struggling on the morrow, and on the morrow after that, and +after that—the thought of all these things faded for the moment from his mind, +lost if not their significance, at least their instancy. +</p> + +<p> +He simply sat face to face with the sheer difficulty of living on at all. He +even concluded in a kind of lethargy that if nothing had occurred, no ‘change,’ +he might still be sitting here, Arthur Rennet Lawford, in his best visitor’s +room, deciding between inscrutable life and just—death. He supposed he was +tired out. His thoughts hadn’t even the energy to complete themselves. None +cared but himself and this—this Silence. +</p> + +<p> +‘But what does it all mean?’ the insistent voice he was getting to know so well +began tediously inquiring again. And every time he raised his eyes, or, rather, +as in many cases it seemed, his eyes raised themselves, they saw this haunting +face there—a face he no longer bitterly rebelled at, nor dimmed with scrutiny, +but a face that was becoming a kind of hold on life, even a kind of refuge, an +ally. It was a face that might have come out of a rather flashy book; or such +as is revered on the stage. ‘A rotten bad face,’ he whispered at it in his own +familiar slang, after some such abrupt encounter; a fearless, packed, daring, +fascinating face, with even—what?—a spice of genius in it. Whose the devil’s +face was it? What on earth was the matter?... ‘Brazen it out,’ a jubilant +thought cried suddenly; ‘follow it up; play the game! give me just one opening. +Think—think what I’ve risked!’ +</p> + +<p> +And all these voices thought Lawford, in deadly lassitude, meant only one +thing—insanity. A blazing, impotent indignation seized him. He leaned near, +peering as it were out of a red dusky mist. He snatched up the china +candlestick, and poised it above the sardonic reflection, as if to throw. Then +slowly, with infinite pains, he drew back from the glass and replaced the +candlestick on the table; stuffed his paper packet into his pocket, took off +his boots and threw himself on to the bed. In a little while, in the faint, +still light, he opened drowsily wondering eyes. ‘Poor old thing!’ his voice +murmured, ‘Poor old Sheila!’ +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap05"></a> +CHAPTER FIVE</h2> + +<p> +It was but little after daybreak when Mrs Lawford, after listening at his door +a while, turned the key and looked in on her husband. Blue-grey light from +between the venetian blinds just dusked the room. She stood in a bluish +dressing-gown, her hand on her bosom, looking down on the lean impassive face. +For the briefest instant her heart had leapt with an indescribable surmise; to +fall dull as lead once more. Breathing equably and quietly, the strange figure +lay stretched upon the bed. ‘How can he sleep? How can he sleep?’ she whispered +with a black and hopeless indignation. What a night she had had! And he! +</p> + +<p> +She turned noiselessly away. The candle had guttered to extinction. The big +glass reflected her, voluminous and wan, her dark-ringed eyes, full lips, rich, +glossy hair, and rounded chin. ‘Yes, yes,’ it seemed to murmur mournfully. She +turned away, and drawing stealthily near stooped once more quite low, and +examined the face on the pillow with lynx-like concentration. And though every +nerve revolted at the thought, she was finally convinced, unwillingly, but +assuredly, that her husband was here. Indeed, if it were not so, how could she +for a single moment have accepted the possibility that he was a stranger? He +seemed to haunt, like a ghostly emanation, this strange, detestable face—as +memory supplies the features concealed beneath a mask. The face was still and +stony, like one dead or imaged in wax, yet beneath it dreams were +passing—silly, ordinary Lawford dreams. She was almost alarmed at the terribly +rancorous hatred she felt for the face... ‘It was just like Arthur to be so +taken in!’ +</p> + +<p> +Then she too remembered Quain, and remembered also in the slowly paling dusk +that the house would soon be stirring. She went out and noiselessly locked the +door again. But it was useless to begin looking for Quain now—her husband had a +good many dull books, most of them his ‘eccentric’ father’s. What must the +servants be thinking? and what was all that talk about a mysterious visitor? +She would have to question Ada—diplomatically. She returned to her room and sat +down in an arm-chair, and waited. In sheer weariness she fell into a doze, and +woke at the sound of dustpan and broom. She rang the bell, and asked for hot +water, tea, and a basin of cornflour. +</p> + +<p> +‘And please, Ada, be as quiet as possible over your work; your master is in a +nice sleep, and must not be disturbed on any account. In the front bedroom.’ +She looked up suddenly. ‘By the way, who let Dr Ferguson in last night?’ It was +dangerous, but successful. +</p> + +<p> +‘Dr Ferguson, ma’am? Oh, you mean... He <i>was</i> in.’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila smiled resignedly. ‘Was in? What do you mean, “was in”? And where were +you, then?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I had been sent out to Critchett’s, the chemist’s.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Of course, of course. So cook let Dr Ferguson in, then? Why didn’t you say so +before, Ada? And did you bring the medicine with you?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It was a packet in an envelope, ma’am. But Cook is sure she heard no knock—not +while I was out. So Dr Ferguson must have come in quite unbeknown.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, really,’ said Sheila, ‘it seems very difficult to get at the truth +sometimes. And when illness is in the house I cannot understand why there +should be no one available to answer the door. You must have left it ajar, +unsecured, when you went out. And pray, what if Dr Ferguson had been some +common tramp? That would have been a nice thing.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I am quite certain,’ said Ada a little flatly, ‘that I did shut the door. And +cook says she never so much as stirred from the kitchen till I came down the +area steps with the packet. And that’s all I know about it, ma’am; except that +he was here when I came back. I did not know even there was a Dr Ferguson; and +my mother has lived here nineteen years.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘We must be thankful your mother enjoys such good health,’ replied Mrs Lawford +suavely. ‘Please tell cook to be very careful with the cornflour—to be sure +it’s well mixed and thoroughly done.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford’s eyes followed with a certain discomfort those narrow print +shoulders descending the stairs. And this abominable ruse was—Arthur’s! She ran +up lightly and listened with her ear to the panel of his door. And just as she +was about to turn away again, there came a little light knock at the front +door. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford paused at the loop of the staircase; and not altogether with +gratitude or relief she heard the voice of Mr Bethany, inquiring in cautious +but quite audible tones after her husband. +</p> + +<p> +She dressed quickly and went down. The little white old man looked very +solitary in the long, fireless, drawing-room. +</p> + +<p> +‘I could not sleep,’ he said; ‘I don’t think I grasped in the least, I don’t +indeed, until I was nearly home, the complexity of our problem. I came, in +fact, to a lamppost. It was casting a peculiar shadow. And then—you know how +such thoughts seize us, my dear—like a sudden inspiration, I realised how +tenuous, how appallingly tenuous a hold we every one of us have on our mere +personality. But that,’ he continued rapidly, ‘that’s only for ourselves—and +after the event. Ours, just now, is to act. And first—?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You really do, then—you really are convinced—’ began Mrs Lawford. +</p> + +<p> +But Mr Bethany was too quick. ‘We must be <i>most</i> circumspect. My dear +friend, we must be <i>most</i> circumspect, for all our sakes. And this, you’ll +say,’ he added, smiling, stretching out his arms, his soft hat in one hand, his +umbrella in the other—‘this is being circumspect—a seven o’clock in the morning +call! But you see, my dear, I have come, as I took the precaution of explaining +to the maid, because it’s now or never to-day. It does so happen that I have to +take a wedding for an old friend’s niece at Witchett; so when in need, you see, +Providence enables us to tell even the conventional truth. Now really, how is +he? has he slept? has he recalled himself at all? is there any change?—and, +dear me, how are <i>you</i>?’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford sighed. ‘A broken night is really very little to a mother,’ she +said. ‘He is still asleep. He hasn’t, I think, stirred all night.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Not stirred!’ Mr Bethany repeated. ‘You baffle me. And you have watched?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh no,’ was the cheerful answer; ‘I felt that quiet, solitude; space, was +everything; he preferred it so. He—he changed alone, I suppose. Don’t you think +it almost stands to reason that he will be alone...when he comes back? Was I +right? But there, it’s useless, it’s worse than useless, to talk like this. My +husband is gone. Some terrible thing has happened. Whatever the mystery may be, +he will never come back alive. My only fear is that I am dragging you into a +matter that should from the beginning have been entrusted to—Oh, it’s +monstrous!’ It appeared for a moment as if she were blinking to keep back her +tears, yet her scrutiny seemed merely to harden. +</p> + +<p> +Only the merest flicker of the folded eyelids over the greenish eyes of her +visitor answered the challenge. He stood small and black, peeping fixedly out +of the window at the sunflecked laurels. +</p> + +<p> +‘Last night,’ he said slowly, ‘when I said good-bye to your husband, on the tip +of my tongue were the words I have used, in season and out of season, for +nearly forty-five years—“God knows best.” Well, my dear lady, a sense of +humour, a sense of reverence, or perhaps even a taint of scepticism—call it +what you will—just intercepted them. Oh no, not any of these, my child; just +pity, overwhelming pity. God does know best; but in a matter like this it is +not even my place to say so. It would be good for none of us to endanger our +souls even with <i>verbal</i> cant. Now, if, do you think, I had just five +minutes’ talk—five minutes; would it disquiet him?’ +</p> + +<p> +Only by an almost undignified haste, for the vicar was remarkably agile, Sheila +managed to unlock the bedroom door without apparently his perceiving it, and +with a warning finger she preceded him into the great bedroom. ‘Oh, yes, yes,’ +he was whispering to himself; ‘alone—well, well!’ He hung his hat on his +umbrella and leaned it in a corner, and then he turned. +</p> + +<p> +‘I don’t think, you know, an old friend does him any wrong; but last night I +had no real oppor—’ He firmly adjusted his spectacles, and looked long into the +dark, dispassioned face. +</p> + +<p> +‘H’m!’ he said, and fidgeted, and peered again. Mrs Lawford watched him keenly. +</p> + +<p> +‘Do you still—’ she began. +</p> + +<p> +But at the same moment he too broke silence, suddenly stepping back with the +innocent remark, ‘Has he—has he asked for anything?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Only for Quain.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“Quain”?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘The medical Dictionary.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, yes; bless me; of course.... A calm, complete sleep of utter +prostration—utter nervous prostration. And can one wonder? Poor fellow, poor +fellow!’ He walked to the window and peered between the blinds. ‘Sparrows, +sunshine—yes, and here’s the postman,’ he said, as if to himself. Then he +turned sharply round, with mind made up. +</p> + +<p> +‘Now, do you leave me here,’ he said. ‘Take half an hour’s quiet rest. He will +be glad of a dull old fellow like me when he wakes. And as for my pretty bride, +if I miss the train, she must wait till the next. Good discipline, my dear. Oh, +dear me! <i>I</i> don’t change. What a precious experience now this would have +been for a tottery, talkative, owlish old parochial creature like me. But +there, there. Light words make heavy hearts, I see. I shall be quite +comfortable. No, no, I breakfasted at home. There’s hat and umbrella; at 9.3 I +can fly.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford thanked him mutely. He smilingly but firmly bowed her out and +closed the door. +</p> + +<p> +But eyes and brain had been very busy. He had looked at the gutted candle; at +the tinted bland portrait on the dressing-table; at the chair drawn-up; at the +boots; and now again he turned almost with a groan towards the sleeper. Then he +took out an envelope, on which he had jotted various memoranda, and waited +awhile. Minutes passed and at last the sleeper faintly stirred, muttering. +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany stooped quickly. ‘What is it, what is it?’ he whispered. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford sighed. ‘I was only dreaming, Sheila,’ he said, and softly, peacefully +opened his eyes. ‘I dreamed I was in the—’ His lids narrowed, his dark eyes +fixed themselves on the anxious spectacled face bending over him. ‘Mr Bethany! +Where? What’s wrong?’ +</p> + +<p> +His friend put out his hand. ‘There, there,’ he said soothingly, ‘do not be +disturbed; do not disquiet yourself.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford struggled up. Slowly, painfully consciousness returned to him. He +glanced furtively round the room, at his clothes, slinkingly at the vicar; +licked his lips; flushed with extraordinary rapidity; and suddenly burst into +tears. +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany sat without movement, waiting till he should have spent himself. +‘Now, Lawford,’ he said gently, ‘compose yourself, old friend. We must face the +music—like men.’ He went to the window, drew up the blind, peeped out, and took +off his spectacles. +</p> + +<p> +‘The first thing to be done,’ he said, returning briskly to his chair, ‘is to +send for Simon. Now, does Simon know you <i>well?</i>’ Lawford shook his head. +‘Would he recognise you?... I mean...’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I have only met him once—in the evening.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Good; let him come immediately, then. Tell him just the facts. If I am not +mistaken, he will pooh-pooh the whole thing; tell you to keep quiet, not to +worry, and so on. My dear fellow, if we realised, say, typhoid, who’d dare to +face it? That will give us time; to wait a while, to recover our breath, to see +what happens next. And if—as I don’t believe for a moment—Why, in that case I +heard the other day of a most excellent man—Grosser, of Wimpole Street; nerves. +He would be absorbed. He’ll bottle you in spirit, Lawford. We’ll have him down +quietly. You see? But there won’t be any necessity. Oh no. By then light will +have come. We shall remember. What I mean is this.’ He crossed his legs and +pushed out his lips. ‘We are on quaky ground; and it’s absolutely essential +that you keep cool, and trust. I am yours, heart and soul—you know that. I own +frankly, at first I was shaken. And I have, I confess, been very cunning. But +first, faith, then evidence to bolster it up. The faith was absolute’—he placed +one firm hand on Lawford’s knee—‘why, I cannot explain; but it was. The +evidence is convincing. But there are others to think of. The shock, the +incredibleness, the consequences; we must not scan too closely. Think +<i>with</i>; never against: and bang go all the arguments. Your wife, poor +dear, believes; but of course, of course, she is horribly—’ he broke off; ‘of +course she is <i>shaken</i>, you old simpleton! Time will heal all that. Time +will wear out the mask. Time will tire out this detestable physical witchcraft. +The mind, the self’s the thing. Old fogey though I may seem for saying it—that +must be kept unsmirched. We won’t go wearily over the painful subject again. +You told me last night, dear old friend, that you were absolutely alone at +Widderstone. That is enough. But here we have visible facts, tangible effects, +and there must have been a definite reason and a cause for them. I believe in +the devil, in the Powers of Darkness, Lawford, as firmly as I believe he and +they are powerless—in the long run. They—what shall we say?—have surrendered +their intrinsicality. You can just go through evil, as you can go through a +sewer, and come out on the other side too. A loathsome process too. But +there—we are not speaking of any such monstrosities, and even if we were, you +and I with God’s help would just tire them out. And that ally gone, our poor +dear old Mrs Grundy will at once capitulate. Eh? Eh?’ +</p> + +<p> +Through all this long and arduous harangue, consciousness, like the gradual +light of dawn, had been flooding that other brain. And the face that now +confronted Mr Bethany, though with his feeble unaided sight he could only very +obscurely discern it, was vigilant and keen, in every sharp-cut hungry feature. +</p> + +<p> +A rather prolonged silence followed, the visitor peering mutely. The black eyes +nearly closed, the face turned slowly towards the window, saw burnt-out candle, +comprehensive glass. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, yes.’ he said; ‘I’ll send for Simon at once.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Good,’ said Mr Bethany, and more doubtfully repeated ‘good.’ ‘Now there’s only +one thing left,’ he went on cheerfully. ‘I have jotted down a few test +questions here; they are questions no one on this earth could answer but you, +Lawford. They are merely for external proofs. You won’t, you can’t, mistake my +motive. We cannot foretell or foresee what need may arise for just such +jog-trot primitive evidence. I propose that you now answer them here, in +writing.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford stood up and walked to the looking-glass, and paused. He put his hand +to his head, ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘of course; it’s a rattling good move. I’m not +quite awake; myself, I mean. I’ll do it now.’ He took out a pencil case and +tore another leaf from his pocket-book. ‘What are they?’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany rang the bell. Sheila herself answered it. She stood on the +threshold and looked across through a shaft of autumnal sunshine at her +husband, and her husband with a quiet strange smile looked across through the +sunshine at his wife. Mr Bethany waited in vain. +</p> + +<p> +‘I am just going to put the arch-impostor through his credentials,’ he said +tartly. ‘Now then, Lawford!’ He read out the questions, one by one, from his +crafty little list, pursing his lips between each; and one by one, Lawford, +seated at the dressing-table, fluently scribbled his answers. Then question and +answer were rigorously compared by Mr Bethany, with small white head bent close +and spectacles poised upon the powerful nose, and signed and dated, and passed +to Mrs Lawford without a word. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford read question and answer where she stood, in complete silence. She +looked up. ‘Many of these questions I don’t know the answers to myself,’ she +said. +</p> + +<p> +‘It is immaterial,’ said Mr Bethany. +</p> + +<p> +‘One answer is—is inaccurate. ‘Yes, yes, quite so: due to a mistake in a letter +from myself.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford read quietly on, folded the papers, and held them out between +finger and thumb. ‘The—handwriting...’ she remarked very softly. +</p> + +<p> +‘Wonderful, isn’t it?’ said Mr Bethany warmly; ‘all the general look and run of +the thing different, but every real essential feature unchanged. Now into the +envelope. And now a little wax?’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford stood waiting. ‘There’s a green piece of sealing-wax,’ almost +drawled the quiet voice, ‘in the top right drawer of the nest in the study, +which old James gave me the Christmas before last.’ He glanced with lowered +eyelids at his wife’s flushed cheek. Their eyes met. +</p> + +<p> +‘Thank you,’ she said. +</p> + +<p> +When she returned the vicar was sitting in a chair, leaning his chin on the +knobbed handle of his umbrella. He rose and lit a taper for her with a match +from a little green pot on the table. And Mrs Lawford, with trembling fingers, +sealed the letter, as he directed, with his own seal. +</p> + +<p> +‘There!’ he said triumphantly, ‘how many more such brilliant lawyers, I wonder, +lie dormant in the Church? And who shall keep this?... Why, all three, of +course.’ He went on without pausing. ‘Some little drawer now, secret and +undetectable, with a lock.’ Just such a little drawer that locked itself with a +spring lay by chance in the looking-glass. There the letter was hidden. And Mr +Bethany looked at his watch. ‘Nineteen minutes,’ he said. ‘The next thing, my +dear child—we’re getting on swimmingly—and it’s astonishing how things are +simplified by mere use—the next thing is to send for Simon.’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila took a deep breath, but did not look up. ‘I am entirely in your hands,’ +she replied. +</p> + +<p> +‘So be it,’ said he crisply. ‘Get to bed, Lawford; it’s better so. And I’ll +look in on my way back from Witchett. I came, my dear fellow, in gloomy +disturbance of mind. It was getting up too early; it fogs old brains. Good-bye, +good-bye.’ +</p> + +<p> +He squeezed Lawford’s hand. Then, with umbrella under his arm, his hat on his +head, his spectacles readjusted, he hurried out of the room. Mrs Lawford +followed him. For a few minutes Lawford sat motionless, with head bent a +little, and eyes restlessly scanning the door. Then he rose abruptly, and in a +quarter of an hour was in bed, alone with his slow thoughts: while a basin of +cornflour stood untasted on a little table at his bedside, and a cheerful fire +burned in the best visitors’ room’s tiny grate. +</p> + +<p> +At half-past eleven Dr Simon entered this soundless seclusion. He sat down +beside Lawford, and took temperature and pulse. Then he half closed his lids, +and scanned his patient out of an unusually dark, un-English face, with +straight black hair, and listened attentively to his rather incoherent story. +It was a story very much modified and rounded off. Nor did Lawford draw Dr +Simon’s attention to the portrait now smiling conventionally above their heads +from the wall over the fireplace. +</p> + +<p> +‘It was rather bleak—the wind; and, I think, perhaps, I had had a touch of +influenza. It was a silly thing to do. But still, Dr Simon, one doesn’t +expect—well, there, I don’t feel the same man—physically. I really cannot +explain how great a change has taken place. And yet I feel perfectly fit in +myself. And if it were not for—for being laughed at, go back to town, to-day. +Why my wife scarcely recognised me.’ +</p> + +<p> +Dr Simon continued his scrutiny. Try as he would, Lawford could not raise his +downcast eyes to meet direct the doctor’s polite attention. +</p> + +<p> +‘And what,’ said Dr Simon, ‘what precisely is the nature of the change? Have +you any pain?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No, not the least pain,’ said Lawford; ‘I think, perhaps, or rather my face +<i>is</i> a little shrunken—and yet lengthened; at least it feels so; and a +faint twinge of rheumatism. But my hair—well, I don’t know; it’s difficult to +say one’s self.’ He could get on so very much better, he thought, if only his +mind would be at peace and these preposterous promptings and voices were still. +</p> + +<p> +Dr Simon faced the window, and drew his hand softly over his head. ‘We never +can be too cautious at a certain age, and especially after influenza,’ he said. +‘It undermines the whole system, and in particular the nervous system; leaving +the mind the prey of the most melancholy fancies. I should astound you, Mr +Lawford, with the devil influenza plays.... A slight nervous shock and a chill; +quite slight, I hope. A few days’ rest and plenty of nourishment. There’s +nothing; temperature inconsiderable. All perfectly intelligible. Most certainly +reassure yourself! And as for the change you speak of’—he looked steadily at +the dark face on the pillow and smiled amiably—‘I don’t think we need worry +much about that. It certainly was a bleak wind yesterday—and a cemetery, my +dear sir! It was indiscreet—yes, very.’ He held out his hand. ‘You must not be +alarmed,’ he said, very distinctly with the merest trace of an accent; ‘air, +sunshine, quiet, nourishment; sleep—that is all. The little window might be a +few inches open, and—and any light reading.’ +</p> + +<p> +He opened the door and joined Mrs Lawford on the staircase. He talked to her +quietly over his shoulder all the way downstairs. ‘It was, it was sporting with +Providence—a wind, believe me, nearly due east, in spite of the warm sunshine.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But the change—the change!’ Mrs Lawford managed to murmur tragically, as he +strode to the door. Dr Simon smiled, and gracefully tapped his forehead with a +red-gloved forefinger. +</p> + +<p> +‘Humour him, humour him,’ he repeated indulgently. ‘Rest and quiet will soon +put that little trouble out of his head. Oh yes, I did notice it—the set drawn +look, and the droop: quite so. Good morning.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford gently closed the door after him. A glimpse of Ada, crossing from +room to room, suggested a precaution. She called out in her clearest notes. ‘If +Dr Ferguson should call while I am out, Ada, will you please tell him that Dr +Simon regretted that he was unable to wait? Thank you.’ She paused with hand on +the balusters, then slowly ascended the stairs. Her husband’s face was turned +to the ceiling, his hands clasped above his head. She took up her stand by the +fireplace, resting one silk-slippered foot on the fender. ‘Dr Simon is +reassuring,’ she said, ‘but I do hope, Arthur, you will follow his advice. He +looks a fairly clever man.... But with a big practice.... Do you think, dear, +he quite realised the extent of the—the change?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I told him what happened,’ said her husband’s voice out of the bed-clothes. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, yes, I know,’ said Sheila soothingly; ‘but we must remember he is +comparatively a stranger. He would not detect—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What did he tell you?’ asked the voice. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford deliberately considered. If only he would always thus keep his face +concealed, how much easier it would be to discuss matters rationally. ‘You see, +dear,’ she said softly, ‘I know, of course, nothing about the nerves; but +personally, I think his suggestion absurd. No mere fancy, surely, can make a +lasting alteration in one’s face. And your hair—I don’t want to say anything +that may seem unkind—but isn’t it really quite a distinct shade darker, +Arthur?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Any great strain will change the colour of a man’s hair,’ said Lawford +stolidly; ‘at any rate, to white. Why, I read once of a fellow in India, a +Hindoo, or something, who—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But have you <i>had</i> any intense strain, or anxiety?’ broke in Sheila. ‘You +might, at least, have confided in me; that is, unless—But there, don’t you +think really, Arthur, it would be much more satisfactory in every way if we had +further advice at once? Alice will be home next week. To-morrow is the Harvest +Festival, and next week, of course, the Dedication; and, in any case, the +Bazaar is out of the question. They will have to find another stall-holder. We +must do our utmost to avoid comment or scandal. Every minute must help to—to +fix a thing like that. I own even now I cannot realise what this awful calamity +means. It’s useless to brood on it. We must, as the poor dear old vicar said +only last night, keep our heads clear. But I am sure Dr Simon was under a +misapprehension. If, now, it was explained to him, a little more fully, +Arthur—a photograph. Oh, anything on earth but this dreadful wearing +uncertainty and suspense! Besides ...is Simon quite an English name?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford drew further into his pillow. ‘Do as you think best, Sheila,’ he said. +‘For my own part, I believe it may be as he suggests—partly an illusion, a +touch of nervous breakdown. It simply can’t be as bad as I think it is. If it +were, you would not be here talking like this; and Bethany wouldn’t have +believed a word I said. Whatever it is, it’s no good crying it on the +housetops. Give me time, just time. Besides, how do we know what he really +thought? Doctors don’t tell their patients everything. Give the poor chap a +chance, and more so if he is a foreigner. He’s’—his voice sank almost to a +whisper—‘he’s no darker than this. And do, please, Sheila, take this infernal +stuff away, and let me have something solid. I’m not ill—in that way. All I +want is peace and quiet, time to think. Let me fight it out alone. It’s been +sprung on me. The worst’s not over. But I’ll win through; wait! And if +not—well, you shall not suffer, Sheila. Don’t be afraid. There are other ways +out.’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila broke down. ‘Any one would think to hear you talk, that I was perfectly +heartless. I told Ada to be most careful about the cornflour. And as for other +ways out, it’s a positively wicked thing to say to me when I’m nearly +distracted with trouble and anxiety. What motive could you have had for +loitering in an old cemetery? And in an east wind! It’s useless for me to +remain here, Arthur, to be accused of every horrible thing that comes into a +morbid imagination. I will leave you, as you suggest, in peace.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘One moment, Sheila,’ answered the muffled voice. ‘I have accused you of +nothing. If you knew all; if you could read my thoughts, you would be +surprised, perhaps, at my—But never mind that. On the other hand, I really do +think it would be better for the present to discuss the thing no more. To-day +is Friday. Give this miserable face a week. Talk it over with Bethany if you +like. But I forbid’—he struggled up in bed, sallow and sinister—‘I flatly +forbid, please understand, any other interference till then. Afterwards you +must do exactly as you please. Send round the Town Crier! But till then, +silence!’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila with raised head confronted him. ‘This, then, is your gratitude. So be +it. Silence, no doubt! Until it’s too late to take action. Until you have +wormed your way in, and think you are safe. To have believed! Where is my +husband? that is what I am asking you now. When and how you have learned his +secrets God only knows, and your conscience! But he always was a simpleton at +heart. I warn you, then. Until next Thursday I consent to say nothing provided +you remain quiet; make no disturbance, no scandal here. The servants and all +who inquire shall simply be told that my husband is confined to his room +with—with a nervous breakdown, as you have yourself so glibly suggested. I am +at your mercy, I own it. The vicar believes your preposterous story—with his +spectacles off. You would convince anybody with the wicked cunning with which +you have cajoled and wheedled him, with which you have deceived and fooled a +foreign doctor. But you will not convince me. You will not convince Alice. I +have friends in the world, though you may not be aware of it, who will not be +quite so apt to believe any cock-and-bull story you may see fit to invent. That +is all I have to say. To-night I tell the vicar all that I have just told you. +And from this moment, please, we are strangers. I shall come into the room no +more than necessity dictates. On Friday we resume our real parts. My +husband—Arthur—to—to connive at... Phh!’ +</p> + +<p> +Rage had transfigured her. She scarcely heard her own words. They poured out +senselessly, monotonously, one calling up another, as if from the lips of a +Cassandra. Lawford sank back into bed, clutching the sheets with both lean +hands. He took a deep breath and shut his mouth. +</p> + +<p> +‘It reminds me, Sheila,’ he began arduously, ‘of our first quarrel before we +were married, the evening after your aunt Rose died at Llandudno—do you +remember? You threw open the window, and I think—I saved your life.’ A pause +followed. Then a queer, almost inarticulate voice added, ‘At least, I am afraid +so.’ +</p> + +<p> +A cold and awful quietness fell on Sheila’s heart. She stared fixedly at the +tuft of dark hair, the only visible sign of her husband, on the pillow. Then, +taking up the basin of cold cornflour, she left the room. In a quarter of an +hour she reappeared carrying a tray, with ham and eggs and coffee and honey +invitingly displayed. She laid it down. +</p> + +<p> +‘There is only one other question,’ she said, with perfect composure—‘that of +money. Your signature as it appears on the—the document drawn up this morning, +would, of course, be quite useless on a cheque. I have taken all the money I +could find; it is in safety. You may, however, conceivably be in need of some +yourself; here is five pounds. I have my own cheque-book, and shall therefore +have no need to consider the question again for—for the present. So far as you +are concerned, I shall be guided solely by Mr Bethany. He will, I do not doubt, +take full responsibility.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And may the Lord have mercy on my soul!’ uttered a stifled, unfamiliar voice +from the bed. Mrs Lawford stooped. ‘Arthur!’ she cried faintly, ‘Arthur!’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford raised himself on his elbow with a sigh that was very near to being a +sob. ‘Oh, Sheila, if you’d only be your real self! What is the use of all this +pretence? Just consider <i>my</i> position a little. The fear and horror are +not all on your side. You called me Arthur even then. I’d willingly do anything +you wish to save you pain; you know that. Can’t we be friends even in this—this +ghastly—Won’t you, Sheila?’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford drew back, struggling with a doubtful heart. +</p> + +<p> +‘I think,’ she said, ‘it would be better not to discuss that now.’ +</p> + +<p> +The rest of the morning Lawford remained in solitude. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap06"></a> +CHAPTER SIX</h2> + +<p> +There were three books in the room—Jeremy Taylor’s ‘Holy Living and Dying,’ a +volume of the <cite>Quiver</cite>, and a little gilded book on wildflowers. He +read in vain. He lay and listened to the uproar of his thoughts on which an +occasional sound—the droning of a fly, the cry of a milkman, the noise of a +passing van—obtruded from the workaday world. The pale gold sunlight edged +softly over the bed. He ate up everything on his tray. He even, on the shoals +of nightmare, dreamed awhile. But by and by as the hours wheeled slowly on he +grew less calm, less strenuously resolved on lying there inactive. Every +sparrow that twittered cried reveille through his brain. He longed with an +ardour strange to his temperament to be up and doing. +</p> + +<p> +What if his misfortune was, as he had in the excitement of the moment suggested +to Sheila, only a morbid delusion of mind; shared too in part by sheer force of +his absurd confession? Even if he was going mad, who knows how peaceful a +release that might not be? Could his shrewd old vicar have implicitly believed +in him if the change were as complete as he supposed it? He flung off the +bedclothes and locked the door. He dressed himself, noticing, he fancied, with +a deadly revulsion of feeling, that his coat was a little too short in the +sleeves, his waistcoat too loose. In the midst of his dressing came Sheila +bringing his luncheon. ‘I’m sorry,’ he called out, stooping quickly beside the +bed, ‘I can’t talk now. Please put the tray down.’ +</p> + +<p> +About half an hour afterwards he heard the outer door close, and peeping from +behind the curtains saw his wife go out. All was drowsily quiet in the house. +He devoured his lunch like a schoolboy. That finished to the last crumb, +without a moment’s delay he covered his face with a towel, locked the door +behind him, put the key in his pocket, and ran lightly downstairs. He stuffed +the towel into an ulster pocket, put on a soft, wide-brimmed hat, and +noiselessly let himself out. Then he turned with an almost hysterical delight +and ran—ran like the wind, without pausing, without thinking, straight on, up +one turning, down another, until he reached a broad open common, thickly +wooded, sprinkled with gorse and hazel and may, and faintly purple with fading +heather. There he flung himself down in the beautiful sunlight, among the +yellowing bracken, to recover his breath. +</p> + +<p> +He lay there for many minutes, thinking almost with composure. Flight, it +seemed, had for the moment quietened the demands of that other feebly +struggling personality which was beginning to insinuate itself into his +consciousness, which had so miraculously broken in and taken possession of his +body. He would not think now. All he needed was a little quiet and patience +before he threw off for good and all his right to be free, to be his own +master, to call himself sane. +</p> + +<p> +He scrambled up and turned his face towards the westering sun. What was there +in the stillness of its beautiful splendour that seemed to sharpen his horror +and difficulty, and yet to stir him to such a daring and devilry as he had +never known since he was a boy? There was little sound of life; somewhere an +unknown bird was singing, and a few late bees were droning in the bracken. All +these years he had, like an old blind horse, stolidly plodded round and round +in a dull self-set routine. And now, just when the spirit had come for +rebellion, the mood for a harmless truancy, there had fallen with them too this +hideous enigma. He sat there with the dusky silhouette of the face that was now +drenched with sunlight in his mind’s eye. He set off again up the stony +incline. +</p> + +<p> +Why not walk on and on? In time real wholesome weariness would come; he could +sleep at ease in some pleasant wayside inn, without once meeting the eyes that +stood as it were like a window between himself and a shrewd incredulous +scoffing world that would turn him into a monstrosity and his story into a +fable. And in a little while, perhaps in three days, he would awaken out of +this engrossing nightmare, and know he was free, this black dog gone from his +back, and (as the old saying expressed it without any one dreaming what it +really meant) his own man again. How astonished Sheila would be; how warmly she +would welcome him!... Oh yes, of course she would. +</p> + +<p> +He came again to a standstill. No voice answered him out of that illimitable +gold and blue. Nothing seemed aware of him. But as he stood there, doubtful as +Cain on the outskirts of the unknown, he caught the sound of a footfall on the +lonely and stone-strewn path. +</p> + +<p> +The ground sloped steeply away to the left, and slowly mounting the hillside +came mildly on an old lady he knew, a Miss Sinnet, an old friend of his +mother’s. There was just such a little seat as that other he knew so well, on +the brow of the hill. He made his way to it, intending to sit quietly there +until the little old lady had passed by. Up and up she came. Her large bonnet +appeared, and then her mild white face, inclined a little towards him as she +ascended. Evidently this very seat was her goal; and evasion was impossible. +Evasion!... Memory rushed back and set his pulses beating. He turned boldly to +the sun, and the old lady, with a brief glance into his face, composed herself +at the other end of the little seat. She gazed out of a gentle reverie into the +golden valley. And so they sat a while. And almost as if she had felt the bond +of acquaintance between them, she presently sighed, and addressed him: ‘A very, +very, beautiful view, sir.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford paused, then turned a gloomy, earnest face, gilded with sunshine. +‘Beautiful, indeed,’ he said, ‘but not for me. No, Miss Sinnet, not for me.’ +</p> + +<p> +The old lady gravely turned and examined the aquiline profile. ‘Well, I +confess,’ she remarked urbanely, ‘you have the advantage of me.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford smiled uneasily. ‘Believe me, it is little advantage.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘My sight,’ said Miss Sinnet precisely, ‘is not so good as I might wish; though +better perhaps than I might have hoped; I fear I am not much wiser; your face +is still unfamiliar to me.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It is not unfamiliar to me,’ said Lawford. Whose trickery was this? he +thought, putting such affected stuff into his mouth. +</p> + +<p> +A faint lightening of pity came into the silvery and scrupulous countenance. +‘Ah, dear me, yes,’ she said courteously. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford rested a lean hand on the seat. ‘And have you,’ he asked, ‘not the +least recollection in the world of my face?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Now really,’ she said, smiling blandly, ‘is that quite fair? Think of all the +scores and scores of faces in seventy long years; and how very treacherous +memory is. You shall do me the service of <i>reminding</i> me of one whose name +has for the moment escaped me.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I am the son of a very old friend of yours, Miss Sinnet,’ said Lawford quietly +‘a friend that was once your schoolfellow at Brighton.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, now,’ said the old lady, grasping her umbrella, ‘that is undoubtedly a +clue; but then, you see, all but one of the friends of my girlhood are dead; +and if I have never had the pleasure of meeting her son, unless there is a +decided resemblance, how am I to recollect <i>her</i> by looking at +<i>him?</i>’ +</p> + +<p> +‘There is, I believe, a likeness,’ said Lawford. +</p> + +<p> +She nodded her great bonnet at him with gentle amusement. ‘You are insistent in +your fancy. Well, let me think again. The last to leave me was Fanny Urquhart, +that was—let me see—last October. Now you are certainly not Fanny Urquhart’s +son,’ she stooped austerely, ‘for she never had one. Last year, too, I heard +that my dear, dear Mrs Jameson was dead. <i>Her</i> I hadn’t met for many, many +years. But, if I may venture to say so, yours is not a Scottish face; and she +not only married a Scottish husband, but was herself a Dunbar. No, I am still +at a loss.’ +</p> + +<p> +A miserable strife was in her chance companion’s mind, a strife of anger and +recrimination. He turned his eyes wearily to the fast declining sun. ‘You will +forgive my persistency, but I assure you it is a matter of life or death to me. +Is there no one my face recalls? My voice?’ +</p> + +<p> +Miss Sinnet drew her long lips together, her eyebrows lifted with the faintest +perturbation. ‘But he certainly knows my name,’ she said to herself. She turned +once more, and in the still autumnal beauty, beneath that pale blue arch of +evening, these two human beings confronted one another again. She eyed him +blandly, yet with a certain grave directness. +</p> + +<p> +‘I don’t really think,’ she said, ‘you <i>can</i> be Mary Lawford’s son. I +could scarcely have mistaken <i>him</i>.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford gulped and turned away. He hardly knew what this surge of feeling +meant. Was it hope, despair, resentment; had he caught even the echo of an +unholy joy? His mind for a moment became confused as if in the tumult of a +struggle. He heard himself expostulate, ‘Ah, Miss Bennett, I fear I set you too +difficult a task.’ +</p> + +<p> +The old lady drew abruptly in, like a trustful and gentle snail into its +shocked house. ‘Bennett, sir; but my name is not Bennett.’ +</p> + +<p> +And again Lawford accepted the miserable prompting. ‘Not Bennett!... How can I +ever then apologise for so frantic a mistake?’ +</p> + +<p> +The little old lady took firm hold of her umbrella. She did not answer him. +‘The likeness, the likeness!’ he began unctuously, and stopped, for the glance +that dwelt fleetingly on him was cold with the formidable dignity and +displeasure of age. He raised his hat and turned miserably home. He strode on +out of the last gold into the blue twilight. What fantastic foolery of mind was +mastering him? He cast a hurried look over his shoulder at the kindly and +offended old figure sitting there, solitary, on the little seat, in her great +bonnet, with back turned resolutely upon him—the friend of his dead mother who +might have proved in his need a friend indeed to him. And he had by this insane +caprice hopelessly estranged her. +</p> + +<p> +She would remember this face well enough now, he thought bitterly, and would +take her place among his quiet enemies, if ever the day of reckoning should +come. It was scandalous, it was banal to have abused her trust and courtesy. +Oh, it was hopeless to struggle any more! The fates were against him. They had +played him a trick. He was to be their transitory sport, as many a better man +he could himself recollect had been before him. He would go home and give in; +let Sheila do with him what she pleased. No one but a lunatic could have acted +as he had, with just that frantic hint of method so remarkable in the insane. +</p> + +<p> +He left the common. A lamplighter was lighting the lamps. A thin evening haze +was on the air. If only he had stayed at home that fateful afternoon! Who, what +had induced him, enticed him to venture out? And even with the thought welled +up into his mind an intense desire to go to the old green time-worn churchyard +again; to sit there contentedly alone, where none heeded the completest +metamorphosis, down beside the yew-trees. What a fool he had been. There alone, +of course, lay his only possible chance of recovery. He would go to-morrow. +Perhaps Sheila had not yet discovered his absence; and there would be no +difficulty in repeating so successful a stratagem. +</p> + +<p> +Remembrance of his miserable mistake, of Miss Sinnet, faintly returned to him +as he swiftly mounted the steps to his porch. Poor old lady. He would make +amends for his discourtesy when he was quite himself again. She should some day +hear, perhaps, his infinitely tragic, infinitely comic experience from his own +lips. He would take her some flowers, some old keepsake of his mother’s. What +would he not do when the old moods and brains of the stupid Arthur Lawford, +whom he had appreciated so little and so superficially, came back to him. +</p> + +<p> +He ran up the steps and stopped dead, his hand in his pocket, chilled and +aghast. Sheila had taken his keys. He stood there, dazed and still, beneath the +dim yellow of his own fanlight; and once again that inward spring flew back. +‘Brazen it out; brazen it out! Knock and ring!’ +</p> + +<p> +He knocked flamboyantly, and rang. +</p> + +<p> +There came a quiet step and the door opened. ‘Dr Simon, of course, has called?’ +he inquired suavely. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, sir.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, and gone’—as I feared. And Mrs Lawford?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I think Mrs Lawford is in, sir.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford put out a detaining hand. ‘We will not disturb her; we will not disturb +her. I can find my way up; oh yes, thank you!’ +</p> + +<p> +But Ada still palely barred the way. ‘I think, sir,’ she said, ‘Mrs Lawford +would prefer to see you herself; she told me most particularly “all callers.” +And Mr Lawford was not to be disturbed on any account.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Disturbed? God forbid!’ said Lawford, but his dark eyes failed to move these +lightest hazel. ‘Well,’ he continued nonchalantly, ‘perhaps—perhaps +it—<i>would</i> be as well if Mrs Lawford should know that I am here. No, thank +you, I won’t come in. Please go and tell—’ But even as the maid turned to obey, +Sheila herself appeared at the dining-room door in hat and veil. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford hesitated an immeasurable moment. In one swift glance he perceived the +lamplit mystery of evening, beckoning, calling, pleading—Fly, fly! Home’s here +for you. Begin again, begin again. And there before him in quiet and hostile +decorum stood maid and mistress. He took off his hat and stepped quickly in. +</p> + +<p> +‘So late, so very late, I fear,’ he began glibly. ‘A sudden call, a perfectly +impossible distance. Shall we disturb him, do you think?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Wouldn’t it,’ began Sheila softly, ‘be rather a pity perhaps? Dr Simon seemed +to think.... But, of course, you must decide that.’ +</p> + +<p> +Ada turned quiet small eyes. +</p> + +<p> +‘No, no, by no means,’ he almost mumbled. +</p> + +<p> +And a hard, slow smile passed over Sheila’s face. ‘Excuse me one moment,’ she +said; ‘I will see if he is awake.’ She swept swiftly forward, superb and +triumphant, beneath the gaze of those dark, restless eyes. But so still was +home and street that quite distinctly a clear and youthful laughter was heard, +and light footsteps approaching. Sheila paused. Ada, in the act of closing the +door, peered out. ‘Miss Alice, ma’am,’ she said. +</p> + +<p> +And in this infinitesimal advantage of time Dr Ferguson had seized his +vanishing opportunity, and was already swiftly mounting the stairs. Mrs Lawford +stood with veil half raised and coldly smiling lips and, as if it were by +pre-arrangement, her daughter’s laughing greeting from the garden, and from the +landing above her, a faint ‘Ah, and how are we now?’ broke out simultaneously. +And Ada, silent and discreet, had thrown open the door again to the twilight +and to the young people ascending the steps. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford was still sitting on his bed before a cold and ashy hearth when Sheila +knocked at the door. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes?’ he said; ‘who’s there?’ No answer followed. He rose with a shuddering +sigh and turned the key. His wife entered. +</p> + +<p> +‘That little exhibition of finesse was part of our agreement, I suppose?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I say—’ began Lawford. +</p> + +<p> +‘To creep out in my absence like a thief, and to return like a mountebank; that +was part of our compact?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I say,’ he stubbornly began again, ‘did you <i>wire</i> for Alice?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Will you please answer my question? Am I to be a mere catspaw in your +intrigues, in this miserable masquerade before the servants? To set the whole +place ringing with the name of a doctor that doesn’t exist, and a bedridden +patient that slips out of the house with his bedroom key in his pocket! Are you +aware that Ada has been hammering at your door every half-hour of your absence? +Are you aware of that? How much,’ she continued in a low, bitter voice, ‘how +much should I offer for her discretion?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Who was that with Alice?’ inquired the same toneless voice. +</p> + +<p> +‘I refuse to be ignored. I refuse to be made a child of. Will you please answer +me?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford turned. ‘Look here, Sheila,’ he began heavily, ‘what about Alice? If +you wired: well, it’s useless to say anything more. But if you didn’t, I ask +you just this one thing. Don’t tell her!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, I perfectly appreciate a father’s natural anxiety.’ +</p> + +<p> +Her husband drew up his shoulders as if to receive a blow. ‘Yes, yes,’ he said, +‘but you won’t?’ +</p> + +<p> +The sound of a young laughing voice came faintly up from below. ‘How did Jimmie +Fortescue know she was coming home to-day?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Will you not inquire of Jimmie Fortescue for yourself?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, what is the use of sneering?’ began the dull voice again. ‘I am horribly +tired, Sheila. And try how you will, you can’t convince me that you believe for +a moment that I am not myself, that you are as hard as you pretend. An +acquaintance, even a friend might be deceived; but husband and wife—oh no! It +isn’t only a man’s face that’s himself—or even his hands.’ He looked at them, +straightened them slowly out, and buried them in his pockets. ‘All I care about +now is Alice. Is she, or is she not going to be told? I am simply asking you to +give her just a chance.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“Simply asking me to give Alice a chance”; now isn’t that really just a +little...?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford slowly shook his head. ‘You know in your heart it isn’t, Sheila; you +understand me quite well, although you persistently pretend not to. I can’t +argue now. I can’t speak up for myself. I am just about as far down as I can +go. It’s only Alice.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I see; a lucid interval?’ suggested his wife in a low, trembling voice. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, yes, if you like,’ said her husband patiently, ‘“a lucid interval.” Don’t +please look at my face like that, Sheila. Think—think that it’s just lupus, +just some horrible disfigurement.’ +</p> + +<p> +Not much light was in the large room, and there was something so +extraordinarily characteristic of her husband in those stooping shoulders, in +the head hung a little forward, and in the preternaturally solemn voice, that +Sheila had to bend a little over the bed to catch a glimpse of the sallow and +keener face again. She sighed; and even on her own strained ear her sigh +sounded almost like one of relief. +</p> + +<p> +‘It’s useless, I know, to ask you anything while you are in this mood,’ +continued Lawford dully; ‘I know that of old.’ +</p> + +<p> +The white, ringed hands clenched, ‘“Of old!”’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I didn’t mean anything. Don’t listen to what I say. It’s only—it’s just Alice +knowing, that was all; I mean at once.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Don’t for a moment suppose I am not perfectly aware that it is only Alice you +think of. You were particularly anxious about my feelings, weren’t you? You +broke the news to me with the tenderest solicitude. I am glad our—our daughter +shares my husband’s love.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Look here,’ said Lawford densely, ‘you know that I love you as much as ever; +but with this—as I am; what would be the good of my saying so?’ Mrs Lawford +took a deep breath. +</p> + +<p> +And a voice called softly at the door, ‘Mother, are you there? Is father awake? +May I come in?’ +</p> + +<p> +In a flash the memory returned to her; twenty-four hours ago she was asking +that very question of this unspeakable figure that sat hunched-up before her. +</p> + +<p> +‘One moment, dear,’ she called. And added in a very low voice, ‘Come here!’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford looked up. ‘What?’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +‘Perhaps, perhaps,’ she whispered, ‘it isn’t quite so bad.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘For mercy’s sake, Sheila,’ he said, ‘don’t torture me; tell the poor child to +go away.’ +</p> + +<p> +She paused. ‘Are you there, Alice? Would you mind, father says, waiting a +little? He is so very tired.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Too tired to.... Oh, very well, mother.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford opened the door, and called after her, ‘Is Jimmie gone?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, yes, hours.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Where did you meet?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I couldn’t get a carriage at the station. He carried my dressing-bag; I begged +him not to. The other’s coming on. You know what Jimmie is. How very, very +lucky I <i>did</i> come home. I don’t know what made me; just an impulse; they +did laugh at me so. Father dear—do speak to me; how are you now?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford opened his mouth, gulped, and shook his head. +</p> + +<p> +‘Ssh, dear!’ whispered Sheila, ‘I think he has fallen asleep. I will be down in +a minute.’ Mrs Lawford was about to close the door when Ada appeared. +</p> + +<p> +‘If you please, ma’am,’ she said, ‘I have been waiting, as you told me, to let +Dr Ferguson out, but it’s nearly seven now; and the table’s not laid yet.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I really should have thought, Ada,’ Sheila began, then caught back the angry +words, and turned and looked over her shoulder into the room. ‘Do you think you +will need anything more, Dr Ferguson?’ she asked in a sepulchral voice. +</p> + +<p> +Again Lawford’s lips moved; again he shook his head. +</p> + +<p> +‘One moment, Ada,’ she said closing the door. ‘Some more medicine—what +medicine? Quick! She mustn’t suspect.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“What medicine?”’ repeated Lawford stolidly. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, vexing, vexing; don’t you <i>see</i> we must send her out? Don’t you see? +What was it you sent to Critchett’s for last night? Tell him that’s gone: we +want more of <i>that</i>.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford stared heavily. Oh, yes, yes,’ he said thickly, ‘more of that....’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila, with a shrug of extreme distaste and vexation, hastily opened the door. +‘Dr Ferguson wants a further supply of the drug which Mr Critchett made up for +Mr Lawford yesterday evening. You had better go at once, Ada, and please make +as much haste as you possibly can.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I say, I say,’ began Lawford; but it was too late, the door was shut. +</p> + +<p> +‘How I detest this wretched falsehood and subterfuge. What could have induced +you....?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ said her husband, ‘what! I think I’ll be getting to bed again, Sheila; I +forgot I had been ill. And now I do really feel very tired. But I should like +to feel—in spite of this hideous—I should like to feel we are friends, Sheila.’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila almost imperceptibly shuddered, crossed the room, and faced the still, +almost lifeless mask. ‘I spoke,’ she said, in a low, cold, difficult voice—‘I +spoke in a temper this morning. You must try to understand what a shock it has +been to me. Now, I own it frankly, I know you are—Arthur. But God only knows +how it frightens me, and—and—horrifies me.’ She shut her eyes beneath her veil. +They waited on in silence a while. +</p> + +<p> +‘Poor boy!’ she said at last, lightly touching the loose sleeve; ‘be brave; it +will all come right, soon. Meanwhile, for Alice’s sake, if not for mine, don’t +give way to—to caprices, and all that. Keep quietly here, Arthur. And—and +forgive my impatience.’ +</p> + +<p> +He put out his hand as if to touch her. ‘Forgive you!’ he said humbly, pushing +it stubbornly back into his pocket again. ‘Oh, Sheila, the forgiveness is all +on your side. You know <i>I</i> have nothing to forgive.’ A long silence fell +between them. +</p> + +<p> +‘Then, to-night,’ at last began Sheila wearily, drawing back, ‘we say nothing +to Alice, except that you are too tired—just nervous prostration—to see her. +What we should do without this influenza, I cannot conceive. Mr Bethany will +probably look in on his way home; and then we can talk it over—we can talk it +over again. So long as you are like this, yourself, in mind, why I—What is it +now?’ she broke off querulously. +</p> + +<p> +‘If you please, ma’am, Mr Critchett says he doesn’t know Dr Ferguson, his +name’s not in the Directory, and there must be something wrong with the +message, and he’s sorry, but he must have it in writing because there was more +even in the first packet than he ought by rights to send. What shall I do, if +you please?’ +</p> + +<p> +Still looking at her husband. Sheila listened quietly to the end, and then, as +if in inarticulate disdain, she deliberately shrugged her shoulders, and went +out to play her part unaided. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap07"></a> +CHAPTER SEVEN</h2> + +<p> +Her husband turned wearily once more, and drawing up a chair sat down in front +of the cold grate. He realised that Sheila thought him as much of a fool now as +she had for the moment thought him an impostor, or something worse, the night +before. That was at least something gained. He realised, too, in a vague way +that the exuberance of mind that had practically invented Dr Ferguson, and +outraged Miss Sinnet, had quite suddenly flickered out. It was astonishing, he +thought, with gaze fixed innocently on the black coals, that he should ever +have done such things. He detested that kind of ‘rot’; that jaunty theatrical +pose so many men prided their jackdaw brains on. +</p> + +<p> +And he sat quite still, like a cat at a cranny, listening, as it were, for the +faintest remotest stir that might hint at any return of this—activity. It was +the first really sane moment he had had since the ‘change.’ Whatever it was +that had happened at Widderstone was now distinctly weakening in effect. Why, +now, perhaps? He stole a thievish look over his shoulder at the glass, and +cautiously drew finger and thumb down that beaked nose. Then he really quietly +smiled, a smile he felt this abominable facial caricature was quite unused to, +the superior Lawford smile of guileless contempt for the fanatical, the +fantastic, and the bizarre: <i>He</i> wouldn’t have sat with his feet on the +fender before a burnt-out fire. +</p> + +<p> +And the animosity of that ‘he,’ uttered only just under his breath, surprised +even himself. It actually did seem as if there were a chance; if only he kept +cool and collected. If the whole mind of a man was bent on being one thing, +surely no power on earth, certainly not on earth, could for long compel him to +look another, any more (followed the resplendent thought) than vice versa. +</p> + +<p> +That, in fact, was the trick that had been in fitful fashion played him since +yesterday. Obviously, and apart altogether from his promise to Sheila, the best +possible thing he could do would be to walk quietly over to Widderstone +to-morrow and like a child that has lost a penny, just make the attempt to +reverse the process: look at the graves, read the inscriptions on the +weather-beaten stones, compose himself once more to sleep on the little seat. +</p> + +<p> +Magic, witchcraft, possession, and all that—well, Mr Bethany might prefer to +take it on the authority of the Bible if it was his duty. But it was at least +mainly Old Testament stuff, like polygamy, Joshua, and the ‘unclean beasts.’ +The ‘unclean beasts.’ It was simply, as Simon had said, mainly an affair of the +nerves, like Indian jugglery. He had heard of dozens of such cases, or similar +cases. And it was hardly likely that cases even remotely like his own would be +much bragged about, or advertised. All those mysterious ‘disappearances,’ too, +which one reads about so repeatedly? What of them? Even now, he felt (and +glanced swiftly behind him at the fancy), it would be better to think as softly +as possible, not to hope too openly, certainly not to triumph in the least +degree, just in case of—well—listeners. +</p> + +<p> +He would wrap up too. And he wouldn’t tell Sheila of the project till he had +come safely back. What an excellent joke it would be to confess meekly to his +escapade, and to be scolded, and then suddenly to reveal himself. He sat back +and gazed with an almost malignant animosity at the face in the portrait, +comely and plump. +</p> + +<p> +An inarticulate, unfathomable depression rolled back on him, like a mist out of +the sea. He hastily undressed, put watch and door-key and Critchett’s powder +under his pillow, paused, vacantly ruminated, and then replaced the powder in +his waistcoat pocket, said his prayers, and got shivering to bed. He did not +feel hurt at Sheila’s leaving him like this. So long as she really believed in +him. And now—Alice was home. He listened, trying not to shiver, for her voice; +and sometimes heard, he fancied, the clear note. It was this beastly influenza +that made him feel so cold and lifeless. But all would soon come right—that is, +if only that face, luminous against the floating darkness within, would not +appear the instant he closed his eyes. +</p> + +<p> +But legions of dreams are Influenza’s allies. He fell into a chill doze, heard +voices innumerable, and one above the rest, shouting them down, until there +fell a lull. And another, as it were, from afar said quite clearly and +distinctly, ‘But surely, my dear, you have heard the story of the poor old +charwoman who talked Greek in her delirium? A little school French need not +alarm us.’ And Lawford opened his eyes again on Mr Bethany standing at his bed. +</p> + +<p> +‘Tt, tt! There, I’ve been and waked him. And yet they say men make such +excellent nurses in time of war. But you see, Lawford, what did I tell you? +Wasn’t I now an infallible prophet? Your wife has been giving me a most glowing +account. Quite your old self, she tells me, except for just this—this touch of +facial paralysis. And I think, do you know’ (the kind old creature stooped over +the bed, but still, Lawford noticed bitterly, still without his +spectacles)—‘yes, I really think there is a decided improvement. Not quite +so—drawn. We must make haste slowly. Wedderburn, you know, believes profoundly +in Simon; he pulled his wife through a dangerous confinement. And here’s pills +and tonics and liniments—a whole chemist’s shop. Oh, we are getting on +swimmingly.’ +</p> + +<p> +Flamelight was flickering in the candled dusk. Lawford turned his head and saw +Sheila’s coiled, beautiful hair in the firelight. +</p> + +<p> +‘You haven’t told Alice?’ he asked. +</p> + +<p> +‘My dear good man,’ said Mr Bethany, ‘of course we haven’t. You shall tell her +yourself on Monday. What an incredible tradition it will be! But you mustn’t +worry; you mustn’t even think. And no more of these jaunts, eh? That Ferguson +business—that was too bad. What are we going to do with the fellow now we have +created him? He will come home to roost—mark my words. And as likely as not +down the Vicarage chimney. I wouldn’t have believed it of you, my dear fellow.’ +He beamed, but looked, none the less, very lean and fagged and depressed. +</p> + +<p> +‘How did the wedding go off?’ Lawford managed to think of inquiring. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, A1,’ said Mr Bethany. ‘I’ve just been describing it to Alice—the bride, +her bridegroom, mother, aunts, cake, presents, finery, blushes, tears, and +everything that was hers. We’ve been in fits, haven’t we, Mrs Lawford? And +Alice says I’m a Worth in a clerical collar—didn’t she? And that it’s only Art +that has kept me out of an apron. Now look here; quiet, quiet, quiet; no +excitement, no pranks. What is there to worry about, pray? And now Little +Dorrit’s down with influenza too. And Craik and I will have double work to do. +Well, well; good-bye, my dear. God bless you, Lawford. I can’t tell you how +relieved, how unspeakably relieved I am to find you so much—so much better. +Feed him up, my other dear; body and mind and soul and spirit. And there goes +the bell. I must have a biscuit. I’ve swallowed nothing but a Cupid in plaster +of Paris since breakfast. Goodnight; we shall miss you both—both.’ +</p> + +<p> +But when Sheila returned, her husband was sunk again into a quiet sleep, from +which not even the many questions she fretted to put to him seemed weighty +enough to warrant his disturbance. +</p> + +<p> +So when Lawford again opened his eyes he found himself lying wide awake, clear +and refreshed, and eager to get up. But upon the air lay the still hush of +early morning. He tried in vain to catch back sleep again. A distant shred of +dream still floated in his mind, like a cloud at evening. He rarely dreamed, +but certainly something immensely interesting had but a moment ago eluded him. +He sat up and looked at the clear red cinders and their maze of grottoes. He +got out of bed and peeped through the blinds. To the east and opposite to him +gardens and an apple-orchard lay, and there in strange liquid tranquillity hung +the morning star, and rose, rifling into the dusk of night, the first grey of +dawn. The street beneath its autumn leaves was vacant, charmed, deserted. +</p> + +<p> +Hardly since childhood had Lawford seen the dawn unless over his winter +breakfast-table. Very much like a child now he stood gazing out of his +bow-window—the child whom Time’s busy robins had long ago covered over with the +leaves of numberless hours. A vague exultation fumed up into his brain. Still +on the borders of sleep, he unlocked the great wardrobe and took out an old +faded purple and crimson dressing-gown that had belonged to his grandfather, +the chief glory of every Christmas charade. He pulled the cowl-like hood over +his head and strode majestically over to the looking-glass. +</p> + +<p> +He looked in there a moment on the strange face, like a child dismayed at its +own excitement, and a fit of sobbing that was half uncontrollable laughter +swept over him. He threw off the hood and turned once more to the window. +Consciousness had flooded back indeed. What would Sheila have said to see him +there? The unearthly beauty and stillness, and man’s small labours, garden and +wall and roof-tree idle and smokeless in the light of daybreak—there seemed to +be some half-told secret between them. What had life done with him to leave a +reality so clouded? He put on his slippers, and, gently opening the door, crept +with extreme caution up the stairs. At a long, narrow landing window he +confronted a panorama of starry night-gardens, sloping orchards; and beyond +them fields, hills, Orion, the Dogs, in the clear and cloudless darkness. +</p> + +<p> +‘My God, how beautiful!’ a voice whispered. And a cock crowed mistily afar. He +stood staring like a child into the wintry brightness of a pastry-cook’s. Then +once more he crept stealthily on. He stooped and listened at a closed door, +until he fancied that above the beating of his own heart he could hear the +breathing of the sleeper within. Then, taking firm hold of the handle with both +hands, he slowly noiselessly turned it, and peeped in on Alice. +</p> + +<p> +The moon was long past her faint shining here. The blind was down. And yet it +was not pitch dark. He stood with eyes fixed, waiting. Then he edged softly +forward and knelt down beside the bed. He could hear her breathing now: long, +low, quiet, unhastening—the miracle of life. He could just dimly discern the +darkness of her hair against the pillow. Some long-sealed spring of tenderness +seemed to rise in his heart with a grief and an ache he had never known before. +Here at least he could find a little peace, a brief pause, however futile and +stupid all his hopes of the night had been. He leant his head on his hands on +the counterpane and refused to think. He felt a quick tremor, a startled +movement, and knew that eyes wide open with fear were striving to pierce the +gloom between them. +</p> + +<p> +‘There, there, dearest,’ he said in a low whisper, ‘it’s only me, only me.’ He +stroked the narrow hand and gazed into the shadowiness. Her fingers lay quiet +and passive in his, with that strange sense of immateriality that sleep brings +to the body. +</p> + +<p> +‘You, you!’ she answered with a deep sigh. ‘Oh, dearest, how you frightened me. +What is wrong? why have you come? Are you worse, dearest, dearest?’ +</p> + +<p> +He kissed her hand. ‘No, Alice, not worse. I couldn’t sleep, that was all.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, and I came so utterly miserable to bed because you would not see me. And +Mother would tell me only so very little. I didn’t even know you had been ill.’ +She pressed his hand between her own. ‘But this, you know, is very, very +naughty—you will catch cold, you bad thing. What <i>would</i> Mother say?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I think we mustn’t tell her, dear. I couldn’t help it; I felt much I wanted to +see you. I have been rather miserable.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Why?’ she said, stroking his hand from wrist to fingertips with one soft +finger. ‘You mustn’t be miserable. You and me have never done such a thing +before; have we? Was it that wretched old Flu?’ +</p> + +<p> +It was too dark in the little fragrant room even to see her face so close to +his own. And yet he feared. ‘Dr Simon,’ she went on softly, ‘said it was. But +isn’t your voice a little hoarse, and it sounds so melancholy in the dark. And +oh’—she squeezed his wrist—‘you have grown so thin! You do frighten me. +Whatever should I do if you were really ill? And it was so odd, dear. When +first I woke I seemed to be still straining my eyes in a dream, at such a +curious, haunting face—not very nice. I am glad, I am glad you were here.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What was the dream-face like?’ came the muttered question. +</p> + +<p> +‘Dark and sharp, and rather dwelling eyes; you know those long faces one sees +in dreams: like a hawk, like a conjuror’s.’ +</p> + +<p> +Like a conjuror’s!—it was the first unguarded and ungarbled criticism. +‘Perhaps, dear, if you find my voice different, and my hand shrunk up, you will +find my face changed, too—like a conjuror’s.... What then?’ +</p> + +<p> +She laughed gaily and tenderly. ‘You silly silly; I should love you more than +ever. Your hands are icy cold. I can’t warm them nohow.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford held tight his daughter’s hand. ‘You do love me, Alice? You would not +turn against me, whatever happened? Ah, you shall see, you shall see.’ A sudden +burning hope sprang up in him. Surely when all was well again, these last few +hours would not have been spent in vain. Like the shadow of death they had +been, against whose darkness the green familiar earth seems beautiful as the +plains of paradise. Had he but realized before how much he loved her—what years +of life had been wasted in leaving it all unsaid! He came back from his reverie +to find his hand wet with her tears. He stroked her hair, and touched gently +her eyelids without speaking. +</p> + +<p> +‘You will let me come in to-morrow?’ she pleaded; ‘you won’t keep me out?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, but, dear, you must remember your mother. She gets so anxious, and every +word the doctor says is law. How would you like me to come again like this, +perhaps?—like Santa Claus?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You know how I love having you,’ she said, and stopped. ‘But—but...’ He leaned +closer. ‘Yes, yes, come,’ she said, clutching his hand and hiding her eyes; ‘it +is only my dream—that horrible, dwelling face in the dream; it frightened me +so.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford rose very slowly from his knees. He could feel in the dark his brows +drawn down; there came a low, sullen beating on his ear; he saw his face as it +were in dim outline against the dark. Rage and rebellion surged up in him; even +his love could be turned to bitterness. Well, two could play at any game! Alice +sprang up in bed and caught his sleeve. ‘Dearest, dearest, you must not be +angry with me now!’ +</p> + +<p> +He flung himself down beside the bed. Anger, resentment died away. ‘You are all +I have left,’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +He stole back, as he had come, in the clear dawn to his bedroom. +</p> + +<p> +It was not five yet. He put a few more coals on his fire and blew out the +night-light, and lay down. But it was impossible to rest, to remain inactive. +He would go down and search for that first volume of Quain. Hallucination, +Influenza, Insanity—why, Sheila must have purposely mislaid it. A rather +formidable figure he looked, descending the stairs in the grey dusk of +daybreak. The breakfast-room was at the back of the house. He tilted the blind, +and a faint light flowed in from the changing colours of the sky. He opened the +glass door of the little bookcase to the right of the window, and ran eye and +finger over the few rows of books. But as he stood there with his back to the +room, just as the shadow of a bird’s wing floats across the moonlight of a +pool, he became suddenly conscious that something, somebody had passed across +the doorway, and in passing had looked in on him. +</p> + +<p> +He stood motionless, listening; but no sound broke the morning slumbrousness, +except the faraway warbling of a thrush in the first light. So sudden and +transitory had been the experience that it seemed now to be illusory; yet it +had so caught him up, it had with so furtive and sinister a quietness broken in +on his solitude, that for a moment he dared not move. A cold, indefinite +sensation stole over him that he was being watched; that some dim, evil +presence was behind him biding its time, patient and stealthy, with eyes fixed +unmovingly on him where he stood. But, watch and wait as silently as he might, +only the day broadened at the window, and at last a narrow ray of sunlight +stole trembling up into the dusky bowl of the sky. +</p> + +<p> +At any rate Quain was found, with all the ills of life, from A to I; and +Lawford turned back to his bondage with the book under his arm. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap08"></a> +CHAPTER EIGHT</h2> + +<p> +The Sabbath, pale with September sunshine, and monotonous with chiming bells, +had passed languidly away. Dr Simon had come and gone, optimistic and urbane, +yet with a faint inward dissatisfaction over a patient behind whose taciturnity +a hint of mockery and subterfuge seemed to lurk. Even Mrs Lawford had appeared +to share her husband’s reticence. But Dr Simon had happened on other cases in +his experience where tact was required rather than skill, and time than +medicine. +</p> + +<p> +The voices and footsteps, even the <i lang="fr">frou-frou</i> of worshippers +going to church, the voices and footsteps of worshippers returning from church, +had floated up to the patient’s open window. Sunlight had drawn across his room +in one pale beam, and vanished. A few callers had called. Hothouse flowers, +waxen and pale, had been left with messages of sympathy. Even Dr Critchett had +respectfully and discreetly made inquiries on his way home from chapel. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford had spent most of his time in pacing to and fro in his soft slippers. +The very monotony had eased his mind. Now and again he had lain motionless, +with his face to the ceiling. He had dozed and had awakened, cold and torpid +with dream. He had hardly been aware of the process, but every hour had done +something, it seemed, towards clarifying his point of view. A consciousness had +begun to stir in him that was neither that of the old, easy Lawford, whom he +had never been fully aware of before, nor of this strange ghostly intelligence +that haunted the hawklike, restless face, and plucked so insistently at his +distracted nerves. He had begun in a vague fashion to be aware of them both, +could in a fashion discriminate between them, almost as if there really were +two spirits in stubborn conflict within him. It would, of course, wear him down +in time. There could be only one end to such a struggle—<i>the</i> end. +</p> + +<p> +All day he had longed for freedom, on and on, with craving for the open sky, +for solitude, for green silence, beyond these maddening walls. This heedful +silken coming and going, these Sunday voices, this reiterant yelp of a single +peevish bell—would they never cease? And above all, betwixt dread and an almost +physical greed, he hungered for night. He sat down with elbows on knees and +head on his hands, thinking of night, its secrecy, its immeasurable solitude. +</p> + +<p> +His eyelids twitched; the fire before him had for an instant gone black out. He +seemed to see slow-gesturing branches, grass stooping beneath a grey and +wind-swept sky. He started up; and the remembrance of the morning returned to +him—the glassy light, the changing rays, the beaming gilt upon the useless +books. Now, at last, at the windows; afternoon had begun to wane. And when +Sheila brought up his tea, as if Chance had heard his cry, she entered in hat +and stole. She put down the tray, and paused at the glass, looking across it +out of the window. +</p> + +<p> +‘Alice says you are to eat every one of those delicious sandwiches, and +especially the tiny omelette. You have scarcely touched anything to-day, +Arthur. I am a poor one to preach, I am afraid; but you know what that will +mean—a worse breakdown still. You really must try to think of—of us all.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Are you going to church?’ he asked in a low voice. +</p> + +<p> +‘Not, of course, if you would prefer not. But Dr Simon advised me most +particularly to go out at least once a day. We must remember, this is not the +beginning of your illness. Long-continued anxiety, I suppose, does tell on one +in time. Anyhow, he said that I looked worried and run-down. I <i>am</i> +worried. Let us both try for each other’s sakes, or even if only for Alice’s, +to—to do all we can. I must not harass you; but is there any—do you see the +slightest change of any kind?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You always look pretty, Sheila; to-night you look prettier: <i>that</i> is the +only change, I think.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lawford’s attitude intensified in its stillness. ‘Now, speaking quite +frankly, what is it in you suggests these remarks at such a time? That’s what +baffles me. It seems so childish, so needlessly blind.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I am very sorry, Sheila, to be so childish. But I’m not, say what you like, +blind. You <i>are</i> pretty: I’d repeat it if I was burning at the stake.’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila lowered her eyes softly on to the rich-toned picture in the glass. +‘Supposing,’ she said, watching her lips move, ‘supposing—of course, I know you +are getting better and all that—but supposing you don’t change back as Mr +Bethany thinks, what will you do? Honestly, Arthur, when I think over it +calmly, the whole tragedy comes back on me with such a force it sweeps me off +my feet; I am for the moment scarcely my own mistress. What would you do?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I think, Sheila,’ replied a low, infinitely weary voice, ‘I think I should +marry again.’ It was the same wavering, faintly ironical voice that had +slightly discomposed Dr Simon that same morning. +</p> + +<p> +‘“Marry again”!’ exclaimed incredulously the full lips in the looking-glass. +‘Who?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘<i>You</i>, dear!’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila turned softly round, conscious in a most humiliating manner that she had +ever so little flushed. +</p> + +<p> +Her husband was pouring out his tea, unaware, apparently, of her change of +position. She watched him curiously. In spite of all her reason, of her +absolute certainty, she wondered even again for a moment if this really could +be Arthur. And for the first time she realised the power and mastery of that +eager and far too hungry face. Her mind seemed to pause, fluttering in air, +like a bird in the wind. She hastened rather unsteadily to the door. +</p> + +<p> +‘Will you want anything more, do you think, for an hour?’ she asked. +</p> + +<p> +Her husband looked up over his little table. ‘Is Alice going with you?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh yes; poor child, she looks so pale and miserable. We are going to Mrs +Sherwin’s, and then on to Church. You will lock your door?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, I will lock my door.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And I do hope Arthur—nothing rash!’ +</p> + +<p> +A change, that seemed almost the effect of actual shadow, came over his face. +‘I wish you could stay with me,’ he said slowly. ‘I don’t think you have any +idea what—what I go through.’ +</p> + +<p> +It was as if a child had asked on the verge of terror for a candle in the dark. +But an hour’s terror is better than a lifetime of timidity. Sheila sighed. +</p> + +<p> +‘I think,’ she said, ‘I too might say that. But there; giving way will do +nothing for either of us. I shall be gone only for an hour, or two at the most. +And I told Mr Bethany I should have to come out before the sermon: it’s only Mr +Craik.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But why Mrs Sherwin? She’d worm a secret out of one’s grave.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It’s useless to discuss that, Arthur; you have always consistently disliked my +friends. It’s scarcely likely that you would find any improvement in them now.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, well—’ he began. But the door was already closed. +</p> + +<p> +‘Sheila!’ he called in a burst of anger. +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, Arthur?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You have taken my latchkey.’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila came hastily in again. ‘Your latchkey?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I am going out.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“Going out!”—you will not be so mad, so criminal; and after your promise!’ +</p> + +<p> +He stood up. ‘It is useless to argue. If I do not go out, I shall certainly go +mad. As for criminal—why, that’s a woman’s word. Who on earth is to know me?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It is of no consequence, then, that the servants are already gossiping about +this impossible Dr Ferguson; that you are certain to be seen either going or +returning; that Alice is bound to discover that you are well enough to go out, +and yet not even enough to say good-night to your own daughter—oh, it’s +monstrous, it’s a frantic, a heartless thing to do!’ Her voice vaguely +suggested tears. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford eyed her coldly and stubbornly—thinking of the empty room he would +leave awaiting his return, its lamp burning, its fire-flames shining. It was +almost a physical discomfort, this longing unspeakable for the twilight, the +green secrecy and the silence of the graves. ‘Keep them out of the way,’ he +said in a low voice; ‘it will be dark when I come in.’ His hardened face lit +up. ‘It’s useless to attempt to dissuade me.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Why must you always be hurting me? why do you seem to delight in trying to +estrange me?’ Husband and wife faced each other across the clear-lit room. He +did not answer. +</p> + +<p> +‘For the last time,’ she said in a quiet, hard voice, ‘I ask you not to go.’ +</p> + +<p> +He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Ask me not to come back,’ he said; ‘that’s nearer +your hope.’ He turned his face to the fire. Without moving he heard her go out, +return, pause, and go out again. And when he deliberately wheeled round in his +chair the little key lay conspicuous there on the counterpane. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap09"></a> +CHAPTER NINE</h2> + +<p> +The last light of sunset lay in the west; and a sullen wrack of cloud was +mounting into the windless sky when Lawford entered the country graveyard again +by its dark weather-worn lych-gate. The old stone church with its square tower +stood amid trees, its eastern window faintly aglow with crimson and purple. He +could hear a steady, rather nasal voice through its open lattices. But the +stooping stones and the cypresses were out of sight of its porch. He would not +be seen down there. He paused a moment, however; his hat was drawn down over +his eyes; he was shivering. Far over the harvest fields showed a growing pallor +in the sky. He would have the moon to go home by. +</p> + +<p> +‘Home!’—these trees, this tongueless companionship, this heavy winelike air, +this soundless turf—these in some obscure desolate fashion seemed far rather +really home. His eyes wandered towards the fading crimson. And with that on his +right hand he began softly, almost on tiptoe, descending the hill. It seemed to +him that the steady eyes of the dead were watching him in his slow progress. +The air was echoing with little faint, clear calls. He turned and snapped his +fingers at a robin that was stalking him with its stony twittering from bush to +bush. +</p> + +<p> +But when after some little time he actually came out of the narrow avenue and +looked down, his heart misgave him, for some one was already sitting there on +his low and solitary seat beneath the cypresses. He stood hesitating, gazing +steadily and yet half vacantly at the motionless figure, and in a while a face +was lifted in his direction, and undisconcerted eyes calmly surveyed him. +</p> + +<p> +‘I am afraid,’ called Lawford rather nervously—‘I hope I am not intruding?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Not at all, not at all,’ said the stranger. ‘I have no privileges here; at +least as yet.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford again hesitated, then slowly advanced. ‘It’s astonishingly quiet and +beautiful,’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +The stranger turned his head to glance over the fields. ‘Yes, it is, very,’ he +replied. There was the faintest accent, a little drawl of unfriendliness in the +remark. +</p> + +<p> +‘You often sit here?’ Lawford persisted. +</p> + +<p> +The stranger raised his eyebrows. ‘Oh yes, often.’ He smiled. ‘It is my own +modest fashion of attending divine service. The congregation is rapt.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘<i>My</i> visits,’ said Lawford, ‘have been very few—in fact, so far as I +know, I have only once been here before.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I envy you the novelty.’ There was again the same faint unmistakable +antagonism in voice and attitude; and yet so deep was the relief in talking to +a fellow creature who hadn’t the least suspicion of anything unusual in his +appearance that Lawford was extremely disinclined to turn back. He made another +effort—for conversation with strangers had always been a difficulty to him—and +advanced towards the seat. ‘You mustn’t please let me intrude upon you,’ he +said, ‘but really I am very interested in this queer old place. Perhaps you +would tell me something of its history?’ He sat down. His companion moved +slowly to the other side of the broken gravestone. +</p> + +<p> +‘To tell you the truth,’ he replied, picking his way as it were from word to +word, ‘it’s “history,” as people call it, does not interest me in the least. +After all, it’s not <i>when</i> a thing is, but <i>what</i> it is, that much +matters. What this is’—he glanced, with head bent, across the shadowy stones, +‘is pretty evident. Of course, age has its charms.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And is this very old?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh yes, it’s old right enough, as things go; but even age, perhaps, is mainly +an affair of the imagination. There’s a tombstone near that little old +hawthorn, and there are two others side by side under the wall, still even +legibly late seventeenth century. That’s pretty good weathering.’ He smiled +faintly. ‘Of course, the church itself is centuries older, drenched with age. +But she’s still sleep-walking while these old tombstones dream. Glow-worms and +crickets are not such bad bedfellows.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What interested me most, I think,’ said Lawford haltingly, ‘was this.’ He +pointed with his stick to the grave at his feet. +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, yes, Sabathier’s,’ said the stranger; ‘I know his peculiar history almost +by heart.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford found himself staring with unusual concentration into the rather long +and pale face. ‘Not, I suppose,’ he resumed faintly—‘not, I suppose, beyond +what’s there.’ +</p> + +<p> +His companion leant his hand on the old stooping tombstone. ‘Well, you know, +there’s a good deal there’—he stooped over—‘if you read between the lines. Even +if you don’t.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘A suicide,’ said Lawford, under his breath. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, a suicide; that’s why our Christian countrymen have buried him outside of +the fold. Dead or alive, they try to keep the wolf out.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Is this, then, unconsecrated ground?’ said Lawford. +</p> + +<p> +‘Haven’t you noticed,’ drawled the other, ‘how green the grass grows down here, +and how very sharp are poor old Sabathier’s thorns? Besides, he was a stranger, +and they—kept him out.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But, surely,’ said Lawford, ‘was it so entirely a matter of choice—the laws of +the Church? If he did kill himself, he did.’ +</p> + +<p> +The stranger turned with a little shrug. ‘I don’t suppose it’s a matter of much +consequence to <i>him</i>. I fancied I was his only friend. May I venture to +ask why you are interested in the poor old thing?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford’s mind was as calm and shallow as a millpond. ‘Oh, a rather unusual +thing happened to me here,’ he said. ‘You say you often come?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Often,’ said the stranger rather curtly. +</p> + +<p> +‘Has anything—ever—occurred?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“Occurred?”’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘I wish it had. I come here simply, as I +have said, because it’s quiet; because I prefer the company of those who never +answer me back, and who do not so much as condescend to pay me the least +attention.’ He smiled and turned his face towards the quiet fields. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford, after a long pause, lifted his eyes. ‘Do you think,’ he said softly, +‘it is possible one ever could?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“One ever could?”’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Answer back?’ +</p> + +<p> +There was a low rotting wall of stone encompassing Sabathier’s grave; on this +the stranger sat down. He glanced up rather curiously at his companion. ‘Seldom +the time and the place and the <i>revenant</i> altogether. The thought has +occurred to others,’ he ventured to add. +</p> + +<p> +‘Of course, of course,’ said Lawford eagerly. ‘But it is an absolutely new one +to me. I don’t mean that I have never had such an idea, just in one’s own +superficial way; but’—he paused and glanced swiftly into the fast-thickening +twilight—‘I wonder: are they, do you think, really, all quite dead?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Call and see!’ taunted the stranger softly. +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, yes, I know,’ said Lawford. ‘But I believe in the resurrection of the +body; that is what we say; and supposing, when a man dies—supposing it was most +frightfully against one’s will; that one hated the awful inaction that death +brings, shutting a poor devil up like a child kicking against the door in a +dark cupboard; one might surely one might—just quietly, you know, try to get +out? wouldn’t you?’ he added. +</p> + +<p> +‘And, surely,’ he found himself beginning gently to argue again, ‘surely, what +about, say, him?’ He nodded towards the old and broken grave that lay between +them. +</p> + +<p> +‘What, Sabathier?’ the other echoed, laying his hand upon the stone. +</p> + +<p> +And a sheer enormous abyss of silence seemed to follow the unanswerable +question. +</p> + +<p> +‘He was a stranger; it says so. Good God!’ said Lawford, ‘how he must have +wanted to get home! He killed himself, poor wretch, think of the fret and fever +he must have been in—just before. Imagine it.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But it might, you know,’ suggested the other with a smile—‘might have been +sheer indifference.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“Nicholas Sabathier, Stranger to this parish”—no, no,’ said Lawford, his heart +beating as if it would choke him, ‘I don’t fancy it was indifference.’ +</p> + +<p> +It was almost too dark now to distinguish the stranger’s features but there +seemed a faint suggestion of irony in his voice. ‘And how do you suppose your +angry naughty child would set about it? It’s narrow quarters; how would he +begin?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford sat quite still. ‘You say—I hope I am not detaining you—you say you +have come here, sat here often, on this very seat; have you ever had—have you +ever fallen asleep here?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Why do you ask?’ inquired the other curiously. +</p> + +<p> +‘I was only wondering,’ said Lawford. He was cold and shivering. He felt +instinctively it was madness to sit on here in the thin gliding mist that had +gathered in swathes above the grass, milk-pale in the rising moon. The stranger +turned away from him. +</p> + +<p> +‘“For in that sleep of death what dreams may come must give us pause,”’ he said +slowly, with a little satirical catch on the last word. ‘What did <i>you</i> +dream?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford glanced helplessly about him. The moon cast lean grey beams of light +between the cypresses. But to his wide and wandering eyes it seemed that a +radiance other than hers haunted these mounds and leaning stones. ‘Have you +ever noticed it?’ he said, putting out his hand towards his unknown companion; +‘this stone is cracked from head to foot?... But there’—he rose stiff and +chilled—‘I am afraid I have bored you with my company. You came here for +solitude, and I have been trying to convince you that we are surrounded with +witnesses. You will forgive my intrusion?’ There was a kind of old-fashioned +courtesy in his manner that he himself was dimly aware of. He held out his +hand. +</p> + +<p> +‘I hope you will think nothing of the kind,’ said the other earnestly; ‘how +could it be in any sense an intrusion? It’s the old story of Bluebeard. And I +confess I too should very much like a peep into his cupboard. Who wouldn’t? But +there, it’s merely a matter of time, I suppose.’ He paused, and together they +slowly ascended the path already glimmering with a heavy dew. At the porch they +paused once more. And now it was the stranger that held out his hand. +</p> + +<p> +‘Perhaps,’ he said, ‘you will give me the pleasure of some day continuing our +talk. As for our friend below, it so happens that I <i>have</i> managed to pick +up a little more of his history than the sexton seems to have heard of—if you +would care some time or other to share it. I live only at the foot of the hill, +not half a mile distant. Perhaps you could spare the time now?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford took out his watch, ‘You are really very kind,’ he said. ‘But, +perhaps—well, whatever that history may be, I think you would agree that mine +is even—but, there, I’ve talked too much about myself already. Perhaps +to-morrow?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Why, to-morrow, then,’ said his companion. ‘It’s a flat wooden house, on the +left-hand side. Come at any time of the evening’; he paused again and +smiled—‘the third house after the Rectory, which is marked up on the gate. My +name is Herbert—Herbert Herbert to be precise.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford took out his pocket-book and a card. ‘Mine,’ he said, handing it +gravely to his companion. ‘is Lawford—at least...’ It was really the first time +that either had seen the other’s face at close quarters and clear-lit; and on +Lawford’s a moon almost at the full shone dazzlingly. He saw an +expression—dismay, incredulity, overwhelming astonishment—start suddenly into +the dark, rather indifferent eyes. +</p> + +<p> +‘What is it?’ he cried, hastily stooping close. +</p> + +<p> +‘Why,’ said the other, laughing and turning away, ‘I think the moon must have +bewitched me too.’ +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap10"></a> +CHAPTER TEN</h2> + +<p> +Lawford listened awhile before opening his door. He heard voices in the +dining-room. A light shone faintly between the blinds of his bedroom. He very +gently let himself in, and unheard, unseen, mounted the stairs. He sat down in +front of the fire, tired out and bitterly cold in spite of his long walk home. +But his mind was wearier even than his body. He tried in vain to catch up the +thread of his thoughts. He only knew for certain that so far as his first hope +and motives had gone his errand had proved entirely futile. ‘How could I +possibly fall asleep with that fellow talking there?’ he had said to himself +angrily; yet knew in his heart that their talk had driven every other idea out +of his mind. He had not yet even glanced into the glass. His every thought was +vainly wandering round and round the one curious hint that had drifted in, but +which he had not yet been able to put into words. +</p> + +<p> +Supposing, though, that he had really fallen into a deep sleep, with none to +watch or spy—what then? However ridiculous that idea, it was not more +ridiculous, more incredible than the actual fact. If he had remained there, he +might, it was just possible that he would by now, have actually awakened just +his own familiar every-day self again. And the thought of that—though he hardly +realised its full import—actually did send him on tip-toe for a glance that +more or less effectually set the question at rest. And there looked out at him, +it seemed, the same dark sallow face that had so much appalled him only two +nights ago—expressionless, cadaverous, with shadowy hollows beneath the +glittering eyes. And even as he watched it, its lips, of their own volition, +drew together and questioned him—‘Whose?’ +</p> + +<p> +He was not to be given much leisure, however, for fantastic reveries like this. +As he leaned his head on his hands, gladly conscious that he could not possibly +bear this incessant strain for long, Sheila opened the door. He started up. +</p> + +<p> +‘I wish you would knock,’ he said angrily; ‘you talk of quiet; you tell me to +rest, and think; and here you come creeping and spying on me as if I was a +child in a nursery. I refuse to be watched and guarded and peeped on like +this.’ He knew that his hands were trembling, that he could not keep his eyes +fixed, that his voice was nearly inarticulate. +</p> + +<p> +Sheila drew in her lips. ‘I have merely come to tell you, Arthur, that Mr +Bethany has brought Mr Danton in to supper. He agrees with me it really would +be advisable to take such a very old and prudent and practical friend into our +confidence. You do nothing I ask of you. I simply cannot bear the burden of +this incessant anxiety. Look, now, what your night walk has done for you! You +look positively at death’s door.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What—what an instinct you have for the right word,’ said Lawford softly. ‘And +Danton, of all people in the world! It was surely rather a curious, a +thoughtless choice. Has he had supper?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Why do you ask?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘He won’t believe: too—bloated.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I think,’ said Sheila indignantly, ‘it is hardly fair to speak of a very old +and a very true friend of mine in such—well, vulgar terms as that. Besides, +Arthur, as for believing—without in the least desiring to hurt your feelings—I +must candidly warn you, some people won’t.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Come along,’ said Lawford, with a faint gust of laughter; ‘let’s see.’ +</p> + +<p> +They went quickly downstairs, Sheila with less dignity, perhaps, than she had +been surprised into since she had left a slimmer girlhood behind. She swept +into the gaze of the two gentlemen standing together on the hearthrug; and so +was caught, as it were, between a rain of conflicting glances, for her husband +had followed instantly, and stood now behind her, stooping a little, and with +something between contempt and defiance confronting an old fat friend, whom +that one brief challenging instant had congealed into a condition of passive +and immovable hostility. +</p> + +<p> +Mr Danton composed his chin in his collar, and deliberately turned himself +towards his companion. His small eyes wandered, and instantaneously met and +rested on those of Mrs Lawford. +</p> + +<p> +‘Arthur thought he would prefer to come down and see you himself.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You take such formidable risks, Lawford,’ said Mr Bethany in a dry, difficult +voice. +</p> + +<p> +‘Am I really to believe,’ Danton began huskily. ‘I am sure, Bethany, you +will—My dear Mrs Lawford!’ said he, stirring vaguely, glancing restlessly. +</p> + +<p> +‘It was not my wish, Vicar, to come at all,’ said a voice from the doorway. ‘To +tell you the truth, I am too tired to care a jot either way. And’—he lifted a +long arm—‘I must positively refuse to produce the least, the remotest proof +that I am not, so far as I am personally aware, even the Man in the Moon. +Danton at heart was always an incorrigible sceptic. Aren’t you, T. D.? You +pride your dear old brawn on it in secret?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I really—’ began Danton in a rich still voice. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, but you know you are,’ drawled on the slightly hesitating long-drawn +syllables; ‘it’s your parochial <i lang="fr">métier</i>. Firm, unctuous, +subtle, scepticism; and to that end your body flourishes. You were born fat; +you became fat; and fat, my dear Danton, has been deliberately thrust on you—in +layers! Lampreys! You’ll perish of surfeit some day, of sheer Dantonism. And +fat, postmortem, Danton. Oh, what a basting’s there!’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany, with a convulsive effort, woke. He turned swiftly on Mrs Lawford. +‘Why, why, could you not have seen?’ he cried. +</p> + +<p> +‘It’s no good, Vicar. She’s all sheer Laodicean. Blow hot, blow cold. North, +south, east, west—to have a weathercock for a wife is to marry the wind. +There’s nothing to be got from poor Sheila but...’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Lawford!’ the little man’s voice was as sharp as the crack of a whip; ‘I +forbid it. Do you hear me? I forbid it. Some self-command; my dear good fellow, +remember, remember it’s only the will, the will that keeps us breathing.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford peered as if out of a gathering dusk, that thickened and flickered with +shadows before his eyes. ‘What’s he mean, then,’ he muttered huskily, ‘coming +here with his black, still carcase—peeping, peeping—what’s he mean, I say?’ +There was a moment’s silence. Then with lifted brows and wide eyes that to +every one of his three witnesses left an indelible memory of clear and wolfish +light within their glassy pupils, he turned heavily, and climbed back to his +solitude. +</p> + +<p> +‘I suppose,’ began Danton, with an obvious effort to disentangle himself from +the humiliation of the moment, ‘I suppose he was—wandering?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Bless me, yes,’ said Mr Bethany cordially—‘fever. We all know what that +means.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ said Danton, taking refuge in Mrs Lawford’s white and intent gaze. +</p> + +<p> +‘Just think, think, Danton—the awful, incessant strain of such an ordeal. Think +for an instant what such a thing <i>means</i>!’ +</p> + +<p> +Danton inserted a plump, white finger between collar and chin. ‘Oh yes. +But—eh?—needlessly abusive? I never <i>said</i> I disbelieved him.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Do you?’ said Mrs Lawford’s voice. +</p> + +<p> +He poised himself, as if it were, on the monolithic stability of his legs. +‘Eh?’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany sat down at the table. ‘I rather feared some such temporary +breakdown as this, Danton. I think I foresaw it. And now, just while we are all +three alone here together in friendly conclave, wouldn’t it be as well, don’t +you think, to confront ourselves with the difficulties? I know—we all know, +that that poor half-demented creature <i>is</i> Arthur Lawford. This morning he +was as sane, as lucid as I hope I am now. An awful calamity has suddenly fallen +upon him—this change. I own frankly at the first sheer shock it staggered me as +I think for the moment it has staggered you. But when I had seen the poor +fellow face to face, heard him talk, and watched him there upstairs in the +silence stir and awake and come up again to his trouble out of his sleep. I had +no more doubt in my own mind and heart that he was he than I have in my mind +that I—am I. We do in some mysterious way, you’ll own at once, grow so +accustomed, so inured, if you like, to each other’s faces (masks though they +be) that we hardly realise we see them when we are speaking together. And yet +the slightest, the most infinitesimal change is instantly apparent.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh yes, Vicar; but you see—’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany raised a small lean hand: ‘One moment, please. I have heard +Lawford’s own account. Conscious or unconscious, he has been through some +terrific strain, some such awful conflict with the unseen powers that we—thank +God!—have only read about, and never perhaps, until death is upon us, shall +witness for ourselves. What more likely, more inevitable than that such a thing +should leave its scar, its cloud, its masking shadow?—call it what you will. A +smile can turn a face we dread into a face we’d die for. Some experience, which +would be nothing but a hideous cruelty and outrage to ask too closely +about—one, perhaps, which he could, even if he would, poor fellow, give no +account of—has put him temporarily at the world’s mercy. They made him a nine +days’ wonder, a byword. And that, my dear Danton, is just where we come in. We +know the man himself; and it is to be our privilege to act as a buffer-state, +to be intermediaries between him and the rest of this deadly, craving, sheepish +world—for the time being; oh yes, just for the time being. Other and keener and +more knowledgeable minds than mine or yours will some day bring him back to us +again. We don’t attempt to explain; we can’t. We simply believe.’ +</p> + +<p> +But Danton merely continued to stare, as if into the quiet of an aquarium. +</p> + +<p> +‘My dear good Danton,’ persisted Mr Bethany with cherubic patience, ‘how old +are you?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I don’t see quite...’ smiled Danton with recovered ease, and rapidly +mobilising forces. ‘Excuse the confidence, Mrs Lawford, I’m forty-three.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Good,’ said Mr Bethany; ‘and I’m seventy-one, and this child here’—he pointed +an accusing finger at Sheila—is youth perpetual. So,’ he briskly brightened, +‘say, between us we’re six score all told. Are we—can <i>we</i>, deliberately, +with this mere pinch of years at our command out of the wheeling millions that +have gone—can we say, “This is impossible,” to any single phenomenon? +<i>Can</i> we?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No, we can’t, of course,’ said Danton formidably. ‘Not finally. That’s all +very well, but’—he paused, and nodded, nodding his round head upward as if +towards the inaudible overhead, ‘I suppose he can’t <i>hear?</i>’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany rose cheerfully. ‘All right, Danton; I am afraid you are exactly +what the poor fellow in his delirium solemnly asseverated. And, jesting apart, +it is in delirium that we tell our sheer, plain, unadulterated truth: you’re a +nicely covered sceptic. Personally, I refuse to discuss the matter. Mere dull, +stubborn prejudice; bigotry, if you like. I will only remark just this—that Mrs +Lawford and I, in our inmost hearts, <i>know</i>. You, my dear Danton, forgive +the freedom, merely incredulously grope. Faith versus Reason—that prehistoric +Armageddon. Some day, and a day not far distant either, Lawford will come back +to us. This—this shutter will be taken down as abruptly as by some +inconceivably drowsy heedlessness of common Nature it has been put up. He’ll +win through; and of his own sheer will and courage. But now, because I ask it, +and this poor child here entreats it, you will say nothing to a living soul +about the matter, say, till Friday? What step-by-step creatures we are, to be +sure! I say Friday because it will be exactly a week then. And what’s a +week?—to Nature scarcely the unfolding of a rose. But still, Friday be it. +Then, if nothing has occurred, we will, we shall <i>have</i> to call a friendly +gathering, we shall be compelled to have a friendly consultation.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I’m not, I hope, a brute, Bethany,’ said Danton apologetically; ‘but, +honestly, speaking for myself, simply as a man of the world, it’s a big risk to +be taking on—what shall we call it?—on mere intuition. Personally, and even in +a court of law—though Heaven forbid it ever reaches that stage—personally, I +could swear that the fellow that stood abusing me there, in that revolting +fashion, was not Lawford. It would be easier even to believe in him, if there +were not that—that glaze, that shocking simulation of the man himself, the very +man. But then, I am a sceptic; I own it. And ‘pon my word, Mrs Lawford, there’s +plenty of room for sceptics in a world like this.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Very well,’ said Mr Bethany crisply, ‘that’s settled, then. With your +permission, my dear,’ he added, turning untarnishably clear childlike eyes on +Sheila, ‘I will take all risks—even to the foot of the gibbet: accessory, +Danton, <i>after</i> the fact.’ And so direct and cloudless was his gaze that +Sheila tried in vain to evade it and to catch a glimpse of Danton’s small +agate-like eyes, now completely under mastery, and awaiting confidently the +meeting with her own. +</p> + +<p> +‘Of course,’ she said, ‘I am entirely in your hands, dear Mr Bethany.’ +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap11"></a> +CHAPTER ELEVEN</h2> + +<p> +Lawford slept far into the cloudy Monday morning, to wake steeped in sleep, +lethargic, and fretfully haunted by inconclusive remembrances of the night +before. When Sheila, with obvious and capacious composure, brought him his +breakfast tray, he watched her face for some time without speaking. +</p> + +<p> +‘Sheila,’ he began, as she was about to leave the room again. +</p> + +<p> +She paused, smiling. +</p> + +<p> +‘Did anything happen last night? Would you mind telling me, Sheila? Who was it +was here?’ +</p> + +<p> +Her lids the least bit narrowed. ‘Certainly, Arthur; Mr Danton was here.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Then it was not a dream?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh no,’ said Sheila. +</p> + +<p> +‘What did I say? What did <i>he</i> say? It was hopeless, anyhow.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I don’t quite understand what you mean by “hopeless,” Arthur. And must I +answer the other questions?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford drew his hand over his face, like a tired child. ‘He didn’t—believe?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No, dear,’ said Sheila softly. +</p> + +<p> +‘And you, Sheila?’ came the subdued voice. +</p> + +<p> +Sheila crossed slowly to the window. ‘Well, quite honestly, Arthur, I was not +very much surprised. Whatever we are agreed about on the whole, you were +scarcely yourself last night.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford shut his eyes, and re-opened them full on his wife’s calm scrutiny, who +had in that moment turned in the light of the one drawn blind to face him +again. +</p> + +<p> +‘Who is? Always?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No,’ said Sheila; ‘but—it was at least unfortunate. We can’t, I suppose, rely +on Dr Bethany alone.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford crouched over his food. ‘Will he blab?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Blab! Mr Danton is a gentleman, Arthur.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford rolled his eyes as if in temporary vertigo. ‘Yes,’ he said. And Sheila +once more prepared to make a reposeful exit. +</p> + +<p> +‘I don’t think I can see Simon this morning.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh. Who, then?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I mean I would prefer to be left alone.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Believe me, I had no intention to intrude.’ And this time the door really +closed. +</p> + +<p> +‘He is in a quiet, soothing sleep,’ said Sheila a few minutes later. +</p> + +<p> +‘Nothing could be better,’ said Dr Simon; and Lawford, to his inexpressible +relief, heard the fevered throbbing of the doctor’s car reverse, and turned +over and shut his eyes, dulled and exhausted in the still unfriendliness of the +vacant room. His spirits had sunk, he thought, to their lowest ebb. He scarcely +heeded the fragments of dreams—clear, green landscapes, amazing gleams of +peace, the sudden broken voices, the rustling and calling shadowiness of +subconsciousness—in this quiet sunlight of reality. The clouds had broken, or +had been withdrawn like a veil from the October skies. One thought alone was +his refuge; one face alone haunted him with its peace; one remembrance soothed +him—Alice. Through all his scattered and purposeless arguments he strove to +remember her voice, the loving-kindness of her eyes, her untroubled confidence. +</p> + +<p> +In the afternoon he got up and dressed himself. He could not bring himself to +stand before the glass and deliberately shave. He even smiled at the thought of +playing the barber to that lean chin. He dressed by the fireplace. +</p> + +<p> +‘I couldn’t rest,’ he told Sheila, when she presently came in on one of her +quiet, cautious, heedful visits; ‘and one tires of reading even Quain in bed.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Have you found anything?’ she inquired politely. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh yes,’ said Lawford wearily; ‘I have discovered that infinitely worse things +are infinitely commoner. But that there’s nothing quite so picturesque.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Tell me,’ said Sheila, with refreshing naivete. ‘How does it feel? does it +even in the slightest degree affect your mind?’ +</p> + +<p> +He turned his back and looked up at his broad gilt portrait for inspiration. +‘Practically, not at all,’ he said hollowly. ‘Of course, one’s nerves—that +fellow Danton—when one’s overtired. You have’—his voice, in spite of every +effort, faintly quavered—‘<i>you</i> haven’t noticed anything? My mind?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Me? Oh dear, no! I never was the least bit observant; you know that, Arthur. +But apart from that, and I hope you will not think me unsympathetic—but don’t +you think we must sooner or later be thinking of what’s to be done? At present, +though I fully agree with Mr Bethany as to the wisdom of hushing this unhappy +business up as long as possible, at least from the gossiping outside world, +still we are only standing still. And your malady, dear, I suppose, isn’t. You +<i>will</i> help me, Arthur? You will try and think? Poor Alice!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What about Alice?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘She mopes, dear, rather. She cannot, of course, quite understand why she must +not see her father, and yet his not being, or, for the matter of that, even if +he was, at death’s door.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘At death’s door,’ murmured Lawford under his breath; ‘who was it was saying +that? Have you ever, Sheila, in a dream, or just as one’s thoughts go +sometimes, seen that door?...its ruinous stone lintel carved into lichenous +stone heads...stonily silent in the last thin sunlight, hanging in peace +unlatched. Heated, hunted, in agony—in that cold, green-clad shadowed porch is +haven and sanctuary....But beyond—O God, beyond!’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila stood listening with startled eyes. ‘And was all that in Quain?’ she +inquired rather flutteringly. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford turned a sidelong head, and looked steadily at his wife. +</p> + +<p> +She shook herself, with a slight shiver. ‘Very well, then,’ she said and paused +in the silence. +</p> + +<p> +Her husband yawned, and smiled, and almost as if lit with that thin last +sunshine seemed the smile that passed for an instant across the reverie of his +shadowy face. He drew a hand wearily over his eyes. ‘What has he been saying +now?’ he inquired like a fretful child. +</p> + +<p> +Sheila stood very quiet and still, as if in fear of scaring some rare, wild, +timid creature by the least stir. ‘Who?’ she merely breathed. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford paused on the hearth-rug with his comb in his hand. ‘It’s just the last +rags of that beastly influenza,’ he said, and began vigorously combing his +hair. And yet, simple and frank though the action was, it moved Sheila, +perhaps, more than any other of the congested occurrences of the last few days. +Her forehead grew suddenly cold, the palms of her hands began to ache, she had +to hasten out of the room to avoid revealing the sheer physical repulsion she +had experienced. +</p> + +<p> +But Lawford, quite unmindful of the shock, continued in a kind of heedless +reverie to watch, as he combed, the still visionary thoughts that passed in +tranced stillness before his eyes. He longed beyond measure for freedom that +until yesterday he had not even dreamed existed outside the covers of some old +impossible romance—the magic of the darkening sky, the invisible flocking +presences of the dead, the shock of imaginations that had no words, of quixotic +emotions which the stranger had stirred in that low, mocking, furtive talk +beside the broken stones of the Huguenot. Was the ‘change’ quite so monstrous, +so meaningless? How often, indeed, he remembered curiously had he seemed to be +standing outside these fast-shut gates of thought, that now had been freely +opened to him. +</p> + +<p> +He drew ajar the door, and leant his ear to listen. From far away came a rich, +long-continued chuckle of laughter, followed by the clatter of a falling plate, +and then, still more uncontrollable laughter. There was a faint smell of toast +on the air. Lawford ventured out on to the landing and into a little room that +had once, in years gone by, been Alice’s nursery. He stood far back from the +strip of open window that showed beneath the green blind, craning forward to +see into the garden—the trees, their knotted trunks, and then, as he stole +nearer, a flower-bed, late roses, geraniums, calceolarias, the lawn and—yes, +three wicker chairs, a footstool, a work-basket, a little table on the smooth +grass in the honey-coloured sunshine; and Sheila sitting there in the autumnal +sunlight, her hands resting on the arms of her chair, her head bent, evidently +deeply engrossed in her thoughts. He crept an inch or two forward, and stooped. +There was a hat on the grass—Alice’s big garden hat—and beside it lay Flitters, +nose on paws, long ears sagging. He had forgotten Flitters. Had Flitters +forgotten him? Would he bark at the strange, distasteful scent of a—Dr +Ferguson? The coast was clear, then. He turned even softlier yet, to confront, +rapt, still, and hovering betwixt astonishment and dread, the blue calm eyes of +his daughter, looking in at the door. It seemed to Lawford as if they had both +been suddenly swept by some unseen power into a still, unearthly silence. +</p> + +<p> +‘We thought,’ he began at last, ‘we thought just to beckon Mrs Lawford from the +window. He—he is asleep.’ +</p> + +<p> +Alice nodded. Her whole face was in a moment flooded with red. It ebbed and +left her pale. ‘I will go down and tell mother you want to see her. It was very +silly of me. I did not quite recognise at first...I suppose, thinking of my +father—’ The words faltered, and the eyes were lifted to his face again with a +desolate, incredulous appeal. Lawford turned away heartsick and trembling. +</p> + +<p> +‘Certainly, certainly, by no means,’ he began, listening vaguely to the glib +patter that seemed to come from another mouth. ‘Your father, my dear young +lady, I venture to think is now really on the road to recovery. Dr Simon makes +excellent progress. But, of course—two heads, we know, are so much better than +one when there’s the least—the least difficulty. The great thing is quiet, +rest, isolation, no possibility of a shock, else—’ His voice fell away, his +eloquence failed. +</p> + +<p> +For Alice stood gazing stirlessly on and on into this infinitely strange, +infinitely familiar shadowy, phantasmal face. ‘Oh yes,’ she replied, ‘I quite +understand, of course; but if I might just peep even, it would—I should be so +much, much happier. Do let me just see him, Dr Ferguson, if only his head on +the pillow! I wouldn’t even breathe. Couldn’t it possibly help—even a +faith-cure?’ She leant forward impulsively, her voice trembling, and her eyes +still shining beneath their faint, melancholy smile. +</p> + +<p> +‘I fear, my dear...it cannot be. He longs to see you. But with his mind, you +know, in this state, it might—?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But mother never told me,’ broke in the girl desperately, ‘there was anything +wrong with his <i>mind</i>. Oh, but that was quite unfair. You don’t mean, you +don’t mean—that—?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford scanned swiftly the little square beloved and memoried room that fate +had suddenly converted for him into a cage of unspeakable pain and longing. ‘Oh +no; believe me, no! Not his brain, not that, not even wandering; really: but +always thinking, always longing on and on for you, dear, only. Quite, quite +master of himself, but—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You talk,’ she broke in again angrily, ‘only in pretence! You are treating me +like a child; and so does mother, and so it has been ever since I came home. +Why, if mother can, and you can, why may not I? Why, if he can walk and talk in +the night....’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But who—who “can walk and talk in the night?”’ inquired a low stealthy voice +out of the quietness behind her. +</p> + +<p> +Alice turned swiftly. Her mother was standing at a little distance, with all +the calm and moveless concentration of a waxwork figure, looking up at her from +the staircase. +</p> + +<p> +‘I was—I was talking to Dr Ferguson, mother.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But as I came up the stairs I understood you to be inquiring something of Dr +Ferguson, “if,” you were saying, “he can walk and talk in the night”: you +surely were not referring to your father, child? That could not possibly be, in +his state. Dr Ferguson, I know, will bear me out in that at least. And besides, +I really must insist on following out medical directions to the letter. Dr +Ferguson I know, will fully concur. Do, pray, Dr Ferguson,’ continued Sheila, +raising her voice even now scarcely above a rapid murmur—‘do pray assure my +daughter that she must have patience; that however much even he himself may +desire it, it is impossible that she should see her father yet. And now, my +dear child, come down, I want to have a moment’s talk with Dr Ferguson. I +feared from his beckoning at the window that something was amiss.’ +</p> + +<p> +Alice turned, dismayed, and looked steadily, almost with hostility, at the +stranger, so curiously transfixed and isolated in her small old play-room. And +in this scornful yet pleading confrontation her eye fell suddenly on the pin in +his scarf—the claw and the pearl she had known all her life. From that her gaze +flitted, like some wild demented thing’s, over face, hair, hands, clothes, +attitude, expression, and her heart stood still in an awful, inarticulate dread +of the unknown. She turned slowly towards her mother, groped forward a few +steps, turned once more, stretching out her hands towards the vague still +figure whose eyes had called so piteously to her out of their depths, and fell +fainting in the doorway. Lawford stood motionless, vacantly watching Sheila, +who knelt, chafing the cold hands. ‘She has fainted?’ he said; ‘oh, Sheila, +tell me—only fainted?’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila made no answer; did not even raise her eyes. +</p> + +<p> +‘Some day, Sheila’ he began in a dull voice, and broke off, and without another +word, without even another glance at the still face and blue, twitching lids, +he passed her rapidly by, and in another instant Sheila heard the house-door +shut. She got up quickly, and after a glance into the vacant bedroom turned the +key; then she hastened upstairs for sal volatile and eau de cologne.... +</p> + +<p> +It was yet clear daylight when Lawford appeared beneath the portico of his +house. With a glance of circumspection that almost seemed to suggest a fear of +pursuit, he descended the steps, only to be made aware in so doing that Ada was +with a kind of furtive eagerness pointing out the mysterious Dr Ferguson to a +steadily gazing cook. One or two well-known and many a well-remembered face he +encountered in the thin stream of City men treading blackly along the pavement. +It was a still, high evening, and something very like a forlorn compassion rose +in his mind at sight of their grave, rather pretentious, rather dull, +respectable faces. +</p> + +<p> +He found himself walking with an affectation of effrontery, and smiling with a +faint contempt on all alike, as if to keep himself from slinking, and the wolf +out of his eyes. He felt restless, and watchful, and suspicious, as if he had +suddenly come down in the world. His, then, was a disguise as effectual as a +shabby coat and a glazing eye. His heart sickened. Was it even worth while +living on a crust of social respectability so thin and so exquisitely +treacherous? He challenged no one. One or two actual acquaintances raised and +lowered a faintly inquiring eyebrow in his direction. One even recalled in his +confusion a smile of recognition just a moment too late. There was, it seemed, +a peculiar aura in Lawford’s presence, a shadow of a something in his demeanour +that proved him alien. +</p> + +<p> +None the less green Widderstone kept calling him, much as a bell in the +imagination tolls on and on, the echo of reality. If the worst should come to +the worst, why—there is pasture in the solitary by-ways for the beast that +strays. He quickened his pace along lonelier streets, and soon strode freely +through the little flagged and cobbled village of shops, past the same small +jutting window whose clock had told him the hour on that first dark hurried +night. All was pale and faint with dying colours now; and decay was in the +leaf, and the last swallows filled the gold air with their clashing stillness. +No one heeded him here. He looked from side to side, exulting in the +strangeness. Shops were left behind, the last milestone passed, and in a little +while he was descending the hill beneath the elm boughs, which he remembered +had stood like a turreted wall against the sunset when first he had wandered +down into the churchyard. +</p> + +<p> +At the foot of the hill he passed by the green and white Rectory, and there was +the parson, a short fat, pursy man with wrists protruding from his jacket +sleeves as he stood on tip-toe tying up a rambling rose-shoot on his trim +cedared lawn. The next house barely showed its old red chimney-tops, above its +bowers; the next was empty, with windows vacantly gazing, its paths peopled +with great bearded weeds that stood mutely watching and guarding the +seldom-opened gate. Then came more lofty grandmotherly elms, a dense hedge of +every leaf that pricks, and then Lawford found himself standing at the small +canopied gate of the queer old wooden house that the stranger of his talk had +in part described. +</p> + +<p> +It stood square and high and dark in a small amphitheatre of verdure. Roses +here and there sprang from the grass, and a narrow box-edged path led to a +small door in a low green-mantled wing, with its one square window above the +porch. And while, with vacant mind, Lawford stood waiting, as one stands +forebodingly upon the eve of a new experience he heard as if at a distance the +sound of falling water. He still paused on the country roadside, scrutinising +this strange, still, wooden presence; but at last with an effort he pushed open +the gate, followed the winding path, and pulled the old iron hanging bell. +There came presently a quiet tread, and Herbert himself opened the door which +led into a little square wood-panelled hall, hung with queer old prints and +obscure portraits in dark frames. +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, yes, come in, Mr Lawford,’ he drawled; ‘I was beginning to be afraid you +were not coming.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford laid hat and walking-stick on an oak bench, and followed his churchyard +companion up a slightly inclined corridor and a staircase into a high room, +covered far up the yellowish walls with old books on shelves and in cases, +between which hung in little black frames, mezzo tints, etchings, and +antiquated maps. A large table stood a few paces from the deep alcove of the +window, which was surrounded by a low, faded, green seat, and was screened from +the sunshine by wooden shutters. And here the tranquil surge of falling water +shook incessantly on the air, for the three lower casements stood open to the +fading sunset. On a smaller table were spread cups, old earthenware dishes of +fruit, and a big bowl of damask roses. +</p> + +<p> +‘Please sit down; I shan’t be a moment; I am not sure that my sister is in; but +if so, I will tell her we are ready for tea.’ Left to himself in this quiet, +strange old room, Lawford forgot for a while everything else, he was for the +moment so taken up with his surroundings. +</p> + +<p> +What seized on his fancy and strangely affected his mind was this incessant +changing roar of falling water. It must be the Widder, he said to himself, +flowing close to the walls. But not until he had had the boldness to lean head +and shoulders out of the nearest window did he fully realize how close indeed +the Widder was. It came sweeping dark and deep and begreened and full with the +early autumnal rains, actually against the lower walls of the house itself, and +in the middle suddenly swerved in a black, smooth arch, and tumbled headlong +into a great pool, nodding with tall slender water-weeds, and charged in its +bubbled blackness here and there with the last crimson of the setting sun. To +the left of the house, where the waters floated free again, stood vast, still +trees above the clustering rushes; and in glimpses between their spreading +boughs lay the far-stretching countryside, now dimmed with the first mists of +approaching evening. So absorbed he became as he stood leaning over the wooden +sill above the falling water, that eye and ear became enslaved by the roar and +stillness. And in the faint atmosphere of age that seemed like a veil to hang +about the odd old house and these prodigious branches, he fell into a kind of +waking dream. +</p> + +<p> +When at last he did draw back into the room it was perceptibly darker, and a +thin keen shaft of recollection struck across his mind—the recollection of what +he was, and of how he came to be there, his reasons for coming and of that dark +indefinable presence which like a raven had begun to build its dwelling in his +mind. He sat on, his eyes restlessly wandering, his face leaning on his hands; +and in a while the door opened and Herbert returned, carrying an old crimson +and green teapot and a dish of hot cakes. +</p> + +<p> +‘They’re all out,’ he said; ‘sister, Sallie, and boy; but these were in the +oven, so we won’t wait. I hope you haven’t been very much bored.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford dropped his hands from his face and smiled. ‘I have been looking at the +water,’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +‘My sister’s favorite occupation; she sits for hours and hours, with not even a +book for an apology, staring down into the black old roaring pot. It has a sort +of hypnotic effect after a time. And you’d be surprised how quickly one gets +used to the noise. To me it’s even less distracting than sheer silence. You +don’t know, after all, what on earth sheer silence means—even at Widderstone. +But one can just realize a water-nymph. They chatter; but, thank Heaven, it’s +not articulate.’ He handed Lawford a cup with a certain niceness and +self-consciousness, lifting his eyebrows slightly as he turned. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford found himself listening out of a peculiar stillness of mind to the +voice of this suave and rather inscrutable acquaintance. ‘The curious thing is, +do you know,’ he began rather nervously, ‘that though I must have passed your +gate at least twice in the last few months, I have never noticed it before, +never even caught the sound of the water.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No, that’s the best of it; nobody ever does. We are just buried alive. We have +lived here for years, and scarcely know a soul—not even our own, perhaps. Why +on earth should one? Acquaintances, after all, are little else than a bad +habit.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But then, what about me?’ said Lawford. +</p> + +<p> +‘But that’s just it,’ said Herbert. ‘I said <i>acquaintances</i>; that’s just +exactly what I’m going to prove—what very old friends we are. You’ve no idea! +It really is rather queer.’ He took up his cup and sauntered over to the +window. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford eyed him vacantly for a moment, and, following rather his own curious +thoughts than seeking any light on this somewhat vague explanation, again broke +the silence. ‘It’s odd, I suppose, but this house affects me much in the same +way as Widderstone does. I’m not particularly fanciful—at least, I used not to +be. But sitting here I seem, I hope it isn’t a very frantic remark, it seems as +though, if only my ears would let me, I should hear—well, voices. It’s just +what you said about the silence. I suppose it’s the age of the place; it +<i>is</i> very old?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Pretty old, I suppose; it’s worm-eaten and rat-eaten and tindery enough in all +conscience; and the damp doesn’t exactly foster it. It’s a queer old shanty. +There are two or three accounts of it in some old local stuff I have. And of +course there’s a ghost.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘A ghost?’ echoed Lawford, looking up. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap12"></a> +CHAPTER TWELVE</h2> + +<p> +‘What’s in a name?’ laughed Herbert. ‘But it really is a queer show-up of human +oddity. A fellow comes in here, searching; that’s all.’ His back was turned, as +he stood staring absently out, sipping his tea between his sentences. ‘He comes +in—oh, it’s a positive fact, for I’ve seen him myself, just sitting back in my +chair here, you know, watching him as one would a tramp in one’s orchard.’ He +cast a candid glance over his shoulder. ‘First he looks round, like a prying +servant. Then he comes cautiously on—a kind of grizzled, fawn-coloured face, +middle-size, with big hands; and then just like some quiet, groping, nocturnal +creature, he begins his precious search—shelves, drawers that are not here, +cupboards gone years ago, questing and nosing no end, and quite methodically +too, until he reaches the window. Then he stops, looks back, narrows his foxy +lids, listens—quite perceptibly, you know, a kind of gingerish blur; then he +seems to open this corner bookcase here, as if it were a door and goes out +along what I suppose might at some time have been an outside gallery or +balcony, unless, as I rather fancy, the house extended once beyond these +windows. Anyhow, out he goes quite deliberately, treading the air as lightly as +Botticelli’s angels, until, however far you lean out of the window, you can’t +follow him any further. And then—and this is the bit that takes one’s +fancy—when you have contentedly noddled down again to whatever you may have +been doing when the wretch appeared, or are sitting in a cold sweat, with +bolting eyes awaiting developments, just according to your school of thought, +or of nerves, the creature comes back—comes back; and with what looks +uncommonly like a lighted candle in his hand. That really is a thrill, I assure +you.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But you’ve seen this—you’ve really seen this yourself?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh yes, twice,’ replied Herbert cheerfully. ‘And my sister, quite by +haphazard, once saw him from the garden. She was shelling peas one evening for +Sallie, and she distinctly saw him shamble out of the window here, and go +shuffling along, mid-air, across the roaring washpot down below, turn sharp +round the high corner of the house, sheer against the stars, in a kind of +frightened hurry. And then, after five minutes’ concentrated watching over the +shucks, she saw him come shuffling back again—the same distraction, the same +nebulous snuff colour, and a candle trailing its smoke behind him as he whisked +in home.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And then?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, then,’ said Herbert, lagging along the bookshelves, and scanning the +book-backs with eyes partially closed: he turned with lifted teapot, and +refilled his visitor’s cup; ‘then, wherever you are—I mean,’ he added, cutting +up a little cake into six neat slices, ‘wherever the chance inmate of the room +happens to be, he comes straight for you, at a quite alarming velocity, and +fades, vanishes, melts, or, as it were, silts inside.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford listened in a curious hush that had suddenly fallen over his mind. +‘“Fades inside? silts?”—I’m awfully stupid, but what on earth do you mean?’ The +room had slowly emptied itself of daylight; its own darkness, it seemed, had +met that of the narrowing night, and Herbert deliberately lit a cigarette +before replying. His clear pale face, with its smooth outline and thin mouth +and rather long dark eyes, turned with a kind of serene good-humour towards his +questioner. +</p> + +<p> +‘Why,’ he said, ‘I mean frankly just that. Besides, it’s Grisel’s own phrase; +and an old nurse we used to have said much the same. He comes, or <i>it</i> +comes towards you, first just walking, then with a kind of gradually +accelerated slide or glide, and sweeps straight into you,’ he tapped his chest, +‘me, whoever it may be is here. In a kind of panic, I suppose, to hide, or +perhaps simply to get back again.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Get back where?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Be resumed, as it were, via you. You see, I suppose he is compelled to regain +his circle, or Purgatory, or Styx, whatever you like to call it, via +consciousness. No one present, then no revenant or spook, or astral body, or +hallucination: what’s in a name? And of course even an hallucination is +mind-stuff, and on its own, as it were. What I mean is that the poor devil must +have some kind of human personality to get back through in order to make his +exit from our sphere of consciousness into his. And naturally, of course to +make his entrance too. If like a tenuous smoke he can get in, the probability +is that he gets out in precisely the same fashion. For really, if you weren’t +consciously expecting the customary impact (you actually jerk forward in the +act of resistance unresisted), you would not notice his going. I am afraid I +must be horribly boring you with all these tangled theories. All I mean is, +that if you were really absorbed in what you happened to be doing at the time, +the thing might come and go, with your mind for entrance and exit, as it were, +without your being conscious of it at all.’ There was a longish pause, in which +Herbert slowly inhaled and softly breathed out his smoke. +</p> + +<p> +‘And what—what is the poor wretch searching <i>for?</i> And what—why, what +becomes of him when he does go?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, there you have me! One merely surmises just as one’s temperament or +convictions lean. Grisel says it’s some poor derelict soul in search of +peace—that the poor beggar wants finally to die, in fact, and can’t. Sallie +smells crime. After all, what is every man?’ he talked on; ‘a horde of +ghosts—like a Chinese nest of boxes—oaks that were acorns that were oaks. Death +lies behind us, not in front—in our ancestors, back and back, until—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“Until?”’ Lawford managed to remark. +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, that settles me again. Don’t they call it an amoeba? But really I am +abjectly ignorant of all that kind of stuff. We are <i>all</i> we are, and all +in a sense we care to dream we are. And for that matter, anything outlandish, +bizarre, is a godsend in this rather stodgy life. It is after all just what the +old boy said—it’s only the impossible that’s credible; whatever credible may +mean....’ +</p> + +<p> +It seemed to Lawford as if the last remark had wafted him bodily into the +presence of his kind, blinking, intensely anxious old friend, Mr Bethany. And +what leagues asunder the two men were who had happened on much the same words +to express their convictions. +</p> + +<p> +He drew his hand gropingly over his face, half rose, and again seated himself. +‘Whatever it may be,’ he said, ‘the whole thing reminds me, you know—it is in a +way so curiously like my own—my own case.’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert sat on, a little drawn up in his chair, quietly smoking. The crash of +the falling water, after seeming to increase in volume with the fading of +evening, had again died down in the darkness to a low multitudinous tumult as +of countless inarticulate, echoing voices. +</p> + +<p> +‘“Bizarre,” you said; God knows <i>I</i> am.’ But Herbert still remained +obdurately silent. ‘You remember, perhaps,’ Lawford faintly began again, ‘our +talk the other night?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, rather,’ replied the cordial voice out of the dusk. +</p> + +<p> +‘I suppose you thought I was insane?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Insane!’ There was a genuinely amused astonishment in the echo. ‘You were +lucidity itself. Besides—well, honestly, if I may venture, I don’t put very +much truck in what one calls one’s sanity: except, of course, as a bond of +respectability and a means of livelihood.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But did you realise in the least from what I said how I really stand? That I +went down into that old shadowy hollow one man, and came back—well—this?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I gathered vaguely something like that. I thought at first it was merely an +affectation—that what you said was an affectation, I mean—until—well, to be +frank, it was the “this” that so immensely interested me. Especially,’ he added +almost with a touch of gaiety, ‘especially the last glimpse. But if it’s really +not a forbidden question, what precisely <i>was</i> the other? What precise +manner of man, I mean, came down into Widderstone?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It is my face that is changed, Mr Herbert. If you’ll try to understand me—my +<i>face</i>. What you see now is not what I really am, not what I was. Oh, it +is all quite different. I know perfectly well how absurd it must sound. And you +won’t press me further. But that’s the truth: that’s what they have done for +me.’ +</p> + +<p> +It seemed to Lawford as if a remote tiny shout of laughter had been suddenly +caught back in the silence that had followed this confession. He peered in vain +in the direction of his companion. Even his cigarette revealed no sign of him. +‘I know, I know,’ he went gropingly on; ‘I felt it would sound to you like +nothing but frantic incredible nonsense. <i>You</i> can’t see it. <i>You</i> +can’t feel it. <i>You</i> can’t hear these hooting voices. It’s no use at all +blinking the fact; I am simply on the verge, if not over it, of insanity.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘As to that, Mr Lawford,’ came the still voice out of the darkness; ‘the very +fact of your being able to say so seems to me all but proof positive that +you’re not. Insanity is on another plane, isn’t it? in which one can’t compare +one’s states. As for what you say being credible, take our precious noodle of a +spook here! Ninety-nine hundredths of this amiable world of ours would have +guffawed the poor creature into imperceptibility ages ago. To such poor +credulous creatures as my sister and I he is no more and no less a fact, a +personality, an amusing reality than—well, this teacup. Here we are, amazing +mysteries both of us in any case; and all round us are scores of books, dealing +just with life, pure, candid, and unexpurgated; and there’s not a single one +among them but reads like a taradiddle. Yet grope between the lines of any +autobiography, it’s pretty clear what one has got—a feeble, timid, creeping +attempt to describe the indescribable. As for what you say <i>your</i> case is, +the bizarre—that kind very seldom gets into print at all. In all our +make-believe, all our pretence, how, honestly, could it? But there, this is +immaterial. The real question is, may I, can I help? What I gather is this: You +just trundled down into Widderstone all among the dead men, and—but one moment, +I’ll light up.’ +</p> + +<p> +A light flickered up in the dark. Shading it in his hand from the night air +straying through the open window, Herbert lit the two candles that stood upon +the little chimneypiece behind Lawford’s head. Then sauntering over to the +window again, almost as if with an affectation of nonchalance, he drew one of +the shutters, and sat down. ‘Nothing much struck me,’ he went on, leaning back +on his hands, ‘I mean on Sunday evening, until you said good-bye. It was then +that I caught in the moon a distinct glimpse of your face.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘This,’ said Lawford, with a sudden horrible sinking of the heart. +</p> + +<p> +Herbert nodded. ‘The fact is, I have a print of it,’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +‘A print of it?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘A miserable little dingy engraving.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Of this?’ Herbert nodded, with eyes fixed. ‘Where?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘That’s the nuisance. I searched high and low for it the instant I got home. +For the moment it has been mislaid; but it must be somewhere in the house and +it will turn up all in good time. It’s the frontispiece of one of a queer old +hotchpotch of pamphlets, sewn up together by some amateur enthusiast in a +marbled paper cover—confessions, travels, trials and so on. All eighteenth +century, and all in French.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And mine?’ said Lawford, gazing stonily across the candlelight. +</p> + +<p> +Herbert, from a head slightly stooping, gazed back in an almost birdlike +fashion across the room at his visitor. +</p> + +<p> +‘Sabathier’s,’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +‘Sabathier’s!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘A really curious resemblance. Of course, I am speaking only from memory; and +perhaps it’s not quite so vivid in this light; but still astonishingly clear.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford sat drawn up, staring at his companion’s face in an intense and +helpless silence. His mouth opened but no words came. +</p> + +<p> +‘Of course,’ began Herbert again, ‘I don’t say there’s anything in it—except +the—the mere coincidence,’ he paused and glanced out of the open casement +beside him. ‘But there’s just one obvious question. Do you happen to know of +any strain of French blood in your family?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford shut his eyes, even memory seemed to be forsaking him at last. ‘No,’ he +said, after a long pause, ‘there’s a little Dutch, I think, on my mother’s +side, but no French.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No Sabathier, then?’ said Herbert, smiling. ‘And then there’s another +question—this change; is it really as complete as you suppose? Has it—please +just warn me off if I am in the least intruding—has it been noticed?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford hesitated. ‘Oh, yes,’ he said slowly, ‘it has been noticed—my wife, a +few friends.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Do you mind this infernal clatter?’ said Herbert, laying his fingers on the +open casement. +</p> + +<p> +‘No, no. And you think?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘My dear fellow, I don’t think anything. It’s all the craziest conjecture. +Stranger things even than this have happened. There are dozens here—in print. +What are we human beings after all? Clay in the hands of the potter. Our bodies +are merely an inheritance, packed tight and corded up. We have practically no +control over their main functions. We can’t even replace a little finger-nail. +And look at the faces of us—what atrocious mockeries most of them are of +<i>any</i> kind of image! But we know our bodies change—age, sickness, thought, +passion, fatality. It proves they are amazingly plastic. And merely even as a +theory it is not in the least untenable that by force of some violent +convulsive effort from outside one’s body <i>might</i> change. It answers with +odd voluntariness to friend or foe, smile or snarl. As for what we call the +laws of Nature, they are pure assumptions to-day, and may be nothing better +than scrap-iron tomorrow. Good Heavens, Lawford, consider man’s abysmal +impudence.’ He smoked on in silence for a moment. ‘You say you fell asleep down +there?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford nodded. Herbert tapped his cigarette on the sill. ‘Just following up +our ludicrous conjecture, you know,’ he remarked musingly, ‘it wasn’t such a +bad opportunity for the poor chap.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But surely,’ said Lawford, speaking as it were out of a dream of candle-light +and reverberating sound and clearest darkness, towards this strange deliberate +phantom with the unruffled clear-cut features—‘surely then, in that case, he is +here now? And yet, on my word of honour, though every friend I ever had in the +world should deny it, I am the same. Memory stretches back clear and sound to +my childhood. I can see myself with extraordinary lucidity, how I think, my +motives and all that; and in spite of these voices that I seem to hear, and +this peculiar kind of longing to break away, as it were, just to press on—it is +I,—I myself, that am speaking to you now out of this—this mask.’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert glanced reflectively at his companion. ‘You mustn’t let me tire you,’ +he said; ‘but even on our theory it would not necessarily follow that you +yourself would be much affected. It’s true this fellow Sabathier really was +something of a personality. He had a rather unusual itch for life, for trying +on and on to squeeze something out of experience that isn’t there; and he +seemed never to weary of a magnificent attempt to find in his fellow-creatures, +especially in the women he met, what even—if they have it—they cannot give. The +little book I wanted to show you is partly autobiographical and really does +manage to set the fellow on his feet. Even there he does absolutely take one’s +imagination. I shall never forget the thrill of picking him up in the Charing +Cross Road. You see, I had known the queer old tombstone for years. He’s +enormously vivid—quite beyond my feebleness to describe, with a kind of French +verve and rapture. Unluckily we can’t get nearer than two years to his death. I +shouldn’t mind guessing some last devastating dream swept over him, held him +the breath of an instant too long beneath the wave, and he caved in. We know he +killed himself; and perhaps lived to regret it ever after. +</p> + +<p> +‘After all, what is this precious dying we talk so much about?’ Herbert +continued after a while, his eyes restlessly wandering from shelf to shelf. +‘You remember our talk in the churchyard? We all know that the body fades quick +enough when its occupant is gone. Supposing even in the sleep of the living it +lies very feebly guarded. And supposing in that state some infernally potent +thing outside it, wandering disembodied, just happens on it—like some hungry +sexton beetle on the carcase of a mouse. Supposing—I know it’s the most +outrageous theorising—but supposing all these years of sun and dark, +Sabathier’s emanation, or whatever you like to call it, horribly restless, by +some fatality longing on and on just for life, or even for the face, the voice, +of some “impossible she” whom he couldn’t get in this muddled world, simply +loathing all else; supposing he has been lingering in ambush down beside those +poor old dusty bones that had poured out for him such marrowy hospitality—oh, I +know it; the dead do. And then, by a chance, one quiet autumn evening, a +veritable godsend of a little Miss Muffet comes wandering down under the shade +of his immortal cypresses, half asleep, fagged out, depressed in mind and body, +perhaps: imagine yourself in his place, and he in yours!’ Herbert stood up in +his eagerness, his sleek hair shining. ‘The one clinching chance of a century! +Wouldn’t you have made a fight for it? Wouldn’t you have risked the raid? I can +just conceive it—the amazing struggle in that darkness within a darkness; like +some dazed alien bee bursting through the sentinels of a hive; one mad +impetuous clutch at victory; then the appalling stirring on the other side; the +groping back to a house dismantled, rearranged, not, mind you, disorganised or +disintegrated....’ He broke off with a smile, as if of apology for his long, +fantastic harangue. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford sat listening, his eyes fixed on Herbert’s colourless face. There was +not a sound else, it seemed, than that slightly drawling scrupulous voice +poking its way amid a maze of enticing, baffling thoughts. Herbert turned away +with a shrug. ‘It’s tempting stuff,’ he said, choosing another cigarette. ‘But +anyhow, the poor beggar failed.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Failed?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Why, surely; if he had succeeded I should not now be talking to a mere +imperfect simulacrum, to the outward illusion of a passing likeness to the man, +but to Sabathier himself!’ His eyes moved slowly round and dwelt for a moment +with a dark, quiet scrutiny on his visitor. +</p> + +<p> +‘You say a passing likeness; do you <i>mean</i> that?’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert smiled indulgently. ‘If one <i>can</i> mean what is purely a +speculation. I am only trying to look at the thing dispassionately, you see. We +are so much the slaves of mere repetition. Here is life—yours and mine—a kind +of <i lang="la">plenum in vacuo</i>. It is only when we begin to play the +eavesdropper; when something goes askew; when one of the sentries on the +frontier of the unexpected shouts a hoarse “<i lang="fr">Qui vive?”</i>—it is +only then we begin to question; to prick our aldermen and pinch the calves of +our kings. Why, who is there can answer to anybody’s but his own satisfaction +just that one fundamental question—Are we the prisoners, the slaves, the +inheritors, the creatures, or the creators of our bodies? Fallen angels or +horrific dust? As for identity or likeness or personality, we have only our +neighbours’ nod for them, and just a fading memory. No, the old fairy tales +knew better; and witchcraft’s witchcraft to the end of the chapter. Honestly, +and just of course on that one theory, Lawford, I can’t help thinking that +Sabathier’s raid only just so far succeeded as to leave his impression in the +wax. It doesn’t, of course, follow that it will necessarily end there. It +might—it may be even now just gradually fading away. It may, you know, need +driving out—with whips and scorpions. It might, perhaps, work in.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford sat cold and still. ‘It’s no good, no good,’ he said, ‘I don’t +understand; I can’t follow you. I was always stupid, always bigoted and +cocksure. These things have never seemed anything but old women’s tales to me. +And now I must pay for it. And this Nicholas Sabathier; you say he was a +blackguard?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well,’ said Herbert with a faint smile, ‘that depends on your definition of +the word. He wasn’t a flunkey, a fool, or a prig, if that’s what you mean. He +wasn’t perhaps on Mrs Grundy’s visiting list. He wasn’t exactly gregarious. And +yet in a sense that kind of temperament is so rare that Sappho, Nelson, and +Shelley shared it. To the stodgy, suety world of course it’s little else than +sheer moonshine, midsummer madness. Naturally, in its own charming and stodgy +way the world kept flickering cold water in his direction. Naturally it +hissed.... I shall find the book. You shall have the book; oh yes.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘There’s only one more question,’ said Lawford in a dull, slow voice, stooping +and covering his face with his hands. ‘I know it’s impossible for you to +realise—but to me time seems like that water there, to be heaping up about me. +I wait, just as one waits when the conductor of an orchestra lifts his hand and +in a moment the whole surge of brass and wood, cymbal and drum will crash +out—and sweep me under. I can’t tell you Herbert, how it all is, with just +these groping stirrings of that mole in my mind’s dark. You say it may be this +face, working in! God knows. I find it easy to speak to you—this cold, clear +sense, you know. The others feel too much, or are afraid, or—Let me think—yes, +I was going to ask you a question. But no one can answer it.’ He peered darkly, +with white face suddenly revealed between his hands. ‘What remains now? Where +do <i>I</i> come in? What is there left for <i>me</i> to do?’ +</p> + +<p> +And at that moment there sounded, even above the monotonous roar of the water +beyond the window—there fell the sound of a light footfall approaching along +the corridor. +</p> + +<p> +‘Listen,’ said Herbert; ‘here’s my sister coming; we’ll ask her.’ +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap13"></a> +CHAPTER THIRTEEN</h2> + +<p> +The door opened. Lawford rose, and into the further rays of the candlelight +entered a rather slim figure in a light summer gown. +</p> + +<p> +‘Just home?’ said Herbert. +</p> + +<p> +‘We’ve been for a walk—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘My sister always forgets everything,’ said Herbert, turning to Lawford; ‘even +tea-time. This is Mr Lawford, Grisel. We’ve been arguing no end. And we want +you to give a decision. It’s just this: Supposing if by some impossible trick +you had come in now, not the charming familiar sister you are, but shorter, +fatter, fair and round-faced, quite different, physically, you know—what would +you do?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What nonsense you talk, Herbert!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, but supposing: a complete transmogrification—by some unimaginable +ingression or enchantment, by nibbling a bunch of roses, or whatever you like +to call it?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘<i>Only</i> physically?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, yes, actually; but potentially, why—that’s another matter.’ +</p> + +<p> +The dark eyes passed slowly from her brother’s face and rested gravely on their +visitor’s. +</p> + +<p> +‘Is he making fun of me?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford almost imperceptibly shook his head. +</p> + +<p> +‘But what a question! And I’ve had no tea.’ She drew her gloves slowly through +her hand. ‘The thing, of course, isn’t possible, I know. But shouldn’t I go +mad, don’t you think?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford gazed quietly back into the clear, grave, deliberate eyes. ‘Suppose, +suppose, just for the sake of argument—<i>not</i>,’ he suggested. +</p> + +<p> +She turned her head and reflected, glancing from one to the other of the pure, +steady candle-flames. +</p> + +<p> +‘And what was <i>your</i> answer?’ she said, looking over her shoulder at her +brother. +</p> + +<p> +‘My dear child, you know what <i>my</i> answers are like!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And yours?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford took a deep breath, gazing mutely, forlornly, into the lovely +untroubled peace of her eyes, and without the least warning tears swept up into +his own. With an immense effort he turned, and choking back every sound, +beating back every thought, groped his way towards the square black darkness of +the open door. +</p> + +<p> +‘I must think, I must think,’ he managed to whisper, lifting his hand and +steadying himself. He caught over his shoulder the glimpse of a curiously +distorted vision, a lifted candle, and a still face gazing after him with +infinitely grieved eyes, then found himself groping and stumbling down the +steep, uneven staircase into the darkness of the queer old wooden and hushed +and lonely house. The night air cold on his face calmed his mind. He turned and +held out his hand. +</p> + +<p> +‘You’ll come again?’ Herbert was saying, with a hint of anxiety, even of +apology in his voice. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford nodded, with eyes fixed blankly on the candle, and turning once more, +made his way slowly down the narrow green-bordered path upon which the stars +rained a scattered light so feeble it seemed but as a haze that blurred the +darkness. He pushed open the little white wicket and turned his face towards +the soundless, leaf-crowned hill. He had advanced hardly a score of steps in +the thick dust when almost as if its very silence had struck upon his ear he +remembered the black broken grave with its sightless heads that lay beyond the +leaves. And fear, vast and menacing, fear such as only children know, broke +like a sea of darkness on his heart. He stopped dead—cold, helpless, trembling. +And, in the silence he heard a faint cry behind him and light footsteps +pursuing him. He turned again. In the thick close gloom beneath the enormous +elm-boughs the grey eyes shone clearly visible in the face upturned to him. ‘My +brother,’ she began breathlessly—‘the little French book. It was I who—who +mislaid it.’ +</p> + +<p> +The set, stricken face listened unmoved. +</p> + +<p> +‘You are ill. Come back! I am afraid you are very ill.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It’s not that, not that,’ Lawford muttered; ‘don’t leave me; I am alone. Don’t +question me,’ he said strangely, looking down into her face, clutching her +hand; ‘only understand that I can’t, I can’t go on.’ He swept a lean arm +towards the unseen churchyard. ‘I am afraid.’ +</p> + +<p> +The cold hand clasped his closer. ‘Hush, don’t speak! Come back; come back. I +am with you, a friend, you see; come back.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford clutched her hand as a blind man in sudden peril might clutch the hand +of a child. He saw nothing clearly; spoke almost without understanding his +words. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, but it’s <i>must</i>,’ he said; ‘I <i>must</i> go on. You see—why, +everything depends on struggling through: the future! But if you only +knew—There!’ Again his arm swept out, and the lean terrified face turned +shuddering from the dark. +</p> + +<p> +‘I do know; believe me, believe me! I can guess. See, I am coming with you; we +will go together. As if, as if I did not know what it is to be afraid. Oh, +believe me; no one is near; we go on; and see! it gradually, gradually +lightens. How thankful I am I came.’ +</p> + +<p> +She had turned and they were steadily ascending as if pushing their way, +battling on through some obstacle of the mind rather than of the senses beneath +the star-powdered callous vault of night. And it seemed to Lawford as if, as +they pressed on together, some obscure detestable presence as slowly, as +doggedly had drawn worsted aside. He could see again the peaceful outspread +branches of the trees, the lych-gate standing in clear-cut silhouette against +the liquid dusk of the sky. A strange calm stole over his mind. The very +meaning and memory of his fear faded out and vanished, as the passed-away +clouds of a storm that leave a purer, serener sky. +</p> + +<p> +They stopped and stood together on the brow of the little hill, and Lawford, +still trembling from head to foot, looked back across the hushed and lightless +countryside. ‘It’s all gone now,’ he said wearily, ‘and now there’s nothing +left. You see, I cannot even ask your forgiveness—and a stranger!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Please don’t say that—unless—unless—a “pilgrim” too. I think, surely, you must +own we did have the best of it that time. Yes—and I don’t care <i>who</i> may +be listening—but we <i>did</i> win through.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What can I say? How shall I explain? How shall I make you understand?’ +</p> + +<p> +The clear grey eyes showed not the faintest perturbation. ‘But I do; I do +indeed, in part; I do understand, ever so faintly.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And now I will come back with <i>you</i>.’ +</p> + +<p> +They paused in the darkness face to face, the silence of the sky, arched in its +vastness above the little hill, the only witness of their triumph. +</p> + +<p> +She turned unquestioningly. And laughing softly almost as children do, the +stalking shadows of a twilight wood behind them—they trod in silence back to +the house. They said good-bye at the gate, and Lawford started once more for +home. He walked slowly, conscious of an almost intolerable weariness, as if his +strength had suddenly been wrested away from him. And at some distance beyond +the top of the hill he sat down on the bank beside a nettled ditch, and with +his book pressed down upon the wayside grass struck a match, and holding it low +in the scented, windless air turned slowly the cockled leaf. +</p> + +<p> +Few of them were alike except for the dinginess of the print and the sinister +smudge of the portraits. All were sewn roughly together into a mould-stained, +marbled cover. He lit a second match, and as he did so glanced as if +inquiringly over his shoulder. And a score or so of pages before the end he +came at last upon the name he was seeking, and turned the page. +</p> + +<p> +It was a likeness even more striking in its crudeness of ink and line and paper +than the most finished of portraits could have been. It repelled, and yet it +fascinated him. He had not for a moment doubted Herbert’s calm conviction. And +yet as he stooped in the grass, closely scrutinising the blurred obscure +features, he felt the faintest surprise not so much at the significant +resemblance but at his own composure, his own steady, unflinching confrontation +with this sinister and intangible adversary. The match burned down to his +fingers. It hissed faintly in the grass. +</p> + +<p> +He stuffed the book into his pocket, and stared into the pale dial of his +watch. It was a few minutes after eleven. Midnight, then, would just see him +in. He rose stiffly and yawned in sheer exhaustion. Then, hesitating, he turned +his head and looked back towards the hollow. But a vague foreboding held him +back. A sour and vacuous incredulity swept over him. What was the use of all +this struggling and vexation. What gain in living on? Once dead <i>his</i> +sluggish spirit at least would find its rest. Dust to dust it would indeed be +for him. What else, in sober earnest, had he been all his daily stolid life but +half dead, scarce conscious, without a living thought, or desire, in head or +heart? +</p> + +<p> +And while he was still gloomily debating within himself he had turned towards +home, and soon was walking in a kind of reverie, even his extreme tiredness in +part forgotten, and only a far-away dogged recollection in his mind that in +spite of shame, in spite of all his miserable weakness, the words had been +uttered once for all, and in all sincerity, ‘We <i>did</i> win through.’ +</p> + +<p> +Yet a desolate and odd air of strangeness seemed to drape his unlighted house +as he stood looking up in a kind of furtive communion with its windows. It +affected him with that discomforting air of extreme and meaningless novelty +that things very familiar sometimes take upon themselves. In this leaden +tiredness no impression could be trustworthy. His lids shut of themselves as he +softly mounted the steps. It seemed a needlessly wide door that soundlessly +admitted him. But however hard he pressed the key his bedroom door remained +stubbornly shut until he found that it was already unlocked and he had only to +turn the handle. A night-light burned in a little basin on the washstand. The +room was hung, as it were, with the stillness of night. And half lying on the +bed in her dressing-gown, her head leaning on the rail at the foot, was Alice, +just as sleep had overtaken her. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford returned to the door and listened. It seemed he heard a voice talking +downstairs, and yet not talking, for it ran on and on in an incessant slightly +argumentative monotony that had neither break nor interruption. He closed the +door, and stooping laid his hand softly on Alice’s narrow, still childish hand +that lay half-folded on her knee. Her eyes opened instantly and gazed widely +into his face. A slow vacant smile of sleep came and went and her fingers +tightened gently over his as again her lids drooped down over the drowsy blue +eyes. +</p> + +<p> +‘At last, at last, dear,’ she said; ‘I have been waiting such a time. But we +mustn’t talk much. Mother is waiting up, reading.’ +</p> + +<p> +Faintly through the close-shut door came the sound of that distant +expressionless voice monotonously rising and falling. +</p> + +<p> +‘Why didn’t you tell me, dear?’ Alice still sleepily whispered. ‘Would I have +asked a single question? How could I? Oh, if you had only trusted me!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But the change—the change, Alice! You must have seen that. You spoke to me, +you did think I was only a stranger; and even when you knew, it was only fear +on your face, dearest, and aversion; and you turned to your mother first. Don’t +think, Alice, that I am...God only knows—I’m not complaining. But truth is best +whatever it is. I do feel that. You mustn’t be afraid of hurting me, my dear.’ +</p> + +<p> +Her very hands seemed to quicken in his as now, with sleep quite gone, the fret +of memory returned, and she must reassure both herself and him. ‘But you see, +dear, mother had told me that you—besides, I did know you at once, really; +quite inside, you know, deep down. I know I was perplexed; I didn’t understand; +but that was all. Why, even when you came up in the dark, and we talked—if you +only knew how miserable I had been—though I knew even then there was something +different, still I was not a bit afraid. Was I? And shouldn’t I have been +afraid, horribly afraid, if <i>you</i> had not been <i>you?</i>’ She repressed +a little shudder, and clasped his hand more closely. ‘Don’t let us say anything +more about it, she implored him; ‘we are just together again, you and I; that +is all that matters.’ But her words were like brave soldiers who have fought +their way through an ambuscade but have left all confidence behind them. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford listened; and that was enough just now—that she still, in spite of +doubt, believed in him, and thought and cared for him. He was too tired to have +refused the least kindness. He made no answer, but leant his head on the cool, +slender fingers in gratitude and peace. And, just as he was, he almost +instantly fell asleep. He woke in the darkness to find himself alone. He groped +his way heavily to the door and turned the handle. But now it was really +locked. Energy failed him. ‘I suppose—Sheila...’ he muttered. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap14"></a> +CHAPTER FOURTEEN</h2> + +<p> +Sheila, calm, alert, reserved, was sitting at the open window when he awoke +again. His breakfast tray stood on a little table beside the bed. He raised +himself on his elbow and looked at his wife. The morning light shone full on +her features as she turned quickly at sound of his stirring. +</p> + +<p> +‘You have slept late,’ she said, in a low, mellow voice. +</p> + +<p> +‘Have I, Sheila? I suppose I was tired out. It is very kind of you to have got +everything ready like this.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I am afraid, Arthur, I was thinking rather of the maids. I like to +inconvenience them as little as possible; in their usual routine, I mean. How +are you feeling, do you think, this morning?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I—I haven’t seen the glass, Sheila.’ +</p> + +<p> +She paused to place a little pencil tick at the foot of the page of her +butcher’s book. ‘And did you—did you try?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Did I try? Try what?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I understood,’ she said, turning slowly in her chair, ‘you gave me to +understand that you went out with the specific intention of trying to +regain.... But there, forgive me, Arthur; I think I must be getting a little +bit hardened to the position, so far at least as any hope is in my mind of +rather amateurish experiments being of much help. I may seem unsympathetic in +saying frankly what I feel. But amateurish or no, you are curiously erratic. +Why, if you really were the Dr Ferguson whose part you play so admirably you +could scarcely spend a more active life.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘All you mean, Sheila, I suppose, is that I have failed.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“Failed” did not enter my mind. I thought, looking at you just now in your +clothes on the bed, one might for the moment be deceived into thinking there +was a slight—quite the slightest improvement. There was not quite that’—she +hovered for the right word—‘that tenseness. Whether or not, whether you desired +any such change or didn’t, I should have supposed in any case it would have +been better to act as far as possible like any ordinary person. You were +certainly in an extraordinarily sound sleep. I was almost alarmed; until I +remembered that it was a little after two when I looked up from reading aloud +to keep myself awake and discovered that you had only just come home. I had no +fire. You know how easily late hours bring on my headaches; a little thought +might possibly have suggested that I should be anxious to hear. But no; it +seems I cannot profit by experience, Arthur. And even now you have not answered +surely a very natural question. You do not recollect, perhaps, exactly what did +happen last night? Did you go in the direction even of Widderstone?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, Sheila, I went to Widderstone.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It was of course absurd to suppose that sitting on a seat beside the +broken-down grave of a suicide would have the slightest effect on one’s—one’s +physical condition; though possibly it might affect one’s brain. It would mine; +I am at least certain of that. It was your own prescription, however; and it +merely occurred to me to inquire whether the actual experience has not brought +you round to my own opinion.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, I think it has,’ Lawford answered calmly. ‘But I don’t quite see what +suicide has got to do with it; unless—You know Widderstone, then, Sheila?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I drove there last Saturday afternoon.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘For prayer or praise?’ Although Lawford had not actually raised his head, he +became conscious rather of the wonderfully adjusted mass of hair than of the +pained dignity in the face that was now closely regarding him. +</p> + +<p> +‘I went,’ came the rigidly controlled retort, ‘simply to test an inconceivable +story.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And returned?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Convinced, Arthur, of its inconceivability. But if you would kindly inform me +what precise formula you followed at Widderstone last night, I would tell you +why I think the explanation, or rather your first account of the matter, is not +an explanation of the facts.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford shot a rather doglike glance over his toast. ‘Danton?’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +‘Candidly, Arthur, Mr Danton doubts the whole story. Your very conduct—well, it +would serve no useful purpose to go into that. Candidly, on the other hand, Mr. +Danton did make some extremely helpful suggestions—basing them, of course, on +the <i>truth</i> of your account. He has seen a good deal of life; and +certainly very mysterious things do occur to quite innocent and well-meaning +people without the faintest shadow of warning, and as Mr. Bethany himself said, +evil birds do come home to roost, and often out of a clear sky, as it were. But +there, every fresh solution that occurs to me only makes the thing more +preposterous, more, I was going to say, disreputable—I mean, of course, to the +outside world. And we have our duties to perform to them too, I suppose. Why, +what can we say? What plausible account of ourselves have we? We shall never be +able to look anybody in the face again. I can only—I am compelled to believe +that God has been pleased to make this precise visitation upon us—an eye for an +eye, I suppose, <i>somewhere</i>. And to that conviction I shall hold until +actual circumstances convince me that it’s false. What, however, and this is +all that I have to say now, what I cannot understand are your amazing +indiscretions.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Do you understand your own, Sheila?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘My indiscretions, Arthur?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well,’ said Lawford, ‘wasn’t it indiscreet, don’t you think, to risk divine +retribution by marrying me? Shouldn’t you have inquired? Wasn’t it indiscreet +to allow me to remain here in—in my “visitation?” Wasn’t it indiscreet to risk +the moral stigma this unhappy face of mine must cast on its surroundings? I am +not sure whether such a change as this constitutes cruelty.... Oh, what is the +use of fretting and babbling on like this?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Am I to understand, then, that you refuse positively to discuss this horrible +business any more? You are doing your best to drive me away, Arthur; you must +see that. Will you be very disappointed if I refuse to go?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford rose from the bed. ‘Listen just this once,’ he said, seating himself on +the corner of the dressing-table. ‘Imagine all this—whatever you like to call +it—obliterated. Take this,’ he nodded towards the glass, ‘entirely for itself, +on its own merits, as it were. Let the dead past bury its dead. Which, now, +precisely, <i>really</i> do you prefer—him,’ he jerked his head in the +direction of the dispassionate youthful picture on the wall, ‘him or me?’ +</p> + +<p> +He was so close to her now that he could see the faintest tremor on the face +that had suddenly become grey and still in the thin clear sunshine. +</p> + +<p> +‘I own it, I own it,’ he went on, slowly; ‘the change is more than skin-deep +now. One can’t go through what I have gone through these last few terrifying +days, Sheila, unchanged. They have played the devil with my body; now begins +the tampering with my mind. Not even Danton knows how it will end. But shall I +tell you why you won’t, why you can’t answer me that one question—him or me? +Shall I tell you?’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila slowly raised her eyes. +</p> + +<p> +‘It is because, my dear, you don’t care the ghost of a straw for either. That +one—he was worn out long ago, and we never knew it. I know it now. Time and the +sheer going-on of day by day, without either of us guessing at it, wore that +down till it had no more meaning for you or me than any other faded remembrance +in this interminable footling with truth that we call life. And this one—the +whole abject meaning of it lies simply in the fact that it has pierced down and +shown us up. I had no courage. I couldn’t see how feeble a hold I had on +life—just one’s friends’ opinions. It was all at second hand. What I want to +know now is—leave me out; don’t think, or care, or regard my living-on one +shadow of an iota—all I ask is, What am I to do for you?’ He turned away and +stood staring down at the cinders in the fireless grate. +</p> + +<p> +‘I answer that mad wicked outburst with one plain question,’ said a low, +trembling voice; ‘did you or did you not go to Widderstone yesterday?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I did go.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You sat there, just as you said you sat before; and with all your heart and +soul strove to regain—yourself?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford lifted a still, colourless face into the sunlight. ‘No,’ he said; ‘I +spent the evening at the house of a friend.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Then I say it is infamous. You cast all this on me. You have brought me into +contempt and poisoned Alice’s whole life. You dream and idle on just as you +used to do, without the least care or thought or consideration for others; and +go out in this condition—go out absolutely unashamed—to spend the evening at a +friend’s. Peculiar friends they must be. Why, really, Arthur, you must be mad!’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford paused. Like a flock of sheep streaming helter-skelter before the onset +of a wolf were the thoughts that a moment before had seemed so orderly and +sober. +</p> + +<p> +‘Not mad—possessed,’ he said softly. +</p> + +<p> +‘And I add this,’ cried Sheila, as it were out of a tragic mask, ‘somewhere in +the past, whether of your own life, or of the lives of those who brought you +into the world—the world which you pretend so conveniently to despise—somewhere +is hidden some miserable secret. God visits all sins. On you has fallen at last +the payment. <i>That</i> I believe. You can’t run away, any more than a child +can run away from the cupboard it has been locked into for a punishment. Who’s +going to hear you now? You have deliberately refused to make a friend of me. +Fight it out alone, then!’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford heard the door close, and the dying away of the sound that had been the +unceasing accompaniment of all these later years—the rustling of his wife’s +skirts, her crisp, authoritative footstep. And he turned towards the flooding +sunlight that streamed in on the upturned surface of the looking-glass. No +clear decisive thought came into his mind, only a vague recognition that so far +as Sheila was concerned this was the end. No regret, no remorse visited him. He +was just alone again, that was all—alone, as in reality he had always been +alone, without having the sense or power to see or to acknowledge it. All he +had said had been the mere flotsam of the moment, and now it stood stark and +irrevocable between himself and the past. +</p> + +<p> +He sat down dazed and stupid. Again and again a struggling recollection tried +to obtrude itself; again and again he beat it back. And rather for something to +distract his attention than for any real interest or enlightenment he might +find in its pages, he took out the grimy dog’s-eared book that Herbert had +given him, and turned slowly over the leaves till he came to Sabathier once +more. Snatches of remembrance of their long talk returned to him, but just as +that dark, water-haunted house had seemed to banish remembrance and the reality +of the room in which he now sat, and of the old familiar life; so now the +house, the faces of yesterday seemed in their turn unreal, almost spectral, and +the thick print on the smudgy page no more significant than a story one reads +and throws away. +</p> + +<p> +But a moment’s comparison in the glass of the two faces side by side suddenly +sharpened his attention—the resemblance was so oddly arresting, and yet, and +yet, so curiously inconclusive. There was then something of the stolid old +Saxon left, he thought. Or had it been regained? Which was it? Not merely the +complexity of the question, but a half-conscious distaste of attempting to face +it, set him reading very slowly and laboriously, for his French was little more +than fragmentary recollection, the first few pages of the life of this buried +Sabathier. But with a disinclination almost amounting to aversion he made very +slow progress. Many of the words were meaningless to him, and every other +moment he found himself listening with intense concentration for the least hint +of what Sheila was doing, of what was going on in the house beneath him. He had +not very long to wait. He was sitting with his head leaning on his hand, the +book unheeded beneath the other on the table, when the door opened again behind +him, and Sheila entered. She stood for a moment, calm and dignified, looking +down on him through her veil. +</p> + +<p> +‘Please understand, Arthur, that I am not taking this step in pique, or even in +anger. It would serve no purpose to go on like this—this incessant heedlessness +and recrimination. There have been mistakes, misconceptions, perhaps, on both +sides. To me naturally yours are most conspicuous. That need not, however, +blind me to my own.’ +</p> + +<p> +She paused in vain for an answer. +</p> + +<p> +‘Think the whole thing over candidly and quietly,’ she began again in a quiet +rapid voice. ‘Have you really shown the slightest regard, I won’t say for me, +or even for Alice, but for just the obvious difficulties and—and proprieties of +our position? I have given up as far as I can brooding on and on over the same +horrible impossible thoughts. I withdraw unreservedly what I said just now +about punishment. Whatever the evidence, it is not even a wife’s place to judge +like that. You will forgive me that?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford did not turn his head. ‘Of course,’ he said, looking rather vacantly +out of the window, ‘it was only in the heat of the moment, Sheila; though, who +knows? it may be true.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well,’ she took hold of the great brass knob at the foot of the bed with one +gloved hand—‘well, I feel it is my duty to withdraw it. Apart from it, I see +only too clearly that even though all that has happened in these last few days +was in reality nothing but a horrible nightmare, I see that even then what you +have said about our married life together can never be recalled. You have told +me quite deliberately that for years past your life has been nothing but a +pretence—a sham. You implied that mine had been too. Honestly, I was not aware +of it, Arthur. But supposing all that has happened to you had been merely what +might happen at any moment to anybody, some actual defacement (you will forgive +me suggesting such a horrible thing)—why, if what you say is true, even in that +case my sympathy would have been only a continual fret and annoyance to you. +And this—this change, I own, is infinitely harder to bear. It would be an +outrage on common sense and on all that we hold seemly and—and sacred in life, +even in some trumpery story. You do, you must see all that, Arthur?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh yes,’ said Lawford, narrowing his eyes to pierce through the sunlight, ‘I +see all that.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Then we need not go over it all again. Whatever others may say, or think, I +shall still, at least so long as nothing occurs to the contrary, keep firmly to +my present convictions. Mr Bethany has assured me repeatedly that he has no—no +misgivings; that he understands. And even if I still doubted, which I don’t, +Arthur, though it would be rather trying to have to accept one’s husband at +second-hand, as it were, I should have to be satisfied. I dare say even such an +unheard-of thing as what we are discussing now, or something equally ghastly, +does occur occasionally. In foreign countries, perhaps. I have not studied such +things enough to say. We were all very much restricted in our reading as +children, and I honestly think, not unwisely. It is enough for the present to +repeat that I do believe, and that whatever may happen—and I know absolutely +nothing about the procedure in such cases—but whatever may happen, I shall +still be loyal; I shall always have your interests at heart.’ Her words +faltered and she turned her head away. ‘You did love me once, Arthur, I can’t +forget that.’ The contralto voice trembled ever so little, and the gloved hand +smoothed gently the brass knob beneath. +</p> + +<p> +‘If,’ said Lawford, resting his face on his hands, and curiously watching the +while his moving reflection in the looking-glass before him—‘if I said I still +loved you, what then? +</p> + +<p> +‘But you have already denied it, Arthur.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes; but if I said that that too was said only in haste, that brooding over +the trouble this—this metamorphosis was bringing on us all had driven me almost +beyond endurance: supposing that I withdrew all that, and instead said now that +I do still love you, just as I—’ he turned a little, and turned back again, +‘like this?’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila paused. ‘Could <i>any</i> woman answer such a question?’ she almost +sighed at last. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, but,’ Lawford pressed on, in a voice almost naive and stubborn as a +child’s, ‘If I tried to—to make you? I did once, Sheila.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I can’t, I can’t conceive such a position. Surely that alone is almost as +frantic as it is heartless! Is it, is it even right?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, I have not actually asked it. I own,’ he added moodily, almost under his +breath, ‘it would be—dangerous.... But there, Sheila, this poor old mask of +mine is wearing out. I am somehow convinced of that. What will be left, God +only knows. You were saying—’ He rose abruptly. ‘Please, please sit down,’ he +said; ‘I did not notice you were standing.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I shall not keep you a moment,’ she answered hurriedly; ‘I will sit here. The +truth is, Arthur,’ she began again almost solemnly, ‘apart from all sentiment +and—and good intentions, my presence here only harasses you and keeps you back. +I am not so bound up in myself that I cannot realise <i>that</i>. The +consequence is that after calmly—and I hope considerately—thinking the whole +thing over, I have come to the conclusion that it would arouse very little +comment, the least possible perhaps in the circumstances, if I just went away +for a few days. You are not in any sense ill. In fact, I have never known you +so—so robust, so energetic. You will be alone: Mr Bethany, perhaps.... You +could go out and come in just as you pleased. Possibly,’ Sheila smiled frankly +beneath her veil, ‘even this Dr Ferguson you have invented will be a help. It’s +only the servants that remain to be considered.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I should prefer to be quite alone.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Then do not worry about <i>them</i>. I can easily explain. And if you would +not mind letting her in, Mrs Gull can come in every other day or so just to +keep things in order. She’s entirely trustworthy and discreet. Or perhaps, if +you would prefer—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Mrs Gull will do nicely, Sheila. It’s very good of you to have given me so +much thought.’ A long and rather arduous pause followed. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, one other thing, Arthur. You sent out to Mr Critchett—do you remember?—the +night you first came home. I think, too, after the first awful shock, when we +were sitting in our bedroom, you actually referred to—to violent measures. You +will promise me, I may perhaps at least ask that, you will promise me on your +word of honour, for Alice’s sake, if not for mine, to do nothing rash.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, yes,’ said Lawford, sinking lower even than he had supposed possible into +the thin and lightless chill of ennui—‘nothing rash.’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila rose with a sigh only in part suppressed. ‘I have not seen Mr Bethany +again. I think, however, it would be better to let Harry know; I mean, dear, of +your derangement. After all, he is one of the family—at least, of mine. He will +not interfere. He would, perhaps quite naturally, be hurt if we did not take +him into our confidence. Otherwise there is no pressing cause for haste, at +least for another week or so. After that, I suppose, something will have to be +done. Then there’s Mr Wedderburn; wouldn’t it be as well to let him know that +at least for the present you are quite unable to think of returning to town? +That, too, in time will have to be arranged, I suppose, if nothing happens +meanwhile; I mean if things don’t come right. And I do hope, Arthur, you will +not set your mind too closely on what may only prove false hopes. This is all +intensely painful to me; of course, to us both.’ +</p> + +<p> +Again Lawford, even though he did not turn to confront it, became conscious of +the black veil turned towards him tentatively, speculatively, impenetrably. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I’ll write to Wedderburn; he’s had his ups and downs too.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I always rather fancied so,’ said Sheila reflectively, ‘he looks rather a—a +restless man. Oh, and then again,’ she broke off quickly, ‘there’s the question +of money. I suppose—it is only a conjecture—I suppose it would be better to do +nothing in that direction just for the present. Ada has now gone to the Bank. +Fifty pounds, Arthur; it is out of my own private account—do you think that +will be enough, just, of course, for your <i>present</i> needs?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘As a bribe, hush-money, or a thank-offering, Sheila?’ murmured her husband +wearily. +</p> + +<p> +‘I don’t follow you,’ replied the discreet voice from beneath the veil. +</p> + +<p> +He did actually turn this time and glance steadily over his shoulder. ‘How long +are you going for? and where?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I proposed to go to my cousin’s, Bettie Lovat’s; that is, of course, if you +have no objection. It’s near; it will be a long-deferred visit; and she need +know very little. And, of course, if for the least thing in the world you +should want me, there I am within call, as it were. And you will write? We +<i>are</i> acting for the best, Arthur?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘So long as it is your best, Sheila.’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila pondered. ‘You think, you mean, they’ll all say I ought to have stayed. +Candidly, I can’t see it in that light. Surely every experience of life proves +that in intimate domestic matters, and especially in those between husband and +wife, only the parties concerned have any means of judging what is best for +them? It has been our experience at any rate: though I must in fairness confess +that, outwardly at least, I haven’t had much of that kind of thing to complain +of.’ Sheila paused again for a reply. +</p> + +<p> +‘What kind of thing?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Domestic experience, dear.’ +</p> + +<p> +The house was quiet. There was not a sound stirring in the still sunny road of +orchards and discreet and drowsy villas. A long silence followed, immensely +active and alert on the one side, almost morbidly lethargic so far as the +stooping figure in front of the looking-glass was concerned. At last the last +haunting question came in a kind of croak, as if only by a supreme effort could +it be compelled to produce itself for consideration. +</p> + +<p> +‘And Alice, Sheila?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Alice, dear, of course goes with <i>me</i>.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You realise,’ he stirred uneasily, ‘you realise it may be final.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘My dear Arthur,’ cried Sheila, ‘it is surely, apart from mere delicacy, a +parental obligation to screen the poor child from the shock. Could she be at +such a time in any better keeping than her mother’s? At present she only +vaguely guesses. To know definitely that her father, infinitely worse than +death, had—had—Oh, is it possible to realise anything in this awful cloud? It +would kill her outright.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford made no stir. The quietest of raps came at the door. ‘The money from +the Bank, ma’am,’ said a faint voice. +</p> + +<p> +Sheila carefully opened the door a few inches. She laid the blue envelope on +the dressing-table at her husband’s elbow. ‘You had better perhaps count it,’ +she said in a low voice—‘forty in notes, the rest in gold,’ and narrowed her +eyes beneath her veil upon her husband’s very peculiar method of forgetting his +responsibilities. +</p> + +<p> +‘French?’ she said with a nod. ‘How very quaint.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford’s eyes fell and rested gravely on the dingy page of Herbert’s +mean-looking bundle of print. A queer feeling of cold crept over him. ‘Yes,’ he +said vaguely, ‘French,’ and hopelessly failed to fill in the silence that +seemed like some rather sleek nocturnal creature quietly waiting to be fed. +</p> + +<p> +Sheila swept softly towards the door. ‘Well, Arthur, I think that is all. The +servants will have gone by this evening. I have ordered a carriage for +half-past twelve. Perhaps you would first write down anything that occurs to +you to be necessary? Perhaps, too, it would be better if Dr Simon were told +that we shall not need him any more, that you are thinking of a complete change +of scene, a voyage. He is obviously useless. Besides, Mr Bethany, I think, is +going to discuss a specialist with you. I have written him a little note, just +briefly explaining. Shall I write to Dr Simon too?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You remember everything,’ said Lawford, and it seemed to him it was a remark +he had heard ages and ages ago. ‘It’s only this money, Sheila; will you please +take that away?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Take it away?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I think, Sheila, if I do take a voyage I should almost prefer to work my +passage. As for a mere “change of scene,” that’s quite uncostly.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It is only your face, Arthur,’ said Sheila solemnly, ‘that suggest these +wicked stabs. Some day you will perhaps repent of every one.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It is possible, Sheila; we none of us stand still, you know. One rips open a +lid sometimes and the wax face rots before one’s eyes. Take back your blue +envelope; and thank you for thinking of me. It’s always the woman of the house +that has the head.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I wish,’ said Sheila almost pathetically, and yet with a faint quaver of +resignation, ‘I wish it could be said that the man of the house sometimes has +the heart. Think it over, Arthur!’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila, with her husband’s luncheon tray, brought also her farewells. Lawford +surveyed, not without a faint, shy stirring of incredulity, the superbly +restrained presence. He stood before her dry-lipped, inarticulate, a schoolboy +caught redhanded in the shabbiest of offences. +</p> + +<p> +‘It is your wish then that I go, Arthur?’ she said pleadingly. +</p> + +<p> +He handed her her money without a word. +</p> + +<p> +‘Very well, Arthur; if you won’t take it,’ she said. ‘I should scarcely have +thought this the occasion for mere pride.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘The tenth,’ she continued, as she squeezed the envelope into her purse, with +only the least hardening of voice, ‘although I daresay you have not troubled to +remember it—the tenth will be the eighteenth anniversary of our wedding-day. It +makes parting, however advisable, and though only for the few days we should +think nothing of in happier circumstances, a little harder to bear. But there, +all will come right. You will see things in a different light, perhaps. Words +may wound, but time will heal.’ But even as she now looked closely into his +colourless sunken face some distant memory seemed to well up irresistibly—the +memory of eyes just as ingenuous, and as unassuming that even in claiming her +love had expressed only their stolid unworthiness. +</p> + +<p> +‘Did you know it? have you seen it?’ she said, stooping forward a little. ‘I +believe in spite of all....’ He gazed on solemnly, almost owlishly, out of his +fading mask. +</p> + +<p> +‘Wait till Mr Bethany tells you; you will believe it perhaps from him.’ He saw +the grey-gloved hand a little reluctantly lifted towards him. +</p> + +<p> +‘Good-bye, Sheila,’ he said, and turned mechanically back to the window. +</p> + +<p> +She hesitated, listening to a small far-away voice that kept urging her with an +almost frog-like pertinacity to do, to say something, and yet as stubbornly +would not say what; and she was gone. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap15"></a> +CHAPTER FIFTEEN</h2> + +<p> +Raying and gleaming in the sunlight the hired landau drove up to the gate. +Lawford, peeping between the blinds, looked down on the coachman, with reins +hanging loosely from his red squat-thumbed hand, seated in his tight livery and +indescribable hat on the faded cushions. One thing only was in his mind; and it +was almost with an audible cry that he turned towards the figure that edged, +white and trembling, into the chill room, to fling herself into his arms. +‘Don’t look at me,’ he begged her, ‘only remember, dearest, I would rather have +died down there and been never seen again than have given you pain. Run—run, +your mother’s calling. Write to me, think of me; good-bye!’ +</p> + +<p> +He threw himself on the bed and lay there till evening—till the door had shut +gently behind the last rat to leave the sinking ship. All the clearness, the +calmness were gone again. Round and round in dizzy sickening flare and clatter +his thoughts whirled. Contempt, fear, loathing, blasphemy, laughter, longing: +there was no end. Death was no end. There was no meaning, no refuge, no hope, +no possible peace. To give up was to go to perdition: to go forward was to go +mad. And even madness—he sat up with trembling lips in the twilight—madness +itself was only a state, only a state. You might be bereaved, and the pain and +hopelessness of that would pass. You might be cast out, betrayed, deserted, and +still be you, still find solitude lovely and in a brave face a friend. But +madness!—it surged in on him with all the clearness and emptiness of a dream. +And he sat quite still, his hand clutching the bedclothes, his head askew, +waiting for the sound of footsteps, for the presences and the voices that have +their thin-walled dwelling beneath the shallow crust of consciousness. +</p> + +<p> +Inky blackness drifted up in wisps, in smoke before his eyes; he was powerless +to move, to cry out. There was no room to turn; no air to breathe. And yet +there was a low, continuous, never-varying stir as of an enormous wheel +whirling in the gloom. Countless infinitesimal faces arched like glimmering +pebbles the huge dim-coloured vault above his head. He heard a voice above the +monstrous rustling of the wheel, clamouring, calling him back. He was hastening +headlong, muttering to himself his own flat meaningless name, like a child +repeating as he runs his errand. And then as if in a charmed cold pool he awoke +and opened his eyes again on the gathering darkness of the great bedroom, and +heard a quick, importunate, long-continued knocking on the door below, as of +some one who had already knocked in vain. +</p> + +<p> +Cramped and heavy-limbed, he felt his way across the room and lit a candle. He +stood listening awhile: his eyes fixed on the door that hung a little open. All +in the room seemed acutely fantastically still. The flame burned dim, enisled +in the sluggish air. He stole slowly to the door, looked out, and again +listened. Again the knocking broke out, more impetuously and yet with a certain +restraint and caution. Shielding the flame of his candle in the shell of his +left hand, Lawford moved slowly, with chin uplifted, to the stairs. He bent +forward a little, and stood motionless and drawn up, the pupils of his eyes +slowly contracting and expanding as he gazed down into the carpeted vacant +gloom; past the dim louring presence that had fallen back before him. +</p> + +<p> +His mouth opened. ‘Who’s there?’ at last he called. +</p> + +<p> +‘Thank God, thank God!’ he heard Mr Bethany mutter. ‘I mustn’t call, Lawford,’ +came a hurried whisper as if the old gentleman were pressing his lips to speak +through the letter-box. ‘Come down and open the door; there’s a good fellow! +I’ve been knocking no end of a time.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, I am coming,’ said Lawford. He shut his mouth and held his breath, and +stair by stair he descended, driving steadily before him the crouching, +gloating menacing shape, darkly lifted up before him against the darkness, +contending the way with him. +</p> + +<p> +‘Are you ill? Are you hurt? Has anything happened, Lawford?’ came the anxious +old voice again, striving in vain to be restrained. +</p> + +<p> +‘No, no,’ muttered Lawford. ‘I am coming; coming slowly.’ He paused to breathe, +his hands trembling, his hair lank with sweat, and still with eyes wide open he +descended against the phantom lurking in the darkness—an adversary that, if he +should but for one moment close his lids, he felt would master sanity and +imagination with its evil. ‘So long as you don’t get in,’ he heard himself +muttering, ‘so long as you don’t get <i>in</i>, my friend!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What’s that you’re saying?’ came up the muffled, querulous voice; ‘I can’t for +the life of me hear, my boy.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Nothing, nothing,’ came softly the answer from the foot of the stairs. ‘I was +only speaking to myself.’ +</p> + +<p> +Deliberately, with candle held rigidly on a level with his eyes, Lawford pushed +forward a pace or two into the airless, empty drawing-room, and grasped the +handle of the door. He gazed in awhile, a black oblique shadow flung across his +face, his eyes fixed like an animal’s, then drew the door steadily towards him. +And suddenly some power that had held him tense seemed to fail. He thrust out +his head, and, his face quivering with fear and loathing, spat defiance as if +in a passion of triumph into the gloom. +</p> + +<p> +Still muttering, he shut the door and turned the key. In another moment his +light was gleaming out on the grey perturbed face and black narrow shoulders of +his visitor. +</p> + +<p> +‘You gave me quite a fright,’ said the old man almost angrily; ‘have you hurt +your foot, or something?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It was very dark,’ said Lawford, ‘down the stairs.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What!’ said Mr Bethany still more angrily, blinking out of his unspectacled +eyes; ‘has she cut off the gas, then?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You got the note?’ said Lawford, unmoved. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, yes; I got the note.... Gone?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, yes; all gone. It was my choice. I preferred it so.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany sat down on one of the hard old wooden chairs that stood on either +side of the lofty hall, and breathing rather thickly, rested his hands on his +knees. ‘What’s happened?’ he inquired, looking up into the candle. ‘I forgot my +glasses, old fool that I am, and can’t, my dear fellow, see you very plainly. +But your voice—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I think,’ said Lawford, ‘I think it’s beginning to come back.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What, the whole thing! Oh no, my dear, dear man; be frank with me; not the +whole thing?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ said Lawford, ‘the whole thing—very, very gradually, imperceptibly. I +think even Sheila noticed. But I rather feel it than see it; that is all.... +I’m cornering him.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Him?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford jerked his candle as if towards some definite goal. ‘In time,’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +The two faces with the candle between them seemed as it were to gain light each +from the other. +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, well,’ said Mr Bethany, ‘every man for himself, Lawford; it’s the only +way. But what’s going to be done? We must be cautious; must think of—of the +others?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, that,’ said Lawford; ‘she’s going to squeeze me out.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You’ve—squabbled? Oh, but my dear, honest old, <i>honest</i> old idiot, there +are scores of families here in this parish, within a stone’s throw, that +squabble, wrangle, all but politely tear each other’s eyes out, every day of +their earthly lives. It’s perfectly natural. Where should we poor old +busybodies be else. Peace on earth we bring, and it’s mainly between husband +and wife.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ said Lawford, ‘but you see, this was not our earthly life. It was +between <i>us</i>.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Listen, listen to the dear mystic!’ exclaimed the old creature scoffingly. +‘What depths we’re touching. Here’s the first serious break of his lifetime, +and he’s gone stark staring transcendental. Ah well.’ He paused and glanced +quickly about him, with his curious bird-like poise of head. ‘But you’re not +alone here?’ he inquired suddenly; ‘not absolutely alone?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ said Lawford. ‘But there’s plenty to think about—and read. I haven’t +thought or read for years.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No, nor I; after thirty, my dear boy, one merely annotates, and the book’s +called Life. Bless me, his solemn old voice is grinding epigrams out of even +this poor old parochial barrel-organ. You don’t suppose, you cannot be +supposing you are the only serious person in the world? What’s more, it’s only +skin deep.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford smiled. ‘Skin deep. But think quietly over it; you’ll see I’m done.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Come here,’ said Mr Bethany. ‘Where’s the whiskey, where’s the cigars? You +shall smoke and drink, and I’ll watch. If it weren’t for a pitiful old stomach, +I’d join you. Come on!’ He led the way into the dining-room. +</p> + +<p> +He looked sparer, more wizened and sinewy than ever as he stooped to open the +sideboard. ‘Where on earth do they keep everything?’ he was muttering to +himself. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford put the candlestick down on the table. ‘There’s only one thing,’ he +said, watching his visitor’s rummaging; ‘what precisely do you think they will +do with me?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Look here, Lawford,’ snapped Mr Bethany; ‘I’ve come round here, hooting +through your letter-box, to talk sense, not sentiment. Why has your wife +deserted you? Without a servant, without a single—It’s perfectly monstrous.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘On my word of honour, I prefer it so. I couldn’t have gone on. Alone I all but +forget this—this lupus. Every turn of her little finger reminded me of it. We +are all of us alone, whether we know it or not; you said so yourself. And it’s +better to realize it stark and unconfused. Besides, you have no idea what—what +odd things.... There may be; there <i>is</i> something on the other side. I’ll +win through to that.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany had been listening attentively. He scrambled up from his knees with +a half-empty syphon of sodawater. ‘See here, Lawford,’ he said; ‘if you really +want to know what’s your most insidious and most dangerous symptom just now, it +is spiritual pride. You’ve won what you think a domestic victory; and you can +scarcely bear the splendour. Oh, you may shrug! Pray, what <i>is</i> this +“other side” which the superior double-faced creature’s going to win through to +now?’ He rapped it out almost bitterly, almost contemptuously. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford hardly heard the question. Before his eyes had suddenly arisen the +peace, the friendly unquestioning stillness, the thunderous lullaby old as the +grave. ‘It’s only a fancy. It seemed I could begin again.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, look here,’ said Mr Bethany, his whole face suddenly lined and grey with +age. ‘You can’t. It’s the one solitary thing I’ve got to say, as I’ve said it +to myself morn, noon, and night these scores of years. You can’t begin again; +it’s all a delusion and a snare. You say we’re alone. So we are. The world’s a +dream, a stage, a mirage, a rack, call it what you will—but <i>you</i> don’t +change, <i>you’re</i> no illusion. There’s no crying off for <i>you</i> no +ravelling out, no clean leaves. You’ve got this—this trouble, this +affliction—my dear, dear fellow what shall I say to tell you how I grieve and +groan for you oh yes, and actually laughed, I confess it, a vile hysterical +laughter, to think of it. You’ve got this almost intolerable burden to bear; +it’s come like a thief in the night; but bear it you must, and <i>alone!</i> +They say death’s a going to bed; I doubt it; but anyhow life’s a long +undressing. We came in puling and naked, and every stitch must come off before +we get out again. We must stand on our feet in all our Rabelaisian nakedness, +and watch the world fade. Well then, and not another word of sense shall you +worm out of my worn-out old brains after today—all I say is, don’t give in! +Why, if you stood here now, freed from this devilish disguise, the old, fat, +sluggish fellow that sat and yawned his head off under my eyes in his pew the +Sunday before last, if I know anything about human nature I’d say it to your +face, and a fig for your vanity and resignation—your last state would be worse +than the first. There!’ +</p> + +<p> +He bunched up a big white handkerchief and mopped it over his head. ‘That’s +done,’ he said, ‘and we won’t go back. What I want to know now is what are you +going to do? Where are you sleeping? What are you going to think about? I’ll +stay—yes, yes, that’s what it must be: I must stay. And I detest strange beds. +I’ll stay, you <i>sha’n’t</i> be alone. Do you hear me, Lawford?—you +<i>sha’n’t</i> be alone!’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford gazed gravely. ‘There is just one little thing I want to ask you before +you go. I’ve wormed out an extraordinary old French book; and—just as you +say—to pass the time, I’ve been having a shot at translating it. But I’m +frightfully rusty; it’s old French; would you mind having a look?’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany blinked and listened. He tried for the twentieth time to judge his +friend’s eyes, to gain as best he could some sustained and unobserved glance at +this baffling face. ‘Where is your precious French book?’ he said irritably. +</p> + +<p> +‘It’s upstairs.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Fire away, then!’ Lawford rose and glanced about the room. ‘What, no light +there either?’ snapped Mr Bethany. ‘Take this; <i>I</i> don’t mind the dark. +There’ll be plenty of that for me soon.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford hesitated at the door, looking rather strangely back. ‘No,’ he said, +‘there are matches upstairs.’ He shut the door after him. The darkness seemed +cold and still as water. He went slowly up, with eyes fixed wide on the +floating luminous gloom, and out of memory seemed to gather, as faintly as in +the darkness which they had exorcised for him, the strange pitiful eyes of the +night before. And as he mounted a chill, terrible, physical peace seemed to +steal over him. +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany was sitting as he had left him, looking steadily on the floor, when +Lawford returned. He flattened out the book on the table with a sniff of +impatience. And dragging the candle nearer, and stooping his nose close to the +fusty print, he began to read. +</p> + +<p> +‘Was this in the house?’ he inquired presently. +</p> + +<p> +‘No,’ said Lawford; ‘it was lent to me by a friend—Herbert.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘H’m! don’t know him. Anyhow, precious poor stuff this is. This Sabathier, +whoever he is, seems to be a kind of clap-trap eighteenth-century adventurer +who thought the world would be better off, apparently, for a long account of +all his sentimental amours. Rousseau, with a touch of Don Quixote in his +composition, and an echo of that prince of bogies, Poe! What, in the name of +wonder, induced you to fix on this for your holiday reading?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Sabathier’s alive, isn’t he?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I never said he wasn’t. He’s a good deal too much alive for my old wits, with +his Mam’selle This and Madame the Other; interesting enough, perhaps, for the +professional literary nose with a taste for patchouli.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yet I suppose even that is not a very rare character?’ Mr Bethany peered up +from the dingy book at his ingenuous questioner. ‘I should say decidedly that +the fellow was a <i>very</i> rare character, so long as by rare you don’t mean +good. It’s one of the dullest stupidities of the present day, my dear fellow, +to dote on a man simply because he’s different from the rest of us. Once a man +strays out of the common herd, he’s more likely to meet wolves in the thickets +than angels. From what I can gather in just these few pages this Sabathier +appears to have been an amorous, adventurous, emotional Frenchman, who went to +the dogs as easily and as rapidly as his own nature and his period allowed. And +I should say, Lawford, that he made precious bad reading for a poor old +troubled hermit like yourself at the present moment.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘There’s a portrait of him a few pages back.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany, with some little impatience, turned back to the engraving. +‘“Nicholas de Sabathier,”’s he muttered. ‘“De,” indeed!’ He poked in at the +foxy print with narrowed eyes. ‘I don’t deny it’s a striking, even perhaps, a +rather taking face. I don’t deny it.’ He gazed on with an even more acute +concentration, and looked up sharply. ‘Look here, Lawford, what in the name of +wonder—what trick are you playing on me now?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Trick?’ said Lawford; and the world fell with the tiniest plash in the +silence, like a vivid little float upon the surface of a shadowy pool. +</p> + +<p> +The old face flushed. ‘What conceivable bearing, I say, has this dead and gone +old roué on us now?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You don’t think, then, you see any resemblance—<i>any</i> resemblance at all?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Resemblance?’ repeated Mr Bethany in a flat voice, and without raising his +face again to meet Lawford’s direct scrutiny. ‘Resemblance to whom?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘To me? To me, as I am?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But even, my dear fellow (forgive my dull old brains!), even if there was just +the faintest superficial suggestion of—of that; what then?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Why,’ said Lawford, ‘he’s buried in Widderstone.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Buried in Widderstone?’ The keen childlike blue eyes looked almost stealthily +up across the book; the old man sat without speaking, so still that it might +even be supposed he himself was listening for a quiet distant footfall. +</p> + +<p> +‘He is buried in the grave beside which I fell asleep,’ said Lawford; ‘all +green and still and broken,’ he added faintly. ‘You remember,’ he went on in a +repressed voice—‘you remember you asked me if there was anybody else in sight, +any eavesdropper? You don’t think—him?’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bethany pushed the book a few inches away from him. ‘Who, did you say—who +was it you said put the thing into your head? A queer friend surely?’ he paused +helplessly. ‘And how, pray, do you know,’ he began again more firmly, ‘even if +there is a Sabathier buried at Widderstone, how do you know it is this +Sabathier? It’s not, I think,’ he added boldly, ‘a very uncommon name; with two +<i>b</i>’s at any rate. Whereabouts is the grave?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Quite down at the bottom, under the trees. And the little seat I told you of +is there, too, where I fell asleep. You see,’ he explained, ‘the grave’s almost +isolated; I suppose because he killed himself.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany clasped his knuckled fingers on the tablecloth. ‘It’s no good,’ he +concluded after a long pause; ‘the fellow’s got up into my head. I can’t think +him out. We must thrash it out quietly in the morning with the blessed sun at +the window; not this farthing dip. To me the whole idea is as revolting as it +is incredible. Why, above a century—no, no! And on the other hand, how easily +one’s fancy builds! A few straws and there’s a nest and squawking fledglings, +all complete. Is that why—is that why that good, practical wife of yours and +all your faithful household have absconded? Does it’—he threw up his head as if +towards the house above them—‘does it <i>reek</i> with him?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford shook his head. ‘She hasn’t seen him: not—not apart. I haven’t told +her.’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr Bethany tossed the hugger-mugger of pamphlets across the table. ‘Then, for +simple sanity’s sake, don’t. Hide it; burn it; put the thing completely out of +your mind. A friend! Who, where is this wonderful friend?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Not very far from Widderstone. He lives—practically alone.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And all that stumbling and muttering on the stairs?’ he leant forward almost +threateningly. ‘There isn’t anybody here, Lawford?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, no,’ said Lawford. ‘We are practically alone with this, you know,’ he +pointed to the book, and smiled frankly, however faintly. +</p> + +<p> +Again Mr Bethany sank into a fixed yet uneasy reverie, and again shook himself +and raised his eyes. +</p> + +<p> +‘Well then,’ he said, in a voice all but morose in its fretfullness, ‘what I +suggest is that first you keep quiet here; and next, that you write and get +your wife back. You say you are better. I think you said she herself noticed a +slight improvement. Isn’t it just exactly as I foresaw? And yet she’s gone! But +that’s not our business. Get her back. And don’t for a single instant waste a +thought on the other; not for a single instant, I implore you, Lawford. And in +a week the whole thing will be no more than a dreary, preposterous dream.... +You don’t <i>answer</i> me!’ he cried impulsively. +</p> + +<p> +‘But can one so easily forget a dream like this?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You don’t speak out, Lawford; you mean <i>she</i> won’t.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It must at least seem to have been in part of my own seeking, or contriving; +or at any rate—she said it—of my own hereditary or unconscious deserving.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘She said that!’ Mr Bethany sat back. ‘I see, I see,’ he said. ‘I’m nothing but +a fumbling old meddler. And there was I, not ten minutes ago, preaching for all +I was worth on a text I knew nothing about. God bless me, Lawford, how long we +take a-learning. I’ll say no more. But what an illusion. To think this—this—he +laid a long lean hand at arm’s length flat upon the table towards his +friend—‘to think this is our old jog-trot Arthur Lawford! From henceforth I +throw you over, you old wolf in sheep’s wool. I wash my hands of you. And now +where am I going to sleep?’ +</p> + +<p> +He covered up his age and weariness for an instant with a small crooked hand. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford took a deep breath. ‘You’re going, old friend, to sleep at home. And +I—I’m going to give you my arm to the Vicarage gate. Here I am, immeasurably +relieved, fitter than I’ve been since I was a dolt of a schoolboy. On my word +of honour: I can’t say why, but I am. I don’t care <i>that</i>, vicar, +honestly—puffed up with spiritual pride. If a man can’t sleep with pride for a +bed-fellow, well, he’d better try elsewhere. It’s no good; I’m as stubborn as a +mule; that’s at least a relic of the old Adam. I care no more,’ he raised his +voice firmly and gravely—‘I don’t care a jot for solitude, not a jot for all +the ghosts of all the catacombs!’ +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bethany listened, grimly pursed up his lips. ‘Not a jot for all the ghosts +of all the catechisms!’ he muttered. ‘Nor the devil himself, I suppose?’ He +turned once more to glance sharply in the direction of the face he could so +dimly—and of set purpose—discern; and without a word trotted off into the hall. +Lawford followed with the candle. +</p> + +<p> +‘’Pon my word, you haven’t had a mouthful of supper. Let me forage; just a +quarter of an hour, eh?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Not me,’ said Mr Bethany; ‘if you won’t have me, home I go. I refuse to +encourage this miserable grass-widowering. What <i>would</i> they say? What +would the busybodies say? Ghouls and graves and shocking mysteries—Selina! +Sister Anne! Come on.’ +</p> + +<p> +He shuffled on his hat and caught firm hold of his knobbed umbrella. ‘Better +not leave a candle,’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford blew out the candle. +</p> + +<p> +‘What? What?’ called the old man suddenly. But no voice had spoken. +</p> + +<p> +A thin trickle of light from the lamp in the street stuck up through the +fanlight as, with a smile that could be described neither as mischievous, +saturnine, nor vindictive, and was yet faintly suggestive of all three, Lawford +quietly opened the drawing-room door and put down the candlestick on the floor +within. +</p> + +<p> +‘What on earth, my good man, are you fumbling after now?’ came the almost +fretful question from under the echoing porch. +</p> + +<p> +‘Coming, coming,’ said Lawford, and slammed the door behind them. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap16"></a> +CHAPTER SIXTEEN</h2> + +<p> +The first faint streaks of dawn were silvering across the stars when Lawford +again let himself into his deserted house. He stumbled down to the pantry and +cut himself a crust of bread and cheese, and ate it, sitting on the table, +watching the leafy eastern sky through the painted bars of the area window. He +munched on, hungry and tired. His night walk had cooled head and heart. Having +obstinately refused Mr Bethany’s invitation to sleep at the Vicarage, he had +sat down on an old low wall, and watched until his light had shone out at his +bedroom window. Then he had simply wandered on, past rustling glimmering +gardens, under the great timbers of yellowing elms, hardly thinking, hardly +aware of himself except as in a far-away vision of a sluggish insignificant +creature struggling across the tossed-up crust of an old, incomprehensible +world. +</p> + +<p> +The secret of his content in that long leisurely ramble had been that +repeatedly by a scarcely realised effort it had not lain in the direction of +Widderstone. And now, as he sat hungrily devouring his breakfast on the table +in the kitchen, with the daybreak comforting his eyes, he thought with a +positive mockery of that poor old night-thing he had given inch by inch into +the safe keeping of his pink and white drawing-room. Don Quixote, Poe, +Rousseau—they were familiar but not very significant labels to a mind that had +found very poor entertainment in reading. But they were at least representative +enough to set him wondering which of their influences it was that had inflated +with such a gaseous heroism the Lawford of the night before. He thought of +Sheila with a not unkindly smile, and of the rest. ‘I wonder what they’ll do?’ +had been a question almost as much in his mind during these last few hours as +had ‘What am I to do?’ in the first bout of his ‘visitation.’ +</p> + +<p> +But the ‘they’ was not very precisely visualised. He saw Sheila, and Harry, and +dainty pale-blue Bettie Lovat, and cautious old Wedderburn, and Danton, and +Craik, and cheery, gossipy Dr Sutherland, and the verger, Mr Dutton, and +Critchett, and the gardener, and Ada, and the whole vague populous host that +keep one as definitely in one’s place in the world’s economy as a firm-set pin +the camphored moth. What his place was to be only time could show. Meanwhile +there was in this loneliness at least a respite. +</p> + +<p> +Solitude!—he bathed his weary bones in it. He laved his eyelids in it, as in a +woodland brook after the heat of noon. He sat on in calmest reverie till his +hunger was satisfied. Then, scattering out his last crumbs to the birds from +the barred window, he climbed upstairs again, past his usual bedroom, past his +detested guest room, up into the narrow sweetness of Alice’s, and flinging +himself on her bed fell into a long and dreamless sleep. +</p> + +<p> +By ten next morning Lawford had bathed and dressed. And at half-past ten he got +up from Sheila’s fat little French dictionary and his Memoirs to answer Mrs +Gull’s summons on the area bell. The little woman stood with arms folded over +an empty and capacious bag, with an air of sustained melancholy on her friendly +face. She wished him a very nervous ‘Good morning,’ and dived down into the +kitchen. The hours dragged slowly by in a silence broken only by an occasional +ring at the bell. About three she emerged from the house and climbed the area +steps with her bag hooked over her arm. He watched the little black figure out +of sight, watched a man in a white canvas hat ascend the steps to push a +blue-printed circular through the letter-box. It had begun to rain a little. He +returned to the breakfast-room and with the window wide open to the rustling +coolness of the leaves, edged his way very slowly across from line to line of +the obscure French print. +</p> + +<p> +Sabathier none the less, and in spite of his unintelligible literariness, did +begin to take shape and consistency. The man himself, breathing, and thinking, +began to live for Lawford even in those few half-articulate pages, though not +in quite so formidable a fashion as Mr Bethany had summed him up. But as the +west began to lighten with the declining sun, the same old disquietude, the +same old friendless and foreboding ennui stole over Lawford’s solitude once +more. He shut his books, placed a candlestick and two boxes of matches on the +hall table, lit a bead of gas, and went out into the rainy-sweet streets again. +</p> + +<p> +At a mean little barber’s with a pole above his lettered door he went in to be +shaved. And a few steps further on he sat down at the crumb-littered counter of +a little baker’s shop to have some tea. It pleased him almost to childishness +to find how easily he could listen and even talk to the oiled and crimpy little +barber, and to the pretty, consumptive-looking, print-dressed baker’s wife. +Whatever his face might now be conniving at, the Arthur Lawford of last week +could never have hob-nobbed so affably with his social ‘inferiors.’ +</p> + +<p> +For no reason in the world, unless to spend a moment or two longer in the +friendly baker’s shop, he bought six-penny-worth of cakes. He watched them as +they were deposited one by one in the bag, and even asked for one sort to be +exchanged for another, flushing a little at the pretty compliment he had +ventured on. +</p> + +<p> +He climbed out of the shop, and paused on the wooden doorstep. ‘Do you happen +to know Mr Herbert Herbert’s?’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +The baker’s wife glanced up at him with clear, reflective eyes. ‘Mr +Herbert’s?—that must be some little way off, sir. I don’t know any such name, +and I know most, just round about like.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, yes, it is,’ said Lawford, rather foolishly; ‘I hardly know why I asked. +It’s past the churchyard at Widderstone.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh yes, sir,’ she encouraged him. +</p> + +<p> +‘A big, wooden-looking house.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Really, sir. Wooden?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford looked into her face, but could find nothing more to say, so he smiled +again rather absently, and ascended into the street. +</p> + +<p> +He sat down outside the churchyard gate on the very bank where he had in the +sourness of the nettles first opened Sabathier’s Memoirs. The world lay still +beneath the pale sky. Presently the little fat rector walked up the hill, his +wrists still showing beneath his sleeves. Lawford meditatively watched him pass +by. A small boy with a switch, a tiny nose, and a swinging gallipot, his cheeks +lit with the sunset, followed soon after. Lawford beckoned him with his finger +and held out the bag of tarts. He watched him, half incredulous of his prize, +and with many a cautious look over his shoulder, pass out of sight. For a long +while he sat alone, only the evening birds singing out of the greenness and +silence of the churchyard. What a haunting inescapable riddle life was. +</p> + +<p> +Colour suddenly faded out of the light streaming between the branches. And +depression, always lying in ambush of the novelty of his freedom, began like +mist to rise above his restless thoughts. It was all so devilish empty—this +raft of the world floating under evening’s shadow. How many sermons had he +listened to, enriched with the simile of the ocean of life. Here they were, +come home to roost. He had fallen asleep, ineffectual sailor that he was, and a +thief out of the cloudy deep had stolen oar and sail and compass, leaving him +adrift amid the riding of the waves. +</p> + +<p> +‘Are they worth, do you think, quite a penny?’ suddenly inquired a quiet voice +in the silence. He looked up into the almost colourless face, into the grey +eyes beneath their clear narrow brows. +</p> + +<p> +‘I was thinking,’ he said, ‘what a curious thing life is, and wondering—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘The first half is well worth the penny—its originality! I can’t afford +twopence. So you must <i>give</i> me what you were wondering.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford gazed rather blankly across the twilight fields. ‘I was wondering,’ he +said with an oddly naive candour, ‘how long it took one to sink.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘They say, you know,’ Grisel replied solemnly, ‘drowned sailors float midway, +suffering their sea change; purgatory. But what a splendid pennyworth. All pure +philosophy!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“Philosophy!”’ said Lawford; ‘I am a perfect fool. Has your brother told you +about me?’ +</p> + +<p> +She glanced at him quickly. ‘We had a talk.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Then you do know—?’ He stopped dead, and turned to her. ‘You really realise +it, looking at me now?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I realise,’ she said gravely, ‘that you look even a little more pale and +haggard than when I saw you first the other night. We both, my brother and I, +you know, thought for certain you’d come yesterday. In fact, I went into the +Widderstone in the evening to look for you, knowing your nocturnal habits....’ +She glanced again at him with a kind of shy anxiety. +</p> + +<p> +‘Why—why is your brother so—why does he let me bore him so horribly?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Does he? He’s tremendously interested; but then, he’s pretty easily interested +when he’s interested at all. If he can possibly twist anything into the +slightest show of a mystery, he will. But, of course, you won’t, you can’t, +take all he says seriously. The tiniest pinch of salt, you know. He’s an +absolute fanatic at talking in the air. Besides, it doesn’t really matter +much.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘In the air?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I mean if once a theory gets into his head—the more far-fetched, so long as +it’s original, the better—it flowers out into a positive miracle of +incredibilities. And of course you can rout out evidence for anything under the +sun from his dingy old folios. Why did he lend you that <i>particular</i> +book?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Didn’t he tell you that, then?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘He said it was Sabathier.’ She seemed to think intensely for the merest +fraction of a moment, and turned. ‘Honestly, though, I think he immensely +exaggerated the likeness. As for...’ +</p> + +<p> +He touched her arm, and they stopped again, face to face. ‘Tell me what +difference exactly you see,’ he said. ‘I am quite myself again now, honestly; +please tell me just the very worst you think.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I think, to begin with,’ she began, with exaggerated candour, ‘his is rather a +detestable face.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And mine?’ he said gravely. +</p> + +<p> +‘Why—very troubled; oh yes—but his was like some bird of prey. Yours—what mad +stuff to talk like this!—not the least symptom, that I can see, of—why, the +“prey,” you know.’ +</p> + +<p> +They had come to the wicket in the dark thorny hedge. ‘Would it be very +dreadful to walk on a little—just to finish?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Very,’ she said, turning as gravely at his side. +</p> + +<p> +‘What I wanted to say was—’ began Lawford, and forgetting altogether the thread +by which he hoped to lead up to what he really wanted to say, broke off lamely; +‘I should have thought you would have absolutely despised a coward.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It would be rather absurd to despise what one so horribly well understands. +Besides, we weren’t cowards—we weren’t cowards a bit. My childhood was one +long, reiterated terror—nights and nights of it. But I never had the pluck to +tell any one. No one so much as dreamt of the company I had. Ah, and you didn’t +see either that my heart was absolutely in my mouth, that I was shrivelled up +with fear, even at sight of the fear on your face in the dark. There’s +absolutely nothing so catching. So, you see, I <i>do</i> know a little what +nerves are; and dream too sometimes, though I don’t choose charnelhouses if I +can get a comfortable bed. A coward! May I really say that to ask my help was +one of the bravest things in a man I ever heard of. Bullets—that kind of +courage—no real woman cares twopence for bullets. An old aunt of mine stared a +man right out of the house with the thing in her face. Anyhow, whether I may or +not, I do say it. So now we are quits.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Will you—’ began Lawford, and stopped. ‘What I wanted to say was,’ he jerked +on, ‘it is sheer horrible hypocrisy to be talking to you like this—though you +will never have the faintest idea of what it has meant and done for me. I +mean... And yet, and yet, I do feel when just for the least moment I forget +what I am, and that isn’t very often, when I forget what I have become and what +I must go back to—I feel that I haven’t any business to be talking with you at +all. “Quits!” And here I am, an outcast from decent society. Ah, you don’t +know—’ +</p> + +<p> +She bent her head and laughed under her breath. ‘You do really stumble on such +delicious compliments. And yet, do you know, I think my brother would be +immensely pleased to think you were an outcast from decent society if only he +could be thought one too. He has been trying half his life to wither decent +society with neglect and disdain—but it doesn’t take the least notice. The deaf +adder, you know. Besides, besides; what is all this meek talk? I detest meek +talk—gods or men. Surely in the first and last resort all we are is ourselves. +Something has happened; you are jangled, shaken. But to us, believe me, you are +simply one of fewer friends—and I think, after struggling up Widderstone Lane +hand in hand with you in the dark, I have a right to say “friends”—than I could +count on one hand. What are we all if we only realized it? We talk of dignity +and propriety, and we are like so many children playing with knucklebones in a +giant’s scullery. Come along, he will, some suppertime, for us, each in +turn—and how many even will so much as look up from their play to wave us +good-bye? that’s what I mean—the plot of <i>silence</i> we are all in. If only +I had my brother’s lucidity, how much better I would have said all this. It is +only, believe me, that I want ever so much to help you, if I may—even at risk, +too,’ she added, rather shakily, ‘of having that help—well—I know it’s little +good.’ +</p> + +<p> +The lane had narrowed. They had climbed the arch of a narrow stone bridge that +spanned the smooth dark Widder. A few late starlings were winging far above +them. Darkness was coming on apace. They stood for awhile looking down into the +black flowing water, with here and there the mild silver of a star dim leagues +below. ‘I am afraid,’ said Grisel, looking quietly up, ‘you have led me into +talking most pitiless nonsense. How many hours, I wonder, did I lie awake in +the dark last night, thinking of you? Honestly, I shall never, <i>never</i> +forget that walk. It haunted me, on and on.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Thinking of me? Do you really mean that? Then it was not all imagination; it +wasn’t just the drowning man clutching at a straw?’ +</p> + +<p> +The grey eyes questioned him. ‘You see,’ he explained in a whisper, as if +afraid of being overheard, ‘it—it came back again, and—I don’t mind a bit how +much you laugh at me! I had been asleep, and had had a most awful dream, one of +those dreams that seem to hint that some day <i>that</i> will be our real +world, that some day we may awake where dreaming then will be of this; and I +woke—came back—and there was a tremendous knocking going on downstairs. I knew +there was no one else in the house—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No one else in the house? And you like this?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ said Lawford, stolidly, ‘they were all out as it happened. And, of +course,’ he went on quickly, ‘there was nothing for me to do but simply to go +down and open the door. And yet, do you know, at first I simply couldn’t move. +I lit a candle, and then—then somehow I got to know that waiting for me was +just—but there,’ he broke off half-ashamed, ‘I mustn’t bother you with all this +morbid stuff. Will your brother be in now, do you think?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘My brother will be in, and, of course, expecting you. But as for “bother,” +believe me—well, did I quite deserve it?’ She stooped towards him. ‘You lit a +candle—and then?’ +</p> + +<p> +They turned and retraced their way slowly up the hill. +</p> + +<p> +‘It came again.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘That—that presence, that shadow. I don’t mean, of course, it’s a real shadow. +It comes, doesn’t it, from—from within? As if from out of some unheard-of +hiding place, where it has been lurking for ages and ages before one’s +childhood; at least, so it seems to me now. And yet although it does come from +within, there it is, too, in front of you, before your eyes, feeding even on +your fear, just watching, waiting for—What nonsense all this must seem to you!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, yes; and then?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Then, and you must remember the poor old boy had been knocking all this +time—my old friend—Mr Bethany, I mean—knocking and calling through the +letter-box, thinking I was <i lang="la">in extremis</i>, or something; then—how +shall I describe it?—well <i>you</i> came, your eyes, your face, as clear as +when, you know, the night before last, we went up the hill together. And +then...’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And then?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And then, we—you and I, you know—simply drove him downstairs, and I could hear +myself grunting as if it was really a physical effort; we drove him, step by +step, downstairs. And—’ He laughed outright, and boyishly continued his +adventure. ‘What do you think I did then, without the ghost of a smile, too, at +the idiocy of the thing? I locked the poor beggar in the drawing-room. I saw +him there, as plainly as I ever saw anything in my life, and the furniture +glimmering, though it was pitch dark: I can’t describe it. It all seemed so +desperately real, absolutely vital then. It all seems so meaningless and +impossible now. And yet, although I am utterly played out and done for, and +however absurd it may <i>sound</i>, I wouldn’t have lost it; I wouldn’t go back +for any bribe there is. I feel just as if a great bundle had been rolled off my +back. Of course, the queerest, the most detestable part of the whole business +is that <i>it</i>—the thing on the stairs—was this’—he lifted a grave and +haggard face towards her again—‘or rather <i>that</i>,’ he pointed with his +stick towards the starry churchyard. ‘Sabathier,’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +Again they had paused together before the white gate, and this time Lawford +pushed it open, and followed his companion up the narrow path. +</p> + +<p> +She stayed a moment, her hand on the bell. ‘Was it my brother who actually put +that horrible idea into your mind?—about Sabathier?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh no, not really put it into my head,’ said Lawford hollowly. ‘He only found +it there; lit it up.’ +</p> + +<p> +She laid her hand lightly on his arm. ‘Whether he did or not,’ she said with an +earnestness that was almost an entreaty, ‘of course, you <i>must</i> agree that +we every one of us have some such experience—that kind of visitor, once at +least, in a lifetime.’ ‘Ah, but,’ began Lawford, turning forlornly away, ‘you +didn’t see, you can’t have realized—the change.’ +</p> + +<p> +She pulled the bell almost as if in some inward triumph. ‘But don’t you think,’ +she suggested, ‘that that, like the other, might be, as it were, partly +imagination too? If now you thought <i>back.</i>...’ +</p> + +<p> +But a little old woman had opened the door, and the sentence, for the moment, +was left unfinished. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap17"></a> +CHAPTER SEVENTEEN</h2> + +<p> +There was no one in the room, and no light, when they entered. For a moment +Grisel stood by the open window, looking out. Then she turned impulsively. ‘My +brother, of course, will ask you too,’ she said; ‘we had made up our minds to +do so if you came again; but I want you to promise me now that you won’t dream +of going back to-night. That surely would be tempting—well, not Providence. I +couldn’t rest if I thought you might be alone; like that again.’ Her voice died +away into the calling of the waters. A light moved across the dingy old rows of +books and as his sister turned to go out Herbert appeared in the doorway, +carrying a green-shaded lamp, with an old leather quarto under his arm. +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, here you are,’ he said. ‘I guessed you had probably met.’ He drew up, +burdened, before his visitor. But his clear black glance, instead of wandering +off at his first greeting, had intensified. And it was almost with an air of +absorption that he turned away. He dumped his book on to a chair and it turned +over with scattered leaves on to the floor. He put the lamp down and stooped +after it, so that his next words came up muffled, and as if the remark had been +forced out of him. ‘You don’t feel worse, I hope?’ He got up and faced his +visitor for the answer. And for the moment Lawford stood considering his +symptoms. +</p> + +<p> +‘No,’ he said almost gaily; ‘I feel enormously better.’ But Herbert’s long, +oval, questioning eyes beneath the sleek black hair were still fixed on his +face. ‘I am afraid, my dear fellow,’ he said, with something more than his +usual curiously indifferent courtesy, ‘the struggle has frightfully pulled you +to pieces.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘The question is,’ answered Lawford, with a kind of tired yet whimsical +melancholy in his voice, ‘though I am not sure that the answer very much +matters—what’s going to put me together again? It’s the old story of Humpty +Dumpty, Herbert. Besides, one thing you said has stuck out in a quite curious +way in my memory. I wonder if you will remember?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What was that?’ said Herbert with unfeigned curiosity. +</p> + +<p> +‘Why, you said even though Sabathier had failed, though I was still my own old +stodgy self, that you thought the face—the face, you know, might work in. +Somehow, sometimes I think it has. It does really rather haunt me. In that +case—well, what then?’ Lawford had himself listened to this involved +explanation much as one watches the accomplishment of a difficult trick, +marvelling more at its completion at all than at the difficulty involved in the +doing of it. +</p> + +<p> +‘“Work in,”’ repeated Herbert, like a rather blasé child confronted with a new +mechanical toy; ‘did I really say that? well, honestly, it wasn’t bad; it’s +what one would expect on that hypothesis. You see, we are only different, as it +were, in our differences. Once the foot’s over the threshold, it’s nine points +of the law! But I don’t remember saying it.’ He shamefacedly and naively +confessed it: ‘I say such an awful lot of things. And I’m always changing my +mind. It’s a standing joke against me with my sister. She says the recording +angel will have two sides to my account: Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays; and +Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays—diametrically opposite convictions, and both +kinds wrong. On Sundays I am all things to all men. As for Sabathier, by the +way, I do want particularly to have another go at him. I’ve been thinking him +over, and I’m afraid in some ways he won’t quite wash. And that reminds me, did +you read the poor chap?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I just grubbed through a page or two; but most of my French was left at +school. What I did do, though, was to show the book to an old friend of ours—my +wife’s and mine—just to skim—a Mr Bethany. He’s an old clergyman—our vicar, in +fact.’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert had sat down, and with eyes slightly narrowed was listening with +peculiar attention. He smiled a little magnanimously. ‘His verdict, I should +think, must have been a perfect joy.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘He said,’ said Lawford, in his rather low, monotonous voice, ‘he said it was +precious poor stuff, that it reminded him of patchouli; and that Sabathier—the +print I mean—looked like a foxy old roué. They were, I think, his exact words. +We were alone together, last night.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You don’t mean that he simply didn’t see the faintest resemblance?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford nodded. ‘But then,’ he added simply, ‘whenever he comes to see me now +he leaves his spectacles at home.’ +</p> + +<p> +And at that, as if at some preconcerted signal, they both went off into a +simple shout of laughter, unanimous and sustained. +</p> + +<p> +But this first wild bout of laughter over, the first real bursting of the dam, +perhaps, for years, Lawford found himself at a lower ebb than ever. +</p> + +<p> +‘You see,’ he said presently, and while still his companion’s face was smiling +around the remembrance of his laughter like ripples after the splash of a +stone, ‘Bethany has been absolutely my sheet-anchor right through. And I was—it +was—you can’t possibly realise what a ghastly change it really was. I don’t +think any one ever will.’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert opened his hand and looked reflectively into its palm before allowing +himself to reply. ‘I wonder, you know; I have been wondering a good deal; +simply taking the other point of view for a moment; <i>was</i> it? I don’t mean +“ghastly” exactly (like, say, smallpox, G.P.I., elephantiasis), but was it +quite so complete, so radical, as in the first sheer gust of astonishment you +fancied?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford thought on a little further. ‘You know how one sees oneself in a +passion—why, how a child looks—the whole face darkened and drawn and possessed? +That was the change. That’s how it seems to come back to me. And something, +somebody, dodging behind the eyes. Yes; more that than even any excessive +change of feature, except, of course, that I also seemed—Shall I ever forget +that first cold, stifling stare into the looking-glass! I certainly was much +darker, even my hair. But I’ve told you all this before,’ he added wearily, +‘and the scores and scores of times I’ve thought it. I used to sit up there in +the big spare bedroom my wife put me up in, simply gloating. My flesh seemed +nothing more than an hallucination: there I was, haunting my body, an old +grinning tenement, and all that I thought I wanted, and couldn’t do without, +all I valued and prided myself on—stacked up in the drizzling street below. +Why, Herbert, our bodies <i>are</i> only glass or cloud. They melt, don’t they, +like wax in the sun once we’re out. But those first few days don’t make very +pleasant thinking. Friday night was the first, when I sat there like a +twitching waxwork, soberly debating between Bedlam here and Bedlam hereafter. I +even sometimes wonder whether its very repetition has not dulled the memory or +distorted it. My wife,’ he added ingenuously, ‘seems to think there are signs +of a slight improvement—a going back, I mean. But I’m not sure whether she +meant it.’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert surveyed his visitor critically. ‘You say “dark,” he said; ‘but surely, +Lawford, your hair now is nearly grey; well-flecked at least.’ +</p> + +<p> +Although the remark carried nothing comparatively of a shock with it, yet it +seemed to Lawford as if an electric current had passed over his scalp, coldly +stirring every hair upon his head. But somehow or other it was easier to sit +quietly on, to express no surprise, to let them do or say what they liked. +‘Well’ he retorted with an odd, crooked smile, ‘you must remember I am a good +deal older than I was last Saturday. I grew grey in the grave, Herbert.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But it’s like this, you know,’ said Herbert, rising excitedly, and at the next +moment, on reflection, composedly reseating himself. ‘How many of your people +actually <i>saw</i> it? How many owned to its being as bad, as complete, as you +made out? I don’t want for a moment to cut right across what you said last +night—our talk—but there are two million sides to every question, and as often +as not the less conspicuous have sounder—well—roots. That’s all.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I think really, do you know, I would rather not go over the detestable thing +again. Not many; my wife, though, and a man I know called Danton, who—who’s +prejudiced. After all, I have myself to think about too. And right through, +right through—there wasn’t the least doubt of that—they all in their hearts +knew it was me. They knew I was behind. I could feel that absolutely always; +it’s not just eyes and ears we use, there’s us ourselves to consider, though +God alone knows what that means. But the password was there, as you might say; +and they all knew I knew it, all—except’—he looked up as if in +bewilderment—‘except just one, a poor old lady, a very old friend of my +mother’s, whom I—I Sabathiered!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Whom—you—Sabathiered!’ repeated Herbert carefully, with infinite relish, +looking sidelong at his visitor. ‘And it is just precisely that....’ +</p> + +<p> +But at that moment his sister appeared in the doorway to say that supper was +ready. And it was not until Herbert was actually engaged in carving a cold +chicken that he followed up his advantage. ‘Mr. Lawford, Grisel,’ he said, ‘has +just enriched our jaded language with a new verb—to Sabathier. And if I may +venture to define it in the presence of the distinguished neologist himself, it +means, “To deal with histrionically”; or, rather, that’s what it will mean a +couple of hundred years hence. For the moment it means, “To act under the +influence of subliminalization; To perplex, or bemuse, or estrange with +<i>otherness</i>.” Do tell us, Lawford, more about the little old lady.’ He +passed with her plate a little meaningful glance at his sister, and repeated, +‘Do!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But I’ve been plaguing your sister enough already. You’ll wish...’ Lawford +began, and turned his tired-out eyes towards those others awaiting them so +frankly they seemed in their perfect friendliness a rest from all his troubles. +‘You see,’ he went on, ‘what I kept on thinking and thinking of was to get a +quite unbiased and unprejudiced view. She had known me for years, though we had +not actually met more than once or twice since my mother’s death. And there she +was sitting with me at the other end of just such another little seat as’—he +turned—to Herbert ‘as ours, at Widderstone. It was on Bewley Common: I can see +it all now; it was sunset. And I simply turned and asked her in a kind of a +whining affected manner if she remembered me; and when after a long time she +came round to owning that to all intents and purposes she did not—I professed +to have made a mistake in recognising <i>her</i>. I think,’ he added, glancing +up from one to the other of his two strange friends, ‘I think it was the +meanest trick I can remember.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘H’m,’ said Herbert solemnly: ‘I wish I had as sensitive a conscience. But as +your old friend didn’t recognise you, who’s the worse? As for her not doing so, +just think of the difference a few years makes to a man, and <i>any</i> severe +shock. Life wears so infernally badly. Who, for that matter, does not change, +even in character and yet who professes to see it? Mind, I don’t say in +essence! But then how many of the human ghosts one meets does one know in +essence? One doesn’t want to. It would be positively cataclysmic. And that’s +what brings me around to feel, Lawford, if I may venture to say so, that you +may have brooded a little too keenly on—on your own case. Tell any one you feel +ill; he will commiserate with you to positive nausea. Tell any priest your soul +is in danger; will he wait for proof? It’s misereres and penances world without +end. Tell any woman you love her; will she, can she, should she, gainsay you? +There you are. The cat’s out of the bag, you see. My sister and I sat up half +the night talking the thing over. I said I’d take the plunge. I said I’d risk +appearing the crassest, contradictoriest wretch that ever drew breath. I don’t +deny that what I hinted at the other night must seem in part directly contrary +to what I’m going to say now.’ +</p> + +<p> +He wheeled his black eyes as if for inspiration, and helped himself to salad. +‘It’s this,’ he said. ‘Isn’t it possible, isn’t it even probable that being +ill, and overstrung, moping a little over things more or less out of the common +ruck, and sitting there in a kind of trance—isn’t it possible that you may have +very largely <i>imagined</i> the change? Hypnotised yourself into believing it +much worse—more profound, radical, acute—and simply absolutely hypnotizing +others into thinking so, too. Christendom is just beginning to rediscover that +there is such a thing as faith, that it is just possible that, say, megrims or +melancholia may be removed at least as easily as mountains. The converse, of +course, is obvious on the face of it. A man fails because he thinks himself a +failure. It’s the men that run away that lose the battle. Suppose then, +Lawford’—he leaned forward, keen and suave—‘suppose you have been and +“Sabathiered” yourself!’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford had grown accustomed during the last few days to finding himself gazing +out like a child into reality, as if from the windows of a dream. He had in a +sense followed this long, loosely stitched, preliminary argument; he had at +least in part realised that he sat there between two clear friendly minds +acting in the friendliest and most obvious collusion. But he was incapable of +fixing his attention very closely on any single fragment of Herbert’s apology, +or of rousing himself into being much more than a dispassionate and not very +interested spectator of the little melodrama that Fate, it appeared, had at the +last moment decided rather capriciously to twist into a farce. He turned with a +smile to the face so keenly fixed and enthusiastic with the question it had so +laboriously led up to: ‘But surely, I don’t quite see...’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert lifted his glass as if to his visitor’s acumen and set it down again +without tasting it. ‘Why, my dear fellow,’ he said triumphantly, ‘even a dream +must have a peg. Yours was this unforgettable old suicide. Candidly now, how +much of Sabathier was actually yours? In spite of all that that fantastical +fellow, Herbert, said last night, dead men <i>don’t</i> tell tales. The last +place in the world to look for a ghost is where his traitorous bones lie +crumbling. Good heavens, think what irrefutable masses of evidence there would +be at our finger-tips if every tombstone hid its ghost! No; the fellow just +arrested you with his creepy epitaph: an epitaph, mind you, that is in a +literary sense distinctly fertilizing. It catches one’s fancy in its own crude +way, as pages and pages of infinitely more complicated stuff take possession +of, germinate, and sprout in one’s imagination in another way. We are all +psychical parasites. Why, given his epitaph, given the surroundings, I wager +any sensitive consciousness could have guessed at his face; and guessing, as it +were, would have feigned it. What do you think, Grisel?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I think, dear, you are talking absolute nonsense; what do they call +it—“darkening counsel”? It’s “the hair of the dog,” Mr Lawford.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, then, you see,’ said Herbert over a hasty mouthful, and turning again to +his victim—‘then you see, when you were just in the pink of condition to credit +any idle tale you heard, then I came in. What, with the least impetus, can one +<i>not</i> see by moonlight? The howl of a dog turns the midnight into a +Brocken; the branch of a tree stoops out at you like a Beelzebub crusted with +gadflies. I’d, mind you, sipped of the deadly old Huguenot too. I’d listened to +your innocent prattle about the child kicking his toes out on death’s cupboard +door; what more likely thing in the world, then, than that with that moon, in +that packed air, I should have swallowed the bait whole, and seen Sabathier in +every crevice of your skin? I don’t say there wasn’t any resemblance; it was +for the moment extraordinary; it was even when you were here the other night +distinctly arresting. But now (poor old Grisel, I’m nearly done) all I want to +say is this: that if we had the “foxy old roué” here now, and Grisel played +Paris between the three of us, she’d hand over the apple not to you but to me.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I don’t quite see where poor Paris comes in,’ suggested Grisel meekly. +</p> + +<p> +‘No, nor do I,’ said Herbert. ‘All that I mean, sagacious child, is, that Mr +Lawford no more resembles the poor wretch now than I resemble the Apollo +Belvedere. If you had only heard my sister scolding me, railing at me for +putting such ideas into your jangled head! They don’t affect <i>me</i> one +iota. I have, I suppose, what is usually called imagination; which merely means +that I can sup with the devil, spoon for spoon, and could sleep in Bluebeard’s +linen-closet without turning a hair. You, if I am not very much mistaken, are +not much troubled with that very unprofitable quality, and so, I suppose, when +a crooked and bizarre fancy does edge into your mind it roots there.’ +</p> + +<p> +And that said, not without some little confusion, and covert glance of inquiry +at his sister, Herbert made all the haste he could to catch up the course that +his companions had already finished. +</p> + +<p> +If only, Lawford thought, this insufferable weariness would lift awhile he +could enjoy the quiet, absurd, heedless talk, and this very friendly +topsy-turvy effort to ease his mind and soothe his nerves. He might even take +an interest again in his ‘case.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You see,’ he said, turning to Grisel, ‘I don’t think it really very much +matters how it all came about. I never could believe it would last. It may +perhaps—some of it at least may be fancy. But then, what isn’t? What <i>is</i> +trustworthy? And now your brother tells me my hair’s turning grey. I suppose I +have been living too slowly, too sluggishly, and they thought it was high time +to stir me up.’ +</p> + +<p> +He saw with extraordinary vividness the low panelled room; the still listening +face; the white muslin shoulders and dark hair; and the eyes that seemed to +recall some far-off desolate longing for home and childhood. It was all a +dream. That was the end of the matter. Even now, perhaps, his tired old stupid +body was lying hunched up, drenched with dew upon the little old seat under the +mist-wreathed branches. Soon it would bestir itself and wake up and go off +home—home to Sheila, to the old deadly round that once had seemed so natural +and inevitable, to the old dull Lawford—eyes and brain and heart. +</p> + +<p> +They returned up the dark shallow staircase to Herbert’s book-room, and he +talked on to very quiet and passive listeners in his own fantastic endless +fashion. And ever and again Lawford would find himself intercepting fleeting +and anxious glances at his face, glances almost of remorse and pity; and +thought he detected beneath this irresponsible contradictory babble an +unceasing effort to clear the sky, to lure away too pressing memories, to put +his doubts and fears completely to rest. +</p> + +<p> +Herbert even went so far as to plead guilty, when Grisel gave him the cue, of +having a little heightened and overcoloured his story of the restless +phantasmal old creature that haunted their queer wooden hauntable old house. +And when they rose, laughing and yawning to take up their candles, it was, +after all, after a rather animated discussion, with many a hair-raising ghost +story brought in for proof between brother and sister, as to exactly how many +times that snuff-coloured spectre had made his appearance; and, with less +unanimity still, as to the precise manner in which he was in the habit of +making his precipitant exit. +</p> + +<p> +‘You do at any rate acknowledge, Grisel, that the old creature does appear, and +that you saw him yourself step out into space when you were sitting down there +under the willow shelling peas. I’ve seen him twice for certain, once rather +hazily; Sallie saw him so plainly she asked his business: that’s five. I +resign.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Acknowledge!’ said Grisel; ‘of course I do. I’d acknowledge anything in the +world to save argument. Why, I don’t know what I should do without him. If +only, now Mr Lawford would give him a fair chance to show himself reading +quietly here about ten minutes to one, or shelling peas even, if he prefers it. +If only he’d stay long enough for <i>that</i>. Wouldn’t it be the very thing +for them both!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Of course,’ said Herbert cordially, ‘the very thing.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford looked up at neither of them. He shook his head. +</p> + +<p> +But he needed little persuasion to stay at least one night. The prospect of +that long solitary walk, of that tired stupid stooping figure dragging itself +along the interminable country roads seemed a sheer impossibility. ‘It is +not—it isn’t, I swear it—the other that keeps me back,’ he had solemnly assured +the friend that half smiled her relief at his acceptance, ‘but—if you only knew +how empty it’s all got now; all reason gone even to go on at all.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But doesn’t it follow? Of course it’s empty. And now life is going to begin +again. I assure you it is, I do indeed. Only, only have courage—just the will +to win on.’ +</p> + +<p> +He said good-night; shut-to the latched door of his long low room, ceilinged +with rafters close under the steep roof, its brown walls hung with quiet, dark, +pondering and beautiful faces looking gravely across at him. And with his +candle in his hand he sat down on the bedside. All speculation was gone. The +noisy clock of his brain had run down again. He turned towards the old oval +looking-glass on the dressing-table without the faintest stirring of interest, +suspense, or anxiety. What did it matter what a man looked like—a now familiar +but enfeebled and deprecating voice seemed to say. He knew that a change had +come. Even Sheila had noticed it. And since then what had he not gone through? +What now was here seemed of little moment, so far at least as this world was +concerned. +</p> + +<p> +At last with an effort he rose, crossed the uneven floor, and looked in +unmovedly on what was his own poor face come back to him: changed indeed almost +beyond belief from the sleek self-satisfied genial yet languid Arthur Lawford +of the past years, and still haunted with some faint trace of the set and icy +sharpness, and challenge, and affront of the dark Adventurer, but that—how +immeasurably dimmed and blunted and faded. He had expected to find it so. Would +it (the thought vanished across his mind) would it have been as unmistakably +there had he come hot-foot, fearing, expecting to find the other? But—was he +disappointed! +</p> + +<p> +He hardly knew how long he stood there, leaning on his hands, surveying almost +listlessly in the candle-light that lined, bedraggled, grey, hopeless +countenance, those dark-socketed, smouldering eyes, whose pupils even now were +so dilated that a casual glance would have failed to detect the least hint of +any iris. ‘It must have been something pretty bad you were, you know, or +something pretty bad you did,’ they seemed to be trying to say to him, ‘to drag +us down to this.’ +</p> + +<p> +He knelt down by force of habit to say his prayers; but no words came. Well, +between earthly friends a betrayal such as this would have caused a livelong +estrangement and hostility. The God the old Lawford used to pray to would +forgive him, he thought wearily, if just for the present he was a little too +sore at heart to play the hypocrite. But if, while kneeling, he said nothing, +he saw a good many things in such tranquillity and clearness as the mere eyes +of the body can share but rarely with their sisters of the imagination. And now +it was Alice who looked mournfully out of the dark at him; and now the little +old charwoman, Mrs Gull, with her bag hooked over her arm, climbed painfully up +the area steps; and now it was the lean vexed face of a friend, nursing some +restless and anxious grievance against him—Mr Bethany; and then and ever again +it was the face of one who seemed pure dream and fantasy and yet... He listened +intently and fancied even now he could hear the voices of brother and sister +talking quietly and circumspectly together in the room beneath. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap18"></a> +CHAPTER EIGHTEEN</h2> + +<p> +A quiet knocking aroused him in the long, tranquil bedroom; and Herbert’s head +was poked into the room. ‘There’s a bath behind that door over there,’ he +whispered, ‘or if you like I’m off for a bathe in the Widder. It’s a luscious +day. Shall I wait? All right,’ and the head was withdrawn. ‘Don’t put much on,’ +came the voice at the panel; ‘we’ll be home again in twenty minutes.’ +</p> + +<p> +The green and brightness of the morning must have been prepared for overnight +by spiders and the dew. Everywhere the gleaming nets were hung, and everywhere +there rose a tiny splendour from the waterdrops, so clear and pure and +changeable it seemed with their fire and colour they shook a tiny crystal music +in the air. Herbert led the way along a clayey downward path beneath hazels +tossing softly together their twigs of nuts, until they came out into a rounded +hollow that, mounded with thyme, sloped gently down to the green banks of the +Widder. The water poured like clearest glass beneath a rain of misty sunbeams. +</p> + +<p> +‘My sister always says that this is the very dell Boccaccio had in his mind’s +eye when he wrote the “Decameron.” There really is something almost classic in +those pines. And I’d sometimes swear with my eyes just out of the water I’ve +seen Dryads half in hiding peeping between those beeches. Good Lord, Lawford, +what a world we wretched moderns have made, and missed!’ +</p> + +<p> +The water was violently cold. It seemed to Lawford, as it swept up over his +body, and as he plunged his night-distorted eyes beneath its blazing surface, +that it was charged with some strange, powerful enchantment to wash away in its +icy clearness even the memory of the dull and tarnished days behind him. If one +could but tie up anyhow that stained bundle of inconsequent memories called +life, and fling it into a cupboard remoter even than Bluebeard’s, and lock the +door, and drop the quickly-rusting key into these living waters! +</p> + +<p> +He dressed himself with window thrown open to the blackbirds and thrushes, and +the occasional shrill solitary whistling of a robin. But, like the sour-sweet +fragrance of the brier, its wandering desolate burst of music had power to wake +memory, and carried him instantly back to that first aimless descent into the +evening gloom of Widderstone from which it was in vain to hope ever to climb +again. Surely never a more ghoulish face looked out on its man before than that +which confronted him as with borrowed razor he stood shaving those sunken +chaps, that angular chin. +</p> + +<p> +And even now, beneath the lantern of broad daylight, just as within that other +face had lurked the undeniable ghost and presence of himself, so beneath the +sunken features seemed to float, tenuous as smoke, scarcely less elusive than a +dream, between eye and object, the sinister darkness of the face that in those +two bouts with fear he had by some strange miracle managed to repel. +</p> + +<p> +‘Work in,’ the chance phrase came back. It had worked in in sober earnest; and +so far as the living of the next few weeks went, surely it might prove an ally +without which he simply could not conceive himself as struggling on at all. +</p> + +<p> +But as dexterous minds as even restless Sabathier’s had him just now in safe +and kindly keeping. All the quiet October morning Herbert kept him talking and +stooping over his extraordinary collection of books. +</p> + +<p> +‘The point is,’ he explained to Lawford, standing amid a positive archipelago +of precious ‘finds,’ with his foot hoisted onto a chair and a patched-up, +sea-stained folio on his knee, ‘I honestly detest the mere give and take of +what we are fools enough to call life. I don’t deny Life’s there,’ he swept his +hand towards the open window—‘in that frantic Tophet we call London; but +there’s no focus, no point of vantage. Even a scribbler only gets it piecemeal +and through a dulled medium. We learn to read before we know how to see; we +swallow our tastes, convictions, and emotions whole; so that nine-tenths of the +world’s nectar is merely honeydew.’ He smiled pleasantly into the fixed vacancy +of his visitor’s face. ‘That’s why I’ve just gone on,’ he continued amiably, +‘collecting this particular kind of stuff—what you might call riff-raff. +There’s not a book here, Lawford, that hasn’t at least a glimmer of the real +thing in it—just Life, seen through a living eye, and felt. As for literature, +and style, and all that gallimaufry, don’t fear for them if your author has the +ghost of a hint of genius in his making.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But surely,’ said Lawford, trying for the twentieth time to pretend to himself +that these endless books carried the faintest savour of the delight to him +which they must, he rather forlornly supposed, shower upon Herbert, ‘surely +genius is a very rare thing!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Rare! the world simply swarms with it. But before you can bottle it up in a +book it’s got to be articulate. Just for a single instant imagine yourself +Falstaff, and if there weren’t hundreds of Falstaffs in every generation, to be +examples of his ungodly life, he’d be as dead as a doornail to-morrow—imagine +yourself Falstaff, and being so, sitting down to write “Henry IV,” or “The +Merry Wives.” It’s simply preposterous. You wouldn’t be such a fool as to waste +the time. A mere Elizabethan scribbler comes along with a gift of expression +and an observant eye, lifts the bloated old tippler clean out of life, and +swims down the ages as the greatest genius the world has ever seen. Whereas, +surely, though you mustn’t let me bore you with all this piffle, it’s Falstaff +is the genius, and W. S. merely a talented reporter. +</p> + +<p> +‘Lear, Macbeth, Mercutio—they live on their own, as it were. The newspapers are +full of them, if we were only the Shakespeares to see it. Have you ever been in +a Police Court? Have you ever <i>watched</i> tradesmen behind their counters? +My soul, the secrets walking in the streets! You jostle them at every corner. +There’s a Polonius in every first-class railway carriage, and as many Juliets +as there are boarding-schools. What the devil are <i>you</i>, my dear chap, but +genius itself, with all the world brand new upon your shoulders? And who’d have +thought it of you ten days ago? +</p> + +<p> +‘It’s simply and solely because we’re all, poor wretches, dumb—dumb as butts of +Malmsez; dumb as drummerless drums. Here am I, ass that I am, trickling out +this—this whey that no more expresses me than Tupper does Sappho. But that’s +what I want to mean. How inexhaustibly rich everything is, if you only stick to +life. Here it is packed away behind these rotting covers, just the real thing, +no respectable stodge; no mere parasitic stuff; not more than a dozen poets; +scores of outcasts and vagabonds—and the real thing in vagabonds is pretty rare +in print, I can tell you. We’re all, every one of us, sodden with facts, +drugged with the second-hand, and barnacled with respectability until—until the +touch comes. Goodness knows where from; but there’s no mistaking it; oh no!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But what,’ said Lawford uneasily, ‘what on earth do you mean by the touch?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I mean when you cease to be a puppet only and sit up in the gallery too. When +you squeeze through to the other side. When you suffer a kind of conversion of +the mind; become aware of your senses. When you get a living inkling. When you +become articulate to yourself. When you <i>see</i>.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I am awfully stupid,’ Lawford murmured, ‘but even now I don’t really follow +you a bit. But when, as you say, you do become articulate to yourself, what +happens then?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Why, then,’ said Herbert with a shrug almost of despair, ‘then begins the +weary tramp back. One by one drop off the truisms, and the Grundyisms, and the +pedantries, and all the stillborn claptrap of the marketplace sloughs off. Then +one can seriously begin to think about saving one’s soul.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Saving one’s soul,’ groaned Lawford; ‘why, I am not even sure of my own body +yet.’ He walked slowly over to the window and with every thought in his head as +quiet as doves on a sunny wall, stared out into the garden of green things +growing, leaves fading and falling water. ‘I tell you what,’ he said, turning +irresolutely, ‘I wonder if you could possibly find time to write me out a +translation of Sabathier. My French is much too hazy to let me really get at +the chap. He’s gone now; but I really should like to know what kind of stuff +exactly he has left behind.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, Sabathier!’ said Herbert, laughing. ‘What do you think of that, Grisel?’ +he asked, turning to his sister, who at that moment had looked in at the door. +‘Here’s Mr Lawford asking me to make a translation of Sabathier. Lunch, +Lawford.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford sighed. And not until he had slowly descended half the narrow uneven +stairs that led down to the dining-room did he fully realise the guile of a +sister that could induce a hopeless bookworm to waste a whole morning over the +stupidest of companions, simply to keep his tired-out mind from rankling, and +give his Sabathier a chance to go to roost. +</p> + +<p> +‘I think, do you know,’ he managed to blurt out at last ‘I think I ought to be +getting home again. The house is empty—and—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You shall go this evening,’ said Herbert, ‘if you really must insist on it. +But honestly, Lawford, we both think that after what the last few days must +have been, it is merely common sense to take a rest. How can you possibly rest +with a dozen empty rooms echoing every thought you think? There’s nothing more +to worry about; you agree to that. Send your people a note saying that you are +here, safe and sound. Give them a chance of lighting a fire, and driving in the +fatted calf. Stay on with us just the week out.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford turned from one to the other of the two friendly faces. But what was +dimly in his mind refused to express itself. ‘I think, you know, I—’ he began +falteringly. +</p> + +<p> +‘But it’s just this thinking that’s the deuce—this preposterous habit of having +continually to make up one’s mind. Off with his head, Grisel! My sister’s going +to take you for a picnic; we go every other fine afternoon; and you can argue +it out with her.’ +</p> + +<p> +Once alone again with Grisel, however, Lawford found talking unnecessary. +Silences seemed to fall between them as quietly and restfully as evening flows +into night. They walked on slowly through the fading woods, and when they had +reached the top of the hill that sloped down to the dark and foamless Widder +they sat down in the honey-scented sunshine on a knoll of heather and bracken, +and Grisel lighted the little spirit-kettle she had brought with her, and +busied herself very methodically over making tea. +</p> + +<p> +That done, she clasped her hands round her knees, and sat now gossiping, now +silent, in the pale autumnal beauty. There was a bird wistfully twittering in +the branches overhead, and ever and again a withered leaf would slip circling +down from the motionless beech boughs arched in their stillness above their +heads beneath the thin blue sky. +</p> + +<p> +‘Men, you know,’ she began again suddenly, starting out of reverie, ‘really are +absurdly blind; and just a little bit absurdly kindly stupid. How many times +have I been at the point of laughing out at my brother’s delicious naive +subtleties. But you do, you will, understand, Mr Lawford, that he was, that we +are both “doing our best”—to make amends?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I understand—I do indeed—a tenth part of all your kindness.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, but that’s just it—that horrible word “kindness”! If ever there were two +utterly self-absorbed people, without a trace, with an absolute horror of +kindness, it is just my brother and I. It’s most of it false and most of it +useless. We all surely must take what comes in this topsy-turvy world. I +believe in saying out:—that the more one thinks about life the worse it +becomes. There are only two kinds of happiness in this world—a wooden post’s +and Prometheus’s. And who ever heard of any one having the impudence to be kind +to Prometheus? As for a miserable “medium” like me, not quite a post and +leagues and leagues from even envying a Prometheus, she’s better for the powder +without the jam. But that’s all nothing. What I can’t help thinking—and it’s +not a bit giving my brother away, because we both think it—that it was partly +our thoughtlessness that added at least something to—to the rest. It was +perfectly absurd. He saw you were ill; he saw—he must have seen even in that +first Sunday talk—that your nerves were all askew. And who doesn’t know what +“nerves” means nowadays? And yet he deliberately chattered. He loves it—just at +large, you know, like me. I told him before I came out that I intended, if I +could, to say all this. And now it’s said you’ll please forgive me for going +back to it.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Please don’t talk about forgiveness. But when you say he chattered, you mean +about Sabathier, of course. And that, you know, I don’t care a fig for now. We +can settle all that between ourselves—him and me, I mean. And now tell me +candidly again—Is there any “prey” in my face now?’ +</p> + +<p> +She looked up fleetingly into his eyes, leant back her head and laughed. +‘“Prey,” there never was a glimpse.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And “change”?’ Their eyes met again in an infinitely brief, infinitely +bewildering argument. +</p> + +<p> +‘Really, really, scarcely perceptible,’ she assured him, ‘except, of course, +how horribly, horribly ill you look. And that only seems to prove to me you +must be hiding something else. No illusion on earth could—could have done that +to your face.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You think, I know,’ he persisted, ‘that I must be persuaded and cosseted and +humoured. Yes, you do; it’s my poor old sanity that’s really in both your +minds. Perhaps I am—not absolutely sound. Anyhow. I’ve been watching it in your +looks at each other all the time. And I can never, never say, never tell you +what you have done for me. But you see, after all, we did win through; I keep +on telling myself that. So that now it’s purely from the most selfish and +practical motives that I want you to be perfectly frank with me. I have to go +back, you know; and some of them, one or two of my friends I mean, are not all +on my side. Think of me as I was when you came into the room, three centuries +ago, and you turned and looked, frowning at me in the candle-light; remember +that and look at me now. What is the difference? Does it shock you? Does it +make the whole world seem a trick, a sham? Does it simply sour your life to +think such a thing possible? Oh, the hours I’ve spent gloating on Widderstone’s +miserable mask of skin and bone, as I was saying to your brother only last +night, and never knew until they shuffled me that the old self too was nothing +better than a stifling suffocating mask.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But don’t you see,’ she argued softly, turning her face away a little, ‘you +were a stranger then (though I certainly didn’t <i>mean</i> to frown). And then +a little while after we were, well, just human beings, shoulder to shoulder, +and if friendship does not mean that, I don’t know what it does mean. And now, +you are—well, just you: the you, you know, of three centuries ago! And if you +mean to ask me whether at any precise moment I have been conscious that this +you I am now speaking to was not the you of last night, or of that dark climb +up the hill, why, it is simply frantic to think it could ever be necessary to +say over and over again, No. But if you mean, Have you changed else? All I +could answer is, Don’t we all change as we grow to know one another? What were +just features, what just dingily represented one, as it were, is forgotten, or +rather gets remembered. Of course, the first glimpse is the landscape under +lightning as it were. But afterwards isn’t it surely like the alphabet to a +child; what was first a queer angular scrawl becomes A, and is always ever +after A, undistinguished, half-forgotten, yet standing at last for goodness +knows what real wonderful things—or for just the dry bones of soulless words? +Is that it?’ She stole a sidelong glance into his brooding face, leaning her +head on her hand. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, yes,’ came the rather dissatisfied reply. ‘I do agree; perfectly. But +then, you see—I told you I was going to talk of nothing but myself—what did at +first happen to me was something much worse, and, I suppose, something quite +different from that.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And yet, didn’t you tell us, that of all your friends not one really denied in +their hearts your—what they would call, I suppose—your <i>identity</i>; except +that poor little offended old lady. And even she, if my intuition is worth a +penny piece, even she when you go soon and talk to her will own that she did +know you, and that it was not because you were a stranger that she was +offended, but because you so ungenerously pretended to be one. That was a +little mad, now, if you like!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh yes,’ said Lawford, ‘I am going to ask her forgiveness. I don’t know what I +didn’t vow to take her for a peace-offering if the chance should ever come—and +the courage—to make my peace with her. But now that the chance has come, and I +think the courage, it is the desire that’s gone. I don’t seem to care either +way. I feel as if I had got past making my peace with any one.’ +</p> + +<p> +But this time no answer helped him out. +</p> + +<p> +‘After all,’ he went plodding on, ‘there is more than just the mere day to day +to consider. And one doesn’t realise that one’s face actually <i>is</i> one’s +fortune without a shock. And that <i>that</i> gone, one is, as your brother +said, just like a bee come back to the wrong hive. It undermines,’ he smiled +rather bitterly, ‘one’s views rather. And it certainly shifts one’s friends. If +it hadn’t been just for my old’—he stopped dead, and again pushed slowly on—‘if +it hadn’t been for our old friend, Mr Bethany, I doubt if we should now have +had a soul on our side. I once read somewhere that wolves always chase the old +and weak and maimed out of the pack. And after all, what do <i>we</i> do? Where +do we keep the homeless and the insane? And yet, you know,’ he added +ruminatingly, ‘it is not as if mine was ever a particularly lovely or lovable +face! While as for the poor wretch behind it, well, I really cannot see what +meaning, or life even, he had before—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Before?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford met bravely the clear whimsical eyes. ‘Before, I was Sabathiered.’ +</p> + +<p> +Grisel laughed outright. +</p> + +<p> +‘You think,’ he retorted almost bitterly, ‘you think I am talking like a +child.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ she sighed cheerfully, ‘I was quite envying you.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, there I am,’ said Lawford inconsequently. ‘And now; well, now, I +suppose, the whole thing’s to begin again. I can’t help beginning to wonder +what the meaning of it all is; why one’s duty should always seem so very stupid +a thing. And then, too, what <i>can</i> there be on earth that even a buried +Sabathier could desire?’ He glanced up in a really animated perplexity at the +still, dark face turned in the evening light towards the darkening valley. And +perplexity deepened into a disquieted frown—like that of a child who is roused +suddenly from a daydream by the half-forgotten question of a stranger. He +turned his eyes almost furtively away as if afraid of disturbing her; and for +awhile they sat in silence... At last he turned again almost shyly. ‘I hope +some day you will let me bring my daughter to see you.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, yes,’ said Grisel eagerly; ‘we should both <i>love</i> it, of course. +Isn’t it curious?—I simply <i>knew</i> you had a daughter. Sheer intuition!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I say “some day,”’ said Lawford; ‘I know, though, that that some day will +never come.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Wait; just wait,’ replied the quiet confident voice, ‘that will come too. One +thing at a time, Mr Lawford. You’ve won your old self back again; you’ll win +your old love of life back again in a little while; never fear. Oh, don’t I +know that awful Land’s End after illness; and that longing, too, that gnawing +longing, too, for Ultima Thule. So, it’s a bargain between us that you bring +your daughter soon.’ She busied herself over the tea things. ‘And, of course,’ +she added, as if it were an afterthought, looking across at him in the pale +green sunlight as she knelt, ‘you simply won’t think of going back to-night.... +Solitude, I really do think, solitude just now would be absolute madness. +You’ll write to-day and go, perhaps, to-morrow!’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford looked across in his mind at his square ungainly house, full-fronting +the afternoon sun. He tried to repress a shudder. ‘I think, do you know, I +ought to go to-day.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, why not? Why not? Just to reassure yourself that all’s well. And come +back here to sleep. If you’d really promise that I’d drive you in. I’d love it. +There’s the jolliest little governess-cart we sometimes hire for our picnics. +May I? You’ve no idea how much easier in our minds my brother and I would be if +you would. And then to-morrow, or at any rate the next day, you shall be +surrendered, whole and in your right mind. There, that’s a bargain too. Now we +must hurry.’ +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap19"></a> +CHAPTER NINETEEN</h2> + +<p> +Herbert himself went down to order the governess cart, and packed them in with +a rug. And in the dusk Grisel set Lawford down at the corner of his road and +drove on to an old bookseller’s with a commission from her brother, promising +to return for him in an hour. Dust and a few straws lay at rest as if in some +abstruse arrangement on the stones of the porch just as the last faint whirling +gust of sunset had left them. Shut lids of sightless indifference seemed to +greet the wanderer from the curtained windows. +</p> + +<p> +He opened the door and went in. For a moment he stood in the vacant hall; then +he peeped first into the blind-drawn dining-room, faintly, dingily sweet, like +an empty wine-bottle. He went softly on a few paces and just opening the door +looked in on the faintly glittering twilight of the drawing-room. But the +congealed stump of candle that he had set in the corner as a final rancorous +challenge to the beaten Shade was gone. He slowly and deliberately ascended the +stairs, conscious of a peculiar sense of ownership of what in even so brief an +absence had taken on so queer a look of strangeness. It was almost as if he +might be some lone heir come in the rather mournful dusk to view what +melancholy fate had unexpectedly bestowed on him. +</p> + +<p> +‘Work in’—what on earth else could this chill sense of strangeness mean? Would +he ever free his memory from that one haphazard, haunting hint? And as he stood +in the doorway of the big, calm room, which seemed even now to be stirring with +the restless shadow of these last few far-away days; now pacing sullenly to and +fro; now sitting hunched-up to think; and now lying impotent in a vain, +hopeless endeavour only for the breath of a moment to forget—he awoke out of +reverie to find himself smiling at the thought that a changed face was +practically at the mercy of an incredulous world, whereas a changed heart was +no one’s deadly dull affair but its owner’s. The merest breath of pity even +stole over him for the Sabathier who after all had dared and had needed, +perhaps, nothing like so arrogant and merciless a <i lang="fr">coup de +grâce</i> to realise that he had so ignominiously failed. +</p> + +<p> +‘But there, that’s done!’ he exclaimed out loud, not without a tinge of regret +that theories, however brilliant and bizarre, could never now be anything +else—that now indeed that the symptoms had gone, the ‘malady,’ for all who had +not been actually admitted into the shocked circle, was become nothing more +than an inanely ‘tall’ story; stuffing not even savoury enough for a goose. How +wide exactly, he wondered, would Sheila’s discreet, shocked circle prove? He +stood once more before the looking-glass, hearing again Grisel’s words in the +still green shadow of the beech-tree, ‘Except of course, horribly, horribly +ill.’ ‘What a fool, what a coward she thinks I am!’ +</p> + +<p> +There was still nearly an hour to be spent in this great barn of faded +interests. He lit a candle and descended into the kitchen. A mouse went +scampering to its hole as he pushed open the door. The memory of that ravenous +morning meal nauseated him. It was sour and very still here; he stood erect; +the air smelt faint of earth. In the breakfast-room the bookcase still swung +open. Late evening mantled the garden; and in sheer ennui again he sat down to +the table, and turned for a last not unfriendly hob-a-nob with his poor old +friend Sabathier. He would take the thing back. Herbert, of course, was going +to translate it for him. Now if the patient old Frenchman had stormed Herbert +instead—that surely would have been something like a coup! Those frenzied +books. The absurd talk of the man. Herbert was perfectly right—he could have +entertained fifty old Huguenots without turning a hair. ‘I’m such an awful +stodge.’ +</p> + +<p> +He turned the woolly leaves over very slowly. He frowned impatiently, and from +the end backwards turned them over again. Then he laid the book softly down on +the table and sat back. He stared with narrowed lids into the flame of his +quiet friendly candle. Every trace, every shred of portrait and memoir were +gone. Once more, deliberately, punctiliously, he examined page by page the +blurred and unfamiliar French—the sooty heads, the long, lean noses, the baggy +eyes passing like figures in a peepshow one by one under his hand—to the last +fragmentary and dexterously mended leaf. Yes, Sabathier was gone. Quite the old +slow Lawford smile crept over his face at the discovery. It was a smile a +little sheepish too, as he thought of Sheila’s quiet vigilance. +</p> + +<p> +And the next instant he had looked up sharply, with a sudden peculiar shrug, +and a kind of cry, like the first thin cry of an awakened child, in his mind. +Without a moment’s hesitation he climbed swiftly upstairs again to the big +sepulchral bedroom. He pressed with his fingernail the tiny spring in the +looking-glass. The empty drawer flew open. There were finger-marks still in the +dust. +</p> + +<p> +Yet, strangely enough, beneath all the clashing thoughts that came flocking +into his mind as he stood with the empty drawer in his hand, was a wounding yet +still a little amused pity for his old friend Mr Bethany. So far as he himself +was concerned the discovery—well, he would have plenty of time to consider +everything that could possibly now concern himself. Anyhow, it could only +simplify matters. +</p> + +<p> +He remembered waking to that old wave of sickening horror on the first unhappy +morning; he remembered the keen yet owlish old face blinking its deathless +friendliness at him, and the steady pressure of the cold, skinny hand. As for +Sheila, she had never done anything by halves; certainly not when it came to +throwing over a friend no longer necessary to one’s social satisfaction. But +she would edge out cleverly, magnanimously, triumphantly enough, no doubt, when +the day of reckoning should come, the day when, her nets wide spread, her bait +prepared, he must stand up before her outraged circle and positively prove +himself her lawful husband, perhaps even to the very imprint of his thumb. +</p> + +<p> +‘Poor old thing!’ he said again; and this time his pity was shared almost +equally between both witnesses to Mr Bethany’s ingenuous little document, the +loss of which had fallen so softly and pathetically that he felt only ashamed +of having discovered it so soon. +</p> + +<p> +He shut back the tell-tale drawer, and after trying to collect his thoughts in +case anything should have been forgotten, he turned with a deep trembling sigh +to descend the stairs. But on the landing he drew back at the sound of voices, +and then a footstep. Soon came the sound of a key in the lock. He blew out his +candle and leant listening over the balusters. +</p> + +<p> +‘Who’s there?’ he called quietly. +</p> + +<p> +‘Me, sir,’ came the feeble reply out of the darkness. +</p> + +<p> +‘What is it, Ada? What have you come for?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Only, sir, to see that all was safe, and you were in, sir.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ he said. ‘All’s safe; and I am in. What if I had been out?’ It was like +dropping tiny pebbles into a deep well—so long after came the answering feeble +splash. +</p> + +<p> +‘Then I was to go back, sir.’ And a moment after the discreet voice floated up +with the faintest tinge of effrontery out of the hush. ‘Is that Dr Ferguson, +too sir?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No, Ada; and please tell your mistress from me that Dr Ferguson is unlikely to +call again.’ A keen but rather forlorn smile passed over his face. ‘He’s dining +with friends no doubt at Holloway. But of course if she should want to see him +he will see her to-morrow at any hour at Mrs Lovat’s. And—Ada!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, sir?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Say that I’m a little better; your mistress will be relieved to hear that I’m +a little better; still not <i>quite</i> myself say, but, I think, a little +better.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, sir; and I’m sure I’m very glad to hear it,’ came fainter still. +</p> + +<p> +‘What voice was that I heard just now?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Miss Alice’s, sir; but she came quite against my wishes, and I hope you won’t +repeat it, sir. She promised if she came that mistress shouldn’t know. I was +only afraid she might disturb you, or—or Dr Ferguson. And did you say, sir, +that I was to tell mistress that he <i>might</i> be coming back?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, that I don’t know; so perhaps it would be as well not to mention him at +all. Is Miss Alice there?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I said I would tell her if you were alone. But I hope you’ll understand that +it was only because she begged so. Mistress has gone to St Peter’s bazaar; and +that’s how it was.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I quite understand. Beckon to her.’ +</p> + +<p> +There came a hasty step in the hall and a hurried murmur of explanation. +Lawford heard her call as she ran up the stairs; and the next moment he had +Alice’s hand in his and they were groping together through the gloaming back +into the solitude of the empty room again. +</p> + +<p> +‘Don’t be alarmed, dear,’ he heard himself imploring. ‘Just hold tight to that +clear common sense, and above all you won’t tell? It must be our secret; a +dead, dead secret from every one, even your mother, for just a little while; +just a mere two days or so—in case. I’m—I’m better, dear.’ +</p> + +<p> +He fumbled with the little box of matches, dropped one, broke another; but at +last the candle-flame dipped, brightened, and with the door shut and the last +pale blueness of dusk at the window Lawford turned and looked at his daughter. +She stood with eyes wide open, like the eyes of a child walking in its sleep; +then twisted her fingers more tightly within his. ‘Oh, dearest, how ill, how +ill you look,’ she whispered. ‘But there, never mind—never mind. It was all a +miserable dream, then; it won’t, it can’t come back? I don’t think I could bear +its coming back. And mother told me such curious things; as if I were a child +and understood nothing. And even after I knew that you were you—I mean before I +sat up here in the dark to see you—she said that you were gone and would never +come back; that a terrible thing had happened—a disgrace which we must never +speak of; and that all the other was only a pretence to keep people from +talking. But I did not believe then, and how could I believe afterwards?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘There, never mind now, dear, what she said. It was all meant for the best, +perhaps. But here I am; and not nearly so ill as I look, Alice; and there’s +nothing more to trouble ourselves about; not even if it should be necessary for +me to go away for a time. And this is our secret, mind; ours only; just a dead +secret between you and me.’ +</p> + +<p> +They sat for awhile without speaking or stirring. And faintly along the hushed +road Lawford heard in the silence a leisurely indolent beat of little hoofs +approaching, and the sound of wheels. A sudden wave of feeling swept over him. +He took Alice’s quiet loving face in his hands and kissed her passionately. ‘Do +not so much as think of me yet, or doubt, or question: only love me, dearest. +And soon—and soon—’ +</p> + +<p> +‘We’ll just begin again, just begin again, won’t we? all three of us together, +just as we used to be. I didn’t mean to have said all those horrid things about +mother. She was only dreadfully anxious and meant everything for the best. +You’ll let me tell her soon?’ +</p> + +<p> +The haggard face turned slowly, listening. ‘I hear, I understand, but I can’t +think very clearly now, Alice; I can’t, dear; my miserable old tangled nerves. +I just stumble along as best I can. You’ll understand better when you get to be +a poor old thing like me. We must do the best we can. And of course you’ll see, +Dillie, how awfully important it is not to raise false hopes. You understand? I +mustn’t risk the least thing in the world, must I? And now goodbye; only for a +few hours now. And not a word, not a word to a single living soul.’ +</p> + +<p> +He extinguished the candle again, and led the way to the top of the stairs. +‘Are you there, Ada?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, sir,’ answered the quiet imperturbable voice from under the black straw +brim. Alice went slowly down, but at the foot of the stairs, looking out into +the cold, blue, lamplit street she paused as if at a sudden recollection, and +ran hastily up again. +</p> + +<p> +‘There was nothing more, dear?’ She said, leaning back to peer up. +</p> + +<p> +‘“Nothing more?” What?’ +</p> + +<p> +She stood panting a little in the darkness, listening to some cautious yet +uneasy thought that seemed to haunt her mind. ‘I thought—it seemed there was +something we had not said, something I could not understand. But there, it is +nothing! You know what a fanciful old silly I am. You do love me? Quite as much +as ever?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘More, sweetheart, more!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Good-night again, then; and God bless you, dear.’ +</p> + +<p> +The outer door closed softly, the footsteps died away. Lawford still hesitated. +He took hold of the stairs above his head as he stood on the landing and leaned +his head upon his hands, striving calmly to disentangle the perplexity of his +thoughts. His pulses were beating in his ear with a low muffled roar. He looked +down between the blinds to where against the blue of the road beneath the +straggling yellow beams of the lamp stood the little cart and drooping, shaggy +pony, and Grisel sitting quietly there awaiting him. He shut his eyes as if in +hope by some convulsive effort of mind to break through this subtle glasslike +atmosphere of dream that had stolen over consciousness, and blotted out the +significance, almost the meaning of the past. He turned abruptly. Empty as the +empty rooms around him, unanswering were mind and heart. Life was a tale told +by an idiot—signifying nothing. +</p> + +<p> +He paused at the head of the staircase. And even then the doubt confronted him: +Would he ever come back? Who knows? he thought; and again stood pondering, +arguing, denying. At last he seemed to have come to a decision. He made his way +downstairs, opened and left ajar a long narrow window in a passage to the +garden beyond the kitchen. He turned on his heel as he reached the gate and +waved his hand as if in a kind of forlorn mockery towards the darkly glittering +windows. The drowsy pony awoke at touch of the whip. +</p> + +<p> +Grisel lifted the rug and squeezed a little closer into the corner. She had +drawn a veil over her face, so that to Lawford her eyes seemed to be dreaming +in a little darkness of their own as he laid his hand on the side of the cart. +‘It’s a most curious thing,’ he said, ‘but peeping down at you just now when +the sound of the wheels came, a memory came clearly back to me of years and +years ago—of my mother. She used to come to fetch me at school in a little cart +like this, and a little pony just like this, with a thick dusty coat. And once +I remember I was simply sick of everything, a failure, and fagged out, and all +that, and was looking out in the twilight; I fancy even it was autumn too. It +was a little side staircase window; I was horribly homesick. And she came quite +unexpectedly. I shall never forget it—the misery, and then, her coming.’ He +lifted his eyes, cowed with the incessant struggle, and watched her face for +some time in silence. ‘Ought I to stay?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I see no “ought,”’ she said. ‘No one is there?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Only a miserable broken voice out of a broken cage—called Conscience.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Don’t you think, perhaps, that even <i>that</i> has a good many +disguises—convention, cowardice, weakness, ennui; they all take their turn at +hooting in its feathers? You must, you really must have rest. You don’t know; +you don’t see; I do. Just a little snap, some one last exquisite thread gives +way, and then it is all over. You see I have even to try to frighten you, for I +can’t tell you how you distress me.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Why do I distress you?—my face, my story you mean?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No; I mean you: your trouble, that horrible empty house, and—oh, dear me, yes, +your courage too.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Listen,’ said Lawford, stooping forward. He could scarcely see the pale, +veiled face through this mist that had risen up over his eyes. ‘I have no +courage apart from you; no courage and no hope. Ask me to come!—a stranger with +no history, no mockery, no miserable rant of a grave and darkness and fear +behind me. Are we not all haunted—every one? That forgotten, and the fool I +was, and the vacillating, and the pretence—oh, how it all sweeps clear before +me; without a will, without a hope or glimpse or whisper of courage. Be just +the memory of my mother, the face, the friend I’ve never seen; the voice that +every dream leaves echoing. Ask me to come.’ +</p> + +<p> +She sat unstirring; and then as if by some uncontrollable impulse stooped a +little closer to him and laid her gloved hand on his. +</p> + +<p> +‘I hear, you know; I hear too,’ she whispered. ‘But we mustn’t listen. Come +now. It’s growing late.’ +</p> + +<p> +The little village echoed back from its stone walls the clatter of the pony’s +hoofs. Night had darkened to its deepest when their lamp shone white on the +wicket in the hedge. They had scarcely spoken. Lawford had simply watched pass +by, almost without a thought, the arching trees, the darkening fields; had +watched rise up in a mist of primrose light the harvest moon to shine in +saffron on the faces and shoulders of the few wayfarers they met, or who passed +them by. The still grave face beneath the shadow of its veil had never turned, +though the moon poured all her flood of brilliance upon the dark profile. And +once when as if in sudden alarm he had lifted his head and looked at her, a +sudden doubt had assailed him so instantly that he had half put out his hand to +touch her, and had as quickly withdrawn it, lest her beauty and stillness +should be, even as the moment’s fancy had suggested, only a far-gone memory +returned in dream. +</p> + +<p> +Herbert hailed them from the darkness of an open window. He came down, and they +talked a little in the cold air of the garden. He lit a cigarette, and climbed +languidly into the cart, and drove the drowsy little pony off into the +moonlight. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap20"></a> +CHAPTER TWENTY</h2> + +<p> +It was a quiet supper the three friends sat down to. Herbert sat narrowing his +eyes over his thoughts, which, when the fancy took him, he scattered out upon +the others’ silence. Lawford apparently had not yet shaken himself free from +the sorcery of the moonlight. His eyes shone dark and full like those of a +child who has trespassed beyond its hour for bed, and sits marvelling at +reality in a waking dream. +</p> + +<p> +Long after they had bidden each other good-night, long after Herbert had +trodden on tiptoe with his candle past his closed door, Lawford sat leaning on +his arms at the open window, staring out across the motionless moonlit trees +that seemed to stand like draped and dreaming pilgrims, come to the peace of +their Nirvana at last beside the crashing music of the waters. And he himself, +the self that never sleeps beneath the tides and waves of consciousness, was +listening, too, almost as unmovedly and unheedingly to the thoughts that +clashed in conflict through his brain. +</p> + +<p> +Why, in a strange transitory life was one the slave of these small cares? What +if even in that dark pit beneath, which seemed to whisper Lethe to the +tumultuous, swirling waters—what if there, too, were merely a beginning again, +and to seek a slumbering refuge there merely a blind and reiterated plunge into +the heat and tumult of another day? Who was that poor, dark, homeless ghoul, +Sabathier? Who was this Helen of an impossible dream? Her face with its strange +smile, her eyes with their still pity and rapt courage had taken hope away. +‘Here’s not your rest,’ cried one insistent voice; ‘she is the mystery that +haunts day and night, past all the changing of the restless hours. Chance has +given you back eyes to see, a heart that can be broken. Chance and the +stirrings of a long-gone life have torn down the veil age spins so thick and +fast. Pride and ambition; what dull fools men are! Effort and duty, what dull +fools men are!’ He listened on and on to these phantom pleadings and to the +rather coarse old Lawford conscience grunting them mercilessly down, too weary +even to try to rest. +</p> + +<p> +Rooks at dawn came sweeping beneath the turquoise of the sky. He saw their +sharp-beaked heads turn this way, that way, as they floated on outspread wings +across the misty world. Except for the hoarse roar of the water under the huge +thin-leafed trees, not a sound was stirring. ‘One thing,’ he seemed to hear +himself mutter as he turned with a shiver from the morning air, ‘it won’t be +for long. You can, at least, poor devil, wait the last act out.’ If in this +foolish hustling mob of the world, hired anywhere and anywhen for the one poor +dubious wage of a penny—if it was only his own small dull part to carry a mock +spear, and shout huzza with the rest—there was nothing for it, he grunted +obstinately to himself, shout he would with the loudest. +</p> + +<p> +He threw himself on to the bed with eyes so wearied with want of sleep it +seemed they had lost their livelong skill in finding it. Not the echo of +triumph nor even a sigh of relief stirred the torpor of his mind. He knew +vaguely that what had been the misery and madness of the last few days was +gone. But the thought had no power to move him now. Sheila’s good sense, and Mr +Bethany’s stubborn loyalty were alike old stories that had lost their savour +and meaning. Gone, too, was the need for that portentous family gathering that +had sat so often in his fancy during these last few days around his dining-room +table, discussing with futile decorum the problem of how to hush him up, to +muffle him down. Half dreaming, half awake, he saw the familiar door slowly +open and, like the timely hero in a melodrama, his own figure appear before the +stricken and astonished company. His eyes opened half-fearfully, and glanced up +in the morning twilight. Their perplexity gave place to a quiet, almost vacant +smile; the lids slowly closed again, and at last the lean hands twitched awhile +in sleep. +</p> + +<p> +Next morning he spent rummaging among the old books, dipping listlessly here +and there as the tasteless fancy took him, while Herbert sat writing with +serene face and lifted eyebrows at his open window. But the unfamiliar long +S’s, the close type, and the spelling of the musty old books wearied eye and +mind. What he read, too, however far-fetched, or lively, or sententious, or +gross, seemed either to be of the same texture as what had become his everyday +experience, and so baffled him with its nearness, or else was only the +meaningless ramblings of an idle pen. And this, he thought to himself, looking +covertly up at the spruce clear-cut profile at the window, this is what Herbert +had called Life. +</p> + +<p> +‘Am I interrupting you, Herbert; are you very busy?’ he asked at last, taking +refuge on a chair in a far corner of the room. +</p> + +<p> +‘Bless me, no; not a bit—not a bit,’ said Herbert amiably, laying down his pen. +‘I’m afraid the old leatherjackets have been boring you. It’s a habit this +beastly reading; this gorge and glint and fever all at second-hand—purely a bad +habit, like morphia, like laudanum. But once in, you know there’s no recovery. +Anyhow, I’m neck-deep, and to struggle would be simply to drown.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I was only going to say how sorry I am for having left Sabathier at home.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘My dear fellow—’ began Herbert reassuringly. +</p> + +<p> +‘It was only because I wanted so very much to have your translation. I get +muddled up with other things groping through the dictionary.’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert surveyed him critically. ‘What exactly is your interest now, Lawford? +You don’t mean that my old “theory” has left any sting now?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No sting; oh no. I was only curious. But you yourself still think it really, +don’t you?’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert turned for a moment to the open window. +</p> + +<p> +‘I was simply trying then to find something to fit the facts as you experienced +them. But now that the facts have gone—and they have, haven’t they?—exit, of +course, my theory!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I see,’ was the cryptic answer. ‘And yet, Herbert,’ Lawford solemnly began +again, ‘it has changed me; even in my way of thinking. When I shut my eyes +now—I only discovered it by chance—I see immediately faces quite strange to me; +or places, sometimes thronged with people; and once an old well with some one +sitting in the shadow. I can’t tell you how clearly, and yet it is all +altogether different from a dream. Even when I sit with my eyes open, I am +conscious, as it were, of a kind of faint, colourless mirage. In the old days—I +mean before Widderstone, what I saw was only what I’d seen already. Nothing +came uncalled for, unexplained. This makes the old life seem so blank; I did +not know what extraordinarily <i>real</i> things I was doing without. And +whether for that reason or another, I can’t quite make out what in fact I did +want then, and was always fretting and striving for. I can see no wisdom or +purpose in anything now but to get to one’s journey’s end as quickly and +bravely as one can. And even then, even if we do call life a journey, and death +the inn we shall reach at last in the evening when it’s over; that, too, I feel +will be only as brief a stopping-place as any other inn would be. Our +experience here is so scanty and shallow—nothing more than the moment of the +continual present. Surely that must go on, even if one does call it eternity. +And so we shall all have to begin again. Probably Sabathier himself.... But +there, what on earth <i>are</i> we, Herbert, when all is said? Who is it +has—has done all this for us—what kind of self? And to what possible end? Is it +that the clockwork has been wound up and must still jolt on a while with +jarring wheels? Will it never run down, do you think?’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert smiled faintly, but made no answer. +</p> + +<p> +‘You see,’ continued Lawford, in the same quiet, dispassionate undertone, ‘I +wouldn’t mind if it was only myself. But there are so many of us, so many +selves, I mean; and they all seem to have a voice in the matter. What is the +reality to this infernal dream?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘The reality is, Lawford, that you are fretting your life out over this rotten +illusion. Be guided by me just this once. We’ll go, all three of us, a good +ten-mile walk to-day, and thoroughly tire you out. And to-night you shall sleep +here—a really sound, refreshing sleep. Then to-morrow, whole and hale, back you +shall go; honestly. It’s only professional strong men should ask questions. +Babes like you and me must keep to slops.’ +</p> + +<p> +So, though Lawford made no answer, it was agreed. Before noon the three of them +had set out on their walk across the fields. And after rambling on just as +caprice took them, past reddening blackberry bushes and copses of hazel, and +flaming beech, they sat down to spread out their meal on the slope of a hill, +overlooking quiet ploughed fields and grazing cattle. Herbert stretched himself +with his back to the earth, and his placid face to the pale vacant sky, while +Lawford, even more dispirited after his walk, wandered up to the crest of the +hill. +</p> + +<p> +At the foot of the hill, upon the other side, lay a farm and its out-buildings, +and a pool of water beneath a group of elms. It was vacant in the sunlight, and +the water vividly green with a scum of weed. And about half a mile beyond stood +a cluster of cottages and an old towered church. He gazed idly down, listening +vaguely to the wailing of a curlew flitting anxiously to and fro above the +broken solitude of its green hill. And it seemed as if a thin and dark cloud +began to be quietly withdrawn from over his eyes. Hill and wailing cry and barn +and water faded out. And he was staring as if in an endless stillness at an +open window against which the sun was beating in a bristling torrent of gold, +while out of the garden beyond came the voice of some evening bird singing with +such an unspeakable ecstasy of grief it seemed it must be perched upon the +confines of another world. The light gathered to a radiance almost intolerable, +driving back with its raining beams some memory, forlorn, remorseless, remote. +His body stood dark and senseless, rocking in the air on the hillside as if +bereft of its spirit. Then his hands were drawn over his eyes. He turned +unsteadily and made his way, as if through a thick, drizzling haze, slowly +back. +</p> + +<p> +‘What is that—there?’ he said almost menacingly, standing with bloodshot eyes +looking down upon Herbert. +</p> + +<p> +‘“That!”—what?’ said Herbert, glancing up startled from his book. ‘Why, what’s +wrong, Lawford?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘That,’ said Lawford sullenly, yet with a faintly mournful cadence in his +voice; ‘those fields and that old empty farm—that village over there? Why did +you bring me here?’ +</p> + +<p> +Grisel had not stirred. ‘The village...’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ssh!’ she said, catching her brother’s sleeve; ‘that’s Detcham, yes, Detcham.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford turned wide vacant eyes on her. He shook his head and shuddered. ‘No, +no; not Detcham. I know it; I know it; but it has gone out of my mind. Not +Detcham; I’ve been there before; don’t look at me. Horrible, horrible. It takes +me back—I can’t think. I stood there, trying, trying; it’s all in a blur. Don’t +ask me—a dream.’ +</p> + +<p> +Grisel leaned forward and touched his hand. ‘Don’t think; don’t even try. Why +should you? We can’t; we <i>mustn’t</i> go back.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford, still gazing fixedly, turned again a darkened face towards the steep +of the hill. ‘I think, you know,’ he said, stooping and whispering, ‘<i>he</i> +would know—the window and the sun and the singing. And oh, of course it was too +late. You understand—too late. And once... you can’t go back; oh no. You won’t +leave me? You see, if you go, it would only be all. I could not be quite so +alone. But Detcham—Detcham? perhaps you will not trust me—tell me? That was not +the name.’ He shuddered violently and turned dog-like beseeching eyes. +‘To-morrow—yes, to-morrow,’ he said, ‘I will promise anything if you will not +leave me now. Once—’ But again the thread running so faintly through that +inextricable maze of memory eluded him. ‘So long as you won’t leave me now!’ he +implored her. +</p> + +<p> +She was vainly trying to win back her composure, and could not answer him at +once.... +</p> + +<p> +In the evening after supper Grisel sat her guest down in front of a big wood +fire in the old book-room, where, staring into the playing flames, he could +fall at peace into the almost motionless reverie which he seemed merely to +harass and weary himself by trying to disperse. She opened the little piano at +the far end of the room and played on and on as fancy led—Chopin and Beethoven, +a fugue from Bach, and lovely forlorn old English airs, till the music seemed +not only a voice persuading, pondering, and lamenting, but gathered about +itself the hollow surge of the water and the darkness; wistful and clear, as +the thoughts of a solitary child. Ever and again a log burnt through its +strength, and falling amid sparks, stirred, like a restless animal, the +stillness; or Herbert in his corner lifted his head to glance towards his +visitor, and to turn another page. At last the music, too, fell silent, and +Lawford stood up with his candle in his hand and eyed with a strange fixity +brother and sister. His glance wandered slowly round the quiet flame-lit room. +</p> + +<p> +‘You won’t,’ he said, stooping towards them as if in extreme confidence, ‘you +won’t much notice? They come and go. I try not to—to speak. It’s the only way +through. It is not that I don’t know they’re only dreams. But if once the—the +others thought there had been any tampering’—he tapped his forehead +meaningly—‘here: if once they thought <i>that</i>, it would, you know, be quite +over then. How could I prove...?’ He turned cautiously towards the door, and +with laborious significance nodded his head at them. +</p> + +<p> +Herbert bent down and held out his long hands to the fire. ‘Tampering, my dear +chap: That’s what the lump said to the leaven.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, yes,’ said Lawford, putting out his hand, ‘but you know what I mean, +Herbert. Anything I tried to do then would be quite, quite hopeless. That would +be poisoning the wells.’ +</p> + +<p> +They watched him out of the room, and listened till quite distinctly in the +still night-shaded house they heard his door gently close. Then, as if by +consent, they turned and looked long and questioningly into each other’s faces. +</p> + +<p> +‘Then you are not afraid?’ Herbert said quietly. +</p> + +<p> +Grisel gazed steadily on, and almost imperceptibly shook her head. +</p> + +<p> +‘You mean?’ he questioned her; but still he had again to read her answer in her +eyes. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, very well, Grisel,’ he said quietly, ‘you know best,’ and returned once +more to his writing. +</p> + +<p> +For an hour or two Lawford slept heavily, so heavily that when a little after +midnight he awoke, with his face towards the uncurtained window, though for +many minutes he lay brightly confronting all Orion, that from blazing helm to +flaming dog at heel filled high the glimmering square, he could not lift or +stir his cold and leaden limbs. He rose at last and threw off the burden of his +bedclothes, and rested awhile, as if freed from the heaviness of an +unrememberable nightmare. But so clear was his mind and so extraordinarily +refreshed he seemed in body that sleep for many hours would not return again. +And he spent almost all the remainder of the lagging darkness pacing softly to +and fro; one face only before his eyes, the one sure thing, the one thing +unattainable in a world of phantoms. +</p> + +<p> +Herbert waited on in vain for his guest next morning, and after wandering up +and down the mossy lawn at the back of the house, went off cheerfully at last +alone for his dip. When he returned Lawford was in his place at the +breakfast-table. He sat on, moody and constrained, until even Herbert’s +haphazard talk trickled low. +</p> + +<p> +‘I fancy my sister is nursing a headache,’ he said at last, ‘but she’ll be down +soon. And I’m afraid from the looks of you, Lawford, your night was not +particularly restful.’ He felt his way very heedfully. ‘Perhaps we walked you a +little too far yesterday. We are so used to tramping that—’ Lawford kept +thoughtful eyes fixed on the deprecating face. +</p> + +<p> +‘I see what it is, Herbert—you are humouring me again. I have been wracking my +brains in vain to remember what exactly <i>did</i> happen yesterday. I feel as +if it was all sunk oceans deep in sleep. I get so far—and then I’m done. It +won’t give up a hint. But you really mustn’t think I’m an invalid, or—or in my +second childhood. The truth is,’ he added, ‘it’s only my <i>first</i>, come +back again. But now that I’ve got so far, now that I’m really better, I—’ He +broke off rather vacantly, as if afraid of his own confidence. ‘I must be +getting on,’ he summed up with an effort, ‘and that’s the solemn fact. I keep +on forgetting I’m—I’m a ratepayer!’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert sat round in his chair. ‘You see, Lawford, the very term is little else +than Double-Dutch to me. As a matter of fact Grisel sends all my hush-money to +the horrible people that do the cleaning up, as it were. I can’t catch their +drift. Government to me is merely the spectacle of the clever, or the specious, +managing the dull. It deals merely with the physical, and just the fringe of +consciousness. I am not joking. I think I follow you. All I mean is that the +obligations—mainly tepid, I take it—that are luring you back to the fold would +be the very ones that would scare me quickest off. The imagination, the appeal +faded: we’re dead.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford opened his mouth; ‘<i>Temporarily</i> tepid,’ he at last all but +coughed out. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh yes, of course,’ said Herbert intelligently. ‘Only temporarily. It’s this +beastly gregariousness that’s the devil. The very thought of it undoes me—with +an absolute shock of sheepishness. I suddenly realise my human nakedness: that +here we are, little better than naked animals, bleating behind our illusory +wattles on the slopes of—of infinity. And nakedness, after all, is a wholesome +thing to realize only when one thinks too much of one’s clothes. I peer +sometimes, feebly enough, out of my wool, and it seems to me that all these +busybodies, all these fact-devourers, all this news-reading rabble, are nothing +brighter than very dull-witted children trying to play an imaginative game, +much too deep for their poor reasons. I don’t mean that <i>your</i> wanting to +go home is anything gregarious, but I do think <i>their</i> insisting on your +coming back at once might be. And I know you won’t visit this stuff on me as +anything more than just my “scum,” as Grisel calls the fine flower of my maiden +meditations. All that I really <i>want</i> to say is that we should both be +more than delighted if you’d stay just as long as it will not be a bore for you +to stay. Stay till you’re heartily tired of us. Go back now, if you +<i>must</i>; tell them how much better you are. Bolt off to a nerve specialist. +He’ll say complete rest—change of scene, and all that. They all do. Instinct +via intellect. And why not take your rest here? We are such miserably dull +company to one another it would be a greater pleasure to have you with us than +I can say. I mean it from the very bottom of my heart. Do!’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford listened. ‘I wish—,’ he began, and stopped dead again. ‘Anyhow, I’ll go +back. I am afraid, Herbert, I’ve been playing truant. It was all very well +while—To tell you the truth I can’t think <i>quite</i> straight yet. But it +won’t last for ever. Besides—well, anyhow, I’ll go back.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Right you are,’ said Herbert, pretending to be cheerful. ‘You can’t expect, +you really can’t, everything to come right straight away. Just have patience. +And now, let’s go out and sit in the sun. They’ve mixed September up with May.’ +</p> + +<p> +And about half an hour afterwards he glanced up from his book to find his +visitor fast asleep in his garden chair. +</p> + +<p> +Grisel had taken her brother’s place, with a little pile of needlework beside +her on the grass, when Lawford again opened his eyes under the rosy shade of a +parasol. He watched her for a while, without speaking. +</p> + +<p> +‘How long have I been asleep?’ he said at last. +</p> + +<p> +She started and looked up from her needle. +</p> + +<p> +‘That depends on how long you have been awake,’ she said, smiling. ‘My brother +tells me,’ she went on, beginning to stitch, ‘that you have made up your mind +to leave us to-day. Perhaps we are only flattering ourselves it has been a +rest. But if it has—is that, do you think, quite wise?’ +</p> + +<p> +He leant forward and hid his face in his hands. ‘It’s because—it’s because it’s +the only “must” I can see.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But even “musts”—well, we have to be sure even of “musts,” haven’t we? Are +<i>you</i>?’ She glanced up and for an instant their eyes met, and the falling +water seemed to be sounding out of a distance so remote it might be but the +echo of a dream. She stooped once more over her work. +</p> + +<p> +‘Supposing,’ he said very slowly, and almost as if speaking to himself, +‘supposing Sabathier—and you know he’s merely like a friend now one mustn’t be +seen talking to—supposing he came back; what then?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, but Sabathier’s gone: he never really came. It was only a fancy—a mood. It +was only you—another you.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Who was that yesterday, then?’ +</p> + +<p> +She glanced at him swiftly and knew the question was but a venture. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yesterday?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, very well,’ he said fretfully, ‘you too! But if he did, if he did, come +really back: “prey” and all?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What is the riddle?’ she said, taking a deep breath and facing him brightly. +</p> + +<p> +‘Would <i>my</i> “must” still be <i>his</i>?’ The face he raised to her, as he +leaned forward under the direct light of the sun, was so colourless, cadaverous +and haggard, the thought crossed her mind that it did indeed seem little more +than a shadowy mask that but one hour of darkness might dispel. +</p> + +<p> +‘You said, you know, we did win through. Why then should we be even thinking of +defeat now?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“We”!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh no, you!’ she cried triumphantly. +</p> + +<p> +‘You do not answer my question.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Nor you mine! It <i>was</i> a glorious victory. Is there the ghost of a reason +why you should cast your mind back? Is there, now?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Only,’ said Lawford, looking patiently up into her face, ‘only because I love +you’: and listened in the silence to the words as one may watch a bird that has +escaped for ever and irrevocably out of its cage, steadily flying on and on +till lost to sight. +</p> + +<p> +For an instant the grey eyes faltered. ‘But that, surely,’ she began in a low +voice, still steadily sewing, ‘that was our compact last night—that you should +let me help, that you should trust me just as you trusted the mother years ago +who came in the little cart with the shaggy dusty pony to the homesick boy +watching at the window. Perhaps,’ she added, her fingers trembling, ‘in this +odd shuffle of souls and faces, I <i>am</i> that mother, and most frightfully +anxious you should not give in. Why, even because of the tiredness, even +because the cause seems vain, you must still fight on—wouldn’t she have said +it? Surely there are prizes, a daughter, a career, no end! And even they +gone—still the self undimmed, undaunted, that took its drubbing like a man.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I know you know I’m all but crazed; you see this wretched mind all littered +and broken down; look at me like that, then. Forget even you have befriended me +and pretended—Why must I blunder on and on like this? Oh, Grisel, my friend, my +friend, if only you loved me!’ +</p> + +<p> +Tears clouded her eyes. She turned vaguely as if for a hiding-place. ‘We can’t +talk here. How mad the day is. Listen, listen! I do—I do love you—mother and +woman and friend—from the very moment you came. It’s all so clear, so clear: +<i>that</i>, and your miserable “must,” my friend. Come, we will go away by +ourselves a little, and talk. That way. I’ll meet you by the gate.’ +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap21"></a> +CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE</h2> + +<p> +She came out into the sunlight, and they went through the little gate together. +She walked quickly, without speaking, over the bridge, past a little cottage +whose hollyhocks leaned fading above its low flint wall. Skirting a field of +stubble, she struck into a wood by a path that ran steeply up the hillside. And +by and by they came to a glen where the woodmen of a score of years ago had +felled the trees, leaving a green hollow of saplings in the midst of their +towering neighbours. +</p> + +<p> +‘There,’ she said, holding out her hand to him, ‘now we are alone. Just six +hours or so—and then the sun will be there,’ she pointed to the tree-tops to +the west, ‘and then you will have to go; for good, for good—you your way, and I +mine. What a tangle—a tangle is this life of ours. Could I have dreamt we +should ever be talking like this, you and I? Friends of an hour. What will you +think of me? Does it matter? Don’t speak. Say nothing—poor face, poor hands. If +only there were something to look to—to pray to!’ She bent over his hand and +pressed it to her breast. ‘What worlds we’ve seen together, you and I. And +then—another parting.’ +</p> + +<p> +They wandered on a little way, and came back and listened to the first few +birds that flew up into the higher branches, noonday being past, to sing. +</p> + +<p> +They talked, and were silent, and talked again with out question, or sadness, +or regret, or reproach; she mocking even at themselves, mocking at this +‘change’—‘Why, and yet without it, would you ever even have dreamed once a poor +fool of a Frenchman went to his restless grave for me—for me? Need we +understand? Were we told to pry? Who made us human must be human too. Why must +we take such care, and make such a fret—this soul? I know it, I know it; it is +all we have—“to save,” they say, poor creatures. No, never to <i>spend</i>, and +so they daren’t for a solitary instant lift it on the finger from its cage. +Well, we have; and now, soon, back it must go, back it must go, and try its +best to whistle the day out. And yet, do you know, perhaps the very freedom +does a little shake its—its monotony. It’s true, you see, they have lived a +long time; these Worldly Wisefolk they were wise before they were swaddled.... +</p> + +<p> +‘There, and you are hungry?’ she asked him, laughing in his eyes. ‘Of course, +of course you are—scarcely a mouthful since that first still wonderful supper. +And you haven’t slept a wink, except like a tired-out child after its first +party, on that old garden chair. I sat and watched, and yes, almost hoped you’d +never wake in case—in case. Come along, see, down there. I can’t go home just +yet. There’s a little old inn—we’ll go and sit down there—as if we were really +trying to be romantic! I know the woman quite well; we can talk there—just the +day out.’ +</p> + +<p> +They sat at a little table in the garden of ‘The Cherry Trees,’ its thick green +apple branches burdened with ripened fruit. And Grisel tried to persuade him to +eat and drink, ‘for to-morrow we die,’ she said, her hands trembling, her face +as it were veiled with a faint mysterious light. +</p> + +<p> +‘There are dozens and dozens of old stories, you know,’ she said, leaning on +her elbows, ‘dozens and dozens, meaning only us. You must, you must eat; look, +just an apple. We’ve got to say good-bye. And faintness will double the +difficulty.’ She lightly touched his hand as if to compel him to smile with +her. ‘There, I’ll peel it; and this is Eden; and soon it will be the cool of +the evening. And then, oh yes, the voice will come. What nonsense I am talking. +Never mind.’ +</p> + +<p> +They sat on in the quiet sunshine, and a spider slid softly through the air and +with busy claws set to its nets; and those small ghosts the robins went +whistling restlessly among the heavy boughs. +</p> + +<p> +A child presently came out of the porch of the inn into the garden, and stood +with its battered doll in its arms, softly watching them awhile. But when +Grisel smiled and tried to coax her over, she burst out laughing and ran in +again. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford stooped forward on his chair with a groan. ‘You see,’ he said, ‘the +whole world mocks me. You say “this evening”; need it be, must it be this +evening? If you only knew how far they have driven me. If you only knew what we +should only detest each other for saying and for listening to. The whole +thing’s dulled and staled. Who wants a changeling? Who wants a painted bird? +Who does not loathe the converted?—and I’m converted to Sabathier’s God. Should +we be sitting here talking like this if it were not so? I can’t, I can’t go +back.’ +</p> + +<p> +She rose and stood with her hand pressed over her mouth, watching him. +</p> + +<p> +‘Won’t you understand?’ he continued. ‘I am an outcast—a felon caught +red-handed, come in the flesh to a hideous and righteous judgment. I hear +myself saying all these things; and yet, Grisel, I do, I do love you with all +the dull best I ever had. Not now, then; I don’t ask new even. I can, I would +begin again. God knows my face has changed enough even as it is. Think of me as +that poor wandering ghost of yours; how easily I could hide away—in your +memory; and just wait, wait for you. In time even this wild futile madness too +would fade away. Then I could come back. May I try?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I can’t answer you. I can’t reason. Only, still, I do know, talk, put off, +forget as I may, must is must. Right and wrong, who knows what <i>they</i> +mean, except that one’s to be done and one’s to be forsworn; or—forgive, my +friend, the truest thing I ever said—or else we lose the savour of both. Oh, +then, and I know, too, you’d weary of me. I know you, Monsieur Nicholas, better +than you can ever know yourself, though you have risen from your grave. You +follow a dream, no voice or face or flesh and blood; and not to do what the one +old raven within you cries you <i>must,</i> would be in time to hate the very +sound of my footsteps. You shall go back, poor turncoat, and face the +clearness, the utterly more difficult, bald, and heartless clearness, as +together we faced the dark. Life is a little while. And though I have no words +to tell what always are and must be foolish reasons because they are not +reasons at all but ghosts of memory, I know in my heart that to face the worst +is your only hope of peace. Should I have staked so much on your finding that, +and now throw up the game? Don’t let us talk any more. I’ll walk half the way, +perhaps. Perhaps I will walk <i>all</i> the way. I think my brother guesses—at +least <i>my</i> madness. I’ve talked and talked him nearly past his patience. +And then, when you are quite safely, oh yes, quite safely and soundly gone, +then I shall go away for a little, so that we can’t even hear each other speak, +except in dreams. Life!—well, I always thought it was much too plain a tale to +have as dull an ending. And with us the powers beyond have played a newer +trick, that’s all. Another hour, and we will go. Till then there’s just the +solitary walk home and only the dull old haunted house that hoards as many +ghosts as we ourselves to watch our coming.’ +</p> + +<p> +Evening began to shine between the trees; they seemed to stand aflame, with a +melancholy rapture in their uplifted boughs above their fading coats. The +fields of the garnered harvest shone with a golden stillness, awhir with +shimmering flocks of starlings. And the old birds that had sung in the spring +sang now amid the same leaves, grown older too to give them harbourage. +</p> + +<p> +Herbert was sitting in his room when they returned, nursing his teacup on his +knee while he pretended to be reading, with elbow propped on the table. +</p> + +<p> +‘Here’s Nicholas Sabathier, my dear, come to say goodbye awhile,’ said Grisel. +She stood for a moment in her white gown, her face turned towards the clear +green twilight of the open window. ‘I have promised to walk part of the way +with him. But I think first we must have some tea. No; he flatly refuses to be +driven. We are going to walk.’ +</p> + +<p> +The two friends were left alone, face to face with a rather difficult silence, +only the least degree of nervousness apparent, so far as Herbert was concerned, +in that odd aloof sustained air of impersonality that had so baffled his +companion in their first queer talk together. +</p> + +<p> +‘Your sister said just now, Herbert,’ blurted Lawford at last. ‘“Here’s +Nicholas Sabathier come to say good-bye” well, I—what I want you to understand +is that it <i>is</i> Sabathier, the worst he ever was; but also that it +<i>is</i> “good-bye.”’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert slowly turned. ‘I don’t quite see why “goodbye,” Lawford. And—frankly, +there is nothing to explain. We have chosen to live such a very out-of-the-way +life,’ he went on, as if following up a train of thought.... ‘The truth is if +one wants to live at all—one’s own life, I mean—there’s no time for many +friends. And just steadfastly regarding your neighbour’s tail as you follow it +down into the Nowhere—it’s that that seems to me the deadliest form of +hypnotism. One must simply go one’s own way, doing one’s best to free one’s +mind of cant—and I dare say clearing some excellent stuff out with the rubbish. +One consequence is that I don’t think, however foolhardy it may be to say so, I +don’t think I care a groat for any opinion as human as my own, good or bad. My +sister’s a million times a better woman than I am a man. What possibly could +there be, then, for me to say?’ He turned with a nervous smile. ‘Why should it +be good-bye?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford glanced involuntarily towards the door that stood in shadow duskily +ajar. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘we have talked, and we think it must be that, until, at +least,’ he smiled faintly, ‘I can come as quietly as your old ghost you told me +of; and in that case it may not be so very long to wait.’ +</p> + +<p> +Their eyes met fleetingly across the still, listening room. ‘The more I think +of it,’ Lawford pushed slowly on, ‘the less I understand the frantic +purposelessness of all that has happened to me. Until I went down, as you said, +“a godsend of a little Miss Muffet,” and the inconceivable farce came off, I +was fairly happy, fairly contented to dance my little wooden dance and wait +till the showman should put me down into his box again. And now—well, here I +am. The whole thing has gone by and scarcely left a trace of its visit. Here I +am for all my friends to swear to; and yet, Herbert, if you’ll forgive me +troubling you with this stuff about myself, not a single belief, or thought, or +desire remains unchanged. You will remember all that, I hope. It’s not, of +course, the ghost of an apology, only the mere facts.’ +</p> + +<p> +Herbert rose and paced slowly across to the window. ‘The longer I live, +Lawford, the more I curse this futile gift of speech. Here am I, wanting to +tell you, to say out frankly what, if mind could appeal direct to mind, would +be merely as the wind passing through the leaves of a tree with just one—one +multitudinous rustle, but which, if I tried to put into words—well, daybreak +would find us still groping on....’ He turned; a peculiar wry smile on his +face. ‘It’s a dumb world: but there we are. And some day you’ll come again.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well,’ said Lawford, as if with an almost hopeless effort to turn thought into +such primitive speech, ‘that’s where we stand, then.’ He got up suddenly like a +man awakened in the midst of unforeseen danger, ‘Where is your sister?’ he +cried, looking into the shadow. And as if in actual answer to his entreaty, +they heard the clinking of the cups on the little, old, green lacquer tray she +was at that moment carrying into the room. She sat down on the window seat and +put the tray down beside her. ‘It will be before dark even now,’ she said, +glancing out at the faintly burning skies. +</p> + +<p> +They had trudged on together with almost as deep a sense of physical exhaustion +as peasants have who have been labouring in the fields since daybreak. And a +little beyond the village, before the last, long road began that led in +presently to the housed and scrupulous suburb, she stopped with a sob beside an +old scarred milestone by the wayside. ‘This—is as far as I can go,’ she said. +She stooped, and laid her hand on the cold moss-grown surface of the stone. +‘Even now it’s wet with dew.’ She rose again and looked strangely into his +face. ‘Yes, yes, here it is,’ she said, ‘oh, and worse, worse than any fear. +But nothing now can trouble you again of that. We’re both at least past that.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Grisel,’ he said, ‘forgive me, but I can’t—I can’t go on.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Don’t think, don’t think,’ she said, taking his hands, and lifting them to her +bosom. ‘It’s only how the day goes; and it has all, my one dear, happened +scores and scores of times before—mother and child and friend—and lovers that +are all these too, like us. We mustn’t cry out. Perhaps it was all before even +we could speak—this sorrow came. Take all the hope and all the future: and then +may come our chance.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What’s life to me now. You said the desire would come back; that I should +shake myself free. I could if you would help me. I don’t know what you are or +what your meaning is, only that I love you; care for nothing, wish for nothing +but to see you and think of you. A flat, dull voice keeps saying that I have no +right to be telling you all this. You will know best. I know I am nothing. I +ask nothing. If we love one another, what is there else to say?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Nothing, nothing to say, except only good-bye. What could you tell me that I +have not told myself over and over again? Reason’s gone. Thinking’s gone. Now I +am only sure.’ She smiled shadowily. ‘What peace did <i>he</i> find who +couldn’t, perhaps, like you, face the last good-bye?’ +</p> + +<p> +They stood in utter solitude awhile in the evening gloom. The air was as still +and cold as some grey unfathomable untraversed sea. Above them uncountable +clouds drifted slowly across space. +</p> + +<p> +‘Why do they all keep whispering together?’ he said in a low voice, with +cowering face. ‘Oh if you knew, Grisel, how they have hemmed me in; how they +have come pressing in through the narrow gate I left ajar. Only to mock and +mislead. It’s all dark and unintelligible.’ +</p> + +<p> +He touched her hand, peering out of the shadows that seemed to him to be +gathering between their faces. He drew her closer and touched her lips with his +fingers. Her beauty seemed to his distorted senses to fill earth and sky. This, +then, was the presence, the grave and lovely overshadowing dream whose +surrender made life a torment, and death the near fold of an immortal, starry +veil. She broke from him with a faint cry. And he found himself running and +running, just as he had run that other night, with death instead of life for +inspiration, towards his earthly home. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap22"></a> +CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO</h2> + +<p> +He was utterly wearied, but he walked on for a long while with a dogged +unglancing pertinacity and without looking behind him. Then he rested under the +dew-sodden hedgeside and buried his face in his hands. Once, indeed, he did +turn and grind his way back with hard uplifted face for many minutes, but at +the meeting with an old woman who in the late dusk passed him unheeded on the +road, he stopped again, and after standing awhile looking down upon the dust, +trying to gather up the tangled threads of his thoughts, he once more set off +homewards. +</p> + +<p> +It was clear, starry, and quite dark when he reached the house. The lamp at the +roadside obscurely lit its breadth and height. Lamp-light within, too, was +showing yellow between the Venetian blinds; a cold gas-jet gleamed out of the +basement window. He seemed bereft now of all desire or emotion, simply the +passive witness of things external in a calm which, though he scarcely realised +its cause, was an exquisite solace and relief. His senses were intensely +sharpened with sleeplessness. The faintest sound belled clear and keen on his +ear. The thinnest beam of light besprinkled his eyes with curious brilliance. +</p> + +<p> +As quietly as some nocturnal creature he ascended the steps to the porch, and +leaning between stone pilaster and wall, listened intently for any rumour of +those within. +</p> + +<p> +He heard a clear, rather languid and delicate voice quietly speak on until it +broke into a little peal of laughter, followed, when it fell silent by +Sheila’s—rapid, rich, and low. The first speaker seemed to be standing. +Probably, then, his evening visitors had only just come in, or were preparing +to depart. He inserted his latchkey and gently pushed at the cumbersome door. +It was locked against him. With not the faintest thought of resentment or +surprise, he turned back, stooped over the balustrade and looked down into the +kitchen. Nothing there was visible but a narrow strip of the white table, on +which lay a black cotton glove, and beyond, the glint of a copper pan. What +made all these mute and inanimate things so coldly hostile? +</p> + +<p> +An extreme, almost nauseous distaste filled him at the thought of knocking for +admission, of confronting Ada, possibly even Sheila, in the cold echoing gloom +of the detestable porch; of meeting the first wild, almost metallic, flash of +recognition. He swept softly down again, and paused at the open gate. Once +before the voices of the night had called him: they would not summon him +forever in vain. He raised his eyes again towards the window. Who were these +visitors met together to drum the alien out? He narrowed his lids and smiled up +at the vacuous unfriendly house. Then wheeling, on a sudden impulse he groped +his way down the gravel path that led into the garden. As he had left it, the +long white window was ajar. +</p> + +<p> +With extreme caution he pushed it noiselessly up, and climbed in, and stood +listening again in the black passage on the other side. When he had fully +recovered his breath, and the knocking of his heart was stilled, he trod on +softly, till turning the corner he came in sight of the kitchen door. It was +now narrowly open, just enough, perhaps, to admit a cat; and as he softly +approached, looking steadily in, he could see Ada sitting at the empty table, +beneath the single whistling chandelier, in her black dress and black straw +hat. She was reading apparently; but her back was turned to him and he could +not distinguish her arm beyond the elbow. Then almost in an instant he +discovered, as, drawn up and unstirring he gazed on, that she was not reading, +but had covertly and instantaneously raised her eyes from the print on the +table beneath, and was transfixedly listening too. He turned his eyes away and +waited. When again he peered in she had apparently bent once more over her +magazine, and he stole on. +</p> + +<p> +One by one, with a thin remote exultation in his progress, he mounted the +kitchen stairs, and with each deliberate and groping step the voices above him +became more clearly audible. At last, in the darkness of the hall, but faintly +stirred by the gleam of lamplight from the chink of the dining-room door, he +stood on the threshold of the drawing-room door and could hear with varying +distinctness what those friendly voices were so absorbedly discussing. His ear +seemed as exquisite as some contrivance of science, registering passively the +least sound, the faintest syllable, and like it, in no sense meddling with the +thought that speech conveyed. He simply stood listening, fixed and motionless, +like some uncouth statue in the leafy hollow of a garden, stony, unspeculating. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, but you either refuse to believe, Bettie, or you won’t understand that +it’s far worse than that.’ Sheila seemed to be upbraiding, or at least +reasoning with, the last speaker. ‘Ask Mr Danton—he actually <i>saw</i> him.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“Saw him,”’ repeated a thick, still voice. ‘He stood there, in that very +doorway, Mrs Lovat, and positively railed at me. He stood there and streamed +out all the names he could lay his tongue to. I wasn’t—unfriendly to the poor +beggar. When Bethany let me into it I thought it was simply—I did indeed, Mrs +Lawford—a monstrous exaggeration. Flatly, I didn’t believe it; shall I say +that? But when I stood face to face with him, I could have taken my oath that +that was no more poor old Arthur Lawford than—well, I won’t repeat what +particular word occurred to me. But there,’ the corpulent shrug was almost +audible, ‘we all know what old Bethany is. A sterling old chap, mind you, so +far as mere character is concerned; the right man in the right place; but as +gullible and as soft-hearted as a tom-tit. I’ve said all this before, I know, +Mrs Lawford, and been properly snubbed for my pains. But if I had been Bethany +I’d have sifted the whole story at the beginning, the moment he put his foot +into the house. Look at that Tichborne fellow—went for months and months, just +picking up one day what he floored old Hawkins—wasn’t it?—with the next. But of +course,’ he added gloomily, ‘now that’s all too late. He’s moaned himself into +a tolerably tight corner. I’d just like to see, though, a British jury +comparing this claimant with his photograph, ‘pon my word I would. Where would +he be then, do you think?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But my dear Mr Danton,’ went on the clear, languid voice Lawford had heard +break so light-heartedly into laughter, ‘you don’t mean to tell me that a woman +doesn’t know her own husband when she sees him—or, for the matter of that, when +she doesn’t see him? If Tom came home from a ramble as handsome as Apollo +to-morrow, I’d recognise him at the very first blush—literally! He’d go +nuzzling off to get his slippers, or complain that the lamps had been smoking, +or hunt the house down for last week’s paper. Oh, besides, Tom’s Tom—and +there’s an end of it.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘That’s precisely what I think, Mrs Lovat; one is saturated with one’s +personality, as it were.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You see, that’s just it! That’s just exactly every woman’s husband all over; +he is saturated with his personality. Bravo, Mr Craik!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Good Lord,’ said Danton softly. ‘I don’t deny it!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But that,’ broke in Sheila crisply—‘that’s just precisely what I asked you all +to come in for. It’s because I know now, apart altogether from the mere +evidence, that—that he is Arthur. Mind, I don’t say I ever really doubted. I +was only so utterly shocked, I suppose. I positively put posers to him; but his +memory was perfect in spite of the shock which would have killed a—a more +sensitive nature.’ She had risen, it seemed, and was moving with all her +splendid impressiveness of silk and presence across the general line of vision. +But the hall was dark and still; her eyes were dimmed with light. Lawford could +survey her there unmoved. +</p> + +<p> +‘Are you there, Ada?’ she called discreetly. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, ma’am,’ answered the faint voice from below. +</p> + +<p> +‘You have not heard anything—no knock?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No, ma’am, no knock.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘The door is open if you should call.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, ma’am.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘The girl’s scared out of her wits,’ said Sheila returning to her audience. +‘I’ve told you all that miserable Ferguson story—a piece of calm, callous +presence of mind I should never have dreamed my husband capable of. And the +curious thing is—at least, it is no longer curious in the light of the ghastly +facts I am only waiting for Mr Bethany to tell you—from the very first she +instinctively detested the very mention of his name.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I believe, you know,’ said Mr Craik with some decision, ‘that servants must +have the same wonderful instinct as dogs and children; they are natural, +<i>intuitive</i> judges of character.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ said Sheila gravely, ‘and it’s only through that that I got to hear of +the—the mysterious friend in the little pony-carriage. Ada’s magnificently +loyal—I will say that.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I don’t want to suggest anything, Mrs Lawford,’ began Mr Craik rather +hurriedly, ‘but wouldn’t it perhaps be wiser not to wait for Mr Bethany? It is +not at all unusual for him to be kept a considerable time in the vestry after +service, and to-day is the Feast of St Michael’s and all Angels, you know. +Mightn’t your husband be—er—coming back, don’t you think?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Craik’s right, Mrs Lawford; it’s not a bit of good waiting. Bethany would +stick there till midnight if any old woman’s spiritual state could keep her +going so long. Here we all are, and at any moment we may be interrupted. Mind +you, I promise nothing—only that there shall be no scene. But here I am, and if +he does come knocking and ringing and lunging out in the disgusting manner +he—well, all I ask is permission to speak for <i>you</i>. ‘Pon my soul, to +think what you must have gone through! It isn’t the place for ladies just +now—honestly it ain’t.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Besides, supposing the romantic lady of the pony-carriage has friends? Are +<i>you</i> a pugilist, Mr Craik?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I hope I could give some little account of myself, Mrs Lovat; but you need +have no anxiety about that.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘There, Mr Danton. So as there is not the least cause for anxiety even if poor +Arthur <i>should</i> return to his earthly home, may we share your dreadful +story at once, Sheila; and then, perhaps, hear Mr Bethany’s exposition of it +when he <i>does</i> arrive? We are amply guarded.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Honestly, you know, you are a bit of a sceptic, Mrs Lovat,’ pleaded Danton +playfully. ‘I’ve <i>seen</i> him.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And seeing is disbelieving, I suppose. Now then, Sheila.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I don’t think there’s the least chance of Arthur returning to-night,’ said +Sheila solemnly. ‘I am perfectly well aware it’s best to be as cheerful as one +can—and as resolved; but I think, Bettie, when even you know the whole horrible +secret, you won’t think Mr Danton was—was horrified for nothing. The ghastly, +the awful truth is that my husband—there is no other word for it—is—possessed!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘“Possessed,” Sheila! What in the name of all the creeps is that?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, I dare say Mr Craik will explain it much better than I can. By a devil, +dear.’ The voice was perfectly poised and restrained, and Mr Craik did not see +fit for the moment to embellish the definition. +</p> + +<p> +Lawford, with an almost wooden immobility, listened on. +</p> + +<p> +‘But <i>the</i> devil, or <i>a</i> devil? Isn’t there a distinction?’ inquired +Mrs Lovat. +</p> + +<p> +‘It’s in the Bible, Bettie, over and over again. It was quite a common thing in +the Middle Ages; I think I’m right in saying that, am I not, Mr Craik?’ Mr +Craik must have solemnly nodded or abundantly looked his unwilling affirmation. +‘And what <i>has</i> been,’ continued Sheila temperately, ‘I suppose may be +again.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘When the fellow began raving at me the other night,’ began Danton huskily, as +if out of an unfathomable pit of reflection, ‘among other things he said that I +haven’t any wish to remember was that I was a sceptic. And Bethany said +<i>ditto</i> to it. I don’t mind being called a sceptic: why, I said myself Mrs +Lovat was a sceptic just now! But when it comes to “devils,” Mrs Lawford—I may +be convinced about the other, but “devils”! Well, I’ve been in the City nearly +twenty-five years, and it’s my impression human nature can raise all the devils +<i>we</i> shall ever need. And another thing,’ he added, as if inspired, and +with an immensely intelligent blink, ‘is it just precisely that word in the +Revised Version—eh, Craik?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I’ll certainly look it up, Danton. But I take it that Mrs Lawford is not so +much insisting on the word, as on the—the manifestation. And I’m bound to +confess that the Society for Psychical Research, which has among its members +quite eminent and entirely trustworthy men of <i>science</i>—I am bound to +admit they have some very curious stories to tell. The old idea was, you know, +that there are seventy-two princely devils, and as many as seven +million—er—commoners. It may very well sound quaint to <i>our</i> ears, Mrs +Lovat; but there it is. But whether that has any bearing on—on what you were +saying, Danton, I can’t say. Perhaps Mrs Lawford will throw a little more light +on the subject when she tells us on what precise facts her—her distressing +theory is based.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford had soundlessly stolen a pace or two nearer, and by stooping forward a +little he could, each in turn, scrutinise the little intent company sitting +over his story around the lamp at the further end of the table; squatting like +little children with their twigs and pins, fishing for wonders on the brink of +the unknown. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ Mrs Lovat was saying, ‘I quite agree, Mr Craik. Seventy-two princes, and +no princesses. Oh, these masculine prejudices! But do throw a little more +<i>modern</i> light on the subject, Sheila.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I mean this,’ said Sheila firmly. ‘When I went in for the last time to say +good-bye—and of course it was at his own wish that I did leave him; and +precisely <i>why</i> he wished it is now unhappily only too apparent—I had +brought him some money from the bank—fifty pounds, I think; yes, fifty pounds. +And quite by the merest chance I glanced down, in passing, at a book he had +apparently been reading, a book which he seemed very anxious to conceal with +his hand. Arthur is not a great reader, though I believe he studied a little +before we were married, and—well, I detest anything like subterfuge, and I said +it out without thinking, “Why, you’re reading French, Arthur!” He turned +deathly white but made no answer.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And can’t you even confide to us the title, Sheila?’ sighed Mrs Lovat +reproachfully. +</p> + +<p> +‘Wait a minute,’ said Sheila; ‘you shall make as much fun of the thing as you +like, Bettie, when I’ve finished. I don’t know why, but that peculiar, stealthy +look haunted me. “Why French?” I kept asking myself. “Why French?” Arthur +hasn’t opened a French book for years. He doesn’t even approve of the <i +lang="fr">entente</i>. His argument was that we ought to be friends with the +Germans because they are more hostile. Never mind. When Ada came back the next +evening and said he was out, I came the following morning—by myself—and +knocked. No one answered, and I let myself in. His bed had not been slept in. +There were candles and matches all over the house—one even burnt nearly to the +stick on the floor in the corner of the drawing-room. I suppose it was foolish, +but I was alone, and just that, somehow, horrified me. It seemed to point to +such a peculiar state of mind. I hesitated; what was the use of looking +further? Yet something seemed to say to me—and it was surely providential—“Go +downstairs!” And there in the breakfast-room the first thing I saw on the table +was this book—a dingy, ragged, bleared, patched-up, oh, a horrible, a loathsome +little book (and I have read bits too here and there); and beside it was my own +little school dictionary, my own child’s——’ She looked up sharply. ‘What was +that? Did anybody call?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Nobody <i>I</i> heard,’ said Danton, staring stonily round. +</p> + +<p> +‘It may have been the passing of the wind,’ suggested Mr Craik, after a pause. +</p> + +<p> +‘Peep between the blinds, Mr Craik; it may be poor Mr Bethany confronting +Pneumonia in the porch.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘There’s no one there, Mrs Lovat,’ said the curate, returning softly from his +errand. ‘Please continue your—your narrative, Mrs Lawford.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘We are panting for the “devil,” my dear.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, I sat down and, very much against my inclination, turned over the pages. +It was full of the most revolting confessions and trials, so far as I could +see. In fact, I think the book was merely an amateur collection of—of horrors. +And the faces, the portraits! Well, then, can you imagine my feelings when +towards the end of the book about thirty pages from the end, I came upon +this—gloating up at me from the table in my house before my very eyes?’ +</p> + +<p> +She cast a rapid glance over her shoulder, and gathering up her silk skirt, +drew out, from the pocket beneath, the few crumpled pages, and passed them +without a word to Danton. Lawford kept him plainly in view, as, lowering his +great face, he slowly stooped, and holding the loose leaves with both fat hands +between his knees, stared into the portrait. Then he truculently lifted his +cropped head. +</p> + +<p> +‘What did I say?’ he said. ‘What did I <i>say?</i> What did I tell old Bethany +in this very room? What d’ye think of that, Mrs Lovat, for a portrait of Arthur +Lawford? What d’ye make of that, Craik—eh? Devil—eh?’ +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Lovat glanced with arched eyebrows, and with her finger-tips handed the +sheets on to her neighbour, who gazed with a settled and mournful frown and +returned them to Sheila. +</p> + +<p> +She took the pages, folded them and replaced them carefully in her pocket. She +swept her hands over her skirts, and turned to Danton. +</p> + +<p> +‘You agree,’ she inquired softly, ‘it’s like?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Like! It’s the livin’ livid image. The livin’ image,’ he repeated, stretching +out his arm, ‘as he stood there that very night.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What will you say, then,’ said Sheila, quietly, ‘What will you say if I tell +you that that man, Nicholas de Sabathier, has been in his grave for over a +hundred years?’ +</p> + +<p> +Danton’s little eyes seemed, if anything, to draw back even further into his +head. ‘I’d say, Mrs Lawford, if you’ll excuse the word, that it might be a damn +horrible coincidence—I’d go farther, an almost incredible coincidence. But if +you want the sober truth, I’d say it was nothing more than a crafty, clever, +abominable piece of trickery. That’s what I’d say. Oh, you don’t know, Mrs +Lovat. When a scamp’s a scamp, he’ll stop at nothing. <i>I</i> could tell you +some tales.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, but that’s not all,’ said Sheila, eyeing them steadfastly one by one. ‘We +all of us know that my husband’s story was that he had gone down to +Widderstone—into the churchyard, for his convalescent ramble; that story’s +true. We all know that he said he had had a fit, a heart attack, and that a +kind of—of stupor had come over him. I believe on my honour that’s true too. +But no one knows but he himself and Mr Bethany and I, that it was a wretched +broken grave, quite at the bottom of the hill, that he chose for his resting +place, nor—and I can’t get the scene out of my head—nor that the name on that +one solitary tombstone down there was—was...this!’ +</p> + +<p> +Danton rolled his eyes. ‘I don’t begin to follow,’ he said stubbornly. +</p> + +<p> +‘You don’t mean,’ said Mr Craik, who had not removed his gaze from Sheila’s +face, ‘I am not to take it that you mean, Mrs Lawford, the—the other?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ said Sheila, ‘<i>his</i>’—she patted her skirts—‘Sabathier’s.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You mean,’ said Mrs Lovat crisply, ‘that the man in the grave is the man in +the book, and that the man in the book is—is poor Arthur’s changed face?’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila nodded. +</p> + +<p> +Danton rose cumbrously from his chair, looking beadily down on his three +friends. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, but you know, it isn’t—it isn’t right,’ he began. ‘Lord! I can see him +now. Glassy—yes, that’s the very word I said—glassy. It won’t do, Mrs Lawford; +on my solemn honour, it won’t do. I don’t deny it, call it what you like; yes, +devils, if you like. But what I say as a practical man is that it’s just +rank—that’s what it is! Bethany’s had too much rope. The time’s gone by for +sentiment and all that foolery. Mercy’s all very well, but after all it’s +justice that clinches the bargain. There’s only one way: we must catch him; we +must lay the poor wretch by the heels before it’s too late. No publicity, God +bless me, no. We’d have all the rags in London on us. They’d pillory us nine +days on end. We’d never live it down. No, we must just hush it up—a home or +something; an asylum. For my part,’ he turned like a huge toad, his chin low in +his collar—‘and I’d say the same if it was my own brother, and, after all, he +is your husband, Mrs Lawford—I’d sooner he was in his grave. It takes two to +play at that game, that’s what I say. To lay himself open! I can’t stand +it—honestly, I can’t stand it. And yet,’ he jerked his chin over the peak of +his collar towards the ladies, ‘and yet you say he’s being fetched; comes +creeping home, and is fetched at dark by a—a lady in a pony-carriage. God bless +me! It’s rank. What,’ he broke out violently again, ‘what was he doing there in +a cemetery after dark? Do you think that beastly Frenchman would have played +such a trick on Craik here? Would he have tried his little game on me? Deviltry +be it, if you prefer the word, and all deference to you, Mrs Lawford. But I +know this—a couple of hundred years ago they would have burnt a man at the +stake for less than a tenth of this. Ask Craik here. I don’t know how, and I +don’t know when: his mother, I’ve always heard say, was a little eccentric; but +the truth is he’s managed by some unholy legerdemain to get the thing at his +finger’s ends; that’s what it is. Think of that unspeakable book. Left open on +the table! Look at his Ferguson game. It’s our solemn duty to keep him for good +and all out of mischief. It reflects all round. There’s no getting out of it; +we’re all in it. And tar sticks. And then there’s poor little Alice to +consider, and—and you yourself, Mrs. Lawford: I wouldn’t give the fellow—friend +though he was, in a way—it isn’t safe to give him five minutes’ freedom. We’ve +simply got to save you from yourself, Mrs Lawford; that’s what it is—and from +old-fashioned sentiment. And I only wish Bethany was here now to dispute it!’ +</p> + +<p> +He stirred himself down, as it were, into his clothes, and stood in the middle +of the hearthrug, gently oscillating, with his hands behind his back. But at +some faint rumour out of the silent house his posture suddenly stiffened, and +he lifted a little, with heavy, steady lids, his head. +</p> + +<p> +‘What is the matter, Danton?’ said Mr Craik in a small voice; ‘why are you +listening?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I wasn’t listening,’ said Danton stoutly, ‘I was thinking.’ +</p> + +<p> +At the same moment, at the creak of a footstep on the kitchen stairs, Lawford +also had drawn soundlessly back into the darkness of the empty drawing-room. +</p> + +<p> +‘While Mr Danton is “thinking,” Sheila,’ Mrs Lovat was softly interposing, ‘do +please listen a moment to <i>me</i>. Do you mean really that that Frenchman—the +one you’ve pocketed—is the poor creature in the grave?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, Mrs Lawford,’ said Mr Craik, putting out his face a little, ‘are we to +take it that you mean that?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It’s the same date, dear, the same name even to the spelling; what possibly +else can I think?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And that the poor creature in the grave actually climbed up out of the +darkness and—well, what?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I know no more than you do <i>now</i>, Bettie. But the two faces—you must +remember you haven’t seen my husband <i>since</i>.’ You must remember you +haven’t heard the peculiar—the most peculiar things he—Arthur himself—has said +to me. Things such as a wife... And not in jest, Bettie; I assure you....’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And Mr Bethany?’ interpolated Mr Craik modestly, feeling his way. +</p> + +<p> +‘Pah, Bethany, Craik! He’d back Old Nick himself if he came with a good tale. +We’ve got to act; we’ve got to settle his hash before he does any mischief.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well,’ began Mrs Lovat, smiling a little remorsefully beneath the arch of her +raised eyebrows, ‘I sincerely hope you’ll all forgive me; but I really am, +heart and soul, with Old Nick, as Mr Danton seems on intimate terms enough to +call him. Dead, he is really immensely alluring; and alive, I think, +awfully—just awfully pitiful and—and pathetic. But if I know anything of Arthur +he won’t be beaten by a Frenchman. As for just the portrait, I think, do you +know, I almost prefer dark men’—she glanced up at the face immediately in front +of the clock—‘at least,’ she added softly, ‘when they are not looking very +vindictive. I suppose people are fairly often possessed, Mr Craik? <i>How</i> +many “deadly sins” are there?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘As a matter of fact, Mrs Lovat, there are seven. But I think in this case Mrs +Lawford intends to suggest not so much that—that her husband is in that +condition; habitual sin, you know—grave enough, of course, I own—but that he is +actually being compelled, even to the extent of a more or less complete change +of physiognomy, to follow the biddings of some atrocious spiritual influence. +It is no breach of confidence to say that I have myself been present at a +death-bed where the struggle against what I may call the end was perfectly +awful to witness. I don’t profess to follow all the ramifications of the +affair, but though possibly Mr Danton may seem a little harsh, such harshness, +if I may venture to intercede, is not necessarily “vindictive.” And—and +personal security is a consideration.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘If you only knew the awful fear, the awful uncertainty I have been in, Bettie! +Oh, it is worse, infinitely worse, than you can possibly imagine. I have myself +heard the Voice speak out of him—a high, hard, nasal voice. I’ve seen what Mr +Danton calls the “glassiness” come into his face, and an expression so wild and +so appallingly depraved, as it were, that I have had to hurry downstairs to +hide myself from the thought. I’m willing to sacrifice everything for my own +husband and for Alice; but can it be expected of me to go on harbouring....’ +Lawford listened on in vain for a moment; poor Sheila, it seemed, had all but +broken down. +</p> + +<p> +‘Look here, Mrs Lawford,’ began Danton huskily, ‘you really mustn’t give way; +you really mustn’t. It’s awful, unspeakably awful, I admit. But here we are; +friends, in the midst of friends. And there’s absolutely nothing—What’s that? +Eh? Who is it?... Oh, the maid!’ +</p> + +<p> +Ada stood in the doorway looking in. ‘All I’ve come to ask, ma’am,’ she said in +a low voice, ‘is, am I to stay downstairs any longer? And are you aware there’s +somebody in the house?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What’s that? What’s that you’re saying?’ broke out the husky voice again. +‘Control yourself! Speak gently! What’s that?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Begging your pardon, sir, I’m perfectly under control. And all I say is that I +can’t stay any longer alone downstairs there. There’s somebody in the house.’ +</p> + +<p> +A concentrated hush seemed to have fallen on the little assembly. +</p> + +<p> +‘“Somebody”—but who?’ said Sheila out of the silence. ‘You come up here, Ada, +with these idle fancies. Who’s in the house? There has been no knock—no +footstep.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No knock, no footstep, ma’am, that I’ve heard. It’s Dr Ferguson, ma’am. He was +here that first night; and he’s been here ever since. He was here when I came +on Tuesday; and he was here last night. And he’s here now. I can’t be deceived +by my own feelings. It’s not right, it’s not out-spoken to keep me in the dark +like this. And if you have no objection, I would like to go home.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford in his utter weariness had nearly closed the door and now sat bent up +on a chair, wondering vaguely when this poor play was coming to an end, longing +with an intensity almost beyond endurance for the keen night air, the open sky. +But still his ears drank in every tiniest sound or stir. He heard Danton’s +lowered voice muttering his arguments. He heard Ada quietly sniffing in the +darkness of the hall. And this was his world! This was his life’s panorama, +creaking on at every jolt. This was the ‘must’ Grisel had sent him back +to—these poor fools packed together in a panic at an old stale tale! Well, they +would all come out presently, and cluster; and the crested, cackling fellow +would lead them safely away out of the haunted farmyard. +</p> + +<p> +He started out of his reverie at Danton’s voice close at hand. +</p> + +<p> +‘Look here, my good girl, we haven’t the least intention of keeping you in the +dark. If you want to leave your mistress like this in the midst of her +anxieties she says you can go and welcome. But it’s not a bit of good in the +world coming up with these cock-and-bull stories. The truth is your master’s +mad, that’s the sober truth of it—hopelessly insane, you understand; and we’ve +got to find him. But nothing’s to be said, d’ye see? It’s got to be done +without fuss or scandal. But if there’s any witness wanted, or anything of that +kind, why, here you are; and,’ he dropped his voice to an almost inaudible +hoot, ‘and well worth your while! You did see him, eh? Step into the trap, and +all that?’ +</p> + +<p> +Ada stood silent a moment. ‘I don’t know, sir,’ she began quietly, ‘by what +right you speak to me about what you call my cock-and-bull stories. If the +master is mad, all I can say to <i>anybody</i> is I’m very sorry to hear it. I +came to my mistress, sir, if you please; and I prefer to take my orders from +one who has a right to give them. Did I understand you to say, ma’am, that you +wouldn’t want me any more this evening?’ +</p> + +<p> +Sheila had swept solemnly to the door. ‘Mr Danton meant all that he said quite +kindly, Ada. I can perfectly understand your feelings—perfectly. And I’m very +much obliged to you for all your kindness to me in very trying circumstances. +We are all agreed—we are forced to the terrible conclusion which—which Mr +Danton has just—expressed. And I know I can rely on your discretion. Don’t stay +on a moment if you really are afraid. But when you say “some one” Ada, do you +mean—some one like you or me; or do you mean—the other?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I’ve been sitting in the kitchen, ma’am, unable to move. I’m watched +everywhere. The other evening I went into the drawing-room—I was alone in the +house—and... I can’t describe it. It wasn’t dark; and yet it was all still and +black, like the ruins after a fire. I don’t mean I saw it, only that it was +like a scene. And then the watching—I am quite aware to some it may sound all +fancy. But I’m not superstitious, never was. I only mean—that I can’t sit alone +here. I daren’t. Else, I’m quite myself. So if so be you don’t want me any +more; if I can’t be of any further use to you or to—to Mr. Lawford, I’d prefer +to go home.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Very well, Ada; thank you. You can go out this way.’ +</p> + +<p> +The door was unchained and unbolted, and ‘Good-night’ said. And Sheila swept +back in sombre pomp to her absorbed friends. +</p> + +<p> +‘She’s quite a good creature at heart,’ she explained frankly, as if to +disclaim any finesse, ‘and almost quixotically loyal. But what really did she +mean, do you think? She is so obstinate. That maddening “some one”! How they do +repeat themselves. It can’t be my husband; not Dr Ferguson, I mean. You don’t +suppose—oh surely, not “some one” else!’ Again the dark silence of the house +seemed to drift in on the little company. +</p> + +<p> +Mr Craik cleared his throat. ‘I failed to catch quite all that the maid said,’ +he murmured apologetically; ‘but I certainly did gather it was to some kind +of—of emanation she was referring. And the “ruin,” you know. I’m not a mystic; +and yet do you know, that somehow seemed to me almost offensively suggestive +of—of demonic influence. You don’t suppose, Mrs Lawford—and of course I +wouldn’t for a moment venture on such a conjecture unsupported—but even if this +restless spirit (let us call it) did succeed in making a footing, it might +possibly be rather in the nature of a lodging than a permanent residence. +Moreover we are, I think, bound to remember that probably in all spheres of +existence like attracts like; even the Gadarene episode seems to suggest a +possible <i>multiplication!</i>’ he peered largely. ‘You don’t suppose, Mrs +Lawford...?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I think Mr Craik doesn’t quite relish having to break the news, Sheila dear,’ +explained Mrs Lovat soothingly, ‘that perhaps Sabathier’s <i>out</i>. Which +really is quite a heavenly suggestion, for in that case your husband would be +in, wouldn’t he? Just our old stolid Arthur again, you know. And next Mr Craik +is suggesting, and it certainly does seem rather fascinating, that poor Ada’s +got mixed up with the Frenchman’s friends, or perhaps, even, with one of the +seventy-two Princes Royal. I know women can’t, or mustn’t reason, Mr Danton, +but you do, I hope, just catch the drift?’ +</p> + +<p> +Danton started. ‘I wasn’t really listening to the girl,’ he explained +nonchalantly, shrugging his black shoulders and pursing up his eyes. +‘Personally, Mrs Lovat, I’d pack the baggage off to-night, box and all. But +it’s not my business.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You mustn’t be depressed—must he, Mr Craik? After all, my dear man, the +business, as you call it, is not exactly entailed. But really, Sheila, I think +it must be getting very late. Mr Bethany won’t come now. And the dear old thing +ought certainly to have his say before we go any further; <i>oughtn’t</i> he, +Mr Danton? So what’s the use of worriting poor Ada’s ghost any longer. And as +for poor Arthur—I haven’t the faintest desire in the world to hear the little +cart drive up, simply in case it should be to leave your unfortunate husband +behind it, Sheila. What it must be to be alone all night in this house with a +dead and buried Frenchman’s face—well, I shudder, dear!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And yet, Mrs Lovat,’ said Mr Craik, with some little show of returning +bravado, ‘as we make our bed, you know.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘But in this case, you see,’ she replied reflectively, ‘if all accounts are +true, Mr Craik, it’s manifestly the wicked Frenchman who has made the bed, and +Sheila who refu—— But look; Mr Danton is fretting to get home.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘If you’ll all go to the door,’ said Danton, seizing a fleeting opportunity to +raise his eyebrows more expressively even than if he had again shrugged his +shoulders at Sheila, ‘I’ll put out the light.’ +</p> + +<p> +The night air flowed into the dark house as Danton hastily groped his way out +of the dining-room. +</p> + +<p> +‘There’s only one thing,’ said Sheila slowly. ‘When I last saw my husband, you +know, he was, I think, the least bit better. He was always stubbornly convinced +it would all come right in time. That’s why, I think, he’s been spending +his—his evenings away from home. But supposing it did?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘For my part,’ said Mrs Lovat, breathing the faint wind that was rising out of +the west, ‘I’d sigh; I’d rub my eyes; I’d thank God for such an exciting dream; +and I’d turn comfortably over and go to sleep again. I’m all for +Arthur—absolutely—back against the wall.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘For my part,’ said Danton, looming in the dusk, ‘friend or no friend, I’d cut +the—I’d cut him dead. But don’t fret, Mrs Lawford, devil or no devil, he’s gone +for good.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And for my part—’ began Mr Craik; but the door at that moment slammed. +</p> + +<p> +Voices, however, broke out almost immediately in the porch. And after a hurried +consultation, Lawford in his stagnant retreat heard the door softly reopen, and +the striking of a match. And Mr Craik, followed closely by Danton’s great body, +stole circumspectly across his dim chink, and the first adventurer went +stumbling down the kitchen staircase. +</p> + +<p> +‘I suppose,’ muttered Lawford, turning his head in the darkness, ‘they have +come back to put out the kitchen gas.’ +</p> + +<p> +Danton began a busy tuneless whistle between his teeth. +</p> + +<p> +‘Coming, Craik?’ he called thickly, after a long pause. +</p> + +<p> +Apparently no answer had been returned to his inquiry: he waited a little +longer, with legs apart, and eyeballs enveloped in brooding darkness. ‘I’ll +just go and tell the ladies you’re coming,’ he suddenly bawled down the hollow. +‘Do you hear, Craik? They’re alone, you know.’ And with that he resolutely +wheeled and rapidly made his way down the steps into the garden. Some few +moments afterwards Mr Craik shook himself free of the basement, hastened at a +spirited trot to rejoin his companions, and in his absence of mind omitted to +shut the front door. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap23"></a> +CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE</h2> + +<p> +Lawford sat on in the darkness, and now one sentence and now another of their +talk would repeat itself in his memory, in much the same way as one listlessly +turns over an antiquated diary, to read here and there a flattened and almost +meaningless sentiment. Sometimes a footstep passed echoing along the path under +the trees, then his thoughts would leave him, and he would listen and listen +till it had died quite out. It was all so very far away. And they too—these +talkers—so very far away; as remote and yet as clear as the characters in a +play when they have made their final bow, and have left the curtained stage, +and one is standing uncompanioned and nearly the last of the spectators, and +the lights that have summoned back reality again are being extinguished. It was +only by painful effort of mind that he kept recalling himself to himself—why he +was here; what it all meant; that this was indeed actuality. +</p> + +<p> +Yet, after all, this by now was his customary loneliness: there was little else +he desired for the present than the hospitality of the dark. He glanced around +him in the clear, black, stirless air. Here and there, it seemed, a humped or +spindled form held against all comers its passive place. Here and there a tiny +faintness of light played. Night after night these chairs and tables kept their +blank vigil. Why, he thought, pleased as an overtired child with the fancy, in +a sense they were always alone, shut up in a kind of senselessness—just like us +all. But what—what, he had suddenly risen from his chair to ask himself—what on +earth are they alone with? No precise answer had been forthcoming to that +question. But as in turning in the doorway, he looked out into the night, +flashing here and there in dark spaces of the sky above the withering apple +leaves—the long dark wall and quiet untrodden road—with the tumultuous beating +of the stars—one thing at least he was conscious of having learned in these +last few days: he knew what kind of a place he was alone <i>in</i>. +</p> + +<p> +It seemed to weave a spell over him, to call up a nostalgia he had lost all +remembrance of since childhood. And that queer homesickness, at any rate, was +all Sabathier’s doing, he thought, smiling in his rather careworn fashion. +Sabathier! It was this mystery, bereft now of all fear, and this beauty +together, that made life the endless, changing and yet changeless, thing it +was. And yet mystery and loveliness alike were only really appreciable with +one’s legs, as it were, dangling down over into the grave. +</p> + +<p> +Just with one’s lantern lit, on the edge of the whispering unknown, and a +reiterated going back out of the solitude into the light and warmth, to the +voices and glancing of eyes, to say good-bye:—that after all was this life on +earth for those who watched as well as acted. What if one’s earthly home were +empty?—still the restless fretted traveller must tarry; ‘for the horrible worst +of it is, my friend,’ he said, as if to some silent companion listening behind +him, ‘the worst of it is, <i>your</i> way was just simply, solely suicide.’ +What was it Herbert had called it? Yes, a cul-de-sac—black, lofty, immensely +still and old and picturesque, but none the less merely a contemptible +cul-de-sac; no abiding place, scarcely even sufficing with its flagstones for a +groan from the fugitive and deluded refugee. There was no peace for the wicked. +The question of course then came in—Was there any peace anywhere, for anybody? +</p> + +<p> +He smiled at a sudden odd remembrance of a quiet, sardonic old aunt whom he +used to stay with as a child. ‘Children should be seen and not heard,’ she +would say, peering at him over his favourite pudding. +</p> + +<p> +His eyes rested vacantly on the darkling street. He fell again into reverie, +gigantically brooded over by shapes only imagination dimly conceived of: the +remote alleys of his mind astir with a shadowy and ceaseless traffic which it +wasn’t at least <i>this</i> life’s business to hearken after, or regard. And as +he stood there in a mysteriously thronging peaceful solitude such as he had +never known before, faintly out of the silence broke the sound of approaching +hoofs. His heart seemed to gather itself close; a momentary blindness veiled +his eyes, so wildly had his blood surged up into cheek and brain. He remained, +caught up, with head slightly inclined, listening, as, with an interminable +tardiness, measureless anguished hope died down into nothing in his mind. +</p> + +<p> +Cold and heavy, his heart began to beat again, as if to catch up those laggard +moments. He turned with an infinite revulsion of feeling to look out on the +lamps of the old fly that had drawn up at his gate. +</p> + +<p> +He watched incuriously a little old lady rather arduously alight, pause, and +look up at his darkened windows, and after a momentary hesitation, and a word +over her shoulder to the cabman, stoop and fumble at the iron latch. He watched +her with a kind of wondering aversion, still scarcely tinged with curiosity. +She had succeeded in lifting the latch and in pushing her way through, and was +even now steadily advancing towards him along the tiled path. And a minute +after he recognised with the strangest reactions the quiet old figure that had +shared a sunset with him ages and ages ago—his mother’s old schoolfellow, Miss +Sinnet. +</p> + +<p> +He was already ransacking the still faintly-perfumed dining-room for matches, +and had just succeeded in relighting the still-warm lamp, when he heard her +quiet step in the porch, even felt her peering in, in the gloom, with all her +years’ trickling customariness behind her, a little dubious of knocking on a +wide-open door. +</p> + +<p> +But the lamp lit Lawford went out again and welcomed his visitor. ‘I am alone,’ +he was explaining gravely, ‘my wife’s away and the whole house topsy-turvy. How +very, very kind of you!’ +</p> + +<p> +The old lady was breathing a little heavily after her ascent of the steep +steps, and seemed not to have noticed his outstretched hand. None the less she +followed him in, and when she was well advanced into the lighted room, she +sighed deeply, raised her veil over the front of her bonnet, and leisurely took +out her spectacles. +</p> + +<p> +‘I suppose,’ she was explaining in a little quiet voice, ‘you <i>are</i> Mr +Arthur Lawford, but as I did not catch sight of a light in any of the windows I +began to fear that the cabman might have set me down at the wrong house.’ +</p> + +<p> +She raised her head, and first through, and then over her spectacles she +deliberately and steadfastly regarded him. +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes,’ she said to herself, and turned, not as it seemed entirely with +satisfaction, to look for a chair. He wheeled the most comfortable up to the +table. +</p> + +<p> +‘I have been visiting my old friend Miss Tucker—Rev W. Tucker’s daughter—she, I +knew, could give me your address; and sure enough she did. Your road, d’ye see, +was on my way home. And I determined, in spite of the hour, just to inquire. +You must understand, Mr Lawford, there was something that I rather particularly +wanted to say to you. But there!—you’re looking sadly, sadly ill; and,’ she +glanced round a little inquisitively, ‘I think my story had better wait for a +more convenient occasion.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Not at all, Miss Sinnet; please not,’ Lawford assured her, ‘really. I have +been ill, but I’m now practically quite myself again. My wife and daughter have +gone away for a few days; and I follow to-morrow, so if you’ll forgive such a +very poor welcome, it may be my—my only chance. Do please let me hear.’ +</p> + +<p> +The old lady leant back in her chair, placed her hands on its arms and softly +panted, while out of the rather broad serenity of her face she sat blinking up +at her companion as if after a long talk, instead of at the beginning of one. +‘No,’ she repeated reflectively, ‘I don’t like your looks at all; yet here we +are, enjoying beautiful autumn weather, Mr Lawford, why not make use of it?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh yes,’ said Lawford, ‘I do. I have been making tremendous use of it.’ +</p> + +<p> +Her eyelid flickered at his candid glance. ‘And does your business permit of +much walking?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, I’ve been malingering these last few days idling at home; but I am +usually more or less my own man, Miss Sinnet. I walk a little.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘H’m, but not much in my direction, Mr Lawford?’ she quizzed him. +</p> + +<p> +‘All horrible indolence, Miss Sinnet. But I often—often think of you; and +especially just lately.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, now,’ she wriggled round her head to get a better view of him rather +stiffly seated on his chair, ‘that’s very peculiar; because I too have been +thinking lately a great deal of you. And yet—I fancy I shall succeed in +mystifying you presently—not precisely of you, but of somebody else!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘You do mystify me—“somebody else”!’ he replied gallantly. ‘And that is the +story, I suppose?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘That’s the story,’ repeated Miss Sinnet with some little triumph. ‘Now, let me +see; it was on Saturday last—yes, Saturday evening; a wonderful sunset; Bewley +Heath.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh yes; my daughter’s favourite walk.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘And your daughter’s age now?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘She’s nearly sixteen; Alice, you know.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, yes, Alice; to be sure. It <i>is</i> a beautiful walk, and if fine, I +generally take mine there too. It’s near; there’s shade; it’s very little +frequented; and I can wander and muse undisturbed. And that I think is pretty +well all that an old woman like me is fit for, Mr Lawford. “Nearly sixteen!” Is +it possible? Dear, dear me? But let me get on. On my way home from the Heath, +you may be aware, before one reaches the road again, there’s a somewhat steep +ascent. I haven’t the strength I had, and whether I’m fatigued or not, I have +always made it a rule to rest awhile on a most convenient little seat at the +summit, admire the view—what I can see of it—and then make my way quietly, +quietly home. On Saturday, however, and it most rarely occurs—once, I remember, +when a very civil nursemaid was sitting with two charmingly behaved little +children in the sunshine, and I heard they were my old friend Major Loder’s +<i>son’s</i> children—on Saturday, as I was saying, my own particular little +haunt was already occupied.’ She glanced back at him from out of her thoughts, +as it were. ‘By a gentleman. I say, gentleman; though I must confess that his +conduct—perhaps, too, a little something even in his appearance, somewhat +belied the term. Anyhow, gentleman let us call him.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford, all attention, nodded, and encouragingly smiled. +</p> + +<p> +‘I’m not one of those tiresome, suspicious people, Mr Lawford, who distrust +strangers. I have never been molested, and I have enjoyed many and many a most +interesting, and sometimes instructive, talk with an individual whom I’ve never +seen in my life before, and this side of the grave perhaps, am never likely to +see again.’ She lifted her head with pursed lips, and gravely yet still +flickeringly regarded him once more. ‘Well, I made some trifling remark—the +weather, the view, what-not,’ she explained with a little jerk of her +shoulder—‘and to my extreme astonishment he turned and addressed me by +name—Miss Sinnet. Unmistakably—Sinnet. Now, perhaps, and very rightly, you +won’t considered <i>that</i> a very peculiar thing to do? But you will +recollect, Mr Lawford, that I had been sitting there a considerable time. +Surely, now, if you had recognised my face you would have addressed me at +once?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Was he, do you think, Miss Sinnet, a little uncertain, perhaps?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Never mind, never mind; let me get on with my story first. The next thing my +gentleman does is more mysterious still. His whole manner was a little +peculiar, perhaps—a certain restlessness, what, in fact, one might be almost +tempted to call a certain furtiveness of behaviour. Never mind. What he does +next is to ask me a riddle! Perhaps you won’t think <i>that</i> was peculiar +either?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What was the riddle?’ smiled Lawford. +</p> + +<p> +‘Why, to be sure, to guess his name! Simply guided, so I surmised, by some very +faint resemblance in his face to his <i>mother</i>, who was, he assured me, an +old schoolfellow of mine at <i>Brighton</i>. I thought and thought. I confess +the adventure was beginning to be a little perplexing. But of course, very, +very few of my old schoolfellows remain distinctly in my memory now; and I fear +<i>that</i> grows more treacherous the longer I live. Their faces as girls are +clear enough. But later in life most of them drifted out of sight—many, alas, +are dead; and, well, at last I narrowed my man down to one. And who now, do you +suppose <i>that</i> was?’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford sustained an expression of abysmal mystification. ‘Do tell me—who?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Your own poor dear mother, Mr Lawford.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘<i>He</i> said so?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘No, no,’ said the old lady, with some vexation, closing her eyes. ‘<i>I</i> +said so. He asked me to guess. And I guessed Mary Lawford; now do you see?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Yes, yes. But <i>was</i> he like her, Miss Sinnet? That was really very, very +extraordinary. Did you see <i>any</i> likeness in his face?’ +</p> + +<p> +Miss Sinnet very deliberately took her spectacles out of their case again. +‘Now, see here, sir; this is being practical, isn’t it? I’m just going to take +a leisurely glance at yours. But you mustn’t let me forget the time. You must +look after the time for me.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘It’s about a quarter to ten,’ said Lawford, having glanced first at the +stopped clock on the chimney-piece and then at his watch. He then sat quite +still and endeavoured to sit at ease, while the old lady lifted her bonneted +head and ever so gravely and benignly surveyed him. +</p> + +<p> +‘H’m,’ she said at last. ‘There’s no mistaking <i>you</i>. It’s Mary’s chin, +and Mary’s brow—with just a little something, perhaps, of her dreamy eye. But +you haven’t all her looks, Mr Lawford, by any manner of means. She was a very +beautiful girl, and so vivacious, so fanciful—it was, I suppose the foreign +strain showing itself. Even marriage did not quite succeed in spoiling her.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘The foreign strain?’ Lawford glanced with a kind of fleeting fixity at the +quiet old figure. ‘The foreign strain?’ +</p> + +<p> +Your mother’s maiden name, my dear Mr Lawford, surely memory does not deceive +me in that, was van der Gucht. <i>That</i>, I believe, is a foreign name.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, yes,’ said Lawford, his rising thoughts sinking quietly to rest again. +‘Van der Gucht, of course. I—how stupid of me!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘As a matter of fact, your mother was very proud of her Dutch blood. But +there,’ she flung out little fin-like sleeves, ‘if you don’t let me keep to my +story I shall go back as uneasy as I came. And you didn’t,’ she added even more +fretfully, ‘you didn’t tell me the time.’ +</p> + +<p> +Lawford stared at his watch again for some few moments without replying. ‘It’s +a few minutes to ten,’ he said at last. +</p> + +<p> +‘Dear me! And I’m keeping the cabman! I must hurry on. Well, now, I put it to +you; you shall be my father confessor—though I detest the idea in real life—was +I wrong? Was I justified in professing to the poor fellow that I detected a +likeness when there was extremely little likeness there?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘What! None at all!’ cried Lawford; ‘not the faintest trace?’ +</p> + +<p> +‘My dear good Mr Lawford,’ she expostulated, patting her lap, ‘there’s very +little more than a trace of my dear beautiful Mary in <i>you</i>, her own son. +How could there be—how could you expect it in him, a complete stranger? No, it +was nothing but my own foolish kindliness. It might have been Mary’s son for +all that I could recollect. I haven’t for years, please remember, had the +pleasure of receiving a visit from <i>you</i>. I am firmly of opinion that I +was justified. My motive was entirely benevolent. And then—to my positive +amazement—well, I won’t say hard things of the absent; but he suddenly turns +round on me with a “Thank you, Miss Bennett.” Bennett, hark ye! Perhaps you +won’t agree that I had any justification in being vexed and—and affronted at +<i>that</i>.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘I think, Miss Sinnet,’ said Lawford solemnly, ‘that you were perfectly +justified. Oh, perfectly. I wonder even you had the patience to give the real +Arthur Lawford a chance to ask your forgiveness for—for the stranger.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Well, candidly,’ said Miss Sinnett severely. ‘I was very much scandalised; and +I shouldn’t be here now telling you my story if it hadn’t been for your +mother.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘My mother!’ +</p> + +<p> +The old lady rather grimly enjoyed his confusion. ‘Yes, Mr Lawford, your +mother. I don’t know why—something in his manner, something in his face—so +dejected, so unhappy, so—if it is not uncharitablnesse to say it—so wild: it +has haunted me: I haven’t been able to put the matter out of my mind. I have +lain awake in my bed thinking of him. Why did he speak to me, I keep asking +myself. Why did he play me so very aimless a trick? How had he learned my name? +Why was he sitting there so solitary and so dejected? And worse even than that, +what has become of him? A little more patience, a little more charity, +perhaps—what might I not have done for him? The whole thing has harassed and +distressed me more than I can say. Would you believe it, I have actually twice, +and on one occasion, three times in a day made my way to the seat—hoping to see +him there. And I am not so young as I was. And then, as I say, to crown all, I +had a most remarkable dream about your mother. But that’s my own affair. +Elderly people like me are used—well, perhaps I won’t say used—we’re not +surprised or disturbed by visits from those who have gone before. We live, in a +sense, among the tombs; though I would not have you fancy it’s in any way a +morbid or unhappy life to lead. We don’t talk about it—certainly not to young +people. Let them enjoy their Eden while they can; though there’s plenty of +apples, I fear, on the Tree yet, Mr Lawford.’ +</p> + +<p> +She leant forward and whispered it with a big, simple smile:—‘We don’t even +discuss it much among ourselves. But as one gets nearer and nearer to the +wicket-gate there’s other company around one than you’ll find in—in the +directory. And that is why I have just come on here tonight. Very probably my +errand may seem to have no meaning for you. You look ill, but you don’t appear +to be in any great trouble or adversity, as I feared in my—well, there—as I +feared you might be. I must say, though, it seems a terribly empty house. And +no lights, too!’ +</p> + +<p> +She slowly, with a little trembling nodding of her bonnet, turned her head and +glanced quietly, fixedly, and unflinchingly, out of the half-open door. ‘But +that’s not my affair.’ And again she looked at him for a little while. +</p> + +<p> +Then she stooped forward and touched him kindly and trustingly on the knee. +‘Trouble or no trouble,’ she said, ‘it’s never too late to remind a man of his +mother. And I’m sure, Mr Lawford, I’m very glad to hear you are struggling up +out of your illness again. We must keep a brave heart, forty or seventy, +whichever we may be: “While the evil days come not nor the years draw nigh when +thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them,” though they have not come to me +even yet; and I trust from the bottom of my heart, not to <i>you</i>.’ +</p> + +<p> +She looked at him without a trace of emotion or constraint in her large, quiet +face, and their eyes met for a moment in that brief, fixed, baffling fashion +that seems to prove that mankind is after all but a dumb masked creature +saddled with the vain illusion of speech. +</p> + +<p> +‘And now that I’ve eased my conscience,’ said the old lady, pulling down her +veil, ‘I must beg pardon for intruding at such an hour of the evening. And may +I have your arm down those dreadful steps? Really, Mr Lawford, judging from the +houses they erect for us, the builders must have a very peculiar notion of +mankind. Is the fly still there? I expressly told the man to wait, and what I +am going to do if—!’ +</p> + +<p> +‘He’s there,’ Lawford reassured her, craning his neck in their slow progress to +catch a peep into the quiet road. And like a flock of birds scared by a chance +comer at their feeding in some deserted field, a whirring cloud of memories +swept softly up in his mind—memories whose import he made no effort to +discover. None the less, the leisurely descent became in their company +something of a real experience even in such a brimming week. +</p> + +<p> +‘I hope, some day, you will really tell me your dream?’ he said, pushing the +old lady’s silk skirts in after her as she slowly climbed into the carriage. +</p> + +<p> +‘Ah, my dear Lawford, when you are my age,’ she called back to him, groping her +way into the rather musty gloom, ‘you’ll dream such dreams for yourself. Life’s +not what’s just the fashion. And there are queerer things to be seen and heard +just quietly in one’s solitude than this busy life gives us time to discover. +But as for my mystifying Bewley acquaintance—I confess I cannot make head or +tail of him.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Was he,’ said Lawford rather vaguely, looking up into the dim white face that +with its plumes filled nearly the whole carriage window, ‘was his face very +unpleasing?’ +</p> + +<p> +She raised a gloved hand. ‘It has haunted me, haunted me, Mr Lawford; its—its +conflict! Poor fellow; I hope, I do hope, he faced his trouble out. But I shall +never see him again.’ +</p> + +<p> +He squeezed the trembling, kindly old hand. ‘I bet, Miss Sinnet,’ he said +earnestly, ‘even your having <i>thought</i> kindly of the poor beggar eased his +mind—whoever he may have been. I assure you, assure you of that.’ +</p> + +<p> +‘Ay, but I did more than <i>think</i>,’ replied the old lady with a chuckle +that might have seemed even a little derisive if it had not been so profoundly +magnanimous. +</p> + +<p> +He watched the old black fly roll slowly off, and still smiling at Miss +Sinnet’s inscrutable finesse went back into the house. ‘And now, my friend,’ he +said, addressing peacefully the thronging darkness, ‘the time’s nearly up for +me to go too.’ +</p> + +<p> +He had made up his mind. Or, rather, it seemed as if in the unregarded silences +of this last long talk his mind had made up itself. Only among impossibilities +had he the shadow of a choice. In this old haunted house, amid this shallow +turmoil no practicable clue could show itself of a way out. He would go away +for a while. +</p> + +<p> +He left the door ajar behind him for the moments still left, and stood for a +while thinking. Then, lamp in hand, he descended into the breakfast-room for +pen, ink, and paper. He sat for some time in that underground calm, nibbling +his pen like a harassed and self-conscious schoolboy. At last he began: +</p> + +<p> +‘MY DEAR SHEILA,—I must tell you, to begin with, that the <i>change</i> has now +all passed away. I am—as near as man can be—completely myself again. And next: +that I overheard all that was said to-night in the dining-room. +</p> + +<p> +‘I’m sorry for listening; but it’s no good going over all that now. Here I am, +and, as you said, for Alice’s sake we must make the best of it. I am going away +for a while, to get, if I can, a chance to quiet down. I suppose every one +comes sooner or later to a time in life when there is nothing else to be done +but just shut one’s eyes and blunder on. And that’s all I can do now—blunder +on....’ +</p> + +<p> +He paused, and suddenly, at the echo of the words in his mind, a revulsion of +feeling—shame and hatred of himself surged up, and he tore his letter into tiny +pieces. Once more he began, ‘my dear Sheila,’ dropped his pen, sat on for a +long time, cold and inert, harbouring almost unendurably a pitiful, hopeless +longing.... He would write to Grisel another day. +</p> + +<p> +He leant back in his chair, his fingers pressed against his eyelids. And +clearer than those which myriad-hued reality can ever present, pictures of the +imagination swam up before his eyes. It seemed, indeed, that even now some +ghost, some revenant of himself was sitting there, in the old green churchyard, +roofed only with a thousand thousand stars. The breath of darkness stirred +softly on his cheek. Some little scampering shape slipped by. A bird on high +cried weirdly, solemnly, over the globe. He shuddered faintly, and looked out +again into the small lamplit room. +</p> + +<p> +Here, too, was quite as inexplicable a coming and going. A fly was walking on +the table beneath his eyes, with the uneasy gait of one that has outlived his +hour and most of his companions. Mice were scampering and shrieking in the +empty kitchen. And all about him, in the viewless air, the phantoms of another +life passed by, unmindful of his motionless body. He fell into a lethargy of +the senses, and only gradually became aware after a while of the strange +long-drawn sigh of rain at the window. He rose and opened it. The night air +flowed in, chilled with its waters and faintly fragrant of the dust. It soothed +away all thought for a while. He turned back to his chair. He would wait until +the rain had lulled before starting.... +</p> + +<p> +A little before midnight the door was softly, and with extreme care, pushed +open, and Mr Bethany’s old face, with an intense and sharpened scrutiny, looked +in on the lamplit room. And as if still intent on the least sound within the +empty walls around him, he came near, and stooping across the table, stared +through his spectacles at the sidelong face of his friend, so still, with hands +so lightly laid on the arms of his chair that the old man had need to watch +closely to detect in his heavy slumber the slow measured rise and fall of his +breast. +</p> + +<p> +He turned wearily away muttering a little, between an immeasurable relief and a +now almost intolerable medley of vexations. What <i>was</i> this monstrous web +of Craik’s? What <i>had</i> the creature been nodding and ducketing +about?—those whisperings, that tattling? And what in the end, when you were old +and sour and out-strategied, what was the end to be of this urgent dream called +Life? He sat quietly down and drew his hands over his face, pushed his lean +knotted fingers up under his spectacles, then sat blinking—and softly slowly +deciphered the solitary ‘My dear Sheila’ on Lawford’s note-paper. ‘H’m,’ he +muttered, and looked up again at the dark still eyelids that in the strange +torpor of sleep might yet be dimly conveying to the dreaming brain behind them +some hint of his presence. ‘I wish to goodness, you wonderful old creature,’ he +muttered, wagging his head, ‘I wish to goodness you’d wake up.’ +</p> + +<p> +For some time he sat on, listening to the still soft downpour on the fading +leaves. ‘They don’t come to <i>me</i>,’ he said softly again; with a tiny smile +on his old face. ‘It’s that old medieval Craik: with a face like a last year’s +rookery!’ And again he sat, with head a little sidelong, listening now to the +infinitesimal sounds of life without, now to the thoughts within, and ever and +again he gazed steadfastly on Lawford. +</p> + +<p> +At last it seemed in the haunted quietness other thoughts came to him. A cloud, +as it were of youth, drew over the wrinkled skin, composed the birdlike +keenness; his head nodded. Once, like Lawford in the darkness at Widderstone, +he glanced up sharply across the lamplight at his phantasmagorical shadowy +companion, heard the steady surge of multitudinous rain-drops, like the roar of +Time’s winged chariot hurrying near; then he too, with spectacles awry, bobbed +on in his chair, a weary old sentinel on the outskirts of his friend’s denuded +battlefield. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RETURN ***</div> +<div style='text-align:left'> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will +be renamed. +</div> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8802a09 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #3075 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3075) diff --git a/old/3075.txt b/old/3075.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5e02f81 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/3075.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8972 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Return, by Walter de la Mare + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Return + +Author: Walter de la Mare + +Posting Date: February 22, 2009 [EBook #3075] +Release Date: February, 2002 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RETURN *** + + + + +Produced by Eve Sobol + + + + + +THE RETURN + +Walter de la Mare + + + +Transcriber's Note: + + This edition has single quotation marks for direct quotes, + and double for indirect quotes. + + There are no periods in the original text after + Mr + Mrs + Dr + + + "Look not for roses in Attalus his garden, or wholesome + flowers in a venomous plantation. And since there is scarce + any one bad, but some others are the worse for him; tempt + not contagion by proximity and hazard not thyself in the + shadow of corruption." + + SIR THOMAS BROWNE. + + + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +The churchyard in which Arthur Lawford found himself wandering that mild +and golden September afternoon was old, green, and refreshingly still. +The silence in which it lay seemed as keen and mellow as the light--the +pale, almost heatless, sunlight that filled the air. Here and there +robins sang across the stones, elvishly shrill in the quiet of harvest. +The only other living creature there seemed to Lawford to be his own +rather fair, not insubstantial, rather languid self, who at the noise +of the birds had raised his head and glanced as if between content and +incredulity across his still and solitary surroundings. An increasing +inclination for such lonely ramblings, together with the feeling that +his continued ill-health had grown a little irksome to his wife, and +that now that he was really better she would be relieved at his absence, +had induced him to wander on from home without much considering where +the quiet lanes were leading him. And in spite of a peculiar melancholy +that had welled up into his mind during these last few days, he had +certainly smiled with a faint sense of the irony of things on lifting +his eyes in an unusually depressed moodiness to find himself looking +down on the shadows and peace of Widderstone. + +With that anxious irresolution which illness so often brings in its +train he had hesitated for a few minutes before actually entering the +graveyard. But once safely within he had begun to feel extremely loth to +think of turning back again, and this not the less at remembering with +a real foreboding that it was now drawing towards evening, that another +day was nearly done. He trailed his umbrella behind him over the +grass-grown paths; staying here and there to read some time-worn +inscription; stooping a little broodingly over the dark green graves. +Not for the first time during the long laborious convalescence that had +followed apparently so slight an indisposition, a fleeting sense almost +as if of an unintelligible remorse had overtaken him, a vague thought +that behind all these past years, hidden as it were from his daily life, +lay something not yet quite reckoned with. How often as a boy had he +been rapped into a galvanic activity out of the deep reveries he used +to fall into--those fits of a kind of fishlike day-dream. How often, +and even far beyond boyhood, had he found himself bent on some distant +thought or fleeting vision that the sudden clash of self-possession had +made to seem quite illusory, and yet had left so strangely haunting. And +now the old habit had stirred out of its long sleep, and, through the +gate that Influenza in departing had left ajar, had returned upon him. + +'But I suppose we are all pretty much the same, if we only knew it,' he +had consoled himself. 'We keep our crazy side to ourselves; that's all. +We just go on for years and years doing and saying whatever happens to +come up--and really keen about it too'--he had glanced up with a kind of +challenge in his face at the squat little belfry--'and then, without +the slightest reason or warning, down you go, and it all begins to wear +thin, and you get wondering what on earth it all means.' Memory slipped +back for an instant to the life that in so unusual a fashion seemed +to have floated a little aloof. Fortunately he had not discussed these +inward symptoms with his wife. How surprised Sheila would be to see him +loafing in this old, crooked churchyard. How she would lift her dark +eyebrows, with that handsome, indifferent tolerance. He smiled, but a +little confusedly; yet the thought gave even a spice of adventure to the +evening's ramble. + +He loitered on, scarcely thinking at all now, stooping here and there. +These faint listless ideas made no more stir than the sunlight gilding +the fading leaves, the crisp turf underfoot. With a slight effort he +stooped even once again;-- + + 'Stranger, a moment pause, and stay; + In this dim chamber hidden away + Lies one who once found life as dear + As now he finds his slumbers here: + Pray, then, the Judgement but increase + His deep, everlasting peace!' + +'But then, do you know you lie at peace?' Lawford audibly questioned, +gazing at the doggerel. And yet, as his eyes wandered over the blunt +green stone and the rambling crimson-berried brier that had almost +encircled it with its thorns, the echo of that whisper rather jarred. +He was, he supposed, rather a dull creature--at least people seemed +to think so--and he seldom felt at ease even with his own small +facetiousness. Besides, just that kind of question was getting +very common. Now that cleverness was the fashion most people were +clever--even perfect fools; and cleverness after all was often only +a bore: all head and no body. He turned languidly to the small +cross-shaped stone on the other side: + + 'Here lies the body of Ann Hard, who died in child-bed. + Also of James, her infant son.' + +He muttered the words over with a kind of mournful bitterness. 'That's +just it--just it; that's just how it goes!'... He yawned softly; the +pathway had come to an end. Beyond him lay ranker grass, one and +another obscurer mounds, an old scarred oak seat, shadowed by a few +everlastingly green cypresses and coral-fruited yew-trees. And above and +beyond all hung a pale blue arch of sky with a few voyaging clouds like +silvered wool, and the calm wide curves of stubble field and pasture +land. He stood with vacant eyes, not in the least aware how queer a +figure he made with his gloves and his umbrella and his hat among the +stained and tottering gravestones. Then, just to linger out his hour, +and half sunken in reverie, he walked slowly over to the few solitary +graves beneath the cypresses. + +One only was commemorated with a tombstone, a rather unusual oval-headed +stone, carved at each corner into what might be the heads of angels, +or of pagan dryads, blindly facing each other with worn-out, sightless +faces. A low curved granite canopy arched over the grave, with a crevice +so wide between its stones that Lawford actually bent down and slid in +his gloved fingers between them. He straightened himself with a +sigh, and followed with extreme difficulty the well-nigh, illegible +inscription: + + 'Here lie ye Bones of one, + Nicholas Sabathier, a Stranger to this Parish, + who fell by his own Hand on ye + Eve of Ste. Michael and All Angels. + MDCCXXXIX + +Of the date he was a little uncertain. The 'Hand' had lost its 'n' and +'d'; and all the 'Angels' rain had erased. He was not quite sure even +of the 'Stranger.' There was a great rich 'S,' and the twisted tail of +a 'g'; and, whether or not, Lawford smilingly thought, he is no Stranger +now. But how rare and how memorable a name! French evidently; probably +Huguenot. And the Huguenots, he remembered vaguely, were a rather +remarkable 'crowd.' He had, he thought, even played at 'Huguenots' +once. What was the man's name? Coligny; yes, of course, Coligny. 'And I +suppose,' Lawford continued, muttering to himself, 'I suppose this poor +beggar was put here out of the way. They might, you know,' he added +confidentially, raising the ferrule of his umbrella, 'they might have +stuck a stake through you, and buried you at the crossroads.' And +again, a feeling of ennui, a faint disgust at his poor little witticism, +clouded over his mind. It was a pity thoughts always ran the easiest +way, like water in old ditches. + +'"Here lie ye bones of one, Nicholas Sabathier,"' he began murmuring +again--'merely bones, mind you; brains and heart are quite another +story. And it's pretty certain the fellow had some kind of brains. +Besides, poor devil! he killed himself. That seems to hint at brains... +Oh, for goodness' sake!' he cried out; so loud that the sound of his +voice alarmed even a robin that had perched on a twig almost within +touch, with glittering eye intent above its dim red breast on this other +and even rarer stranger. + +'I wonder if it is XXXIX.; it might be LXXIX.' Lawford cast a cautious +glance over his round grey shoulder, then laboriously knelt down beside +the stone, and peeped into the gaping cranny. There he encountered +merely the tiny, pale-green, faintly conspicuous eyes of a large spider, +confronting his own. It was for the moment an alarming, and yet a +faintly fascinating experience. The little almost colourless fires +remained so changeless. But still, even when at last they had actually +vanished into the recesses of that quiet habitation, Lawford did not +rise from his knees. An utterly unreasonable feeling of dismay, a sudden +weakness and weariness had come over him. + +'What is the good of it all?' he asked himself inconsequently--this +monotonous, restless, stupid life to which he was soon to be returning, +and for good. He began to realize how ludicrous a spectacle he must be, +kneeling here amid the weeds and grass beneath the solemn cypresses. +'Well, you can't have everything,' seemed loosely to express his +disquiet. + +He stared vacantly at the green and fretted gravestone, dimly aware that +his heart was beating with an unusual effort. He felt ill and weak. He +leant his hand on the stone and lifted himself on to the low wooden +seat nearby. He drew off his glove and thrust his bare hand under his +waistcoat, with his mouth a little ajar, and his eyes fixed on the dark +square turret, its bell sharply defined against the evening sky. + +'Dead!' a bitter inward voice seemed to break into speech; 'Dead!' +The viewless air seemed to be flocking with hidden listeners. The very +clearness and the crystal silence were their ambush. He alone seemed to +be the target of cold and hostile scrutiny. There was not a breath to +breathe in this crisp, pale sunshine. It was all too rare, too thin. The +shadows lay like wings everlastingly folded. The robin that had been +his only living witness lifted its throat, and broke, as if from the +uttermost outskirts of reality, into its shrill, passionless song. +Lawford moved heavy eyes from one object to another--bird--sun-gilded +stone--those two small earth-worn faces--his hands--a stirring in the +grass as of some creature labouring to climb up. It was useless to sit +here any longer. He must go back now. Fancies were all very well for +a change, but must be only occasional guests in a world devoted to +reality. He leaned his hand on the dark grey wood, and closed his eyes. +The lids presently unsealed a little, momentarily revealing astonished, +aggrieved pupils, and softly, slowly they again descended.... + +The flaming rose that had swiftly surged from the west into the zenith, +dyeing all the churchyard grass a wild and vivid green, and the stooping +stones above it a pure faint purple, waned softly back like a falling +fountain into its basin. In a few minutes, only a faint orange burned in +the west, dimly illuminating with its band of light the huddled figure +on his low wood seat, his right hand still pressed against a faintly +beating heart. Dusk gathered; the first white stars appeared; out of the +shadowy fields a nightjar purred. But there was only the silence of the +falling dew among the graves. Down here, under the ink-black cypresses, +the blades of the grass were stooping with cold drops; and darkness lay +like the hem of an enormous cloak, whose jewels above the breast of +its wearer might be in the unfathomable clearness the glittering +constellations.... + +In his small cage of darkness Lawford shuddered and raised a furtive +head. He stood up and peered eagerly and strangely from side to side. He +stayed quite still, listening as raptly as some wandering night-beast to +the indiscriminate stir and echoings of the darkness. He cocked his head +above his shoulder and listened again, then turned upon the soundless +grass towards the hill. He felt not the faintest astonishment or +strangeness in his solitude here; only a little chilled, and physically +uneasy; and yet in this vast darkness a faint spiritual exaltation +seemed to hover. + +He hastened up the narrow path, walking with knees a little bent, like +an old labourer who has lived a life of stooping, and came out into the +dry and dusty lane. One moment his instinct hesitated as to which turn +to take--only a moment; he was soon walking swiftly, almost trotting, +downhill with this vivid exaltation in the huge dark night in his +heart, and Sheila merely a little angry Titianesque cloud on a scarcely +perceptible horizon. He had no notion of the time; the golden hands of +his watch were indiscernible in the gloom. But presently, as he passed +by, he pressed his face close to the cold glass of a little shop-window, +and pierced that out by an old Swiss cuckoo-clock. He would if he +hurried just be home before dinner. + +He broke into a slow, steady trot, gaining speed as he ran on, vaguely +elated to find how well his breath was serving him. An odd smile +darkened his face at remembrance of the thoughts he had been thinking. +There could be little amiss with the heart of a man who could shamble +along like this, taking even pleasure, an increasing pleasure in this +long, wolf-like stride. He turned round occasionally to look into the +face of some fellow-wayfarer whom he had overtaken, for he felt not only +this unusual animation, this peculiar zest, but that, like a boy on some +secret errand, he had slightly disguised his very presence, was going +masked, as it were. Even his clothes seemed to have connived at this +queer illusion. No tailor had for these ten years allowed him so +much latitude. He cautiously at last opened his garden gate and with +soundless agility mounted the six stone steps, his latch-key ready in +his gloveless hand, and softly let himself into the house. + +Sheila was out, it seemed, for the maid had forgotten to light the +lamp. Without pausing to take off his greatcoat, he hung up his hat, ran +nimbly upstairs, and knocked with a light knuckle on his bedroom door. +It was closed, but no answer came. He opened it, shut it, locked it, and +sat down on the bedside for a moment, in the darkness, so that he could +scarcely hear any other sound, as he sat erect and still, like some +night animal, wary of danger, attentively alert. Then he rose from the +bed, threw off his coat, which was clammy with dew, and lit a candle on +the dressing-table. + +Its narrow flame lengthened, drooped, brightened, gleamed clearly. He +glanced around him, unusually contented--at the ruddiness of the low +fire, the brass bedstead, the warm red curtains, the soft silveriness +here and there. It seemed as if a heavy and dull dream had withdrawn out +of his mind. He would go again some day, and sit on the little hard seat +beside the crooked tombstone of the friendless old Huguenot. He opened +a drawer, took out his razors, and, faintly whistling, returned to the +table and lit a second candle. And still with this strange heightened +sense of life stirring in his mind, he drew his hand gently over his +chin and looked unto the glass. + +For an instant he stood head to foot icily still, without the least +feeling, or thought, or stir--staring into the looking-glass. Then an +inconceivable drumming beat on his ear. A warm surge, like the onset of +a wave, broke in him, flooding neck, face, forehead, even his hands with +colour. He caught himself up and wheeled deliberately and completely +round, his eyes darting to and fro, suddenly to fix themselves in +a prolonged stare, while he took a deep breath, caught back his +self-possession and paused. Then he turned and once more confronted the +changed strange face in the glass. + +Without a sound he drew up a chair and sat down, just as he was, frigid +and appalled, at the foot of the bed. To sit like this, with a kind of +incredibly swift torrent of consciousness, bearing echoes and images +like straws and bubbles on its surface, could not be called thinking. +Some stealthy hand had thrust open the sluice of memory. And words, +voices, faces of mockery streamed through without connection, tendency, +or sense. His hands hung between his knees, a deep and settled frown +darkened the features stooping out of the direct rays of the light, and +his eyes wandered like busy and inquisitive, but stupid, animals over +the floor. + +If, in that flood of unintelligible thoughts, anything clearly recurred +at all, it was the memory of Sheila. He saw her face, lit, transfigured, +distorted, stricken, appealing, horrified. His lids narrowed; a vague +terror and horror mastered him. He hid his eyes in his hands and cried +without sound, without tears, without hope, like a desolate child. He +ceased crying; and sat without stirring. And it seemed after an age of +vacancy and meaninglessness he heard a door shut downstairs, a distant +voice, and then the rustle of some one slowly ascending the stairs. Some +one turned the handle; in vain; tapped. 'Is that you, Arthur?' + +For an instant Lawford paused, then like a child listening for an echo, +answered, 'Yes, Sheila.' And a sigh broke from him; his voice, except +for a little huskiness, was singularly unchanged. + +'May I come in?' Lawford stood softly up and glanced once more into the +glass. His lips set tight, and a slight frown settled between the long, +narrow, intensely dark eyes. + +'Just one moment, Sheila,' he answered slowly, 'just one moment.' + +'How long will you be?' + +He stood erect and raised his voice, gazing the while impassively into +the glass. + +'It's no use,' he began, as if repeating a lesson, 'it's no use your +asking me, Sheila. Please give me a moment, a...I am not quite myself, +dear,' he added quite gravely. + +The faintest hint of vexation was in the answer. + +'What is the matter? Can't I help? It's so very absurd--' + +'What is absurd?' he asked dully. + +'Why, standing like this outside my own bedroom door. Are you ill? I +will send for Dr. Simon.' + +'Please, Sheila, do nothing of the kind. I am not ill. I merely want +a little time to think in.' There was again a brief pause, and then a +slight rattling at the handle. + +'Arthur, I insist on knowing at once what's wrong; this does not sound a +bit like yourself. It is not even quite like your own voice.' + +'It is myself,' he replied stubbornly, staring fixedly into the glass. +You must give me a few moments, Sheila. Something has happened. My face. +Come back in an hour.' + +'Don't be absurd; it's simply wicked to talk like that. How do I know +what you are doing? As if I can leave you for an hour in uncertainty! +Your face! If you don't open at once I shall believe there's something +seriously wrong: I shall send Ada for assistance.' + +'If you do that, Sheila, it will be disastrous. I cannot answer for the +con--. Go quietly downstairs. Say I am unwell; don't wait dinner for me; +come back in an hour; oh, half an hour!' + +The answer broke out angrily. 'You must be mad, beside yourself, to ask +such a thing. I shall wait in the next room until you call.' + +'Wait where you please,' Lawford replied, 'but tell them downstairs.' + +'Then if I tell them to wait until half-past eight, you will come down? +You say you are not ill: the dinner will be ruined. It's absurd.' + +Lawford made no answer. He listened a while, then he deliberately sat +down once more to try to think. Like a squirrel in a cage his mind +seemed to be aimlessly, unceasingly astir. 'What is it really? What +is it really?--really?' He sat there and it seemed to him his body was +transparent as glass. It seemed he had no body at all--only the memory +of an hallucinatory reflection in the glass, and this inward voice +crying, arguing, questioning, threatening out of the silence--'What is +it really--really--REALLY?' And at last, cold, wearied out, he rose +once more and leaned between the two long candle-flames, and stared +on--on--on, into the glass. + +He gave that long, dark face that had been foisted on him tricks to +do--lift an eyebrow, frown. There was scarcely any perceptible pause +between the wish and its performance. He found to his discomfiture that +the face answered instantaneously to the slightest emotion, even to his +fainter secondary thoughts; as if these unfamiliar features were not +entirely within control. He could not, in fact, without the glass before +him, tell precisely what that face WAS expressing. He was still, it +seemed, keenly sane. That he would discover for certain when Sheila +returned. Terror, rage, horror had fallen back. If only he felt ill, or +was in pain: he would have rejoiced at it. He was simply caught in some +unheard-of snare--caught, how? when? where? by whom? + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +But the coolness and deliberation of his scrutiny, had to a certain +extent calmed Lawford's mind and given him confidence. Hitherto he had +met the little difficulties of life only to vanquish them with ease and +applause. Now he was standing face to face with the unknown. He burst +out laughing, into a long, low, helpless laughter. Then he arose and +began to walk softly, swiftly, to and fro across the room--from wall to +wall seven paces, and at the fourth, that awful, unseen, brightly-lit +profile passed as swiftly over the tranquil surface of the +looking-glass. The power of concentration was gone again. He simply +paced on mechanically, listening to a Babel of questions, a conflicting +medley of answers. But above all the confusion and turmoil of his brain, +as a boatswain's whistle rises above a storm, so sounded that same +infinitesimal voice, incessantly repeating another question now, 'What +are you going to do? What are you going to do?' + +And in the midst of this confusion, out of the infinite, as it were, +came another sharp tap at the door, and all within sank to utter +stillness again. + +'It's nearly half-past eight, Arthur; I can't wait any longer.' + +Lawford cast a last fleeting look into the glass, turned, and confronted +the closed door. 'Very well, Sheila, you shall not wait any longer.' He +crossed over to the door, and suddenly a swift crafty idea flashed into +his mind. + +He tapped on the panel. 'Sheila,' he said softly, 'I want you first, +before you come in, to get me something out of my old writing-desk in +the smoking-room. Here is the key.' He pushed a tiny key--from off the +ring he carried--beneath the door. 'In the third little drawer from the +top, on the left side, is a letter; please don't say anything now. It +is the letter you wrote me, you will remember, after I had asked you to +marry me. You scribbled in the corner under your signature the initials +"Y.S.O.A."--do you remember? They meant, You Silly Old Arthur!--do you +remember? Will you please get that letter at once?' + +'Arthur,' answered the voice from without, empty of all expression, +'what does all this mean, this mystery, this hopeless nonsense about +a silly letter? What has happened? Is this a miserable form of +persecution? Are you mad?--I refuse to get the letter.' + +Lawford stooped, black and angular, against the door. 'I am not mad. Oh, +I am in the deadliest earnest, Sheila. You must get the letter, if only +for your own peace of mind.' He heard his wife hesitate as she turned. +He heard a sob. And once more he waited. + +'I have brought the letter,' came the low toneless voice again. + +'Have you opened it?' + +There was a rustle of paper. 'Are the letters there underlined three +times--"Y.S.O.A."?' + +'The letters are there.' + +'And the date of the month is underneath, "April 3rd." No one else +in the whole world, living or dead, could know of this but ourselves, +Sheila?' + +'Will you please open the door?' + +'No one?' + +'I suppose not--no one.' + +'Then come in.' He unlocked the door and opened it. A dark, rather +handsome woman, with sleek hair, in a silk dress of a dark rich colour +entered. Lawford closed the door. But his face was in shadow. He had +still a moment's respite. + +'I need not ask you to be patient,' he began quickly; 'if I could +possibly have spared you--if there had been anybody in the world to go +to... I am in horrible, horrible trouble, Sheila. It is inconceivable. I +said I was sane: so I am, but the fact is--I went out for a walk; it +was rather stupid, perhaps, so soon: and I think I was taken ill, or +something--my heart. A kind of fit, a nervous fit. Possibly I am a +little unstrung, and it's all, it's mainly fancy: but I think, I can't +help thinking it has a little distorted--changed my face; everything, +Sheila; except, of course, myself. Would you mind looking?' He walked +slowly and with face averted towards the dressing-table. + +'Simply a nervous--to make such a fuss, to scare!...' began his wife, +following him. + +Without a word he took up the two old china candlesticks, and held them, +one in each lank-fingered hand, before his face, and turned. + +Lawford could see his wife--every tint and curve and line as distinctly +as she could see him. Her cheeks never had much colour; now her whole +face visibly darkened, from pallor to a dusky leaden grey, as she +gazed. It was not an illusion then; not a miserable hallucination. The +unbelievable, the inconceivable, had happened. He replaced the candles +with trembling fingers and sat down. + +'Well,' he said, 'what is it really; what is it really, Sheila? What on +earth are we to do?' + +'Is the door locked?' she whispered. He nodded. With eyes fixed +stirlessly on his face, Sheila unsteadily seated herself, a little out +of the candlelight, in the shadow. Lawford rose and put the key of +the door on his wife's little rose-wood prayer-desk at her elbow, and +deliberately sat down again. + +'You said "a fit"--where?' + +'I suppose--is--is it very different--hopeless? You will understand +my being... O Sheila, what am I to do?' His wife sat perfectly still, +watching him with unflinching attention. + +'You gave me to understand--"a nervous fit"; where?' + +Lawford took a deep breath, and quietly faced her again. 'In the old +churchyard, Widderstone; I was looking at--at the gravestones.' + +'A fit; in the old churchyard, Widderstone--you were "looking at the +gravestones"?' + +Lawford shut his mouth. 'I suppose so--a fit,' he said presently. +'My heart went a little queer, and I sat down and fell into a kind of +doze--a stupor, I suppose. I don't remember anything more. And then I +woke; like this.' + +'How do you know?' + +'How do I know what?' + +'"Like that"?' + +He turned slowly towards the looking-glass. 'Why, here I am!' + +She gazed at him steadily; and a hard, incredulous, almost cunning glint +came into her wide blue eyes. She took up the key carelessly, glanced +at it; glanced at him. 'It has made me--I mean the first shock, you +know--it has made me a little faint.' She walked slowly, deliberately to +the door, and unlocked it. 'I'll get a little sal volatile.' She softly +drew out the key, and without once removing her eyes from his face, +opened the door and pushed the key noiselessly in on the other side. +'Please stay there; I won't be a minute.' + +Lawford's face smiled--a rather desperate, yet for all that a patient, +resolute smile. 'Oh yes, of course,' he said, almost to himself, 'I had +not foreseen--at least--you must do precisely what you please, Sheila. +You were going to lock me in. You will, however, before taking any final +step, please think over what it will entail. I did not think you would, +after such proof, in this awful trouble--I did not think you would +simply disbelieve me, Sheila. Who else is there to help me? You have the +letter in your hand. Isn't that sufficient proof? It was overwhelming +proof to me. And even I doubted too; doubted myself. But never mind; why +I should have dreamed you would believe me; or taken this awful thing +differently, I don't know. It's rather awful to have to go on alone. +But there, think it over. I shall not stir until I hear the voices. And +then: honestly, Sheila, I couldn't face quite that. I'd sooner give up +altogether. Any proof you can think of--I will... O God, I cannot bear +it!' He covered his face with his hands; but in a moment looked up, +unmoved once more. 'Why, for that matter,' he added slowly, and, as it +were, with infinite pains, a faint thin smile again stealing into his +face, 'I think,' he turned wearily to the glass, 'I think, it's almost +an improvement!' + +Something deep in those dark clear pupils, out of that lean adventurous +face, gleamed back at him, the distant flash of a heliograph, as it +were, height to height, flashing 'Courage!' He shuddered, and shut his +eyes. 'But I would really rather,' he aided in a quiet childlike way, 'I +would really rather, Sheila, you left me alone now.' + +His wife stood irresolute. 'I understand you to explain,' she said, +'that you went out of this house, just your usual self, this afternoon, +for a walk; that for some reason you went to Widderstone--"to read the +tombstones," that you had a heart attack, or, as you said at first, a +fit, that you fell into a stupor, and came home like--like this. Am I +likely to believe all that? Am I likely to believe such a story as that? +Whoever you are, whoever you may be, is it likely? I am not in the least +afraid. I thought at first it was some silly practical joke. I thought +that at first.' She paused, but no answer came. 'Well, I suppose in a +civilised country there is a remedy even for a joke as wicked as that.' + +Lawford listened patiently. 'She is pretending; she is trying me; she is +feeling her way,' he kept repeating to himself. 'She knows I AM I, but +hasn't the courage... Let her talk!' + +'I shall leave the door open,' Sheila continued. 'I am not, as you +no doubt very naturally assumed--I am not going to do anything either +senseless or heedless. I am merely going to ask your brother Cecil +to come in, if he is at home, and if not, no doubt our old friend +Mr. Montgomery would--would help us.' Her scrutiny was still and +concentrated, like that of a cat above a mouse's hole. + +Lawford sat crouched together in the candle-light. 'By all means, +Sheila,' he said slowly choosing his words, 'if you think poor old +Cecil, who next January will have been three years in his grave, will +be of any use in our difficulty. Who Mr. Montgomery is...' His voice +dropped in utter weariness. 'You did it very well, my dear,' he added +softly. + +Sheila gently closed the door and sat down on the bed. He heard her +softly crying, he heard the bed shaken with her sobs. But a slow glance +towards the steady candle-flames restrained him. He let her cry on +alone. When she had become a little more composed he stood up. 'You have +had no dinner,' he managed to blurt out at last, 'you will be faint. +It's useless to talk, even to think, any more to-night. Leave me to +myself for a while. Don't look at me any more. Perhaps I can sleep: +perhaps if I sleep it will come right again. When the servants are +gone up, I will come down. Just let me have some--some medical book, or +other; and some more candles. Don't think, Sheila; don't even think!' + +Sheila paid him no attention for a while. 'You tell me not to think,' +she began, in a low, almost listless voice; 'why--I wonder I am in my +right mind. And "eat"! How can you have the heartlessness to suggest it? +You don't seem in the least to realize what you say. You seem to have +lost all--all consciousness. I quite agree, it is useless for me to +burden you with my company while you are in your present condition of +mind. But you will at least promise me that you won't take any further +steps in this awful business.' She could not, try as she would, bring +herself again to look at him. She rose softly, paused a moment with +sidelong eyes, then turned deliberately towards the door, 'What, what +have I done to deserve all this?' + +From behind her that voice, so extraordinarily like--and yet in some +vague fashion more arresting, more resonant than her husband's, broke +incredibly out once more. 'You will please leave the key, Sheila. I am +ill, but I am not yet in the padded room. And please understand, I take +no further steps in "this awful business" until I hear a strange voice +in the house.' Sheila paused, but the quiet voice rang in her ear, +desperately yet convincingly. She took the key out of the lock, placed +it on the bed, and with a sigh, that was not quite without a hint of +relief in its misery, she furtively extinguished the gas-light on the +landing and rustled downstairs. + +She speedily returned. 'I have brought the book.' she said hastily. +'I could only find the one volume. I have said you have taken a fresh +chill. No one will disturb you.' + +Lawford took the book without a word. And once more, with eyes stonily +averted, his wife left him to his own company and that of the face in +the glass. + +When completely deserted, Lawford with fumbling fingers opened Quain's +'Dictionary of Medicine.' He had never had much curiosity, and had +always hated what he disbelieved, but none the less he had heard +occasionally of absurd and questionable experiments. He remembered +even to have glanced over reports of cases in the newspapers concerning +disappearances, loss of memory, dual personality. Cranks... Oh yes, he +thought now, with a sense of cold humiliating relief, there had been +such cases as his before. They were no doubt curable. They must be +comparatively common in America--that land of jangled nerves. Possibly +bromide, rest, a battery. But Quain, it seemed, shared his prejudices, +at least in this edition, or had hidden away all such apocryphal matter +beneath technical terms, where no sensible man could find it, 'Besides,' +he muttered angrily, 'what's the good of your one volume?' He flung +it down and strode to the bed, and rang the bell. Then suddenly +recollecting himself, he paused and listened. There came a tap on the +door. 'Is that you, Sheila?' he called, doubtfully. + +'No, sir, it's me,' came the answer. + +'Oh, don't trouble; I only wanted to speak to your mistress. It's all +right.' + +'Mrs. Lawford has gone out, sir,' replied the voice. + +'Gone out?' + +'Yes, sir; she told me not to mention it; but I suppose as you asked--' + +'Oh, that's all right; never mind; I didn't ring.' He stood with face +uplifted, thinking. + +'Can I do anything, sir?' came the faint, nervous question after a long +pause. + +'One moment, Ada,' he called in a loud voice. He took out his +pocket-book, sat down, and scribbled a little note. He hardly noticed +how changed his handwriting was--the clear round letters crabbed and +irregular. + +'Are you there, Ada?' he called. 'I am slipping a note beneath the +door; just draw back the mat; that's it. Take it at once, please, to Mr. +Critchett's, and be sure to wait for an answer. Then come back direct +to me, up here. I don't think, Ada, your mistress believes much in +Critchett; but I have fully explained what I want. He has made me up +many prescriptions. Explain that to his assistant if he is not there. +Go at once, and you will be back before she is. I should be so very much +obliged, tell him. "Mr Arthur Lawford."' + +The minutes slowly drifted by. He sat quite still in the clear +untroubled light, waiting in the silence of the empty house. And for +the first time he was confronted with the cold incredible horror of his +ordeal. Who would believe, who could believe, that behind this strange +and awful, yet how simple mask, lay himself? What test; what heaped-up +evidence of identity would break it down? It was all a loathsome +ignominy. It was utterly absurd. It was-- + +Suddenly, with a kind of ape-like cunning, he deliberately raised a +long lean forefinger and pointed it at the shadowy crystal of the +looking-glass. Perhaps he was dead, was really and indeed changed in +body, was fated really and indeed to change in soul, into That. 'It's +that beastly voice again,' Lawford cried out loud, looking vacantly at +his upstretched finger. And then, hand and arm, not too willingly, as it +were, obeyed; relaxed and fell to his side. 'You must keep a tight hold, +old man,' he muttered to himself. 'Once, once you lose yourself--the +least symptom of that--the least symptom, and it's all up!' And the +fools, the heartless, preposterous fools had brought him one volume! + +When on earth was Ada coming back? She was lagging on purpose. She was +in the conspiracy too. Oh, it should be a lesson to Sheila! Oh, if only +daylight would come! 'What are you going to do--to do--to DO?' He rose +once more and paced his silent cage. To and fro, thinking no more; +just using his eyes, compelling them to wander from picture to picture, +bedpost to bedpost; now counting aloud his footsteps; now humming; only, +only to keep himself from thinking. At last he took out a drawer and +actually began arranging its medley of contents; ties, letters, studs, +concert and theatre programmes--all higgledy-piggledy. And in the midst +of this childish strategem he heard a faint sound, as of heavy water +trickling from a height. He turned. A thief was in one of the candles. +It was guttering out. He would be left in darkness. He turned hastily +without a moment's heed, to call for light, flung the door open and full +in the flare of a lamp, illuminating her pale forehead and astonished +face beneath her black straw hat, stood face to face with Ada. + +With one swift dexterous movement he drew the door to after him, +looking straight into her almost colourless steady eyes. 'Ah,' he +said instantly, in a high faint voice, 'the powder, thank you; yes, +Mr Lawford's powder; thank you, thank you. He must be kept absolutely +quiet--absolutely. Mrs Lawford is following. Please tell her that I am +here, when she returns. Mr Critchett was in, then? Thank you. Extreme, +extreme silence, please.' Again that knotted, melodramatic finger raised +itself on high; and within that lean, cadaverous body the soul of its +lodger quailed at this spectral boldness. But it was triumphant. The +maid at once left him and went downstairs. He heard faint voices in +muffled consultation. And in a moment Sheila's silks rustled once +more on the staircase. Lawford put down the lamp, and watched her +deliberately close the door. + +'What does this mean?' she began swiftly, 'I understand that--Ada tells +me a stranger is here; giving orders, directions. Who is he? where +is he? You bound yourself on your solemn promise not to stir till +I returned. You... How can I, how can we get decently through this +horrible business if you are so wretchedly indiscreet? You sent Ada to +the chemist's. What for? What for? I say.' + +Lawford watched his wife with an almost extraneous interest. She was +certainly extremely interesting from that point of view, that very +novel point of view. 'It's quite useless,' he said, 'to get in the least +nervous or hysterical. I don't care for the darkness just now. That was +all. Tell the girl I am a strange doctor--Dr Simon's new partner. You +are clever at conventionalities, Sheila. Invent! I said our patient must +be kept quiet--I really think he must. That is all, so far as Ada is +concerned.... What on earth else ARE we to say?' he broke out. 'That, +for the present to EVERYBODY, is our only possible story. It will give +us what we must have--time. And next--where is the second volume of +Quain? I want that. And next--why have you broken faith with me?' Mrs +Lawford sat down. This sudden and baffling outburst had stupefied her. + +'I can't, I can't make head or tail of what you say. And as for having +broken faith, as you call it, would any wife, would any sane woman face +what you have brought on us, a situation like this, without seeking +advice and help? Mr Bethany will be perfectly discreet--if he thinks +discretion desirable. He is the only available friend we have close +enough to ask at once. And things of this kind are, I suppose, if +anybody's concern, his. It's certain to leak out. Everybody will hear +of it. Don't flatter yourself you are going to hush up a thing like this +for long. You can't keep living skeletons in a cupboard. You think only +of yourself, only of your own misfortune. But who's to know, pray, that +you really are my husband--if you are? The sooner I get the vicar on +my side the better for us both. Who in the whole of the parish--I ask +you--and you must have the sense left to see that--who will believe that +a respectable man, a gentleman, a Churchman, would deliberately go out +to seek an afternoon's amusement in a poky little country churchyard? +Why, apart from everything else, THAT was absolutely mad to start with. +Can you really wonder at the result?' + +Probably because she still steadfastly refused to look at him, her +memory kept losing its hold on the appalling fact facing them. She +realised fully only that she was in a great, unwarrantable, and +insurmountable difficulty, but until she actually lifted her eyes for a +moment she had not fully realised what that difficulty was. She got up +with a sudden and horrible nausea. 'One moment,' she said, 'I will see +if the servants have gone to bed.' + +That long saturnine face, behind which Lawford lay in a dull and +desperate ambush, smiled. Something partaking of its clay, some reflex +ghost of its rather remarkable features, was even a little amused at +Sheila. + +She returned in a moment, and stood in profile in the doorway. 'Will you +come down?' she remarked distantly. + +'One moment, Sheila,' Lawford began miserably. 'Before we take this +irrevocable step, a step I implore you to postpone awhile--for what +comes, I suppose, may go--what precisely have you told the vicar? I must +in fairness know that.' + +'In fairness,' she began ironically, and suddenly broke off. Her husband +had turned the flame of the lamp low down in the vacant room behind +them; the corridor was lit obscurely by the chandelier far down in the +hall below. A faint, inexplicable dread fell softly and coldly on her +heart. 'Have you no trust in me?' she murmured a little bitterly. 'I +have simply told him the truth.' + +They softly descended the stairs; she first, the dark figure following +close behind her. + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +Mr Bethany sat awaiting them in the dining-room, a large, +heavily-furnished room with a great benign looking-glass on the +mantelpiece, a marble clock, and with rich old damask curtains. Fleecy +silver hair was all that was visible of their visitor when they entered. +But Mr Bethany rose out of his chair when he heard them, and with a +little jerk, turned sharply round. Thus it was that the gold-spectacled +vicar and Lawford first confronted each other, the one brightly +illuminated, the other framed in the gloom of the doorway. Mr Bethany's +first scrutiny was timid and courteous, but beneath it he tried to be +keen, and himself hastened round the table almost at a trot, to obtain, +as delicately as possible, a closer view. But Lawford, having shut +the door behind him, had gone straight to the fire and seated himself, +leaning his face in his hands. Mr Bethany smiled faintly, waved his hand +almost as if in blessing, but certainly in peace, and tapped Mrs Lawford +into the chair upon the other side. But he himself remained standing. + +'Mrs Lawford has, I declare, been telling family secrets,' he began, +and paused, peering. But there, you will forgive an old friend's +intrusion--this little confidence about a change, my dear fellow--about +a ramble and a change?' He sat down, put up his kind little puckered +face and peered again at Lawford, and then very hastily at his wife. +But all her attention was centred on the bowed figure opposite to her. +Lawford responded to this cautious advance without raising his head. + +'You do not wish me to repeat all that my wife tells me she has told +you?' + +'Dear me, no,' said Mr Bethany cheerfully, 'I wish nothing, nothing, old +friend. You must not burden yourself with me. If I may be of any help, +here I am.... Oh, no, no....' he paused, with blinking eyes, but wits +still shrewd and alert. Why doesn't the man raise his head? he thought. +A mere domestic dispute! + +'I thought,' he went on ruminatingly, 'I thought on Tuesday, yes, on +Tuesday, that you weren't looking quite the thing. Indeed, I remarked on +it. But now, I understand from Mrs Lawford that the malady has taken +a graver turn--eh, Lawford, an heretical turn? I hear you have been +wandering from the true fold.' Mr Bethany leaned forward with what might +be described as a very large smile in a very small compass. 'And that, +of course, entailed instant retribution.' He broke off solemnly. 'I know +Widderstone churchyard well; a most verdant and beautiful spot. The late +rector, a Mr Strickland, was a very old friend of mine. And his wife, +dear good Alicia, used to set out her babies, in the morning, to sleep +and to play there, twenty, dear me, perhaps twenty-five years ago. But +I did not know, my dear Lawford, that you--' and suddenly, without an +instant's warning, something seemed to shout at him, 'Look, look! He is +looking at you!' He stopped, faltered, and a slight warmth came into his +face. 'And and you were taken ill there?' His voice had fallen flat and +faint. + +'I fell asleep--or something of that sort,' came the stubborn reply. + +'Yes,' said Mr Bethany, brightly, 'so your wife was saying. "Fell +asleep," so have I too--scores of times'; he beamed, with beads of sweat +glistening on his forehead. 'And then? I'm not, I'm not persisting?' + +'Then I woke; refreshed, I think, as it seemed--I felt much better and +came home.' + +'Ah, yes,' said his visitor. And after that there was a long, brightly +lit, intense pause; at the end of which Lawford raised his face and +again looked firmly at his friend. + +Mr Bethany was now a shrunken old man; he sat perfectly still, his head +craned a little forward, and his veined hands clutching his bent, spare +knees. + +There wasn't the least sign of devilry, or out-facingness, or insolence +in that lean shadowy steady head; and yet he himself was compelled to +sidle his glance away, so much the face shook him. He closed his eyes, +too, as a cat does after exchanging too direct a scrutiny with human +eyes. He put out towards, and withdrew, a groping hand from Mrs Lawford. + +'Is it,' came a voice from somewhere, 'is it a great change, sir? I +thought perhaps I may have exaggerated--candle-light, you know.' + +Mr Bethany remained still and silent, striving to entertain one thought +at a time. His lips moved as if he were talking to himself. And again +it was Lawford's faltering voice that broke the silence. 'You see,' +he said, 'I have never... no fit, or anything of that kind before. I +remember on Tuesday... oh yes, quite well. I did feel seedy, very. And +we talked, didn't we?--Harvest Festival, Mrs Wine's flowers, the new +offertory-bags, and all that. For God's sake, Vicar, it is not as bad +as--as they make out?' + +Mr Bethany woke with a start. He leaned forward, and stretched out a +long black wrinkled sleeve, just managing to reach far enough to tap +Lawford's knee. 'Don't worry, don't worry,' he said soothingly. 'We +believe, we believe.' + +It was, none the less, a sheer act of faith. He took off his spectacles +and took out his handkerchief. 'What we must do, eh, my dear,' he half +turned to Mrs Lawford, 'what we must do is to consult, yes, consult +together. And later--we must have advice--medical advice; unless, as +I very much suspect, it is merely a little quite temporary physical +aberration. Science, I am told, is making great strides, experimenting, +groping after things which no sane man has ever dreamed of +before--without being burned alive for it. What's in a name? Nerves, +especially, Lawford.' + +Mrs Lawford sat perfectly still, absorbedly listening, turning her face +first this way, then that, to each speaker in turn. 'That is what +I thought,' she said, and cast one fleeting glance across at the +fireplace, 'but--' + +The little old gentleman turned sharply with half-blind eyes, and lips +tight shut. 'I think,' he said, with a hind of austere humour, 'I think, +do you know, I see no "but."' He paused as if to catch the echo and +added, 'It's our only course.' He continued to polish round and round +his glasses. Mrs Lawford rather magnificently rose. + +'Perhaps if I were to leave you together awhile? I shall not be far +off. It is,' she explained, as if into a huge vacuum, 'it is a terrible +visitation.' She moved gravely round the table and very softly and +firmly closed the door after her. + +Lawford took a deep breath. 'Of course.' he said, 'you realise my +wife does not believe me. She thinks,' he explained naively, as if to +himself, 'she thinks I am an imposter. Goodness knows what she does +think. I can't think much myself--for long!' + +The vicar rubbed busily on. 'I have found, Lawford,' he said smoothly, +'that in all real difficulties the only feasible plan is--is to face the +main issue. The others right themselves. Now, to take a plunge into your +generosity. You have let me in far enough to make it impossible for me +to get out--may I hear then exactly the whole story? All that I know +now, so far as I could gather from your wife, poor soul, is of course +inconceivable: that you went out one man and came home another. You will +understand, my dear man, I am speaking, as it were, by rote. God has +mercifully ordered that the human brain works slowly; first the +blow, hours afterwards the bruise. Oh, dear me, that man Hume--"on +miracles"--positively amazing! So that too, please, you will be quite +clear about. Credo--not quia impossible est, but because you, Lawford, +have told me. Now then, if it won't be too wearisome to you, the whole +story.' He sat, lean and erect in his big chair, a hand resting +loosely on each knee, in one spectacles, in the other a dangling pocket +handkerchief. And the dark, sallow, aquiline, formidable figure, with +its oddly changing voice, re-told the whole story from the beginning. + +'You were aware then of nothing different, I understand, until you +actually looked into the glass?' + +'Only vaguely. I mean that after waking I felt much better, more alert. +And my thoughts--' + +'Ah, yes, your thoughts?' + +'I hardly know--oh, clear as if I had had a real long rest. It was just +like being a boy again. Influenza dispirits one so.' + +Mr Bethany gazed without stirring. 'And yet, you know,' he said, 'I can +hardly believe, I mean conceive, how--You have been taking no drugs, no +quackery, Lawford?' + +'I never dose myself,' said Lawford, with sombre pride. + +'God bless me, that's Lawford to the echo,' thought his visitor. 'And +before--?' he went on gently; 'I really cannot conceive, you see, how +a mere fit could... Before you sat down you were quite alone?' He stuck +out his head. 'There was nobody with you?' + +'With me? Oh no,' came the soft answer. + +'What had you been thinking of? In these days of faith-cures, and +hypnotism, and telepathy, and subliminalities--why, the simple old world +grows very confusing. But rarely, very rarely novel. You were thinking, +you say; do you remember, perhaps, just the drift?' + +'Well,' began Lawford ruminatingly, 'there was something curious even +then, perhaps. I remember, for instance, I knelt down to read an old +tombstone. There was a little seat--no back. And an epitaph. The sun was +just setting; some French name. And there was a long jagged crack in +the stone, like the black line you know one sees after lightning, I mean +it's as clear as that even now, in memory. Oh yes, I remember. And then, +I suppose, came the sleep--stupid, sluggish: and then; well, here I am.' + +'You are absolutely certain, then,' persisted Mr Bethany almost +querulously, 'there was no living creature near you? Bless me, Lawford, +I see no unkindness in believing what the Bible itself relates. There +are powers supernatural. Saul, and so on. We are all convinced of that. +No one?' + +'I remember distinctly,' replied Lawford, in a calm, stubborn voice, 'I +looked up all around me, while I was kneeling there, and there wasn't a +soul to be seen. Because, you see, it even then occurred to me that it +would have looked rather queer--my wandering about like that, I mean. +Facing me there were some cypress-trees, and beyond, a low sunken +fence, and then, just open country. Up above there were the gravestones +toppling down the hill, where I had just strolled down, and sunshine!' +He suddenly threw up his hand. 'Oh, marvellous! streaming in +gold--flaming, like God's own ante-chamber.' + +There was a very pregnant pause. Mr Bethany shrunk back a little into +his chair. His lips moved; he folded his spectacles. + +'Yes, yes,' he said. And then very quietly he stole one mole-like look +into his sidesman's face. + +'What is Dr Simon's number?' he said. Lawford was gazing gloomily +into the fire. 'Oh, Annandale,' he replied absently. 'I don't know the +number.' + +'Do you believe in him? Your wife mentioned him. Is he clever?' + +'Oh, he's new,' said Lawford; 'old James was our doctor. He--he killed +my father.' He laughed out shamefacedly. + +'A sound, lovable man,' said Mr Bethany, 'one of the kindest men I ever +knew; and a very old friend of mine.' + +And suddenly the dark face turned with a shudder from the fire, and +spoke in a low trembling voice. 'Only one thing--only one thing--my +sanity, my sanity. If once I forget, who will believe me?' He thrust his +long lean fingers beneath his coat. 'And mad,' he added; 'I would sooner +die.' + +Mr Bethany deliberately adjusted his spectacles. 'May I, may I +experiment?' he said boldly. There came a tap on the door. + +'Bless me,' said the vicar, taking out his watch, 'it is a quarter to +twelve. 'Yes, yes, Mrs Lawford,' he trotted round to the door. 'We are +beginning to see light--a ray!' + +'But I--I can see in the dark,' whispered Lawford, as if at a cue, +turning with an inscrutable smile to the fire. + +The vicar came again, wrapped up in a little tight grey great-coat, and +a white silk muffler. He looked up unflinching into Lawford's face, +and tears stood in his eyes. 'Patience, patience, my dear fellow,' +he repeated gravely, squeezing his hand. 'And rest, complete rest, is +imperative. Just till the first thing to-morrow. And till then,' he +turned to Mrs Lawford, where she stood looking in at the doorway, 'oh +yes, complete quiet; and caution!' + +Mrs Lawford let him out. He shook his head once or twice, holding her +fingers. 'Oh yes,' he whispered, 'it is your husband, not the smallest +doubt. I tried: for MYSELF. But something--something has happened. Don't +fret him now. Have patience. Oh yes, it is incredible... the change! But +there, the very first thing to-morrow.' She closed the door gently +after him, and stepping softly back to the dining-room, peered in. Her +husband's back was turned, but he could see her in the looking-glass, +stooping a little, with set face watching him, in the silvery stillness. + +'Well,' he said, 'is the old--' he doggedly met the fixed eyes facing +him there, 'is our old friend gone?' + +'Yes,' said Sheila, 'he's gone.' Lawford sighed and turned round. 'It's +useless talking now, Sheila. No more questions. I cannot tell you how +tired I am. And my head--' + +'What is wrong with your head?' inquired his wife discreetly. + +The haggard face turned gravely and patiently. 'Only one of my old +headaches.' he smiled, 'my old bilious headaches--the hereditary Lawford +variety.' But his voice fell low again. 'We must get to bed.' + +With a rather pretty and childish movement, Sheila gently drew her hands +across her silk skirts. 'Yes, dear,' she said, 'I have made up a bed for +you in the large spare room. It is thoroughly aired.' She came softly +in, hastened over to a closed work-table that stood under the curtains, +and opened it. + +Lawford watched her, utterly expressionless, utterly motionless. He +opened his mouth and shut it again, still watching his wife as she +stooped with ridiculously too busy fingers, searching through her +coloured silks. + +Again he opened his mouth. 'Yes,' he said, and stalked slowly towards +the door. But there he paused. 'God knows,' he said, strangely and +meekly, 'I am sorry, sorry for all this. You will forgive me, Sheila?' + +She looked up swiftly. 'It's very tiresome, I can't find anywhere,' she +murmured, 'I can't find anywhere the--the little red box key.' + +Lawford's cheek turned more sallow than ever. 'You are only pretending +to look for it,' he said, 'to try me. We both know perfectly well the +lock is broken. Ada broke it.' + +Sheila let fall the lid; and yet for a while her eyes roved over it as +if in violent search for something. Then she turned: 'I am so very glad +the vicar was at home,' she said brightly. 'And mind, mind you rest, +Arthur. There's nothing so bad but it might be worse.... Oh, I can't, I +can't bear it!' She sat down in the chair and huddled her face between +her hands, sobbing on and on, without a tear. + +Lawford listened and stared solemnly. 'Whatever it may be, Sheila, I +will be loyal,' he said. + +Her sobs hushed, and again cold horror crept over her. Nobody in +the whole world could have said that 'I will be loyal' quite like +that--nobody but Arthur. She stood up, patting her hair. 'I don't think +my brain would bear much more. It's useless to talk. If you will go up; +I will put out the lamp.' + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +One solitary and tall candle burned on the great dressing-table. Faint, +solitary pictures broke the blankness of each wall. The carpet was rich, +the bed impressive, and the basins on the washstand as uninviting as the +bed. Lawford sat down on the edge of it in complete isolation. He sat +without stirring, listening to his watch ticking in his pocket. The +china clock on the chimney piece pointed cheerfully to the hour of dawn. +It was exactly, he computed carefully, five hours and seven minutes +fast. Not the slightest sound broke the stillness, until he heard, very, +very softly and gradually, the key of his door turn in the oiled wards, +and realized that he was a prisoner. + +Women were strange creatures. How often he had heard that said, he +thought lamely. He felt no anger, no surprise or resentment, at the +trick. It was only to be expected. He could sit on till morning; easily +till morning. He had never noticed before how empty a well-furnished +room could seem. It was his own room too; his best visitors' room. His +father-in-law had slept here, with his whiskers on that pillow. His +wife's most formidable aunt had been all night here, alone with these +pictures. She certainly was... 'But what are you doing here?' cried a +voice suddenly out of his reverie. + +He started up and stretched himself, and taking out the neat little +packet that the maid had brought from the chemist's, he drew up a chair, +and sat down once more in front of the glass. He sighed vacantly, rose +and lifted down from the wall above the fireplace a tinted photograph +of himself that Sheila had had enlarged about twelve years ago. It was +a brighter, younger, hairier, but unmistakably the same dull indolent +Lawford who had ventured into Widderstone churchyard that afternoon. The +cheek was a little plumper, the eyes not quite so full-lidded, the hair +a little more precisely parted, the upper lip graced with a small blonde +moustache. He tilted the portrait into the candlelight, and compared it +with this reflection in the glass of what had come out of Widderstone, +feature with feature, with perfect composure and extreme care, Then he +laid down the massive frame on the table, and gazed quietly at the tiny +packet. + +It was to be a day of queer experiences. He had never before realized +with how many miracles mere everyday life is besieged. Here in this +small punctilious packet lay a Sesame--a power of transformation beside +which the transformation of that rather flaccid face of the noonday into +this tense, sinister face of midnight was but as a moving from house +to house--a change just as irrevocable and complete, and yet so very +normal. Which should it be, that, or--his face lifted itself once more +to the ice-like gloom of the looking-glass-that, or this? + +It simply gazed back with a kind of quizzical pity on its lean features +under the scrutiny of eyes so deep, so meaningful, so desolate, and yet +so indomitably courageous. In the brain behind them a slow and stolid +argument was in progress; the one baffling reply on the one side to +every appeal on the other being still simply. 'What dreams may come?' + +Those eyes surely knew something of dreams, else, why this violent and +stubborn endeavour to keep awake. + +Lawford did indeed once actually frame the question, 'But who the +devil are you?' And it really seemed the eyes perceptibly widened or +brightened. The mere vexation of his unparalleled position. Sheila's +pathetic incredulity, his old vicar's laborious kindness, the tiresome +network of experience into which he would be dragged struggling on the +morrow, and on the morrow after that, and after that--the thought of +all these things faded for the moment from his mind, lost if not their +significance, at least their instancy. + +He simply sat face to face with the sheer difficulty of living on +at all. He even concluded in a kind of lethargy that if nothing had +occurred, no 'change,' he might still be sitting here, Arthur Rennet +Lawford, in his best visitor's room, deciding between inscrutable life +and just--death. He supposed he was tired out. His thoughts hadn't even +the energy to complete themselves. None cared but himself and this--this +Silence. + +'But what does it all mean?' the insistent voice he was getting to know +so well began tediously inquiring again. And every time he raised +his eyes, or, rather, as in many cases it seemed, his eyes raised +themselves, they saw this haunting face there--a face he no longer +bitterly rebelled at, nor dimmed with scrutiny, but a face that was +becoming a kind of hold on life, even a kind of refuge, an ally. It was +a face that might have come out of a rather flashy book; or such as is +revered on the stage. 'A rotten bad face,' he whispered at it in his own +familiar slang, after some such abrupt encounter; a fearless, packed, +daring, fascinating face, with even--what?--a spice of genius in it. +Whose the devil's face was it? What on earth was the matter?... 'Brazen +it out,' a jubilant thought cried suddenly; 'follow it up; play the +game! give me just one opening. Think--think what I've risked!' + +And all these voices thought Lawford, in deadly lassitude, meant only +one thing--insanity. A blazing, impotent indignation seized him. He +leaned near, peering as it were out of a red dusky mist. He snatched up +the china candlestick, and poised it above the sardonic reflection, as +if to throw. Then slowly, with infinite pains, he drew back from the +glass and replaced the candlestick on the table; stuffed his paper +packet into his pocket, took off his boots and threw himself on to the +bed. In a little while, in the faint, still light, he opened drowsily +wondering eyes. `Poor old thing!' his voice murmured, 'Poor old Sheila!' + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +It was but little after daybreak when Mrs Lawford, after listening at +his door a while, turned the key and looked in on her husband. Blue-grey +light from between the venetian blinds just dusked the room. She stood +in a bluish dressing-gown, her hand on her bosom, looking down on the +lean impassive face. For the briefest instant her heart had leapt with +an indescribable surmise; to fall dull as lead once more. Breathing +equably and quietly, the strange figure lay stretched upon the bed. 'How +can he sleep? How can he sleep?' she whispered with a black and hopeless +indignation. What a night she had had! And he! + +She turned noiselessly away. The candle had guttered to extinction. The +big glass reflected her, voluminous and wan, her dark-ringed eyes, full +lips, rich, glossy hair, and rounded chin. 'Yes, yes,' it seemed to +murmur mournfully. She turned away, and drawing stealthily near stooped +once more quite low, and examined the face on the pillow with lynx-like +concentration. And though every nerve revolted at the thought, she was +finally convinced, unwillingly, but assuredly, that her husband was +here. Indeed, if it were not so, how could she for a single moment have +accepted the possibility that he was a stranger? He seemed to haunt, +like a ghostly emanation, this strange, detestable face--as memory +supplies the features concealed beneath a mask. The face was still +and stony, like one dead or imaged in wax, yet beneath it dreams were +passing--silly, ordinary Lawford dreams. She was almost alarmed at the +terribly rancorous hatred she felt for the face... 'It was just like +Arthur to be so taken in!' + +Then she too remembered Quain, and remembered also in the slowly paling +dusk that the house would soon be stirring. She went out and noiselessly +locked the door again. But it was useless to begin looking for +Quain now--her husband had a good many dull books, most of them his +'eccentric' father's. What must the servants be thinking? and what was +all that talk about a mysterious visitor? She would have to question +Ada--diplomatically. She returned to her room and sat down in an +arm-chair, and waited. In sheer weariness she fell into a doze, and woke +at the sound of dustpan and broom. She rang the bell, and asked for hot +water, tea, and a basin of cornflour. + +'And please, Ada, be as quiet as possible over your work; your master is +in a nice sleep, and must not be disturbed on any account. In the front +bedroom.' She looked up suddenly. 'By the way, who let Dr Ferguson in +last night?' It was dangerous, but successful. + +'Dr Ferguson, ma'am? Oh, you mean... He WAS in.' + +Sheila smiled resignedly. 'Was in? What do you mean, "was in"? And where +were you, then?' + +'I had been sent out to Critchett's, the chemist's.' + +'Of course, of course. So cook let Dr Ferguson in, then? Why didn't you +say so before, Ada? And did you bring the medicine with you?' + +'It was a packet in an envelope, ma'am. But Cook is sure she heard +no knock--not while I was out. So Dr Ferguson must have come in quite +unbeknown.' + +'Well, really,' said Sheila, 'it seems very difficult to get at the +truth sometimes. And when illness is in the house I cannot understand +why there should be no one available to answer the door. You must +have left it ajar, unsecured, when you went out. And pray, what if Dr +Ferguson had been some common tramp? That would have been a nice thing.' + +'I am quite certain,' said Ada a little flatly, 'that I did shut the +door. And cook says she never so much as stirred from the kitchen till +I came down the area steps with the packet. And that's all I know about +it, ma'am; except that he was here when I came back. I did not know even +there was a Dr Ferguson; and my mother has lived here nineteen years.' + +'We must be thankful your mother enjoys such good health,' replied +Mrs Lawford suavely. 'Please tell cook to be very careful with the +cornflour--to be sure it's well mixed and thoroughly done.' + +Mrs Lawford's eyes followed with a certain discomfort those narrow print +shoulders descending the stairs. And this abominable ruse was--Arthur's! +She ran up lightly and listened with her ear to the panel of his door. +And just as she was about to turn away again, there came a little light +knock at the front door. + +Mrs Lawford paused at the loop of the staircase; and not altogether +with gratitude or relief she heard the voice of Mr Bethany, inquiring in +cautious but quite audible tones after her husband. + +She dressed quickly and went down. The little white old man looked very +solitary in the long, fireless, drawing-room. + +'I could not sleep,' he said; 'I don't think I grasped in the least, I +don't indeed, until I was nearly home, the complexity of our problem. +I came, in fact, to a lamppost. It was casting a peculiar shadow. +And then--you know how such thoughts seize us, my dear--like a sudden +inspiration, I realised how tenuous, how appallingly tenuous a hold we +every one of us have on our mere personality. But that,' he continued +rapidly, 'that's only for ourselves--and after the event. Ours, just +now, is to act. And first--?' + +'You really do, then--you really are convinced--' began Mrs Lawford. + +But Mr Bethany was too quick. 'We must be most circumspect. My dear +friend, we must be most circumspect, for all our sakes. And this, you'll +say,' he added, smiling, stretching out his arms, his soft hat in one +hand, his umbrella in the other--'this is being circumspect--a seven +o'clock in the morning call! But you see, my dear, I have come, as I +took the precaution of explaining to the maid, because it's now or +never to-day. It does so happen that I have to take a wedding for an old +friend's niece at Witchett; so when in need, you see, Providence enables +us to tell even the conventional truth. Now really, how is he? has he +slept? has he recalled himself at all? is there any change?--and, dear +me, how are YOU?' + +Mrs Lawford sighed. 'A broken night is really very little to a mother,' +she said. 'He is still asleep. He hasn't, I think, stirred all night.' + +'Not stirred!' Mr Bethany repeated. 'You baffle me. And you have +watched?' + +'Oh no,' was the cheerful answer; 'I felt that quiet, solitude; space, +was everything; he preferred it so. He--he changed alone, I suppose. +Don't you think it almost stands to reason that he will be alone...when +he comes back? Was I right? But there, it's useless, it's worse than +useless, to talk like this. My husband is gone. Some terrible thing has +happened. Whatever the mystery may be, he will never come back alive. My +only fear is that I am dragging you into a matter that should from the +beginning have been entrusted to--Oh, it's monstrous!' It appeared for a +moment as if she were blinking to keep back her tears, yet her scrutiny +seemed merely to harden. + +Only the merest flicker of the folded eyelids over the greenish eyes of +her visitor answered the challenge. He stood small and black, peeping +fixedly out of the window at the sunflecked laurels. + +'Last night,' he said slowly, 'when I said good-bye to your husband, on +the tip of my tongue were the words I have used, in season and out of +season, for nearly forty-five years--"God knows best." Well, my dear +lady, a sense of humour, a sense of reverence, or perhaps even a taint +of scepticism--call it what you will--just intercepted them. Oh no, +not any of these, my child; just pity, overwhelming pity. God does know +best; but in a matter like this it is not even my place to say so. It +would be good for none of us to endanger our souls even with verbal +cant. Now, if, do you think, I had just five minutes' talk--five +minutes; would it disquiet him?' + +Only by an almost undignified haste, for the vicar was remarkably +agile, Sheila managed to unlock the bedroom door without apparently his +perceiving it, and with a warning finger she preceded him into the great +bedroom. 'Oh, yes, yes,' he was whispering to himself; 'alone--well, +well!' He hung his hat on his umbrella and leaned it in a corner, and +then he turned. + +'I don't think, you know, an old friend does him any wrong; but last +night I had no real oppor--' He firmly adjusted his spectacles, and +looked long into the dark, dispassioned face. + +'H'm!' he said, and fidgeted, and peered again. Mrs Lawford watched him +keenly. + +'Do you still--' she began. + +But at the same moment he too broke silence, suddenly stepping back with +the innocent remark, 'Has he--has he asked for anything?' + +'Only for Quain.' + +'"Quain"?' + +'The medical Dictionary.' + +'Oh, yes; bless me; of course.... A calm, complete sleep of utter +prostration--utter nervous prostration. And can one wonder? Poor fellow, +poor fellow!' He walked to the window and peered between the blinds. +'Sparrows, sunshine--yes, and here's the postman,' he said, as if to +himself. Then he turned sharply round, with mind made up. + +'Now, do you leave me here,' he said. 'Take half an hour's quiet rest. +He will be glad of a dull old fellow like me when he wakes. And as for +my pretty bride, if I miss the train, she must wait till the next. +Good discipline, my dear. Oh, dear me! I don't change. What a precious +experience now this would have been for a tottery, talkative, owlish +old parochial creature like me. But there, there. Light words make heavy +hearts, I see. I shall be quite comfortable. No, no, I breakfasted at +home. There's hat and umbrella; at 9.3 I can fly.' + +Mrs Lawford thanked him mutely. He smilingly but firmly bowed her out +and closed the door. + +But eyes and brain had been very busy. He had looked at the gutted +candle; at the tinted bland portrait on the dressing-table; at the chair +drawn-up; at the boots; and now again he turned almost with a groan +towards the sleeper. Then he took out an envelope, on which he had +jotted various memoranda, and waited awhile. Minutes passed and at last +the sleeper faintly stirred, muttering. + +Mr Bethany stooped quickly. 'What is it, what is it?' he whispered. + +Lawford sighed. 'I was only dreaming, Sheila,' he said, and softly, +peacefully opened his eyes. 'I dreamed I was in the--, His lids +narrowed, his dark eyes fixed themselves on the anxious spectacled face +bending over him. 'Mr Bethany! Where? What's wrong?' + +His friend put out his hand. 'There, there,' he said soothingly, 'do not +be disturbed; do not disquiet yourself.' + +Lawford struggled up. Slowly, painfully consciousness returned to him. +He glanced furtively round the room, at his clothes, slinkingly at +the vicar; licked his lips; flushed with extraordinary rapidity; and +suddenly burst into tears. + +Mr Bethany sat without movement, waiting till he should have spent +himself. 'Now, Lawford,' he said gently, compose yourself, old friend. +We must face the music--like men.' He went to the window, drew up the +blind, peeped out, and took off his spectacles. + +'The first thing to be done,' he said, returning briskly to his chair, +'is to send for Simon. Now, does Simon know you WELL?' Lawford shook his +head. 'Would he recognise you?... I mean...' + +'I have only met him once--in the evening.' + +'Good; let him come immediately, then. Tell him just the facts. If I am +not mistaken, he will pooh-pooh the whole thing; tell you to keep quiet, +not to worry, and so on. My dear fellow, if we realised, say, typhoid, +who'd dare to face it? That will give us time; to wait a while, to +recover our breath, to see what happens next. And if--as I don't +believe for a moment--Why, in that case I heard the other day of a most +excellent man--Grosser, of Wimpole Street; nerves. He would be absorbed. +He'll bottle you in spirit, Lawford. We'll have him down quietly. You +see? But there won't be any necessity. Oh no. By then light will have +come. We shall remember. What I mean is this.' He crossed his legs +and pushed out his lips. 'We are on quaky ground; and it's absolutely +essential that you keep cool, and trust. I am yours, heart and soul--you +know that. I own frankly, at first I was shaken. And I have, I confess, +been very cunning. But first, faith, then evidence to bolster it up. The +faith was absolute'--he placed one firm hand on Lawford's knee--'why, +I cannot explain; but it was. The evidence is convincing. But there are +others to think of. The shock, the incredibleness, the consequences; we +must not scan too closely. Think WITH; never against: and bang go all +the arguments. Your wife, poor dear, believes; but of course, of course, +she is horribly--' he broke off; 'of course she is SHAKEN, you old +simpleton! Time will heal all that. Time will wear out the mask. Time +will tire out this detestable physical witchcraft. The mind, the self's +the thing. Old fogey though I may seem for saying it--that must be kept +unsmirched. We won't go wearily over the painful subject again. You +told me last night, dear old friend, that you were absolutely alone at +Widderstone. That is enough. But here we have visible facts, tangible +effects, and there must have been a definite reason and a cause for +them. I believe in the devil, in the Powers of Darkness, Lawford, +as firmly as I believe he and they are powerless--in the long run. +They--what shall we say?--have surrendered their intrinsicality. You can +just go through evil, as you can go through a sewer, and come out on the +other side too. A loathsome process too. But there--we are not speaking +of any such monstrosities, and even if we were, you and I with God's +help would just tire them out. And that ally gone, our poor dear old Mrs +Grundy will at once capitulate. Eh? Eh?' + +Through all this long and arduous harangue, consciousness, like the +gradual light of dawn, had been flooding that other brain. And the face +that now confronted Mr Bethany, though with his feeble unaided sight he +could only very obscurely discern it, was vigilant and keen, in every +sharp-cut hungry feature. + +A rather prolonged silence followed, the visitor peering mutely. The +black eyes nearly closed, the face turned slowly towards the window, saw +burnt-out candle, comprehensive glass. + +'Yes, yes.' he said; 'I'll send for Simon at once.' + +'Good,' said Mr Bethany, and more doubtfully repeated 'good.' 'Now +there's only one thing left,' he went on cheerfully. 'I have jotted down +a few test questions here; they are questions no one on this earth could +answer but you, Lawford. They are merely for external proofs. You won't, +you can't, mistake my motive. We cannot foretell or foresee what need +may arise for just such jog-trot primitive evidence. I propose that you +now answer them here, in writing.' + +Lawford stood up and walked to the looking-glass, and paused. He put his +hand to his head, 'es,' he said, 'of course; it's a rattling good move. +I'm not quite awake; myself, I mean. I'll do it now.' He took out a +pencil case and tore another leaf from his pocket-book. 'What are they?' + +Mr Bethany rang the bell. Sheila herself answered it. She stood on the +threshold and looked across through a shaft of autumnal sunshine at +her husband, and her husband with a quiet strange smile looked across +through the sunshine at his wife. Mr Bethany waited in vain. + +'I am just going to put the arch-impostor through his credentials,' he +said tartly. 'Now then, Lawford!' He read out the questions, one by one, +from his crafty little list, pursing his lips between each; and one +by one, Lawford, seated at the dressing-table, fluently scribbled +his answers. Then question and answer were rigorously compared by Mr +Bethany, with small white head bent close and spectacles poised upon the +powerful nose, and signed and dated, and passed to Mrs Lawford without a +word. + +Mrs Lawford read question and answer where she stood, in complete +silence. She looked up. 'Many of these questions I don't know the +answers to myself,' she said. + +'It is immaterial,' said Mr Bethany. + +'One answer is--is inaccurate. 'Yes, yes, quite so: due to a mistake in +a letter from myself.' + +Mrs Lawford read quietly on, folded the papers, and held them out +between finger and thumb. 'The--handwriting...' she remarked very +softly. + +'Wonderful, isn't it?' said Mr Bethany warmly; 'all the general look and +run of the thing different, but every real essential feature unchanged. +Now into the envelope. And now a little wax?' + +Mrs Lawford stood waiting. 'There's a green piece of sealing-wax,' +almost drawled the quiet voice, 'in the top right drawer of the nest +in the study, which old James gave me the Christmas before last.' He +glanced with lowered eyelids at his wife's flushed cheek. Their eyes +met. + +'Thank you,' she said. + +When she returned the vicar was sitting in a chair, leaning his chin on +the knobbed handle of his umbrella. He rose and lit a taper for her +with a match from a little green pot on the table. And Mrs Lawford, with +trembling fingers, sealed the letter, as he directed, with his own seal. + +'There!' he said triumphantly, 'how many more such brilliant lawyers, I +wonder, lie dormant in the Church? And who shall keep this?... Why, all +three, of course.' He went on without pausing. 'Some little drawer now, +secret and undetectable, with a lock.' Just such a little drawer that +locked itself with a spring lay by chance in the looking-glass. There +the letter was hidden. And Mr Bethany looked at his watch. 'Nineteen +minutes,' he said. 'The next thing, my dear child--we're getting on +swimmingly--and it's astonishing how things are simplified by mere +use--the next thing is to send for Simon.' + +Sheila took a deep breath, but did not look up. 'I am entirely in your +hands,' she replied. + +'So be it,' said he crisply. 'Get to bed, Lawford; it's better so. And +I'll look in on my way back from Witchett. I came, my dear fellow, in +gloomy disturbance of mind. It was getting up too early; it fogs old +brains. Good-bye, good-bye.' + +He squeezed Lawford's hand. Then, with umbrella under his arm, his hat +on his head, his spectacles readjusted, he hurried out of the room. Mrs +Lawford followed him. For a few minutes Lawford sat motionless, with +head bent a little, and eyes restlessly scanning the door. Then he rose +abruptly, and in a quarter of an hour was in bed, alone with his slow +thoughts: while a basin of cornflour stood untasted on a little table +at his bedside, and a cheerful fire burned in the best visitors' room's +tiny grate. + +At half-past eleven Dr Simon entered this soundless seclusion. He sat +down beside Lawford, and took temperature and pulse. Then he half closed +his lids, and scanned his patient out of an unusually dark, un-English +face, with straight black hair, and listened attentively to his rather +incoherent story. It was a story very much modified and rounded off. +Nor did Lawford draw Dr Simon's attention to the portrait now smiling +conventionally above their heads from the wall over the fireplace. + +'It was rather bleak--the wind; and, I think, perhaps, I had had a +touch of influenza. It was a silly thing to do. But still, Dr Simon, one +doesn't expect--well, there, I don't feel the same man--physically. I +really cannot explain how great a change has taken place. And yet I feel +perfectly fit in myself. And if it were not for--for being laughed at, +go back to town, to-day. Why my wife scarcely recognised me.' + +Dr Simon continued his scrutiny. Try as he would, Lawford could not +raise his downcast eyes to meet direct the doctor's polite attention. + +'And what,' said Dr Simon, 'what precisely is the nature of the change? +Have you any pain?' + +'No, not the least pain,' said Lawford; 'I think, perhaps, or rather my +face is a little shrunken--and yet lengthened; at least it feels so; +and a faint twinge of rheumatism. But my hair--well, I don't know; it's +difficult to say one's self.' He could get on so very much better, +he thought, if only his mind would be at peace and these preposterous +promptings and voices were still. + +Dr Simon faced the window, and drew his hand softly over his head. +'We never can be too cautious at a certain age, and especially after +influenza,' he said. 'It undermines the whole system, and in particular +the nervous system; leaving the mind the prey of the most melancholy +fancies. I should astound you, Mr Lawford, with the devil influenza +plays.... A slight nervous shock and a chill; quite slight, I hope. A +few days' rest and plenty of nourishment. There's nothing; temperature +inconsiderable. All perfectly intelligible. Most certainly reassure +yourself! And as for the change you speak of'--he looked steadily at the +dark face on the pillow and smiled amiably--'I don't think we need +worry much about that. It certainly was a bleak wind yesterday--and a +cemetery, my dear sir! It was indiscreet--yes, very.' He held out his +hand. 'You must not be alarmed,' he said, very distinctly with +the merest trace of an accent; 'air, sunshine, quiet, nourishment; +sleep--that is all. The little window might be a few inches open, +and--and any light reading.' + +He opened the door and joined Mrs Lawford on the staircase. He talked +to her quietly over his shoulder all the way downstairs. 'It was, it was +sporting with Providence--a wind, believe me, nearly due east, in spite +of the warm sunshine.' + +'But the change--the change!' Mrs Lawford managed to murmur tragically, +as he strode to the door. Dr Simon smiled, and gracefully tapped his +forehead with a red-gloved forefinger. + +'Humour him, humour him,' he repeated indulgently. 'Rest and quiet +will soon put that little trouble out of his head. Oh yes, I did notice +it--the set drawn look, and the droop: quite so. Good morning.' + +Mrs Lawford gently closed the door after him. A glimpse of Ada, crossing +from room to room, suggested a precaution. She called out in her +clearest notes. 'If Dr Ferguson should call while I am out, Ada, will +you please tell him that Dr Simon regretted that he was unable to wait? +Thank you.' She paused with hand on the balusters, then slowly ascended +the stairs. Her husband's face was turned to the ceiling, his hands +clasped above his head. She took up her stand by the fireplace, resting +one silk-slippered foot on the fender. 'Dr Simon is reassuring,' she +said, 'but I do hope, Arthur, you will follow his advice. He looks a +fairly clever man.... But with a big practice.... Do you think, dear, he +quite realised the extent of the--the change?' + +'I told him what happened,' said her husband's voice out of the +bed-clothes. + +'Yes, yes, I know,' said Sheila soothingly; 'but we must remember he is +comparatively a stranger. He would not detect--' + +'What did he tell you?' asked the voice. + +Mrs Lawford deliberately considered. If only he would always thus keep +his face concealed, how much easier it would be to discuss matters +rationally. 'You see, dear,' she said softly, 'I know, of course, +nothing about the nerves; but personally, I think his suggestion absurd. +No mere fancy, surely, can make a lasting alteration in one's face. And +your hair--I don't want to say anything that may seem unkind--but isn't +it really quite a distinct shade darker, Arthur?' + +'Any great strain will change the colour of a man's hair,' said Lawford +stolidly; 'at any rate, to white. Why, I read once of a fellow in India, +a Hindoo, or something, who--' + +'But have you HAD any intense strain, or anxiety?' broke in Sheila. 'You +might, at least, have confided in me; that is, unless--But there, don't +you think really, Arthur, it would be much more satisfactory in every +way if we had further advice at once? Alice will be home next week. +To-morrow is the Harvest Festival, and next week, of course, the +Dedication; and, in any case, the Bazaar is out of the question. They +will have to find another stall-holder. We must do our utmost to avoid +comment or scandal. Every minute must help to--to fix a thing like that. +I own even now I cannot realise what this awful calamity means. It's +useless to brood on it. We must, as the poor dear old vicar said only +last night, keep our heads clear. But I am sure Dr Simon was under a +misapprehension. If, now, it was explained to him, a little more fully, +Arthur--a photograph. Oh, anything on earth but this dreadful wearing +uncertainty and suspense! Besides ...is Simon quite an English name?' + +Lawford drew further into his pillow. 'Do as you think best, Sheila,' +he said. 'For my own part, I believe it may be as he suggests--partly an +illusion, a touch of nervous breakdown. It simply can't be as bad as I +think it is. If it were, you would not be here talking like this; and +Bethany wouldn't have believed a word I said. Whatever it is, it's no +good crying it on the housetops. Give me time, just time. Besides, how +do we know what he really thought? Doctors don't tell their patients +everything. Give the poor chap a chance, and more so if he is a +foreigner. He's'--his voice sank almost to a whisper--'he's no darker +than this. And do, please, Sheila, take this infernal stuff away, and +let me have something solid. I'm not ill--in that way. All I want is +peace and quiet, time to think. Let me fight it out alone. It's been +sprung on me. The worst's not over. But I'll win through; wait! And +if not--well, you shall not suffer, Sheila. Don't be afraid. There are +other ways out.' + +Sheila broke down. 'Any one would think to hear you talk, that I was +perfectly heartless. I told Ada to be most careful about the cornflour. +And as for other ways out, it's a positively wicked thing to say to me +when I'm nearly distracted with trouble and anxiety. What motive could +you have had for loitering in an old cemetery? And in an east wind! It's +useless for me to remain here, Arthur, to be accused of every horrible +thing that comes into a morbid imagination. I will leave you, as you +suggest, in peace.' + +'One moment, Sheila,' answered the muffled voice. 'I have accused you +of nothing. If you knew all; if you could read my thoughts, you would +be surprised, perhaps, at my--But never mind that. On the other hand, I +really do think it would be better for the present to discuss the thing +no more. To-day is Friday. Give this miserable face a week. Talk it over +with Bethany if you like. But I forbid'--he struggled up in bed, +sallow and sinister--'I flatly forbid, please understand, any other +interference till then. Afterwards you must do exactly as you please. +Send round the Town Crier! But till then, silence!' + +Sheila with raised head confronted him. 'This, then, is your gratitude. +So be it. Silence, no doubt! Until it's too late to take action. Until +you have wormed your way in, and think you are safe. To have believed! +Where is my husband? that is what I am asking you now. When and how you +have learned his secrets God only knows, and your conscience! But he +always was a simpleton at heart. I warn you, then. Until next Thursday +I consent to say nothing provided you remain quiet; make no disturbance, +no scandal here. The servants and all who inquire shall simply be told +that my husband is confined to his room with--with a nervous breakdown, +as you have yourself so glibly suggested. I am at your mercy, I own it. +The vicar believes your preposterous story--with his spectacles off. +You would convince anybody with the wicked cunning with which you have +cajoled and wheedled him, with which you have deceived and fooled a +foreign doctor. But you will not convince me. You will not convince +Alice. I have friends in the world, though you may not be aware of it, +who will not be quite so apt to believe any cock-and-bull story you may +see fit to invent. That is all I have to say. To-night I tell the vicar +all that I have just told you. And from this moment, please, we are +strangers. I shall come into the room no more than necessity dictates. +On Friday we resume our real parts. My husband--Arthur--to--to connive +at... Phh!' + +Rage had transfigured her. She scarcely heard her own words. They poured +out senselessly, monotonously, one calling up another, as if from the +lips of a Cassandra. Lawford sank back into bed, clutching the sheets +with both lean hands. He took a deep breath and shut his mouth. + +'It reminds me, Sheila,' he began arduously, 'of our first quarrel +before we were married, the evening after your aunt Rose died at +Llandudno--do you remember? You threw open the window, and I think--I +saved your life.' A pause followed. Then a queer, almost inarticulate +voice added, 'At least, I am afraid so.' + +A cold and awful quietness fell on Sheila's heart. She stared fixedly +at the tuft of dark hair, the only visible sign of her husband, on the +pillow. Then, taking up the basin of cold cornflour, she left the room. +In a quarter of an hour she reappeared carrying a tray, with ham and +eggs and coffee and honey invitingly displayed. She laid it down. + +'There is only one other question,' she said, with perfect +composure--'that of money. Your signature as it appears on the--the +document drawn up this morning, would, of course, be quite useless on +a cheque. I have taken all the money I could find; it is in safety. +You may, however, conceivably be in need of some yourself; here is five +pounds. I have my own cheque-book, and shall therefore have no need +to consider the question again for--for the present. So far as you are +concerned, I shall be guided solely by Mr Bethany. He will, I do not +doubt, take full responsibility.' + +'And may the Lord have mercy on my soul!' uttered a stifled, unfamiliar +voice from the bed. Mrs Lawford stooped. 'Arthur!' she cried faintly, +'Arthur!' + +Lawford raised himself on his elbow with a sigh that was very near to +being a sob. 'Oh, Sheila, if you'd only be your real self! What is the +use of all this pretence? Just consider MY position a little. The fear +and horror are not all on your side. You called me Arthur even then. I'd +willingly do anything you wish to save you pain; you know that. Can't we +be friends even in this--this ghastly--Won't you, Sheila?' + +Mrs Lawford drew back, struggling with a doubtful heart. + +'I think,' she said, `it would be better not to discuss that now.' + +The rest of the morning Lawford remained in solitude. + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +There were three books in the room--Jeremy Taylor's 'Holy Living and +Dying,' a volume of the Quiver, and a little gilded book on wildflowers. +He read in vain. He lay and listened to the uproar of his thoughts on +which an occasional sound--the droning of a fly, the cry of a milkman, +the noise of a passing van--obtruded from the workaday world. The pale +gold sunlight edged softly over the bed. He ate up everything on his +tray. He even, on the shoals of nightmare, dreamed awhile. But by and +by as the hours wheeled slowly on he grew less calm, less strenuously +resolved on lying there inactive. Every sparrow that twittered cried +reveille through his brain. He longed with an ardour strange to his +temperament to be up and doing. + +What if his misfortune was, as he had in the excitement of the moment +suggested to Sheila, only a morbid delusion of mind; shared too in part +by sheer force of his absurd confession? Even if he was going mad, who +knows how peaceful a release that might not be? Could his shrewd old +vicar have implicitly believed in him if the change were as complete +as he supposed it? He flung off the bedclothes and locked the door. +He dressed himself, noticing, he fancied, with a deadly revulsion +of feeling, that his coat was a little too short in the sleeves, his +waistcoat too loose. In the midst of his dressing came Sheila bringing +his luncheon. 'I'm sorry,' he called out, stooping quickly beside the +bed, 'I can't talk now. Please put the tray down.' + +About half an hour afterwards he heard the outer door close, and peeping +from behind the curtains saw his wife go out. All was drowsily quiet in +the house. He devoured his lunch like a schoolboy. That finished to the +last crumb, without a moment's delay he covered his face with a towel, +locked the door behind him, put the key in his pocket, and ran lightly +downstairs. He stuffed the towel into an ulster pocket, put on a soft, +wide-brimmed hat, and noiselessly let himself out. Then he turned +with an almost hysterical delight and ran--ran like the wind, without +pausing, without thinking, straight on, up one turning, down another, +until he reached a broad open common, thickly wooded, sprinkled with +gorse and hazel and may, and faintly purple with fading heather. There +he flung himself down in the beautiful sunlight, among the yellowing +bracken, to recover his breath. + +He lay there for many minutes, thinking almost with composure. Flight, +it seemed, had for the moment quietened the demands of that other feebly +struggling personality which was beginning to insinuate itself into his +consciousness, which had so miraculously broken in and taken possession +of his body. He would not think now. All he needed was a little quiet +and patience before he threw off for good and all his right to be free, +to be his own master, to call himself sane. + +He scrambled up and turned his face towards the westering sun. What was +there in the stillness of its beautiful splendour that seemed to sharpen +his horror and difficulty, and yet to stir him to such a daring and +devilry as he had never known since he was a boy? There was little sound +of life; somewhere an unknown bird was singing, and a few late bees were +droning in the bracken. All these years he had, like an old blind horse, +stolidly plodded round and round in a dull self-set routine. And now, +just when the spirit had come for rebellion, the mood for a harmless +truancy, there had fallen with them too this hideous enigma. He sat +there with the dusky silhouette of the face that was now drenched with +sunlight in his mind's eye. He set off again up the stony incline. + +Why not walk on and on? In time real wholesome weariness would come; he +could sleep at ease in some pleasant wayside inn, without once meeting +the eyes that stood as it were like a window between himself and a +shrewd incredulous scoffing world that would turn him into a monstrosity +and his story into a fable. And in a little while, perhaps in three +days, he would awaken out of this engrossing nightmare, and know he +was free, this black dog gone from his back, and (as the old saying +expressed it without any one dreaming what it really meant) his own +man again. How astonished Sheila would be; how warmly she would welcome +him!... Oh yes, of course she would. + +He came again to a standstill. No voice answered him out of that +illimitable gold and blue. Nothing seemed aware of him. But as he stood +there, doubtful as Cain on the outskirts of the unknown, he caught the +sound of a footfall on the lonely and stone-strewn path. + +The ground sloped steeply away to the left, and slowly mounting the +hillside came mildly on an old lady he knew, a Miss Sinnet, an old +friend of his mother's. There was just such a little seat as that +other he knew so well, on the brow of the hill. He made his way to it, +intending to sit quietly there until the little old lady had passed by. +Up and up she came. Her large bonnet appeared, and then her mild white +face, inclined a little towards him as she ascended. Evidently this very +seat was her goal; and evasion was impossible. Evasion!... Memory rushed +back and set his pulses beating. He turned boldly to the sun, and the +old lady, with a brief glance into his face, composed herself at the +other end of the little seat. She gazed out of a gentle reverie into the +golden valley. And so they sat a while. And almost as if she had +felt the bond of acquaintance between them, she presently sighed, and +addressed him: 'A very, very, beautiful view, sir.' + +Lawford paused, then turned a gloomy, earnest face, gilded with +sunshine. 'Beautiful, indeed,' he said, 'but not for me. No, Miss +Sinnet, not for me.' + +The old lady gravely turned and examined the aquiline profile. 'Well, I +confess,' she remarked urbanely, 'you have the advantage of me.' + +Lawford smiled uneasily. 'Believe me, it is little advantage.' + +'My sight,' said Miss Sinnet precisely, 'is not so good as I might wish; +though better perhaps than I might have hoped; I fear I am not much +wiser; your face is still unfamiliar to me.' + +'It is not unfamiliar to me,' said Lawford. Whose trickery was this? he +thought, putting such affected stuff into his mouth. + +A faint lightening of pity came into the silvery and scrupulous +countenance. 'Ah, dear me, yes,' she said courteously. + +Lawford rested a lean hand on the seat. 'And have you,' he asked, 'not +the least recollection in the world of my face?' + +'Now really,' she said, smiling blandly, 'is that quite fair? Think of +all the scores and scores of faces in seventy long years; and how very +treacherous memory is. You shall do me the service of REMINDING me of +one whose name has for the moment escaped me.' + +'I am the son of a very old friend of yours, Miss Sinnet,' said Lawford +quietly 'a friend that was once your schoolfellow at Brighton.' + +'Well, now,' said the old lady, grasping her umbrella, 'that is +undoubtedly a clue; but then, you see, all but one of the friends of my +girlhood are dead; and if I have never had the pleasure of meeting her +son, unless there is a decided resemblance, how am I to recollect HER by +looking at HIM?' + +'There is, I believe, a likeness,' said Lawford. + +She nodded her great bonnet at him with gentle amusement. 'You are +insistent in your fancy. Well, let me think again. The last to leave +me was Fanny Urquhart, that was--let me see--last October. Now you are +certainly not Fanny Urquhart's son,' she stooped austerely, 'for she +never had one. Last year, too, I heard that my dear, dear Mrs Jameson +was dead. HER I hadn't met for many, many years. But, if I may venture +to say so, yours is not a Scottish face; and she not only married a +Scottish husband, but was herself a Dunbar. No, I am still at a loss.' + +A miserable strife was in her chance companion's mind, a strife of anger +and recrimination. He turned his eyes wearily to the fast declining sun. +'You will forgive my persistency, but I assure you it is a matter of +life or death to me. Is there no one my face recalls? My voice?' + +Miss Sinnet drew her long lips together, her eyebrows lifted with the +faintest perturbation. 'But he certainly knows my name,' she said to +herself. She turned once more, and in the still autumnal beauty, beneath +that pale blue arch of evening, these two human beings confronted +one another again. She eyed him blandly, yet with a certain grave +directness. + +'I don't really think,' she said, 'you can be Mary Lawford's son. I +could scarcely have mistaken HIM.' + +Lawford gulped and turned away. He hardly knew what this surge of +feeling meant. Was it hope, despair, resentment; had he caught even the +echo of an unholy joy? His mind for a moment became confused as if +in the tumult of a struggle. He heard himself expostulate, 'Ah, Miss +Bennett, I fear I set you too difficult a task.' + +The old lady drew abruptly in, like a trustful and gentle snail into its +shocked house. 'Bennett, sir; but my name is not Bennett.' + +And again Lawford accepted the miserable prompting. 'Not Bennett!... How +can I ever then apologise for so frantic a mistake?' + +The little old lady took firm hold of her umbrella. She did not answer +him. 'The likeness, the likeness!' he began unctuously, and stopped, +for the glance that dwelt fleetingly on him was cold with the formidable +dignity and displeasure of age. He raised his hat and turned miserably +home. He strode on out of the last gold into the blue twilight. What +fantastic foolery of mind was mastering him? He cast a hurried look +over his shoulder at the kindly and offended old figure sitting there, +solitary, on the little seat, in her great bonnet, with back turned +resolutely upon him--the friend of his dead mother who might have proved +in his need a friend indeed to him. And he had by this insane caprice +hopelessly estranged her. + +She would remember this face well enough now, he thought bitterly, +and would take her place among his quiet enemies, if ever the day of +reckoning should come. It was scandalous, it was banal to have abused +her trust and courtesy. Oh, it was hopeless to struggle any more! The +fates were against him. They had played him a trick. He was to be their +transitory sport, as many a better man he could himself recollect had +been before him. He would go home and give in; let Sheila do with him +what she pleased. No one but a lunatic could have acted as he had, with +just that frantic hint of method so remarkable in the insane. + +He left the common. A lamplighter was lighting the lamps. A thin +evening haze was on the air. If only he had stayed at home that fateful +afternoon! Who, what had induced him, enticed him to venture out? And +even with the thought welled up into his mind an intense desire to go +to the old green time-worn churchyard again; to sit there contentedly +alone, where none heeded the completest metamorphosis, down beside the +yew-trees. What a fool he had been. There alone, of course, lay his only +possible chance of recovery. He would go to-morrow. Perhaps Sheila had +not yet discovered his absence; and there would be no difficulty in +repeating so successful a stratagem. + +Remembrance of his miserable mistake, of Miss Sinnet, faintly returned +to him as he swiftly mounted the steps to his porch. Poor old lady. He +would make amends for his discourtesy when he was quite himself again. +She should some day hear, perhaps, his infinitely tragic, infinitely +comic experience from his own lips. He would take her some flowers, some +old keepsake of his mother's. What would he not do when the old moods +and brains of the stupid Arthur Lawford, whom he had appreciated so +little and so superficially, came back to him. + +He ran up the steps and stopped dead, his hand in his pocket, chilled +and aghast. Sheila had taken his keys. He stood there, dazed and still, +beneath the dim yellow of his own fanlight; and once again that inward +spring flew back. 'Brazen it out; brazen it out! Knock and ring!' + +He knocked flamboyantly, and rang. + +There came a quiet step and the door opened. 'Dr Simon, of course, has +called?' he inquired suavely. + +'Yes, sir.' + +'Ah, and gone'--as I feared. And Mrs Lawford?' + +'I think Mrs Lawford is in, sir.' + +Lawford put out a detaining hand. 'We will not disturb her; we will not +disturb her. I can find my way up; oh yes, thank you!' + +But Ada still palely barred the way. 'I think, sir,' she said, 'Mrs +Lawford would prefer to see you herself; she told me most particularly +"all callers." And Mr Lawford was not to be disturbed on any account.' + +'Disturbed? God forbid!' said Lawford, but his dark eyes failed to +move these lightest hazel. 'Well,' he continued nonchalantly, +'perhaps--perhaps it--WOULD be as well if Mrs Lawford should know that +I am here. No, thank you, I won't come in. Please go and tell--' +But even as the maid turned to obey, Sheila herself appeared at the +dining-room door in hat and veil. + +Lawford hesitated an immeasurable moment. In one swift glance +he perceived the lamplit mystery of evening, beckoning, calling, +pleading--Fly, fly! Home's here for you. Begin again, begin again. And +there before him in quiet and hostile decorum stood maid and mistress. +He took off his hat and stepped quickly in. + +'So late, so very late, I fear,' he began glibly. 'A sudden call, a +perfectly impossible distance. Shall we disturb him, do you think?' + +'Wouldn't it,' began Sheila softly, 'be rather a pity perhaps? Dr Simon +seemed to think.... But, of course, you must decide that.' + +Ada turned quiet small eyes. + +'No, no, by no means,' he almost mumbled. + +And a hard, slow smile passed over Sheila's face. 'Excuse me one +moment,' she said; 'I will see if he is awake.' She swept swiftly +forward, superb and triumphant, beneath the gaze of those dark, restless +eyes. But so still was home and street that quite distinctly a clear +and youthful laughter was heard, and light footsteps approaching. Sheila +paused. Ada, in the act of closing the door, peered out. 'Miss Alice, +ma'am,' she said. + +And in this infinitesimal advantage of time Dr Ferguson had seized his +vanishing opportunity, and was already swiftly mounting the stairs. Mrs +Lawford stood with veil half raised and coldly smiling lips and, as if +it were by pre-arrangement, her daughter's laughing greeting from the +garden, and from the landing above her, a faint 'Ah, and how are we +now?' broke out simultaneously. And Ada, silent and discreet, had thrown +open the door again to the twilight and to the young people ascending +the steps. + +Lawford was still sitting on his bed before a cold and ashy hearth when +Sheila knocked at the door. + +'Yes?' he said; 'who's there?' No answer followed. He rose with a +shuddering sigh and turned the key. His wife entered. + +'That little exhibition of finesse was part of our agreement, I +suppose?' + +'I say--' began Lawford. + +'To creep out in my absence like a thief, and to return like a +mountebank; that was part of our compact?' + +'I say,' he stubbornly began again, 'did you wire for Alice?' + +'Will you please answer my question? Am I to be a mere catspaw in your +intrigues, in this miserable masquerade before the servants? To set the +whole place ringing with the name of a doctor that doesn't exist, and +a bedridden patient that slips out of the house with his bedroom key in +his pocket! Are you aware that Ada has been hammering at your door +every half-hour of your absence? Are you aware of that? How much,' +she continued in a low, bitter voice, 'how much should I offer for her +discretion?' + +'Who was that with Alice?' inquired the same toneless voice. + +'I refuse to be ignored. I refuse to be made a child of. Will you please +answer me?' + +Lawford turned. 'Look here, Sheila,' he began heavily, 'what about +Alice? If you wired: well, it's useless to say anything more. But if you +didn't, I ask you just this one thing. Don't tell her!' + +'Oh, I perfectly appreciate a father's natural anxiety.' + +Her husband drew up his shoulders as if to receive a blow. 'Yes, yes,' +he said, 'but you won't?' + +The sound of a young laughing voice came faintly up from below. 'How did +Jimmie Fortescue know she was coming home to-day?' + +'Will you not inquire of Jimmie Fortescue for yourself?' + +'Oh, what is the use of sneering?' began the dull voice again. 'I am +horribly tired, Sheila. And try how you will, you can't convince me that +you believe for a moment that I am not myself, that you are as hard +as you pretend. An acquaintance, even a friend might be deceived; but +husband and wife--oh no! It isn't only a man's face that's himself--or +even his hands.' He looked at them, straightened them slowly out, and +buried them in his pockets. 'All I care about now is Alice. Is she, or +is she not going to be told? I am simply asking you to give her just a +chance.' + +'"Simply asking me to give Alice a chance"; now isn't that really just a +little...?' + +Lawford slowly shook his head. 'You know in your heart it isn't, Sheila; +you understand me quite well, although you persistently pretend not to. +I can't argue now. I can't speak up for myself. I am just about as far +down as I can go. It's only Alice.' + +'I see; a lucid interval?' suggested his wife in a low, trembling voice. + +'Yes, yes, if you like,' said her husband patiently, '"a lucid +interval." Don't please look at my face like that, Sheila. Think--think +that it's just lupus, just some horrible disfigurement.' + +Not much light was in the large room, and there was something so +extraordinarily characteristic of her husband in those stooping +shoulders, in the head hung a little forward, and in the preternaturally +solemn voice, that Sheila had to bend a little over the bed to catch a +glimpse of the sallow and keener face again. She sighed; and even on her +own strained ear her sigh sounded almost like one of relief. + +'It's useless, I know, to ask you anything while you are in this mood,' +continued Lawford dully; 'I know that of old.' + +The white, ringed hands clenched, '"Of old!"' + +'I didn't mean anything. Don't listen to what I say. It's only--it's +just Alice knowing, that was all; I mean at once.' + +'Don't for a moment suppose I am not perfectly aware that it is only +Alice you think of. You were particularly anxious about my feelings, +weren't you? You broke the news to me with the tenderest solicitude. I +am glad our--our daughter shares my husband's love.' + +'Look here,' said Lawford densely, 'you know that I love you as much as +ever; but with this--as I am; what would be the good of my saying so?' +Mrs Lawford took a deep breath. + +And a voice called softly at the door, 'Mother, are you there? Is father +awake? May I come in?' + +In a flash the memory returned to her; twenty-four hours ago she was +asking that very question of this unspeakable figure that sat hunched-up +before her. + +'One moment, dear,' she called. And added in a very low voice, 'Come +here!' + +Lawford looked up. 'What?' he said. + +'Perhaps, perhaps,' she whispered, 'it isn't quite so bad.' + +'For mercy's sake, Sheila,' he said, 'don't torture me; tell the poor +child to go away.' + +She paused. 'Are you there, Alice? Would you mind, father says, waiting +a little? He is so very tired.' + +'Too tired to.... Oh, very well, mother.' + +Mrs Lawford opened the door, and called after her, 'Is Jimmie gone?' + +'Oh, yes, hours.' + +'Where did you meet?' + +'I couldn't get a carriage at the station. He carried my dressing-bag; +I begged him not to. The other's coming on. You know what Jimmie is. +How very, very lucky I did come home. I don't know what made me; just an +impulse; they did laugh at me so. Father dear--do speak to me; how are +you now?' + +Lawford opened his mouth, gulped, and shook his head. + +'Ssh, dear!' whispered Sheila, 'I think he has fallen asleep. I will +be down in a minute.' Mrs Lawford was about to close the door when Ada +appeared. + +'If you please, ma'am,' she said, 'I have been waiting, as you told me, +to let Dr Ferguson out, but it's nearly seven now; and the table's not +laid yet.' + +'I really should have thought, Ada,' Sheila began, then caught back the +angry words, and turned and looked over her shoulder into the room. +'Do you think you will need anything more, Dr Ferguson?' she asked in a +sepulchral voice. + +Again Lawford's lips moved; again he shook his head. + +'One moment, Ada,' she said closing the door. 'Some more medicine--what +medicine? Quick! She mustn't suspect.' + +'"What medicine?"' repeated Lawford stolidly. + +'Oh, vexing, vexing; don't you see we must send her out? Don't you see? +What was it you sent to Critchett's for last night? Tell him that's +gone: we want more of that.' + +Lawford stared heavily. Oh, yes, yes,' he said thickly, 'more of +that....' + +Sheila, with a shrug of extreme distaste and vexation, hastily opened +the door. 'Dr Ferguson wants a further supply of the drug which Mr +Critchett made up for Mr Lawford yesterday evening. You had better go at +once, Ada, and please make as much haste as you possibly can.' + +'I say, I say,' began Lawford; but it was too late, the door was shut. + +'How I detest this wretched falsehood and subterfuge. What could have +induced you....?' + +'Yes,' said her husband, 'what! I think I'll be getting to bed again, +Sheila; I forgot I had been ill. And now I do really feel very tired. +But I should like to feel--in spite of this hideous--I should like to +feel we are friends, Sheila.' + +Sheila almost imperceptibly shuddered, crossed the room, and faced +the still, almost lifeless mask. 'I spoke,' she said, in a low, cold, +difficult voice--'I spoke in a temper this morning. You must try to +understand what a shock it has been to me. Now, I own it frankly, I +know you are--Arthur. But God only knows how it frightens me, +and--and--horrifies me.' She shut her eyes beneath her veil. They waited +on in silence a while. + +'Poor boy!' she said at last, lightly touching the loose sleeve; 'be +brave; it will all come right, soon. Meanwhile, for Alice's sake, if +not for mine, don't give way to--to caprices, and all that. Keep quietly +here, Arthur. And--and forgive my impatience.' + +He put out his hand as if to touch her. 'Forgive you!' he said humbly, +pushing it stubbornly back into his pocket again. 'Oh, Sheila, the +forgiveness is all on your side. You know I have nothing to forgive.' A +long silence fell between them. + +'Then, to-night,' at last began Sheila wearily, drawing back, 'we +say nothing to Alice, except that you are too tired--just nervous +prostration--to see her. What we should do without this influenza, I +cannot conceive. Mr Bethany will probably look in on his way home; and +then we can talk it over--we can talk it over again. So long as you +are like this, yourself, in mind, why I--What is it now?' she broke off +querulously. + +'If you please, ma'am, Mr Critchett says he doesn't know Dr Ferguson, +his name's not in the Directory, and there must be something wrong with +the message, and he's sorry, but he must have it in writing because +there was more even in the first packet than he ought by rights to send. +What shall I do, if you please?' + +Still looking at her husband. Sheila listened quietly to the end, and +then, as if in inarticulate disdain, she deliberately shrugged her +shoulders, and went out to play her part unaided. + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +Her husband turned wearily once more, and drawing up a chair sat down in +front of the cold grate. He realised that Sheila thought him as much +of a fool now as she had for the moment thought him an impostor, or +something worse, the night before. That was at least something gained. +He realised, too, in a vague way that the exuberance of mind that had +practically invented Dr Ferguson, and outraged Miss Sinnet, had quite +suddenly flickered out. It was astonishing, he thought, with gaze +fixed innocently on the black coals, that he should ever have done such +things. He detested that kind of 'rot'; that jaunty theatrical pose so +many men prided their jackdaw brains on. + +And he sat quite still, like a cat at a cranny, listening, as it +were, for the faintest remotest stir that might hint at any return of +this--activity. It was the first really sane moment he had had since +the 'change.' Whatever it was that had happened at Widderstone was now +distinctly weakening in effect. Why, now, perhaps? He stole a thievish +look over his shoulder at the glass, and cautiously drew finger and +thumb down that beaked nose. Then he really quietly smiled, a smile he +felt this abominable facial caricature was quite unused to, the superior +Lawford smile of guileless contempt for the fanatical, the fantastic, +and the bizarre: He wouldn't have sat with his feet on the fender before +a burnt-out fire. + +And the animosity of that 'he,' uttered only just under his breath, +surprised even himself. It actually did seem as if there were a chance; +if only he kept cool and collected. If the whole mind of a man was bent +on being one thing, surely no power on earth, certainly not on earth, +could for long compel him to look another, any more (followed the +resplendent thought) than vice versa. + +That, in fact, was the trick that had been in fitful fashion played him +since yesterday. Obviously, and apart altogether from his promise to +Sheila, the best possible thing he could do would be to walk quietly +over to Widderstone to-morrow and like a child that has lost a penny, +just make the attempt to reverse the process: look at the graves, read +the inscriptions on the weather-beaten stones, compose himself once more +to sleep on the little seat. + +Magic, witchcraft, possession, and all that--well, Mr Bethany might +prefer to take it on the authority of the Bible if it was his duty. But +it was at least mainly Old Testament stuff, like polygamy, Joshua, and +the 'unclean beasts.' The 'unclean beasts.' It was simply, as Simon had +said, mainly an affair of the nerves, like Indian jugglery. He had heard +of dozens of such cases, or similar cases. And it was hardly likely +that cases even remotely like his own would be much bragged about, or +advertised. All those mysterious 'disappearances,' too, which one +reads about so repeatedly? What of them? Even now, he felt (and glanced +swiftly behind him at the fancy), it would be better to think as softly +as possible, not to hope too openly, certainly not to triumph in the +least degree, just in case of--well--listeners. + +He would wrap up too. And he wouldn't tell Sheila of the project till +he had come safely back. What an excellent joke it would be to confess +meekly to his escapade, and to be scolded, and then suddenly to reveal +himself. He sat back and gazed with an almost malignant animosity at the +face in the portrait, comely and plump. + +An inarticulate, unfathomable depression rolled back on him, like a +mist out of the sea. He hastily undressed, put watch and door-key and +Critchett's powder under his pillow, paused, vacantly ruminated, and +then replaced the powder in his waistcoat pocket, said his prayers, and +got shivering to bed. He did not feel hurt at Sheila's leaving him like +this. So long as she really believed in him. And now--Alice was home. He +listened, trying not to shiver, for her voice; and sometimes heard, he +fancied, the clear note. It was this beastly influenza that made him +feel so cold and lifeless. But all would soon come right--that is, if +only that face, luminous against the floating darkness within, would not +appear the instant he closed his eyes. + +But legions of dreams are Influenza's allies. He fell into a chill doze, +heard voices innumerable, and one above the rest, shouting them down, +until there fell a lull. And another, as it were, from afar said quite +clearly and distinctly, 'But surely, my dear, you have heard the story +of the poor old charwoman who talked Greek in her delirium? A little +school French need not alarm us.' And Lawford opened his eyes again on +Mr Bethany standing at his bed. + +'Tt, tt! There, I've been and waked him. And yet they say men make such +excellent nurses in time of war. But you see, Lawford, what did I tell +you? Wasn't I now an infallible prophet? Your wife has been giving me a +most glowing account. Quite your old self, she tells me, except for just +this--this touch of facial paralysis. And I think, do you know' (the +kind old creature stooped over the bed, but still, Lawford noticed +bitterly, still without his spectacles)--'yes, I really think there is +a decided improvement. Not quite so--drawn. We must make haste slowly. +Wedderburn, you know, believes profoundly in Simon; he pulled his +wife through a dangerous confinement. And here's pills and tonics and +liniments--a whole chemist's shop. Oh, we are getting on swimmingly.' + +Flamelight was flickering in the candled dusk. Lawford turned his head +and saw Sheila's coiled, beautiful hair in the firelight. + +'You haven't told Alice?' he asked. + +'My dear good man,' said Mr Bethany, 'of course we haven't. You shall +tell her yourself on Monday. What an incredible tradition it will be! +But you mustn't worry; you mustn't even think. And no more of these +jaunts, eh? That Ferguson business--that was too bad. What are we going +to do with the fellow now we have created him? He will come home to +roost--mark my words. And as likely as not down the Vicarage chimney. +I wouldn't have believed it of you, my dear fellow.' He beamed, but +looked, none the less, very lean and fagged and depressed. + +'How did the wedding go off?' Lawford managed to think of inquiring. + +'Oh, A1,' said Mr Bethany. 'I've just been describing it to Alice--the +bride, her bridegroom, mother, aunts, cake, presents, finery, blushes, +tears, and everything that was hers. We've been in fits, haven't we, Mrs +Lawford? And Alice says I'm a Worth in a clerical collar--didn't she? +And that it's only Art that has kept me out of an apron. Now look here; +quiet, quiet, quiet; no excitement, no pranks. What is there to worry +about, pray? And now Little Dorrit's down with influenza too. And Craik +and I will have double work to do. Well, well; good-bye, my dear. God +bless you, Lawford. I can't tell you how relieved, how unspeakably +relieved I am to find you so much--so much better. Feed him up, my other +dear; body and mind and soul and spirit. And there goes the bell. I must +have a biscuit. I've swallowed nothing but a Cupid in plaster of Paris +since breakfast. Goodnight; we shall miss you both--both.' + +But when Sheila returned, her husband was sunk again into a quiet sleep, +from which not even the many questions she fretted to put to him seemed +weighty enough to warrant his disturbance. + +So when Lawford again opened his eyes he found himself lying wide awake, +clear and refreshed, and eager to get up. But upon the air lay the still +hush of early morning. He tried in vain to catch back sleep again. +A distant shred of dream still floated in his mind, like a cloud +at evening. He rarely dreamed, but certainly something immensely +interesting had but a moment ago eluded him. He sat up and looked at +the clear red cinders and their maze of grottoes. He got out of bed and +peeped through the blinds. To the east and opposite to him gardens and +an apple-orchard lay, and there in strange liquid tranquillity hung the +morning star, and rose, rifling into the dusk of night, the first grey +of dawn. The street beneath its autumn leaves was vacant, charmed, +deserted. + +Hardly since childhood had Lawford seen the dawn unless over his winter +breakfast-table. Very much like a child now he stood gazing out of his +bow-window--the child whom Time's busy robins had long ago covered over +with the leaves of numberless hours. A vague exultation fumed up into +his brain. Still on the borders of sleep, he unlocked the great wardrobe +and took out an old faded purple and crimson dressing-gown that had +belonged to his grandfather, the chief glory of every Christmas charade. +He pulled the cowl-like hood over his head and strode majestically over +to the looking-glass. + +He looked in there a moment on the strange face, like a child dismayed +at its own excitement, and a fit of sobbing that was half uncontrollable +laughter swept over him. He threw off the hood and turned once more to +the window. Consciousness had flooded back indeed. What would Sheila +have said to see him there? The unearthly beauty and stillness, and +man's small labours, garden and wall and roof-tree idle and smokeless in +the light of daybreak--there seemed to be some half-told secret between +them. What had life done with him to leave a reality so clouded? He +put on his slippers, and, gently opening the door, crept with extreme +caution up the stairs. At a long, narrow landing window he confronted +a panorama of starry night-gardens, sloping orchards; and beyond them +fields, hills, Orion, the Dogs, in the clear and cloudless darkness. + +'My God, how beautiful!' a voice whispered. And a cock crowed mistily +afar. He stood staring like a child into the wintry brightness of a +pastry-cook's. Then once more he crept stealthily on. He stooped and +listened at a closed door, until he fancied that above the beating of +his own heart he could hear the breathing of the sleeper within. Then, +taking firm hold of the handle with both hands, he slowly noiselessly +turned it, and peeped in on Alice. + +The moon was long past her faint shining here. The blind was down. And +yet it was not pitch dark. He stood with eyes fixed, waiting. Then he +edged softly forward and knelt down beside the bed. He could hear her +breathing now: long, low, quiet, unhastening--the miracle of life. He +could just dimly discern the darkness of her hair against the pillow. +Some long-sealed spring of tenderness seemed to rise in his heart with a +grief and an ache he had never known before. Here at least he could find +a little peace, a brief pause, however futile and stupid all his hopes +of the night had been. He leant his head on his hands on the counterpane +and refused to think. He felt a quick tremor, a startled movement, and +knew that eyes wide open with fear were striving to pierce the gloom +between them. + +'There, there, dearest,' he said in a low whisper, 'it's only me, only +me.' He stroked the narrow hand and gazed into the shadowiness. Her +fingers lay quiet and passive in his, with that strange sense of +immateriality that sleep brings to the body. + +'You, you!' she answered with a deep sigh. 'Oh, dearest, how you +frightened me. What is wrong? why have you come? Are you worse, dearest, +dearest?' + +He kissed her hand. 'No, Alice, not worse. I couldn't sleep, that was +all.' + +'Oh, and I came so utterly miserable to bed because you would not see +me. And Mother would tell me only so very little. I didn't even know +you had been ill.' She pressed his hand between her own. 'But this, you +know, is very, very naughty--you will catch cold, you bad thing. What +would Mother say?' + +'I think we mustn't tell her, dear. I couldn't help it; I felt much I +wanted to see you. I have been rather miserable.' + +'Why?' she said, stroking his hand from wrist to fingertips with one +soft finger. 'You mustn't be miserable. You and me have never done such +a thing before; have we? Was it that wretched old Flu?' + +It was too dark in the little fragrant room even to see her face so +close to his own. And yet he feared. 'Dr Simon,' she went on softly, +'said it was. But isn't your voice a little hoarse, and it sounds so +melancholy in the dark. And oh'--she squeezed his wrist--'you have grown +so thin! You do frighten me. Whatever should I do if you were really +ill? And it was so odd, dear. When first I woke I seemed to be still +straining my eyes in a dream, at such a curious, haunting face--not very +nice. I am glad, I am glad you were here.' + +'What was the dream-face like?' came the muttered question. + +'Dark and sharp, and rather dwelling eyes; you know those long faces one +sees in dreams: like a hawk, like a conjuror's.' + +Like a conjuror's!--it was the first unguarded and ungarbled criticism. +'Perhaps, dear, if you find my voice different, and my hand shrunk up, +you will find my face changed, too--like a conjuror's.... What then?' + +She laughed gaily and tenderly. 'You silly silly; I should love you more +than ever. Your hands are icy cold. I can't warm them nohow.' + +Lawford held tight his daughter's hand. 'You do love me, Alice? You +would not turn against me, whatever happened? Ah, you shall see, you +shall see.' A sudden burning hope sprang up in him. Surely when all was +well again, these last few hours would not have been spent in vain. +Like the shadow of death they had been, against whose darkness the green +familiar earth seems beautiful as the plains of paradise. Had he but +realized before how much he loved her--what years of life had been +wasted in leaving it all unsaid! He came back from his reverie to find +his hand wet with her tears. He stroked her hair, and touched gently her +eyelids without speaking. + +'You will let me come in to-morrow?' she pleaded; 'you won't keep me +out?' + +'Ah, but, dear, you must remember your mother. She gets so anxious, and +every word the doctor says is law. How would you like me to come again +like this, perhaps?--like Santa Claus?' + +'You know how I love having you,' she said, and stopped. 'But--but...' +He leaned closer. 'Yes, yes, come,' she said, clutching his hand and +hiding her eyes; 'it is only my dream--that horrible, dwelling face in +the dream; it frightened me so.' + +Lawford rose very slowly from his knees. He could feel in the dark his +brows drawn down; there came a low, sullen beating on his ear; he saw +his face as it were in dim outline against the dark. Rage and rebellion +surged up in him; even his love could be turned to bitterness. Well, two +could play at any game! Alice sprang up in bed and caught his sleeve. +'Dearest, dearest, you must not be angry with me now!' + +He flung himself down beside the bed. Anger, resentment died away. 'You +are all I have left,' he said. + +He stole back, as he had come, in the clear dawn to his bedroom. + +It was not five yet. He put a few more coals on his fire and blew out +the night-light, and lay down. But it was impossible to rest, to remain +inactive. He would go down and search for that first volume of Quain. +Hallucination, Influenza, Insanity--why, Sheila must have purposely +mislaid it. A rather formidable figure he looked, descending the stairs +in the grey dusk of daybreak. The breakfast-room was at the back of +the house. He tilted the blind, and a faint light flowed in from the +changing colours of the sky. He opened the glass door of the little +bookcase to the right of the window, and ran eye and finger over the few +rows of books. But as he stood there with his back to the room, just as +the shadow of a bird's wing floats across the moonlight of a pool, he +became suddenly conscious that something, somebody had passed across the +doorway, and in passing had looked in on him. + +He stood motionless, listening; but no sound broke the morning +slumbrousness, except the faraway warbling of a thrush in the first +light. So sudden and transitory had been the experience that it seemed +now to be illusory; yet it had so caught him up, it had with so furtive +and sinister a quietness broken in on his solitude, that for a moment he +dared not move. A cold, indefinite sensation stole over him that he was +being watched; that some dim, evil presence was behind him biding its +time, patient and stealthy, with eyes fixed unmovingly on him where +he stood. But, watch and wait as silently as he might, only the day +broadened at the window, and at last a narrow ray of sunlight stole +trembling up into the dusky bowl of the sky. + +At any rate Quain was found, with all the ills of life, from A to I; and +Lawford turned back to his bondage with the book under his arm. + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +The Sabbath, pale with September sunshine, and monotonous with chiming +bells, had passed languidly away. Dr Simon had come and gone, optimistic +and urbane, yet with a faint inward dissatisfaction over a patient +behind whose taciturnity a hint of mockery and subterfuge seemed to +lurk. Even Mrs Lawford had appeared to share her husband's reticence. +But Dr Simon had happened on other cases in his experience where tact +was required rather than skill, and time than medicine. + +The voices and footsteps, even the frou-frou of worshippers going to +church, the voices and footsteps of worshippers returning from church, +had floated up to the patient's open window. Sunlight had drawn across +his room in one pale beam, and vanished. A few callers had called. +Hothouse flowers, waxen and pale, had been left with messages of +sympathy. Even Dr Critchett had respectfully and discreetly made +inquiries on his way home from chapel. + +Lawford had spent most of his time in pacing to and fro in his soft +slippers. The very monotony had eased his mind. Now and again he had +lain motionless, with his face to the ceiling. He had dozed and had +awakened, cold and torpid with dream. He had hardly been aware of +the process, but every hour had done something, it seemed, towards +clarifying his point of view. A consciousness had begun to stir in him +that was neither that of the old, easy Lawford, whom he had never been +fully aware of before, nor of this strange ghostly intelligence that +haunted the hawklike, restless face, and plucked so insistently at his +distracted nerves. He had begun in a vague fashion to be aware of them +both, could in a fashion discriminate between them, almost as if there +really were two spirits in stubborn conflict within him. It would, of +course, wear him down in time. There could be only one end to such a +struggle--THE end. + +All day he had longed for freedom, on and on, with craving for the open +sky, for solitude, for green silence, beyond these maddening walls. This +heedful silken coming and going, these Sunday voices, this reiterant +yelp of a single peevish bell--would they never cease? And above all, +betwixt dread and an almost physical greed, he hungered for night. He +sat down with elbows on knees and head on his hands, thinking of night, +its secrecy, its immeasurable solitude. + +His eyelids twitched; the fire before him had for an instant gone black +out. He seemed to see slow-gesturing branches, grass stooping beneath +a grey and wind-swept sky. He started up; and the remembrance of the +morning returned to him--the glassy light, the changing rays, the +beaming gilt upon the useless books. Now, at last, at the windows; +afternoon had begun to wane. And when Sheila brought up his tea, as if +Chance had heard his cry, she entered in hat and stole. She put down the +tray, and paused at the glass, looking across it out of the window. + +'Alice says you are to eat every one of those delicious sandwiches, and +especially the tiny omelette. You have scarcely touched anything to-day, +Arthur. I am a poor one to preach, I am afraid; but you know what that +will mean--a worse breakdown still. You really must try to think of--of +us all.' + +'Are you going to church?' he asked in a low voice. + +'Not, of course, if you would prefer not. But Dr Simon advised me most +particularly to go out at least once a day. We must remember, this is +not the beginning of your illness. Long-continued anxiety, I suppose, +does tell on one in time. Anyhow, he said that I looked worried and +run-down. I AM worried. Let us both try for each other's sakes, or even +if only for Alice's, to--to do all we can. I must not harass you; but is +there any--do you see the slightest change of any kind?' + +'You always look pretty, Sheila; to-night you look prettier: THAT is the +only change, I think.' + +Mrs Lawford's attitude intensified in its stillness. 'Now, speaking +quite frankly, what is it in you suggests these remarks at such a time? +That's what baffles me. It seems so childish, so needlessly blind.' + +'I am very sorry, Sheila, to be so childish. But I'm not, say what +you like, blind. You ARE pretty: I'd repeat it if I was burning at the +stake.' + +Sheila lowered her eyes softly on to the rich-toned picture in the +glass. 'Supposing,' she said, watching her lips move, 'supposing--of +course, I know you are getting better and all that--but supposing you +don't change back as Mr Bethany thinks, what will you do? Honestly, +Arthur, when I think over it calmly, the whole tragedy comes back on me +with such a force it sweeps me off my feet; I am for the moment scarcely +my own mistress. What would you do?' + +'I think, Sheila,' replied a low, infinitely weary voice, 'I think I +should marry again.' It was the same wavering, faintly ironical voice +that had slightly discomposed Dr Simon that same morning. + +'"Marry again"!' exclaimed incredulously the full lips in the +looking-glass. 'Who?' + +'YOU, dear!' + +Sheila turned softly round, conscious in a most humiliating manner that +she had ever so little flushed. + +Her husband was pouring out his tea, unaware, apparently, of her change +of position. She watched him curiously. In spite of all her reason, of +her absolute certainty, she wondered even again for a moment if this +really could be Arthur. And for the first time she realised the power +and mastery of that eager and far too hungry face. Her mind seemed to +pause, fluttering in air, like a bird in the wind. She hastened rather +unsteadily to the door. + +'Will you want anything more, do you think, for an hour?' she asked. + +Her husband looked up over his little table. 'Is Alice going with you?' + +'Oh yes; poor child, she looks so pale and miserable. We are going to +Mrs Sherwin's, and then on to Church. You will lock your door?' + +'Yes, I will lock my door.' + +'And I do hope Arthur--nothing rash!' + +A change, that seemed almost the effect of actual shadow, came over his +face. 'I wish you could stay with me,' he said slowly. 'I don't think +you have any idea what--what I go through.' + +It was as if a child had asked on the verge of terror for a candle in +the dark. But an hour's terror is better than a lifetime of timidity. +Sheila sighed. + +'I think,' she said, 'I too might say that. But there; giving way will +do nothing for either of us. I shall be gone only for an hour, or two +at the most. And I told Mr Bethany I should have to come out before the +sermon: it's only Mr Craik.' + +'But why Mrs Sherwin? She'd worm a secret out of one's grave.' + +'It's useless to discuss that, Arthur; you have always consistently +disliked my friends. It's scarcely likely that you would find any +improvement in them now.' + +'Oh, well--' he began. But the door was already closed. + +'Sheila!' he called in a burst of anger. + +'Well, Arthur?' + +'You have taken my latchkey.' + +Sheila came hastily in again. 'Your latchkey?' + +'I am going out.' + +'"Going out!"--you will not be so mad, so criminal; and after your +promise!' + +He stood up. 'It is useless to argue. If I do not go out, I shall +certainly go mad. As for criminal--why, that's a woman's word. Who on +earth is to know me?' + +'It is of no consequence, then, that the servants are already gossiping +about this impossible Dr Ferguson; that you are certain to be seen +either going or returning; that Alice is bound to discover that you are +well enough to go out, and yet not even enough to say good-night to your +own daughter--oh, it's monstrous, it's a frantic, a heartless thing to +do!' Her voice vaguely suggested tears. + +Lawford eyed her coldly and stubbornly--thinking of the empty room +he would leave awaiting his return, its lamp burning, its fire-flames +shining. It was almost a physical discomfort, this longing unspeakable +for the twilight, the green secrecy and the silence of the graves. 'Keep +them out of the way,' he said in a low voice; 'it will be dark when I +come in.' His hardened face lit up. 'It's useless to attempt to dissuade +me.' + +'Why must you always be hurting me? why do you seem to delight in trying +to estrange me?' Husband and wife faced each other across the clear-lit +room. He did not answer. + +'For the last time,' she said in a quiet, hard voice, 'I ask you not to +go.' + +He shrugged his shoulders. 'Ask me not to come back,' he said; 'that's +nearer your hope.' He turned his face to the fire. Without moving +he heard her go out, return, pause, and go out again. And when he +deliberately wheeled round in his chair the little key lay conspicuous +there on the counterpane. + + + +CHAPTER NINE + +The last light of sunset lay in the west; and a sullen wrack of cloud +was mounting into the windless sky when Lawford entered the country +graveyard again by its dark weather-worn lych-gate. The old stone church +with its square tower stood amid trees, its eastern window faintly aglow +with crimson and purple. He could hear a steady, rather nasal voice +through its open lattices. But the stooping stones and the cypresses +were out of sight of its porch. He would not be seen down there. He +paused a moment, however; his hat was drawn down over his eyes; he was +shivering. Far over the harvest fields showed a growing pallor in +the solitary seat beneath the cypresses. He stood hesitating, gazing +steadily and yet half vacantly at the motionless figure, and in a while +a face was lifted in his direction, and undisconcerted eyes calmly +surveyed him. + +'I am afraid,' called Lawford rather nervously--'I hope I am not +intruding?' + +'Not at all, not at all,' said the stranger. 'I have no privileges here; +at least as yet.' + +Lawford again hesitated, then slowly advanced. 'It's astonishingly quiet +and beautiful,' he said. + +The stranger turned his head to glance over the fields. 'Yes, it is, +very,' he replied. There was the faintest accent, a little drawl of +unfriendliness in the remark. + +'You often sit here?' Lawford persisted. + +The stranger raised his eyebrows. 'Oh yes, often.' He smiled. 'It is +my own modest fashion of attending divine service. The congregation is +rapt.' + +'My visits,' said Lawford, 'have been very few--in fact, so far as I +know, I have only once been here before.' + +'I envy you the novelty.' There was again the same faint unmistakable +antagonism in voice and attitude; and yet so deep was the relief in +talking to a fellow creature who hadn't the least suspicion of anything +unusual in his appearance that Lawford was extremely disinclined to turn +back. He made another effort--for conversation with strangers had always +been a difficulty to him--and advanced towards the seat. 'You mustn't +please let me intrude upon you,' he said, 'but really I am very +interested in this queer old place. Perhaps you would tell me something +of its history?' He sat down. His companion moved slowly to the other +side of the broken gravestone. + +'To tell you the truth,' he replied, picking his way as it were from +word to word, 'it's "history," as people call it, does not interest me +in the least. After all, it's not when a thing is, but what it is, that +much matters. What this is'--he glanced, with head bent, across the +shadowy stones, 'is pretty evident. Of course, age has its charms.' + +'And is this very old?' + +'Oh yes, it's old right enough, as things go; but even age, perhaps, +is mainly an affair of the imagination. There's a tombstone near that +little old hawthorn, and there are two others side by side under the +wall, still even legibly late seventeenth century. That's pretty +good weathering.' He smiled faintly. 'Of course, the church itself is +centuries older, drenched with age. But she's still sleep-walking while +these old tombstones dream. Glow-worms and crickets are not such bad +bedfellows.' + +'What interested me most, I think,' said Lawford haltingly, 'was this.' +He pointed with his stick to the grave at his feet. + +'Ah, yes, Sabathier's,' said the stranger; 'I know his peculiar history +almost by heart.' + +Lawford found himself staring with unusual concentration into the +rather long and pale face. 'Not, I suppose,' he resumed faintly--'not, I +suppose, beyond what's there.' + +His companion leant his hand on the old stooping tombstone. 'Well, you +know, there's a good deal there'--he stooped over--'if you read between +the lines. Even if you don't.' + +'A suicide,' said Lawford, under his breath. + +'Yes, a suicide; that's why our Christian countrymen have buried him +outside of the fold. Dead or alive, they try to keep the wolf out.' + +'Is this, then, unconsecrated ground?' said Lawford. + +'Haven't you noticed,' drawled the other, 'how green the grass grows +down here, and how very sharp are poor old Sabathier's thorns? Besides, +he was a stranger, and they--kept him out.' + +'But, surely,' said Lawford, 'was it so entirely a matter of choice--the +laws of the Church? If he did kill himself, he did.' + +The stranger turned with a little shrug. 'I don't suppose it's a matter +of much consequence to HIM. I fancied I was his only friend. May I +venture to ask why you are interested in the poor old thing?' + +Lawford's mind was as calm and shallow as a millpond. 'Oh, a rather +unusual thing happened to me here,' he said. 'You say you often come?' + +'Often,' said the stranger rather curtly. + +'Has anything--ever--occurred?' + +'"Occurred?"' He raised his eyebrows. 'I wish it had. I come here +simply, as I have said, because it's quiet; because I prefer the company +of those who never answer me back, and who do not so much as condescend +to pay me the least attention.' He smiled and turned his face towards +the quiet fields. + +Lawford, after a long pause, lifted his eyes. 'Do you think,' he said +softly, 'it is possible one ever could?' + +'"One ever could?"' + +'Answer back?' + +There was a low rotting wall of stone encompassing Sabathier's grave; +on this the stranger sat down. He glanced up rather curiously at his +companion. 'Seldom the time and the place and the revenant altogether. +The thought has occurred to others,' he ventured to add. + +'Of course, of course,' said Lawford eagerly. 'But it is an absolutely +new one to me. I don't mean that I have never had such an idea, just in +one's own superficial way; but'--he paused and glanced swiftly into the +fast-thickening twilight--'I wonder: are they, do you think, really, all +quite dead?' + +'Call and see!' taunted the stranger softly. + +'Ah, yes, I know,' said Lawford. 'But I believe in the resurrection of +the body; that is what we say; and supposing, when a man dies--supposing +it was most frightfully against one's will; that one hated the awful +inaction that death brings, shutting a poor devil up like a child +kicking against the door in a dark cupboard; one might surely one +might--just quietly, you know, try to get out? wouldn't you?' he added. + +'And, surely,' he found himself beginning gently to argue again, +'surely, what about, say, him?' He nodded towards the old and broken +grave that lay between them. + +'What, Sabathier?' the other echoed, laying his hand upon the stone. + +And a sheer enormous abyss of silence seemed to follow the unanswerable +question. + +'He was a stranger; it says so. Good God!' said Lawford, 'how he must +have wanted to get home! He killed himself, poor wretch, think of the +fret and fever he must have been in--just before. Imagine it.' + +'But it might, you know,' suggested the other with a smile--'might have +been sheer indifference.' + +'"Nicholas Sabathier, Stranger to this parish"--no, no,' said Lawford, +his heart beating as if it would choke him, 'I don't fancy it was +indifference.' + +It was almost too dark now to distinguish the stranger's features but +there seemed a faint suggestion of irony in his voice. 'And how do +you suppose your angry naughty child would set about it? It's narrow +quarters; how would he begin?' + +Lawford sat quite still. 'You say--I hope I am not detaining you--you +say you have come here, sat here often, on this very seat; have you ever +had--have you ever fallen asleep here?' + +'Why do you ask?' inquired the other curiously. + +'I was only wondering,' said Lawford. He was cold and shivering. He felt +instinctively it was madness to sit on here in the thin gliding mist +that had gathered in swathes above the grass, milk-pale in the rising +moon. The stranger turned away from him. + +'"For in that sleep of death what dreams may come must give us pause,"' +he said slowly, with a little satirical catch on the last word. 'What +did you dream?' + +Lawford glanced helplessly about him. The moon cast lean grey beams +of light between the cypresses. But to his wide and wandering eyes it +seemed that a radiance other than hers haunted these mounds and leaning +stones. 'Have you ever noticed it?' he said, putting out his hand +towards his unknown companion; 'this stone is cracked from head to +foot?... But there'--he rose stiff and chilled--'I am afraid I have +bored you with my company. You came here for solitude, and I have been +trying to convince you that we are surrounded with witnesses. You will +forgive my intrusion?' There was a kind of old-fashioned courtesy in his +manner that he himself was dimly aware of. He held out his hand. + +'I hope you will think nothing of the kind,' said the other earnestly; +'how could it be in any sense an intrusion? It's the old story of +Bluebeard. And I confess I too should very much like a peep into his +cupboard. Who wouldn't? But there, it's merely a matter of time, I +suppose.' He paused, and together they slowly ascended the path already +glimmering with a heavy dew. At the porch they paused once more. And now +it was the stranger that held out his hand. + +'Perhaps,' he said, 'you will give me the pleasure of some day +continuing our talk. As for our friend below, it so happens that I have +managed to pick up a little more of his history than the sexton seems to +have heard of--if you would care some time or other to share it. I live +only at the foot of the hill, not half a mile distant. Perhaps you could +spare the time now?' + +Lawford took out his watch, 'You are really very kind,' he said. 'But, +perhaps--well, whatever that history may be, I think you would agree +that mine is even--but, there, I've talked too much about myself +already. Perhaps to-morrow?' + +'Why, to-morrow, then,' said his companion. 'It's a flat wooden house, +on the left-hand side. Come at any time of the evening'; he paused again +and smiled--'the third house after the Rectory, which is marked up on +the gate. My name is Herbert--Herbert Herbert to be precise.' + +Lawford took out his pocket-book and a card. 'Mine,' he said, handing +it gravely to his companion. 'is Lawford--at least...' It was really the +first time that either had seen the other's face at close quarters and +clear-lit; and on Lawford's a moon almost at the full shone +dazzlingly. He saw an expression--dismay, incredulity, overwhelming +astonishment--start suddenly into the dark, rather indifferent eyes. + +'What is it?' he cried, hastily stooping close. + +'Why,' said the other, laughing and turning away, 'I think the moon must +have bewitched me too.' + + + +CHAPTER TEN + +Lawford listened awhile before opening his door. He heard voices in the +dining-room. A light shone faintly between the blinds of his bedroom. He +very gently let himself in, and unheard, unseen, mounted the stairs. He +sat down in front of the fire, tired out and bitterly cold in spite +of his long walk home. But his mind was wearier even than his body. He +tried in vain to catch up the thread of his thoughts. He only knew for +certain that so far as his first hope and motives had gone his errand +had proved entirely futile. 'How could I possibly fall asleep with that +fellow talking there?' he had said to himself angrily; yet knew in his +heart that their talk had driven every other idea out of his mind. He +had not yet even glanced into the glass. His every thought was vainly +wandering round and round the one curious hint that had drifted in, but +which he had not yet been able to put into words. + +Supposing, though, that he had really fallen into a deep sleep, with +none to watch or spy--what then? However ridiculous that idea, it was +not more ridiculous, more incredible than the actual fact. If he had +remained there, he might, it was just possible that he would by now, +have actually awakened just his own familiar every-day self again. And +the thought of that--though he hardly realised its full import--actually +did send him on tip-toe for a glance that more or less effectually set +the question at rest. And there looked out at him, it seemed, the +same dark sallow face that had so much appalled him only two nights +ago--expressionless, cadaverous, with shadowy hollows beneath the +glittering eyes. And even as he watched it, its lips, of their own +volition, drew together and questioned him--'Whose?' + +He was not to be given much leisure, however, for fantastic reveries +like this. As he leaned his head on his hands, gladly conscious that he +could not possibly bear this incessant strain for long, Sheila opened +the door. He started up. + +'I wish you would knock,' he said angrily; 'you talk of quiet; you tell +me to rest, and think; and here you come creeping and spying on me as +if I was a child in a nursery. I refuse to be watched and guarded and +peeped on like this.' He knew that his hands were trembling, that he +could not keep his eyes fixed, that his voice was nearly inarticulate. + +Sheila drew in her lips. 'I have merely come to tell you, Arthur, that +Mr Bethany has brought Mr Danton in to supper. He agrees with me it +really would be advisable to take such a very old and prudent and +practical friend into our confidence. You do nothing I ask of you. I +simply cannot bear the burden of this incessant anxiety. Look, now, what +your night walk has done for you! You look positively at death's door.' + +'What--what an instinct you have for the right word,' said Lawford +softly. 'And Danton, of all people in the world! It was surely rather a +curious, a thoughtless choice. Has he had supper?' + +'Why do you ask?' + +'He won't believe: too--bloated.' + +'I think,' said Sheila indignantly, 'it is hardly fair to speak of a +very old and a very true friend of mine in such--well, vulgar terms as +that. Besides, Arthur, as for believing--without in the least desiring +to hurt your feelings--I must candidly warn you, some people won't.' + +'Come along,' said Lawford, with a faint gust of laughter; 'let's see.' + +They went quickly downstairs, Sheila with less dignity, perhaps, than +she had been surprised into since she had left a slimmer girlhood +behind. She swept into the gaze of the two gentlemen standing together +on the hearthrug; and so was caught, as it were, between a rain of +conflicting glances, for her husband had followed instantly, and stood +now behind her, stooping a little, and with something between contempt +and defiance confronting an old fat friend, whom that one brief +challenging instant had congealed into a condition of passive and +immovable hostility. + +Mr Danton composed his chin in his collar, and deliberately +turned himself towards his companion. His small eyes wandered, and +instantaneously met and rested on those of Mrs Lawford. + +'Arthur thought he would prefer to come down and see you himself.' + +'You take such formidable risks, Lawford,' said Mr Bethany in a dry, +difficult voice. + +'Am I really to believe,' Danton began huskily. 'I am sure, Bethany, +you will--My dear Mrs Lawford!' said he, stirring vaguely, glancing +restlessly. + +'It was not my wish, Vicar, to come at all,' said a voice from the +doorway. 'To tell you the truth, I am too tired to care a jot either +way. And'--he lifted a long arm--'I must positively refuse to produce +the least, the remotest proof that I am not, so far as I am personally +aware, even the Man in the Moon. Danton at heart was always an +incorrigible sceptic. Aren't you, T. D.? You pride your dear old brawn +on it in secret?' + +'I really--' began Danton in a rich still voice. + +'Oh, but you know you are,' drawled on the slightly hesitating +long-drawn syllables; 'it's your parochial metier. Firm, unctuous, +subtle, scepticism; and to that end your body flourishes. You were born +fat; you became fat; and fat, my dear Danton, has been deliberately +thrust on you--in layers! Lampreys! You'll perish of surfeit some day, +of sheer Dantonism. And fat, postmortem, Danton. Oh, what a basting's +there!' + +Mr Bethany, with a convulsive effort, woke. He turned swiftly on Mrs +Lawford. 'Why, why, could you not have seen?' he cried. + +'It's no good, Vicar. She's all sheer Laodicean. Blow hot, blow cold. +North, south, east, west--to have a weathercock for a wife is to marry +the wind. There's nothing to be got from poor Sheila but.... + +'Lawford!' the little man's voice was as sharp as the crack of a whip; +'I forbid it. Do you hear me? I forbid it. Some self-command; my dear +good fellow, remember, remember it's only the will, the will that keeps +us breathing.' + +Lawford peered as if out of a gathering dusk, that thickened and +flickered with shadows before his eyes. 'What's he mean, then,' he +muttered huskily, 'coming here with his black, still carcase--peeping, +peeping--what's he mean, I say?' There was a moment's silence. Then with +lifted brows and wide eyes that to every one of his three witnesses +left an indelible memory of clear and wolfish light within their glassy +pupils, he turned heavily, and climbed back to his solitude. + +'I suppose,' began Danton, with an obvious effort to disentangle himself +from the humiliation of the moment, 'I suppose he was--wandering?' + +'Bless me, yes,' said Mr Bethany cordially--'fever. We all know what +that MEANS.' + +'Yes,' said Danton, taking refuge in Mrs Lawford's white and intent +gaze. + +'Just think, think, Danton--the awful, incessant strain of such an +ordeal. Think for an instant what such a thing means!' + +Danton inserted a plump, white finger between collar and chin. 'Oh yes. +But--eh?--needlessly abusive? I never SAID I disbelieved him.' + +'Do you?' said Mrs Lawford's voice. + +He poised himself, as if it were, on the monolithic stability of his +legs. 'Eh?' he said. + +Mr Bethany sat down at the table. 'I rather feared some such temporary +breakdown as this, Danton. I think I foresaw it. And now, just while we +are all three alone here together in friendly conclave, wouldn't it be +as well, don't you think, to confront ourselves with the difficulties? +I know--we all know, that that poor half-demented creature IS Arthur +Lawford. This morning he was as sane, as lucid as I hope I am now. An +awful calamity has suddenly fallen upon him--this change. I own frankly +at the first sheer shock it staggered me as I think for the moment it +has staggered you. But when I had seen the poor fellow face to face, +heard him talk, and watched him there upstairs in the silence stir and +awake and come up again to his trouble out of his sleep. I had no more +doubt in my own mind and heart that he was he than I have in my mind +that I--am I. We do in some mysterious way, you'll own at once, grow so +accustomed, so inured, if you like, to each other's faces (masks +though they be) that we hardly realise we see them when we are speaking +together. And yet the slightest, the most infinitesimal change is +instantly apparent.' + +'Oh yes, Vicar; but you see--' + +Mr Bethany raised a small lean hand: 'One moment, please. I have heard +Lawford's own account. Conscious or unconscious, he has been through +some terrific strain, some such awful conflict with the unseen powers +that we--thank God!--have only read about, and never perhaps, until +death is upon us, shall witness for ourselves. What more likely, more +inevitable than that such a thing should leave its scar, its cloud, its +masking shadow?--call it what you will. A smile can turn a face we dread +into a face we'd die for. Some experience, which would be nothing but +a hideous cruelty and outrage to ask too closely about--one, perhaps, +which he could, even if he would, poor fellow, give no account of--has +put him temporarily at the world's mercy. They made him a nine days' +wonder, a byword. And that, my dear Danton, is just where we come in. +We know the man himself; and it is to be our privilege to act as a +buffer-state, to be intermediaries between him and the rest of this +deadly, craving, sheepish world--for the time being; oh yes, just for +the time being. Other and keener and more knowledgeable minds than mine +or yours will some day bring him back to us again. We don't attempt to +explain; we can't. We simply believe.' + +But Danton merely continued to stare, as if into the quiet of an +aquarium. + +'My dear good Danton,' persisted Mr Bethany with cherubic patience, 'how +old are you?' + +'I don't see quite...' smiled Danton with recovered ease, and +rapidly mobilising forces. 'Excuse the confidence, Mrs Lawford, I'm +forty-three.' + +'Good,' said Mr Bethany; 'and I'm seventy-one, and this child here'--he +pointed an accusing finger at Sheila--is youth perpetual. So,' he +briskly brightened, 'say, between us we're six score all told. Are +we--can we, deliberately, with this mere pinch of years at our command +out of the wheeling millions that have gone--can we say, "This is +impossible," to any single phenomenon? CAN we?' + +'No, we can't, of course,' said Danton formidably. 'Not finally. That's +all very well, but'--he paused, and nodded, nodding his round head +upward as if towards the inaudible overhead, 'I suppose he can't HEAR?' + +Mr Bethany rose cheerfully. 'All right, Danton; I am afraid you are +exactly what the poor fellow in his delirium solemnly asseverated. +And, jesting apart, it is in delirium that we tell our sheer, plain, +unadulterated truth: you're a nicely covered sceptic. Personally, I +refuse to discuss the matter. Mere dull, stubborn prejudice; bigotry, if +you like. I will only remark just this--that Mrs Lawford and I, in our +inmost hearts, know. You, my dear Danton, forgive the freedom, merely +incredulously grope. Faith versus Reason--that prehistoric Armageddon. +Some day, and a day not far distant either, Lawford will come back +to us. This--this shutter will be taken down as abruptly as by some +inconceivably drowsy heedlessness of common Nature it has been put +up. He'll win through; and of his own sheer will and courage. But now, +because I ask it, and this poor child here entreats it, you will say +nothing to a living soul about the matter, say, till Friday? What +step-by-step creatures we are, to be sure! I say Friday because it +will be exactly a week then. And what's a week?--to Nature scarcely +the unfolding of a rose. But still, Friday be it. Then, if nothing has +occurred, we will, we shall HAVE to call a friendly gathering, we shall +be compelled to have a friendly consultation.' + +'I'm not, I hope, a brute, Bethany,' said Danton apologetically; 'but, +honestly, speaking for myself, simply as a man of the world, it's a +big risk to be taking on--what shall we call it?--on mere intuition. +Personally, and even in a court of law--though Heaven forbid it ever +reaches that stage--personally, I could swear that the fellow that stood +abusing me there, in that revolting fashion, was not Lawford. It would +be easier even to believe in him, if there were not that--that glaze, +that shocking simulation of the man himself, the very man. But then, I +am a sceptic; I own it. And 'pon my word, Mrs Lawford, there's plenty of +room for sceptics in a world like this.' + +'Very well,' said Mr Bethany crisply, 'that's settled, then. With your +permission, my dear,' he added, turning untarnishably clear childlike +eyes on Sheila, 'I will take all risks--even to the foot of the gibbet: +accessory, Danton, AFTER the fact.' And so direct and cloudless was his +gaze that Sheila tried in vain to evade it and to catch a glimpse +of Danton's small agate-like eyes, now completely under mastery, and +awaiting confidently the meeting with her own. + +'Of course,' she said, 'I am entirely in your hands, dear Mr Bethany.' + + + +CHAPTER ELEVEN + +Lawford slept far into the cloudy Monday morning, to wake steeped in +sleep, lethargic, and fretfully haunted by inconclusive remembrances +of the night before. When Sheila, with obvious and capacious composure, +brought him his breakfast tray, he watched her face for some time +without speaking. + +'Sheila,' he began, as she was about to leave the room again. + +She paused, smiling. + +'Did anything happen last night? Would you mind telling me, Sheila? Who +was it was here?' + +Her lids the least bit narrowed. 'Certainly, Arthur; Mr Danton was +here.' + +'Then it was not a dream?' + +'Oh no,' said Sheila. + +'What did I say? What did HE say? It was hopeless, anyhow.' + +'I don't quite understand what you mean by "hopeless," Arthur. And must +I answer the other questions?' + +Lawford drew his hand over his face, like a tired child. 'He +didn't--believe?' + +'No, dear,' said Sheila softly. + +'And you, Sheila?' came the subdued voice. + +Sheila crossed slowly to the window. 'Well, quite honestly, Arthur, I +was not very much surprised. Whatever we are agreed about on the whole, +you were scarcely yourself last night.' + +Lawford shut his eyes, and re-opened them full on his wife's calm +scrutiny, who had in that moment turned in the light of the one drawn +blind to face him again. + +'Who is? Always?' + +'No,' said Sheila; 'but--it was at least unfortunate. We can't, I +suppose, rely on Dr Bethany alone.' + +Lawford crouched over his food. 'Will he blab?' + +'Blab! Mr Danton is a gentleman, Arthur.' + +Lawford rolled his eyes as if in temporary vertigo. 'Yes,' he said. And +Sheila once more prepared to make a reposeful exit. + +'I don't think I can see Simon this morning.' + +'Oh. Who, then?' + +'I mean I would prefer to be left alone.' + +'Believe me, I had no intention to intrude.' And this time the door +really closed. + +'He is in a quiet, soothing sleep,' said Sheila a few minutes later. + +'Nothing could be better,' said Dr Simon; and Lawford, to his +inexpressible relief, heard the fevered throbbing of the doctor's car +reverse, and turned over and shut his eyes, dulled and exhausted in +the still unfriendliness of the vacant room. His spirits had sunk, +he thought, to their lowest ebb. He scarcely heeded the fragments of +dreams--clear, green landscapes, amazing gleams of peace, the +sudden broken voices, the rustling and calling shadowiness of +subconsciousness--in this quiet sunlight of reality. The clouds had +broken, or had been withdrawn like a veil from the October skies. One +thought alone was his refuge; one face alone haunted him with its +peace; one remembrance soothed him--Alice. Through all his scattered +and purposeless arguments he strove to remember her voice, the +loving-kindness of her eyes, her untroubled confidence. + +In the afternoon he got up and dressed himself. He could not bring +himself to stand before the glass and deliberately shave. He even smiled +at the thought of playing the barber to that lean chin. He dressed by +the fireplace. + +'I couldn't rest,' he told Sheila, when she presently came in on one +of her quiet, cautious, heedful visits; 'and one tires of reading even +Quain in bed.' + +'Have you found anything?' she inquired politely. + +'Oh yes,' said Lawford wearily; 'I have discovered that infinitely +worse things are infinitely commoner. But that there's nothing quite so +picturesque.' + +'Tell me,' said Sheila, with refreshing naivete. 'How does it feel? does +it even in the slightest degree affect your mind?' + +He turned his back and looked up at his broad gilt portrait for +inspiration. 'Practically, not at all,' he said hollowly. 'Of course, +one's nerves--that fellow Danton--when one's overtired. You have'--his +voice, in spite of every effort, faintly quavered--'YOU haven't noticed +anything? My mind?' + +'Me? Oh dear, no! I never was the least bit observant; you know +that, Arthur. But apart from that, and I hope you will not think me +unsympathetic--but don't you think we must sooner or later be thinking +of what's to be done? At present, though I fully agree with Mr Bethany +as to the wisdom of hushing this unhappy business up as long as +possible, at least from the gossiping outside world, still we are only +standing still. And your malady, dear, I suppose, isn't. You WILL help +me, Arthur? You will try and think? Poor Alice!' + +'What about Alice?' + +'She mopes, dear, rather. She cannot, of course, quite understand why +she must not see her father, and yet his not being, or, for the matter +of that, even if he was, at death's door.' + +'At death's door,' murmured Lawford under his breath; 'who was it +was saying that? Have you ever, Sheila, in a dream, or just as one's +thoughts go sometimes, seen that door?...its ruinous stone lintel carved +into lichenous stone heads...stonily silent in the last thin sunlight, +hanging in peace unlatched. Heated, hunted, in agony--in that cold, +green-clad shadowed porch is haven and sanctuary....But beyond--O God, +beyond!' + +Sheila stood listening with startled eyes. 'And was all that in Quain?' +she inquired rather flutteringly. + +Lawford turned a sidelong head, and looked steadily at his wife. + +She shook herself, with a slight shiver. 'Very well, then,' she said and +paused in the silence. + +Her husband yawned, and smiled, and almost as if lit with that thin last +sunshine seemed the smile that passed for an instant across the reverie +of his shadowy face. He drew a hand wearily over his eyes. 'What has he +been saying now?' he inquired like a fretful child. + +Sheila stood very quiet and still, as if in fear of scaring some rare, +wild, timid creature by the least stir. 'Who?' she merely breathed. + +Lawford paused on the hearth-rug with his comb in his hand. 'It's just +the last rags of that beastly influenza,' he said, and began vigorously +combing his hair. And yet, simple and frank though the action was, it +moved Sheila, perhaps, more than any other of the congested occurrences +of the last few days. Her forehead grew suddenly cold, the palms of +her hands began to ache, she had to hasten out of the room to avoid +revealing the sheer physical repulsion she had experienced. + +But Lawford, quite unmindful of the shock, continued in a kind of +heedless reverie to watch, as he combed, the still visionary thoughts +that passed in tranced stillness before his eyes. He longed beyond +measure for freedom that until yesterday he had not even dreamed existed +outside the covers of some old impossible romance--the magic of the +darkening sky, the invisible flocking presences of the dead, the shock +of imaginations that had no words, of quixotic emotions which the +stranger had stirred in that low, mocking, furtive talk beside the +broken stones of the Huguenot. Was the 'change' quite so monstrous, so +meaningless? How often, indeed, he remembered curiously had he seemed to +be standing outside these fast-shut gates of thought, that now had been +freely opened to him. + +He drew ajar the door, and leant his ear to listen. From far away came +a rich, long-continued chuckle of laughter, followed by the clatter of a +falling plate, and then, still more uncontrollable laughter. There was a +faint smell of toast on the air. Lawford ventured out on to the landing +and into a little room that had once, in years gone by, been Alice's +nursery. He stood far back from the strip of open window that showed +beneath the green blind, craning forward to see into the garden--the +trees, their knotted trunks, and then, as he stole nearer, a flower-bed, +late roses, geraniums, calceolarias, the lawn and--yes, three wicker +chairs, a footstool, a work-basket, a little table on the smooth grass +in the honey-coloured sunshine; and Sheila sitting there in the autumnal +sunlight, her hands resting on the arms of her chair, her head bent, +evidently deeply engrossed in her thoughts. He crept an inch or two +forward, and stooped. There was a hat on the grass--Alice's big garden +hat--and beside it lay Flitters, nose on paws, long ears sagging. He +had forgotten Flitters. Had Flitters forgotten him? Would he bark at the +strange, distasteful scent of a--Dr Ferguson? The coast was clear, then. +He turned even softlier yet, to confront, rapt, still, and hovering +betwixt astonishment and dread, the blue calm eyes of his daughter, +looking in at the door. It seemed to Lawford as if they had both been +suddenly swept by some unseen power into a still, unearthly silence. + +'We thought,' he began at last, 'we thought just to beckon Mrs Lawford +from the window. He--he is asleep.' + +Alice nodded. Her whole face was in a moment flooded with red. It ebbed +and left her pale. 'I will go down and tell mother you want to see her. +It was very silly of me. I did not quite recognise at first...I suppose, +thinking of my father--' The words faltered, and the eyes were lifted to +his face again with a desolate, incredulous appeal. Lawford turned away +heartsick and trembling. + +'Certainly, certainly, by no means,' he began, listening vaguely to the +glib patter that seemed to come from another mouth. 'Your father, +my dear young lady, I venture to think is now really on the road to +recovery. Dr Simon makes excellent progress. But, of course--two heads, +we know, are so much better than one when there's the least--the least +difficulty. The great thing is quiet, rest, isolation, no possibility of +a shock, else--' His voice fell away, his eloquence failed. + +For Alice stood gazing stirlessly on and on into this infinitely +strange, infinitely familiar shadowy, phantasmal face. 'Oh yes,' she +replied, 'I quite understand, of course; but if I might just peep even, +it would--I should be so much, much happier. Do let me just see him, +Dr Ferguson, if only his head on the pillow! I wouldn't even breathe. +Couldn't it possibly help--even a faith-cure?' She leant forward +impulsively, her voice trembling, anal her eyes still shining beneath +their faint, melancholy smile. + +'I fear, my dear...it cannot be. He longs to see you. But with his mind, +you know, in this state, it might--?' + +'But mother never told me,' broke in the girl desperately, 'there was +anything wrong with his MIND. Oh, but that was quite unfair. You don't +mean, you don't mean--that--?' + +Lawford scanned swiftly the little square beloved and memoried room that +fate had suddenly converted for him into a cage of unspeakable pain +and longing. 'Oh no; believe me, no! Not his brain, not that, not even +wandering; really: but always thinking, always longing on and on for +you, dear, only. Quite, quite master of himself, but--' + +'You talk,' she broke in again angrily, 'only in pretence! You are +treating me like a child; and so does mother, and so it has been ever +since I came home. Why, if mother can, and you can, why may not I? Why, +if he can walk and talk in the night....' + +'But who--who "can walk and talk in the night?"' inquired a low stealthy +voice out of the quietness behind her. + +Alice turned swiftly. Her mother was standing at a little distance, with +all the calm and moveless concentration of a waxwork figure, looking up +at her from the staircase. + +'I was--I was talking to Dr Ferguson, mother.' + +'But as I came up the stairs I understood you to be inquiring something +of Dr Ferguson, "if," you were saying, "he can walk and talk in the +night": you surely were not referring to your father, child? That could +not possibly be, in his state. Dr Ferguson, I know, will bear me out +in that at least. And besides, I really must insist on following out +medical directions to the letter. Dr Ferguson I know, will fully concur. +Do, pray, Dr Ferguson,' continued Sheila, raising her voice even now +scarcely above a rapid murmur--'do pray assure my daughter that she must +have patience; that however much even he himself may desire it, it is +impossible that she should see her father yet. And now, my dear child, +come down, I want to have a moment's talk with Dr Ferguson. I feared +from his beckoning at the window that something was amiss.' + +Alice turned, dismayed, and looked steadily, almost with hostility, +at the stranger, so curiously transfixed and isolated in her small old +play-room. And in this scornful yet pleading confrontation her eye fell +suddenly on the pin in his scarf--the claw and the pearl she had known +all her life. From that her gaze flitted, like some wild demented +thing's, over face, hair, hands, clothes, attitude, expression, and her +heart stood still in an awful, inarticulate dread of the unknown. She +turned slowly towards her mother, groped forward a few steps, turned +once more, stretching out her hands towards the vague still figure +whose eyes had called so piteously to her out of their depths, and fell +fainting in the doorway. Lawford stood motionless, vacantly watching +Sheila, who knelt, chafing the cold hands. 'She has fainted?' he said; +'oh, Sheila, tell me--only fainted?' + +Sheila made no answer; did not even raise her eyes. + +'Some day, Sheila' he began in a dull voice, and broke off, and without +another word, without even another glance at the still face and blue, +twitching lids, he passed her rapidly by, and in another instant Sheila +heard the house-door shut. She got up quickly, and after a glance into +the vacant bedroom turned the key; then she hastened upstairs for sal +volatile and eau de cologne.... + +It was yet clear daylight when Lawford appeared beneath the portico of +his house. With a glance of circumspection that almost seemed to suggest +a fear of pursuit, he descended the steps, only to be made aware in so +doing that Ada was with a kind of furtive eagerness pointing out the +mysterious Dr Ferguson to a steadily gazing cook. One or two well-known +and many a well-remembered face he encountered in the thin stream of +City men treading blackly along the pavement. It was a still, high +evening, and something very like a forlorn compassion rose in his mind +at sight of their grave, rather pretentious, rather dull, respectable +faces. + +He found himself walking with an affectation of effrontery, and smiling +with a faint contempt on all alike, as if to keep himself from slinking, +and the wolf out of his eyes. He felt restless, and watchful, and +suspicious, as if he had suddenly come down in the world. His, then, was +a disguise as effectual as a shabby coat and a glazing eye. His +heart sickened. Was it even worth while living on a crust of social +respectability so thin and so exquisitely treacherous? He challenged +no one. One or two actual acquaintances raised and lowered a faintly +inquiring eyebrow in his direction. One even recalled in his confusion +a smile of recognition just a moment too late. There was, it seemed, +a peculiar aura in Lawford's presence, a shadow of a something in his +demeanour that proved him alien. + +None the less green Widderstone kept calling him, much as a bell in the +imagination tolls on and on, the echo of reality. If the worst should +come to the worst, why--there is pasture in the solitary by-ways for +the beast that strays. He quickened his pace along lonelier streets, +and soon strode freely through the little flagged and cobbled village of +shops, past the same small jutting window whose clock had told him the +hour on that first dark hurried night. All was pale and faint with dying +colours now; and decay was in the leaf, and the last swallows filled +the gold air with their clashing stillness. No one heeded him here. He +looked from side to side, exulting in the strangeness. Shops were +left behind, the last milestone passed, and in a little while he was +descending the hill beneath the elm boughs, which he remembered had +stood like a turreted wall against the sunset when first he had wandered +down into the churchyard. + +At the foot of the hill he passed by the green and white Rectory, and +there was the parson, a short fat, pursy man with wrists protruding from +his jacket sleeves as he stood on tip-toe tying up a rambling rose-shoot +on his trim cedared lawn. The next house barely showed its old red +chimney-tops, above its bowers; the next was empty, with windows +vacantly gazing, its paths peopled with great bearded weeds that stood +mutely watching and guarding the seldom-opened gate. Then came more +lofty grandmotherly elms, a dense hedge of every leaf that pricks, and +then Lawford found himself standing at the small canopied gate of +the queer old wooden house that the stranger of his talk had in part +described. + +It stood square and high and dark in a small amphitheatre of verdure. +Roses here and there sprang from the grass, and a narrow box-edged path +led to a small door in a low green-mantled wing, with its one square +window above the porch. And while, with vacant mind, Lawford stood +waiting, as one stands forebodingly upon the eve of a new experience he +heard as if at a distance the sound of falling water. He still paused on +the country roadside, scrutinising this strange, still, wooden presence; +but at last with an effort he pushed open the gate, followed the winding +path, and pulled the old iron hanging bell. There came presently a +quiet tread, and Herbert himself opened the door which led into a +little square wood-panelled hall, hung with queer old prints and obscure +portraits in dark frames. + +'Ah, yes, come in, Mr Lawford,' he drawled; 'I was beginning to be +afraid you were not coming.' + +Lawford laid hat and walking-stick on an oak bench, and followed his +churchyard companion up a slightly inclined corridor and a staircase +into a high room, covered far up the yellowish walls with old books on +shelves and in cases, between which hung in little black frames, mezzo +tints, etchings, and antiquated maps. A large table stood a few paces +from the deep alcove of the window, which was surrounded by a low, +faded, green seat, and was screened from the sunshine by wooden +shutters. And here the tranquil surge of falling water shook incessantly +on the air, for the three lower casements stood open to the fading +sunset. On a smaller table were spread cups, old earthenware dishes of +fruit, and a big bowl of damask roses. + +'Please sit down; I shan't be a moment; I am not sure that my sister is +in; but if so, I will tell her we are ready for tea.' Left to himself +in this quiet, strange old room, Lawford forgot for a while everything +else, he was for the moment so taken up with his surroundings. + +What seized on his fancy and strangely affected his mind was this +incessant changing roar of falling water. It must be the Widder, he said +to himself, flowing close to the walls. But not until he had had the +boldness to lean head and shoulders out of the nearest window did he +fully realize how close indeed the Widder was. It came sweeping dark +and deep and begreened and full with the early autumnal rains, actually +against the lower walls of the house itself, and in the middle suddenly +swerved in a black, smooth arch, and tumbled headlong into a great +pool, nodding with tall slender water-weeds, and charged in its bubbled +blackness here and there with the last crimson of the setting sun. To +the left of the house, where the waters floated free again, stood vast, +still trees above the clustering rushes; and in glimpses between their +spreading boughs lay the far-stretching countryside, now dimmed with the +first mists of approaching evening. So absorbed he became as he stood +leaning over the wooden sill above the falling water, that eye and ear +became enslaved by the roar and stillness. And in the faint atmosphere +of age that seemed like a veil to hang about the odd old house and these +prodigious branches, he fell into a kind of waking dream. + +When at last he did draw back into the room it was perceptibly darker, +and a thin keen shaft of recollection struck across his mind--the +recollection of what he was, and of how he came to be there, his reasons +for coming and of that dark indefinable presence which like a raven had +begun to build its dwelling in his mind. He sat on, his eyes restlessly +wandering, his face leaning on his hands; and in a while the door opened +and Herbert returned, carrying an old crimson and green teapot and a +dish of hot cakes. + +'They're all out,' he said; 'sister, Sallie, and boy; but these were in +the oven, so we won't wait. I hope you haven't been very much bored.' + +Lawford dropped his hands from his face and smiled. 'I have been looking +at the water,' he said. + +'My sister's favorite occupation; she sits for hours and hours, with not +even a book for an apology, staring down into the black old roaring pot. +It has a sort of hypnotic effect after a time. And you'd be surprised +how quickly one gets used to the noise. To me it's even less distracting +than sheer silence. You don't know, after all, what on earth sheer +silence means--even at Widderstone. But one can just realize a +water-nymph. They chatter; but, thank Heaven, it's not articulate.' He +handed Lawford a cup with a certain niceness and self-consciousness, +lifting his eyebrows slightly as he turned. + +Lawford found himself listening out of a peculiar stillness of mind +to the voice of this suave and rather inscrutable acquaintance. 'The +curious thing is, do you know,' he began rather nervously, 'that though +I must have passed your gate at least twice in the last few months, I +have never noticed it before, never even caught the sound of the water.' + +'No, that's the best of it; nobody ever does. We are just buried alive. +We have lived here for years, and scarcely know a soul--not even our +own, perhaps. Why on earth should one? Acquaintances, after all, are +little else than a bad habit.' + +'But then, what about me?' said Lawford. + +'But that's just it,' said Herbert. 'I said ACQUAINTANCES; that's just +exactly what I'm going to prove--what very old friends we are. You've no +idea! It really is rather queer.' He took up his cup and sauntered over +to the window. + +Lawford eyed him vacantly for a moment, and, following rather his +own curious thoughts than seeking any light on this somewhat vague +explanation, again broke the silence. 'It's odd, I suppose, but this +house affects me much in the same way as Widderstone does. I'm not +particularly fanciful--at least, I used not to be. But sitting here I +seem, I hope it isn't a very frantic remark, it seems as though, if only +my ears would let me, I should hear--well, voices. It's just what you +said about the silence. I suppose it's the age of the place; it IS very +old?' + +'Pretty old, I suppose; it's worm-eaten and rat-eaten and tindery enough +in all conscience; and the damp doesn't exactly foster it. It's a queer +old shanty. There are two or three accounts of it in some old local +stuff I have. And of course there's a ghost.' + +'A ghost?' echoed Lawford, looking up. + + + +CHAPTER TWELVE + +What's in a name?' laughed Herbert. 'But it really is a queer show-up of +human oddity. A fellow comes in here, searching; that's all.' His back +was turned, as he stood staring absently out, sipping his tea between +his sentences. 'He comes in--oh, it's a positive fact, for I've seen him +myself, just sitting back in my chair here, you know, watching him as +one would a tramp in one's orchard.' He cast a candid glance over his +shoulder. 'First he looks round, like a prying servant. Then he comes +cautiously on--a kind of grizzled, fawn-coloured face, middle-size, with +big hands; and then just like some quiet, groping, nocturnal creature, +he begins his precious search--shelves, drawers that are not here, +cupboards gone years ago, questing and nosing no end, and quite +methodically too, until he reaches the window. Then he stops, looks +back, narrows his foxy lids, listens--quite perceptibly, you know, a +kind of gingerish blur; then he seems to open this corner bookcase here, +as if it were a door and goes out along what I suppose might at some +time have been an outside gallery or balcony, unless, as I rather fancy, +the house extended once beyond these windows. Anyhow, out he goes quite +deliberately, treading the air as lightly as Botticelli's angels, +until, however far you lean out of the window, you can't follow him any +further. And then--and this is the bit that takes one's fancy--when you +have contentedly noddled down again to whatever you may have been doing +when the wretch appeared, or are sitting in a cold sweat, with bolting +eyes awaiting developments, just according to your school of thought, +or of nerves, the creature comes back--comes back; and with what looks +uncommonly like a lighted candle in his hand. That really is a thrill, I +assure you.' + +'But you've seen this--you've really seen this yourself?' + +'Oh yes, twice,' replied Herbert cheerfully. 'And my sister, quite +by haphazard, once saw him from the garden. She was shelling peas one +evening for Sallie, and she distinctly saw him shamble out of the window +here, and go shuffling along, mid-air, across the roaring washpot down +below, turn sharp round the high corner of the house, sheer against +the stars, in a kind of frightened hurry. And then, after five minutes' +concentrated watching over the shucks, she saw him come shuffling back +again--the same distraction, the same nebulous snuff colour, and a +candle trailing its smoke behind him as he whisked in home.' + +'And then?' + +'Ah, then,' said Herbert, lagging along the bookshelves, and scanning +the book-backs with eyes partially closed: he turned with lifted teapot, +and refilled his visitor's cup; 'then, wherever you are--I mean,' he +added, cutting up a little cake into six neat slices, 'wherever the +chance inmate of the room happens to be, he comes straight for you, at +a quite alarming velocity, and fades, vanishes, melts, or, as it were, +silts inside.' + +Lawford listened in a curious hush that had suddenly fallen over his +mind. '"Fades inside? silts?"--I'm awfully stupid, but what on earth +do you mean?' The room had slowly emptied itself of daylight; its own +darkness, it seemed, had met that of the narrowing night, and Herbert +deliberately lit a cigarette before replying. His clear pale face, with +its smooth outline and thin mouth and rather long dark eyes, turned with +a kind of serene good-humour towards his questioner. + +'Why,' he said, 'I mean frankly just that. Besides, it's Grisel's own +phrase; and an old nurse we used to have said much the same. He comes, +or IT comes towards you, first just walking, then with a kind of +gradually accelerated slide or glide, and sweeps straight into you,' he +tapped his chest, 'me, whoever it may be is here. In a kind of panic, I +suppose, to hide, or perhaps simply to get back again.' + +'Get back where?' + +'Be resumed, as it were, via you. You see, I suppose he is compelled to +regain his circle, or Purgatory, or Styx, whatever you like to call it, +via consciousness. No one present, then no revenant or spook, or +astral body, or hallucination: what's in a name? And of course even an +hallucination is mind-stuff, and on its own, as it were. What I mean is +that the poor devil must have some kind of human personality to get back +through in order to make his exit from our sphere of consciousness +into his. And naturally, of course to make his entrance too. If like +a tenuous smoke he can get in, the probability is that he gets out +in precisely the same fashion. For really, if you weren't consciously +expecting the customary impact (you actually jerk forward in the act of +resistance unresisted), you would not notice his going. I am afraid I +must be horribly boring you with all these tangled theories. All I mean +is, that if you were really absorbed in what you happened to be doing at +the time, the thing might come and go, with your mind for entrance and +exit, as it were, without your being conscious of it at all.' There was +a longish pause, in which Herbert slowly inhaled and softly breathed out +his smoke. + +'And what--what is the poor wretch searching FOR? And what--why, what +becomes of him when he does go?' + +'Ah, there you have me! One merely surmises just as one's temperament or +convictions lean. Grisel says it's some poor derelict soul in search of +peace--that the poor beggar wants finally to die, in fact, and can't. +Sallie smells crime. After all, what is every man?' he talked on; 'a +horde of ghosts--like a Chinese nest of boxes--oaks that were acorns +that were oaks. Death lies behind us, not in front--in our ancestors, +back and back, until--' + +'"Until?"' Lawford managed to remark. + +'Ah, that settles me again. Don't they call it an amoeba? But really I +am abjectly ignorant of all that kind of stuff. We are ALL we are, and +all in a sense we care to dream we are. And for that matter, anything +outlandish, bizarre, is a godsend in this rather stodgy life. It is +after all just what the old boy said--it's only the impossible that's +credible; whatever credible may mean....' + +It seemed to Lawford as if the last remark had wafted him bodily into +the presence of his kind, blinking, intensely anxious old friend, Mr +Bethany. And what leagues asunder the two men were who had happened on +much the same words to express their convictions. + +He drew his hand gropingly over his face, half rose, and again seated +himself. 'Whatever it may be,' he said, 'the whole thing reminds me, you +know--it is in a way so curiously like my own--my own case.' + +Herbert sat on, a little drawn up in his chair, quietly smoking. The +crash of the falling water, after seeming to increase in volume with +the fading of evening, had again died down in the darkness to a low +multitudinous tumult as of countless inarticulate, echoing voices. + +'"Bizarre," you said; God knows I am.' But Herbert still remained +obdurately silent. 'You remember, perhaps,' Lawford faintly began again, +'our talk the other night?' + +'Oh, rather,' replied the cordial voice out of the dusk. + +'I suppose you thought I was insane?' + +'Insane!' There was a genuinely amused astonishment in the echo. 'You +were lucidity itself. Besides--well, honestly, if I may venture, I don't +put very much truck in what one calls one's sanity: except, of course, +as a bond of respectability and a means of livelihood.' + +'But did you realise in the least from what I said how I really +stand? That I went down into that old shadowy hollow one man, and came +back--well--this?' + +'I gathered vaguely something like that. I thought at first it was +merely an affectation--that what you said was an affectation, I +mean--until--well, to be frank, it was the "this" that so immensely +interested me. Especially,' he added almost with a touch of gaiety, +'especially the last glimpse. But if it's really not a forbidden +question, what precisely was the other? What precise manner of man, I +mean, came down into Widderstone?' + +'It is my face that is changed, Mr Herbert. If you'll try to understand +me--my FACE. What you see now is not what I really am, not what I was. +Oh, it is all quite different. I know perfectly well how absurd it must +sound. And you won't press me further. But that's the truth: that's what +they have done for me.' + +It seemed to Lawford as if a remote tiny shout of laughter had been +suddenly caught back in the silence that had followed this confession. +He peered in vain in the direction of his companion. Even his cigarette +revealed no sign of him. 'I know, I know,' he went gropingly on; 'I felt +it would sound to you like nothing but frantic incredible nonsense. YOU +can't see it. YOU can't feel it. YOU can't hear these hooting voices. +It's no use at all blinking the fact; I am simply on the verge, if not +over it, of insanity.' + +'As to that, Mr Lawford,' came the still voice out of the darkness; +'the very fact of your being able to say so seems to me all but proof +positive that you're not. Insanity is on another plane, isn't it? +in which one can't compare one's states. As for what you say being +credible, take our precious noodle of a spook here! Ninety-nine +hundredths of this amiable world of ours would have guffawed the +poor creature into imperceptibility ages ago. To such poor credulous +creatures as my sister and I he is no more and no less a fact, a +personality, an amusing reality than--well, this teacup. Here we are, +amazing mysteries both of us in any case; and all round us are scores +of books, dealing just with life, pure, candid, and unexpurgated; and +there's not a single one among them but reads like a taradiddle. Yet +grope between the lines of any autobiography, it's pretty clear what +one has got--a feeble, timid, creeping attempt to describe the +indescribable. As for what you say your case is, the bizarre--that kind +very seldom gets into print at all. In all our make-believe, all our +pretence, how, honestly, could it? But there, this is immaterial. The +real question is, may I, can I help? What I gather is this: You just +trundled down into Widderstone all among the dead men, and--but one +moment, I'll light up.' + +A light flickered up in the dark. Shading it in his hand from the night +air straying through the open window, Herbert lit the two candles +that stood upon the little chimneypiece behind Lawford's head. Then +sauntering over to the window again, almost as if with an affectation +of nonchalance, he drew one of the shutters, and sat down. 'Nothing much +struck me,' he went on, leaning back on his hands, 'I mean on Sunday +evening, until you said good-bye. It was then that I caught in the moon +a distinct glimpse of your face.' + +'This,' said Lawford, with a sudden horrible sinking of the heart. + +Herbert nodded. 'The fact is, I have a print of it,' he said. + +'A print of it?' + +'A miserable little dingy engraving.' + +'Of this?' Herbert nodded, with eyes fixed. 'Where?' + +'That's the nuisance. I searched high and low for it the instant I got +home. For the moment it has been mislaid; but it must be somewhere in +the house and it will turn up all in good time. It's the frontispiece +of one of a queer old hotchpotch of pamphlets, sewn up together by +some amateur enthusiast in a marbled paper cover--confessions, travels, +trials and so on. All eighteenth century, and all in French.' + +'And mine?' said Lawford, gazing stonily across the candlelight. + +Herbert, from a head slightly stooping, gazed back in an almost birdlike +fashion across the room at his visitor. + +'Sabathier's,' he said. + +'Sabathier's!' + +'A really curious resemblance. Of course, I am speaking only from +memory; and perhaps it's not quite so vivid in this light; but still +astonishingly clear.' + +Lawford sat drawn up, staring at his companion's face in an intense and +helpless silence. His mouth opened but no words came. + +'Of course,' began Herbert again, 'I don't say there's anything in +it--except the--the mere coincidence,' he paused and glanced out of the +open casement beside him. 'But there's just one obvious question. Do you +happen to know of any strain of French blood in your family?' + +Lawford shut his eyes, even memory seemed to be forsaking him at last. +'No,' he said, after a long pause, 'there's a little Dutch, I think, on +my mother's side, but no French.' + +'No Sabathier, then?' said Herbert, smiling. 'And then there's another +question--this change; is it really as complete as you suppose? Has +it--please just warn me off if I am in the least intruding--has it been +noticed?' + +Lawford hesitated. 'Oh, yes,' he said slowly, 'it has been noticed--my +wife, a few friends.' + +'Do you mind this infernal clatter?' said Herbert, laying his fingers on +the open casement. + +'No, no. And you think?' + +'My dear fellow, I don't think anything. It's all the craziest +conjecture. Stranger things even than this have happened. There are +dozens here--in print. What are we human beings after all? Clay in the +hands of the potter. Our bodies are merely an inheritance, packed tight +and corded up. We have practically no control over their main functions. +We can't even replace a little finger-nail. And look at the faces of +us--what atrocious mockeries most of them are of any kind of image! But +we know our bodies change--age, sickness, thought, passion, fatality. It +proves they are amazingly plastic. And merely even as a theory it is not +in the least untenable that by force of some violent convulsive effort +from outside one's body might change. It answers with odd voluntariness +to friend or foe, smile or snarl. As for what we call the laws of +Nature, they are pure assumptions to-day, and may be nothing better +than scrap-iron tomorrow. Good Heavens, Lawford, consider man's abysmal +impudence.' He smoked on in silence for a moment. 'You say you fell +asleep down there?' + +Lawford nodded. Herbert tapped his cigarette on the sill. 'Just +following up our ludicrous conjecture, you know,' he remarked musingly, +'it wasn't such a bad opportunity for the poor chap.' + +'But surely,' said Lawford, speaking as it were out of a dream of +candle-light and reverberating sound and clearest darkness, towards +this strange deliberate phantom with the unruffled clear-cut +features--'surely then, in that case, he is here now? And yet, on my +word of honour, though every friend I ever had in the world should +deny it, I am the same. Memory stretches back clear and sound to my +childhood. I can see myself with extraordinary lucidity, how I think, my +motives and all that; and in spite of these voices that I seem to hear, +and this peculiar kind of longing to break away, as it were, just +to press on--it is I,--I myself, that am speaking to you now out of +this--this mask.' + +Herbert glanced reflectively at his companion. 'You mustn't let me tire +you,' he said; 'but even on our theory it would not necessarily +follow that you yourself would be much affected. It's true this fellow +Sabathier really was something of a personality. He had a rather +unusual itch for life, for trying on and on to squeeze something out +of experience that isn't there; and he seemed never to weary of a +magnificent attempt to find in his fellow-creatures, especially in the +women he met, what even--if they have it--they cannot give. The little +book I wanted to show you is partly autobiographical and really does +manage to set the fellow on his feet. Even there he does absolutely take +one's imagination. I shall never forget the thrill of picking him up in +the Charing Cross Road. You see, I had known the queer old tombstone for +years. He's enormously vivid--quite beyond my feebleness to describe, +with a kind of French verve and rapture. Unluckily we can't get nearer +than two years to his death. I shouldn't mind guessing some last +devastating dream swept over him, held him the breath of an instant too +long beneath the wave, and he caved in. We know he killed himself; and +perhaps lived to regret it ever after. + +'After all, what is this precious dying we talk so much about?' Herbert +continued after a while, his eyes restlessly wandering from shelf to +shelf. 'You remember our talk in the churchyard? We all know that the +body fades quick enough when its occupant is gone. Supposing even in the +sleep of the living it lies very feebly guarded. And supposing in that +state some infernally potent thing outside it, wandering disembodied, +just happens on it--like some hungry sexton beetle on the carcase of +a mouse. Supposing--I know it's the most outrageous theorising--but +supposing all these years of sun and dark, Sabathier's emanation, +or whatever you like to call it, horribly restless, by some fatality +longing on and on just for life, or even for the face, the voice, of +some "impossible she" whom he couldn't get in this muddled world, simply +loathing all else; supposing he has been lingering in ambush down beside +those poor old dusty bones that had poured out for him such marrowy +hospitality--oh, I know it; the dead do. And then, by a chance, one +quiet autumn evening, a veritable godsend of a little Miss Muffet comes +wandering down under the shade of his immortal cypresses, half asleep, +fagged out, depressed in mind and body, perhaps: imagine yourself in his +place, and he in yours!' Herbert stood up in his eagerness, his sleek +hair shining. 'The one clinching chance of a century! Wouldn't you +have made a fight for it? Wouldn't you have risked the raid? I can just +conceive it--the amazing struggle in that darkness within a darkness; +like some dazed alien bee bursting through the sentinels of a hive; +one mad impetuous clutch at victory; then the appalling stirring on the +other side; the groping back to a house dismantled, rearranged, not, +mind you, disorganised or disintegrated....' He broke off with a smile, +as if of apology for his long, fantastic harangue. + +Lawford sat listening, his eyes fixed on Herbert's colourless face. +There was not a sound else, it seemed, than that slightly drawling +scrupulous voice poking its way amid a maze of enticing, baffling +thoughts. Herbert turned away with a shrug. 'It's tempting stuff,' he +said, choosing another cigarette. 'But anyhow, the poor beggar failed.' + +'Failed?' + +'Why, surely; if he had succeeded I should not now be talking to a mere +imperfect simulacrum, to the outward illusion of a passing likeness +to the man, but to Sabathier himself!' His eyes moved slowly round and +dwelt for a moment with a dark, quiet scrutiny on his visitor. + +'You say a passing likeness; do you MEAN that?' + +Herbert smiled indulgently. 'If one CAN mean what is purely a +speculation. I am only trying to look at the thing dispassionately, you +see. We are so much the slaves of mere repetition. Here is life--yours +and mine--a kind of plenum in vacuo. It is only when we begin to play +the eavesdropper; when something goes askew; when one of the sentries on +the frontier of the unexpected shouts a hoarse "Qui vive?"--it is only +then we begin to question; to prick our aldermen and pinch the calves +of our kings. Why, who is there can answer to anybody's but his own +satisfaction just that one fundamental question--Are we the prisoners, +the slaves, the inheritors, the creatures, or the creators of our +bodies? Fallen angels or horrific dust? As for identity or likeness +or personality, we have only our neighbours' nod for them, and just a +fading memory. No, the old fairy tales knew better; and witchcraft's +witchcraft to the end of the chapter. Honestly, and just of course on +that one theory, Lawford, I can't help thinking that Sabathier's raid +only just so far succeeded as to leave his impression in the wax. +It doesn't, of course, follow that it will necessarily end there. It +might--it may be even now just gradually fading away. It may, you know, +need driving out--with whips and scorpions. It might, perhaps, work in.' + +Lawford sat cold and still. 'It's no good, no good,' he said, 'I don't +understand; I can't follow you. I was always stupid, always bigoted and +cocksure. These things have never seemed anything but old women's tales +to me. And now I must pay for it. And this Nicholas Sabathier; you say +he was a blackguard?' + +'Well,' said Herbert with a faint smile, 'that depends on your +definition of the word. He wasn't a flunkey, a fool, or a prig, if +that's what you mean. He wasn't perhaps on Mrs Grundy's visiting +list. He wasn't exactly gregarious. And yet in a sense that kind of +temperament is so rare that Sappho, Nelson, and Shelley shared it. To +the stodgy, suety world of course it's little else than sheer moonshine, +midsummer madness. Naturally, in its own charming and stodgy way +the world kept flickering cold water in his direction. Naturally it +hissed.... I shall find the book. You shall have the book; oh yes.' + +'There's only one more question,' said Lawford in a dull, slow voice, +stooping and covering his face with his hands. 'I know it's impossible +for you to realise--but to me time seems like that water there, to be +heaping up about me. I wait, just as one waits when the conductor of an +orchestra lifts his hand and in a moment the whole surge of brass and +wood, cymbal and drum will crash out--and sweep me under. I can't tell +you Herbert, how it all is, with just these groping stirrings of that +mole in my mind's dark. You say it may be this face, working in! God +knows. I find it easy to speak to you--this cold, clear sense, you know. +The others feel too much, or are afraid, or--Let me think--yes, I +was going to ask you a question. But no one can answer it.' He peered +darkly, with white face suddenly revealed between his hands. 'What +remains now? Where do I come in? What is there left for ME to do?' + +And at that moment there sounded, even above the monotonous roar of +the water beyond the window--there fell the sound of a light footfall +approaching along the corridor. + +'Listen,' said Herbert; 'here's my sister coming; we'll ask her.' + + + + +CHAPTER THIRTEEN + +The door opened. Lawford rose, and into the further rays of the +candlelight entered a rather slim figure in a light summer gown. + +'Just home?' said Herbert. + +'We've been for a walk--' + +'My sister always forgets everything,' said Herbert, turning to Lawford; +'even tea-time. This is Mr Lawford, Grisel. We've been arguing no end. +And we want you to give a decision. It's just this: Supposing if by some +impossible trick you had come in now, not the charming familiar sister +you are, but shorter, fatter, fair and round-faced, quite different, +physically, you know--what would you do?' + +'What nonsense you talk, Herbert!' + +'Yes, but supposing: a complete transmogrification--by some unimaginable +ingression or enchantment, by nibbling a bunch of roses, or whatever you +like to call it?' + +'Only physically?' + +'Well, yes, actually; but potentially, why--that's another matter.' + +The dark eyes passed slowly from her brother's face and rested gravely +on their visitor's. + +'Is he making fun of me?' + +Lawford almost imperceptibly shook his head. + +'But what a question! And I've had no tea.' She drew her gloves slowly +through her hand. 'The thing, of course, isn't possible, I know. But +shouldn't I go mad, don't you think?' + +Lawford gazed quietly back into the clear, grave, deliberate eyes. +'Suppose, suppose, just for the sake of argument--NOT,' he suggested. + +She turned her head and reflected, glancing from one to the other of the +pure, steady candle-flames. + +'And what was your answer?' she said, looking over her shoulder at her +brother. + +'My dear child, you know what my answers are like!' + +'And yours?' + +Lawford took a deep breath, gazing mutely, forlornly, into the lovely +untroubled peace of her eyes, and without the least warning tears swept +up into his own. With an immense effort he turned, and choking back +every sound, beating hack every thought, groped his way towards the +square black darkness of the open door. + +'I must think, I must think,' he managed to whisper, lifting his hand +and steadying himself. He caught over his shoulder the glimpse of a +curiously distorted vision, a lifted candle, and a still face gazing +after him with infinitely grieved eyes, then found himself groping and +stumbling down the steep, uneven staircase into the darkness of the +queer old wooden and hushed and lonely house. The night air cold on his +face calmed his mind. He turned and held out his hand. + +'You'll come again?' Herbert was saying, with a hint of anxiety, even of +apology in his voice. + +Lawford nodded, with eyes fixed blankly on the candle, and turning once +more, made his way slowly down the narrow green-bordered path upon which +the stars rained a scattered light so feeble it seemed but as a haze +that blurred the darkness. He pushed open the little white wicket +and turned his face towards the soundless, leaf-crowned hill. He had +advanced hardly a score of steps in the thick dust when almost as if +its very silence had struck upon his ear he remembered the black broken +grave with its sightless heads that lay beyond the leaves. And fear, +vast and menacing, fear such as only children know, broke like a sea of +darkness on his heart. He stopped dead--cold, helpless, trembling. +And, in the silence he heard a faint cry behind him and light footsteps +pursuing him. He turned again. In the thick close gloom beneath the +enormous elm-boughs the grey eyes shone clearly visible in the face +upturned to him. 'My brother,' she began breathlessly--'the little +French book. It was I who--who mislaid it.' + +The set, stricken face listened unmoved. + +'You are ill. Come back! I am afraid you are very ill.' + +'It's not that, not that,' Lawford muttered; 'don't leave me; I am +alone. Don't question me,' he said strangely, looking down into her +face, clutching her hand; 'only understand that I can't, I can't go on.' +He swept a lean arm towards the unseen churchyard. 'I am afraid.' + +The cold hand clasped his closer. 'Hush, don't speak! Come back; come +back. I am with you, a friend, you see; come back.' + +Lawford clutched her hand as a blind man in sudden peril might clutch +the hand of a child. He saw nothing clearly; spoke almost without +understanding his words. + +'Oh, but it's MUST,' he said; 'I MUST go on. You see--why, everything +depends on struggling through: the future! But if you only knew--There!' +Again his arm swept out, and the lean terrified face turned shuddering +from the dark. + +'I do know; believe me, believe me! I can guess. See, I am coming with +you; we will go together. As if, as if I did not know what it is to be +afraid. Oh, believe me; no one is near; we go on; and see! it gradually, +gradually lightens. How thankful I am I came.' + +She had turned and they were steadily ascending as if pushing their way, +battling on through some obstacle of the mind rather than of the senses +beneath the star-powdered callous vault of night. And it seemed to +Lawford as if, as they pressed on together, some obscure detestable +presence as slowly, as doggedly had drawn worsted aside. He could +see again the peaceful outspread branches of the trees, the lych-gate +standing in clear-cut silhouette against the liquid dusk of the sky. +A strange calm stole over his mind. The very meaning and memory of his +fear faded out and vanished, as the passed-away clouds of a storm that +leave a purer, serener sky. + +They stopped and stood together on the brow of the little hill, and +Lawford, still trembling from head to foot, looked back across the +hushed and lightless countryside. 'It's all gone now,' he said +wearily, 'and now there's nothing left. You see, I cannot even ask your +forgiveness--and a stranger!' + +'Please don't say that--unless--unless--a "pilgrim" too. I think, +surely, you must own we did have the best of it that time. Yes--and I +don't care WHO may be listening--but we DID win through.' + +'What can I say? How shall I explain? How shall I make you understand?' + +The clear grey eyes showed not the faintest perturbation. 'But I do; I +do indeed, in part; I do understand, ever so faintly.' + +'And now I will come back with you.' + +They paused in the darkness face to face, the silence of the sky, +arched in its vastness above the little hill, the only witness of their +triumph. + +She turned unquestioningly. And laughing softly almost as children +do, the stalking shadows of a twilight wood behind them--they trod in +silence back to the house. They said good-bye at the gate, and Lawford +started once more for home. He walked slowly, conscious of an almost +intolerable weariness, as if his strength had suddenly been wrested away +from him. And at some distance beyond the top of the hill he sat down on +the bank beside a nettled ditch, and with his book pressed down upon +the wayside grass struck a match, and holding it low in the scented, +windless air turned slowly the cockled leaf. + +Few of them were alike except for the dinginess of the print and the +sinister smudge of the portraits. All were sewn roughly together into +a mould-stained, marbled cover. He lit a second match, and as he did so +glanced as if inquiringly over his shoulder. And a score or so of pages +before the end he came at last upon the name he was seeking, and turned +the page. + +It was a likeness even more striking in its crudeness of ink and line +and paper than the most finished of portraits could have been. It +repelled, and yet it fascinated him. He had not for a moment doubted +Herbert's calm conviction. And yet as he stooped in the grass, closely +scrutinising the blurred obscure features, he felt the faintest surprise +not so much at the significant resemblance but at his own composure, his +own steady, unflinching confrontation with this sinister and intangible +adversary. The match burned down to his fingers. It hissed faintly in +the grass. + +He stuffed the book into his pocket, and stared into the pale dial of +his watch. It was a few minutes after eleven. Midnight, then, would +just see him in. He rose stiffly and yawned in sheer exhaustion. Then, +hesitating, he turned his head and looked back towards the hollow. But +a vague foreboding held him back. A sour and vacuous incredulity swept +over him. What was the use of all this struggling and vexation. What +gain in living on? Once dead his sluggish spirit at least would find +its rest. Dust to dust it would indeed be for him. What else, in sober +earnest, had he been all his daily stolid life but half dead, scarce +conscious, without a living thought, or desire, in head or heart? + +And while he was still gloomily debating within himself he had turned +towards home, and soon was walking in a kind of reverie, even his +extreme tiredness in part forgotten, and only a far-away dogged +recollection in his mind that in spite of shame, in spite of all his +miserable weakness, the words had been uttered once for all, and in all +sincerity, 'We DID win through.' + +Yet a desolate and odd air of strangeness seemed to drape his unlighted +house as he stood looking up in a kind of furtive communion with its +windows. It affected him with that discomforting air of extreme and +meaningless novelty that things very familiar sometimes take upon +themselves. In this leaden tiredness no impression could be trustworthy. +His lids shut of themselves as he softly mounted the steps. It seemed a +needlessly wide door that soundlessly admitted him. But however hard he +pressed the key his bedroom door remained stubbornly shut until he +found that it was already unlocked and he had only to turn the handle. +A night-light burned in a little basin on the washstand. The room was +hung, as it were, with the stillness of night. And half lying on the +bed in her dressing-gown, her head leaning on the rail at the foot, was +Alice, just as sleep had overtaken her. + +Lawford returned to the door and listened. It seemed he heard a voice +talking downstairs, and yet not talking, for it ran on and on in an +incessant slightly argumentative monotony that had neither break nor +interruption. He closed the door, and stooping laid his hand softly on +Alice's narrow, still childish hand that lay half-folded on her knee. +Her eyes opened instantly and gazed widely into his face. A slow vacant +smile of sleep came and went and her fingers tightened gently over his +as again her lids drooped down over the drowsy blue eyes. + +'At last, at last, dear,' she said; 'I have been waiting such a time. +But we mustn't talk much. Mother is waiting up, reading.' + +Faintly through the close-shut door came the sound of that distant +expressionless voice monotonously rising and falling. + +'Why didn't you tell me, dear?' Alice still sleepily whispered. 'Would +I have asked a single question? How could I? Oh, if you had only trusted +me!' + +'But the change--the change, Alice! You must have seen that. You spoke +to me, you did think I was only a stranger; and even when you knew, it +was only fear on your face, dearest, and aversion; and you turned to +your mother first. Don't think, Alice, that I am...God only knows--I'm +not complaining. But truth is best whatever it is. I do feel that. You +mustn't be afraid of hurting me, my dear.' + +Her very hands seemed to quicken in his as now, with sleep quite gone, +the fret of memory returned, and she must reassure both herself and him. +'But you see, dear, mother had told me that you--besides, I did know +you at once, really; quite inside, you know, deep down. I know I was +perplexed; I didn't understand; but that was all. Why, even when you +came up in the dark, and we talked--if you only knew how miserable I had +been--though I knew even then there was something different, still I +was not a bit afraid. Was I? And shouldn't I have been afraid, horribly +afraid, if YOU had not been YOU?' She repressed a little shudder, and +clasped his hand more closely. 'Don't let us say anything more about it, +she implored him; 'we are just together again, you and I; that is all +that matters.' But her words were like brave soldiers who have fought +their way through an ambuscade but have left all confidence behind them. + +Lawford listened; and that was enough just now--that she still, in spite +of doubt, believed in him, and thought and cared for him. He was too +tired to have refused the least kindness. He made no answer, but leant +his head on the cool, slender fingers in gratitude and peace. And, just +as he was, he almost instantly fell asleep. He woke in the darkness to +find himself alone. He groped his way heavily to the door and turned +the handle. But now it was really locked. Energy failed him. 'I +suppose--Sheila...' he muttered. + + + +CHAPTER FOURTEEN + +Sheila, calm, alert, reserved, was sitting at the open window when he +awoke again. His breakfast tray stood on a little table beside the bed. +He raised himself on his elbow and looked at his wife. The morning +light shone full on her features as she turned quickly at sound of his +stirring. + +'You have slept late,' she said, in a low, mellow voice. + +'Have I, Sheila? I suppose I was tired out. It is very kind of you to +have got everything ready like this.' + +'I am afraid, Arthur, I was thinking rather of the maids. I like to +inconvenience them as little as possible; in their usual routine, I +mean. How are you feeling, do you think, this morning?' + +'I--I haven't seen the glass, Sheila.' + +She paused to place a little pencil tick at the foot of the page of her +butcher's book. 'And did you--did you try?' + +'Did I try? Try what?' + +'I understood,' she said, turning slowly in her chair, 'you gave me to +understand that you went out with the specific intention of trying to +regain.... But there, forgive me, Arthur; I think I must be getting a +little bit hardened to the position, so far at least as any hope is in +my mind of rather amateurish experiments being of much help. I may seem +unsympathetic in saying frankly what I feel. But amateurish or no, you +are curiously erratic. Why, if you really were the Dr Ferguson whose +part you play so admirably you could scarcely spend a more active life.' + +'All you mean, Sheila, I suppose, is that I have failed.' + +'"Failed" did not enter my mind. I thought, looking at you just now +in your clothes on the bed, one might for the moment be deceived into +thinking there was a slight--quite the slightest improvement. There +was not quite that'--she hovered for the right word--'that tenseness. +Whether or not, whether you desired any such change or didn't, I should +have supposed in any case it would have been better to act as far +as possible like any ordinary person. You were certainly in an +extraordinarily sound sleep. I was almost alarmed; until I remembered +that it was a little after two when I looked up from reading aloud to +keep myself awake and discovered that you had only just come home. I had +no fire. You know how easily late hours bring on my headaches; a little +thought might possibly have suggested that I should be anxious to hear. +But no; it seems I cannot profit by experience, Arthur. And even now you +have not answered surely a very natural question. You do not recollect, +perhaps, exactly what did happen last night? Did you go in the direction +even of Widderstone?' + +'Yes, Sheila, I went to Widderstone.' + +'It was of course absurd to suppose that sitting on a seat beside +the broken-down grave of a suicide would have the slightest effect on +one's--one's physical condition; though possibly it might affect one's +brain. It would mine; I am at least certain of that. It was your own +prescription, however; and it merely occurred to me to inquire whether +the actual experience has not brought you round to my own opinion.' + +'Yes, I think it has,' Lawford answered calmly. 'But I don't quite see +what suicide has got to do with it; unless--You know Widderstone, then, +Sheila?' + +'I drove there last Saturday afternoon.' + +'For prayer or praise?' Although Lawford had not actually raised his +head, he became conscious rather of the wonderfully adjusted mass +of hair than of the pained dignity in the face that was now closely +regarding him. + +'I went,' came the rigidly controlled retort, 'simply to test an +inconceivable story.' + +'And returned?' + +'Convinced, Arthur, of its inconceivability. But if you would kindly +inform me what precise formula you followed at Widderstone last night, I +would tell you why I think the explanation, or rather your first account +of the matter, is not an explanation of the facts.' + +Lawford shot a rather doglike glance over his toast. 'Danton?' he said. + +'Candidly, Arthur, Mr Danton doubts the whole story. Your very +conduct--well, it would serve no useful purpose to go into that. +Candidly, on the other hand, Mr. Danton did make some extremely helpful +suggestions--basing them, of course, on the TRUTH of your account. He +has seen a good deal of life; and certainly very mysterious things do +occur to quite innocent and well-meaning people without the faintest +shadow of warning, and as Mr. Bethany himself said, evil birds do come +home to roost, and often out of a clear sky, as it were. But there, +every fresh solution that occurs to me only makes the thing more +preposterous, more, I was going to say, disreputable--I mean, of course, +to the outside world. And we have our duties to perform to them too, I +suppose. Why, what can we say? What plausible account of ourselves have +we? We shall never be able to look anybody in the face again. I can +only--I am compelled to believe that God has been pleased to make this +precise visitation upon us--an eye for an eye, I suppose, SOMEWHERE. And +to that conviction I shall hold until actual circumstances convince me +that it's false. What, however, and this is all that I have to say now, +what I cannot understand are your amazing indiscretions.' + +'Do you understand your own, Sheila?' + +'My indiscretions, Arthur?' + +'Well,' said Lawford, 'wasn't it indiscreet, don't you think, to risk +divine retribution by marrying me? Shouldn't you have inquired? Wasn't +it indiscreet to allow me to remain here in--in my "visitation?" Wasn't +it indiscreet to risk the moral stigma this unhappy face of mine must +cast on its surroundings? I am not sure whether such a change as this +constitutes cruelty.... Oh, what is the use of fretting and babbling on +like this?' + +'Am I to understand, then, that you refuse positively to discuss this +horrible business any more? You are doing your best to drive me away, +Arthur; you must see that. Will you be very disappointed if I refuse to +go?' + +Lawford rose from the bed. 'Listen just this once,' he said, seating +himself on the corner of the dressing-table. 'Imagine all this--whatever +you like to call it--obliterated. Take this,' he nodded towards the +glass, 'entirely for itself, on its own merits, as it were. Let the dead +past bury its dead. Which, now, precisely, REALLY do you prefer--him,' +he jerked his head in the direction of the dispassionate youthful +picture on the wall, 'him or me?' + +He was so close to her now that he could see the faintest tremor on the +face that had suddenly become grey and still in the thin clear sunshine. + +'I own it, I own it,' he went on, slowly; 'the change is more than +skin-deep now. One can't go through what I have gone through these last +few terrifying days, Sheila, unchanged. They have played the devil with +my body; now begins the tampering with my mind. Not even Danton knows +how it will end. But shall I tell you why you won't, why you can't +answer me that one question--him or me? Shall I tell you?' + +Sheila slowly raised her eyes. + +'It is because, my dear, you don't care the ghost of a straw for either. +That one--he was worn out long ago, and we never knew it. I know it now. +Time and the sheer going-on of day by day, without either of us guessing +at it, wore that down till it had no more meaning for you or me than any +other faded remembrance in this interminable footling with truth that we +call life. And this one--the whole abject meaning of it lies simply in +the fact that it has pierced down and shown us up. I had no courage. +I couldn't see how feeble a hold I had on life--just one's friends' +opinions. It was all at second hand. What I want to know now is--leave +me out; don't think, or care, or regard my living-on one shadow of an +iota--all I ask is, What am I to do for you?' He turned away and stood +staring down at the cinders in the fireless grate. + +'I answer that mad wicked outburst with one plain question,' said a low, +trembling voice; 'did you or did you not go to Widderstone yesterday?' + +'I did go.' + +'You sat there, just as you said you sat before; and with all your heart +and soul strove to regain--yourself?' + +Lawford lifted a still, colourless face into the sunlight. 'No,' he +said; 'I spent the evening at the house of a friend.' + +'Then I say it is infamous. You cast all this on me. You have brought +me into contempt and poisoned Alice's whole life. You dream and idle +on just as you used to do, without the least care or thought or +consideration for others; and go out in this condition--go out +absolutely unashamed--to spend the evening at a friend's. Peculiar +friends they must be. Why, really, Arthur, you must be mad!' + +Lawford paused. Like a flock of sheep streaming helter-skelter before +the onset of a wolf were the thoughts that a moment before had seemed so +orderly and sober. + +'Not mad--possessed,' he said softly. + +'And I add this,' cried Sheila, as it were out of a tragic mask, +'somewhere in the past, whether of your own life, or of the lives of +those who brought you into the world--the world which you pretend so +conveniently to despise--somewhere is hidden some miserable secret. God +visits all sins. On you has fallen at last the payment. THAT I believe. +You can't run away, any more than a child can run away from the cupboard +it has been locked into for a punishment. Who's going to hear you now? +You have deliberately refused to make a friend of me. Fight it out +alone, then!' + +Lawford heard the door close, and the dying away of the sound that had +been the unceasing accompaniment of all these later years--the rustling +of his wife's skirts, her crisp, authoritative footstep. And he turned +towards the flooding sunlight that streamed in on the upturned surface +of the looking-glass. No clear decisive thought came into his mind, only +a vague recognition that so far as Sheila was concerned this was the +end. No regret, no remorse visited him. He was just alone again, that +was all--alone, as in reality he had always been alone, without having +the sense or power to see or to acknowledge it. All he had said had been +the mere flotsam of the moment, and now it stood stark and irrevocable +between himself and the past. + +He sat down dazed and stupid. Again and again a struggling recollection +tried to obtrude itself; again and again he beat it back. And rather +for something to distract his attention than for any real interest +or enlightenment he might find in its pages, he took out the grimy +dog's-eared book that Herbert had given him, and turned slowly over the +leaves till he came to Sabathier once more. Snatches of remembrance of +their long talk returned to him, but just as that dark, water-haunted +house had seemed to banish remembrance and the reality of the room in +which he now sat, and of the old familiar life; so now the house, the +faces of yesterday seemed in their turn unreal, almost spectral, and +the thick print on the smudgy page no more significant than a story one +reads and throws away. + +But a moment's comparison in the glass of the two faces side by +side suddenly sharpened his attention--the resemblance was so oddly +arresting, and yet, and yet, so curiously inconclusive. There was then +something of the stolid old Saxon left, he thought. Or had it been +regained? Which was it? Not merely the complexity of the question, but +a half-conscious distaste of attempting to face it, set him reading very +slowly and laboriously, for his French was little more than fragmentary +recollection, the first few pages of the life of this buried Sabathier. +But with a disinclination almost amounting to aversion he made very slow +progress. Many of the words were meaningless to him, and every other +moment he found himself listening with intense concentration for the +least hint of what Sheila was doing, of what was going on in the house +beneath him. He had not very long to wait. He was sitting with his head +leaning on his hand, the book unheeded beneath the other on the table, +when the door opened again behind him, and Sheila entered. She stood for +a moment, calm and dignified, looking down on him through her veil. + +'Please understand, Arthur, that I am not taking this step in pique, +or even in anger. It would serve no purpose to go on like this--this +incessant heedlessness and recrimination. There have been mistakes, +misconceptions, perhaps, on both sides. To me naturally yours are most +conspicuous. That need not, however, blind me to my own.' + +She paused in vain for an answer. + +'Think the whole thing over candidly and quietly,' she began again in a +quiet rapid voice. 'Have you really shown the slightest regard, I won't +say for me, or even for Alice, but for just the obvious difficulties +and--and proprieties of our position? I have given up as far as I +can brooding on and on over the same horrible impossible thoughts. I +withdraw unreservedly what I said just now about punishment. Whatever +the evidence, it is not even a wife's place to judge like that. You will +forgive me that?' + +Lawford did not turn his head. 'Of course,' he said, looking rather +vacantly out of the window, 'it was only in the heat of the moment, +Sheila; though, who knows? it may be true.' + +'Well,' she took hold of the great brass knob at the foot of the bed +with one gloved hand--'well, I feel it is my duty to withdraw it. Apart +from it, I see only too clearly that even though all that has happened +in these last few days was in reality nothing but a horrible nightmare, +I see that even then what you have said about our married life together +can never be recalled. You have told me quite deliberately that for +years past your life has been nothing but a pretence--a sham. You +implied that mine had been too. Honestly, I was not aware of it, Arthur. +But supposing all that has happened to you had been merely what might +happen at any moment to anybody, some actual defacement (you will +forgive me suggesting such a horrible thing)--why, if what you say is +true, even in that case my sympathy would have been only a continual +fret and annoyance to you. And this--this change, I own, is infinitely +harder to bear. It would be an outrage on common sense and on all that +we hold seemly and--and sacred in life, even in some trumpery story. You +do, you must see all that, Arthur?' + +'Oh yes,' said Lawford, narrowing his eyes to pierce through the +sunlight, 'I see all that.' + +'Then we need not go over it all again. Whatever others may say, +or think, I shall still, at least so long as nothing occurs to the +contrary, keep firmly to my present convictions. Mr Bethany has assured +me repeatedly that he has no--no misgivings; that he understands. And +even if I still doubted, which I don't, Arthur, though it would be +rather trying to have to accept one's husband at second-hand, as it +were, I should have to be satisfied. I dare say even such an unheard-of +thing as what we are discussing now, or something equally ghastly, does +occur occasionally. In foreign countries, perhaps. I have not studied +such things enough to say. We were all very much restricted in our +reading as children, and I honestly think, not unwisely. It is enough +for the present to repeat that I do believe, and that whatever may +happen--and I know absolutely nothing about the procedure in such +cases--but whatever may happen, I shall still be loyal; I shall always +have your interests at heart.' Her words faltered and she turned her +head away. 'You did love me once, Arthur, I can't forget that.' The +contralto voice trembled ever so little, and the gloved hand smoothed +gently the brass knob beneath. + +'If,' said Lawford, resting his face on his hands, and curiously +watching the while his moving reflection in the looking-glass before +him--'if I said I still loved you, what then? + +'But you have already denied it, Arthur.' + +'Yes; but if I said that that too was said only in haste, that brooding +over the trouble this--this metamorphosis was bringing on us all had +driven me almost beyond endurance: supposing that I withdrew all that, +and instead said now that I do still love you, just as I--' he turned a +little, and turned back again, 'like this?' + +Sheila paused. 'Could ANY woman answer such a question?' she almost +sighed at last. + +'Yes, but,' Lawford pressed on, in a voice almost naive and stubborn as +a child's, 'If I tried to--to make you? I did once, Sheila.' + +'I can't, I can't conceive such a position. Surely that alone is almost +as frantic as it is heartless! Is it, is it even right?' + +'Well, I have not actually asked it. I own,' he added moodily, almost +under his breath, 'it would be--dangerous.... But there, Sheila, this +poor old mask of mine is wearing out. I am somehow convinced of that. +What will be left, God only knows. You were saying--' He rose abruptly. +'Please, please sit down,' he said; 'I did not notice you were +standing.' + +'I shall not keep you a moment,' she answered hurriedly; 'I will sit +here. The truth is, Arthur,' she began again almost solemnly, 'apart +from all sentiment and--and good intentions, my presence here only +harasses you and keeps you back. I am not so bound up in myself that I +cannot realise THAT. The consequence is that after calmly--and I +hope considerately--thinking the whole thing over, I have come to the +conclusion that it would arouse very little comment, the least possible +perhaps in the circumstances, if I just went away for a few days. You +are not in any sense ill. In fact, I have never known you so--so robust, +so energetic. You will be alone: Mr Bethany, perhaps.... You could go +out and come in just as you pleased. Possibly,' Sheila smiled frankly +beneath her veil, 'even this Dr Ferguson you have invented will be a +help. It's only the servants that remain to be considered.' + +'I should prefer to be quite alone.' + +'Then do not worry about THEM. I can easily explain. And if you would +not mind letting her in, Mrs Gull can come in every other day or so just +to keep things in order. She's entirely trustworthy and discreet. Or +perhaps, if you would prefer--' + +'Mrs Gull will do nicely, Sheila. It's very good of you to have given me +so much thought.' A long and rather arduous pause followed. + +'Oh, one other thing, Arthur. You sent out to Mr Critchett--do you +remember?--the night you first came home. I think, too, after the first +awful shock, when we were sitting in our bedroom, you actually referred +to--to violent measures. You will promise me, I may perhaps at least ask +that, you will promise me on your word of honour, for Alice's sake, if +not for mine, to do nothing rash.' + +'Yes, yes,' said Lawford, sinking lower even than he had supposed +possible into the thin and lightless chill of ennui--'nothing rash.' + +Sheila rose with a sigh only in part suppressed. 'I have not seen Mr +Bethany again. I think, however, it would be better to let Harry know; I +mean, dear, of your derangement. After all, he is one of the family--at +least, of mine. He will not interfere. He would, perhaps quite +naturally, be hurt if we did not take him into our confidence. Otherwise +there is no pressing cause for haste, at least for another week or so. +After that, I suppose, something will have to be done. Then there's Mr +Wedderburn; wouldn't it be as well to let him know that at least for the +present you are quite unable to think of returning to town? That, +too, in time will have to be arranged, I suppose, if nothing happens +meanwhile; I mean if things don't come right. And I do hope, Arthur, you +will not set your mind too closely on what may only prove false hopes. +This is all intensely painful to me; of course, to us both.' + +Again Lawford, even though he did not turn to confront it, became +conscious of the black veil turned towards him tentatively, +speculatively, impenetrably. + +'Yes,' he said, 'I'll write to Wedderburn; he's had his ups and downs +too.' + +'I always rather fancied so,' said Sheila reflectively, 'he looks rather +a--a restless man. Oh, and then again,' she broke off quickly, 'there's +the question of money. I suppose--it is only a conjecture--I suppose it +would be better to do nothing in that direction just for the present. +Ada has now gone to the Bank. Fifty pounds, Arthur; it is out of my own +private account--do you think that will be enough, just, of course, for +your PRESENT needs?' + +'As a bribe, hush-money, or a thank-offering, Sheila?' murmured her +husband wearily. + +'I don't follow you,' replied the discreet voice from beneath the veil. + +He did actually turn this time and glance steadily over his shoulder. +'How long are you going for? and where?' + +'I proposed to go to my cousin's, Bettie Lovat's; that is, of course, if +you have no objection. It's near; it will be a long-deferred visit; and +she need know very little. And, of course, if for the least thing in the +world you should want me, there I am within call, as it were. And you +will write? We ARE acting for the best, Arthur?' + +'So long as it is your best, Sheila.' + +Sheila pondered. 'You think, you mean, they'll all say I ought to have +stayed. Candidly, I can't see it in that light. Surely every experience +of life proves that in intimate domestic matters, and especially in +those between husband and wife, only the parties concerned have any +means of judging what is best for them? It has been our experience at +any rate: though I must in fairness confess that, outwardly at least, +I haven't had much of that kind of thing to complain of.' Sheila paused +again for a reply. + +'What kind of thing?' + +'Domestic experience, dear.' + +The house was quiet. There was not a sound stirring in the still +sunny road of orchards and discreet and drowsy villas. A long silence +followed, immensely active and alert on the one side, almost morbidly +lethargic so far as the stooping figure in front of the looking-glass +was concerned. At last the last haunting question came in a kind of +croak, as if only by a supreme effort could it be compelled to produce +itself for consideration. + +'And Alice, Sheila?' + +'Alice, dear, of course goes with ME.' + +'You realise,' he stirred uneasily, `you realise it may be final.' + +'My dear Arthur,' cried Sheila, 'it is surely, apart from mere delicacy, +a parental obligation to screen the poor child from the shock. Could she +be at such a time in any better keeping than her mother's? At present +she only vaguely guesses. To know definitely that her father, infinitely +worse than death, had--had--Oh, is it possible to realise anything in +this awful cloud? It would kill her outright.' + +Lawford made no stir. The quietest of raps came at the door. 'The money +from the Bank, ma'am,' said a faint voice. + +Sheila carefully opened the door a few inches. She laid the blue +envelope on the dressing-table at her husband's elbow. 'You had better +perhaps count it,' she said in a low voice--'forty in notes, the rest +in gold,' and narrowed her eyes beneath her veil upon her husband's very +peculiar method of forgetting his responsibilities. + +'French?' she said with a nod. 'How very quaint.' + +Lawford's eyes fell and rested gravely on the dingy page of Herbert's +mean-looking bundle of print. A queer feeling of cold crept over him. +'Yes,' he said vaguely, 'French,' and hopelessly failed to fill in the +silence that seemed like some rather sleek nocturnal creature quietly +waiting to be fed. + +Sheila swept softly towards the door. 'Well, Arthur, I think that is +all. The servants will have gone by this evening. I have ordered a +carriage for half-past twelve. Perhaps you would first write down +anything that occurs to you to be necessary? Perhaps, too, it would be +better if Dr Simon were told that we shall not need him any more, +that you are thinking of a complete change of scene, a voyage. He is +obviously useless. Besides, Mr Bethany, I think, is going to discuss +a specialist with you. I have written him a little note, just briefly +explaining. Shall I write to Dr Simon too?' + +'You remember everything,' said Lawford, and it seemed to him it was a +remark he had heard ages and ages ago. 'It's only this money, Sheila; +will you please take that away?' + +'Take it away?' + +'I think, Sheila, if I do take a voyage I should almost prefer to work +my passage. As for a mere "change of scene," that's quite uncostly.' + +'It is only your face, Arthur,' said Sheila solemnly, 'that suggest +these wicked stabs. Some day you will perhaps repent of every one.' + +'It is possible, Sheila; we none of us stand still, you know. One rips +open a lid sometimes and the wax face rots before one's eyes. Take back +your blue envelope; and thank you for thinking of me. It's always the +woman of the house that has the head.' + +'I wish,' said Sheila almost pathetically, and yet with a faint quaver +of resignation, 'I wish it could be said that the man of the house +sometimes has the heart. Think it over, Arthur!' + +Sheila, with her husband's luncheon tray, brought also her farewells. +Lawford surveyed, not without a faint, shy stirring of incredulity, +the superbly restrained presence. He stood before her dry-lipped, +inarticulate, a schoolboy caught redhanded in the shabbiest of offences. + +'It is your wish then that I go, Arthur?' she said pleadingly. + +He handed her her money without a word. + +'Very well, Arthur; if you won't take it,' she said. 'I should scarcely +have thought this the occasion for mere pride.' + +'The tenth,' she continued, as she squeezed the envelope into her purse, +with only the least hardening of voice, 'although I daresay you have not +troubled to remember it--the tenth will be the eighteenth anniversary +of our wedding-day. It makes parting, however advisable, and though only +for the few days we should think nothing of in happier circumstances, +a little harder to bear. But there, all will come right. You will see +things in a different light, perhaps. Words may wound, but time will +heal.' But even as she now looked closely into his colourless sunken +face some distant memory seemed to well up irresistibly--the memory of +eyes just as ingenuous, and as unassuming that even in claiming her love +had expressed only their stolid unworthiness. + +'Did you know it? have you seen it?' she said, stooping forward a +little. 'I believe in spite of all....' He gazed on solemnly, almost +owlishly, out of his fading mask. + +'Wait till Mr Bethany tells you; you will believe it perhaps from him.' +He saw the grey-gloved hand a little reluctantly lifted towards him. + +'Good-bye, Sheila,' he said, and turned mechanically back to the window. + +She hesitated, listening to a small far-away voice that kept urging her +with an almost frog-like pertinacity to do, to say something, and yet as +stubbornly would not say what; and she was gone. + + + +CHAPTER FIFTEEN + +Raying and gleaming in the sunlight the hired landau drove up to the +gate. Lawford, peeping between the blinds, looked down on the coachman, +with reins hanging loosely from his red squat-thumbed hand, seated in +his tight livery and indescribable hat on the faded cushions. One thing +only was in his mind; and it was almost with an audible cry that he +turned towards the figure that edged, white and trembling, into the +chill room, to fling herself into his arms. 'Don't look at me,' he +begged her, 'only remember, dearest, I would rather have died down +there and been never seen again than have given you pain. Run--run, your +mother's calling. Write to me, think of me; good-bye!' + +He threw himself on the bed and lay there till evening--till the door +had shut gently behind the last rat to leave the sinking ship. All +the clearness, the calmness were gone again. Round and round in dizzy +sickening flare and clatter his thoughts whirled. Contempt, fear, +loathing, blasphemy, laughter, longing: there was no end. Death was no +end. There was no meaning, no refuge, no hope, no possible peace. To +give up was to go to perdition: to go forward was to go mad. And even +madness--he sat up with trembling lips in the twilight--madness itself +was only a state, only a state. You might be bereaved, and the pain +and hopelessness of that would pass. You might be cast out, betrayed, +deserted, and still be you, still find solitude lovely and in a brave +face a friend. But madness!--it surged in on him with all the clearness +and emptiness of a dream. And he sat quite still, his hand clutching the +bedclothes, his head askew, waiting for the sound of footsteps, for the +presences and the voices that have their thin-walled dwelling beneath +the shallow crust of consciousness. + +Inky blackness drifted up in wisps, in smoke before his eyes; he was +powerless to move, to cry out. There was no room to turn; no air to +breathe. And yet there was a low, continuous, never-varying stir as of +an enormous wheel whirling in the gloom. Countless infinitesimal faces +arched like glimmering pebbles the huge dim-coloured vault above his +head. He heard a voice above the monstrous rustling of the wheel, +clamouring, calling him back. He was hastening headlong, muttering to +himself his own flat meaningless name, like a child repeating as he runs +his errand. And then as if in a charmed cold pool he awoke and opened +his eyes again on the gathering darkness of the great bedroom, and heard +a quick, importunate, long-continued knocking on the door below, as of +some one who had already knocked in vain. + +Cramped and heavy-limbed, he felt his way across the room and lit a +candle. He stood listening awhile: his eyes fixed on the door that hung +a little open. All in the room seemed acutely fantastically still. The +flame burned dim, misled in the sluggish air. He stole slowly to the +door, looked out, and again listened. Again the knocking broke out, more +impetuously and yet with a certain restraint and caution. Shielding the +flame of his candle in the shell of his left hand, Lawford moved slowly, +with chin uplifted, to the stairs. He bent forward a little, and stood +motionless and drawn up, the pupils of his eyes slowly contracting and +expanding as he gazed down into the carpeted vacant gloom; past the dim +louring presence that had fallen back before him. + +His mouth opened. 'Who's there?' at last he called. + +'Thank God, thank God!' he heard Mr Bethany mutter. 'I mustn't call, +Lawford,' came a hurried whisper as if the old gentleman were pressing +his lips to speak through the letter-box. 'Come down and open the door; +there's a good fellow! I've been knocking no end of a time.' + +'Yes, I am coming,' said Lawford. He shut his mouth and held his +breath, and stair by stair he descended, driving steadily before him the +crouching, gloating menacing shape, darkly lifted up before him against +the darkness, contending the way with him. + +'Are you ill? Are you hurt? Has anything happened, Lawford?' came the +anxious old voice again, striving in vain to be restrained. + +'No, no,' muttered Lawford. 'I am coming; coming slowly.' He paused to +breathe, his hands trembling, his hair lank with sweat, and still +with eyes wide open he descended against the phantom lurking in the +darkness--an adversary that, if he should but for one moment close his +lids, he felt would master sanity and imagination with its evil. 'So +long as you don't get in,' he heard himself muttering, 'so long as you +don't get in, my friend!' + +'What's that you're saying?' came up the muffled, querulous voice; 'I +can't for the life of me hear, my boy.' + +'Nothing, nothing,' came softly the answer from the foot of the stairs. +'I was only speaking to myself.' + +Deliberately, with candle held rigidly on a level with his eyes, Lawford +pushed forward a pace or two into the airless, empty drawing-room, and +grasped the handle of the door. He gazed in awhile, a black oblique +shadow flung across his face, his eyes fixed like an animal's, then drew +the door steadily towards him. And suddenly some power that had held him +tense seemed to fail. He thrust out his head, and, his face quivering +with fear and loathing, spat defiance as if in a passion of triumph into +the gloom. + +Still muttering, he shut the door and turned the key. In another moment +his light was gleaming out on the grey perturbed face and black narrow +shoulders of his visitor. + +'You gave me quite a fright,' said the old man almost angrily; 'have you +hurt your foot, or something?' + +'It was very dark,' said Lawford, 'down the stairs.' + +'What!' said Mr Bethany still more angrily, blinking out of his +unspectacled eyes; 'has she cut off the gas, then?' + +'You got the note?' said Lawford, unmoved. + +'Yes, yes; I got the note.... Gone?' + +'Oh, yes; all gone. It was my choice. I preferred it so.' + +Mr Bethany sat down on one of the hard old wooden chairs that stood on +either side of the lofty hall, and breathing rather thickly, rested his +hands on his knees. 'What's happened?' he inquired, looking up into the +candle. 'I forgot my glasses, old fool that I am, and can't, my dear +fellow, see you very plainly. But your voice--' + +'I think,' said Lawford, 'I think it's beginning to come back.' + +'What, the whole thing! Oh no, my dear, dear man; be frank with me; not +the whole thing?' + +'Yes,' said Lawford, 'the whole thing--very, very gradually, +imperceptibly. I think even Sheila noticed. But I rather feel it than +see it; that is all.... I'm cornering him.' + +'Him?' + +Lawford jerked his candle as if towards some definite goal. 'In time,' +he said. + +The two faces with the candle between them seemed as it were to gain +light each from the other. + +'Well, well,' said Mr Bethany, 'every man for himself, Lawford; it's the +only way. But what's going to be done? We must be cautious; must think +of--of the others?' + +'Oh, that,' said Lawford; 'she's going to squeeze me out.' + +'You've--squabbled? Oh, but my dear, honest old, HONEST old idiot, there +are scores of families here in this parish, within a stone's throw, that +squabble, wrangle, all but politely tear each other's eyes out, every +day of their earthly lives. It's perfectly natural. Where should we poor +old busybodies be else. Peace on earth we bring, and it's mainly between +husband and wife.' + +'Yes,' said Lawford, 'but you see, this was not our earthly life. It was +between US.' + +'Listen, listen to the dear mystic!' exclaimed the old creature +scoffingly. 'What depths we're touching. Here's the first serious break +of his lifetime, and he's gone stark staring transcendental. Ah well.' +He paused and glanced quickly about him, with his curious bird-like +poise of head. 'But you're not alone here?' he inquired suddenly; 'not +absolutely alone?' + +'Yes,' said Lawford. 'But there's plenty to think about--and read. I +haven't thought or read for years.' + +'No, nor I; after thirty, my dear boy, one merely annotates, and the +book's called Life. Bless me, his solemn old voice is grinding epigrams +out of even this poor old parochial barrel-organ. You don't suppose, you +cannot be supposing you are the only serious person in the world? What's +more, it's only skin deep.' + +Lawford smiled. 'Skin deep. But think quietly over it; you'll see I'm +done.' + +'Come here,' said Mr Bethany. 'Where's the whiskey, where's the cigars? +You shall smoke and drink, and I'll watch. If it weren't for a +pitiful old stomach, I'd join you. Come on!' He led the way into the +dining-room. + +He looked sparer, more wizened and sinewy than ever as he stooped to +open the sideboard. 'Where on earth do they keep everything?' he was +muttering to himself. + +Lawford put the candlestick down on the table. 'There's only one thing,' +he said, watching his visitor's rummaging; 'what precisely do you think +they will do with me?' + +'Look here, Lawford,' snapped Mr Bethany; 'I've come round here, hooting +through your letter-box, to tally sense, not sentiment. Why has your +wife deserted you? Without a servant, without a single--It's perfectly +monstrous.' + +'On my word of honour, I prefer it so. I couldn't have gone on. Alone +I all but forget this--this lupus. Every turn of her little finger +reminded me of it. We are all of us alone, whether we know it or +not; you said so yourself. And it's better to realize it stark and +unconfused. Besides, you have no idea what--what odd things.... There +may be; there IS something on the other side. I'll win through to that.' + +Mr Bethany had been listening attentively. He scrambled up from his +knees with a half-empty syphon of sodawater. 'See here, Lawford,' he +said; 'if you really want to know what's your most insidious and most +dangerous symptom just now, it is spiritual pride. You've won what you +think a domestic victory; and you can scarcely bear the splendour. +Oh, you may shrug! Pray, what IS this "other side" which the superior +double-faced creature's going to win through to now?' He rapped it out +almost bitterly, almost contemptuously. + +Lawford hardly heard the question. Before his eyes had suddenly arisen +the peace, the friendly unquestioning stillness, the thunderous lullaby +old as the grave. 'It's only a fancy. It seemed I could begin again.' + +'Well, look here,' said Mr Bethany, his whole face suddenly lined and +grey with age. 'You can't. It's the one solitary thing I've got to say, +as I've said it to myself morn, noon, and night these scores of years. +You can't begin again; it's all a delusion and a snare. You say we're +alone. So we are. The world's a dream, a stage, a mirage, a rack, call +it what you will--but YOU don't change, YOU'RE no illusion. There's +no crying off for YOU no ravelling out, no clean leaves. You've got +this--this trouble, this affliction--my dear, dear fellow what shall +I say to tell you how I grieve and groan for you oh yes, and actually +laughed, I confess it, a vile hysterical laughter, to think of it. +You've got this almost intolerable burden to bear; it's come like a +thief in the night; but bear it you must, and ALONE! They say death's a +going to bed; I doubt it; but anyhow life's a long undressing. We came +in puling and naked, and every stitch must come off before we get out +again. We must stand on our feet in all our Rabelaisian nakedness, and +watch the world fade. Well then, and not another word of sense shall you +worm out of my worn-out old brains after today--all I say is, don't give +in! Why, if you stood here now, freed from this devilish disguise, the +old, fat, sluggish fellow that sat and yawned his head off under my eyes +in his pew the Sunday before last, if I know anything about human nature +I'd say it to your face, and a fig for your vanity and resignation--your +last state would be worse than the first. There!' + +He bunched up a big white handkerchief and mopped it over his head. +'That's done,' he said, 'and we won't go back. What I want to know now +is what are you going to do? Where are you sleeping? What are you going +to think about? I'll stay--yes, yes, that's what it must be: I must +stay. And I detest strange beds. I'll stay, you SHAN'T be alone. Do you +hear me, Lawford?--you SHAN'T be alone!' + +Lawford gazed gravely. 'There is just one little thing I want to ask +you before you go. I've wormed out an extraordinary old French book; +and--just as you say--to pass the time, I've been having a shot at +translating it. But I'm frightfully rusty; it's old French; would you +mind having a look?' + +Mr Bethany blinked and listened. He tried for the twentieth time to +judge his friend's eyes, to gain as best he could some sustained and +unobserved glance at this baffling face. 'Where is your precious French +book?' he said irritably. + +'It's upstairs.' + +'Fire away, then!' Lawford rose and glanced about the room. 'What, no +light there either?' snapped Mr Bethany. 'Take this; I don't mind the +dark. There'll be plenty of that for me soon.' + +Lawford hesitated at the door, looking rather strangely back. 'No,' +he said, 'there are matches upstairs.' He shut the door after him. The +darkness seemed cold and still as water. He went slowly up, with eyes +fixed wide on the floating luminous gloom, and out of memory seemed to +gather, as faintly as in the darkness which they had exorcised for him, +the strange pitiful eyes of the night before. And as he mounted a chill, +terrible, physical peace seemed to steal over him. + +Mr Bethany was sitting as he had left him, looking steadily on the +floor, when Lawford returned. He flattened out the book on the table +with a sniff of impatience. And dragging the candle nearer, and stooping +his nose close to the fusty print, he began to read. + +'Was this in the house?' he inquired presently. + +'No,' said Lawford; 'it was lent to me by a friend--Herbert.' + +'H'm! don't know him. Anyhow, precious poor stuff this is. +This Sabathier, whoever he is, seems to be a kind of clap-trap +eighteenth-century adventurer who thought the world would be better off, +apparently, for a long account of all his sentimental amours. Rousseau, +with a touch of Don Quixote in his composition, and an echo of that +prince of bogies, Poe! What, in the name of wonder, induced you to fix +on this for your holiday reading?' + +'Sabathier's alive, isn't he?' + +'I never said he wasn't. He's a good deal too much alive for my old +wits, with his Mam'selle This and Madame the Other; interesting enough, +perhaps, for the professional literary nose with a taste for patchouli.' + +'Yet I suppose even that is not a very rare character?' Mr Bethany +peered up from the dingy book at his ingenuous questioner. 'I should say +decidedly that the fellow was a very rare character, so long as by rare +you don't mean good. It's one of the dullest stupidities of the present +day, my dear fellow, to dote on a man simply because he's different +from the rest of us. Once a man strays out of the common herd, he's +more likely to meet wolves in the thickets than angels. From what I can +gather in just these few pages this Sabathier appears to have been +an amorous, adventurous, emotional Frenchman, who went to the dogs as +easily and as rapidly as his own nature and his period allowed. And I +should say, Lawford, that he made precious bad reading for a poor old +troubled hermit like yourself at the present moment.' + +'There's a portrait of him a few pages back.' + +Mr Bethany, with some little impatience, turned back to the engraving. +'"Nicholas de Sabathier,"'s he muttered. '"De," indeed!' He poked in at +the foxy print with narrowed eyes. 'I don't deny it's a striking, even +perhaps, a rather taking face. I don't deny it.' He gazed on with +an even more acute concentration, and looked up sharply. 'Look here, +Lawford, what in the name of wonder--what trick are you playing on me +now?' + +'Trick?' said Lawford; and the world fell with the tiniest plash in the +silence, like a vivid little float upon the surface of a shadowy pool. + +The old face flushed. 'What conceivable bearing, I say, has this dead +and gone old roue on us now?' + +'You don't think, then, you see any resemblance--ANY resemblance at +all?' + +'Resemblance?' repeated Mr Bethany in a flat voice, and without raising +his face again to meet Lawford's direct scrutiny. 'Resemblance to whom?' + +'To me? To me, as I am?' + +'But even, my dear fellow (forgive my dull old brains!), even if there +was just the faintest superficial suggestion of--of that; what then?' + +'Why,' said Lawford, 'he's buried in Widderstone.' + +'Buried in Widderstone?' The keen childlike blue eyes looked almost +stealthily up across the book; the old man sat without speaking, so +still that it might even be supposed he himself was listening for a +quiet distant footfall. + +'He is buried in the grave beside which I fell asleep,' said Lawford; +'all green and still and broken,' he added faintly. 'You remember,' he +went on in a repressed voice--'you remember you asked me if there was +anybody else in sight, any eavesdropper? You don't think--him?' + +Mr. Bethany pushed the book a few inches away from him. 'Who, did you +say--who was it you said put the thing into your head? A queer friend +surely?' he paused helplessly. 'And how, pray, do you know,' he began +again more firmly, 'even if there is a Sabathier buried at Widderstone, +how do you know it is this Sabathier? It's not, I think,' he added +boldly, 'a very uncommon name; with two b's at any rate. Whereabouts is +the grave?' + +'Quite down at the bottom, under the trees. And the little seat I told +you of is there, too, where I fell asleep. You see,' he explained, 'the +grave's almost isolated; I suppose because he killed himself.' + +Mr Bethany clasped his knuckled fingers on the tablecloth. 'It's no +good,' he concluded after a long pause; 'the fellow's got up into +my head. I can't think him out. We must thrash it out quietly in the +morning with the blessed sun at the window; not this farthing dip. To +me the whole idea is as revolting as it is incredible. Why, above a +century--no, no! And on the other hand, how easily one's fancy builds! A +few straws and there's a nest and squawking fledglings, all complete. +Is that why--is that why that good, practical wife of yours and all your +faithful household have absconded? Does it'--he threw up his head as if +towards the house above them--'does it REEK with him?' + +Lawford shook his head. 'She hasn't seen him: not--not apart. I haven't +told her.' + +Mr Bethany tossed the hugger-mugger of pamphlets across the table. +'Then, for simple sanity's sake, don't. Hide it; burn it; put the thing +completely out of your mind. A friend! Who, where is this wonderful +friend?' + +'Not very far from Widderstone. He lives--practically alone.' + +'And all that stumbling and muttering on the stairs?' he leant forward +almost threateningly. 'There isn't anybody here, Lawford?' + +'Oh, no,' said Lawford. 'We are practically alone with this, you know,' +he pointed to the book, and smiled frankly, however faintly. + +Again Mr Bethany sank into a fixed yet uneasy reverie, and again shook +himself and raised his eyes. + +'Well then,' he said, in a voice all but morose in its fretfullness, +'what I suggest is that first you keep quiet here; and next, that you +write and get your wife back. You say you are better. I think you said +she herself noticed a slight improvement. Isn't it just exactly as I +foresaw? And yet she's gone! But that's not our business. Get her back. +And don't for a single instant waste a thought on the other; not for a +single instant, I implore you, Lawford. And in a week the whole thing +will be no more than a dreary, preposterous dream.... You don't answer +me!' he cried impulsively. + +'But can one so easily forget a dream like this?' + +'You don't speak out, Lawford; you mean SHE won't.' + +'It must at least seem to have been in part of my own seeking, or +contriving; or at any rate--she said it--of my own hereditary or +unconscious deserving.' + +'She said that!' Mr Bethany sat back. 'I see, I see,' he said. 'I'm +nothing but a fumbling old meddler. And there was I, not ten minutes +ago, preaching for all I was worth on a text I knew nothing about. God +bless me, Lawford, how long we take a-learning. I'll say no more. But +what an illusion. To think this--this--he laid a long lean hand at arm's +length flat upon the table towards his friend--'to think this is our old +jog-trot Arthur Lawford! From henceforth I throw you over, you old wolf +in sheep's wool. I wash my hands of you. And now where am I going to +sleep?' + +He covered up his age and weariness for an instant with a small crooked +hand. + +Lawford took a deep breath. 'You're going, old friend, to sleep at home. +And I--I'm going to give you my arm to the Vicarage gate. Here I am, +immeasurably relieved, fitter than I've been since I was a dolt of a +schoolboy. On my word of honour: I can't say why, but I am. I don't care +THAT, vicar, honestly--puffed up with spiritual pride. If a man can't +sleep with pride for a bed-fellow, well, he'd better try elsewhere. It's +no good; I'm as stubborn as a mule; that's at least a relic of the old +Adam. I care no more,' he raised his voice firmly and gravely--'I +don't care a jot for solitude, not a jot for all the ghosts of all the +catacombs!' + +Mr. Bethany listened, grimly pursed up his lips. 'Not a jot for all the +ghosts of all the catechisms!' he muttered. `Nor the devil himself, I +suppose?' He turned once more to glance sharply in the direction of the +face he could so dimly--and of set purpose--discern; and without a word +trotted off into the hall. Lawford followed with the candle. + +''Pon my word, you haven't had a mouthful of supper. Let me forage; just +a quarter of an hour, eh?' + +'Not me,' said Mr Bethany; 'if you won't have me, home I go. I refuse +to encourage this miserable grass-widowering. What WOULD they say? +What would the busybodies say? Ghouls and graves and shocking +mysteries--Selina! Sister Anne! Come on.' + +He shuffled on his hat and caught firm hold of his knobbed umbrella. +'Better not leave a candle,' he said. + +Lawford blew out the candle. + +'What? What?' called the old man suddenly. But no voice had spoken. + +A thin trickle of light from the lamp in the street stuck up through +the fanlight as, with a smile that could be described neither as +mischievous, saturnine, nor vindictive, and was yet faintly suggestive +of all three, Lawford quietly opened the drawing-room door and put down +the candlestick on the floor within. + +'What on earth, my good man, are you fumbling after now?' came the +almost fretful question from under the echoing porch. + +'Coming, coming,' said Lawford, and slammed the door behind them. + + + + +CHAPTER SIXTEEN + +The first faint streaks of dawn were silvering across the stars when +Lawford again let himself into his deserted house. He stumbled down +to the pantry and cut himself a crust of bread and cheese, and ate it, +sitting on the table, watching the leafy eastern sky through the painted +bars of the area window. He munched on, hungry and tired. His night +walk had cooled head and heart. Having obstinately refused Mr Bethany's +invitation to sleep at the Vicarage, he had sat down on an old low wall, +and watched until his light had shone out at his bedroom window. Then +he had simply wandered on, past rustling glimmering gardens, under +the great timbers of yellowing elms, hardly thinking, hardly aware +of himself except as in a far-away vision of a sluggish insignificant +creature struggling across the tossed-up crust of an old, +incomprehensible world. + +The secret of his content in that long leisurely ramble had been +that repeatedly by a scarcely realised effort it had not lain in the +direction of Widderstone. And now, as he sat hungrily devouring his +breakfast on the table in the kitchen, with the daybreak comforting his +eyes, he thought with a positive mockery of that poor old night-thing +he had given inch by inch into the safe keeping of his pink and white +drawing-room. Don Quixote, Poe, Rousseau--they were familiar but not +very significant labels to a mind that had found very poor entertainment +in reading. But they were at least representative enough to set him +wondering which of their influences it was that had inflated with such +a gaseous heroism the Lawford of the night before. He thought of Sheila +with a not unkindly smile, and of the rest. 'I wonder what they'll do?' +had been a question almost as much in his mind during these last few +hours as had 'What am I to do?' in the first bout of his 'visitation.' + +But the 'they' was not very precisely visualised. He saw Sheila, and +Harry, and dainty pale-blue Bettie Lovat, and cautious old Wedderburn, +and Danton, and Craik, and cheery, gossipy Dr Sutherland, and the +verger, Mr Dutton, and Critchett, and the gardener, and Ada, and the +whole vague populous host that keep one as definitely in one's place in +the world's economy as a firm-set pin the camphored moth. What his place +was to be only time could show. Meanwhile there was in this loneliness +at least a respite. + +Solitude!--he bathed his weary bones in it. He laved his eyelids in +it, as in a woodland brook after the heat of noon. He sat on in calmest +reverie till his hunger was satisfied. Then, scattering out his last +crumbs to the birds from the barred window, he climbed upstairs again, +past his usual bedroom, past his detested guest room, up into the narrow +sweetness of Alice's, and flinging himself on her bed fell into a long +and dreamless sleep. + +By ten next morning Lawford had bathed and dressed. And at half-past ten +he got up from Sheila's fat little French dictionary and his Memoirs to +answer Mrs Gull's summons on the area bell. The little woman stood with +arms folded over an empty and capacious bag, with an air of sustained +melancholy on her friendly face. She wished him a very nervous 'Good +morning,' and dived down into the kitchen. The hours dragged slowly by +in a silence broken only by an occasional ring at the bell. About three +she emerged from the house and climbed the area steps with her bag +hooked over her arm. He watched the little black figure out of +sight, watched a man in a white canvas hat ascend the steps to push a +blue-printed circular through the letter-box. It had begun to rain a +little. He returned to the breakfast-room and with the window wide open +to the rustling coolness of the leaves, edged his way very slowly across +from line to line of the obscure French print. + +Sabathier none the less, and in spite of his unintelligible +literariness, did begin to take shape and consistency. The man himself, +breathing, and thinking, began to live for Lawford even in those few +half-articulate pages, though not in quite so formidable a fashion as +Mr Bethany had summed him up. But as the west began to lighten with the +declining sun, the same old disquietude, the same old friendless and +foreboding ennui stole over Lawford's solitude once more. He shut his +books, placed a candlestick and two boxes of matches on the hall table, +lit a bead of gas, and went out into the rainy-sweet streets again. + +At a mean little barber's with a pole above his lettered door he went +in to be shaved. And a few steps further on he sat down at the +crumb-littered counter of a little baker's shop to have some tea. It +pleased him almost to childishness to find how easily he could listen +and even talk to the oiled and crimpy little barber, and to the pretty, +consumptive-looking, print-dressed baker's wife. Whatever his face might +now be conniving at, the Arthur Lawford of last week could never have +hob-nobbed so affably with his social 'inferiors.' + +For no reason in the world, unless to spend a moment or two longer +in the friendly baker's shop, he bought six-penny-worth of cakes. He +watched them as they were deposited one by one in the bag, and even +asked for one sort to be exchanged for another, flushing a little at the +pretty compliment he had ventured on. + +He climbed out of the shop, and paused on the wooden doorstep. 'Do you +happen to know Mr Herbert Herbert's?' he said. + +The baker's wife glanced up at him with clear, reflective eyes. 'Mr +Herbert's?--that must be some little way off, sir. I don't know any such +name, and I know most, just round about like.' + +'Well, yes, it is,' said Lawford, rather foolishly; 'I hardly know why I +asked. It's past the churchyard at Widderstone.' + +'Oh yes, sir,' she encouraged him. + +'A big, wooden-looking house.' + +'Really, sir. Wooden?' + +Lawford looked into her face, but could find nothing more to say, so he +smiled again rather absently, and ascended into the street. + +He sat down outside the churchyard gate on the very bank where he had in +the sourness of the nettles first opened Sabathier's Memoirs. The world +lay still beneath the pale sky. Presently the little fat rector walked +up the hill, his wrists still showing beneath his sleeves. Lawford +meditatively watched him pass by. A small boy with a switch, a tiny +nose, and a swinging gallipot, his cheeks lit with the sunset, followed +soon after. Lawford beckoned him with his finger and held out the bag +of tarts. He watched him, half incredulous of his prize, and with many a +cautious look over his shoulder, pass out of sight. For a long while +he sat alone, only the evening birds singing out of the greenness and +silence of the churchyard. What a haunting inescapable riddle life was. + +Colour suddenly faded out of the light streaming between the branches. +And depression, always lying in ambush of the novelty of his freedom, +began like mist to rise above his restless thoughts. It was all so +devilish empty--this raft of the world floating under evening's shadow. +How many sermons had he listened to, enriched with the simile of the +ocean of life. Here they were, come home to roost. He had fallen asleep, +ineffectual sailor that he was, and a thief out of the cloudy deep had +stolen oar and sail and compass, leaving him adrift amid the riding of +the waves. + +'Are they worth, do you think, quite a penny?' suddenly inquired a quiet +voice in the silence. He looked up into the almost colourless face, into +the grey eyes beneath their clear narrow brows. + +'I was thinking,' he said, 'what a curious thing life is, and +wondering--' + +'The first half is well worth the penny--its originality! I can't afford +twopence. So you must GIVE me what you were wondering.' + +Lawford gazed rather blankly across the twilight fields. 'I was +wondering,' he said with an oddly naive candour, 'how long it took one +to sink.' + +'They say, you know,' Grisel replied solemnly, 'drowned sailors float +midway, suffering their sea change; purgatory. But what a splendid +pennyworth. All pure philosophy!' + +'"Philosophy!"' said Lawford; 'I am a perfect fool. Has your brother +told you about me?' + +She glanced at him quickly. 'We had a talk.' + +'Then you do know--?' He stopped dead, and turned to her. 'You really +realise it, looking at me now?' + +'I realise,' she said gravely, 'that you look even a little more pale +and haggard than when I saw you first the other night. We both, my +brother and I, you know, thought for certain you'd come yesterday. +In fact, I went into the Widderstone in the evening to look for you, +knowing your nocturnal habits....' She glanced again at him with a kind +of shy anxiety. + +'Why--why is your brother so--why does he let me bore him so horribly?' + +'Does he? He's tremendously interested; but then, he's pretty easily +interested when he's interested at all. If he can possibly twist +anything into the slightest show of a mystery, he will. But, of course, +you won't, you can't, take all he says seriously. The tiniest pinch of +salt, you know. He's an absolute fanatic at talking in the air. Besides, +it doesn't really matter much.' + +'In the air?' + +'I mean if once a theory gets into his head--the more far-fetched, +so long as it's original, the better--it flowers out into a positive +miracle of incredibilities. And of course you can rout out evidence for +anything under the sun from his dingy old folios. Why did he lend you +that PARTICULAR book?' + +'Didn't he tell you that, then?' + +'He said it was Sabathier.' She seemed to think intensely for the +merest fraction of a moment, and turned. 'Honestly, though, I think he +immensely exaggerated the likeness. As for...' + +He touched her arm, and they stopped again, face to face. 'Tell me what +difference exactly you see,' he said. 'I am quite myself again now, +honestly; please tell me just the very worst you think.' + +'I think, to begin with,' she began, with exaggerated candour, 'his is +rather a detestable face.' + +'And mine?' he said gravely. + +'Why--very troubled; oh yes--but his was like some bird of prey. +Yours--what mad stuff to talk like this!--not the least symptom, that I +can see, of--why, the "prey," you know.' + +They had come to the wicket in the dark thorny hedge. 'Would it be very +dreadful to walk on a little--just to finish?' + +'Very,' she said, turning as gravely at his side. + +'What I wanted to say was--' began Lawford, and forgetting altogether +the thread by which he hoped to lead up to what he really wanted to +say, broke off lamely; 'I should have thought you would have absolutely +despised a coward.' + +'It would be rather absurd to despise what one so horribly well +understands. Besides, we weren't cowards--we weren't cowards a bit. My +childhood was one long, reiterated terror--nights and nights of it. But +I never had the pluck to tell any one. No one so much as dreamt of +the company I had. Ah, and you didn't see either that my heart was +absolutely in my mouth, that I was shrivelled up with fear, even at +sight of the fear on your face in the dark. There's absolutely nothing +so catching. So, you see, I do know a little what nerves are; and +dream too sometimes, though I don't choose charnelhouses if I can get a +comfortable bed. A coward! May I really say that to ask my help was one +of the bravest things in a man I ever heard of. Bullets--that kind of +courage--no real woman cares twopence for bullets. An old aunt of mine +stared a man right out of the house with the thing in her face. Anyhow, +whether I may or not, I do say it. So now we are quits.' + +'Will you--' began Lawford, and stopped. 'What I wanted to say was,' +he jerked on, 'it is sheer horrible hypocrisy to be talking to you like +this--though you will never have the faintest idea of what it has meant +and done for me. I mean... And yet, and yet, I do feel when just for +the least moment I forget what I am, and that isn't very often, when +I forget what I have become and what I must go back to--I feel that I +haven't any business to be talking with you at all. "Quits!" And here I +am, an outcast from decent society. Ah, you don't know--' + +She bent her head and laughed under her breath. 'You do really stumble +on such delicious compliments. And yet, do you know, I think my brother +would be immensely pleased to think you were an outcast from decent +society if only he could be thought one too. He has been trying half his +life to wither decent society with neglect and disdain--but it doesn't +take the least notice. The deaf adder, you know. Besides, besides; what +is all this meek talk? I detest meek talk--gods or men. Surely in the +first and last resort all we are is ourselves. Something has happened; +you are jangled, shaken. But to us, believe me, you are simply one of +fewer friends-and I think, after struggling up Widderstone Lane hand in +hand with you in the dark, I have a right to say "friends" than I could +count on one hand. What are we all if we only realized it? We talk of +dignity and propriety, and we are like so many children playing +with knucklebones in a giant's scullery. Come along, he will, some +suppertime, for us, each in turn--and how many even will so much as look +up from their play to wave us good-bye? that's what I mean--the plot +of silence we are all in. If only I had my brother's lucidity, how much +better I would have said all this. It is only, believe me, that I want +ever so much to help you, if I may--even at risk, too,' she added, +rather shakily, 'of having that help--well--I know it's little good.' + +The lane had narrowed. They had climbed the arch of a narrow stone +bridge that spanned the smooth dark Widder. A few late starlings were +winging far above them. Darkness was coming on apace. They stood for +awhile looking down into the black flowing water, with here and there +the mild silver of a star dim leagues below. 'I am afraid,' said +Grisel, looking quietly up, 'you have led me into talking most pitiless +nonsense. How many hours, I wonder, did I lie awake in the dark last +night, thinking of you? Honestly, I shall never, NEVER forget that walk. +It haunted me, on and on.' + +'Thinking of me? Do you really mean that? Then it was not all +imagination; it wasn't just the drowning man clutching at a straw?' + +The grey eyes questioned him. 'You see,' he explained in a whisper, as +if afraid of being overheard, 'it--it came back again, and--I don't mind +a bit how much you laugh at me! I had been asleep, and had had a most +awful dream, one of those dreams that seem to hint that some day THAT +will be our real world, that some day we may awake where dreaming then +will be of this; and I woke--came back--and there was a tremendous +knocking going on downstairs. I knew there was no one else in the +house--' + +'No one else in the house? And you like this?' + +'Yes,' said Lawford, stolidly, 'they were all out as it happened. And, +of course,' he went on quickly, 'there was nothing for me to do but +simply to go down and open the door. And yet, do you know, at first I +simply couldn't move. I lit a candle, and then--then somehow I got +to know that waiting for me was just--but there,' he broke off +half-ashamed, 'I mustn't bother you with all this morbid stuff. Will +your brother be in now, do you think?' + +'My brother will be in, and, of course, expecting you. But as for +"bother," believe me--well, did I quite deserve it?' She stooped towards +him. 'You lit a candle--and then?' + +They turned and retraced their way slowly up the hill. + +'It came again.' + +'It?' + +'That--that presence, that shadow. I don't mean, of course, it's a real +shadow. It comes, doesn't it, from--from within? As if from out of some +unheard-of hiding place, where it has been lurking for ages and ages +before one's childhood; at least, so it seems to me now. And yet +although it does come from within, there it is, too, in front of you, +before your eyes, feeding even on your fear, just watching, waiting +for--What nonsense all this must seem to you!' + +'Yes, yes; and then?' + +'Then, and you must remember the poor old boy had been knocking all this +time--my old friend--Mr Bethany, I mean--knocking and calling through +the letter-box, thinking I was in extremis, or something; then--how +shall I describe it?--well YOU came, your eyes, your face, as clear as +when, you know, the night before last, we went up the hill together. And +then...' + +'And then?' + +'And then, we--you and I, you know--simply drove him downstairs, and +I could hear myself grunting as if it was really a physical effort; we +drove him, step by step, downstairs. And--' He laughed outright, and +boyishly continued his adventure. 'What do you think I did then, without +the ghost of a smile, too, at the idiocy of the thing? I locked the poor +beggar in the drawing-room. I saw him there, as plainly as I ever saw +anything in my life, and the furniture glimmering, though it was pitch +dark: I can't describe it. It all seemed so desperately real, absolutely +vital then. It all seems so meaningless and impossible now. And yet, +although I am utterly played out and done for, and however absurd it may +sound, I wouldn't have lost it; I wouldn't go back for any bribe there +is. I feel just as if a great bundle had been rolled off my back. Of +course, the queerest, the most detestable part of the whole business +is that it--the thing on the stairs--was this'--he lifted a grave and +haggard face towards her again--'or rather that,' he pointed with his +stick towards the starry churchyard. 'Sabathier,' he said. + +Again they had paused together before the white gate, and this time +Lawford pushed it open, and followed his companion up the narrow path. + +She stayed a moment, her hand on the bell. 'Was it my brother who +actually put that horrible idea into your mind?--about Sabathier?' + +'Oh no, not really put it into my head,' said Lawford hollowly. 'He only +found it there; lit it up.' + +She laid her hand lightly on his arm. 'Whether he did or not,' she said +with an earnestness that was almost an entreaty, 'of course, you MUST +agree that we every one of us have some such experience--that kind +of visitor, once at least, in a lifetime.' 'Ah, but,' began Lawford, +turning forlornly away, 'you didn't see, you can't have realized--the +change.' + +She pulled the bell almost as if in some inward triumph. 'But don't you +think,' she suggested, 'that that, like the other, might be, as it were, +partly imagination too? If now you thought back.' + +But a little old woman had opened the door, and the sentence, for the +moment, was left unfinished. + + + +CHAPTER SEVENTEEN + +There was no one in the room, and no light, when they entered. For a +moment Grisel stood by the open window, looking out. Then she turned +impulsively. 'My brother, of course, will ask you too,' she said; 'we +had made up our minds to do so if you came again; but I want you to +promise me now that you won't dream of going back to-night. That surely +would be tempting--well, not Providence. I couldn't rest if I thought +you might be alone; like that again.' Her voice died away into the +calling of the waters. A light moved across the dingy old rows of books +and as his sister turned to go out Herbert appeared in the doorway, +carrying a green-shaded lamp, with an old leather quarto under his arm. + +'Ah, here you are,' he said. 'I guessed you had probably met.' He drew +up, burdened, before his visitor. But his clear black glance, instead of +wandering off at his first greeting, had intensified. And it was almost +with an air of absorption that he turned away. He dumped his book on to +a chair and it turned over with scattered leaves on to the floor. He +put the lamp down and stooped after it, so that his next words came up +muffled, and as if the remark had been forced out of him. 'You don't +feel worse, I hope?' He got up and faced his visitor for the answer. And +for the moment Lawford stood considering his symptoms. + +'No,' he said almost gaily; 'I feel enormously better.' But Herbert's +long, oval, questioning eyes beneath the sleek black hair were still +fixed on his face. 'I am afraid, my dear fellow,' he said, with +something more than his usual curiously indifferent courtesy, 'the +struggle has frightfully pulled you to pieces.' + +'The question is,' answered Lawford, with a kind of tired yet whimsical +melancholy in his voice, 'though I am not sure that the answer very much +matters--what's going to put me together again? It's the old story of +Humpty Dumpty, Herbert. Besides, one thing you said has stuck out in a +quite curious way in my memory. I wonder if you will remember?' + +'What was that?' said Herbert with unfeigned curiosity. + +'Why, you said even though Sabathier had failed, though I was still +my own old stodgy self, that you thought the face--the face, you know, +might work in. Somehow, sometimes I think it has. It does really rather +haunt me. In that case--well, what then?' Lawford had himself listened +to this involved explanation much as one watches the accomplishment of +a difficult trick, marvelling more at its completion at all than at the +difficulty involved in the doing of it. + +'"Work in,"' repeated Herbert, like a rather blase child confronted with +a new mechanical toy; 'did I really say that? well, honestly, it wasn't +bad; it's what one would expect on that hypothesis. You see, we are +only different, as it were, in our differences. Once the foot's over the +threshold, it's nine points of the law! But I don't remember saying it.' +He shamefacedly and naively confessed it: 'I say such an awful lot of +things. And I'm always changing my mind. It's a standing joke against me +with my sister. She says the recording angel will have two sides to my +account: Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays; and Tuesdays, Thursdays, and +Saturdays--diametrically opposite convictions, and both kinds wrong. On +Sundays I am all things to all men. As for Sabathier, by the way, I +do want particularly to have another go at him. I've been thinking him +over, and I'm afraid in some ways he won't quite wash. And that reminds +me, did you read the poor chap?' + +'I just grubbed through a page or two; but most of my French was left at +school. What I did do, though, was to show the book to an old friend +of ours--my wife's and mine--just to skim--a Mr Bethany. He's an old +clergyman--our vicar, in fact.' + +Herbert had sat down, and with eyes slightly narrowed was listening with +peculiar attention. He smiled a little magnanimously. 'His verdict, I +should think, must have been a perfect joy.' + +'He said,' said Lawford, in his rather low, monotonous voice, 'he said +it was precious poor stuff, that it reminded him of patchouli; and that +Sabathier--the print I mean--looked like a foxy old roue. They were, I +think, his exact words. We were alone together, last night.' + +'You don't mean that he simply didn't see the faintest resemblance?' + +Lawford nodded. 'But then,' he added simply, 'whenever he comes to see +me now he leaves his spectacles at home.' + +And at that, as if at some preconcerted signal, they both went off into +a simple shout of laughter, unanimous and sustained. + +But this first wild bout of laughter over, the first real bursting of +the dam, perhaps, for years, Lawford found himself at a lower ebb than +ever. + +'You see,' he said presently, and while still his companion's face was +smiling around the remembrance of his laughter like ripples after the +splash of a stone, 'Bethany has been absolutely my sheet-anchor right +through. And I was--it was--you can't possibly realise what a ghastly +change it really was. I don't think any one ever will.' + +Herbert opened his hand and looked reflectively into its palm before +allowing himself to reply. 'I wonder, you know; I have been wondering a +good deal; simply taking the other point of view for a moment; WAS it? +I don't mean "ghastly" exactly (like, say, smallpox, G.P.I, +elephantiasis), but was it quite so complete, so radical, as in the +first sheer gust of astonishment you fancied?' + +Lawford thought on a little further. 'You know how one sees oneself in +a passion--why, how a child looks--the whole face darkened and drawn and +possessed? That was the change. That's how it seems to come back to me. +And something, somebody, dodging behind the eyes. Yes; more that than +even any excessive change of feature, except, of course, that I also +seemed--Shall I ever forget that first cold, stifling stare into the +looking-glass! I certainly was much darker, even my hair. But I've told +you all this before,' he added wearily, 'and the scores and scores of +times I've thought it. I used to sit up there in the big spare bedroom +my wife put me up in, simply gloating. My flesh seemed nothing more +than an hallucination: there I was, haunting my body, an old grinning +tenement, and all that I thought I wanted, and couldn't do without, all +I valued and prided myself on--stacked up in the drizzling street below. +Why, Herbert, our bodies are only glass or cloud. They melt, don't they, +like wax in the sun once we're out. But those first few days don't make +very pleasant thinking. Friday night was the first, when I sat there +like a twitching waxwork, soberly debating between Bedlam here and +Bedlam hereafter. I even sometimes wonder whether its very repetition +has not dulled the memory or distorted it. My wife,' he added +ingenuously, 'seems to think there are signs of a slight improvement--a +going back, I mean. But I'm not sure whether she meant it.' + +Herbert surveyed his visitor critically. 'You say "dark," he said; 'but +surely, Lawford, your hair now is nearly grey; well-flecked at least.' + +Although the remark carried nothing comparatively of a shock with it, +yet it seemed to Lawford as if an electric current had passed over his +scalp, coldly stirring every hair upon his head. But somehow or other it +was easier to sit quietly on, to express no surprise, to let them do or +say what they liked. 'Well' he retorted with an odd, crooked smile, 'you +must remember I am a good deal older than I was last Saturday. I grew +grey in the grave, Herbert.' + +'But it's like this, you know,' said Herbert, rising excitedly, and at +the next moment, on reflection, composedly reseating himself. 'How many +of your people actually saw it? How many owned to its being as bad, as +complete, as you made out? I don't want for a moment to cut right across +what you said last night--our talk--but there are two million sides +to every question, and as often as not the less conspicuous have +sounder--well--roots. That's all.' + +'I think really, do you know, I would rather not go over the detestable +thing again. Not many; my wife, though, and a man I know called Danton, +who--who's prejudiced. After all, I have myself to think about too. And +right through, right through--there wasn't the least doubt of that--they +all in their hearts knew it was me. They knew I was behind. I could feel +that absolutely always; it's not just eyes and ears we use, there's us +ourselves to consider, though God alone knows what that means. But +the password was there, as you might say; and they all knew I knew it, +all--except'--he looked up as if in bewilderment--'except just one, a +poor old lady, a very old friend of my mother's, whom I--I Sabathiered!' + +'Whom--you--Sabathiered!' repeated Herbert carefully, with infinite +relish, looking sidelong at his visitor. 'And it is just precisely +that....' + +But at that moment his sister appeared in the doorway to say that supper +was ready. And it was not until Herbert was actually engaged in carving +a cold chicken that he followed up his advantage. 'Mr. Lawford, Grisel,' +he said, 'has just enriched our jaded language with a new verb--to +Sabathier. And if I may venture to define it in the presence of +the distinguished neologist himself, it means, "To deal with +histrionically"; or, rather, that's what it will mean a couple of +hundred years hence. For the moment it means, "To act under the +influence of subliminalization; To perplex, or bemuse, or estrange +with OTHERNESS." Do tell us, Lawford, more about the little old lady.' +He passed with her plate a little meaningful glance at his sister, and +repeated, 'Do!' + +'But I've been plaguing your sister enough already. You'll wish...' +Lawford began, and turned his tired-out eyes towards those others +awaiting them so frankly they seemed in their perfect friendliness +a rest from all his troubles. 'You see,' he went on, 'what I kept on +thinking and thinking of was to get a quite unbiased and unprejudiced +view. She had known me for years, though we had not actually met more +than once or twice since my mother's death. And there she was sitting +with me at the other end of just such another little seat as'--he +turned--to Herbert 'as ours, at Widderstone. It was on Bewley Common: I +can see it all now; it was sunset. And I simply turned and asked her in +a kind of a whining affected manner if she remembered me; and when after +a long time she came round to owning that to all intents and purposes +she did not--I professed to have made a mistake in recognising her. I +think,' he added, glancing up from one to the other of his two strange +friends, 'I think it was the meanest trick I can remember.' + +'H'm,' said Herbert solemnly: 'I wish I had as sensitive a conscience. +But as your old friend didn't recognise you, who's the worse? As for her +not doing so, just think of the difference a few years makes to a man, +and any severe shock. Life wears so infernally badly. Who, for that +matter, does not change, even in character and yet who professes to see +it? Mind, I don't say in essence! But then how many of the human ghosts +one meets does one know in essence? One doesn't want to. It would +be positively cataclysmic. And that's what brings me around to feel, +Lawford, if I may venture to say so, that you may have brooded a little +too keenly on--on your own case. Tell any one you feel ill; he will +commiserate with you to positive nausea. Tell any priest your soul is +in danger; will he wait for proof? It's misereres and penances world +without end. Tell any woman you love her; will she, can she, should she, +gainsay you? There you are. The cat's out of the bag, you see. My sister +and I sat up half the night talking the thing over. I said I'd take the +plunge. I said I'd risk appearing the crassest, contradictoriest wretch +that ever drew breath. I don't deny that what I hinted at the other +night must seem in part directly contrary to what I'm going to say now.' + +He wheeled his black eyes as if for inspiration, and helped himself to +salad. 'It's this,' he said. 'Isn't it possible, isn't it even probable +that being ill, and overstrung, moping a little over things more or less +out of the common ruck, and sitting there in a kind of trance--isn't it +possible that you may have very largely IMAGINED the change? Hypnotised +yourself into believing it much worse--more profound, radical, +acute--and simply absolutely hypnotizing others into thinking so, too. +Christendom is just beginning to rediscover that there is such a thing +as faith, that it is just possible that, say, megrims or melancholia may +be removed at least as easily as mountains. The converse, of course, +is obvious on the face of it. A man fails because he thinks himself a +failure. It's the men that run away that lose the battle. Suppose then, +Lawford'--he leaned forward, keen and suave--'suppose you have been and +"Sabathiered" yourself!' + +Lawford had grown accustomed during the last few days to finding himself +gazing out like a child into reality, as if from the windows of a dream. +He had in a sense followed this long, loosely stitched, preliminary +argument; he had at least in part realised that he sat there between +two clear friendly minds acting in the friendliest and most obvious +collusion. But he was incapable of fixing his attention very closely +on any single fragment of Herbert's apology, or of rousing himself into +being much more than a dispassionate and not very interested spectator +of the little melodrama that Fate, it appeared, had at the last moment +decided rather capriciously to twist into a farce. He turned with a +smile to the face so keenly fixed and enthusiastic with the question it +had so laboriously led up to: 'But surely, I don't quite see...' + +Herbert lifted his glass as if to his visitor's acumen and set it down +again without tasting it. 'Why, my dear fellow,' he said triumphantly, +'even a dream must have a peg. Yours was this unforgettable old suicide. +Candidly now, how much of Sabathier was actually yours? In spite of all +that that fantastical fellow, Herbert, said last night, dead men DON'T +tell tales. The last place in the world to look for a ghost is where +his traitorous bones lie crumbling. Good heavens, think what irrefutable +masses of evidence there would be at our finger-tips if every tombstone +hid its ghost! No; the fellow just arrested you with his creepy +epitaph: an epitaph, mind you, that is in a literary sense distinctly +fertilizing. It catches one's fancy in its own crude way, as pages +and pages of infinitely more complicated stuff take possession of, +germinate, and sprout in one's imagination in another way. We are all +psychical parasites. Why, given his epitaph, given the surroundings, I +wager any sensitive consciousness could have guessed at his face; and +guessing, as it were, would have feigned it. What do you think, Grisel?' + +'I think, dear, you are talking absolute nonsense; what do they call +it--"darkening counsel"? It's "the hair of the dog," Mr Lawford.' + +'Well, then, you see,' said Herbert over a hasty mouthful, and turning +again to his victim--'then you see, when you were just in the pink of +condition to credit any idle tale you heard, then I came in. What, with +the least impetus, can one NOT see by moonlight? The howl of a dog turns +the midnight into a Brocken; the branch of a tree stoops out at you like +a Beelzebub crusted with gadflies. I'd, mind you, sipped of the deadly +old Huguenot too. I'd listened to your innocent prattle about the child +kicking his toes out on death's cupboard door; what more likely thing in +the world, then, than that with that moon, in that packed air, I should +have swallowed the bait whole, and seen Sabathier in every crevice of +your skin? I don't say there wasn't any resemblance; it was for the +moment extraordinary; it was even when you were here the other night +distinctly arresting. But now (poor old Grisel, I'm nearly done) all I +want to say is this: that if we had the "foxy old roue" here now, and +Grisel played Paris between the three of us, she'd hand over the apple +not to you but to me.' + +'I don't quite see where poor Paris comes in,' suggested Grisel meekly. + +'No, nor do I,' said Herbert. 'All that I mean, sagacious child, is, +that Mr Lawford no more resembles the poor wretch now than I resemble +the Apollo Belvedere. If you had only heard my sister scolding me, +railing at me for putting such ideas into your jangled head! They +don't affect ME one iota. I have, I suppose, what is usually called +imagination; which merely means that I can sup with the devil, spoon +for spoon, and could sleep in Bluebeard's linen-closet without turning +a hair. You, if I am not very much mistaken, are not much troubled with +that very unprofitable quality, and so, I suppose, when a crooked and +bizarre fancy does edge into your mind it roots there.' + +And that said, not without some little confusion, and covert glance of +inquiry at his sister, Herbert made all the haste he could to catch up +the course that his companions had already finished. + +If only, Lawford thought, this insufferable weariness would lift awhile +he could enjoy the quiet, absurd, heedless talk, and this very friendly +topsy-turvy effort to ease his mind and soothe his nerves. He might even +take an interest again in his 'case.' + +'You see,' he said, turning to Grisel, 'I don't think it really very +much matters how it all came about. I never could believe it would last. +It may perhaps--some of it at least may be fancy. But then, what isn't? +What is trustworthy? And now your brother tells me my hair's turning +grey. I suppose I have been living too slowly, too sluggishly, and they +thought it was high time to stir me up.' + +He saw with extraordinary vividness the low panelled room; the still +listening face; the white muslin shoulders and dark hair; and the +eyes that seemed to recall some far-off desolate longing for home and +childhood. It was all a dream. That was the end of the matter. Even now, +perhaps, his tired old stupid body was lying hunched up, drenched with +dew upon the little old seat under the mist-wreathed branches. Soon it +would bestir itself and wake up and go off home--home to Sheila, to the +old deadly round that once had seemed so natural and inevitable, to the +old dull Lawford--eyes and brain and heart. + +They returned up the dark shallow staircase to Herbert's book-room, and +he talked on to very quiet and passive listeners in his own fantastic +endless fashion. And ever and again Lawford would find himself +intercepting fleeting and anxious glances at his face, glances almost +of remorse and pity; and thought he detected beneath this irresponsible +contradictory babble an unceasing effort to clear the sky, to lure away +too pressing memories, to put his doubts and fears completely to rest. + +Herbert even went so far as to plead guilty, when Grisel gave him the +cue, of having a little heightened and overcoloured his story of +the restless phantasmal old creature that haunted their queer wooden +hauntable old house. And when they rose, laughing and yawning to take +up their candles, it was, after all, after a rather animated discussion, +with many a hair-raising ghost story brought in for proof between +brother and sister, as to exactly how many times that snuff-coloured +spectre had made his appearance; and, with less unanimity still, as +to the precise manner in which he was in the habit of making his +precipitant exit. + +'You do at any rate acknowledge, Grisel, that the old creature does +appear, and that you saw him yourself step out into space when you were +sitting down there under the willow shelling peas. I've seen him twice +for certain, once rather hazily; Sallie saw him so plainly she asked his +business: that's five. I resign.' + +'Acknowledge!' said Grisel; 'of course I do. I'd acknowledge anything in +the world to save argument. Why, I don't know what I should do without +him. If only, now Mr Lawford would give him a fair chance to show +himself reading quietly here about ten minutes to one, or shelling peas +even, if he prefers it. If only he'd stay long enough for THAT. Wouldn't +it be the very thing for them both!' + +'Of course,' said Herbert cordially, 'the very thing.' + +Lawford looked up at neither of them. He shook his head. + +But he needed little persuasion to stay at least one night. The prospect +of that long solitary walk, of that tired stupid stooping figure +dragging itself along the interminable country roads seemed a sheer +impossibility. 'It is not--it isn't, I swear it--the other that beeps me +back,' he had solemnly assured the friend that half smiled her relief at +his acceptance, 'but--if you only knew how empty it's all got now; all +reason gone even to go on at all.' + +'But doesn't it follow? Of course it's empty. And now life is going +to begin again. I assure you it is, I do indeed. Only, only have +courage--just the will to win on.' + +He said good-night; shut-to the latched door of his long low room, +ceilinged with rafters close under the steep roof, its brown walls hung +with quiet, dark, pondering and beautiful faces looking gravely across +at him. And with his candle in his hand he sat down on the bedside. All +speculation was gone. The noisy clock of his brain had run down again. +He turned towards the old oval looking-glass on the dressing-table +without the faintest stirring of interest, suspense, or anxiety. What +did it matter what a man looked like--a now familiar but enfeebled and +deprecating voice seemed to say. He knew that a change had come. Even +Sheila had noticed it. And since then what had he not gone through? What +now was here seemed of little moment, so far at least as this world was +concerned. + +At last with an effort he rose, crossed the uneven floor, and looked in +unmovedly on what was his own poor face come back to him: changed indeed +almost beyond belief from the sleek self-satisfied genial yet languid +Arthur Lawford of the past years, and still haunted with some faint +trace of the set and icy sharpness, and challenge, and affront of the +dark Adventurer, but that--how immeasurably dimmed and blunted and +faded. He had expected to find it so. Would it (the thought vanished +across his mind) would it have been as unmistakably there had he +come hot-foot, fearing, expecting to find the other? But--was he +disappointed! + +He hardly knew how long he stood there, leaning on his hands, surveying +almost listlessly in the candle-light that lined, bedraggled, grey, +hopeless countenance, those dark-socketed, smouldering eyes, whose +pupils even now were so dilated that a casual glance would have failed +to detect the least hint of any iris. 'It must have been something +pretty bad you were, you know, or something pretty bad you did,' they +seemed to be trying to say to him, 'to drag us down to this.' + +He knelt down by force of habit to say his prayers; but no words came. +Well, between earthly friends a betrayal such as this would have caused +a livelong estrangement and hostility. The God the old Lawford used to +pray to would forgive him, he thought wearily, if just for the present +he was a little too sore at heart to play the hypocrite. But if, +while kneeling, he said nothing, he saw a good many things in such +tranquillity and clearness as the mere eyes of the body can share but +rarely with their sisters of the imagination. And now it was Alice +who looked mournfully out of the dark at him; and now the little old +charwoman, Mrs Gull, with her bag hooked over her arm, climbed painfully +up the area steps; and now it was the lean vexed face of a friend, +nursing some restless and anxious grievance against him--Mr Bethany; +and then and ever again it was the face of one who seemed pure dream and +fantasy and yet... He listened intently and fancied even now he could +hear the voices of brother and sister talking quietly and circumspectly +together in the room beneath. + + + +CHAPTER EIGHTEEN + +A quiet knocking aroused him in the long, tranquil bedroom; and +Herbert's head was poked into the room. 'There's a bath behind that door +over there,' he whispered, `or if you like I'm off for a bathe in the +Widder. It's a luscious day. Shall I wait? All right,' and the head was +withdrawn. 'Don't put much on,' came the voice at the panel; 'we'll be +home again in twenty minutes.' + +The green and brightness of the morning must have been prepared for +overnight by spiders and the dew. Everywhere the gleaming nets were +hung, and everywhere there rose a tiny splendour from the waterdrops, so +clear and pure and changeable it seemed with their fire and colour +they shook a tiny crystal music in the air. Herbert led the way along a +clayey downward path beneath hazels tossing softly together their twigs +of nuts, until they came out into a rounded hollow that, mounded with +thyme, sloped gently down to the green banks of the Widder. The water +poured like clearest glass beneath a rain of misty sunbeams. + +'My sister always says that this is the very dell Boccaccio had in his +mind's eye when he wrote the "Decameron." There really is something +almost classic in those pines. And I'd sometimes swear with my eyes just +out of the water I've seen Dryads half in hiding peeping between those +beeches. Good Lord, Lawford, what a world we wretched moderns have made, +and missed!' + +The water was violently cold. It seemed to Lawford, as it swept up over +his body, and as he plunged his night-distorted eyes beneath its blazing +surface, that it was charged with some strange, powerful enchantment to +wash away in its icy clearness even the memory of the dull and tarnished +days behind him. If one could but tie up anyhow that stained bundle of +inconsequent memories called life, and fling it into a cupboard remoter +even than Bluebeard's, and lock the door, and drop the quickly-rusting +key into these living waters! + +He dressed himself with window thrown open to the blackbirds and +thrushes, and the occasional shrill solitary whistling of a robin. But, +like the sour-sweet fragrance of the brier, its wandering desolate burst +of music had power to wake memory, and carried him instantly back to +that first aimless descent into the evening gloom of Widderstone from +which it was in vain to hope ever to climb again. Surely never a more +ghoulish face looked out on its man before than that which confronted +him as with borrowed razor he stood shaving those sunken chaps, that +angular chin. + +And even now, beneath the lantern of broad daylight, just as within that +other face had lurked the undeniable ghost and presence of himself, so +beneath the sunken features seemed to float, tenuous as smoke, scarcely +less elusive than a dream, between eye and object, the sinister darkness +of the face that in those two bouts with fear he had by some strange +miracle managed to repel. + +'Work in,' the chance phrase came back. It had worked in in sober +earnest; and so far as the living of the next few weeks went, surely it +might prove an ally without which he simply could not conceive himself +as struggling on at all. + +But as dexterous minds as even restless Sabathier's had him just now in +safe and kindly keeping. All the quiet October morning Herbert kept him +talking and stooping over his extraordinary collection of books. + +'The point is,' he explained to Lawford, standing amid a positive +archipelago of precious 'finds,' with his foot hoisted onto a chair and +a patched-up, sea-stained folio on his knee, 'I honestly detest the mere +give and take of what we are fools enough to call life. I don't deny +Life's there,' he swept his hand towards the open window--'in that +frantic Tophet we call London; but there's no focus, no point of +vantage. Even a scribbler only gets it piecemeal and through a dulled +medium. We learn to read before we know how to see; we swallow our +tastes, convictions, and emotions whole; so that nine-tenths of the +world's nectar is merely honeydew.' He smiled pleasantly into the +fixed vacancy of his visitor's face. 'That's why I've just gone on,' he +continued amiably, 'collecting this particular kind of stuff--what you +might call riff-raff. There's not a book here, Lawford, that hasn't +at least a glimmer of the real thing in it--just Life, seen through +a living eye, and felt. As for literature, and style, and all that +gallimaufry, don't fear for them if your author has the ghost of a hint +of genius in his making.' + +'But surely,' said Lawford, trying for the twentieth time to pretend +to himself that these endless books carried the faintest savour of the +delight to him which they must, he rather forlornly supposed, shower +upon Herbert, 'surely genius is a very rare thing!' + +'Rare! the world simply swarms with it. But before you can bottle it up +in a book it's got to be articulate. Just for a single instant imagine +yourself Falstaff, and if there weren't hundreds of Falstaffs in every +generation, to be examples of his ungodly life, he'd be as dead as a +doornail to-morrow--imagine yourself Falstaff, and being so, +sitting down to write "Henry IV," or "The Merry Wives." It's simply +preposterous. You wouldn't be such a fool as to waste the time. A mere +Elizabethan scribbler comes along with a gift of expression and an +observant eye, lifts the bloated old tippler clean out of life, and +swims down the ages as the greatest genius the world has ever seen. +Whereas, surely, though you mustn't let me bore you with all this +piffle, it's Falstaff is the genius, and W. S. merely a talented +reporter. + +'Lear, Macbeth, Mercutio--they live on their own, as it were. The +newspapers are full of them, if we were only the Shakespeares to see it. +Have you ever been in a Police Court? Have you ever WATCHED tradesmen +behind their counters? My soul, the secrets walking in the streets! You +jostle them at every corner. There's a Polonius in every first-class +railway carriage, and as many Juliets as there are boarding-schools. +What the devil are you, my dear chap, but genius itself, with all the +world brand new upon your shoulders? And who'd have thought it of you +ten days ago? + +'It's simply and solely because we're all, poor wretches, dumb--dumb as +butts of Malmsez; dumb as drummerless drums. Here am I, ass that I am, +trickling out this--this whey that no more expresses me than Tupper +does Sappho. But that's what I want to mean. How inexhaustibly rich +everything is, if you only stick to life. Here it is packed away behind +these rotting covers, just the real thing, no respectable stodge; no +mere parasitic stuff; not more than a dozen poets; scores of outcasts +and vagabonds--and the real thing in vagabonds is pretty rare in print, +I can tell you. We're all, every one of us, sodden with facts, drugged +with the second-hand, and barnacled with respectability until--until the +touch comes. Goodness knows where from; but there's no mistaking it; oh +no!' + +'But what,' said Lawford uneasily, 'what on earth do you mean by the +touch?' + +'I mean when you cease to be a puppet only and sit up in the gallery +too. When you squeeze through to the other side. When you suffer a kind +of conversion of the mind; become aware of your senses. When you get a +living inkling. When you become articulate to yourself. When you SEE.' + +'I am awfully stupid,' Lawford murmured, 'but even now I don't really +follow you a bit. But when, as you say, you do become articulate to +yourself, what happens then?' + +'Why, then,' said Herbert with a shrug almost of despair, 'then +begins the weary tramp back. One by one drop off the truisms, and the +Grundyisms, and the pedantries, and all the stillborn claptrap of the +marketplace sloughs off. Then one can seriously begin to think about +saving one's soul.' + +'Saving one's soul,' groaned Lawford; 'why, I am not even sure of my own +body yet.' He walked slowly over to the window and with every thought in +his head as quiet as doves on a sunny wall, stared out into the garden +of green things growing, leaves fading and falling water. 'I tell you +what,' he said, turning irresolutely, 'I wonder if you could possibly +find time to write me out a translation of Sabathier. My French is much +too hazy to let me really get at the chap. He's gone now; but I really +should like to know what kind of stuff exactly he has left behind.' + +'Oh, Sabathier!' said Herbert, laughing. 'What do you think of that, +Grisel?' he asked, turning to his sister, who at that moment had looked +in at the door. 'Here's Mr Lawford asking me to make a translation of +Sabathier. Lunch, Lawford.' + +Lawford sighed. And not until he had slowly descended half the narrow +uneven stairs that led down to the dining-room did he fully realise the +guile of a sister that could induce a hopeless bookworm to waste a whole +morning over the stupidest of companions, simply to keep his tired-out +mind from rankling, and give his Sabathier a chance to go to roost. + +'I think, do you know,' he managed to blurt out at last 'I think I ought +to be getting home again. The house is empty--and--' + +'You shall go this evening,' said Herbert, 'if you really must insist +on it. But honestly, Lawford, we both think that after what the last few +days must have been, it is merely common sense to take a rest. How can +you possibly rest with a dozen empty rooms echoing every thought you +think? There's nothing more to worry about; you agree to that. Send +your people a note saying that you are here, safe and sound. Give them a +chance of lighting a fire, and driving in the fatted calf. Stay on with +us just the week out.' + +Lawford turned from one to the other of the two friendly faces. But what +was dimly in his mind refused to express itself. 'I think, you know, +I--' he began falteringly. + +'But it's just this thinking that's the deuce--this preposterous habit +of having continually to make up one's mind. Off with his head, Grisel! +My sister's going to take you for a picnic; we go every other fine +afternoon; and you can argue it out with her.' + +Once alone again with Grisel, however, Lawford found talking +unnecessary. Silences seemed to fall between them as quietly and +restfully as evening flows into night. They walked on slowly through the +fading woods, and when they had reached the top of the hill that sloped +down to the dark and foamless Widder they sat down in the honey-scented +sunshine on a knoll of heather and bracken, and Grisel lighted the +little spirit-kettle she had brought with her, and busied herself very +methodically over making tea. + +That done, she clasped her hands round her knees, and sat now gossiping, +now silent, in the pale autumnal beauty. There was a bird wistfully +twittering in the branches overhead, and ever and again a withered leaf +would slip circling down from the motionless beech boughs arched in +their stillness above their heads beneath the thin blue sky. + +'Men, you know,' she began again suddenly, starting out of reverie, +'really are absurdly blind; and just a little bit absurdly kindly +stupid. How many times have I been at the point of laughing out at my +brother's delicious naive subtleties. But you do, you will, understand, +Mr Lawford, that he was, that we are both "doing our best"--to make +amends?' + + +'I understand--I do indeed--a tenth part of all your kindness.' + +'Yes, but that's just it--that horrible word "kindness"! If ever there +were two utterly self-absorbed people, without a trace, with an absolute +horror of kindness, it is just my brother and I. It's most of it false +and most of it useless. We all surely must take what comes in this +topsy-turvy world. I believe in saying out:--that the more one thinks +about life the worse it becomes. There are only two kinds of happiness +in this world--a wooden post's and Prometheus's. And who ever heard +of any one having the impudence to be kind to Prometheus? As for a +miserable "medium" like me, not quite a post and leagues and leagues +from even envying a Prometheus, she's better for the powder without the +jam. But that's all nothing. What I can't help thinking--and it's not a +bit giving my brother away, because we both think it--that it was partly +our thoughtlessness that added at least something to--to the rest. It +was perfectly absurd. He saw you were ill; he saw--he must have seen +even in that first Sunday talk--that your nerves were all askew. And +who doesn't know what "nerves" means nowadays? And yet he deliberately +chattered. He loves it--just at large, you know, like me. I told him +before I came out that I intended, if I could, to say all this. And now +it's said you'll please forgive me for going back to it.' + +'Please don't talk about forgiveness. But when you say he chattered, you +mean about Sabathier, of course. And that, you know, I don't care a fig +for now. We can settle all that between ourselves--him and me, I mean. +And now tell me candidly again--Is there any "prey" in my face now?' + +She looked up fleetingly into his eyes, leant back her head and laughed. +'"Prey," there never was a glimpse.' + +'And "change"?' Their eyes met again in an infinitely brief, infinitely +bewildering argument. + +'Really, really, scarcely perceptible,' she assured him, 'except, of +course, how horribly, horribly ill you look. And that only seems to +prove to me you must be hiding something else. No illusion on earth +could--could have done that to your face.' + +'You think, I know,' he persisted, 'that I must be persuaded and +cosseted and humoured. Yes, you do; it's my poor old sanity that's +really in both your minds. Perhaps I am--not absolutely sound. Anyhow. +I've been watching it in your looks at each other all the time. And I +can never, never say, never tell you what you have done for me. But you +see, after all, we did win through; I keep on telling myself that. So +that now it's purely from the most selfish and practical motives that I +want you to be perfectly frank with me. I have to go back, you know; and +some of them, one or two of my friends I mean, are not all on my side. +Think of me as I was when you came into the room, three centuries ago, +and you turned and looked, frowning at me in the candle-light; remember +that and look at me now. What is the difference? Does it shock you? Does +it make the whole world seem a trick, a sham? Does it simply sour your +life to think such a thing possible? Oh, the hours I've spent gloating +on Widderstone's miserable mask of skin and bone, as I was saying to +your brother only last night, and never knew until they shuffled me that +the old self too was nothing better than a stifling suffocating mask.' + +'But don't you see,' she argued softly, turning her face away a little, +'you were a stranger then (though I certainly didn't mean to frown). And +then a little while after we were, well, just human beings, shoulder +to shoulder, and if friendship does not mean that, I don't know what it +does mean. And now, you are--well, just you: the you, you know, of three +centuries ago! And if you mean to ask me whether at any precise moment +I have been conscious that this you I am now speaking to was not the +you of last night, or of that dark climb up the hill, why, it is simply +frantic to think it could ever be necessary to say over and over again, +No. But if you mean, Have you changed else? All I could answer is, Don't +we all change as we grow to know one another? What were just features, +what just dingily represented one, as it were, is forgotten, or rather +gets remembered. Of course, the first glimpse is the landscape under +lightning as it were. But afterwards isn't it surely like the alphabet +to a child; what was first a queer angular scrawl becomes A, and is +always ever after A, undistinguished, half-forgotten, yet standing at +last for goodness knows what real wonderful things--or for just the dry +bones of soulless words? Is that it?' She stole a sidelong glance into +his brooding face, leaning her head on her hand. + +'Yes, yes,' came the rather dissatisfied reply. 'I do agree; perfectly. +But then, you see--I told you I was going to talk of nothing but +myself--what did at first happen to me was something much worse, and, I +suppose, something quite different from that.' + +'And yet, didn't you tell us, that of all your friends not one really +denied in their hearts your--what they would call, I suppose--your +IDENTITY; except that poor little offended old lady. And even she, if my +intuition is worth a penny piece, even she when you go soon and talk to +her will own that she did know you, and that it was not because you +were a stranger that she was offended, but because you so ungenerously +pretended to be one. That was a little mad, now, if you like!' + +'Oh yes,' said Lawford, 'I am going to ask her forgiveness. I don't know +what I didn't vow to take her for a peace-offering if the chance should +ever come--and the courage--to make my peace with her. But now that the +chance has come, and I think the courage, it is the desire that's gone. +I don't seem to care either way. I feel as if I had got past making my +peace with any one.' + +But this time no answer helped him out. + +'After all,' he went plodding on, 'there is more than just the mere day +to day to consider. And one doesn't realise that one's face actually +IS one's fortune without a shock. And that THAT gone, one is, as +your brother said, just like a bee come back to the wrong hive. It +undermines,' he smiled rather bitterly, 'one's views rather. And it +certainly shifts one's friends. If it hadn't been just for my old'--he +stopped dead, and again pushed slowly on--'if it hadn't been for our +old friend, Mr Bethany, I doubt if we should now have had a soul on our +side. I once read somewhere that wolves always chase the old and weak +and maimed out of the pack. And after all, what do we do? Where do +we keep the homeless and the insane? And yet, you know,' he added +ruminatingly, 'it is not as if mine was ever a particularly lovely or +lovable face! While as for the poor wretch behind it, well, I really +cannot see what meaning, or life even, he had before--' + +'Before?' + +Lawford met bravely the clear whimsical eyes. 'Before, I was +Sabathiered.' + +Grisel laughed outright. + +'You think,' he retorted almost bitterly, 'you think I am talking like a +child.' + +'Yes,' she sighed cheerfully, 'I was quite envying you.' + +'Well, there I am,' said Lawford inconsequently. 'And now; well, now, +I suppose, the whole thing's to begin again. I can't help beginning to +wonder what the meaning of it all is; why one's duty should always seem +so very stupid a thing. And then, too, what can there be on earth +that even a buried Sabathier could desire?' He glanced up in a really +animated perplexity at the still, dark face turned in the evening light +towards the darkening valley. And perplexity deepened into a disquieted +frown--like that of a child who is roused suddenly from a daydream by +the half-forgotten question of a stranger. He turned his eyes almost +furtively away as if afraid of disturbing her; and for awhile they sat +in silence... At last he turned again almost shyly. 'I hope some day you +will let me bring my daughter to see you.' + +'Yes, yes,' said Grisel eagerly; 'we should both LOVE it, of course. +Isn't it curious?--I simply KNEW you had a daughter. Sheer intuition!' + +'I say "some day,"' said Lawford; 'I know, though, that that some day +will never come.' + +'Wait; just wait,' replied the quiet confident voice, 'that will come +too. One thing at a time, Mr Lawford. You've won your old self back +again; you'll win your old love of life back again in a little while; +never fear. Oh, don't I know that awful Land's End after illness; and +that longing, too, that gnawing longing, too, for Ultima Thule. So, +it's a bargain between us that you bring your daughter soon.' She busied +herself over the tea things. 'And, of course,' she added, as if it were +an afterthought, looking across at him in the pale green sunlight as she +knelt, 'you simply won't think of going back to-night.... Solitude, I +really do think, solitude just now would be absolute madness. You'll +write to-day and go, perhaps, to-morrow!' + +Lawford looked across in his mind at his square ungainly house, +full-fronting the afternoon sun. He tried to repress a shudder. 'I +think, do you know, I ought to go to-day.' + +'Well, why not? Why not? Just to reassure yourself that all's well. And +come back here to sleep. If you'd really promise that I'd drive you in. +I'd love it. There's the jolliest little governess-cart we sometimes +hire for our picnics. Way I? You've no idea how much easier in our minds +my brother and I would be if you would. And then to-morrow, or at any +rate the next day, you shall be surrendered, whole and in your right +mind. There, that's a bargain too. Now we must hurry.' + + + +CHAPTER NINETEEN + +Herbert himself went down to order the governess cart, and packed them +in with a rug. And in the dusk Grisel set Lawford down at the corner of +his road and drove on to an old bookseller's with a commission from her +brother, promising to return for him in an hour. Dust and a few straws +lay at rest as if in some abstruse arrangement on the stones of the +porch just as the last faint whirling gust of sunset had left them. Shut +lids of sightless indifference seemed to greet the wanderer from the +curtained windows. + +He opened the door and went in. For a moment he stood in the vacant +hall; then he peeped first into the blind-drawn dining-room, faintly, +dingily sweet, like an empty wine-bottle. He went softly on a few paces +and just opening the door looked in on the faintly glittering twilight +of the drawing-room. But the congealed stump of candle that he had set +in the corner as a final rancorous challenge to the beaten Shade was +gone. He slowly and deliberately ascended the stairs, conscious of a +peculiar sense of ownership of what in even so brief an absence had +taken on so queer a look of strangeness. It was almost as if he might be +some lone heir come in the rather mournful dusk to view what melancholy +fate had unexpectedly bestowed on him. + +'Work in'--what on earth else could this chill sense of strangeness +mean? Would he ever free his memory from that one haphazard, haunting +hint? And as he stood in the doorway of the big, calm room, which seemed +even now to be stirring with the restless shadow of these last few +far-away days; now pacing sullenly to and fro; now sitting hunched-up to +think; and now lying impotent in a vain, hopeless endeavour only for the +breath of a moment to forget--he awoke out of reverie to find himself +smiling at the thought that a changed face was practically at the mercy +of an incredulous world, whereas a changed heart was no one's deadly +dull affair but its owner's. The merest breath of pity even stole over +him for the Sabathier who after all had dared and had needed, perhaps, +nothing like so arrogant and merciless a coup de grace to realise that +he had so ignominiously failed. + +'But there, that's done!' he exclaimed out loud, not without a tinge of +regret that theories, however brilliant and bizarre, could never now be +anything else--that now indeed that the symptoms had gone, the 'malady,' +for all who had not been actually admitted into the shocked circle, +was become nothing more than an inanely 'tall' story; stuffing not +even savoury enough for a goose. How wide exactly, he wondered, would +Sheila's discreet, shocked circle prove? He stood once more before the +looking-glass, hearing again Grisel's words in the still green shadow +of the beech-tree, 'Except of course, horribly, horribly ill.' 'What a +fool, what a coward she thinks I am!' + +There was still nearly an hour to be spent in this great barn of faded +interests. He lit a candle and descended into the kitchen. A mouse went +scampering to its hole as he pushed open the door. The memory of that +ravenous morning meal nauseated him. It was sour and very still here; +he stood erect; the air smelt faint of earth. In the breakfast-room the +bookcase still swung open. Late evening mantled the garden; and in +sheer ennui again he sat down to the table, and turned for a last not +unfriendly hob-a-nob with his poor old friend Sabathier. He would take +the thing back. Herbert, of course, was going to translate it for him. +Now if the patient old Frenchman had stormed Herbert instead--that +surely would have been something like a coup! Those frenzied books. +The absurd talk of the man. Herbert was perfectly right--he could have +entertained fifty old Huguenots without turning a hair. 'I'm such an +awful stodge.' + +He turned the woolly leaves over very slowly. He frowned impatiently, +and from the end backwards turned them over again. Then he laid the book +softly down on the table and sat back. He stared with narrowed lids +into the flame of his quiet friendly candle. Every trace, every shred of +portrait and memoir were gone. Once more, deliberately, punctiliously, +he examined page by page the blurred and unfamiliar French--the sooty +heads, the long, lean noses, the baggy eyes passing like figures in +a peepshow one by one under his hand--to the last fragmentary and +dexterously mended leaf. Yes, Sabathier was gone. Quite the old slow +Lawford smile crept over his face at the discovery. It was a smile a +little sheepish too, as he thought of Sheila's quiet vigilance. + +And the next instant he had looked up sharply, with a sudden peculiar +shrug, and a kind of cry, like the first thin cry of an awakened child, +in his mind. Without a moment's hesitation he climbed swiftly upstairs +again to the big sepulchral bedroom. He pressed with his fingernail the +tiny spring in the looking-glass. The empty drawer flew open. There were +finger-marks still in the dust. + +Yet, strangely enough, beneath all the clashing thoughts that came +flocking into his mind as he stood with the empty drawer in his hand, +was a wounding yet still a little amused pity for his old friend Mr +Bethany. So far as he himself was concerned the discovery--well, he +would have plenty of time to consider everything that could possibly now +concern himself. Anyhow, it could only simplify matters. + +He remembered waking to that old wave of sickening horror on the first +unhappy morning; he remembered the keen yet owlish old face blinking +its deathless friendliness at him, and the steady pressure of the cold, +skinny hand. As for Sheila, she had never done anything by halves; +certainly not when it came to throwing over a friend no longer +necessary to one's social satisfaction. But she would edge out cleverly, +magnanimously, triumphantly enough, no doubt, when the day of reckoning +should come, the day when, her nets wide spread, her bait prepared, he +must stand up before her outraged circle and positively prove himself +her lawful husband, perhaps even to the very imprint of his thumb. + +'Poor old thing!' he said again; and this time his pity was shared +almost equally between both witnesses to Mr Bethany's ingenuous little +document, the loss of which had fallen so softly and pathetically that +he felt only ashamed of having discovered it so soon. + +He shut back the tell-tale drawer, and after trying to collect his +thoughts in case anything should have been forgotten, he turned with a +deep trembling sigh to descend the stairs. But on the landing he drew +back at the sound of voices, and then a footstep. Soon came the sound of +a key in the lock. He blew out his candle and leant listening over the +balusters. + +'Who's there?' he called quietly. + +'Me, sir,' came the feeble reply out of the darkness. + +'What is it, Ada? What have you come for?' + +'Only, sir, to see that all was safe, and you were in, sir.' + +'Yes,' he said. 'All's safe; and I am in. What if I had been out?' It +was like dropping tiny pebbles into a deep well--so long after came the +answering feeble splash. + +'Then I was to go back, sir.' And a moment after the discreet voice +floated up with the faintest tinge of effrontery out of the hush. 'Is +that Dr Ferguson, too sir?' + +'No, Ada; and please tell your mistress from me that Dr Ferguson is +unlikely to call again.' A keen but rather forlorn smile passed over his +face. 'He's dining with friends no doubt at Holloway. But of course if +she should want to see him he will see her to-morrow at any hour at Mrs +Lovat's. And--Ada!' + +'Yes, sir?' + +'Say that I'm a little better; your mistress will be relieved to hear +that I'm a little better; still not quite myself say, but, I think, a +little better.' + +'Yes, sir; and I'm sure I'm very glad to hear it,' came fainter still. + +'What voice was that I heard just now?' + +'Miss Alice's, sir; but she came quite against my wishes, and I hope you +won't repeat it, sir. She promised if she came that mistress shouldn't +know. I was only afraid she might disturb you, or--or Dr Ferguson. And +did you say, sir, that I was to tell mistress that he MIGHT be coming +back?' + +'Ah, that I don't know; so perhaps it would be as well not to mention +him at all. Is Miss Alice there?' + +'I said I would tell her if you were alone. But I hope you'll understand +that it was only because she begged so. Mistress has gone to St Peter's +bazaar; and that's how it was.' + +'I quite understand. Beckon to her.' + +There came a hasty step in the hall and a hurried murmur of explanation. +Lawford heard her call as she ran up the stairs; and the next moment +he had Alice's hand in his and they were groping together through the +gloaming back into the solitude of the empty room again. + +'Don't be alarmed, dear,' he heard himself imploring. Just hold tight +to that clear common sense, and above all you won't tell? It must be our +secret; a dead, dead secret from every one, even your mother, for just +a little while; just a mere two days or so--in case. I'm--I'm better, +dear.' + +He fumbled with the little box of matches, dropped one, broke another; +but at last the candle-flame dipped, brightened, and with the door shut +and the last pale blueness of dusk at the window Lawford turned and +looked at his daughter. She stood with eyes wide open, like the eyes +of a child walking in its sleep; then twisted her fingers more tightly +within his. 'Oh, dearest, how ill, how ill you look,' she whispered. +'But there, never mind--never mind. It was all a miserable dream, then; +it won't, it can't come back? I don't think I could bear its coming +back. And mother told me such curious things; as if I were a child and +understood nothing. And even after I knew that you were you--I mean +before I sat up here in the dark to see you--she said that you were +gone and would never come back; that a terrible thing had happened--a +disgrace which we must never speak of; and that all the other was only +a pretence to keep people from talking. But I did not believe then, and +how could I believe afterwards?' + +'There, never mind now, dear, what she said. It was all meant for the +best, perhaps. But here I am; and not nearly so ill as I look, Alice; +and there's nothing more to trouble ourselves about; not even if it +should be necessary for me to go away for a time. And this is our +secret, mind; ours only; just a dead secret between you and me.' + +They sat for awhile without speaking or stirring. And faintly along the +hushed road Lawford heard in the silence a leisurely indolent beat of +little hoofs approaching, and the sound of wheels. A sudden wave of +feeling swept over him. He took Alice's quiet loving face in his hands +and kissed her passionately. 'Do not so much as think of me yet, or +doubt, or question: only love me, dearest. And soon--and soon--' + +'We'll just begin again, just begin again, won't we? all three of us +together, just as we used to be. I didn't mean to have said all those +horrid things about mother. She was only dreadfully anxious and meant +everything for the best. You'll let me tell her soon?' + +The haggard face turned slowly, listening. 'I hear, I understand, but +I can't think very clearly now, Alice; I can't, dear; my miserable old +tangled nerves. I just stumble along as best I can. You'll understand +better when you get to be a poor old thing like me. We must do the best +we can. And of course you'll see, Dillie, how awfully important it is +not to raise false hopes. You understand? I mustn't risk the least thing +in the world, must I? And now goodbye; only for a few hours now. And not +a word, not a word to a single living soul.' + +He extinguished the candle again, and led the way to the top of the +stairs. 'Are you there, Ada?' + +'Yes, sir,' answered the quiet imperturbable voice from under the black +straw brim. Alice went slowly down, but at the foot of the stairs, +looking out into the cold, blue, lamplit street she paused as if at a +sudden recollection, and ran hastily up again. + +'There was nothing more, dear?' She said, leaning back to peer up. + +'"Nothing more?" What?' + +She stood panting a little in the darkness, listening to some cautious +yet uneasy thought that seemed to haunt her mind. 'I thought--it seemed +there was something we had not said, something I could not understand. +But there, it is nothing! You know what a fanciful old silly I am. You +do love me? Quite as much as ever?' + +'More, sweetheart, more!' + +'Good-night again, then; and God bless you, dear.' + +The outer door closed softly, the footsteps died away. Lawford still +hesitated. He took hold of the stairs above his head as he stood on +the landing and leaned his head upon his hands, striving calmly to +disentangle the perplexity of his thoughts. His pulses were beating in +his ear with a low muffled roar. He looked down between the blinds to +where against the blue of the road beneath the straggling yellow beams +of the lamp stood the little cart and drooping, shaggy pony, and Grisel +sitting quietly there awaiting him. He shut his eyes as if in hope by +some convulsive effort of mind to break through this subtle glasslike +atmosphere of dream that had stolen over consciousness, and blotted out +the significance, almost the meaning of the past. He turned abruptly. +Empty as the empty rooms around him, unanswering were mind and heart. +Life was a tale told by an idiot--signifying nothing. + +He paused at the head of the staircase. And even then the doubt +confronted him: Would he ever come back? Who knows? he thought; and +again stood pondering, arguing, denying. At last he seemed to have come +to a decision. He made his way downstairs, opened and left ajar a long +narrow window in a passage to the garden beyond the kitchen. He turned +on his heel as he reached the gate and waved his hand as if in a kind of +forlorn mockery towards the darkly glittering windows. The drowsy pony +awoke at touch of the whip. + +Grisel lifted the rug and squeezed a little closer into the corner. She +had drawn a veil over her face, so that to Lawford her eyes seemed to +be dreaming in a little darkness of their own as he laid his hand on +the side of the cart. 'It's a most curious thing,' he said, 'but peeping +down at you just now when the sound of the wheels came, a memory came +clearly back to me of years and years ago--of my mother. She used to +come to fetch me at school in a little cart like this, and a little +pony just like this, with a thick dusty coat. And once I remember I was +simply sick of everything, a failure, and fagged out, and all that, and +was looking out in the twilight; I fancy even it was autumn too. It was +a little side staircase window; I was horribly homesick. And she came +quite unexpectedly. I shall never forget it--the misery, and then, her +coming.' He lifted his eyes, cowed with the incessant struggle, and +watched her face for some time in silence. 'Ought I to stay?' + +'I see no "ought,"' she said. 'No one is there?' + +'Only a miserable broken voice out of a broken cage--called Conscience.' + +'Don't you think, perhaps, that even that has a good many +disguises--convention, cowardice, weakness, ennui; they all take their +turn at hooting in its feathers? You must, you really must have rest. +You don't know; you don't see; I do. Just a little snap, some one last +exquisite thread gives way, and then it is all over. You see I have even +to try to frighten you, for I can't tell you how you distress me.' + +'Why do I distress you?--my face, my story you mean?' + +'No; I mean you: your trouble, that horrible empty house, and--oh, dear +me, yes, your courage too.' + +'Listen,' said Lawford, stooping forward. He could scarcely see the +pale, veiled face through this mist that had risen up over his eyes. +'I have no courage apart from you; no courage and no hope. Ask me to +come!--a stranger with no history, no mockery, no miserable rant of a +grave and darkness and fear behind me. Are we not all haunted--every +one? That forgotten, and the fool I was, and the vacillating, and the +pretence--oh, how it all sweeps clear before me; without a will, without +a hope or glimpse or whisper of courage. Be just the memory of my +mother, the face, the friend I've never seen; the voice that every dream +leaves echoing. Ask me to come.' + +She sat unstirring; and then as if by some uncontrollable impulse +stooped a little closer to him and laid her gloved hand on his. + +'I hear, you know; I hear too,' she whispered. 'But we mustn't listen. +Come now. It's growing late.' + +The little village echoed back from its stone walls the clatter of the +pony's hoofs. Night had darkened to its deepest when their lamp shone +white on the wicket in the hedge. They had scarcely spoken. Lawford had +simply watched pass by, almost without a thought, the arching trees, the +darkening fields; had watched rise up in a mist of primrose light the +harvest moon to shine in saffron on the faces and shoulders of the few +wayfarers they met, or who passed them by. The still grave face beneath +the shadow of its veil had never turned, though the moon poured all her +flood of brilliance upon the dark profile. And once when as if in sudden +alarm he had lifted his head and looked at her, a sudden doubt had +assailed him so instantly that he had half put out his hand to touch +her, and had as quickly withdrawn it, lest her beauty and stillness +should be, even as the moment's fancy had suggested, only a far-gone +memory returned in dream. + +Herbert hailed them from the darkness of an open window. He came +down, and they talked a little in the cold air of the garden. He lit +a cigarette, and climbed languidly into the cart, and drove the drowsy +little pony off into the moonlight. + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY + +It was a quiet supper the three friends sat down to. Herbert sat +narrowing his eyes over his thoughts, which, when the fancy took him, he +scattered out upon the others' silence. Lawford apparently had not yet +shaken himself free from the sorcery of the moonlight. His eyes shone +dark and full like those of a child who has trespassed beyond its hour +for bed, and sits marvelling at reality in a waking dream. + +Long after they had bidden each other good-night, long after Herbert +had trodden on tiptoe with his candle past his closed door, Lawford +sat leaning on his arms at the open window, staring out across the +motionless moonlit trees that seemed to stand like draped and dreaming +pilgrims, come to the peace of their Nirvana at last beside the crashing +music of the waters. And he himself, the self that never sleeps beneath +the tides and waves of consciousness, was listening, too, almost as +unmovedly and unheedingly to the thoughts that clashed in conflict +through his brain. + +Why, in a strange transitory life was one the slave of these small +cares? What if even in that dark pit beneath, which seemed to whisper +Lethe to the tumultuous, swirling waters--what if there, too, were +merely a beginning again, and to seek a slumbering refuge there merely a +blind and reiterated plunge into the heat and tumult of another day? Who +was that poor, dark, homeless ghoul, Sabathier? Who was this Helen of an +impossible dream? Her face with its strange smile, her eyes with their +still pity and rapt courage had taken hope away. 'Here's not your rest,' +cried one insistent voice; 'she is the mystery that haunts day and +night, past all the changing of the restless hours. Chance has given you +back eyes to see, a heart that can be broken. Chance and the stirrings +of a long-gone life have torn down the veil age spins so thick and fast. +Pride and ambition; what dull fools men are! Effort and duty, what dull +fools men are!' He listened on and on to these phantom pleadings and to +the rather coarse old Lawford conscience grunting them mercilessly down, +too weary even to try to rest. + +Rooks at dawn came sweeping beneath the turquoise of the sky. He saw +their sharp-beaked heads turn this way, that way, as they floated on +outspread wings across the misty world. Except for the hoarse roar of +the water under the huge thin-leafed trees, not a sound was stirring. +'One thing,' he seemed to hear himself mutter as he turned with a shiver +from the morning air, 'it won't be for long. You can, at least, poor +devil, wait the last act out.' If in this foolish hustling mob of the +world, hired anywhere and anywhen for the one poor dubious wage of a +penny--if it was only his own small dull part to carry a mock spear, +and shout huzza with the rest--there was nothing for it, he grunted +obstinately to himself, shout he would with the loudest. + +He threw himself on to the bed with eyes so wearied with want of sleep +it seemed they had lost their livelong skill in finding it. Not the echo +of triumph nor even a sigh of relief stirred the torpor of his mind. He +knew vaguely that what had been the misery and madness of the last few +days was gone. But the thought had no power to move him now. Sheila's +good sense, and Mr Bethany's stubborn loyalty were alike old stories +that had lost their savour and meaning. Gone, too, was the need for that +portentous family gathering that had sat so often in his fancy during +these last few days around his dining-room table, discussing with futile +decorum the problem of how to hush him up, to muffle him down. Half +dreaming, half awake, he saw the familiar door slowly open and, like the +timely hero in a melodrama, his own figure appear before the stricken +and astonished company. His eyes opened half-fearfully, and glanced up +in the morning twilight. Their perplexity gave place to a quiet, almost +vacant smile; the lids slowly closed again, and at last the lean hands +twitched awhile in sleep. + +Next morning he spent rummaging among the old books, dipping listlessly +here and there as the tasteless fancy took him, while Herbert sat +writing with serene face and lifted eyebrows at his open window. But the +unfamiliar long S's, the close type, and the spelling of the musty old +books wearied eye and mind. What he read, too, however far-fetched, +or lively, or sententious, or gross, seemed either to be of the same +texture as what had become his everyday experience, and so baffled him +with its nearness, or else was only the meaningless ramblings of an idle +pen. And this, he thought to himself, looking covertly up at the spruce +clear-cut profile at the window, this is what Herbert had called Life. + +'Am I interrupting you, Herbert; are you very busy?' he asked at last, +taking refuge on a chair in a far corner of the room. + +'Bless me, no; not a bit--not a bit,' said Herbert amiably, laying down +his pen. 'I'm afraid the old leatherjackets have been boring you. It's +a habit this beastly reading; this gorge and glint and fever all at +second-hand--purely a bad habit, like morphia, like laudanum. But once +in, you know there's no recovery Anyhow, I'm neck-deep, and to struggle +would be simply to drown.' + +'I was only going to say how sorry I am for having left Sabathier at +home.' + +'My dear fellow--' began Herbert reassuringly. + +'It was only because I wanted so very much to have your translation. I +get muddled up with other things groping through the dictionary.' + +Herbert surveyed him critically. 'What exactly is your interest now, +Lawford? You don't mean that my old "theory" has left any sting now?' + +'No sting; oh no. I was only curious. But you yourself still think it +really, don't you?' + +Herbert turned for a moment to the open window. + +'I was simply trying then to find something to fit the facts as you +experienced them. But now that the facts have gone--and they have, +haven't they?--exit, of course, my theory!' + +'I see,' was the cryptic answer. 'And yet, Herbert,' Lawford solemnly +began again, 'it has changed me; even in my way of thinking. When I shut +my eyes now--I only discovered it by chance--I see immediately faces +quite strange to me; or places, sometimes thronged with people; and once +an old well with some one sitting in the shadow. I can't tell you how +clearly, and yet it is all altogether different from a dream. Even when +I sit with my eyes open, I am conscious, as it were, of a kind of faint, +colourless mirage. In the old days--I mean before Widderstone, what +I saw was only what I'd seen already. Nothing came uncalled for, +unexplained. This makes the old life seem so blank; I did not know what +extraordinarily real things I was doing without. And whether for that +reason or another, I can't quite make out what in fact I did want then, +and was always fretting and striving for. I can see no wisdom or purpose +in anything now but to get to one's journey's end as quickly and bravely +as one can. And even then, even if we do call life a journey, and death +the inn we shall reach at last in the evening when it's over; that, too, +I feel will be only as brief a stopping-place as any other inn would +be. Our experience here is so scanty and shallow--nothing more than the +moment of the continual present. Surely that must go on, even if one +does call it eternity. And so we shall all have to begin again. Probably +Sabathier himself.... But there, what on earth are we, Herbert, when all +is said? Who is it has--has done all this for us--what kind of self? +And to what possible end? Is it that the clockwork has been wound up and +must still jolt on a while with jarring wheels? Will it never run down, +do you think?' + +Herbert smiled faintly, but made no answer. + +'You see,' continued Lawford, in the same quiet, dispassionate +undertone, 'I wouldn't mind if it was only myself. But there are so many +of us, so many selves, I mean; and they all seem to have a voice in the +matter. What is the reality to this infernal dream?' + +'The reality is, Lawford, that you are fretting your life out over this +rotten illusion. Be guided by me just this once. We'll go, all three +of us, a good ten-mile walk to-day, and thoroughly tire you out. And +to-night you shall sleep here--a really sound, refreshing sleep. Then +to-morrow, whole and hale, back you shall go; honestly. It's only +professional strong men should ask questions. Babes like you and me must +keep to slops.' + +So, though Lawford made no answer, it was agreed. Before noon the three +of them had set out on their walk across the fields. And after rambling +on just as caprice took them, past reddening blackberry bushes and +copses of hazel, and flaming beech, they sat down to spread out their +meal on the slope of a hill, overlooking quiet ploughed fields and +grazing cattle. Herbert stretched himself with his back to the earth, +and his placid face to the pale vacant sky, while Lawford, even more +dispirited after his walk, wandered up to the crest of the hill. + +At the foot of the hill, upon the other side, lay a farm and its +out-buildings, and a pool of water beneath a group of elms. It was +vacant in the sunlight, and the water vividly green with a scum of weed. +And about half a mile beyond stood a cluster of cottages and an old +towered church. He gazed idly down, listening vaguely to the wailing of +a curlew flitting anxiously to and fro above the broken solitude of +its green hill. And it seemed as if a thin and dark cloud began to be +quietly withdrawn from over his eyes. Hill and wailing cry and barn and +water faded out. And he was staring as if in an endless stillness at an +open window against which the sun was beating in a bristling torrent of +gold, while out of the garden beyond came the voice of some evening bird +singing with such an unspeakable ecstasy of grief it seemed it must +be perched upon the confines of another world. The light gathered to a +radiance almost intolerable, driving back with its raining beams some +memory, forlorn, remorseless, remote. His body stood dark and senseless, +rocking in the air on the hillside as if bereft of its spirit. Then his +hands were drawn over his eyes. He turned unsteadily and made his way, +as if through a thick, drizzling haze, slowly back. + +'What is that--there?' he said almost menacingly, standing with +bloodshot eyes looking down upon Herbert. + +'"That!"--what?' said Herbert, glancing up startled from his book. 'Why, +what's wrong, Lawford?' + +'That,' said Lawford sullenly, yet with a faintly mournful cadence in +his voice; 'those fields and that old empty farm--that village over +there? Why did you bring me here?' + +Grisel had not stirred. 'The village...' + +'Ssh!' she said, catching her brother's sleeve; 'that's Detcham, yes, +Detcham.' + +Lawford turned wide vacant eyes on her. He shook his head and shuddered. +'No, no; not Detcham. I know it; I know it; but it has gone out of my +mind. Not Detcham; I've been there before; don't look at me. Horrible, +horrible. It takes me back--I can't think. I stood there, trying, +trying; it's all in a blur. Don't ask me--a dream.' + +Grisel leaned forward and touched his hand. 'Don't think; don't even +try. Why should you? We can't; we MUSTN'T go back.' + +Lawford, still gazing fixedly, turned again a darkened face towards +the steep of the hill. 'I think, you know,' he said, stooping and +whispering, 'HE would know--the window and the sun and the singing. And +oh, of course it was too late. You understand--too late. And once... you +can't go back; oh no. You won't leave me? You see, if you go, it would +only be all. I could not be quite so alone. But Detcham--Detcham? +perhaps you will not trust me--tell me? That was not the name.' +He shuddered violently and turned dog-like beseeching eyes. +'To-morrow--yes, to-morrow,' he said, 'I will promise anything if you +will not leave me now. Once--' But again the thread running so faintly +through that inextricable maze of memory eluded him. 'So long as you +won't leave me now!' he implored her. + +She was vainly trying to win back her composure, and could not answer +him at once.... + +In the evening after supper Grisel sat her guest down in front of a big +wood fire in the old book-room, where, staring into the playing flames, +he could fall at peace into the almost motionless reverie which he +seemed merely to harass and weary himself by trying to disperse. She +opened the little piano at the far end of the room and played on and +on as fancy led--Chopin and Beethoven, a fugue from Bach, and lovely +forlorn old English airs, till the music seemed not only a voice +persuading, pondering, and lamenting, but gathered about itself the +hollow surge of the water and the darkness; wistful and clear, as the +thoughts of a solitary child. Ever and again a log burnt through its +strength, and falling amid sparks, stirred, like a restless animal, the +stillness; or Herbert in his corner lifted his head to glance towards +his visitor, and to turn another page. At last the music, too, fell +silent, and Lawford stood up with his candle in his hand and eyed with a +strange fixity brother and sister. His glance wandered slowly round the +quiet flame-lit room. + +'You won't,' he said, stooping towards them as if in extreme confidence, +'you won't much notice? They come and go. I try not to--to speak. It's +the only way through. It is not that I don't know they're only dreams. +But if once the--the others thought there had been any tampering'--he +tapped his forehead meaningly--'here: if once they thought that, it +would, you know, be quite over then. How could I prove...?' He turned +cautiously towards the door, and with laborious significance nodded his +head at them. + +Herbert bent down and held out his long hands to the fire. 'Tampering, +my dear chap: That's what the lump said to the leaven.' + +'Yes, yes,' said Lawford, putting out his hand, 'but you know what +I mean, Herbert. Anything I tried to do then would be quite, quite +hopeless. That would be poisoning the wells.' + +They watched him out of the room, and listened till quite distinctly in +the still night-shaded house they heard his door gently close. Then, as +if by consent, they turned and looked long and questioningly into each +other's faces. + +'Then you are not afraid?' Herbert said quietly. + +Grisel gazed steadily on, and almost imperceptibly shook her head. + +'You mean?' he questioned her; but still he had again to read her answer +in her eyes. + +'Oh, very well, Grisel,' he said quietly, 'you know best,' and returned +once more to his writing. + +For an hour or two Lawford slept heavily, so heavily that when a little +after midnight he awoke, with his face towards the uncurtained window, +though for many minutes he lay brightly confronting all Orion, that from +blazing helm to flaming dog at heel filled high the glimmering square, +he could not lift or stir his cold and leaden limbs. He rose at last and +threw off the burden of his bedclothes, and rested awhile, as if freed +from the heaviness of an unrememberable nightmare. But so clear was his +mind and so extraordinarily refreshed he seemed in body that sleep for +many hours would not return again. And he spent almost all the remainder +of the lagging darkness pacing softly to and fro; one face only before +his eyes, the one sure thing, the one thing unattainable in a world of +phantoms. + +Herbert waited on in vain for his guest next morning, and after +wandering up and down the mossy lawn at the back of the house, went off +cheerfully at last alone for his dip. When he returned Lawford was in +his place at the breakfast-table. He sat on, moody and constrained, +until even Herbert's haphazard talk trickled low. + +'I fancy my sister is nursing a headache,' he said at last, 'but she'll +be down soon. And I'm afraid from the looks of you, Lawford, your night +was not particularly restful.' He felt his way very heedfully. 'Perhaps +we walked you a little too far yesterday. We are so used to tramping +that--' Lawford kept thoughtful eyes fixed on the deprecating face. + +'I see what it is, Herbert--you are humouring me again. I have +been wracking my brains in vain to remember what exactly DID happen +yesterday. I feel as if it was all sunk oceans deep in sleep. I get so +far--and then I'm done. It won't give up a hint. But you really mustn't +think I'm an invalid, or--or in my second childhood. The truth is,' he +added, 'it's only my FIRST, come back again. But now that I've got so +far, now that I'm really better, I--' He broke off rather vacantly, as +if afraid of his own confidence. 'I must be getting on,' he summed +up with an effort, 'and that's the solemn fact. I keep on forgetting +I'm--I'm a ratepayer!' + +Herbert sat round in his chair. 'You see, Lawford, the very term is +little else than Double-Dutch to me. As a matter of fact Grisel sends +all my hush-money to the horrible people that do the cleaning up, as +it were. I can't catch their drift. Government to me is merely the +spectacle of the clever, or the specious, managing the dull. It deals +merely with the physical, and just the fringe of consciousness. I am not +joking. I think I follow you. All I mean is that the obligations--mainly +tepid, I take it--that are luring you back to the fold would be the +very ones that would scare me quickest off. The imagination, the appeal +faded: we're dead.' + +Lawford opened his mouth; 'TEMPORARILY tepid,' he at last all but +coughed out. + +'Oh yes, of course,' said Herbert intelligently. 'Only temporarily. It's +this beastly gregariousness that's the devil. The very thought of it +undoes me--with an absolute shock of sheepishness. I suddenly realise +my human nakedness: that here we are, little better than naked animals, +bleating behind our illusory wattles on the slopes of--of infinity. +And nakedness, after all, is a wholesome thing to realize only when one +thinks too much of one's clothes. I peer sometimes, feebly enough, out +of my wool, and it seems to me that all these busybodies, all these +fact-devourers, all this news-reading rabble, are nothing brighter than +very dull-witted children trying to play an imaginative game, much too +deep for their poor reasons. I don't mean that YOUR wanting to go home +is anything gregarious, but I do think THEIR insisting on your coming +back at once might be. And I know you won't visit this stuff on me as +anything more than just my "scum," as Grisel calls the fine flower of my +maiden meditations. All that I really want to say is that we should both +be more than delighted if you'd stay just as long as it will not be a +bore for you to stay. Stay till you're heartily tired of us. Go back +now, if you MUST; tell them how much better you are. Bolt off to a nerve +specialist. He'll say complete rest--change of scene, and all that. They +all do. Instinct via intellect. And why not take your rest here? We +are such miserably dull company to one another it would be a greater +pleasure to have you with us than I can say. I mean it from the very +bottom of my heart. Do!' + +Lawford listened. 'I wish--,' he began, and stopped dead again. 'Anyhow, +I'll go back. I am afraid, Herbert, I've been playing truant. It was all +very well while--To tell you the truth I can't think QUITE straight yet. +But it won't last for ever. Besides--well, anyhow, I'll go back.' + +'Right you are,' said Herbert, pretending to be cheerful. 'You can't +expect, you really can't, everything to come right straight away. Just +have patience. And now, let's go out and sit in the sun. They've mixed +September up with May.' + +And about half an hour afterwards he glanced up from his book to find +his visitor fast asleep in his garden chair. + +Grisel had taken her brother's place, with a little pile of needlework +beside her on the grass, when Lawford again opened his eyes under the +rosy shade of a parasol. He watched her for a while, without speaking. + +'How long have I been asleep?' he said at last. + +She started and looked up from her needle. + +'That depends on how long you have been awake,' she said, smiling. 'My +brother tells me,' she went on, beginning to stitch, 'that you have +made up your mind to leave us to-day. Perhaps we are only flattering +ourselves it has been a rest. But if it has--is that, do you think, +quite wise?' + +He leant forward and hid his face in his hands. 'It's because--it's +because it's the only "must" I can see.' + +'But even "musts"--well, we have to be sure even of "musts," haven't +we? Are YOU?' She glanced up and for an instant their eyes met, and the +falling water seemed to be sounding out of a distance so remote it might +be but the echo of a dream. She stooped once more over her work. + +'Supposing,' he said very slowly, and almost as if speaking to himself, +'supposing Sabathier--and you know he's merely like a friend now one +mustn't be seen talking to--supposing he came back; what then?' + +'Oh, but Sabathier's gone: he never really came. It was only a fancy--a +mood. It was only you--another you.' + +'Who was that yesterday, then?' + +She glanced at him swiftly and knew the question was but a venture. + +'Yesterday?' + +'Oh, very well,' he said fretfully, 'you too! But if he did, if he did, +come really back: "prey" and all?' + +'What is the riddle?' she said, taking a deep breath and facing him +brightly. + +'Would MY "must" still be HIS?' The face he raised to her, as he leaned +forward under the direct light of the sun, was so colourless, cadaverous +and haggard, the thought crossed her mind that it did indeed seem little +more than a shadowy mask that but one hour of darkness might dispel. + +'You said, you know, we did win through. Why then should we be even +thinking of defeat now?' + +'"We"!' + +'Oh no, you!' she cried triumphantly. + +'You do not answer my question.' + +'Nor you mine! It WAS a glorious victory. Is there the ghost of a reason +why you should cast your mind back? Is there, now?' + +'Only,' said Lawford, looking patiently up into her face, 'only because +I love you': and listened in the silence to the words as one may watch a +bird that has escaped for ever and irrevocably out of its cage, steadily +flying on and on till lost to sight. + +For an instant the grey eyes faltered. 'But that, surely,' she began +in a low voice, still steadily sewing, 'that was our compact last +night--that you should let me help, that you should trust me just as you +trusted the mother years ago who came in the little cart with the shaggy +dusty pony to the homesick boy watching at the window. Perhaps,' she +added, her fingers trembling, 'in this odd shuffle of souls and faces, +I AM that mother, and most frightfully anxious you should not give in. +Why, even because of the tiredness, even because the cause seems vain, +you must still fight on--wouldn't she have said it? Surely there are +prizes, a daughter, a career, no end! And even they gone--still the self +undimmed, undaunted, that took its drubbing like a man.' + +'I know you know I'm all but crazed; you see this wretched mind all +littered and broken down; look at me like that, then. Forget even you +have befriended me and pretended--Why must I blunder on and on like +this? Oh, Grisel, my friend, my friend, if only you loved me!' + +Tears clouded her eyes. She turned vaguely as if for a hiding-place. +'We can't talk here. How mad the day is. Listen, listen! I do--I do love +you--mother and woman and friend--from the very moment you came. It's +all so clear, so clear: that, and your miserable "must," my friend. +Come, we will go away by ourselves a little, and talk. That way. I'll +meet you by the gate.' + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE + +She came out into the sunlight, and they went through the little gate +together. She walked quickly, without speaking, over the bridge, past a +little cottage whose hollyhocks leaned fading above its low flint wall. +Skirting a field of stubble, she struck into a wood by a path that ran +steeply up the hillside. And by and by they came to a glen where the +woodmen of a score of years ago had felled the trees, leaving a green +hollow of saplings in the midst of their towering neighbours. + +'There,' she said, holding out her hand to him, 'now we are alone. Just +six hours or so--and then the sun will be there,' she pointed to the +tree-tops to the west, 'and then you will have to go; for good, for +good--you your way, and I mine. What a tangle--a tangle is this life of +ours. Could I have dreamt we should ever be talking like this, you and +I? Friends of an hour. What will you think of me? Does it matter? Don't +speak. Say nothing--poor face, poor hands. If only there were something +to look to--to pray to!' She bent over his hand and pressed it to her +breast. 'What worlds we've seen together, you and I. And then--another +parting.' + +They wandered on a little way, and came back and listened to the first +few birds that flew up into the higher branches, noonday being past, to +sing. + +They talked, and were silent, and talked again with out question, or +sadness, or regret, or reproach; she mocking even at themselves, mocking +at this 'change'--'Why, and yet without it, would you ever even have +dreamed once a poor fool of a Frenchman went to his restless grave for +me--for me? Need we understand? Were we told to pry? Who made us +human must be human too. Why must we take such care, and make such a +fret--this soul? I know it, I know it; it is all we have--"to save," +they say, poor creatures. No, never to SPEND, and so they daren't for a +solitary instant lift it on the finger from its cage. Well, we have; and +now, soon, back it must go, back it must go, and try its best to whistle +the day out. And yet, do you know, perhaps the very freedom does a +little shake its--its monotony. It's true, you see, they have lived +a long time; these Worldly Wisefolk they were wise before they were +swaddled.... + +'There, and you are hungry?' she asked him, laughing in his eyes. `Of +course, of course you are--scarcely a mouthful since that first still +wonderful supper. And you haven't slept a wink, except like a tired-out +child after its first party, on that old garden chair. I sat and +watched, and yes, almost hoped you'd never wake in case--in case. Come +along, see, down there. I can't go home just yet. There's a little old +inn--we'll go and sit down there--as if we were really trying to be +romantic! I know the woman quite well; we can talk there--just the day +out.' + +They sat at a little table in the garden of 'The Cherry Trees,' its +thick green apple branches burdened with ripened fruit. And Grisel tried +to persuade him to eat and drink, 'for to-morrow we die,' she said, +her hands trembling, her face as it were veiled with a faint mysterious +light. + +'There are dozens and dozens of old stories, you know,' she said, +leaning on her elbows, 'dozens and dozens, meaning only us. You must, +you must eat; look, just an apple. We've got to say good-bye. And +faintness will double the difficulty.' She lightly touched his hand as +if to compel him to smile with her. 'There, I'll peel it; and this is +Eden; and soon it will be the cool of the evening. And then, oh yes, the +voice will come. What nonsense I am talking. Never mind.' + +They sat on in the quiet sunshine, and a spider slid softly through +the air and with busy claws set to its nets; and those small ghosts the +robins went whistling restlessly among the heavy boughs. + +A child presently came out of the porch of the inn into the garden, and +stood with its battered doll in its arms, softly watching them awhile. +But when Grisel smiled and tried to coax her over, she burst out +laughing and ran in again. + +Lawford stooped forward on his chair with a groan. 'You see,' he said, +'the whole world mocks me. You say "this evening"; need it be, must it +be this evening? If you only knew how far they have driven me. If you +only knew what we should only detest each other for saying and +for listening to. The whole thing's dulled and staled. Who wants +a changeling? Who wants a painted bird? Who does not loathe the +converted?--and I'm converted to Sabathier's God. Should we be sitting +here talking like this if it were not so? I can't, I can't go back.' + +She rose and stood with her hand pressed over her mouth, watching him. + +'Won't you understand?' he continued. 'I am an outcast--a felon caught +red-handed, come in the flesh to a hideous and righteous judgment. I +hear myself saying all these things; and yet, Grisel, I do, I do love +you with all the dull best I ever had. Not now, then; I don't ask new +even. I can, I would begin again. God knows my face has changed enough +even as it is. Think of me as that poor wandering ghost of yours; how +easily I could hide away--in your memory; and just wait, wait for you. +In time even this wild futile madness too would fade away. Then I could +come back. May I try?' + +'I can't answer you. I can't reason. Only, still, I do know, talk, put +off, forget as I may, must is must. Right and wrong, who knows what +THEY mean, except that one's to be done and one's to be forsworn; +or--forgive, my friend, the truest thing I ever said--or else we lose +the savour of both. Oh, then, and I know, too, you'd weary of me. I know +you, Monsieur Nicholas, better than you can ever know yourself, though +you have risen from your grave. You follow a dream, no voice or face or +flesh and blood; and not to do what the one old raven within you cries +you must, would be in time to hate the very sound of my footsteps. You +shall go back, poor turncoat, and face the clearness, the utterly more +difficult, bald, and heartless clearness, as together we faced the dark. +Life is a little while. And though I have no words to tell what always +are and must be foolish reasons because they are not reasons at all but +ghosts of memory, I know in my heart that to face the worst is your only +hope of peace. Should I have staked so much on your finding that, and +now throw up the game? Don't let us talk any more. I'll walk half +the way, perhaps. Perhaps I will walk all the way. I think my brother +guesses--at least MY madness. I've talked and talked him nearly past his +patience. And then, when you are quite safely, oh yes, quite safely and +soundly gone, then I shall go away for a little, so that we can't even +hear each other speak, except in dreams. Life!--well, I always thought +it was much too plain a tale to have as dull an ending. And with us the +powers beyond have played a newer trick, that's all. Another hour, and +we will go. Till then there's just the solitary walk home and only the +dull old haunted house that hoards as many ghosts as we ourselves to +watch our coming.' + +Evening began to shine between the trees; they seemed to stand aflame, +with a melancholy rapture in their uplifted boughs above their fading +coats. The fields of the garnered harvest shone with a golden stillness, +awhir with shimmering flocks of starlings. And the old birds that had +sung in the spring sang now amid the same leaves, grown older too to +give them harbourage. + +Herbert was sitting in his room when they returned, nursing his teacup +on his knee while he pretended to be reading, with elbow propped on the +table. + +'Here's Nicholas Sabathier, my dear, come to say goodbye awhile,' +said Grisel. She stood for a moment in her white gown, her face turned +towards the clear green twilight of the open window. 'I have promised to +walk part of the way with him. But I think first we must have some tea. +No; he flatly refuses to be driven. We are going to walk.' + +The two friends were left alone, face to face with a rather difficult +silence, only the least degree of nervousness apparent, so far as +Herbert was concerned, in that odd aloof sustained air of impersonality +that had so baffled his companion in their first queer talk together. + +'Your sister said just now, Herbert,' blurted Lawford at last. '"Here's +Nicholas Sabathier come to say good-bye" well, I--what I want you to +understand is that it is Sabathier, the worst he ever was; but also that +it is "good-bye."' + +Herbert slowly turned. 'I don't quite see why "goodbye," Lawford. +And--frankly, there is nothing to explain. We have chosen to live such +a very out-of-the-way life,' he went on, as if following up a train of +thought.... 'The truth is if one wants to live at all--one's own life, +I mean--there's no time for many friends. And just steadfastly regarding +your neighbour's tail as you follow it down into the Nowhere--it's that +that seems to me the deadliest form of hypnotism. One must simply go +one's own way, doing one's best to free one's mind of cant--and I dare +say clearing some excellent stuff out with the rubbish. One consequence +is that I don't think, however foolhardy it may be to say so, I don't +think I care a groat for any opinion as human as my own, good or bad. My +sister's a million times a better woman than I am a man. What possibly +could there be, then, for me to say?' He turned with a nervous smile. +'Why should it be good-bye?' + +Lawford glanced involuntarily towards the door that stood in shadow +duskily ajar. 'Well,' he said, 'we have talked, and we think it must +be that, until, at least,' he smiled faintly, 'I can come as quietly as +your old ghost you told me of; and in that case it may not be so very +long to wait.' + +Their eyes met fleetingly across the still, listening room. 'The more +I think of it,' Lawford pushed slowly on, 'the less I understand the +frantic purposelessness of all that has happened to me. Until I +went down, as you said, "a godsend of a little Miss Muffet," and the +inconceivable farce came off, I was fairly happy, fairly contented to +dance my little wooden dance and wait till the showman should put me +down into his box again. And now--well, here I am. The whole thing has +gone by and scarcely left a trace of its visit. Here I am for all my +friends to swear to; and yet, Herbert, if you'll forgive me troubling +you with this stuff about myself, not a single belief, or thought, or +desire remains unchanged. You will remember all that, I hope. It's not, +of course, the ghost of an apology, only the mere facts.' + +Herbert rose and paced slowly across to the window. 'The longer I live, +Lawford, the more I curse this futile gift of speech. Here am I, wanting +to tell you, to say out frankly what, if mind could appeal direct to +mind, would be merely as the wind passing through the leaves of a tree +with just one--one multitudinous rustle, but which, if I tried to +put into words--well, daybreak would find us still groping on....' He +turned; a peculiar wry smile on his face. 'It's a dumb world: but there +we are. And some day you'll come again.' + +'Well,' said Lawford, as if with an almost hopeless effort to turn +thought into such primitive speech, 'that's where we stand, then.' He +got up suddenly like a man awakened in the midst of unforeseen danger, +'Where is your sister?' he cried, looking into the shadow. And as if in +actual answer to his entreaty, they heard the clinking of the cups on +the little, old, green lacquer tray she was at that moment carrying into +the room. She sat down on the window seat and put the tray down beside +her. 'It will be before dark even now,' she said, glancing out at the +faintly burning skies. + +They had trudged on together with almost as deep a sense of physical +exhaustion as peasants have who have been labouring in the fields since +daybreak. And a little beyond the village, before the last, long road +began that led in presently to the housed and scrupulous suburb, she +stopped with a sob beside an old scarred milestone by the wayside. +'This--is as far as I can go,' she said. She stooped, and laid her hand +on the cold moss-grown surface of the stone. 'Even now it's wet with +dew.' She rose again and looked strangely into his face. 'Yes, yes, here +it is,' she said, 'oh, and worse, worse than any fear. But nothing now +can trouble you again of that. We're both at least past that.' + +'Grisel,' he said, 'forgive me, but I can't--I can't go on.' + +'Don't think, don't think,' she said, taking his hands, and lifting them +to her bosom. 'It's only how the day goes; and it has all, my one +dear, happened scores and scores of times before--mother and child and +friend--and lovers that are all these too, like us. We mustn't cry out. +Perhaps it was all before even we could speak--this sorrow came. Take +all the hope and all the future: and then may come our chance.' + +'What's life to me now. You said the desire would come back; that I +should shake myself free. I could if you would help me. I don't know +what you are or what your meaning is, only that I love you; care for +nothing, wish for nothing but to see you and think of you. A flat, dull +voice keeps saying that I have no right to be telling you all this. +You will know best. I know I am nothing. I ask nothing. If we love one +another, what is there else to say?' + +'Nothing, nothing to say, except only good-bye. What could you tell +me that I have not told myself over and over again? Reason's gone. +Thinking's gone. Now I am only sure.' She smiled shadowily. 'What peace +did HE find who couldn't, perhaps, like you, face the last good-bye?' + +They stood in utter solitude awhile in the evening gloom. The air was +as still and cold as some grey unfathomable untraversed sea. Above them +uncountable clouds drifted slowly across space. + +'Why do they all keep whispering together?' he said in a low voice, with +cowering face. 'Oh if you knew, Grisel, how they have hemmed me in; how +they have come pressing in through the narrow gate I left ajar. Only to +mock and mislead. It's all dark and unintelligible.' + +He touched her hand, peering out of the shadows that seemed to him to be +gathering between their faces. He drew her closer and touched her lips +with his fingers. Her beauty seemed to his distorted senses to fill +earth and sky. This, then, was the presence, the grave and lovely +overshadowing dream whose surrender made life a torment, and death the +near fold of an immortal, starry veil. She broke from him with a faint +cry. And he found himself running and running, just as he had run that +other night, with death instead of life for inspiration, towards his +earthly home. + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO + +He was utterly wearied, but he walked on for a long while with a dogged +unglancing pertinacity and without looking behind him. Then he rested +under the dew-sodden hedgeside and buried his face in his hands. Once, +indeed, he did turn and grind his way back with hard uplifted face for +many minutes, but at the meeting with an old woman who in the late dusk +passed him unheeded on the road, he stopped again, and after standing +awhile looking down upon the dust, trying to gather up the tangled +threads of his thoughts, he once more set off homewards. + +It was clear, starry, and quite dark when he reached the house. The lamp +at the roadside obscurely lit its breadth and height. Lamp-light within, +too, was showing yellow between the Venetian blinds; a cold gas-jet +gleamed out of the basement window. He seemed bereft now of all desire +or emotion, simply the passive witness of things external in a calm +which, though he scarcely realised its cause, was an exquisite solace +and relief. His senses were intensely sharpened with sleeplessness. The +faintest sound belled clear and keen on his ear. The thinnest beam of +light besprinkled his eyes with curious brilliance. + +As quietly as some nocturnal creature he ascended the steps to the +porch, and leaning between stone pilaster and wall, listened intently +for any rumour of those within. + +He heard a clear, rather languid and delicate voice quietly speak on +until it broke into a little peal of laughter, followed, when it fell +silent by Sheila's--rapid, rich, and low. The first speaker seemed to be +standing. Probably, then, his evening visitors had only just come in, or +were preparing to depart. He inserted his latchkey and gently pushed at +the cumbersome door. It was locked against him. With not the faintest +thought of resentment or surprise, he turned back, stooped over the +balustrade and looked down into the kitchen. Nothing there was visible +but a narrow strip of the white table, on which lay a black cotton +glove, and beyond, the glint of a copper pan. What made all these mute +and inanimate things so coldly hostile? + +An extreme, almost nauseous distaste filled him at the thought of +knocking for admission, of confronting Ada, possibly even Sheila, in the +cold echoing gloom of the detestable porch; of meeting the first wild, +almost metallic, flash of recognition. He swept softly down again, and +paused at the open gate. Once before the voices of the night had called +him: they would not summon him forever in vain. He raised his eyes again +towards the window. Who were these visitors met together to drum the +alien out? He narrowed his lids and smiled up at the vacuous unfriendly +house. Then wheeling, on a sudden impulse he groped his way down the +gravel path that led into the garden. As he had left it, the long white +window was ajar. + +With extreme caution he pushed it noiselessly up, and climbed in, and +stood listening again in the black passage on the other side. When +he had fully recovered his breath, and the knocking of his heart was +stilled, he trod on softly, till turning the corner he came in sight +of the kitchen door. It was now narrowly open, just enough, perhaps, to +admit a cat; and as he softly approached, looking steadily in, he +could see Ada sitting at the empty table, beneath the single whistling +chandelier, in her black dress and black straw hat. She was reading +apparently; but her back was turned to him and he could not distinguish +her arm beyond the elbow. Then almost in an instant he discovered, as, +drawn up and unstirring he gazed on, that she was not reading, but had +covertly and instantaneously raised her eyes from the print on the table +beneath, and was transfixedly listening too. He turned his eyes away and +waited. When again he peered in she had apparently bent once more over +her magazine, and he stole on. + +One by one, with a thin remote exultation in his progress, he mounted +the kitchen stairs, and with each deliberate and groping step the voices +above him became more clearly audible. At last, in the darkness of the +hall, but faintly stirred by the gleam of lamplight from the chink of +the dining-room door, he stood on the threshold of the drawing-room door +and could hear with varying distinctness what those friendly voices +were so absorbedly discussing. His ear seemed as exquisite as some +contrivance of science, registering passively the least sound, the +faintest syllable, and like it, in no sense meddling with the thought +that speech conveyed. He simply stood listening, fixed and motionless, +like some uncouth statue in the leafy hollow of a garden, stony, +unspeculating. + +'Oh, but you either refuse to believe, Bettie, or you won't understand +that it's far worse than that.' Sheila seemed to be upbraiding, or at +least reasoning with, the last speaker. 'Ask Mr Danton--he actually SAW +him.' + +'"Saw him,"' repeated a thick, still voice. 'He stood there, in that +very doorway, Mrs Lovat, and positively railed at me. He stood there +and streamed out all the names he could lay his tongue to. I +wasn't--unfriendly to the poor beggar. When Bethany let me into it +I thought it was simply--I did indeed, Mrs Lawford--a monstrous +exaggeration. Flatly, I didn't believe it; shall I say that? But when I +stood face to face with him, I could have taken my oath that that was no +more poor old Arthur Lawford than--well, I won't repeat what particular +word occurred to me. But there,' the corpulent shrug was almost audible, +'we all know what old Bethany is. A sterling old chap, mind you, so far +as mere character is concerned; the right man in the right place; but as +gullible and as soft-hearted as a tom-tit. I've said all this before, I +know, Mrs Lawford, and been properly snubbed for my pains. But if I +had been Bethany I'd have sifted the whole story at the beginning, +the moment he put his foot into the house. Look at that Tichborne +fellow--went for months and months, just picking up one day what he +floored old Hawkins--wasn't it?--with the next. But of course,' he added +gloomily, 'now that's all too late. He's moaned himself into a tolerably +tight corner. I'd just like to see, though, a British jury comparing +this claimant with his photograph, 'pon my word I would. Where would he +be then, do you think?' + +'But my dear Mr Danton,' went on the clear, languid voice Lawford had +heard break so light-heartedly into laughter, 'you don't mean to tell me +that a woman doesn't know her own husband when she sees him--or, for the +matter of that, when she doesn't see him? If Tom came home from a ramble +as handsome as Apollo to-morrow, I'd recognise him at the very first +blush--literally! He'd go nuzzling off to get his slippers, or complain +that the lamps had been smoking, or hunt the house down for last week's +paper. Oh, besides, Tom's Tom--and there's an end of it.' + +'That's precisely what I think, Mrs Lovat; one is saturated with one's +personality, as it were.' + +'You see, that's just it! That's just exactly every woman's husband all +over; he is saturated with his personality. Bravo, Mr Craik!' + +'Good Lord,' said Danton softly. 'I don't deny it!' + +'But that,' broke in Sheila crisply--'that's just precisely what I asked +you all to come in for. It's because I know now, apart altogether from +the mere evidence, that--that he is Arthur. Mind, I don't say I ever +really doubted. I was only so utterly shocked, I suppose. I positively +put posers to him; but his memory was perfect in spite of the shock +which would have killed a--a more sensitive nature.' She had risen, it +seemed, and was moving with all her splendid impressiveness of silk and +presence across the general line of vision. But the hall was dark and +still; her eyes were dimmed with light. Lawford could survey her there +unmoved. + +'Are you there, Ada?' she called discreetly. + +'Yes, ma'am,' answered the faint voice from below. + +'You have not heard anything--no knock?' + +'No, ma'am, no knock.' + +'The door is open if you should call.' + +'Yes, ma'am.' + +'The girl's scared out of her wits,' said Sheila returning to her +audience. 'I've told you all that miserable Ferguson story--a piece of +calm, callous presence of mind I should never have dreamed my husband +capable of. And the curious thing is--at least, it is no longer curious +in the light of the ghastly facts I am only waiting for Mr Bethany +to tell you--from the very first she instinctively detested the very +mention of his name.' + +'I believe, you know,' said Mr Craik with some decision, 'that servants +must have the same wonderful instinct as dogs and children; they are +natural, intuitive judges of character.' + +'Yes,' said Sheila gravely, 'and it's only through that that I got to +hear of the--the mysterious friend in the little pony-carriage. Ada's +magnificently loyal--I will say that.' + +'I don't want to suggest anything, Mrs Lawford,' began Mr Craik rather +hurriedly, 'but wouldn't it perhaps be wiser not to wait for Mr Bethany? +It is not at all unusual for him to be kept a considerable time in the +vestry after service, and to-day is the Feast of St Michael's and all +Angels, you know. Mightn't your husband be--er--coming back, don't you +think?' + +'Craik's right, Mrs Lawford; it's not a bit of good waiting. Bethany +would stick there till midnight if any old woman's spiritual state could +keep her going so long. Here we all are, and at any moment we may be +interrupted. Mind you, I promise nothing--only that there shall be +no scene. But here I am, and if he does come knocking and ringing and +lunging out in the disgusting manner he--well, all I ask is permission +to speak for YOU. 'Pon my soul, to think what you must have gone +through! It isn't the place for ladies just now--honestly it ain't.' + +'Besides, supposing the romantic lady of the pony-carriage has friends? +Are YOU a pugilist, Mr Craik?' + +'I hope I could give some little account of myself, Mrs Lovat; but you +need have no anxiety about that.' + +'There, Mr Danton. So as there is not the least cause for anxiety even +if poor Arthur SHOULD return to his earthly home, may we share your +dreadful story at once, Sheila; and then, perhaps, hear Mr Bethany's +exposition of it when he DOES arrive? We are amply guarded.' + +'Honestly, you know, you are a bit of a sceptic, Mrs Lovat,' pleaded +Danton playfully. 'I've SEEN him.' + +'And seeing is disbelieving, I suppose. Now then, Sheila.' + +'I don't think there's the least chance of Arthur returning to-night,' +said Sheila solemnly. 'I am perfectly well aware it's best to be as +cheerful as one can--and as resolved; but I think, Bettie, when even +you know the whole horrible secret, you won't think Mr Danton was--was +horrified for nothing. The ghastly, the awful truth is that my +husband--there is no other word for it--is--possessed!' + +'"Possessed," Sheila! What in the name of all the creeps is that?' + +'Well, I dare say Mr Craik will explain it much better than I can. By +a devil, dear.' The voice was perfectly poised and restrained, and Mr +Craik did not see fit for the moment to embellish the definition. + +Lawford, with an almost wooden immobility, listened on. + +'But THE devil, or A devil? Isn't there a distinction?' inquired Mrs +Lovat. + +'It's in the Bible, Bettie, over and over again. It was quite a common +thing in the Middle Ages; I think I'm right in saying that, am I not, +Mr Craik?' Mr Craik must have solemnly nodded or abundantly looked +his unwilling affirmation. 'And what HAS been,' continued Sheila +temperately, 'I suppose may be again.' + +'When the fellow began raving at me the other night,' began Danton +huskily, as if out of an unfathomable pit of reflection, 'among other +things he said that I haven't any wish to remember was that I was a +sceptic. And Bethany said DITTO to it. I don't mind being called a +sceptic: why, I said myself Mrs Lovat was a sceptic just now! But when +it comes to "devils," Mrs Lawford--I may be convinced about the other, +but "devils"! Well, I've been in the City nearly twenty-five years, and +it's my impression human nature can raise all the devils WE shall +ever need. And another thing,' he added, as if inspired, and with an +immensely intelligent blink, 'is it just precisely that word in the +Revised Version--eh, Craik?' + +'I'll certainly look it up, Danton. But I take it that Mrs Lawford is +not so much insisting on the word, as on the--the manifestation. And +I'm bound to confess that the Society for Psychical Research, which +has among its members quite eminent and entirely trustworthy men of +science--I am bound to admit they have some very curious stories to +tell. The old idea was, you know, that there are seventy-two princely +devils, and as many as seven million--er--commoners. It may very well +sound quaint to our ears, Mrs Lovat; but there it is. But whether +that has any bearing on--on what you were saying, Danton, I can't say. +Perhaps Mrs Lawford will throw a little more light on the subject +when she tells us on what precise facts her--her distressing theory is +based.' + +Lawford had soundlessly stolen a pace or two nearer, and by stooping +forward a little he could, each in turn, scrutinise the little intent +company sitting over his story around the lamp at the further end of the +table; squatting like little children with their twigs and pins, fishing +for wonders on the brink of the unknown. + +'Yes,' Mrs Lovat was saying, 'I quite agree, Mr Craik. Seventy-two +princes, and no princesses. Oh, these masculine prejudices! But do throw +a little more modern light on the subject, Sheila.' + +'I mean this,' said Sheila firmly. 'When I went in for the last time to +say good-bye--and of course it was at his own wish that I did leave him; +and precisely WHY he wished it is now unhappily only too apparent--I had +brought him some money from the bank--fifty pounds, I think; yes, fifty +pounds. And quite by the merest chance I glanced down, in passing, at a +book he had apparently been reading, a book which he seemed very anxious +to conceal with his hand. Arthur is not a great reader, though I believe +he studied a little before we were married, and--well, I detest anything +like subterfuge, and I said it out without thinking, "Why, you're +reading French, Arthur!" He turned deathly white but made no answer.' + +'And can't you even confide to us the title, Sheila?' sighed Mrs Lovat +reproachfully. + +'Wait a minute,' said Sheila; 'you shall make as much fun of the thing +as you like, Bettie, when I've finished. I don't know why, but that +peculiar, stealthy look haunted me. "Why French?" I kept asking myself. +"Why French?" Arthur hasn't opened a French book for years. He doesn't +even approve of the entente. His argument was that we ought to be +friends with the Germans because they are more hostile. Never mind. When +Ada came back the next evening and said he was out, I came the following +morning--by myself--and knocked. No one answered, and I let myself in. +His bed had not been slept in. There were candles and matches all over +the house--one even burnt nearly to the stick on the floor in the corner +of the drawing-room. I suppose it was foolish, but I was alone, and just +that, somehow, horrified me. It seemed to point to such a peculiar state +of mind. I hesitated; what was the use of looking further? Yet something +seemed to say to me--and it was surely providential--"Go downstairs!" +And there in the breakfast-room the first thing I saw on the table +was this book--a dingy, ragged, bleared, patched-up, oh, a horrible, +a loathsome little book (and I have read bits too here and there); +and beside it was my own little school dictionary, my own child's 'She +looked up sharply. 'What was that? Did anybody call?' + +'Nobody I heard,' said Danton, staring stonily round. + +'It may have been the passing of the wind,' suggested Mr Craik, after a +pause. + +'Peep between the blinds, Mr Craik; it may be poor Mr Bethany +confronting Pneumonia in the porch.' + +'There's no one there, Mrs Lovat,' said the curate, returning softly +from his errand. 'Please continue your--your narrative, Mrs Lawford.' + +'We are panting for the "devil," my dear.' + +'Well, I sat down and, very much against my inclination, turned over the +pages. It was full of the most revolting confessions and trials, so +far as I could see. In fact, I think the book was merely an amateur +collection of--of horrors. And the faces, the portraits! Well, then, can +you imagine my feelings when towards the end of the book about thirty +pages from the end, I came upon this--gloating up at me from the table +in my house before my very eyes?' + +She cast a rapid glance over her shoulder, and gathering up her silk +skirt, drew out, from the pocket beneath, the few crumpled pages, and +passed them without a word to Danton. Lawford kept him plainly in view, +as, lowering his great face, he slowly stooped, and holding the loose +leaves with both fat hands between his knees, stared into the portrait. +Then he truculently lifted his cropped head. + +'What did I say?' he said. 'What did I SAY? What did I tell old Bethany +in this very room? What d'ye think of that, Mrs Lovat, for a portrait of +Arthur Lawford? What d'ye make of that, Craik--eh? Devil--eh?' + +Mrs Lovat glanced with arched eyebrows, and with her finger-tips handed +the sheets on to her neighbour, who gazed with a settled and mournful +frown and returned them to Sheila. + +She took the pages, folded them and replaced them carefully in her +pocket. She swept her hands over her skirts, and turned to Danton. + +'You agree,' she inquired softly, 'it's like?' + +'Like! It's the livin' livid image. The livin' image,' he repeated, +stretching out his arm, 'as he stood there that very night.' + +'What will you say, then,' said Sheila, quietly, 'What will you say if I +tell you that that man, Nicholas de Sabathier, has been in his grave for +over a hundred years?' + +Danton's little eyes seemed, if anything, to draw back even further +into his head. 'I'd say, Mrs Lawford, if you'll excuse the word, that +it might be a damn horrible coincidence--I'd go farther, an almost +incredible coincidence. But if you want the sober truth, I'd say it was +nothing more than a crafty, clever, abominable piece of trickery. That's +what I'd say. Oh, you don't know, Mrs Lovat. When a scamp's a scamp, +he'll stop at nothing. I could tell you some tales.' + +'Ah, but that's not all,' said Sheila, eyeing them steadfastly one by +one. 'We all of us know that my husband's story was that he had gone +down to Widderstone--into the churchyard, for his convalescent ramble; +that story's true. We all know that he said he had had a fit, a heart +attack, and that a kind of--of stupor had come over him. I believe on my +honour that's true too. But no one knows but he himself and Mr Bethany +and I, that it was a wretched broken grave, quite at the bottom of the +hill, that he chose for his resting place, nor--and I can't get the +scene out of my head--nor that the name on that one solitary tombstone +down there was--was...this!' + +Danton rolled his eyes. 'I don't begin to follow,' he said stubbornly. + +'You don't mean,' said Mr Craik, who had not removed his gaze from +Sheila's face, 'I am not to take it that you mean, Mrs Lawford, the--the +other?' + +'Yes,' said Sheila, 'HIS'--she patted her skirts--'Sabathier's.' + +'You mean,' said Mrs Lovat crisply, 'that the man in the grave is the +man in the book, and that the man in the book is--is poor Arthur's +changed face?' + +Sheila nodded. + +Danton rose cumbrously from his chair, looking beadily down on his three +friends. + +'Oh, but you know, it isn't--it isn't right,' he began. 'Lord! I can see +him now. Glassy--yes, that's the very word I said--glassy. It won't do, +Mrs Lawford; on my solemn honour, it won't do. I don't deny it, call it +what you like; yes, devils, if you like. But what I say as a practical +man is that it's just rank--that's what it is! Bethany's had too much +rope. The time's gone by for sentiment and all that foolery. Mercy's all +very well, but after all it's justice that clinches the bargain. There's +only one way: we must catch him; we must lay the poor wretch by the +heels before it's too late. No publicity, God bless me, no. We'd have +all the rags in London on us. They'd pillory us nine days on end. We'd +never live it down. No, we must just hush it up--a home or something; +an asylum. For my part,' he turned like a huge toad, his chin low in his +collar--'and I'd say the same if it was my own brother, and, after all, +he is your husband, Mrs Lawford--I'd sooner he was in his grave. It +takes two to play at that game, that's what I say. To lay himself open! +I can't stand it--honestly, I can't stand it. And yet,' he jerked his +chin over the peak of his collar towards the ladies, 'and yet you say +he's being fetched; comes creeping home, and is fetched at dark by a--a +lady in a pony-carriage. God bless me! It's rank. What,' he broke out +violently again, 'what was he doing there in a cemetery after dark? Do +you think that beastly Frenchman would have played such a trick on Craik +here? Would he have tried his little game on me? Deviltry be it, if +you prefer the word, and all deference to you, Mrs Lawford. But I know +this--a couple of hundred years ago they would have burnt a man at the +stake for less than a tenth of this. Ask Craik here. I don't know how, +and I don't know when: his mother, I've always heard say, was a little +eccentric; but the truth is he's managed by some unholy legerdemain to +get the thing at his finger's ends; that's what it is. Think of that +unspeakable book. Left open on the table! Look at his Ferguson game. +It's our solemn duty to keep him for good and all out of mischief. It +reflects all round. There's no getting out of it; we're all in it. And +tar sticks. And then there's poor little Alice to consider, and--and +you yourself, Mrs. Lawford: I wouldn't give the fellow--friend though +he was, in a way--it isn't safe to give him five minutes' freedom. +We've simply got to save you from yourself, Mrs Lawford; that's what it +is--and from old-fashioned sentiment. And I only wish Bethany was here +now to dispute it!' + +He stirred himself down, as it were, into his clothes, and stood in the +middle of the hearthrug, gently oscillating, with his hands behind +his back. But at some faint rumour out of the silent house his posture +suddenly stiffened, and he lifted a little, with heavy, steady lids, his +head. + +'What is the matter, Danton?' said Mr Craik in a small voice; 'why are +you listening?' + +'I wasn't listening,' said Danton stoutly, 'I was thinking.' + +At the same moment, at the creak of a footstep on the kitchen stairs, +Lawford also had drawn soundlessly back into the darkness of the empty +drawing-room. + +'While Mr Danton is "thinking," Sheila,' Mrs Lovat was softly +interposing, 'do please listen a moment to me. Do you mean really that +that Frenchman--the one you've pocketed--is the poor creature in the +grave?' + +'Yes, Mrs Lawford,' said Mr Craik, putting out his face a little, 'are +we to take it that you mean that?' + +'It's the same date, dear, the same name even to the spelling; what +possibly else can I think?' + +'And that the poor creature in the grave actually climbed up out of the +darkness and--well, what?' + +'I know no more than you do NOW, Bettie. But the two faces--you must +remember you haven't seen my husband SINCE.' You must remember you +haven't heard the peculiar--the most peculiar things he--Arthur +himself--has said to me. Things such as a wife... And not in jest, +Bettie; I assure you....' + +'And Mr Bethany?' interpolated Mr Craik modestly, feeling his way. + +'Pah, Bethany, Craik! He'd back Old Nick himself if he came with a good +tale. We've got to act; we've got to settle his hash before he does any +mischief.' + +'Well,' began Mrs Lovat, smiling a little remorsefully beneath the arch +of her raised eyebrows, 'I sincerely hope you'll all forgive me; but I +really am, heart and soul, with Old Nick, as Mr Danton seems on intimate +terms enough to call him. Dead, he is really immensely alluring; and +alive, I think, awfully--just awfully pitiful and--and pathetic. But if +I know anything of Arthur he won't be beaten by a Frenchman. As for +just the portrait, I think, do you know, I almost prefer dark men'--she +glanced up at the face immediately in front of the clock--'at least,' +she added softly, 'when they are not looking very vindictive. I suppose +people are fairly often possessed, Mr Craik? HOW many "deadly sins" are +there?' + +'As a matter of fact, Mrs Lovat, there are seven. But I think in this +case Mrs Lawford intends to suggest not so much that--that her husband +is in that condition; habitual sin, you know--grave enough, of course, +I own--but that he is actually being compelled, even to the extent of a +more or less complete change of physiognomy, to follow the biddings of +some atrocious spiritual influence. It is no breach of confidence to +say that I have myself been present at a death-bed where the struggle +against what I may call the end was perfectly awful to witness. I +don't profess to follow all the ramifications of the affair, but though +possibly Mr Danton may seem a little harsh, such harshness, if I may +venture to intercede, is not necessarily "vindictive." And--and personal +security is a consideration.' + +'If you only knew the awful fear, the awful uncertainty I have been +in, Bettie! Oh, it is worse, infinitely worse, than you can possibly +imagine. I have myself heard the Voice speak out of him--a high, hard, +nasal voice. I've seen what Mr Danton calls the "glassiness" come into +his face, and an expression so wild and so appallingly depraved, as +it were, that I have had to hurry downstairs to hide myself from the +thought. I'm willing to sacrifice everything for my own husband and for +Alice; but can it be expected of me to go on harbouring....' Lawford +listened on in vain for a moment; poor Sheila, it seemed, had all but +broken down. + +'Look here, Mrs Lawford,' began Danton huskily, 'you really mustn't give +way; you really mustn't. It's awful, unspeakably awful, I admit. But +here we are; friends, in the midst of friends. And there's absolutely +nothing--What's that? Eh? Who is it?... Oh, the maid!' + +Ada stood in the doorway looking in. 'All I've come to ask, ma'am,' she +said in a low voice, 'is, am I to stay downstairs any longer? And are +you aware there's somebody in the house?' + +'What's that? What's that you're saying?' broke out the husky voice +again. 'Control yourself! Speak gently! What's that?' + +'Begging your pardon, sir, I'm perfectly under control. And all I say is +that I can't stay any longer alone downstairs there. There's somebody in +the house.' + +A concentrated hush seemed to have fallen on the little assembly. + +'"Somebody"--but who?' said Sheila out of the silence. 'You come up +here, Ada, with these idle fancies. Who's in the house? There has been +no knock--no footstep.' + +'No knock, no footstep, ma'am, that I've heard. It's Dr Ferguson, ma'am. +He was here that first night; and he's been here ever since. He was here +when I came on Tuesday; and he was here last night. And he's here now. +I can't be deceived by my own feelings. It's not right, it's not +out-spoken to keep me in the dark like this. And if you have no +objection, I would like to go home.' + +Lawford in his utter weariness had nearly closed the door and now sat +bent up on a chair, wondering vaguely when this poor play was coming to +an end, longing with an intensity almost beyond endurance for the keen +night air, the open sky. But still his ears drank in every tiniest sound +or stir. He heard Danton's lowered voice muttering his arguments. He +heard Ada quietly sniffing in the darkness of the hall. And this was his +world! This was his life's panorama, creaking on at every jolt. This was +the 'must' Grisel had sent him back to--these poor fools packed +together in a panic at an old stale tale! Well, they would all come out +presently, and cluster; and the crested, cackling fellow would lead them +safely away out of the haunted farmyard. + +He started out of his reverie at Danton's voice close at hand. + +'Look here, my good girl, we haven't the least intention of keeping you +in the dark. If you want to leave your mistress like this in the midst +of her anxieties she says you can go and welcome. But it's not a bit of +good in the world coming up with these cock-and-bull stories. The truth +is your master's mad, that's the sober truth of it--hopelessly insane, +you understand; and we've got to find him. But nothing's to be said, +d'ye see? It's got to be done without fuss or scandal. But if there's +any witness wanted, or anything of that kind, why, here you are; and,' +he dropped his voice to an almost inaudible hoot, 'and well worth your +while! You did see him, eh? Step into the trap, and all that?' + +Ada stood silent a moment. 'I don't know, sir,' she began quietly, 'by +what right you speak to me about what you call my cock-and-bull stories. +If the master is mad, all I can say to anybody is I'm very sorry to hear +it. I came to my mistress, sir, if you please; and I prefer to take my +orders from one who has a right to give them. Did I understand you to +say, ma'am, that you wouldn't want me any more this evening?' + +Sheila had swept solemnly to the door. 'Mr Danton meant all that he said +quite kindly, Ada. I can perfectly understand your feelings--perfectly. +And I'm very much obliged to you for all your kindness to me in very +trying circumstances. We are all agreed--we are forced to the terrible +conclusion which--which Mr Danton has just--expressed. And I know I +can rely on your discretion. Don't stay on a moment if you really are +afraid. But when you say "some one" Ada, do you mean--some one like you +or me; or do you mean--the other?' + +'I've been sitting in the kitchen, ma'am, unable to move. I'm watched +everywhere. The other evening I went into the drawing-room--I was alone +in the house--and... I can't describe it. It wasn't dark; and yet it was +all still and black, like the ruins after a fire. I don't mean I saw it, +only that it was like a scene. And then the watching--I am quite aware +to some it may sound all fancy. But I'm not superstitious, never was. +I only mean--that I can't sit alone here. I daren't. Else, I'm quite +myself. So if so be you don't want me any more; if I can't be of any +further use to you or to--to Mr. Lawford, I'd prefer to go home.' + +'Very well, Ada; thank you. You can go out this way.' + +The door was unchained and unbolted, and 'Good-night' said. And Sheila +swept back in sombre pomp to her absorbed friends. + +'She's quite a good creature at heart,' she explained frankly, as if to +disclaim any finesse, 'and almost quixotically loyal. But what really +did she mean, do you think? She is so obstinate. That maddening "some +one"! How they do repeat themselves. It can't be my husband; not Dr +Ferguson, I mean. You don't suppose--oh surely, not "some one" else!' +Again the dark silence of the house seemed to drift in on the little +company. + +Mr Craik cleared his throat. 'I failed to catch quite all that the maid +said,' he murmured apologetically; 'but I certainly did gather it was to +some kind of--of emanation she was referring. And the "ruin," you know. +I'm not a mystic; and yet do you know, that somehow seemed to me almost +offensively suggestive of--of demonic influence. You don't suppose, +Mrs Lawford--and of course I wouldn't for a moment venture on such a +conjecture unsupported-but even if this restless spirit (let us call +it) did succeed in making a footing, it might possibly be rather in +the nature of a lodging than a permanent residence. Moreover we are, I +think, bound to remember that probably in all spheres of existence like +attracts like; even the Gadarene episode seems to suggest a possible +MULTIPLICATION!' he peered largely. 'You don't suppose, Mrs Lawford...?' + +'I think Mr Craik doesn't quite relish having to break the news, Sheila +dear,' explained Mrs Lovat soothingly, 'that perhaps Sabathier's out. +Which really is quite a heavenly suggestion, for in that case your +husband would be in, wouldn't he? Just our old stolid Arthur again, you +know. And next Mr Craik is suggesting, and it certainly does seem rather +fascinating, that poor Ada's got mixed up with the Frenchman's friends, +or perhaps, even, with one of the seventy-two Princes Royal. I know +women can't, or mustn't reason, Mr Danton, but you do, I hope, just +catch the drift?' + +Danton started. 'I wasn't really listening to the girl,' he explained +nonchalantly, shrugging his black shoulders and pursing up his eyes. +'Personally, Mrs Lovat, I'd pack the baggage off to-night, box and all. +But it's not my business.' + +'You mustn't be depressed--must he, Mr Craik? After all, my dear man, +the business, as you call it, is not exactly entailed. But really, +Sheila, I think it must be getting very late. Mr Bethany won't come now. +And the dear old thing ought certainly to have his say before we go any +further; OUGHTN'T he, Mr Danton? So what's the use of worriting poor +Ada's ghost any longer. And as for poor Arthur--I haven't the faintest +desire in the world to hear the little cart drive up, simply in case it +should be to leave your unfortunate husband behind it, Sheila. What +it must be to be alone all night in this house with a dead and buried +Frenchman's face--well, I shudder, dear!' + +'And yet, Mrs Lovat,' said Mr Craik, with some little show of returning +bravado, 'as we make our bed, you know.' + +'But in this case, you see,' she replied reflectively, 'if all accounts +are true, Mr Craik, it's manifestly the wicked Frenchman who has made +the bed, and Sheila who refu---- But look; Mr Danton is fretting to get +home.' + +'If you'll all go to the door,' said Danton, seizing a fleeting +opportunity to raise his eyebrows more expressively even than if he had +again shrugged his shoulders at Sheila, 'I'll put out the light.' + +The night air flowed into the dark house as Danton hastily groped his +way out of the dining-room. + +'There's only one thing,' said Sheila slowly. 'When I last saw my +husband, you know, he was, I think, the least bit better. He was always +stubbornly convinced it would all come right in time. That's why, +I think, he's been spending his--his evenings away from home. But +supposing it did?' + +'For my part,' said Mrs Lovat, breathing the faint wind that was rising +out of the west, 'I'd sigh; I'd rub my eyes; I'd thank God for such an +exciting dream; and I'd turn comfortably over and go to sleep again. I'm +all for Arthur--absolutely--back against the wall.' + +'For my part,' said Danton, looming in the dusk, 'friend or no friend, +I'd cut the--I'd cut him dead. But don't fret, Mrs Lawford, devil or no +devil, he's gone for good.' + +'And for my part--' began Mr Craik; but the door at that moment slammed. + +Voices, however, broke out almost immediately in the porch. And after +a hurried consultation, Lawford in his stagnant retreat heard the door +softly reopen, and the striking of a match. And Mr Craik, followed +closely by Danton's great body, stole circumspectly across his dim +chink, and the first adventurer went stumbling down the kitchen +staircase. + +'I suppose,' muttered Lawford, turning his head in the darkness, 'they +have come back to put out the kitchen gas.' + +Danton began a busy tuneless whistle between his teeth. + +'Coming, Craik?' he called thickly, after a long pause. + +Apparently no answer had been returned to his inquiry: he waited a +little longer, with legs apart, and eyeballs enveloped in brooding +darkness. 'I'll just go and tell the ladies you're coming,' he suddenly +bawled down the hollow. 'Do you hear, Craik? They're alone, you know.' +And with that he resolutely wheeled and rapidly made his way down +the steps into the garden. Some few moments afterwards Mr Craik shook +himself free of the basement, hastened at a spirited trot to rejoin his +companions, and in his absence of mind omitted to shut the front door. + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE + +Lawford sat on in the darkness, and now one sentence and now another of +their talk would repeat itself in his memory, in much the same way as +one listlessly turns over an antiquated diary, to read here and there a +flattened and almost meaningless sentiment. Sometimes a footstep passed +echoing along the path under the trees, then his thoughts would leave +him, and he would listen and listen till it had died quite out. It was +all so very far away. And they too--these talkers--so very far away; as +remote and yet as clear as the characters in a play when they have made +their final bow, and have left the curtained stage, and one is standing +uncompanioned and nearly the last of the spectators, and the lights that +have summoned back reality again are being extinguished. It was only by +painful effort of mind that he kept recalling himself to himself--why he +was here; what it all meant; that this was indeed actuality. + +Yet, after all, this by now was his customary loneliness: there was +little else he desired for the present than the hospitality of the dark. +He glanced around him in the clear, black, stirless air. Here and there, +it seemed, a humped or spindled form held against all comers its passive +place. Here and there a tiny faintness of light played. Night after +night these chairs and tables kept their blank vigil. Why, he thought, +pleased as an overtired child with the fancy, in a sense they were +always alone, shut up in a kind of senselessness--just like us all. But +what--what, he had suddenly risen from his chair to ask himself--what +on earth are they alone with? No precise answer had been forthcoming to +that question. But as in turning in the doorway, he looked out into +the night, flashing here and there in dark spaces of the sky above +the withering apple leaves--the long dark wall and quiet untrodden +road--with the tumultuous beating of the stars--one thing at least he +was conscious of having learned in these last few days: he knew what +kind of a place he was alone IN. + +It seemed to weave a spell over him, to call up a nostalgia he had lost +all remembrance of since childhood. And that queer homesickness, at +any rate, was all Sabathier's doing, he thought, smiling in his rather +careworn fashion. Sabathier! It was this mystery, bereft now of all +fear, and this beauty together, that made life the endless, changing and +yet changeless, thing it was. And yet mystery and loveliness alike were +only really appreciable with one's legs, as it were, dangling down over +into the grave. + +Just with one's lantern lit, on the edge of the whispering unknown, and +a reiterated going back out of the solitude into the light and warmth, +to the voices and glancing of eyes, to say good-bye:--that after all was +this life on earth for those who watched as well as acted. What if one's +earthly home were empty?--still the restless fretted traveller must +tarry; 'for the horrible worst of it is, my friend,' he said, as if to +some silent companion listening behind him, 'the worst of it is, YOUR +way was just simply, solely suicide.' What was it Herbert had called +it? Yes, a cul-de-sac--black, lofty, immensely still and old and +picturesque, but none the less merely a contemptible cul-de-sac; no +abiding place, scarcely even sufficing with its flagstones for a groan +from the fugitive and deluded refugee. There was no peace for the +wicked. The question of course then came in--Was there any peace +anywhere, for anybody? + +He smiled at a sudden odd remembrance of a quiet, sardonic old aunt +whom he used to stay with as a child. 'Children should be seen and not +heard,' she would say, peering at him over his favourite pudding. + +His eyes rested vacantly on the darkling street. He fell again into +reverie, gigantically brooded over by shapes only imagination dimly +conceived of: the remote alleys of his mind astir with a shadowy and +ceaseless traffic which it wasn't at least THIS life's business to +hearken after, or regard. And as he stood there in a mysteriously +thronging peaceful solitude such as he had never known before, faintly +out of the silence broke the sound of approaching hoofs. His heart +seemed to gather itself close; a momentary blindness veiled his eyes, so +wildly had his blood surged up into cheek and brain. He remained, caught +up, with head slightly inclined, listening, as, with an interminable +tardiness, measureless anguished hope died down into nothing in his +mind. + +Cold and heavy, his heart began to beat again, as if to catch up those +laggard moments. He turned with an infinite revulsion of feeling to look +out on the lamps of the old fly that had drawn up at his gate. + +He watched incuriously a little old lady rather arduously alight, pause, +and look up at his darkened windows, and after a momentary hesitation, +and a word over her shoulder to the cabman, stoop and fumble at the iron +latch. He watched her with a kind of wondering aversion, still scarcely +tinged with curiosity. She had succeeded in lifting the latch and in +pushing her way through, and was even now steadily advancing towards +him along the tiled path. And a minute after he recognised with the +strangest reactions the quiet old figure that had shared a sunset with +him ages and ages ago--his mother's old schoolfellow, Miss Sinnet. + +He was already ransacking the still faintly-perfumed dining-room for +matches, and had just succeeded in relighting the still-warm lamp, when +he heard her quiet step in the porch, even felt her peering in, in the +gloom, with all her years' trickling customariness behind her, a little +dubious of knocking on a wide-open door. + +But the lamp lit Lawford went out again and welcomed his visitor. 'I am +alone,' he was explaining gravely, 'my wife's away and the whole house +topsy-turvy. How very, very kind of you!' + +The old lady was breathing a little heavily after her ascent of the +steep steps, and seemed not to have noticed his outstretched hand. None +the less she followed him in, and when she was well advanced into the +lighted room, she sighed deeply, raised her veil over the front of her +bonnet, and leisurely took out her spectacles. + +'I suppose,' she was explaining in a little quiet voice, 'you ARE Mr +Arthur Lawford, but as I did not catch sight of a light in any of the +windows I began to fear that the cabman might have set me down at the +wrong house.' + +She raised her head, and first through, and then over her spectacles she +deliberately and steadfastly regarded him. + +'Yes,' she said to herself, and turned, not as it seemed entirely with +satisfaction, to look for a chair. He wheeled the most comfortable up to +the table. + +'I have been visiting my old friend Miss Tucker--Rev W. Tucker's +daughter--she, I knew, could give me your address; and sure enough she +did. Your road, d'ye see, was on my way home. And I determined, in spite +of the hour, just to inquire. You must understand, Mr Lawford, there +was something that I rather particularly wanted to say to you. But +there!--you're looking sadly, sadly ill; and,' she glanced round a +little inquisitively, 'I think my story had better wait for a more +convenient occasion.' + +'Not at all, Miss Sinnet; please not,' Lawford assured her, 'really. I +have been ill, but I'm now practically quite myself again. My wife and +daughter have gone away for a few days; and I follow to-morrow, so if +you'll forgive such a very poor welcome, it may be my--my only chance. +Do please let me hear.' + +The old lady leant back in her chair, placed her hands on its arms and +softly panted, while out of the rather broad serenity of her face she +sat blinking up at her companion as if after a long talk, instead of +at the beginning of one. 'No,' she repeated reflectively, 'I don't like +your looks at all; yet here we are, enjoying beautiful autumn weather, +Mr Lawford, why not make use of it?' + +'Oh yes,' said Lawford, 'I do. I have been making tremendous use of it.' + +Her eyelid flickered at his candid glance. 'And does your business +permit of much walking?' + +'Well, I've been malingering these last few days idling at home; but I +am usually more or less my own man, Miss Sinnet. I walk a little.' + +'H'm, but not much in my direction, Mr Lawford?' she quizzed him. + +'All horrible indolence, Miss Sinnet. But I often--often think of you; +and especially just lately.' + +'Well, now,' she wriggled round her head to get a better view of him +rather stiffly seated on his chair, 'that's very peculiar; because I too +have been thinking lately a great deal of you. And yet--I fancy I +shall succeed in mystifying you presently--not precisely of you, but of +somebody else!' + +'You do mystify me--"somebody else"!' he replied gallantly. 'And that is +the story, I suppose?' + +'That's the story,' repeated Miss Sinnet with some little triumph. 'Now, +let me see; it was on Saturday last--yes, Saturday evening; a wonderful +sunset; Bewley Heath.' + +'Oh yes; my daughter's favourite walk.' + +'And your daughter's age now?' + +'She's nearly sixteen; Alice, you know.' + +'Ah, yes, Alice; to be sure. It is a beautiful walk, and if fine, I +generally take mine there too. It's near; there's shade; it's very +little frequented; and I can wander and muse undisturbed. And that +I think is pretty well all that an old woman like me is fit for, Mr +Lawford. "Nearly sixteen!" Is it possible? Dear, dear me? But let me get +on. On my way home from the Heath, you may be aware, before one reaches +the road again, there's a somewhat steep ascent. I haven't the strength +I had, and whether I'm fatigued or not, I have always made it a rule to +rest awhile on a most convenient little seat at the summit, admire the +view--what I can see of it--and then make my way quietly, quietly home. +On Saturday, however, and it most rarely occurs--once, I remember, when +a very civil nursemaid was sitting with two charmingly behaved little +children in the sunshine, and I heard they were my old friend Major +Loder's son's children--on Saturday, as I was saying, my own particular +little haunt was already occupied.' She glanced back at him from out of +her thoughts, as it were. 'By a gentleman. I say, gentleman; though I +must confess that his conduct--perhaps, too, a little something even in +his appearance, somewhat belied the term. Anyhow, gentleman let us call +him.' + +Lawford, all attention, nodded, and encouragingly smiled. + +'I'm not one of those tiresome, suspicious people, Mr Lawford, who +distrust strangers. I have never been molested, and I have enjoyed many +and many a most interesting, and sometimes instructive, talk with an +individual whom I've never seen in my life before, and this side of the +grave perhaps, am never likely to see again.' She lifted her head with +pursed lips, and gravely yet still flickeringly regarded him once more. +'Well, I made some trifling remark--the weather, the view, what-not,' +she explained with a little jerk of her shoulder--'and to my extreme +astonishment he turned and addressed me by name--Miss Sinnet. +Unmistakably--Sinnet. Now, perhaps, and very rightly, you won't +considered THAT a very peculiar thing to do? But you will recollect, Mr +Lawford, that I had been sitting there a considerable time. Surely, now, +if you had recognised my face you would have addressed me at once?' + +'Was he, do you think, Miss Sinnet, a little uncertain, perhaps?' + +'Never mind, never mind; let me get on with my story first. The next +thing my gentleman does is more mysterious still. His whole manner was +a little peculiar, perhaps--a certain restlessness, what, in fact, one +might be almost tempted to call a certain furtiveness of behaviour. +Never mind. What he does next is to ask me a riddle! Perhaps you won't +think that was peculiar either?' + +'What was the riddle?' smiled Lawford. + +'Why, to be sure, to guess his name! Simply guided, so I surmised, +by some very faint resemblance in his face to his MOTHER, who was, +he assured me, an old schoolfellow of mine at BRIGHTON. I thought +and thought. I confess the adventure was beginning to be a little +perplexing. But of course, very, very few of my old schoolfellows remain +distinctly in my memory now; and I fear that grows more treacherous the +longer I live. Their faces as girls are clear enough. But later in life +most of them drifted out of sight--many, alas, are dead; and, well, at +last I narrowed my man down to one. And who now, do you suppose that +was?' + +Lawford sustained an expression of abysmal mystification. 'Do tell +me--who?' + +'Your own poor dear mother, Mr Lawford.' + +'HE said so?' + +'No, no,' said the old lady, with some vexation, closing her eyes. 'I +said so. He asked me to guess. And I guessed Mary Lawford; now do you +see?' + +`Yes, yes. But WAS he like her, Miss Sinnet? That was really very, very +extraordinary. Did you see any likeness in his face?' + +Miss Sinnet very deliberately took her spectacles out of their case +again. 'Now, see here, sir; this is being practical, isn't it? I'm just +going to take a leisurely glance at yours. But you mustn't let me forget +the time. You must look after the time for me.' + +'It's about a quarter to ten,' said Lawford, having glanced first at the +stopped clock on the chimney-piece and then at his watch. He then sat +quite still and endeavoured to sit at ease, while the old lady lifted +her bonneted head and ever so gravely and benignly surveyed him. + +'H'm,' she said at last. 'There's no mistaking YOU. It's Mary's chin, +and Mary's brow--with just a little something, perhaps, of her dreamy +eye. But you haven't all her looks, Mr Lawford, by any manner of means. +She was a very beautiful girl, and so vivacious, so fanciful--it was, I +suppose the foreign strain showing itself. Even marriage did not quite +succeed in spoiling her.' + +'The foreign strain?' Lawford glanced with a kind of fleeting fixity at +the quiet old figure. 'The foreign strain?' + +Your mother's maiden name, my dear Mr Lawford, surely memory does not +deceive me in that, was van der Gucht. THAT, I believe, is a foreign +name.' + +'Ah, yes,' said Lawford, his rising thoughts sinking quietly to rest +again. 'Van der Gucht, of course. I--how stupid of me!' + +'As a matter of fact, your mother was very proud of her Dutch blood. But +there,' she flung out little fin-like sleeves, 'if you don't let me keep +to my story I shall go back as uneasy as I came. And you didn't,' she +added even more fretfully, 'you didn't tell me the time.' + +Lawford stared at his watch again for some few moments without replying. +'It's a few minutes to ten,' he said at last. + +'Dear me! And I'm keeping the cabman! I mast hurry on. Well, now, I put +it to you; you shall be my father confessor--though I detest the idea in +real life--was I wrong? Was I justified in professing to the poor fellow +that I detected a likeness when there was extremely little likeness +there?' + +'What! None at all!' cried Lawford; 'not the faintest trace?' + +'My dear good Mr Lawford,' she expostulated, patting her lap, 'there's +very little more than a trace of my dear beautiful Mary in YOU, her +own son. How could there be--how could you expect it in him, a complete +stranger? No, it was nothing but my own foolish kindliness. It might +have been Mary's son for all that I could recollect. I haven't for +years, please remember, had the pleasure of receiving a visit from +YOU. I am firmly of opinionthat I was justified. My motive was entirely +benevolent. And then--to my positive amazement--well, I won't say hard +things of the absent; but he suddenly turns round on me with a "Thank +you, Miss Bennett." Bennett, hark ye! Perhaps you won't agree that I had +any justification in being vexed and--and affronted at THAT.' + +'I think, Miss Sinnet,' said Lawford solemnly, 'that you were perfectly +justified. Oh, perfectly. I wonder even you had the patience to give +the real Arthur Lawford a chance to ask your forgiveness for--or the +stranger.' + +'Well, candidly,' said Miss Sinnett severely. 'I was very much +scandalised; and I shouldn't be here now telling you my story if it +hadn't been for your mother.' + +'My mother!' + +The old lady rather grimly enjoyed his confusion. 'Yes, Mr Lawford, +your mother. I don't know why--something in his manner, something in +his face--so dejected, so unhappy, so--if it is not uncharitablnesse to +say it--so wild: it has haunted me: I haven't been able to put the +matter out of my mind. I have lain awake in my bed thinking of him. Why +did he speak to me, I keep asking myself. Why did he play me so very +aimless a trick? How had he learned my name? Why was he sitting there so +solitary and so dejected? And worse even than that, what has become of +him? A little more patience, a little more charity, perhaps--what might +I not have done for him? The whole thing has harassed and distressed me +more than I can say. Would you believe it, I have actually twice, and on +one occasion, three times in a day made my way to the seat--hoping to +see him there. And I am not so young as I was. And then, as I say, to +crown all, I had a most remarkable dream about your mother. But that's +my own affair. Elderly people like me are used--well, perhaps I won't +say used--we're not surprised or disturbed by visits from those who have +gone before. We live, in a sense, among the tombs; though I would not +have you fancy it's in any way a morbid or unhappy life to lead. We +don't talk about it--certainly not to young people. Let them enjoy their +Eden while they can; though there's plenty of apples, I fear, on the +Tree yet, Mr Lawford.' + +She leant forward and whispered it with a big, simple smile:--'We don't +even discuss it much among ourselves. But as one gets nearer and nearer +to the wicket-gate there's other company around one than you'll find +in--in the directory. And that is why I have just come on here tonight. +Very probably my errand may seem to have no meaning for you. You look +ill, but you don't appear to be in any great trouble or adversity, as I +feared in my--well, there--as I feared you might be. I must say, though, +it seems a terribly empty house. And no lights, too!' + +She slowly, with a little trembling nodding of her bonnet, turned +her head and glanced quietly, fixedly, and unflinchingly, out of the +half-open door. 'But that's not my affair.' And again she looked at him +for a little while. + +Then she stooped forward and touched him kindly and trustingly on the +knee. 'Trouble or no trouble,' she said, 'it's never too late to remind +a man of his mother. And I'm sure, Mr Lawford, I'm very glad to hear you +are struggling up out of your illness again. We must keep a brave heart, +forty or seventy, whichever we may be: "While the evil days come not nor +the years draw nigh when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them," +though they have not come to me even yet; and I trust from the bottom of +my heart, not to YOU.' + +She looked at him without a trace of emotion or constraint in her +large, quiet face, and their eyes met for a moment in that brief, fixed, +baffling fashion that seems to prove that mankind is after all but a +dumb masked creature saddled with the vain illusion of speech. + +'And now that I've eased my conscience,' said the old lady, pulling +down her veil, 'I must beg pardon for intruding at such an hour of the +evening. And may I have your arm down those dreadful steps? Really, Mr +Lawford, judging from the houses they erect for us, the builders must +have a very peculiar notion of mankind. Is the fly still there? I +expressly told the man to wait, and what I am going to do if--!' + +'He's there,' Lawford reassured her, craning his neck in their slow +progress to catch a peep into the quiet road. And like a flock of birds +scared by a chance comer at their feeding in some deserted field, a +whirring cloud of memories swept softly up in his mind--memories whose +import he made no effort to discover. None the less, the leisurely +descent became in their company something of a real experience even in +such a brimming week. + +'I hope, some day, you will really tell me your dream?' he said, pushing +the old lady's silk skirts in after her as she slowly climbed into the +carriage. + +'Ah, my dear Lawford, when you are my age,' she called back to him, +groping her way into the rather musty gloom, 'you'll dream such dreams +for yourself. Life's not what's just the fashion. And there are queerer +things to be seen and heard just quietly in one's solitude than this +busy life gives us time to discover. But as for my mystifying Bewley +acquaintance--I confess I cannot make head or tail of him.' + +'Was he,' said Lawford rather vaguely, looking up into the dim white +face that with its plumes filled nearly the whole carriage window, 'was +his face very unpleasing?' + +She raised a gloved hand. 'It has haunted me, haunted me, Mr Lawford; +its--its conflict! Poor fellow; I hope, I do hope, he faced his trouble +out. But I shall never see him again.' + +He squeezed the trembling, kindly old hand. 'I bet, Miss Sinnet,' he +said earnestly, 'even your having thought kindly of the poor beggar +eased his mind--whoever he may have been. I assure you, assure you of +that.' + +'Ay, but I did more than THINK,' replied the old lady with a chuckle +that might have seemed even a little derisive if it had not been so +profoundly magnanimous. + +He watched the old black fly roll slowly off, and still smiling at Miss +Sinnet's inscrutable finesse went back into the house. 'And now, my +friend,' he said, addressing peacefully the thronging darkness, 'the +time's nearly up for me to go too.' + +He had made up his mind. Or, rather, it seemed as if in the unregarded +silences of this last long talk his mind had made up itself. Only among +impossibilities had he the shadow of a choice. In this old haunted +house, amid this shallow turmoil no practicable clue could show itself +of a way out. He would go away for a while. + +He left the door ajar behind him for the moments still left, and +stood for a while thinking. Then, lamp in hand, he descended into the +breakfast-room for pen, ink, and paper. He sat for some time in that +underground calm, nibbling his pen like a harassed and self-conscious +schoolboy. At last he began: + +'MY DEAR SHEILA,--I must tell you, to begin with, that the CHANGE has +now all passed away. I am--as near as man can be--completely myself +again. And next: that I overheard all that was said to-night in the +dining-room. + +'I'm sorry for listening; but it's no good going over all that now. Here +I am, and, as you said, for Alice's sake we must make the best of it. I +am going away for a while, to get, if I can, a chance to quiet down. I +suppose every one comes sooner or later to a time in life when there +is nothing else to be done but just shut one's eyes and blunder on. And +that's all I can do now--blunder on....' + +He paused, and suddenly, at the echo of the words in his mind, a +revulsion of feeling--shame and hatred of himself surged up, and he +tore his letter into tiny pieces. Once more he began, 'my dear Sheila,' +dropped his pen, sat on for a long time, cold and inert, harbouring +almost unendurably a pitiful, hopeless longing.... He would write to +Grisel another day. + +He leant back in his chair, his fingers pressed against his eyelids. And +clearer than those which myriad-hued reality can ever present, pictures +of the imagination swam up before his eyes. It seemed, indeed, that even +now some ghost, some revenant of himself was sitting there, in the old +green churchyard, roofed only with a thousand thousand stars. The breath +of darkness stirred softly on his cheek. Some little scampering shape +slipped by. A bird on high cried weirdly, solemnly, over the globe. He +shuddered faintly, and looked out again into the small lamplit room. + +Here, too, was quite as inexplicable a coming and going. A fly was +walking on the table beneath his eyes, with the uneasy gait of one that +has outlived his hour and most of his companions. Mice were scampering +and shrieking in the empty kitchen. And all about him, in the viewless +air, the phantoms of another life passed by, unmindful of his motionless +body. He fell into a lethargy of the senses, and only gradually became +aware after a while of the strange long-drawn sigh of rain at the +window. He rose and opened it. The night air flowed in, chilled with its +waters and faintly fragrant of the dust. It soothed away all thought for +a while. He turned back to his chair. He would wait until the rain had +lulled before starting.... + +A little before midnight the door was softly, and with extreme care, +pushed open, and Mr Bethany's old face, with an intense and sharpened +scrutiny, looked in on the lamplit room. And as if still intent on +the least sound within the empty walls around him, he came near, and +stooping across the table, stared through his spectacles at the sidelong +face of his friend, so still, with hands so lightly laid on the arms of +his chair that the old man had need to watch closely to detect in his +heavy slumber the slow measured rise and fall of his breast. + +He turned wearily away muttering a little, between an immeasurable +relief and a now almost intolerable medley of vexations. What WAS +this monstrous web of Craik's? What HAD the creature been nodding and +ducketing about?--those whisperings, that tattling? And what in the end, +when you were old and sour and out-strategied, what was the end to be +of this urgent dream called Life? He sat quietly down and drew his hands +over his face, pushed his lean knotted fingers up under his spectacles, +then sat blinking--and softly slowly deciphered the solitary 'My dear +Sheila' on Lawford's note-paper. 'H'm,' he muttered, and looked up again +at the dark still eyelids that in the strange torpor of sleep might yet +be dimly conveying to the dreaming brain behind them some hint of his +presence. 'I wish to goodness, you wonderful old creature,' he muttered, +wagging his head, 'I wish to goodness you'd wake up.' + +For some time he sat on, listening to the still soft downpour on the +fading leaves. 'They don't come to me,' he said softly again; with a +tiny smile on his old face. 'It's that old medieval Craik: with a +face like a last year's rookery!' And again he sat, with head a little +sidelong, listening now to the infinitesimal sounds of life without, +now to the thoughts within, and ever and again he gazed steadfastly on +Lawford. + +At last it seemed in the haunted quietness other thoughts came to him. +A cloud, as it were of youth, drew over the wrinkled skin, composed the +birdlike keenness; his head nodded. Once, like Lawford in the darkness +at Widderstone, he glanced up sharply across the lamplight at +his phantasmagorical shadowy companion, heard the steady surge of +multitudinous rain-drops, like the roar of Time's winged chariot +hurrying near; then he too, with spectacles awry, bobbed on in his +chair, a weary old sentinel on the outskirts of his friend's denuded +battlefield. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Return, by Walter de la Mare + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RETURN *** + +***** This file should be named 3075.txt or 3075.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/7/3075/ + +Produced by Eve Sobol + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.12.12.00*END* + + + + + +This etext was produced by Eve Sobol. + + + + + +This edition has single quotation marks for direct quotes, and double +for indirect quotes. + +There are no periods in the original text after +Mr +Mrs +Dr + + + + +THE RETURN + +Walter de la Mare + + +"Look not for roses in Attalus his garden, or wholesome +flowers in a venomous plantation. And since there is scarce +any one bad, but some others are the worse for him; tempt +not contagion by proximity and hazard not thyself in the +shadow of corruption." + + SIR THOMAS BROWNE. + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +The churchyard in which Arthur Lawford found himself wandering +that mild and golden September afternoon was old, green, and +refreshingly still. The silence in which it lay seemed as keen +and mellow as the light--the pale, almost heatless, sunlight that +filled the air. Here and there robins sang across the stones, +elvishly shrill in the quiet of harvest. The only other living +creature there seemed to Lawford to be his own rather fair, not +insubstantial, rather languid self, who at the noise of the birds +had raised his head and glanced as if between content and +incredulity across his still and solitary surroundings. An +increasing inclination for such lonely ramblings, together with +the feeling that his continued ill-health had grown a little +irksome to his wife, and that now that he was really better she +would be relieved at his absence, had induced him to wander on +from home without much considering where the quiet lanes were +leading him. And in spite of a peculiar melancholy that had +welled up into his mind during these last few days, he had +certainly smiled with a faint sense of the irony of things on +lifting his eyes in an unusually depressed moodiness to find +himself looking down on the shadows and peace of Widderstone. + +With that anxious irresolution which illness so often brings in +its train he had hesitated for a few minutes before actually +entering the graveyard. But once safely within he had begun to +feel extremely loth to think of turning back again, and this not +the less at remembering with a real foreboding that it was now +drawing towards evening, that another day was nearly done. He +trailed his umbrella behind him over the grass-grown paths; +staying here and there to read some time-worn inscription; +stooping a little broodingly over the dark green graves. Not for +the first time during the long laborious convalescence that had +followed apparently so slight an indisposition, a fleeting sense +almost as if of an unintelligible remorse had overtaken him, a +vague thought that behind all these past years, hidden as it were +from his daily life, lay something not yet quite reckoned with. +How often as a boy had he been rapped into a galvanic activity +out of the deep reveries he used to fall into--those fits of a +kind of fishlike day-dream. How often, and even far beyond +boyhood, had he found himself bent on some distant thought or +fleeting vision that the sudden clash of self-possession had made +to seem quite illusory, and yet had left so strangely haunting. +And now the old habit had stirred out of its long sleep, and, +through the gate that Influenza in departing had left ajar, had +returned upon him. + +'But I suppose we are all pretty much the same, if we only knew +it,' he had consoled himself. 'We keep our crazy side to +ourselves; that's all. We just go on for years and years doing +and saying whatever happens to come up--and really keen about it +too'--he had glanced up with a kind of challenge in his face at +the squat little belfry--'and then, without the slightest reason +or warning, down you go, and it all begins to wear thin, and you +get wondering what on earth it all means.' Memory slipped back +for an instant to the life that in so unusual a fashion seemed to +have floated a little aloof. Fortunately he had not discussed +these inward symptoms with his wife. How surprised Sheila would +be to see him loafing in this old, crooked churchyard. How she +would lift her dark eyebrows, with that handsome, indifferent +tolerance. He smiled, but a little confusedly; yet the thought +gave even a spice of adventure to the evening's ramble. + +He loitered on, scarcely thinking at all now, stooping here and +there. These faint listless ideas made no more stir than the +sunlight gilding the fading leaves, the crisp turf underfoot. +With a slight effort he stooped even once again;-- + +'Stranger, a moment pause, and stay; +In this dim chamber hidden away +Lies one who once found life as dear +As now he finds his slumbers here: +Pray, then, the Judgement but increase +His deep, everlasting peace!' + +'But then, do you know you lie at peace?' Lawford audibly +questioned, gazing at the doggerel. And yet, as his eyes wandered +over the blunt green stone and the rambling crimson-berried brier +that had almost encircled it with its thorns, the echo of that +whisper rather jarred. He was, he supposed, rather a dull +creature--at least people seemed to think so--and he seldom felt +at ease even with his own small facetiousness. Besides, just that +kind of question was getting very common. Now that cleverness was +the fashion most people were clever--even perfect fools; and +cleverness after all was often only a bore: all head and no body. +He turned languidly to the small cross-shaped stone on the other +side: + + 'Here lies the body of Ann Hard, who died in child-bed. + Also of James, her infant son.' + +He muttered the words over with a kind of mournful bitterness. +'That's just it--just it; that's just how it goes!'... He yawned +softly; the pathway had come to an end. Beyond him lay ranker +grass, one and another obscurer mounds, an old scarred oak seat, +shadowed by a few everlastingly green cypresses and coral-fruited +yew-trees. And above and beyond all hung a pale blue arch of sky +with a few voyaging clouds like silvered wool, and the calm wide +curves of stubble field and pasture land. He stood with vacant +eyes, not in the least aware how queer a figure he made with his +gloves and his umbrella and his hat among the stained and +tottering gravestones. Then, just to linger out his hour, and +half sunken in reverie, he walked slowly over to the few solitary +graves beneath the cypresses. + +One only was commemorated with a tombstone, a rather unusual +oval-headed stone, carved at each corner into what might be the +heads of angels, or of pagan dryads, blindly facing each other +with worn-out, sightless faces. A low curved granite canopy +arched over the grave, with a crevice so wide between its stones +that Lawford actually bent down and slid in his gloved fingers +between them. He straightened himself with a sigh, and followed +with extreme difficulty the well-nigh, illegible inscription: + +'Here lie ye Bones of one, +Nicholas Sabathier, a Stranger to this Parish, +who fell by his own Hand on ye +Eve of Ste. Michael and All Angels. +MDCCXXXIX + +Of the date he was a little uncertain. The 'Hand' had lost its +'n' and 'd'; and all the 'Angels' rain had erased. He was not +quite sure even of the 'Stranger.' There was a great rich 'S,' +and the twisted tail of a 'g' ; and, whether or not, Lawford +smilingly thought, he is no Stranger now. But how rare and how +memorable a name! French evidently; probably Huguenot. And the +Huguenots, he remembered vaguely, were a rather remarkable +'crowd.' He had, he thought, even played at 'Huguenots' once. +What was the man's name? Coligny; yes, of course, Coligny. 'And I +suppose,' Lawford continued, muttering to himself, 'I suppose +this poor beggar was put here out of the way. They might, you +know,' he added confidentially, raising the ferrule of his +umbrella, 'they might have stuck a stake through you, and buried +you at the crossroads.' And again, a feeling of ennui, a faint +disgust at his poor little witticism, clouded over his mind. It +was a pity thoughts always ran the easiest way, like water in old +ditches. + +'"Here lie ye bones of one, Nicholas Sabathier,"' he began +murmuring again--'merely bones, mind you; brains and heart are +quite another story. And it's pretty certain the fellow had some +kind of brains. Besides, poor devil! he killed himself. That +seems to hint at brains... Oh, for goodness' sake!' he cried +out; so loud that the sound of his voice alarmed even a robin +that had perched on a twig almost within touch, with glittering +eye intent above its dim red breast on this other and even rarer +stranger. + +'I wonder if it is XXXIX.; it might be LXXIX.' Lawford cast a +cautious glance over his round grey shoulder, then laboriously +knelt down beside the stone, and peeped into the gaping cranny. +There he encountered merely the tiny, pale-green, faintly +conspicuous eyes of a large spider, confronting his own. It was +for the moment an alarming, and yet a faintly fascinating +experience. The little almost colourless fires remained so +changeless. But still, even when at last they had actually +vanished into the recesses of that quiet habitation, Lawford did +not rise from his knees. An utterly unreasonable feeling of +dismay, a sudden weakness and weariness had come over him. + +'What is the good of it all?' he asked himself inconsequently-- +this monotonous, restless, stupid life to which he was soon to be +returning, and for good. He began to realize how ludicrous a +spectacle he must be, kneeling here amid the weeds and grass +beneath the solemn cypresses. 'Well, you can't have everything,' +seemed loosely to express his disquiet. + +He stared vacantly at the green and fretted gravestone, dimly +aware that his heart was beating with an unusual effort. He felt +ill and weak. He leant his hand on the stone and lifted himself +on to the low wooden seat nearby. He drew off his glove and +thrust his bare hand under his waistcoat, with his mouth a little +ajar, and his eyes fixed on the dark square turret, its bell +sharply defined against the evening sky. + +'Dead!' a bitter inward voice seemed to break into speech; 'Dead!' +The viewless air seemed to be flocking with hidden listeners. The +very clearness and the crystal silence were their ambush. He alone +seemed to be the target of cold and hostile scrutiny. There was +not a breath to breathe in this crisp, pale sunshine. It was all +too rare, too thin. The shadows lay like wings everlastingly +folded. The robin that had been his only living witness lifted +its throat, and broke, as if from the uttermost outskirts of +reality, into its shrill, passionless song. Lawford moved heavy +eyes from one object to another--bird--sun-gilded stone--those +two small earth-worn faces--his hands--a stirring in the grass +as of some creature labouring to climb up. It was useless to sit +here any longer. He must go back now. Fancies were all very well +for a change, but must be only occasional guests in a world +devoted to reality. He leaned his hand on the dark grey wood, and +closed his eyes. The lids presently unsealed a little, momentarily +revealing astonished, aggrieved pupils, and softly, slowly they +again descended.... + +The flaming rose that had swiftly surged from the west into the +zenith, dyeing all the churchyard grass a wild and vivid green, +and the stooping stones above it a pure faint purple, waned +softly back like a falling fountain into its basin. In a few +minutes, only a faint orange burned in the west, dimly +illuminating with its band of light the huddled figure on his low +wood seat, his right hand still pressed against a faintly beating +heart. Dusk gathered; the first white stars appeared; out of the +shadowy fields a nightjar purred. But there was only the silence +of the falling dew among the graves. Down here, under the +ink-black cypresses, the blades of the grass were stooping with +cold drops; and darkness lay like the hem of an enormous cloak, +whose jewels above the breast of its wearer might be in the +unfathomable clearness the glittering constellations.... + +In his small cage of darkness Lawford shuddered and raised a +furtive head. He stood up and peered eagerly and strangely from +side to side. He stayed quite still, listening as raptly as some +wandering night-beast to the indiscriminate stir and echoings of +the darkness. He cocked his head above his shoulder and listened +again, then turned upon the soundless grass towards the hill. He +felt not the faintest astonishment or strangeness in his solitude +here; only a little chilled, and physically uneasy; and yet in +this vast darkness a faint spiritual exaltation seemed to hover. + +He hastened up the narrow path, walking with knees a little bent, +like an old labourer who has lived a life of stooping, and came +out into the dry and dusty lane. One moment his instinct +hesitated as to which turn to take--only a moment; he was soon +walking swiftly, almost trotting, downhill with this vivid +exaltation in the huge dark night in his heart, and Sheila merely +a little angry Titianesque cloud on a scarcely perceptible +horizon. He had no notion of the time; the golden hands of his +watch were indiscernible in the gloom. But presently, as he +passed by, he pressed his face close to the cold glass of a +little shop-window, and pierced that out by an old Swiss +cuckoo-clock. He would if he hurried just be home before dinner. + +He broke into a slow, steady trot, gaining speed as he ran on, +vaguely elated to find how well his breath was serving him. An +odd smile darkened his face at remembrance of the thoughts he had +been thinking. There could be little amiss with the heart of a +man who could shamble along like this, taking even pleasure, an +increasing pleasure in this long, wolf-like stride. He turned +round occasionally to look into the face of some fellow-wayfarer +whom he had overtaken, for he felt not only this unusual +animation, this peculiar zest, but that, like a boy on some +secret errand, he had slightly disguised his very presence, was +going masked, as it were. Even his clothes seemed to have +connived at this queer illusion. No tailor had for these ten +years allowed him so much latitude. He cautiously at last opened +his garden gate and with soundless agility mounted the six stone +steps, his latch-key ready in his gloveless hand, and softly let +himself into the house. + +Sheila was out, it seemed, for the maid had forgotten to light +the lamp. Without pausing to take off his greatcoat, he hung up +his hat, ran nimbly upstairs, and knocked with a light knuckle on +his bedroom door. It was closed, but no answer came. He opened +it, shut it, locked it, and sat down on the bedside for a moment, +in the darkness, so that he could scarcely hear any other sound, +as he sat erect and still, like some night animal, wary of +danger, attentively alert. Then he rose from the bed, threw off +his coat, which was clammy with dew, and lit a candle on the +dressing-table. + +Its narrow flame lengthened, drooped, brightened, gleamed clearly. +He glanced around him, unusually contented--at the ruddiness of +the low fire, the brass bedstead, the warm red curtains, the soft +silveriness here and there. It seemed as if a heavy and dull +dream had withdrawn out of his mind. He would go again some day, +and sit on the little hard seat beside the crooked tombstone of +the friendless old Huguenot. He opened a drawer, took out his +razors, and, faintly whistling, returned to the table and lit a +second candle. And still with this strange heightened sense of +life stirring in his mind, he drew his hand gently over his chin +and looked unto the glass. + +For an instant he stood head to foot icily still, without the +least feeling, or thought, or stir--staring into the +looking-glass. Then an inconceivable drumming beat on his ear. A +warm surge, like the onset of a wave, broke in him, flooding +neck, face, forehead, even his hands with colour. He caught +himself up and wheeled deliberately and completely round, his eyes +darting to and fro, suddenly to fix themselves in a prolonged stare, +while he took a deep breath, caught back his self-possession and +paused. Then he turned and once more confronted the changed +strange face in the glass. + +Without a sound he drew up a chair and sat down, just as he was, +frigid and appalled, at the foot of the bed. To sit like this, +with a kind of incredibly swift torrent of consciousness, bearing +echoes and images like straws and bubbles on its surface, could +not be called thinking. Some stealthy hand had thrust open the +sluice of memory. And words, voices, faces of mockery streamed +through without connection, tendency, or sense. His hands hung +between his knees, a deep and settled frown darkened the features +stooping out of the direct rays of the light, and his eyes +wandered like busy and inquisitive, but stupid, animals over the +floor. + +If, in that flood of unintelligible thoughts, anything clearly +recurred at all, it was the memory of Sheila. He saw her face, +lit, transfigured, distorted, stricken, appealing, horrified. His +lids narrowed; a vague terror and horror mastered him. He hid his +eyes in his hands and cried without sound, without tears, without +hope, like a desolate child. He ceased crying; and sat without +stirring. And it seemed after an age of vacancy and +meaninglessness he heard a door shut downstairs, a distant voice, +and then the rustle of some one slowly ascending the stairs. Some +one turned the handle; in vain; tapped. 'Is that you, Arthur?' + +For an instant Lawford paused, then like a child listening for an +echo, answered, 'Yes, Sheila.' And a sigh broke from him; his +voice, except for a little huskiness, was singularly unchanged. + +'May I come in?' Lawford stood softly up and glanced once more +into the glass. His lips set tight, and a slight frown settled +between the long, narrow, intensely dark eyes. + +'Just one moment, Sheila,' he answered slowly, 'just one moment.' + +'How long will you be?' + +He stood erect and raised his voice, gazing the while impassively +into the glass. + +'It's no use,' he began, as if repeating a lesson, 'it's no use +your asking me, Sheila. Please give me a moment, a...I am not +quite myself, dear,' he added quite gravely. + +The faintest hint of vexation was in the answer. + +'What is the matter? Can't I help? It's so very absurd--' + +'What is absurd?' he asked dully. + +'Why, standing like this outside my own bedroom door. Are you +ill? I will send for Dr. Simon.' + +'Please, Sheila, do nothing of the kind. I am not ill. I merely +want a little time to think in.' There was again a brief pause, +and then a slight rattling at the handle. + +'Arthur, I insist on knowing at once what's wrong; this does not +sound a bit like yourself. It is not even quite like your own +voice.' + +'It is myself,' he replied stubbornly, staring fixedly into the +glass. You must give me a few moments, Sheila. Something has +happened. My face. Come back in an hour.' + +'Don't be absurd; it's simply wicked to talk like that. How do I +know what you are doing? As if I can leave you for an hour in +uncertainty! Your face! If you don't open at once I shall believe +there's something seriously wrong: I shall send Ada for +assistance.' + +'If you do that, Sheila, it will be disastrous. I cannot answer +for the con--. Go quietly downstairs. Say I am unwell; don't wait +dinner for me; come back in an hour; oh, half an hour!' + +The answer broke out angrily. 'You must be mad, beside yourself, +to ask such a thing. I shall wait in the next room until you +call.' + +'Wait where you please,' Lawford replied, 'but tell them +downstairs.' + +'Then if I tell them to wait until half-past eight, you will come +down? You say you are not ill: the dinner will be ruined. It's +absurd.' + +Lawford made no answer. He listened a while, then he deliberately +sat down once more to try to think. Like a squirrel in a cage his +mind seemed to be aimlessly, unceasingly astir. 'What is it +really? What is it really?--really?' He sat there and it seemed +to him his body was transparent as glass. It seemed he had no +body at all--only the memory of an hallucinatory reflection in +the glass, and this inward voice crying, arguing, questioning, +threatening out of the silence--'What is it really--really-- +REALLY?' And at last, cold, wearied out, he rose once more and +leaned between the two long candle-flames, and stared on--on--on, +into the glass. + +He gave that long, dark face that had been foisted on him tricks +to do--lift an eyebrow, frown. There was scarcely any perceptible +pause between the wish and its performance. He found to his +discomfiture that the face answered instantaneously to the +slightest emotion, even to his fainter secondary thoughts; as if +these unfamiliar features were not entirely within control. He +could not, in fact, without the glass before him, tell precisely +what that face WAS expressing. He was still, it seemed, keenly +sane. That he would discover for certain when Sheila returned. +Terror, rage, horror had fallen back. If only he felt ill, or was +in pain: he would have rejoiced at it. He was simply caught in +some unheard-of snare--caught, how? when? where? by whom? + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +But the coolness and deliberation of his scrutiny, had to a +certain extent calmed Lawford's mind and given him confidence. +Hitherto he had met the little difficulties of life only to +vanquish them with ease and applause. Now he was standing face to +face with the unknown. He burst out laughing, into a long, low, +helpless laughter. Then he arose and began to walk softly, +swiftly, to and fro across the room--from wall to wall seven +paces, and at the fourth, that awful, unseen, brightly-lit +profile passed as swiftly over the tranquil surface of the +looking-glass. The power of concentration was gone again. He +simply paced on mechanically, listening to a Babel of questions, +a conflicting medley of answers. But above all the confusion and +turmoil of his brain, as a boatswain's whistle rises above a +storm, so sounded that same infinitesimal voice, incessantly +repeating another question now, 'What are you going to do? What +are you going to do?' + +And in the midst of this confusion, out of the infinite, as it +were, came another sharp tap at the door, and all within sank to +utter stillness again. + +'It's nearly half-past eight, Arthur; I can't wait any longer.' + +Lawford cast a last fleeting look into the glass, turned, and +confronted the closed door. 'Very well, Sheila, you shall not +wait any longer.' He crossed over to the door, and suddenly a +swift crafty idea flashed into his mind. + +He tapped on the panel. 'Sheila,' he said softly, 'I want you +first, before you come in, to get me something out of my old +writing-desk in the smoking-room. Here is the key.' He pushed a +tiny key--from off the ring he carried--beneath the door. 'In the +third little drawer from the top, on the left side, is a letter; +please don't say anything now. It is the letter you wrote me, you +will remember, after I had asked you to marry me. You scribbled +in the corner under your signature the initials "Y.S.O.A."--do +you remember? They meant, You Silly Old Arthur!--do you remember? +Will you please get that letter at once?' + +'Arthur,' answered the voice from without, empty of all +expression, 'what does all this mean, this mystery, this hopeless +nonsense about a silly letter? What has happened? Is this a +miserable form of persecution? Are you mad?--I refuse to get the +letter.' + +Lawford stooped, black and angular, against the door. 'I am not +mad. Oh, I am in the deadliest earnest, Sheila. You must get the +letter, if only for your own peace of mind.' He heard his wife +hesitate as she turned. He heard a sob. And once more he waited. + +'I have brought the letter,' came the low toneless voice again. + +'Have you opened it?' + +There was a rustle of paper. 'Are the letters there underlined +three times--"Y.S.O.A."?' + +'The letters are there.' + +'And the date of the month is underneath, "April 3rd." No one +else in the whole world, living or dead, could know of this but +ourselves, Sheila?' + +'Will you please open the door?' + +'No one?' + +'I suppose not--no one.' + +'Then come in.' He unlocked the door and opened it. A dark, +rather handsome woman, with sleek hair, in a silk dress of a dark +rich colour entered. Lawford closed the door. But his face was in +shadow. He had still a moment's respite. + +'I need not ask you to be patient,' he began quickly; 'if I could +possibly have spared you--if there had been anybody in the world +to go to... I am in horrible, horrible trouble, Sheila. It is +inconceivable. I said I was sane: so I am, but the fact is--I +went out for a walk; it was rather stupid, perhaps, so soon: and +I think I was taken ill, or something--my heart. A kind of fit, a +nervous fit. Possibly I am a little unstrung, and it's all, it's +mainly fancy: but I think, I can't help thinking it has a little +distorted--changed my face; everything, Sheila; except, of +course, myself. Would you mind looking?' He walked slowly and +with face averted towards the dressing-table. + +'Simply a nervous--to make such a fuss, to scare!...' began his +wife, following him. + +Without a word he took up the two old china candlesticks, and +held them, one in each lank-fingered hand, before his face, and +turned. + +Lawford could see his wife--every tint and curve and line as +distinctly as she could see him. Her cheeks never had much +colour; now her whole face visibly darkened, from pallor to a +dusky leaden grey, as she gazed. It was not an illusion then; not +a miserable hallucination. The unbelievable, the inconceivable, +had happened. He replaced the candles with trembling fingers and +sat down. + +'Well,' he said, 'what is it really; what is it really, Sheila? +What on earth are we to do?' + +'Is the door locked?' she whispered. He nodded. With eyes fixed +stirlessly on his face, Sheila unsteadily seated herself, a +little out of the candlelight, in the shadow. Lawford rose and +put the key of the door on his wife's little rose-wood +prayer-desk at her elbow, and deliberately sat down again. + +'You said "a fit"--where?' + +'I suppose--is--is it very different--hopeless? You will +understand my being... O Sheila, what am I to do?' His wife sat +perfectly still, watching him with unflinching attention. + +'You gave me to understand--"a nervous fit"; where?' + +Lawford took a deep breath, and quietly faced her again. 'In the +old churchyard, Widderstone; I was looking at--at the +gravestones.' + +'A fit; in the old churchyard, Widderstone--you were "looking at +the gravestones"?' + +Lawford shut his mouth. 'I suppose so--a fit,' he said presently. +'My heart went a little queer, and I sat down and fell into a +kind of doze--a stupor, I suppose. I don't remember anything +more. And then I woke; like this.' + +'How do you know?' + +'How do I know what?' + +'"Like that"?' + +He turned slowly towards the looking-glass. 'Why, here I am!' + +She gazed at him steadily; and a hard, incredulous, almost +cunning glint came into her wide blue eyes. She took up the key +carelessly, glanced at it; glanced at him. 'It has made me--I +mean the first shock, you know--it has made me a little faint.' +She walked slowly, deliberately to the door, and unlocked it. +'I'll get a little sal volatile.' She softly drew out the key, +and without once removing her eyes from his face, opened the door +and pushed the key noiselessly in on the other side. 'Please stay +there; I won't be a minute.' + +Lawford's face smiled--a rather desperate, yet for all that a +patient, resolute smile. 'Oh yes, of course,' he said, almost to +himself, 'I had not foreseen--at least--you must do precisely +what you please, Sheila. You were going to lock me in. You will, +however, before taking any final step, please think over what it +will entail. I did not think you would, after such proof, in this +awful trouble--I did not think you would simply disbelieve me, +Sheila. Who else is there to help me? You have the letter in your +hand. Isn't that sufficient proof? It was overwhelming proof to +me. And even I doubted too; doubted myself. But never mind; why I +should have dreamed you would believe me; or taken this awful +thing differently, I don't know. It's rather awful to have to go +on alone. But there, think it over. I shall not stir until I hear +the voices. And then: honestly, Sheila, I couldn't face quite +that. I'd sooner give up altogether. Any proof you can think of-- +I will... O God, I cannot bear it!' He covered his face with his +hands; but in a moment looked up, unmoved once more. 'Why, for +that matter,' he added slowly, and, as it were, with infinite +pains, a faint thin smile again stealing into his face, 'I +think,' he turned wearily to the glass, 'I think, it's almost an +improvement!' + +Something deep in those dark clear pupils, out of that lean +adventurous face, gleamed back at him, the distant flash of a +heliograph, as it were, height to height, flashing 'Courage!' He +shuddered, and shut his eyes. 'But I would really rather,' he +aided in a quiet childlike way, 'I would really rather, Sheila, +you left me alone now.' + +His wife stood irresolute. 'I understand you to explain,' she +said, 'that you went out of this house, just your usual self, +this afternoon, for a walk; that for some reason you went to +Widderstone--"to read the tombstones," that you had a heart +attack, or, as you said at first, a fit, that you fell into a +stupor, and came home like--like this. Am I likely to believe all +that? Am I likely to believe such a story as that? Whoever you +are, whoever you may be, is it likely? I am not in the least +afraid. I thought at first it was some silly practical joke. I +thought that at first.' She paused, but no answer came. 'Well, I +suppose in a civilised country there is a remedy even for a joke +as wicked as that.' + +Lawford listened patiently. 'She is pretending; she is trying me; +she is feeling her way,' he kept repeating to himself. 'She knows +I AM I, but hasn't the courage... Let her talk!' + +'I shall leave the door open,' Sheila continued. 'I am not, as +you no doubt very naturally assumed--I am not going to do +anything either senseless or heedless. I am merely going to ask +your brother Cecil to come in, if he is at home, and if not, no +doubt our old friend Mr. Montgomery would--would help us.' Her +scrutiny was still and concentrated, like that of a cat above a +mouse's hole. + +Lawford sat crouched together in the candle-light. 'By all means, +Sheila,' he said slowly choosing his words, 'if you think poor +old Cecil, who next January will have been three years in his +grave, will be of any use in our difficulty. Who Mr. Montgomery +is...' His voice dropped in utter weariness. 'You did it very +well, my dear,' he added softly. + +Sheila gently closed the door and sat down on the bed. He heard +her softly crying, he heard the bed shaken with her sobs. But a +slow glance towards the steady candle-flames restrained him. He +let her cry on alone. When she had become a little more composed +he stood up. 'You have had no dinner,' he managed to blurt out at +last, 'you will be faint. It's useless to talk, even to think, +any more to-night. Leave me to myself for a while. Don't look at +me any more. Perhaps I can sleep: perhaps if I sleep it will come +right again. When the servants are gone up, I will come down. +Just let me have some--some medical book, or other; and some more +candles. Don't think, Sheila; don't even think!' + +Sheila paid him no attention for a while. 'You tell me not to +think,' she began, in a low, almost listless voice; 'why--I +wonder I am in my right mind. And "eat"! How can you have the +heartlessness to suggest it? You don't seem in the least to +realize what you say. You seem to have lost all--all +consciousness. I quite agree, it is useless for me to burden you +with my company while you are in your present condition of mind. +But you will at least promise me that you won't take any further +steps in this awful business.' She could not, try as she would, +bring herself again to look at him. She rose softly, paused a +moment with sidelong eyes, then turned deliberately towards the +door, 'What, what have I done to deserve all this?' + +>From behind her that voice, so extraordinarily like--and yet in +some vague fashion more arresting, more resonant than her +husband's, broke incredibly out once more. 'You will please leave +the key, Sheila. I am ill, but I am not yet in the padded room. +And please understand, I take no further steps in "this awful +business" until I hear a strange voice in the house.' Sheila +paused, but the quiet voice rang in her ear, desperately yet +convincingly. She took the key out of the lock, placed it on the +bed, and with a sigh, that was not quite without a hint of relief +in its misery, she furtively extinguished the gas-light on the +landing and rustled downstairs. + +She speedily returned. 'I have brought the book.' she said +hastily. 'I could only find the one volume. I have said you have +taken a fresh chill. No one will disturb you.' + +Lawford took the book without a word. And once more, with eyes +stonily averted, his wife left him to his own company and that of +the face in the glass. + +When completely deserted, Lawford with fumbling fingers opened +Quain's 'Dictionary of Medicine.' He had never had much +curiosity, and had always hated what he disbelieved, but none the +less he had heard occasionally of absurd and questionable +experiments. He remembered even to have glanced over reports of +cases in the newspapers concerning disappearances, loss of +memory, dual personality. Cranks... Oh yes, he thought now, with +a sense of cold humiliating relief, there had been such cases as +his before. They were no doubt curable. They must be +comparatively common in America--that land of jangled nerves. +Possibly bromide, rest, a battery. But Quain, it seemed, shared +his prejudices, at least in this edition, or had hidden away all +such apocryphal matter beneath technical terms, where no sensible +man could find it, 'Besides,' he muttered angrily, 'what's the +good of your one volume?' He flung it down and strode to the bed, +and rang the bell. Then suddenly recollecting himself, he paused +and listened. There came a tap on the door. 'Is that you, +Sheila?' he called, doubtfully. + +'No, sir, it's me,' came the answer. + +'Oh, don't trouble; I only wanted to speak to your mistress. It's +all right.' + +'Mrs. Lawford has gone out, sir,' replied the voice. + +'Gone out?' + +'Yes, sir; she told me not to mention it; but I suppose as you +asked--' + +'Oh, that's all right; never mind; I didn't ring.' He stood with +face uplifted, thinking. + +'Can I do anything, sir?' came the faint, nervous question after +a long pause. + +'One moment, Ada,' he called in a loud voice. He took out his +pocket-book, sat down, and scribbled a little note. He hardly +noticed how changed his handwriting was--the clear round letters +crabbed and irregular. + +'Are you there, Ada?' he called. 'I am slipping a note beneath +the door; just draw back the mat; that's it. Take it at once, +please, to Mr. Critchett's, and be sure to wait for an answer. +Then come back direct to me, up here. I don't think, Ada, your +mistress believes much in Critchett; but I have fully explained +what I want. He has made me up many prescriptions. Explain that +to his assistant if he is not there. Go at once, and you will be +back before she is. I should be so very much obliged, tell him. +"Mr Arthur Lawford."' + +The minutes slowly drifted by. He sat quite still in the clear +untroubled light, waiting in the silence of the empty house. And +for the first time he was confronted with the cold incredible +horror of his ordeal. Who would believe, who could believe, that +behind this strange and awful, yet how simple mask, lay himself? +What test; what heaped-up evidence of identity would break it +down? It was all a loathsome ignominy. It was utterly absurd. It +was-- + +Suddenly, with a kind of ape-like cunning, he deliberately raised +a long lean forefinger and pointed it at the shadowy crystal of +the looking-glass. Perhaps he was dead, was really and indeed +changed in body, was fated really and indeed to change in soul, +into That. 'It's that beastly voice again,' Lawford cried out +loud, looking vacantly at his upstretched finger. And then, hand +and arm, not too willingly, as it were, obeyed; relaxed and fell +to his side. 'You must keep a tight hold, old man,' he muttered +to himself. 'Once, once you lose yourself--the least symptom of +that--the least symptom, and it's all up!' And the fools, the +heartless, preposterous fools had brought him one volume! + +When on earth was Ada coming back? She was lagging on purpose. +She was in the conspiracy too. Oh, it should be a lesson to +Sheila! Oh, if only daylight would come! 'What are you going to +do--to do--to DO?' He rose once more and paced his silent cage. +To and fro, thinking no more; just using his eyes, compelling +them to wander from picture to picture, bedpost to bedpost; now +counting aloud his footsteps; now humming; only, only to keep +himself from thinking. At last he took out a drawer and actually +began arranging its medley of contents; ties, letters, studs, +concert and theatre programmes--all higgledy-piggledy. And in the +midst of this childish strategem he heard a faint sound, as of +heavy water trickling from a height. He turned. A thief was in +one of the candles. It was guttering out. He would be left in +darkness. He turned hastily without a moment's heed, to call for +light, flung the door open and full in the flare of a lamp, +illuminating her pale forehead and astonished face beneath her +black straw hat, stood face to face with Ada. + +With one swift dexterous movement he drew the door to after him, +looking straight into her almost colourless steady eyes. 'Ah,' he +said instantly, in a high faint voice, 'the powder, thank you; +yes, Mr Lawford's powder; thank you, thank you. He must be kept +absolutely quiet--absolutely. Mrs Lawford is following. Please +tell her that I am here, when she returns. Mr Critchett was in, +then? Thank you. Extreme, extreme silence, please.' Again that +knotted, melodramatic finger raised itself on high; and within +that lean, cadaverous body the soul of its lodger quailed at this +spectral boldness. But it was triumphant. The maid at once left +him and went downstairs. He heard faint voices in muffled +consultation. And in a moment Sheila's silks rustled once more on +the staircase. Lawford put down the lamp, and watched her +deliberately close the door. + +'What does this mean?' she began swiftly, 'I understand that--Ada +tells me a stranger is here; giving orders, directions. Who is +he? where is he? You bound yourself on your solemn promise not to +stir till I returned. You... How can I, how can we get decently +through this horrible business if you are so wretchedly +indiscreet? You sent Ada to the chemist's. What for? What for? I +say.' + +Lawford watched his wife with an almost extraneous interest. She +was certainly extremely interesting from that point of view, that +very novel point of view. 'It's quite useless,' he said, 'to get +in the least nervous or hysterical. I don't care for the darkness +just now. That was all. Tell the girl I am a strange doctor--Dr +Simon's new partner. You are clever at conventionalities, Sheila. +Invent! I said our patient must be kept quiet--I really think he +must. That is all, so far as Ada is concerned.... What on earth +else ARE we to say?' he broke out. 'That, for the present to +EVERYBODY, is our only possible story. It will give us what we +must have--time. And next--where is the second volume of Quain? I +want that. And next--why have you broken faith with me?' Mrs +Lawford sat down. This sudden and baffling outburst had stupefied +her. + +'I can't, I can't make head or tail of what you say. And as for +having broken faith, as you call it, would any wife, would any +sane woman face what you have brought on us, a situation like +this, without seeking advice and help? Mr Bethany will he +perfectly discreet--if he thinks discretion desirable. He is the +only available friend we have close enough to ask at once. And +things of this kind are, I suppose, if anybody's concern, his. +It's certain to leak out. Everybody will hear of it. Don't +flatter yourself you are going to hush up a thing like this for +long. You can't keep living skeletons in a cupboard. You think +only of yourself, only of your own misfortune. But who's to know, +pray, that you really are my husband--if you are? The sooner I +get the vicar on my side the better for us both. Who in the whole +of the parish--I ask you--and you must have the sense left to see +that--who will believe that a respectable man, a gentleman, a +Churchman, would deliberately go out to seek an afternoon's +amusement in a poky little country churchyard? Why, apart from +everything else, THAT was absolutely mad to start with. Can you +really wonder at the result?' + +Probably because she still steadfastly refused to look at him, +her memory kept losing its hold on the appalling fact facing +them. She realised fully only that she was in a great, +unwarrantable, and insurmountable difficulty, but until she +actually lifted her eyes for a moment she had not fully realised +what that difficulty was. She got up with a sudden and horrible +nausea. 'One moment,' she said, 'I will see if the servants have +gone to bed.' + +That long saturnine face, behind which Lawford lay in a dull and +desperate ambush, smiled. Something partaking of its clay, some +reflex ghost of its rather remarkable features, was even a little +amused at Sheila. + +She returned in a moment, and stood in profile in the doorway. +'Will you come down?' she remarked distantly. + +'One moment, Sheila,' Lawford began miserably. 'Before we take +this irrevocable step, a step I implore you to postpone awhile-- +for what comes, I suppose, may go--what precisely have you told +the vicar? I must in fairness know that.' + +'In fairness,' she began ironically, and suddenly broke off. Her +husband had turned the flame of the lamp low down in the vacant +room behind them; the corridor was lit obscurely by the +chandelier far down in the hall below. A faint, inexplicable +dread fell softly and coldly on her heart. 'Have you no trust in +me?' she murmured a little bitterly. 'I have simply told him the +truth.' + +They softly descended the stairs; she first, the dark figure +following close behind her. + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +Mr Bethany sat awaiting them in the dining-room, a large, +heavily-furnished room with a great benign looking-glass on the +mantelpiece, a marble clock, and with rich old damask curtains. +Fleecy silver hair was all that was visible of their visitor when +they entered. But Mr Bethany rose out of his chair when he heard +them, and with a little jerk, turned sharply round. Thus it was +that the gold-spectacled vicar and Lawford first confronted each +other, the one brightly illuminated, the other framed in the +gloom of the doorway. Mr Bethany's first scrutiny was timid and +courteous, but beneath it he tried to be keen, and himself +hastened round the table almost at a trot, to obtain, as +delicately as possible, a closer view. But Lawford, having shut +the door behind him, had gone straight to the fire and seated +himself, leaning his face in his hands. Mr Bethany smiled +faintly, waved his hand almost as if in blessing, but certainly +in peace, and tapped Mrs Lawford into the chair upon the other +side. But he himself remained standing. + +'Mrs Lawford has, I declare, been telling family secrets,' he +began, and paused, peering. But there, you will forgive an old +friend's intrusion--this little confidence about a change, my +dear fellow--about a ramble and a change?' He sat down, put up +his kind little puckered face and peered again at Lawford, and +then very hastily at his wife. But all her attention was centred +on the bowed figure opposite to her. Lawford responded to this +cautious advance without raising his head. + +'You do not wish me to repeat all that my wife tells me she has +told you?' + +'Dear me, no,' said Mr Bethany cheerfully, 'I wish nothing, +nothing, old friend. You must not burden yourself with me. If I +may be of any help, here I am.... Oh, no, no....' he paused, with +blinking eyes, but wits still shrewd and alert. Why doesn't the +man raise his head? he thought. A mere domestic dispute! + +'I thought,' he went on ruminatingly, 'I thought on Tuesday, yes, +on Tuesday, that you weren't looking quite the thing. Indeed, I +remarked on it. But now, I understand from Mrs Lawford that the +malady has taken a graver turn--eh, Lawford, an heretical turn? I +hear you have been wandering from the true fold.' Mr Bethany +leaned forward with what might be described as a very large smile +in a very small compass. 'And that, of course, entailed instant +retribution.' He broke off solemnly. 'I know Widderstone +churchyard well; a most verdant and beautiful spot. The late +rector, a Mr Strickland, was a very old friend of mine. And his +wife, dear good Alicia, used to set out her babies, in the +morning, to sleep and to play there, twenty, dear me, perhaps +twenty-five years ago. But I did not know, my dear Lawford, that +you--' and suddenly, without an instant's warning, something +seemed to shout at him, 'Look, look! He is looking at you!' He +stopped, faltered, and a slight warmth came into his face. 'And +and you were taken ill there?' His voice had fallen flat and +faint. + +'I fell asleep--or something of that sort,' came the stubborn +reply. + +'Yes,' said Mr Bethany, brightly, 'so your wife was saying. "Fell +asleep," so have I too--scores of times'; he beamed, with beads +of sweat glistening on his forehead. 'And then? I'm not, I'm not +persisting?' + +'Then I woke; refreshed, I think, as it seemed--I felt much +better and came home.' + +'Ah, yes,' said his visitor. And after that there was a long, +brightly lit, intense pause; at the end of which Lawford raised +his face and again looked firmly at his friend. + +Mr Bethany was now a shrunken old man; he sat perfectly still, +his head craned a little forward, and his veined hands clutching +his bent, spare knees. + +There wasn't the least sign of devilry, or out-facingness, or +insolence in that lean shadowy steady head; and yet he himself +was compelled to sidle his glance away, so much the face shook +him. He closed his eyes, too, as a cat does after exchanging too +direct a scrutiny with human eyes. He put out towards, and +withdrew, a groping hand from Mrs Lawford. + +'Is it,' came a voice from somewhere, 'is it a great change, sir? +I thought perhaps I may have exaggerated--candle-light, you +know.' + +Mr Bethany remained still and silent, striving to entertain one +thought at a time. His lips moved as if he were talking to +himself. And again it was Lawford's faltering voice that broke +the silence. 'You see,' he said, 'I have never... no fit, or +anything of that kind before. I remember on Tuesday... oh yes, +quite well. I did feel seedy, very. And we talked, didn't we?-- +Harvest Festival, Mrs Wine's flowers, the new offertory-bags, and +all that. For God's sake, Vicar, it is not as bad as--as they +make out?' + +Mr Bethany woke with a start. He leaned forward, and stretched +out a long black wrinkled sleeve, just managing to reach far +enough to tap Lawford's knee. 'Don't worry, don't worry,' he said +soothingly. 'We believe, we believe.' + +It was, none the less, a sheer act of faith. He took off his +spectacles and took out his handkerchief. 'What we must do, eh, +my dear,' he half turned to Mrs Lawford, 'what we must do is to +consult, yes, consult together. And later--we must have advice-- +medical advice; unless, as I very much suspect, it is merely a +little quite temporary physical aberration. Science, I am told, +is making great strides, experimenting, groping after things +which no sane man has ever dreamed of before--without being +burned alive for it. What's in a name? Nerves, especially, +Lawford.' + +Mrs Lawford sat perfectly still, absorbedly listening, turning +her face first this way, then that, to each speaker in turn. +'That is what I thought,' she said, and cast one fleeting glance +across at the fireplace, 'but--' + +The little old gentleman turned sharply with half-blind eyes, and +lips tight shut. 'I think,' he said, with a hind of austere +humour, 'I think, do you know, I see no "but."' He paused as if +to catch the echo and added, 'It's our only course.' He continued +to polish round and round his glasses. Mrs Lawford rather +magnificently rose. + +'Perhaps if I were to leave you together awhile? I shall not be +far off. It is,' she explained, as if into a huge vacuum, 'it is +a terrible visitation.' She moved gravely round the table and +very softly and firmly closed the door after her. + +Lawford took a deep breath. 'Of course.' he said, 'you realise my +wife does not believe me. She thinks,' he explained naively, as +if to himself, 'she thinks I am an imposter. Goodness knows what +she does think. I can't think much myself--for long!' + +The vicar rubbed busily on. 'I have found, Lawford,' he said +smoothly, 'that in all real difficulties the only feasible plan +is--is to face the main issue. The others right themselves. Now, +to take a plunge into your generosity. You have let me in far +enough to make it impossible for me to get out--may I hear then +exactly the whole story? All that I know now, so far as I could +gather from your wife, poor soul, is of course inconceivable: +that you went out one man and came home another. You will +understand, my dear man, I am speaking, as it were, by rote. God +has mercifully ordered that the human brain works slowly; first +the blow, hours afterwards the bruise. Oh, dear me, that man +Hume--"on miracles"--positively amazing! So that too, please, you +will be quite clear about. Credo--not quia impossible est, but +because you, Lawford, have told me. Now then, if it won't be too +wearisome to you, the whole story.' He sat, lean and erect in his +big chair, a hand resting loosely on each knee, in one spectacles, +in the other a dangling pocket handkerchief. And the dark, sallow, +aquiline, formidable figure, with its oddly changing voice, +re-told the whole story from the beginning. + +'You were aware then of nothing different, I understand, until +you actually looked into the glass?' + +'Only vaguely. I mean that after waking I felt much better, more +alert. And my thoughts--' + +'Ah, yes, your thoughts?' + +'I hardly know--oh, clear as if I had had a real long rest. It +was just like being a boy again. Influenza dispirits one so.' + +Mr Bethany gazed without stirring. 'And yet, you know,' he said, +'I can hardly believe, I mean conceive, how-- You have been taking +no drugs, no quackery, Lawford?' + +'I never dose myself,' said Lawford, with sombre pride. + +'God bless me, that's Lawford to the echo,' thought his visitor. +'And before--?' he went on gently; 'I really cannot conceive, you +see, how a mere fit could... Before you sat down you were quite +alone?' He stuck out his head. 'There was nobody with you?' + +'With me? Oh no,' came the soft answer. + +'What had you been thinking of? In these days of faith-cures, and +hypnotism, and telepathy, and subliminalities--why, the simple +old world grows very confusing. But rarely, very rarely novel. +You were thinking, you say; do you remember, perhaps, just the +drift?' + +'Well,' began Lawford ruminatingly, 'there was something curious +even then, perhaps. I remember, for instance, I knelt down to +read an old tombstone. There was a little seat--no back. And an +epitaph. The sun was just setting; some French name. And there +was a long jagged crack in the stone, like the black line you +know one sees after lightning, I mean it's as clear as that even +now, in memory. Oh yes, I remember. And then, I suppose, came the +sleep--stupid, sluggish: and then; well, here I am.' + +'You are absolutely certain, then,' persisted Mr Bethany almost +querulously, 'there was no living creature near you? Bless me, +Lawford, I see no unkindness in believing what the Bible itself +relates. There are powers supernatural. Saul, and so on. We are +all convinced of that. No one?' + +'I remember distinctly,' replied Lawford, in a calm, stubborn +voice, 'I looked up all around me, while I was kneeling there, +and there wasn't a soul to be seen. Because, you see, it even +then occurred to me that it would have looked rather queer--my +wandering about like that, I mean. Facing me there were some +cypress-trees, and beyond, a low sunken fence, and then, just +open country. Up above there were the gravestones toppling down +the hill, where I had just strolled down, and sunshine!' He +suddenly threw up his hand. 'Oh, marvellous! streaming in +gold--flaming, like God's own ante-chamber.' + +There was a very pregnant pause. Mr Bethany shrunk back a little +into his chair. His lips moved; he folded his spectacles. + +'Yes, yes,' he said. And then very quietly he stole one mole-like +look into his sidesman's face. + +'What is Dr Simon's number?' he said. Lawford was gazing gloomily +into the fire. 'Oh, Annandale,' he replied absently. 'I don't +know the number.' + +'Do you believe in him? Your wife mentioned him. Is he clever?' + +'Oh, he's new,' said Lawford; 'old James was our doctor. He--he +killed my father.' He laughed out shamefacedly. + +'A sound, lovable man,' said Mr Bethany, 'one of the kindest men +I ever knew; and a very old friend of mine.' + +And suddenly the dark face turned with a shudder from the fire, +and spoke in a low trembling voice. 'Only one thing--only one +thing--my sanity, my sanity. If once I forget, who will believe +me?' He thrust his long lean fingers beneath his coat. 'And mad,' +he added; 'I would sooner die.' + +Mr Bethany deliberately adjusted his spectacles. 'May I, may I +experiment?' he said boldly. There came a tap on the door. + +'Bless me,' said the vicar, taking out his watch, 'it is a +quarter to twelve. 'Yes, yes, Mrs Lawford,' he trotted round to +the door. 'We are beginning to see light--a ray!' + +'But I--I can see in the dark,' whispered Lawford, as if at a +cue, turning with an inscrutable smile to the fire. + +The vicar came again, wrapped up in a little tight grey +great-coat, and a white silk muffler. He looked up unflinching +into Lawford's face, and tears stood in his eyes. 'Patience, +patience, my dear fellow,' he repeated gravely, squeezing his +hand. 'And rest, complete rest, is imperative. Just till the +first thing to-morrow. And till then,' he turned to Mrs Lawford, +where she stood looking in at the doorway, 'oh yes, complete +quiet; and caution!' + +Mrs Lawford let him out. He shook his head once or twice, holding +her fingers. 'Oh yes,' he whispered, 'it is your husband, not the +smallest doubt. I tried: for MYSELF. But something--something has +happened. Don't fret him now. Have patience. Oh yes, it is +incredible... the change! But there, the very first thing +to-morrow.' She closed the door gently after him, and stepping +softly back to the dining-room, peered in. Her husband's back was +turned, but he could see her in the looking-glass, stooping a +little, with set face watching him, in the silvery stillness. + +'Well,' he said, 'is the old--' he doggedly met the fixed eyes +facing him there, 'is our old friend gone?' + +'Yes,' said Sheila, 'he's gone.' Lawford sighed and turned round. +'It's useless talking now, Sheila. No more questions. I cannot +tell you how tired I am. And my head--' + +'What is wrong with your head?' inquired his wife discreetly. + +The haggard face turned gravely and patiently. 'Only one of my +old headaches.' he smiled, 'my old bilious headaches--the +hereditary Lawford variety.' But his voice fell low again. 'We +must get to bed.' + +With a rather pretty and childish movement, Sheila gently drew +her hands across her silk skirts. 'Yes, dear,' she said, 'I have +made up a bed for you in the large spare room. It is thoroughly +aired.' She came softly in, hastened over to a closed work-table +that stood under the curtains, and opened it. + +Lawford watched her, utterly expressionless, utterly motionless. +He opened his mouth and shut it again, still watching his wife as +she stooped with ridiculously too busy fingers, searching through +her coloured silks. + +Again he opened his mouth. 'Yes,' he said, and stalked slowly +towards the door. But there he paused. 'God knows,' he said, +strangely and meekly, 'I am sorry, sorry for all this. You will +forgive me, Sheila?' + +She looked up swiftly. 'It's very tiresome, I can't find +anywhere,' she murmured, 'I can't find anywhere the--the little +red box key.' + +Lawford's cheek turned more sallow than ever. 'You are only +pretending to look for it,' he said, 'to try me. We both know +perfectly well the lock is broken. Ada broke it.' + +Sheila let fall the lid; and yet for a while her eyes roved over +it as if in violent search for something. Then she turned: 'I am +so very glad the vicar was at home,' she said brightly. 'And +mind, mind you rest, Arthur. There's nothing so bad but it might +be worse.... Oh, I can't, I can't bear it!' She sat down in the +chair and huddled her face between her hands, sobbing on and on, +without a tear. + +Lawford listened and stared solemnly. 'Whatever it may be, +Sheila, I will be loyal,' he said. + +Her sobs hushed, and again cold horror crept over her. Nobody in +the whole world could have said that 'I will be loyal' quite like +that--nobody but Arthur. She stood up, patting her hair. 'I don't +think my brain would bear much more. It's useless to talk. If you +will go up; I will put out the lamp.' + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +0ne solitary and tall candle burned on the great dressing-table. +Faint, solitary pictures broke the blankness of each wall. The +carpet was rich, the bed impressive, and the basins on the +washstand as uninviting as the bed. Lawford sat down on the edge +of it in complete isolation. He sat without stirring, listening +to his watch ticking in his pocket. The china clock on the +chimney piece pointed cheerfully to the hour of dawn. It was +exactly, he computed carefully, five hours and seven minutes +fast. Not the slightest sound broke the stillness, until he +heard, very, very softly and gradually, the key of his door turn +in the oiled wards, and realized that he was a prisoner. + +Women were strange creatures. How often he had heard that said, +he thought lamely. He felt no anger, no surprise or resentment, +at the trick. It was only to be expected. He could sit on till +morning; easily till morning. He had never noticed before how +empty a well-furnished room could seem. It was his own room too; +his best visitors' room. His father-in-law had slept here, with +his whiskers on that pillow. His wife's most formidable aunt had +been all night here, alone with these pictures. She certainly +was... 'But what are you doing here?' cried a voice suddenly out +of his reverie. + +He started up and stretched himself, and taking out the neat +little packet that the maid had brought from the chemist's, he +drew up a chair, and sat down once more in front of the glass. He +sighed vacantly, rose and lifted down from the wall above the +fireplace a tinted photograph of himself that Sheila had had +enlarged about twelve years ago. It was a brighter, younger, +hairier, but unmistakably the same dull indolent Lawford who had +ventured into Widderstone churchyard that afternoon. The cheek +was a little plumper, the eyes not quite so full-lidded, the hair +a little more precisely parted, the upper lip graced with a small +blonde moustache. He tilted the portrait into the candlelight, +and compared it with this reflection in the glass of what had +come out of Widderstone, feature with feature, with perfect +composure and extreme care, Then he laid down the massive frame +on the table, and gazed quietly at the tiny packet. + +It was to be a day of queer experiences. He had never before +realized with how many miracles mere everyday life is besieged. +Here in this small punctilious packet lay a Sesame--a power of +transformation beside which the transformation of that rather +flaccid face of the noonday into this tense, sinister face of +midnight was but as a moving from house to house--a change just +as irrevocable and complete, and yet so very normal. Which should +it be, that, or--his face lifted itself once more to the ice-like +gloom of the looking-glass-that, or this? + +It simply gazed back with a kind of quizzical pity on its lean +features under the scrutiny of eyes so deep, so meaningful, so +desolate, and yet so indomitably courageous. In the brain behind +them a slow and stolid argument was in progress; the one baffling +reply on the one side to every appeal on the other being still +simply. 'What dreams may come?' + +Those eyes surely knew something of dreams, else, why this +violent and stubborn endeavour to keep awake + +Lawford did indeed once actually frame the question, 'But who the +devil are you?' And it really seemed the eyes perceptibly widened +or brightened. The mere vexation of his unparalleled position. +Sheila's pathetic incredulity, his old vicar's laborious +kindness, the tiresome network of experience into which he would +be dragged struggling on the morrow, and on the morrow after +that, and after that--the thought of all these things faded for +the moment from his mind, lost if not their significance, at +least their instancy. + +He simply sat face to face with the sheer difficulty of living on +at all. He even concluded in a kind of lethargy that if nothing +had occurred, no 'change,' he might still be sitting here, Arthur +Rennet Lawford, in his best visitor's room, deciding between +inscrutable life and just--death. He supposed he was tired out. +His thoughts hadn't even the energy to complete themselves. None +cared but himself and this--this Silence. + +'But what does it all mean?' the insistent voice he was getting +to know so well began tediously inquiring again. And every time +he raised his eyes, or, rather, as in many cases it seemed, his +eyes raised themselves, they saw this haunting face there--a face +he no longer bitterly rebelled at, nor dimmed with scrutiny, but +a face that was becoming a kind of hold on life, even a kind of +refuge, an ally. It was a face that might have come out of a +rather flashy book; or such as is revered on the stage. 'A rotten +bad face,' he whispered at it in his own familiar slang, after +some such abrupt encounter; a fearless, packed, daring, +fascinating face, with even--what?--a spice of genius in it. +Whose the devil's face was it? What on earth was the matter?... +'Brazen it out,' a jubilant thought cried suddenly; 'follow it +up; play the game! give me just one opening. Think--think what +I've risked!' + +And all these voices thought Lawford, in deadly lassitude, meant +only one thing--insanity. A blazing, impotent indignation seized +him. He leaned near, peering as it were out of a red dusky mist. +He snatched up the china candlestick, and poised it above the +sardonic reflection, as if to throw. Then slowly, with infinite +pains, he drew back from the glass and replaced the candlestick +on the table; stuffed his paper packet into his pocket, took off +his boots and threw himself on to the bed. In a little while, in +the faint, still light, he opened drowsily wondering eyes. `Poor +old thing!' his voice murmured, 'Poor old Sheila!' + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +It was but little after daybreak when Mrs Lawford, after +listening at his door a while, turned the key and looked in on +her husband. Blue-grey light from between the venetian blinds +just dusked the room. She stood in a bluish dressing-gown, her +hand on her bosom, looking down on the lean impassive face. For +the briefest instant her heart had leapt with an indescribable +surmise; to fall dull as lead once more. Breathing equably and +quietly, the strange figure lay stretched upon the bed. 'How can +he sleep? How can he sleep?' she whispered with a black and +hopeless indignation. What a night she had had! And he! + +She turned noiselessly away. The candle had guttered to +extinction. The big glass reflected her, voluminous and wan, her +dark-ringed eyes, full lips, rich, glossy hair, and rounded chin. +'Yes, yes,' it seemed to murmur mournfully. She turned away, and +drawing stealthily near stooped once more quite low, and examined +the face on the pillow with lynx-like concentration. And though +every nerve revolted at the thought, she was finally convinced, +unwillingly, but assuredly, that her husband was here. Indeed, if +it were not so, how could she for a single moment have accepted +the possibility that he was a stranger? He seemed to haunt, like +a ghostly emanation, this strange, detestable face--as memory +supplies the features concealed beneath a mask. The face was +still and stony, like one dead or imaged in wax, yet beneath it +dreams were passing--silly, ordinary Lawford dreams. She was +almost alarmed at the terribly rancorous hatred she felt for the +face... 'It was just like Arthur to be so taken in!' + +Then she too remembered Quain, and remembered also in the slowly +paling dusk that the house would soon be stirring. She went out +and noiselessly locked the door again. But it was useless to +begin looking for Quain now--her husband had a good many dull +books, most of them his 'eccentric' father's. What must the +servants be thinking? and what was all that talk about a +mysterious visitor? She would have to question Ada-- +diplomatically. She returned to her room and sat down in an +arm-chair, and waited. In sheer weariness she fell into a doze, +and woke at the sound of dustpan and broom. She rang the bell, +and asked for hot water, tea, and a basin of cornflour. + +'And please, Ada, be as quiet as possible over your work; your +master is in a nice sleep, and must not be disturbed on any +account. In the front bedroom.' She looked up suddenly. 'By the +way, who let Dr Ferguson in last night?' It was dangerous, but +successful. + +'Dr Ferguson, ma'am? Oh, you mean... He WAS in.' + +Sheila smiled resignedly. 'Was in? What do you mean, "was in"? +And where were you, then?' + +'I had been sent out to Critchett's, the chemist's.' + +'Of course, of course. So cook let Dr Ferguson in, then? Why +didn't you say so before, Ada? And did you bring the medicine +with you?' + +'It was a packet in an envelope, ma'am. But Cook is sure she +heard no knock--not while I was out. So Dr Ferguson must have +come in quite unbeknown.' + +'Well, really,' said Sheila, 'it seems very difficult to get at +the truth sometimes. And when illness is in the house I cannot +understand why there should be no one available to answer the +door. You must have left it ajar, unsecured, when you went out. +And pray, what if Dr Ferguson had been some common tramp? That +would have been a nice thing.' + +'I am quite certain,' said Ada a little flatly, 'that I did shut +the door. And cook says she never so much as stirred from the +kitchen till I came down the area steps with the packet. And +that's all I know about it, ma'am; except that he was here when I +came back. I did not know even there was a Dr Ferguson; and my +mother has lived here nineteen years.' + +'We must be thankful your mother enjoys such good health,' +replied Mrs Lawford suavely. 'Please tell cook to be very careful +with the cornflour--to be sure it's well mixed and thoroughly +done.' + +Mrs Lawford's eyes followed with a certain discomfort those +narrow print shoulders descending the stairs. And this abominable +ruse was--Arthur's! She ran up lightly and listened with her ear +to the panel of his door. And just as she was about to turn away +again, there came a little light knock at the front door. + +Mrs Lawford paused at the loop of the staircase; and not +altogether with gratitude or relief she heard the voice of Mr +Bethany, inquiring in cautious but quite audible tones after her +husband. + +She dressed quickly and went down. The little white old man +looked very solitary in the long, fireless, drawing-room. + +'I could not sleep,' he said; 'I don't think I grasped in the +least, I don't indeed, until I was nearly home, the complexity of +our problem. I came, in fact, to a lamppost. It was casting a +peculiar shadow. And then--you know how such thoughts seize us, +my dear--like a sudden inspiration, I realised how tenuous, how +appallingly tenuous a hold we every one of us have on our mere +personality. But that,' he continued rapidly, 'that's only for +ourselves--and after the event. Ours, just now, is to act. And +first--?' + +'You really do, then--you really are convinced--' began Mrs +Lawford. + +But Mr Bethany was too quick. 'We must be most circumspect. My +dear friend, we must be most circumspect, for all our sakes. And +this, you'll say,' he added, smiling, stretching out his arms, +his soft hat in one hand, his umbrella in the other--'this is +being circumspect--a seven o'clock in the morning call! But you +see, my dear, I have come, as I took the precaution of explaining +to the maid, because it's now or never to-day. It does so happen +that I have to take a wedding for an old friend's niece at +Witchett; so when in need, you see, Providence enables us to tell +even the conventional truth. Now really, how is he? has he slept? +has he recalled himself at all? is there any change?--and, dear +me, how are YOU?' + +Mrs Lawford sighed. 'A broken night is really very little to a +mother,' she said. 'He is still asleep. He hasn't, I think, +stirred all night.' + +'Not stirred!' Mr Bethany repeated. 'You baffle me. And you have +watched?' + +'Oh no,' was the cheerful answer; 'I felt that quiet, solitude; +space, was everything; he preferred it so. He--he changed alone, +I suppose. Don't you think it almost stands to reason that he +will be alone...when he comes back? Was I right? But there, it's +useless, it's worse than useless, to talk like this. My husband +is gone. Some terrible thing has happened. Whatever the mystery +may be, he will never come back alive. My only fear is that I am +dragging you into a matter that should from the beginning have +been entrusted to-- Oh, it's monstrous!' It appeared for a moment +as if she were blinking to keep back her tears, yet her scrutiny +seemed merely to harden. + +Only the merest flicker of the folded eyelids over the greenish +eyes of her visitor answered the challenge. He stood small and +black, peeping fixedly out of the window at the sunflecked +laurels. + +'Last night,' he said slowly, 'when I said good-bye to your +husband, on the tip of my tongue were the words I have used, in +season and out of season, for nearly forty-five years--"God knows +best." Well, my dear lady, a sense of humour, a sense of +reverence, or perhaps even a taint of scepticism--call it what +you will--just intercepted them. Oh no, not any of these, my +child; just pity, overwhelming pity. God does know best; but in a +matter like this it is not even my place to say so. It would be +good for none of us to endanger our souls even with verbal cant. +Now, if, do you think, I had just five minutes' talk--five +minutes; would it disquiet him?' + +Only by an almost undignified haste, for the vicar was remarkably +agile, Sheila managed to unlock the bedroom door without +apparently his perceiving it, and with a warning finger she +preceded him into the great bedroom. 'Oh, yes, yes,' he was +whispering to himself; 'alone--well, well!' He hung his hat on +his umbrella and leaned it in a corner, and then he turned. + +'I don't think, you know, an old friend does him any wrong; but +last night I had no real oppor--' He firmly adjusted his +spectacles, and looked long into the dark, dispassioned face. + +'H'm!' he said, and fidgeted, and peered again. Mrs Lawford +watched him keenly. + +'Do you still--' she began. + +But at the same moment he too broke silence, suddenly stepping +back with the innocent remark, 'Has he--has he asked for +anything?' + +'Only for Quain.' + +'"Quain"?' + +'The medical Dictionary.' + +'Oh, yes; bless me; of course.... A calm, complete sleep of utter +prostration--utter nervous prostration. And can one wonder? Poor +fellow, poor fellow!' He walked to the window and peered between +the blinds. 'Sparrows, sunshine--yes, and here's the postman,' he +said, as if to himself. Then he turned sharply round, with mind +made up. + +'Now, do you leave me here,' he said. 'Take half an hour's quiet +rest. He will be glad of a dull old fellow like me when he wakes. +And as for my pretty bride, if I miss the train, she must wait +till the next. Good discipline, my dear. Oh, dear me! I don't +change. What a precious experience now this would have been for a +tottery, talkative, owlish old parochial creature like me. But +there, there. Light words make heavy hearts, I see. I shall be +quite comfortable. No, no, I breakfasted at home. There's hat and +umbrella; at 9.3 I can fly.' + +Mrs Lawford thanked him mutely. He smilingly but firmly bowed her +out and closed the door. + +But eyes and brain had been very busy. He had looked at the +gutted candle; at the tinted bland portrait on the +dressing-table; at the chair drawn-up; at the boots; and now +again he turned almost with a groan towards the sleeper. Then he +took out an envelope, on which he had jotted various memoranda, +and waited awhile. Minutes passed and at last the sleeper faintly +stirred, muttering. + +Mr Bethany stooped quickly. 'What is it, what is it?' he +whispered. + +Lawford sighed. 'I was only dreaming, Sheila,' he said, and +softly, peacefully opened his eyes. 'I dreamed I was in the--, +His lids narrowed, his dark eyes fixed themselves on the anxious +spectacled face bending over him. 'Mr Bethany! Where? What's +wrong?' + +His friend put out his hand. 'There, there,' he said soothingly, +'do not be disturbed; do not disquiet yourself.' + +Lawford struggled up. Slowly, painfully consciousness returned to +him. He glanced furtively round the room, at his clothes, +slinkingly at the vicar; licked his lips; flushed with +extraordinary rapidity; and suddenly burst into tears. + +Mr Bethany sat without movement, waiting till he should have +spent himself. 'Now, Lawford,' he said gently, compose yourself, +old friend. We must face the music--like men.' He went to the +window, drew up the blind, peeped out, and took off his +spectacles. + +'The first thing to be done,' he said, returning briskly to his +chair, 'is to send for Simon. Now, does Simon know you WELL?' +Lawford shook his head. 'Would he recognise you?... I mean...' + +'I have only met him once--in the evening.' + +'Good; let him come immediately, then. Tell him just the facts. +If I am not mistaken, he will pooh-pooh the whole thing; tell +you to keep quiet, not to worry, and so on. My dear fellow, if +we realised, say, typhoid, who'd dare to face it? That will give +us time; to wait a while, to recover our breath, to see what +happens next. And if--as I don't believe for a moment-- Why, in +that case I heard the other day of a most excellent man-- +Grosser, of Wimpole Street; nerves. He would be absorbed. He'll +bottle you in spirit, Lawford. We'll have him down quietly. You +see? But there won't be any necessity. Oh no. By then light will +have come. We shall remember. What I mean is this.' He crossed +his legs and pushed out his lips. 'We are on quaky ground; and +it's absolutely essential that you keep cool, and trust. I am +yours, heart and soul--you know that. I own frankly, at first I +was shaken. And I have, I confess, been very cunning. But first, +faith, then evidence to bolster it up. The faith was absolute'-- +he placed one firm hand on Lawford's knee--'why, I cannot +explain; but it was. The evidence is convincing. But there are +others to think of. The shock, the incredibleness, the +consequences; we must not scan too closely. Think WITH; never +against: and bang go all the arguments. Your wife, poor dear, +believes; but of course, of course, she is horribly--' he +broke off; 'of course she is SHAKEN, you old simpleton! Time +will heal all that. Time will wear out the mask. Time will tire +out this detestable physical witchcraft. The mind, the self's the +thing. Old fogey though I may seem for saying it--that must be +kept unsmirched. We won't go wearily over the painful subject +again. You told me last night, dear old friend, that you were +absolutely alone at Widderstone. That is enough. But here we have +visible facts, tangible effects, and there must have been a +definite reason and a cause for them. I believe in the devil, in +the Powers of Darkness, Lawford, as firmly as I believe he and +they are powerless--in the long run. They--what shall we say?-- +have surrendered their intrinsicality. You can just go through +evil, as you can go through a sewer, and come out on the other +side too. A loathsome process too. But there--we are not speaking +of any such monstrosities, and even if we were, you and I with +God's help would just tire them out. And that ally gone, our poor +dear old Mrs Grundy will at once capitulate. Eh? Eh?' + +Through all this long and arduous harangue, consciousness, like +the gradual light of dawn, had been flooding that other brain. +And the face that now confronted Mr Bethany, though with his +feeble unaided sight he could only very obscurely discern it, was +vigilant and keen, in every sharp-cut hungry feature. + +A rather prolonged silence followed, the visitor peering mutely. +The black eyes nearly closed, the face turned slowly towards the +window, saw burnt-out candle, comprehensive glass. + +'Yes, yes.' he said; 'I'll send for Simon at once.' + +'Good,' said Mr Bethany, and more doubtfully repeated 'good.' +'Now there's only one thing left,' he went on cheerfully. 'I have +jotted down a few test questions here; they are questions no one +on this earth could answer but you, Lawford. They are merely for +external proofs. You won't, you can't, mistake my motive. We +cannot foretell or foresee what need may arise for just such +jog-trot primitive evidence. I propose that you now answer them +here, in writing.' + +Lawford stood up and walked to the looking-glass, and paused. He +put his hand to his head. 'es,' he said, 'of course; it's a +rattling good move. I'm not quite awake; myself, I mean. I'll do +it now.' He took out a pencil case and tore another leaf from his +pocket-book. 'What are they?' + +Mr Bethany rang the bell. Sheila herself answered it. She stood +on the threshold and looked across through a shaft of autumnal +sunshine at her husband, and her husband with a quiet strange +smile looked across through the sunshine at his wife. Mr Bethany +waited in vain. + +'I am just going to put the arch-impostor through his +credentials,' he said tartly. 'Now then, Lawford!' He read out +the questions, one by one, from his crafty little list, pursing +his lips between each; and one by one, Lawford, seated at the +dressing-table, fluently scribbled his answers. Then question and +answer were rigorously compared by Mr Bethany, with small white +head bent close and spectacles poised upon the powerful nose, and +signed and dated, and passed to Mrs Lawford without a word. + +Mrs Lawford read question and answer where she stood, in complete +silence. She looked up. 'Many of these questions I don't know the +answers to myself,' she said. + +'It is immaterial,' said Mr Bethany. + +'One answer is--is inaccurate. 'Yes, yes, quite so: due to a +mistake in a letter from myself.' + +Mrs Lawford read quietly on, folded the papers, and held them out +between finger and thumb. 'The--handwriting...' she remarked very +softly. + +'Wonderful, isn't it?' said Mr Bethany warmly; 'all the general +look and run of the thing different, but every real essential +feature unchanged. Now into the envelope. And now a little wax?' + +Mrs Lawford stood waiting. 'There's a green piece of +sealing-wax,' almost drawled the quiet voice, 'in the top right +drawer of the nest in the study, which old James gave me the +Christmas before last.' He glanced with lowered eyelids at his +wife's flushed cheek. Their eyes met. + +'Thank you,' she said. + +When she returned the vicar was sitting in a chair, leaning his +chin on the knobbed handle of his umbrella. He rose and lit a +taper for her with a match from a little green pot on the table. +And Mrs Lawford, with trembling fingers, sealed the letter, as he +directed, with his own seal. + +'There!' he said triumphantly, 'how many more such brilliant +lawyers, I wonder, lie dormant in the Church? And who shall keep +this?... Why, all three, of course.' He went on without pausing. +'Some little drawer now, secret and undetectable, with a lock.' +Just such a little drawer that locked itself with a spring lay by +chance in the looking-glass. There the letter was hidden. And Mr +Bethany looked at his watch. 'Nineteen minutes,' he said. 'The +next thing, my dear child--we're getting on swimmingly--and it's +astonishing how things are simplified by mere use--the next thing +is to send for Simon.' + +Sheila took a deep breath, but did not look up. 'I am entirely in +your hands,' she replied. ' + +'So be it,' said he crisply. 'Get to bed, Lawford; it's better +so. And I'll look in on my way back from Witchett. I came, my +dear fellow, in gloomy disturbance of mind. It was getting up too +early; it fogs old brains. Good-bye, good-bye.' + +He squeezed Lawford's hand. Then, with umbrella under his arm, +his hat on his head, his spectacles readjusted, he hurried out of +the room. Mrs Lawford followed him. For a few minutes Lawford sat +motionless, with head bent a little, and eyes restlessly scanning +the door. Then he rose abruptly, and in a quarter of an hour was +in bed, alone with his slow thoughts: while a basin of cornflour +stood untasted on a little table at his bedside, and a cheerful +fire burned in the best visitors' room's tiny grate. + +At half-past eleven Dr Simon entered this soundless seclusion. He +sat down beside Lawford, and took temperature and pulse. Then he +half closed his lids, and scanned his patient out of an unusually +dark, un-English face, with straight black hair, and listened +attentively to his rather incoherent story. It was a story very +much modified and rounded off. Nor did Lawford draw Dr Simon's +attention to the portrait now smiling conventionally above their +heads from the wall over the fireplace. + +'It was rather bleak--the wind; and, I think, perhaps, I had had +a touch of influenza. It was a silly thing to do. But still, Dr +Simon, one doesn't expect--well, there, I don't feel the same +man--physically. I really cannot explain how great a change has +taken place. And yet I feel perfectly fit in myself. And if it +were not for--for being laughed at, go back to town, to-day. Why +my wife scarcely recognised me.' + +Dr Simon continued his scrutiny. Try as he would, Lawford could +not raise his downcast eyes to meet direct the doctor's polite +attention. + +'And what,' said Dr Simon, 'what precisely is the nature of the +change? Have you any pain?' + +'No, not the least pain,' said Lawford; 'I think, perhaps, or +rather my face is a little shrunken--and yet lengthened; at +least it feels so; and a faint twinge of rheumatism. But my +hair--well, I don't know; it's difficult to say one's self.' He +could get on so very much better, he thought, if only his mind +would be at peace and these preposterous promptings and voices +were still. + +Dr Simon faced the window, and drew his hand softly over his +head. 'We never can be too cautious at a certain age, and +especially after influenza,' he said. 'It undermines the whole +system, and in particular the nervous system; leaving the mind +the prey of the most melancholy fancies. I should astound you, Mr +Lawford, with the devil influenza plays.... A slight nervous shock +and a chill; quite slight, I hope. A few days' rest and plenty of +nourishment. There's nothing; temperature inconsiderable. All +perfectly intelligible. Most certainly reassure yourself! And as +for the change you speak of'--he looked steadily at the dark face +on the pillow and smiled amiably--'I don't think we need worry +much about that. It certainly was a bleak wind yesterday--and a +cemetery, my dear sir! It was indiscreet--yes, very.' He held out +his hand. 'You must not be alarmed,' he said, very distinctly +with the merest trace of an accent; 'air, sunshine, quiet, +nourishment; sleep--that is all. The little window might be a few +inches open, and--and any light reading.' + +He opened the door and joined Mrs Lawford on the staircase. He +talked to her quietly over his shoulder all the way downstairs. +'It was, it was sporting with Providence--a wind, believe me, +nearly due east, in spite of the warm sunshine.' + +'But the change--the change!' Mrs Lawford managed to murmur +tragically, as he strode to the door. Dr Simon smiled, and +gracefully tapped his forehead with a red-gloved forefinger. + +'Humour him, humour him,' he repeated indulgently. 'Rest and +quiet will soon put that little trouble out of his head. Oh yes, +I did notice it--the set drawn look, and the droop: quite so. +Good morning.' + +Mrs Lawford gently closed the door after him. A glimpse of Ada, +crossing from room to room, suggested a precaution. She called +out in her clearest notes. 'If Dr Ferguson should call while I am +out, Ada, will you please tell him that Dr Simon regretted that +he was unable to wait? Thank you.' She paused with hand on the +balusters, then slowly ascended the stairs. Her husband's face +was turned to the ceiling, his hands clasped above his head. She +took up her stand by the fireplace, resting one silk-slippered +foot on the fender. 'Dr Simon is reassuring,' she said, 'but I do +hope, Arthur, you will follow his advice. He looks a fairly +clever man.... But with a big practice.... Do you think, dear, he +quite realised the extent of the--the change?' + +'I told him what happened,' said her husband's voice out of the +bed-clothes. + +'Yes, yes, I know,' said Sheila soothingly; 'but we must remember +he is comparatively a stranger. He would not detect--' + +'What did he tell you?' asked the voice. + +Mrs Lawford deliberately considered. If only he would always thus +keep his face concealed, how much easier it would be to discuss +matters rationally. 'You see, dear,' she said softly, 'I know, of +course, nothing about the nerves; but personally, I think his +suggestion absurd. No mere fancy, surely, can make a lasting +alteration in one's face. And your hair--I don't want to say +anything that may seem unkind--but isn't it really quite a +distinct shade darker, Arthur?' + +'Any great strain will change the colour of a man's hair,' said +Lawford stolidly; 'at any rate, to white. Why, I read once of a +fellow in India, a Hindoo, or something, who--' + +'But have you HAD any intense strain, or anxiety?' broke in +Sheila. 'You might, at least, have confided in me; that is, +unless-- But there, don't you think really, Arthur, it would be +much more satisfactory in every way if we had further advice at +once? Alice will be home next week. To-morrow is the Harvest +Festival, and next week, of course, the Dedication; and, in any +case, the Bazaar is out of the question. They will have to find +another stall-holder. We must do our utmost to avoid comment or +scandal. Every minute must help to--to fix a thing like that. I +own even now I cannot realise what this awful calamity means. +It's useless to brood on it. We must, as the poor dear old vicar +said only last night, keep our heads clear. But I am sure Dr +Simon was under a misapprehension. If, now, it was explained to +him, a little more fully, Arthur--a photograph. Oh, anything on +earth but this dreadful wearing uncertainty and suspense! Besides +...is Simon quite an English name?' + +Lawford drew further into his pillow. 'Do as you think best, +Sheila,' he said. 'For my own part, I believe it may be as he +suggests--partly an illusion, a touch of nervous breakdown. It +simply can't be as bad as I think it is. If it were, you would +not be here talking like this; and Bethany wouldn't have believed +a word I said. Whatever it is, it's no good crying it on the +housetops. Give me time, just time. Besides, how do we know what +he really thought? Doctors don't tell their patients everything. +Give the poor chap a chance, and more so if he is a foreigner. +He's'--his voice sank almost to a whisper--'he's no darker than +this. And do, please, Sheila, take this infernal stuff away, and +let me have something solid. I'm not ill--in that way. All I want +is peace and quiet, time to think. Let me fight it out alone. +It's been sprung on me. The worst's not over. But I'll win +through; wait! And if not--well, you shall not suffer, Sheila. +Don't be afraid. There are other ways out.' + +Sheila broke down. 'Any one would think to hear you talk, that I +was perfectly heartless. I told Ada to be most careful about the +cornflour. And as for other ways out, it's a positively wicked +thing to say to me when I'm nearly distracted with trouble and +anxiety. What motive could you have had for loitering in an old +cemetery? And in an east wind! It's useless for me to remain +here, Arthur, to be accused of every horrible thing that comes +into a morbid imagination. I will leave you, as you suggest, in +peace.' + +'One moment, Sheila,' answered the muffled voice. 'I have accused +you of nothing. If you knew all; if you could read my thoughts, +you would be surprised, perhaps, at my-- But never mind that. On +the other hand, I really do think it would be better for the +present to discuss the thing no more. To-day is Friday. Give this +miserable face a week. Talk it over with Bethany if you like. But +I forbid'--he struggled up in bed, sallow and sinister--'I flatly +forbid, please understand, any other interference till then. +Afterwards you must do exactly as you please. Send round the Town +Crier! But till then, silence!' + +Sheila with raised head confronted him. 'This, then, is your +gratitude. So be it. Silence, no doubt! Until it's too late to +take action. Until you have wormed your way in, and think you are +safe. To have believed! Where is my husband? that is what I am +asking you now. When and how you have learned his secrets God +only knows, and your conscience! But he always was a simpleton at +heart. I warn you, then. Until next Thursday I consent to say +nothing provided you remain quiet; make no disturbance, no +scandal here. The servants and all who inquire shall simply be +told that my husband is confined to his room with--with a nervous +breakdown, as you have yourself so glibly suggested. I am at your +mercy, I own it. The vicar believes your preposterous story--with +his spectacles off. You would convince anybody with the wicked +cunning with which you have cajoled and wheedled him, with which +you have deceived and fooled a foreign doctor. But you will not +convince me. You will not convince Alice. I have friends in the +world, though you may not be aware of it, who will not be quite +so apt to believe any cock-and-bull story you may see fit to +invent. That is all I have to say. To-night I tell the vicar all +that I have just told you. And from this moment, please, we are +strangers. I shall come into the room no more than necessity +dictates. On Friday we resume our real parts. My husband-- +Arthur--to--to connive at...Phh!' + +Rage had transfigured her. She scarcely heard her own words. They +poured out senselessly, monotonously, one calling up another, as +if from the lips of a Cassandra. Lawford sank back into bed, +clutching the sheets with both lean hands. He took a deep breath +and shut his mouth. + +'It reminds me, Sheila,' he began arduously, 'of our first +quarrel before we were married, the evening after your aunt Rose +died at Llandudno--do you remember? You threw open the window, +and I think--I saved your life.' A pause followed. Then a queer, +almost inarticulate voice added, 'At least, I am afraid so.' + +A cold and awful quietness fell on Sheila's heart. She stared +fixedly at the tuft of dark hair, the only visible sign of her +husband, on the pillow. Then, taking up the basin of cold +cornflour, she left the room. In a quarter of an hour she +reappeared carrying a tray, with ham and eggs and coffee and +honey invitingly displayed. She laid it down. + +'There is only one other question,' she said, with perfect +composure--'that of money. Your signature as it appears on +the--the document drawn up this morning, would, of course, be +quite useless on a cheque. I have taken all the money I could +find; it is in safety. You may, however, conceivably be in need +of some yourself; here is five pounds. I have my own cheque-book, +and shall therefore have no need to consider the question again +for--for the present. So far as you are concerned, I shall be +guided solely by Mr Bethany. He will, I do not doubt, take full +responsibility.' + +'And may the Lord have mercy on my soul!' uttered a stifled, +unfamiliar voice from the bed. Mrs Lawford stooped. 'Arthur!' she +cried faintly, 'Arthur!' + +Lawford raised himself on his elbow with a sigh that was very +near to being a sob. 'Oh, Sheila, if you'd only be your real +self! What is the use of all this pretence? Just consider MY +position a little. The fear and horror are not all on your side. +You called me Arthur even then. I'd willingly do anything you +wish to save you pain; you know that. Can't we be friends even in +this--this ghastly-- Won't you, Sheila?' + +Mrs Lawford drew back, struggling with a doubtful heart. + +'I think,' she said, `it would be better not to discuss that +now.' + +The rest of the morning Lawford remained in solitude. + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +There were three books in the room--Jeremy Taylor's 'Holy Living +and Dying,' a volume of the Quiver, and a little gilded book on +wildflowers. He read in vain. He lay and listened to the uproar +of his thoughts on which an occasional sound--the droning of a +fly, the cry of a milkman, the noise of a passing van--obtruded +from the workaday world. The pale gold sunlight edged softly over +the bed. He ate up everything on his tray. He even, on the shoals +of nightmare, dreamed awhile. But by and by as the hours wheeled +slowly on he grew less calm, less strenuously resolved on lying +there inactive. Every sparrow that twittered cried reveille +through his brain. He longed with an ardour strange to his +temperament to be up and doing. + +What if his misfortune was, as he had in the excitement of the +moment suggested to Sheila, only a morbid delusion of mind; +shared too in part by sheer force of his absurd confession? Even +if he was going mad, who knows how peaceful a release that might +not be? Could his shrewd old vicar have implicitly believed in +him if the change were as complete as he supposed it? He flung +off the bedclothes and locked the door. He dressed himself, +noticing, he fancied, with a deadly revulsion of feeling, that +his coat was a little too short in the sleeves, his waistcoat too +loose. In the midst of his dressing came Sheila bringing his +luncheon. 'I'm sorry,' he called out, stooping quickly beside the +bed, 'I can't talk now. Please put the tray down.' + +About half an hour afterwards he heard the outer door close, and +peeping from behind the curtains saw his wife go out. All was +drowsily quiet in the house. He devoured his lunch like a +schoolboy. That finished to the last crumb, without a moment's +delay he covered his face with a towel, locked the door behind +him, put the key in his pocket, and ran lightly downstairs. He +stuffed the towel into an ulster pocket, put on a soft, +wide-brimmed hat, and noiselessly let himself out. Then he turned +with an almost hysterical delight and ran--ran like the wind, +without pausing, without thinking, straight on, up one turning, +down another, until he reached a broad open common, thickly +wooded, sprinkled with gorse and hazel and may, and faintly +purple with fading heather. There he flung himself down in the +beautiful sunlight, among the yellowing bracken, to recover his +breath. + +He lay there for many minutes, thinking almost with composure. +Flight, it seemed, had for the moment quietened the demands of +that other feebly struggling personality which was beginning to +insinuate itself into his consciousness, which had so +miraculously broken in and taken possession of his body. He would +not think now. All he needed was a little quiet and patience +before he threw off for good and all his right to be free, to be +his own master, to call himself sane. + +He scrambled up and turned his face towards the westering sun. +What was there in the stillness of its beautiful splendour that +seemed to sharpen his horror and difficulty, and yet to stir him +to such a daring and devilry as he had never known since he was a +boy? There was little sound of life; somewhere an unknown bird +was singing, and a few late bees were droning in the bracken. All +these years he had, like an old blind horse, stolidly plodded +round and round in a dull self-set routine. And now, just when +the spirit had come for rebellion, the mood for a harmless +truancy, there had fallen with them too this hideous enigma. He +sat there with the dusky silhouette of the face that was now +drenched with sunlight in his mind's eye. He set off again up the +stony incline. + +Why not walk on and on? In time real wholesome weariness would +come; he could sleep at ease in some pleasant wayside inn, +without once meeting the eyes that stood as it were like a window +between himself and a shrewd incredulous scoffing world that +would turn him into a monstrosity and his story into a fable. And +in a little while, perhaps in three days, he would awaken out of +this engrossing nightmare, and know he was free, this black dog +gone from his back, and (as the old saying expressed it without +any one dreaming what it really meant) his own man again. How +astonished Sheila would be; how warmly she would welcome him!... +Oh yes, of course she would. + +He came again to a standstill. No voice answered him out of that +illimitable gold and blue. Nothing seemed aware of him. But as he +stood there, doubtful as Cain on the outskirts of the unknown, he +caught the sound of a footfall on the lonely and stone-strewn +path. + +The ground sloped steeply away to the left, and slowly mounting +the hillside came mildly on an old lady he knew, a Miss Sinnet, +an old friend of his mother's. There was just such a little seat +as that other he knew so well, on the brow of the hill. He made +his way to it, intending to sit quietly there until the little +old lady had passed by. Up and up she came. Her large bonnet +appeared, and then her mild white face, inclined a little towards +him as she ascended. Evidently this very seat was her goal; and +evasion was impossible. Evasion!... Memory rushed back and set +his pulses beating. He turned boldly to the sun, and the old +lady, with a brief glance into his face, composed herself at the +other end of the little seat. She gazed out of a gentle reverie +into the golden valley. And so they sat a while. And almost as if +she had felt the bond of acquaintance between them, she presently +sighed, and addressed him: 'A very, very, beautiful view, sir.' + +Lawford paused, then turned a gloomy, earnest face, gilded with +sunshine. 'Beautiful, indeed,' he said, 'but not for me. No, Miss +Sinnet, not for me.' + +The old lady gravely turned and examined the aquiline profile. +'Well, I confess,' she remarked urbanely, 'you have the advantage +of me.' + +Lawford smiled uneasily. 'Believe me, it is little advantage.' + +'My sight,' said Miss Sinnet precisely, 'is not so good as I +might wish; though better perhaps than I might have hoped; I fear +I am not much wiser; your face is still unfamiliar to me.' + +'It is not unfamiliar to me,' said Lawford. Whose trickery was +this? he thought, putting such affected stuff into his mouth. + +A faint lightening of pity came into the silvery and scrupulous +countenance. 'Ah, dear me, yes,' she said courteously. + +Lawford rested a lean hand on the seat. 'And have you,' he asked, +'not the least recollection in the world of my face?' + +'Now really,' she said, smiling blandly, 'is that quite fair? +Think of all the scores and scores of faces in seventy long +years; and how very treacherous memory is. You shall do me the +service of REMINDING me of one whose name has for the moment +escaped me.' + +'I am the son of a very old friend of yours, Miss Sinnet,' said +Lawford quietly 'a friend that was once your schoolfellow at +Brighton.' + +'Well, now,' said the old lady, grasping her umbrella, 'that is +undoubtedly a clue; but then, you see, all but one of the friends +of my girlhood are dead; and if I have never had the pleasure of +meeting her son, unless there is a decided resemblance, how am I +to recollect HER by looking at HIM?' + +'There is, I believe, a likeness,' said Lawford. + +She nodded her great bonnet at him with gentle amusement. 'You +are insistent in your fancy. Well, let me think again. The last +to leave me was Fanny Urquhart, that was--let me see--last +October. Now you are certainly not Fanny Urquhart's son,' she +stooped austerely, 'for she never had one. Last year, too, I +heard that my dear, dear Mrs Jameson was dead. HER I hadn't met +for many, many years. But, if I may venture to say so, yours is +not a Scottish face; and she not only married a Scottish husband, +but was herself a Dunbar. No, I am still at a loss.' + +A miserable strife was in her chance companion's mind, a strife +of anger and recrimination. He turned his eyes wearily to the +fast declining sun. 'You will forgive my persistency, but I +assure you it is a matter of life or death to me. Is there no one +my face recalls? My voice?' + +Miss Sinnet drew her long lips together, her eyebrows lifted with +the faintest perturbation. 'But he certainly knows my name,' she +said to herself. She turned once more, and in the still autumnal +beauty, beneath that pale blue arch of evening, these two human +beings confronted one another again. She eyed him blandly, yet +with a certain grave directness. + +'I don't really think,' she said, 'you can be Mary Lawford's son. +I could scarcely have mistaken HIM.' + +Lawford gulped and turned away. He hardly knew what this surge of +feeling meant. Was it hope, despair, resentment; had he caught +even the echo of an unholy joy? His mind for a moment became +confused as if in the tumult of a struggle. He heard himself +expostulate, 'Ah, Miss Bennett, I fear I set you too difficult a +task.' + +The old lady drew abruptly in, like a trustful and gentle snail +into its shocked house. 'Bennett, sir; but my name is not +Bennett.' + +And again Lawford accepted the miserable prompting. 'Not +Bennett!... How can I ever then apologise for so frantic a +mistake?' + +The little old lady took firm hold of her umbrella. She did not +answer him. 'The likeness, the likeness!' he began unctuously, +and stopped, for the glance that dwelt fleetingly on him was cold +with the formidable dignity and displeasure of age. He raised his +hat and turned miserably home. He strode on out of the last gold +into the blue twilight. What fantastic foolery of mind was +mastering him? He cast a hurried look over his shoulder at the +kindly and offended old figure sitting there, solitary, on the +little seat, in her great bonnet, with back turned resolutely +upon him--the friend of his dead mother who might have proved in +his need a friend indeed to him. And he had by this insane +caprice hopelessly estranged her. + +She would remember this face well enough now, he thought +bitterly, and would take her place among his quiet enemies, if +ever the day of reckoning should come. It was scandalous, it was +banal to have abused her trust and courtesy. Oh, it was hopeless +to struggle any more! The fates were against him. They had played +him a trick. He was to be their transitory sport, as many a +better man he could himself recollect had been before him. He +would go home and give in; let Sheila do with him what she +pleased. No one but a lunatic could have acted as he had, with +just that frantic hint of method so remarkable in the insane. + +He left the common. A lamplighter was lighting the lamps. A thin +evening haze was on the air. If only he had stayed at home that +fateful afternoon! Who, what had induced him, enticed him to +venture out? And even with the thought welled up into his mind an +intense desire to go to the old green time-worn churchyard again; +to sit there contentedly alone, where none heeded the completest +metamorphosis, down beside the yew-trees. What a fool he had +been. There alone, of course, lay his only possible chance of +recovery. He would go to-morrow. Perhaps Sheila had not yet +discovered his absence; and there would be no difficulty in +repeating so successful a stratagem. + +Remembrance of his miserable mistake, of Miss Sinnet, faintly +returned to him as he swiftly mounted the steps to his porch. +Poor old lady. He would make amends for his discourtesy when he +was quite himself again. She should some day hear, perhaps, his +infinitely tragic, infinitely comic experience from his own lips. +He would take her some flowers, some old keepsake of his mother's. +What would he not do when the old moods and brains of the stupid +Arthur Lawford, whom he had appreciated so little and so +superficially, came back to him. + +He ran up the steps and stopped dead, his hand in his pocket, +chilled and aghast. Sheila had taken his keys. He stood there, +dazed and still, beneath the dim yellow of his own fanlight; and +once again that inward spring flew back. 'Brazen it out; brazen +it out! Knock and ring!' + +He knocked flamboyantly, and rang. + +There came a quiet step and the door opened. 'Dr Simon, of +course, has called?' he inquired suavely. + +'Yes, sir.' + +'Ah, and gone'--as I feared. And Mrs Lawford?' + +'I think Mrs Lawford is in, sir.' + +Lawford put out a detaining hand. 'We will not disturb her; we +will not disturb her. I can find my way up; oh yes, thank you!' + +But Ada still palely barred the way. 'I think, sir,' she said, +'Mrs Lawford would prefer to see you herself; she told me most +particularly "all callers." And Mr Lawford was not to be +disturbed on any account.' + +'Disturbed? God forbid!' said Lawford, but his dark eyes failed +to move these lightest hazel. 'Well,' he continued nonchalantly, +'perhaps--perhaps it--,WOULD be as well if Mrs Lawford should +know that I am here. No, thank you, I won't come in. Please go +and tell--' But even as the maid turned to obey, Sheila herself +appeared at the dining-room door in hat and veil. + +Lawford hesitated an immeasurable moment. In one swift glance he +perceived the lamplit mystery of evening, beckoning, calling, +pleading--Fly, fly! Home's here for you. Begin again, begin +again. And there before him in quiet and hostile decorum stood +maid and mistress. He took off his hat and stepped quickly in. + +'So late, so very late, I fear,' he began glibly. 'A sudden call, +a perfectly impossible distance. Shall we disturb him, do you +think?' + +'Wouldn't it,' began Sheila softly, 'be rather a pity perhaps? Dr +Simon seemed to think.... But, of course, you must decide +that.' + +Ada turned quiet small eyes. + +'No, no, by no means,' he almost mumbled. + +And a hard, slow smile passed over Sheila's face. 'Excuse me one +moment,' she said; 'I will see if he is awake.' She swept swiftly +forward, superb and triumphant, beneath the gaze of those dark, +restless eyes. But so still was home and street that quite +distinctly a clear and youthful laughter was heard, and light +footsteps approaching. Sheila paused. Ada, in the act of closing +the door, peered out. 'Miss Alice, ma'am,' she said. + +And in this infinitesimal advantage of time Dr Ferguson had +seized his vanishing opportunity, and was already swiftly +mounting the stairs. Mrs Lawford stood with veil half raised and +coldly smiling lips and, as if it were by pre-arrangement, her +daughter's laughing greeting from the garden, and from the +landing above her, a faint 'Ah, and how are we now?' broke out +simultaneously. And Ada, silent and discreet, had thrown open the +door again to the twilight and to the young people ascending the +steps. + +Lawford was still sitting on his bed before a cold and ashy +hearth when Sheila knocked at the door. + +'Yes?' he said; 'who's there?' No answer followed. He rose with a +shuddering sigh and turned the key. His wife entered. + +'That little exhibition of finesse was part of our agreement, I +suppose?' + +'I say--' began Lawford. + +'To creep out in my absence like a thief, and to return like a +mountebank; that was part of our compact?' + +'I say,' he stubbornly began again, 'did you wire for Alice?' + +'Will you please answer my question? Am I to be a mere catspaw in +your intrigues, in this miserable masquerade before the servants? +To set the whole place ringing with the name of a doctor that +doesn't exist, and a bedridden patient that slips out of the +house with his bedroom key in his pocket! Are you aware that Ada +has been hammering at your door every half-hour of your absence? +Are you aware of that? How much,' she continued in a low, bitter +voice, 'how much should I offer for her discretion?' + +'Who was that with Alice?' inquired the same toneless voice. + +'I refuse to be ignored. I refuse to be made a child of. Will +you please answer me?' + +Lawford turned. 'Look here, Sheila,' he began heavily, 'what +about Alice? If you wired: well, it's useless to say anything +more. But if you didn't, I ask you just this one thing. Don't +tell her!' + +'Oh, I perfectly appreciate a father's natural anxiety.' + +Her husband drew up his shoulders as if to receive a blow. 'Yes, +yes,' he said, 'but you won't?' + +The sound of a young laughing voice came faintly up from below. +'How did Jimmie Fortescue know she was coming home to-day?' + +'Will you not inquire of Jimmie Fortescue for yourself?' + +'Oh, what is the use of sneering?' began the dull voice again. 'I +am horribly tired, Sheila. And try how you will, you can't +convince me that you believe for a moment that I am not myself, +that you are as hard as you pretend. An acquaintance, even a +friend might be deceived; but husband and wife--oh no! It isn't +only a man's face that's himself--or even his hands.' He looked +at them, straightened them slowly out, and buried them in his +pockets. 'All I care about now is Alice. Is she, or is she not +going to be told? I am simply asking you to give her just a +chance.' + +'"Simply asking me to give Alice a chance"; now isn't that really +just a little...?' + +Lawford slowly shook his head. 'You know in your heart it isn't, +Sheila; you understand me quite well, although you persistently +pretend not to. I can't argue now. I can't speak up for myself. I +am just about as far down as I can go. It's only Alice.' + +'I see; a lucid interval?' suggested his wife in a low, trembling +voice. + +'Yes, yes, if you like,' said her husband patiently, '"a lucid +interval." Don't please look at my face like that, Sheila. +Think--think that it's just lupus, just some horrible +disfigurement.' + +Not much light was in the large room, and there was something so +extraordinarily characteristic of her husband in those stooping +shoulders, in the head hung a little forward, and in the +preternaturally solemn voice, that Sheila had to bend a little +over the bed to catch a glimpse of the sallow and keener face +again. She sighed; and even on her own strained ear her sigh +sounded almost like one of relief. + +'It's useless, I know, to ask you anything while you are in this +mood,' continued Lawford dully; 'I know that of old.' + +The white, ringed hands clenched, '"Of old!"' + +'I didn't mean anything. Don't listen to what I say. It's +only--it's just Alice knowing, that was all; I mean at once.' + +'Don't for a moment suppose I am not perfectly aware that it is +only Alice you think of. You were particularly anxious about my +feelings, weren't you? You broke the news to me with the +tenderest solicitude. I am glad our--our daughter shares my +husband's love.' + +'Look here,' said Lawford densely, 'you know that I love you as +much as ever; but with this--as I am; what would be the good of +my saying so?' Mrs Lawford took a deep breath. + +And a voice called softly at the door, 'Mother, are you there? +Is father awake? May I come in?' + +In a flash the memory returned to her; twenty-four hours ago she +was asking that very question of this unspeakable figure that sat +hunched-up before her. + +'One moment, dear,' she called. And added in a very low voice, +'Come here!' + +Lawford looked up. 'What?' he said. + +'Perhaps, perhaps,' she whispered, 'it isn't quite so bad.' + +'For mercy's sake, Sheila,' he said, 'don't torture me; tell the +poor child to go away.' + +She paused. 'Are you there, Alice? Would you mind, father says, +waiting a little? He is so very tired.' + +'Too tired to.... Oh, very well, mother.' + +Mrs Lawford opened the door, and called after her, 'Is Jimmie +gone?' + +'Oh, yes, hours.' + +'Where did you meet?' + +'I couldn't get a carriage at the station. He carried my +dressing-bag; I begged him not to. The other's coming on. You +know what Jimmie is. How very, very lucky I did come home. I +don't know what made me; just an impulse; they did laugh at me +so. Father dear--do speak to me; how are you now?' + +Lawford opened his mouth, gulped, and shook his head. + +'Ssh, dear!' whispered Sheila, 'I think he has fallen asleep. I +will be down in a minute.' Mrs Lawford was about to close the +door when Ada appeared. + +'If you please, ma'am,' she said, 'I have been waiting, as you +told me, to let Dr Ferguson out, but it's nearly seven now; and +the table's not laid yet.' + +'I really should have thought, Ada,' Sheila began, then caught +back the angry words, and turned and looked over her shoulder +into the room. 'Do you think you will need anything more, Dr +Ferguson?' she asked in a sepulchral voice. + +Again Lawford's lips moved; again he shook his head. + +'One moment, Ada,' she said closing the door. 'Some more +medicine--what medicine? Quick! She mustn't suspect.' + +'"What medicine?"' repeated Lawford stolidly. + +'Oh, vexing, vexing; don't you see we must send her out? Don't +you see? What was it you sent to Critchett's for last night? Tell +him that's gone: we want more of that.' + +Lawford stared heavily. Oh, yes, yes,' he said thickly, 'more of +that....' + +Sheila, with a shrug of extreme distaste and vexation. hastily +opened the door. 'Dr Ferguson wants a further supply of the drug +which Mr Critchett made up for Mr Lawford yesterday evening. You +had better go at once, Ada, and please make as much haste as you +possibly can.' + +'I say, I say,' began Lawford; but it was too late, the door was +shut. + +'How I detest this wretched falsehood and subterfuge. What could +have induced you....?' + +'Yes,' said her husband, 'what! I think I'll be getting to bed +again, Sheila; I forgot I had been ill. And now I do really feel +very tired. But I should like to feel--in spite of this hideous-- +I should like to feel we are friends, Sheila.' + +Sheila almost imperceptibly shuddered, crossed the room, and +faced the still, almost lifeless mask. 'I spoke,' she said, in a +low, cold, difficult voice--'I spoke in a temper this morning. +You must try to understand what a shock it has been to me. Now, I +own it frankly, I know you are--Arthur. But God only knows how it +frightens me, and--and--horrifies me.' She shut her eyes beneath +her veil. They waited on in silence a while. + +'Poor boy!' she said at last, lightly touching the loose sleeve; +'be brave; it will all come right, soon. Meanwhile, for Alice's +sake, if not for mine, don't give way to--to caprices, and all +that. Keep quietly here, Arthur. And--and forgive my impatience.' + +He put out his hand as if to touch her. 'Forgive you!' he said +humbly, pushing it stubbornly back into his pocket again. 'Oh, +Sheila, the forgiveness is all on your side. You know I have +nothing to forgive.' A long silence fell between them. + +'Then, to-night,' at last began Sheila wearily, drawing back, 'we +say nothing to Alice, except that you are too tired--just nervous +prostration--to see her. What we should do without this +influenza, I cannot conceive. Mr Bethany will probably look in on +his way home; and then we can talk it over--we can talk it over +again. So long as you are like this, yourself, in mind, why I-- +What is it now?' she broke off querulously. + +'If you please, ma'am, Mr Critchett says he doesn't know Dr +Ferguson, his name's not in the Directory, and there must be +something wrong with the message, and he's sorry, but he must +have it in writing because there was more even in the first +packet than he ought by rights to send. What shall I do, if you +please?' + +Still looking at her husband. Sheila listened quietly to the end, +and then, as if in inarticulate disdain, she deliberately +shrugged her shoulders, and went out to play her part unaided. + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +Her husband turned wearily once more, and drawing up a chair sat +down in front of the cold grate. He realised that Sheila thought +him as much of a fool now as she had for the moment thought him +an impostor, or something worse, the night before. That was at +least something gained. He realised, too, in a vague way that the +exuberance of mind that had practically invented Dr Ferguson, and +outraged Miss Sinnet, had quite suddenly flickered out. It was +astonishing, he thought, with gaze fixed innocently on the black +coals, that he should ever have done such things. He detested +that kind of 'rot'; that jaunty theatrical pose so many men +prided their jackdaw brains on. + +And he sat quite still, like a cat at a cranny, listening, as it +were, for the faintest remotest stir that might hint at any +return of this--activity. It was the first really sane moment he +had had since the 'change.' Whatever it was that had happened at +Widderstone was now distinctly weakening in effect. Why, now, +perhaps? He stole a thievish look over his shoulder at the glass, +and cautiously drew finger and thumb down that beaked nose. Then +he really quietly smiled, a smile he felt this abominable facial +caricature was quite unused to, the superior Lawford smile of +guileless contempt for the fanatical, the fantastic, and the +bizarre: He wouldn't have sat with his feet on the fender before +a burnt-out fire. + +And the animosity of that 'he,' uttered only just under his +breath, surprised even himself. It actually did seem as if there +were a chance; if only he kept cool and collected. If the whole +mind of a man was bent on being one thing, surely no power on +earth, certainly not on earth, could for long compel him to look +another, any more (followed the resplendent thought) than vice +versa. + +That, in fact, was the trick that had been in fitful fashion +played him since yesterday. Obviously, and apart altogether from +his promise to Sheila, the best possible thing he could do would +be to walk quietly over to Widderstone to-morrow and like a child +that has lost a penny, just make the attempt to reverse the +process: look at the graves, read the inscriptions on the +weather-beaten stones, compose himself once more to sleep on the +little seat. + +Magic, witchcraft, possession, and all that--well, Mr Bethany +might prefer to take it on the authority of the Bible if it was +his duty. But it was at least mainly Old Testament stuff, like +polygamy, Joshua, and the 'unclean beasts.' The 'unclean beasts.' +It was simply, as Simon had said, mainly an affair of the nerves, +like Indian jugglery. He had heard of dozens of such cases, or +similar cases. And it was hardly likely that cases even remotely +like his own would be much bragged about, or advertised. All +those mysterious 'disappearances,' too, which one reads about so +repeatedly? What of them? Even now, he felt (and glanced swiftly +behind him at the fancy), it would be better to think as softly +as possible, not to hope too openly, certainly not to triumph in +the least degree, just in case of--well--listeners. + +He would wrap up too. And he wouldn't tell Sheila of the project +till he had come safely back. What an excellent joke it would be +to confess meekly to his escapade, and to be scolded, and then +suddenly to reveal himself. He sat back and gazed with an almost +malignant animosity at the face in the portrait, comely and +plump. + +An inarticulate, unfathomable depression rolled back on him, like +a mist out of the sea. He hastily undressed, put watch and +door-key and Critchett's powder under his pillow, paused, +vacantly ruminated, and then replaced the powder in his waistcoat +pocket, said his prayers, and got shivering to bed. He did not +feel hurt at Sheila's leaving him like this. So long as she +really believed in him. And now--Alice was home. He listened, +trying not to shiver, for her voice; and sometimes heard, he +fancied, the clear note. It was this beastly influenza that made +him feel so cold and lifeless. But all would soon come right-- +that is, if only that face, luminous against the floating +darkness within, would not appear the instant he closed his eyes. + +But legions of dreams are Influenza's allies. He fell into a +chill doze, heard voices innumerable, and one above the rest, +shouting them down, until there fell a lull. And another, as it +were, from afar said quite clearly and distinctly, 'But surely, +my dear, you have heard the story of the poor old charwoman who +talked Greek in her delirium? A little school French need not +alarm us.' And Lawford opened his eyes again on Mr Bethany +standing at his bed + +'Tt, tt! There, I've been and waked him. And yet they say men +make such excellent nurses in time of war. But you see, Lawford, +what did I tell you? Wasn't I now an infallible prophet? Your +wife has been giving me a most glowing account. Quite your old +self, she tells me, except for just this--this touch of facial +paralysis. And I think, do you know' (the kind old creature +stooped over the bed, but still, Lawford noticed bitterly, still +without his spectacles)--'yes, I really think there is a decided +improvement. Not quite so--drawn. We must make haste slowly. +Wedderburn, you know, believes profoundly in Simon; he pulled his +wife through a dangerous confinement. And here's pills and tonics +and liniments--a whole chemist's shop. Oh, we are getting on +swimmingly.' + +Flamelight was flickering in the candled dusk. Lawford turned his +head and saw Sheila's coiled, beautiful hair in the firelight. + +'You haven't told Alice?' he asked. + +'My dear good man,' said Mr Bethany, 'of course we haven't. You +shall tell her yourself on Monday. What an incredible tradition +it will be! But you mustn't worry; you mustn't even think. And no +more of these jaunts, eh? That Ferguson business--that was too +bad. What are we going to do with the fellow now we have created +him? He will come home to roost--mark my words. And as likely as +not down the Vicarage chimney. I wouldn't have believed it of +you, my dear fellow.' He beamed, but looked, none the less, very +lean and fagged and depressed. + +'How did the wedding go off?' Lawford managed to think of +inquiring. + +'Oh, A1,' said Mr Bethany. 'I've just been describing it to +Alice--the bride, her bridegroom, mother, aunts, cake, presents, +finery, blushes, tears, and everything that was hers. We've been +in fits, haven't we, Mrs Lawford? And Alice says I'm a Worth in a +clerical collar--didn't she? And that it's only Art that has kept +me out of an apron. Now look here; quiet, quiet, quiet; no +excitement, no pranks. What is there to worry about, pray? And +now Little Dorrit's down with influenza too. And Craik and I will +have double work to do. Well, well; good-bye, my dear. God bless +you, Lawford. I can't tell you how relieved, how unspeakably +relieved I am to find you so much--so much better. Feed him up, +my other dear; body and mind and soul and spirit. And there goes +the bell. I must have a biscuit. I've swallowed nothing but a +Cupid in plaster of Paris since breakfast. Goodnight; we shall +miss you both--both.' + +But when Sheila returned, her husband was sunk again into a quiet +sleep, from which not even the many questions she fretted to put +to him seemed weighty enough to warrant his disturbance. + +So when Lawford again opened his eyes he found himself lying wide +awake, clear and refreshed, and eager to get up. But upon the air +lay the still hush of early morning. He tried in vain to catch +back sleep again. A distant shred of dream still floated in his +mind, like a cloud at evening. He rarely dreamed, but certainly +something immensely interesting had but a moment ago eluded him. +He sat up and looked at the clear red cinders and their maze of +grottoes. He got out of bed and peeped through the blinds. To the +east and opposite to him gardens and an apple-orchard lay, and +there in strange liquid tranquillity hung the morning star, and +rose, rifling into the dusk of night, the first grey of dawn. The +street beneath its autumn leaves was vacant, charmed, deserted. + +Hardly since childhood had Lawford seen the dawn unless over his +winter breakfast-table. Very much like a child now he stood +gazing out of his bow-window--the child whom Time's busy robins +had long ago covered over with the leaves of numberless hours. A +vague exultation fumed up into his brain. Still on the borders of +sleep, he unlocked the great wardrobe and took out an old faded +purple and crimson dressing-gown that had belonged to his +grandfather, the chief glory of every Christmas charade. He +pulled the cowl-like hood over his head and strode majestically +over to the looking-glass. + +He looked in there a moment on the strange face, like a child +dismayed at its own excitement, and a fit of sobbing that was +half uncontrollable laughter swept over him. He threw off the +hood and turned once more to the window. Consciousness had +flooded back indeed. What would Sheila have said to see him +there? The unearthly beauty and stillness, and man's small +labours, garden and wall and roof-tree idle and smokeless in the +light of daybreak--there seemed to be some half-told secret +between them. What had life done with him to leave a reality so +clouded? He put on his slippers, and, gently opening the door, +crept with extreme caution up the stairs. At a long, narrow +landing window he confronted a panorama of starry night-gardens, +sloping orchards; and beyond them fields, hills, Orion, the Dogs, +in the clear and cloudless darkness. + +'My God, how beautiful!' a voice whispered. And a cock crowed +mistily afar. He stood staring like a child into the wintry +brightness of a pastry-cook's. Then once more he crept stealthily +on. He stooped and listened at a closed door, until he fancied +that above the beating of his own heart he could hear the +breathing of the sleeper within. Then, taking firm hold of the +handle with both hands, he slowly noiselessly turned it, and +peeped in on Alice. + +The moon was long past her faint shining here. The blind was +down. And yet it was not pitch dark. He stood with eyes fixed, +waiting. Then he edged softly forward and knelt down beside the +bed. He could hear her breathing now: long, low, quiet, +unhastening--the miracle of life. He could just dimly discern the +darkness of her hair against the pillow. Some long-sealed spring +of tenderness seemed to rise in his heart with a grief and an +ache he had never known before. Here at least he could find a +little peace, a brief pause, however futile and stupid all his +hopes of the night had been. He leant his head on his hands on +the counterpane and refused to think. He felt a quick tremor, a +startled movement, and knew that eyes wide open with fear were +striving to pierce the gloom between them. + +'There, there, dearest,' he said in a low whisper, 'it's only me, +only me.' He stroked the narrow hand and gazed into the +shadowiness. Her fingers lay quiet and passive in his, with that +strange sense of immateriality that sleep brings to the body. + +'You, you!' she answered with a deep sigh. 'Oh, dearest, how you +frightened me. What is wrong? why have you come? Are you worse, +dearest, dearest?' + +He kissed her hand. 'No, Alice, not worse. I couldn't sleep, that +was all.' + +'Oh, and I came so utterly miserable to bed because you would not +see me. And Mother would tell me only so very little. I didn't +even know you had been ill.' She pressed his hand between her +own. 'But this, you know, is very, very naughty--you will catch +cold, you bad thing. What would Mother say?' + +'I think we mustn't tell her, dear. I couldn't help it; I felt +much I wanted to see you. I have been rather miserable.' + +'Why?' she said, stroking his hand from wrist to fingertips with +one soft finger. 'You mustn't be miserable. You and me have never +done such a thing before; have we? Was it that wretched old Flu?' + +It was too dark in the little fragrant room even to see her face +so close to his own. And yet he feared. 'Dr Simon,' she went on +softly, 'said it was. But isn't your voice a little hoarse, and +it sounds so melancholy in the dark. And oh'--she squeezed his +wrist--'you have grown so thin! You do frighten me. Whatever +should I do if you were really ill? And it was so odd, dear. When +first I woke I seemed to be still straining my eyes in a dream, +at such a curious, haunting face--not very nice. I am glad, I am +glad you were here.' + +'What was the dream-face like?' came the muttered question. + +'Dark and sharp, and rather dwelling eyes; you know those long +faces one sees in dreams: like a hawk, like a conjuror's.' + +Like a conjuror's!--it was the first unguarded and ungarbled +criticism. 'Perhaps, dear, if you find my voice different, and my +hand shrunk up, you will find my face changed, too--like a +conjuror's.... What then?' + +She laughed gaily and tenderly. 'You silly silly; I should love +you more than ever. Your hands are icy cold. I can't warm them +nohow.' + +Lawford held tight his daughter's hand. 'You do love me, Alice? +You would not turn against me, whatever happened? Ah, you shall +see, you shall see.' A sudden burning hope sprang up in him. +Surely when all was well again, these last few hours would not +have been spent in vain. Like the shadow of death they had been, +against whose darkness the green familiar earth seems beautiful +as the plains of paradise. Had he but realized before how much he +loved her--what years of life had been wasted in leaving it all +unsaid! He came back from his reverie to find his hand wet with +her tears. He stroked her hair, and touched gently her eyelids +without speaking, + +'You will let me come in to-morrow?' she pleaded; 'you won't keep +me out?' + +'Ah, but, dear, you must remember your mother. She gets so +anxious, and every word the doctor says is law. How would you +like me to come again like this, perhaps?--like Santa Claus?' + +'You know how I love having you,' she said, and stopped. 'But--but +...' He leaned closer. 'Yes, yes, come,' she said, clutching his +hand and hiding her eyes; 'it is only my dream--that horrible, +dwelling face in the dream; it frightened me so.' + +Lawford rose very slowly from his knees. He could feel in the +dark his brows drawn down; there came a low, sullen beating on +his ear; he saw his face as it were in dim outline against the +dark. Rage and rebellion surged up in him; even his love could be +turned to bitterness. Well, two could play at any game! Alice +sprang up in bed and caught his sleeve. 'Dearest, dearest, you +must not be angry with me now!' + +He flung himself down beside the bed. Anger, resentment died +away. 'You are all I have left,' he said. + +He stole back, as he had come, in the clear dawn to his bedroom. + +It was not five yet. He put a few more coals on his fire and blew +out the night-light, and lay down. But it was impossible to rest, +to remain inactive. He would go down and search for that first +volume of Quain. Hallucination, Influenza, Insanity--why, Sheila +must have purposely mislaid it. A rather formidable figure he +looked, descending the stairs in the grey dusk of daybreak. The +breakfast-room was at the back of the house. He tilted the blind, +and a faint light flowed in from the changing colours of the sky. +He opened the glass door of the little bookcase to the right of +the window, and ran eye and finger over the few rows of books. +But as he stood there with his back to the room, just as the +shadow of a bird's wing floats across the moonlight of a pool, he +became suddenly conscious that something, somebody had passed +across the doorway, and in passing had looked in on him. + +He stood motionless, listening; but no sound broke the morning +slumbrousness, except the faraway warbling of a thrush in the +first light. So sudden and transitory had been the experience +that it seemed now to be illusory; yet it had so caught him up, +it had with so furtive and sinister a quietness broken in on his +solitude, that for a moment he dared not move. A cold, indefinite +sensation stole over him that he was being watched; that some +dim, evil presence was behind him biding its time, patient and +stealthy, with eyes fixed unmovingly on him where he stood. But, +watch and wait as silently as he might, only the day broadened at +the window, and at last a narrow ray of sunlight stole trembling +up into the dusky bowl of the sky. + +At any rate Quain was found, with all the ills of life, from A to +I; and Lawford turned back to his bondage with the book under his +arm. + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +The Sabbath, pale with September sunshine, and monotonous with +chiming bells, had passed languidly away. Dr Simon had come and +gone, optimistic and urbane, yet with a faint inward +dissatisfaction over a patient behind whose taciturnity a hint of +mockery and subterfuge seemed to lurk. Even Mrs Lawford had +appeared to share her husband's reticence. But Dr Simon had +happened on other cases in his experience where tact was required +rather than skill, and time than medicine. + +The voices and footsteps, even the frou-frou of worshippers going +to church, the voices and footsteps of worshippers returning from +church, had floated up to the patient's open window. Sunlight had +drawn across his room in one pale beam, and vanished. A few +callers had called. Hothouse flowers, waxen and pale, had been +left with messages of sympathy. Even Dr Critchett had respectfully +and discreetly made inquiries on his way home from chapel. + +Lawford had spent most of his time in pacing to and fro in his +soft slippers. The very monotony had eased his mind. Now and +again he had lain motionless, with his face to the ceiling. He +had dozed and had awakened, cold and torpid with dream. He had +hardly been aware of the process, but every hour had done +something, it seemed, towards clarifying his point of view. A +consciousness had begun to stir in him that was neither that of +the old, easy Lawford, whom he had never been fully aware of +before, nor of this strange ghostly intelligence that haunted the +hawklike, restless face, and plucked so insistently at his +distracted nerves. He had begun in a vague fashion to be aware of +them both, could in a fashion discriminate between them, almost +as if there really were two spirits in stubborn conflict within +him. It would, of course, wear him down in time. There could be +only one end to such a struggle--THE end. + +All day he had longed for freedom, on and on, with craving for +the open sky, for solitude, for green silence, beyond these +maddening walls. This heedful silken coming and going, these +Sunday voices, this reiterant yelp of a single peevish bell-- +would they never cease? And above all, betwixt dread and an +almost physical greed, he hungered for night. He sat down with +elbows on knees and head on his hands, thinking of night, its +secrecy, its immeasurable solitude. + +His eyelids twitched; the fire before him had for an instant gone +black out. He seemed to see slow-gesturing branches, grass +stooping beneath a grey and wind-swept sky. He started up; and +the remembrance of the morning returned to him--the glassy light, +the changing rays, the beaming gilt upon the useless books. Now, +at last, at the windows; afternoon had begun to wane. And when +Sheila brought up his tea, as if Chance had heard his cry, she +entered in hat and stole. She put down the tray, and paused at +the glass, looking across it out of the window. + +'Alice says you are to eat every one of those delicious +sandwiches, and especially the tiny omelette. You have scarcely +touched anything to-day, Arthur. I am a poor one to preach, I am +afraid; but you know what that will mean--a worse breakdown +still. You really must try to think of--of us all.' + +'Are you going to church?' he asked in a low voice. + +'Not, of course, if you would prefer not. But Dr Simon advised me +most particularly to go out at least once a day. We must +remember, this is not the beginning of your illness. +Long-continued anxiety, I suppose, does tell on one in time. +Anyhow, he said that I looked worried and run-down. I AM worried. +Let us both try for each other's sakes, or even if only for +Alice's, to--to do all we can. I must not harass you; but is +there any--do you see the slightest change of any kind?' + +'You always look pretty, Sheila; to-night you look prettier: THAT +is the only change, I think.' + +Mrs Lawford's attitude intensified in its stillness. 'Now, +speaking quite frankly, what is it in you suggests these remarks +at such a time? That's what baffles me. It seems so childish, so +needlessly blind.' + +'I am very sorry, Sheila, to be so childish. But I'm not, say +what you like, blind. You ARE pretty: I'd repeat it if I was +burning at the stake.' + +Sheila lowered her eyes softly on to the rich-toned picture in +the glass. 'Supposing,' she said, watching her lips move, +'supposing--of course, I know you are getting better and all +that--but supposing you don't change back as Mr Bethany thinks, +what will you do? Honestly, Arthur, when I think over it calmly, +the whole tragedy comes back on me with such a force it sweeps me +off my feet; I am for the moment scarcely my own mistress. What +would you do?' + +'I think, Sheila,' replied a low, infinitely weary voice, 'I +think I should marry again.' It was the same wavering, faintly +ironical voice that had slightly discomposed Dr Simon that same +morning. + +'"Marry again"!' exclaimed incredulously the full lips in the +looking-glass. 'Who?' + +'YOU, dear!' + +Sheila turned softly round, conscious in a most humiliating +manner that she had ever so little flushed. + +Her husband was pouring out his tea, unaware, apparently, of her +change of position. She watched him curiously. In spite of all +her reason, of her absolute certainty, she wondered even again +for a moment if this really could be Arthur. And for the first +time she realised the power and mastery of that eager and far too +hungry face. Her mind seemed to pause, fluttering in air, like a +bird in the wind. She hastened rather unsteadily to the door. + +'Will you want anything more, do you think, for an hour?' she +asked. + +Her husband looked up over his little table. 'Is Alice going with +you?' + +'Oh yes; poor child, she looks so pale and miserable. We are +going to Mrs Sherwin's, and then on to Church. You will lock your +door?' + +'Yes, I will lock my door.' + +'And I do hope Arthur--nothing rash!' + +A change, that seemed almost the effect of actual shadow, came +over his face. 'I wish you could stay with me,' he said slowly. +'I don't think you have any idea what--what I go through.' + +It was as if a child had asked on the verge of terror for a +candle in the dark. But an hour's terror is better than a +lifetime of timidity. Sheila sighed. + +'I think,' she said, 'I too might say that. But there; giving way +will do nothing for either of us. I shall be gone only for an +hour, or two at the most. And I told Mr Bethany I should have to +come out before the sermon: it's only Mr Craik.' + +'But why Mrs Sherwin? She'd worm a secret out of one's grave.' + +'It's useless to discuss that, Arthur; you have always +consistently disliked my friends. It's scarcely likely that you +would find any improvement in them now.' + +'Oh, well--' he began. But the door was already closed. + +'Sheila!' he called in a burst of anger. + +'Well, Arthur?' + +'You have taken my latchkey.' + +Sheila came hastily in again. 'Your latchkey?' + +'I am going out.' + +'"Going out!"--you will not be so mad, so criminal; and after +your promise!' + +He stood up. 'It is useless to argue. If I do not go out, I shall +certainly go mad. As for criminal--why, that's a woman's word. +Who on earth is to know me?' + +'It is of no consequence, then, that the servants are already +gossiping about this impossible Dr Ferguson; that you are certain +to be seen either going or returning; that Alice is bound to +discover that you are well enough to go out, and yet not even +enough to say good-night to your own daughter--oh, it's +monstrous, it's a frantic, a heartless thing to do !' Her voice +vaguely suggested tears. + +Lawford eyed her coldly and stubbornly--thinking of the empty +room he would leave awaiting his return, its lamp burning, its +fire-flames shining. It was almost a physical discomfort, this +longing unspeakable for the twilight, the green secrecy and the +silence of the graves. 'Keep them out of the way,' he said in a +low voice; 'it will be dark when I come in.' His hardened face +lit up. 'It's useless to attempt to dissuade me.' + +'Why must you always be hurting me? why do you seem to delight in +trying to estrange me?' Husband and wife faced each other across +the clear-lit room. He did not answer. + +'For the last time,' she said in a quiet, hard voice, 'I ask you +not to go.' + +He shrugged his shoulders. 'Ask me not to come back,' he said; +'that's nearer your hope.' He turned his face to the fire. +Without moving he heard her go out, return, pause, and go out +again. And when he deliberately wheeled round in his chair the +little key lay conspicuous there on the counterpane. + + + +CHAPTER NINE + +The last light of sunset lay in the west; and a sullen wrack of +cloud was mounting into the windless sky when Lawford entered the +country graveyard again by its dark weather-worn lych-gate. The +old stone church with its square tower stood amid trees, its +eastern window faintly aglow with crimson and purple. He could +hear a steady, rather nasal voice through its open lattices. But +the stooping stones and the cypresses were out of sight of its +porch. He would not be seen down there. He paused a moment, +however; his hat was drawn down over his eyes; he was shivering. +Far over the harvest fields showed a growing pallor in the +solitary seat beneath the cypresses. He stood hesitating, gazing +steadily and yet half vacantly at the motionless figure, and in a +while a face was lifted in his direction, and undisconcerted eyes +calmly surveyed him. + +'I am afraid,' called Lawford rather nervously--'I hope I am not +intruding?' + +'Not at all, not at all,' said the stranger. 'I have no privileges +here; at least as yet.' + +Lawford again hesitated, then slowly advanced. 'It's astonishingly +quiet and beautiful,' he said. + +The stranger turned his head to glance over the fields. 'Yes, it +is, very,' he replied. There was the faintest accent, a little +drawl of unfriendliness in the remark. + +'You often sit here?' Lawford persisted. + +The stranger raised his eyebrows. 'Oh yes, often.' He smiled. 'It +is my own modest fashion of attending divine service. The +congregation is rapt.' + +'My visits,' said Lawford, 'have been very few--in fact, so far +as I know, I have only once been here before.' + +'I envy you the novelty.' There was again the same faint +unmistakable antagonism in voice and attitude; and yet so deep +was the relief in talking to a fellow creature who hadn't the +least suspicion of anything unusual in his appearance that +Lawford was extremely disinclined to turn back. He made another +effort--for conversation with strangers had always been a +difficulty to him--and advanced towards the seat. 'You mustn't +please let me intrude upon you,' he said, 'but really I am very +interested in this queer old place. Perhaps you would tell me +something of its history?' He sat down. His companion moved +slowly to the other side of the broken gravestone. + +'To tell you the truth,' he replied, picking his way as it were +from word to word, 'it's "history," as people call it, does not +interest me in the least. After all, it's not when a thing is, +but what it is, that much matters. What this is'--he glanced, +with head bent, across the shadowy stones, 'is pretty evident. Of +course, age has its charms.' + +'And is this very old?' + +'Oh yes, it's old right enough, as things go; but even age, +perhaps, is mainly an affair of the imagination. There's a +tombstone near that little old hawthorn, and there are two others +side by side under the wall, still even legibly late seventeenth +century. That's pretty good weathering.' He smiled faintly. 'Of +course, the church itself is centuries older, drenched with age. +But she's still sleep-walking while these old tombstones dream. +Glow-worms and crickets are not such bad bedfellows.' + +'What interested me most, I think,' said Lawford haltingly, 'was +this.' He pointed with his stick to the grave at his feet. + +'Ah, yes, Sabathier's,' said the stranger; 'I know his peculiar +history almost by heart.' + +Lawford found himself staring with unusual concentration into the +rather long and pale face. 'Not, I suppose,' he resumed faintly-- +'not, I suppose, beyond what's there.' + +His companion leant his hand on the old stooping tombstone. 'Well, +you know, there's a good deal there'--he stooped over--'if you +read between the lines. Even if you don't.' + +'A suicide,' said Lawford, under his breath. + +'Yes, a suicide; that's why our Christian countrymen have buried +him outside of the fold. Dead or alive, they try to keep the wolf +out.' + +'Is this, then, unconsecrated ground?' said Lawford. + +'Haven't you noticed,' drawled the other, 'how green the grass +grows down here, and how very sharp are poor old Sabathier's +thorns? Besides, he was a stranger, and they--kept him out.' + +'But, surely,' said Lawford, 'was it so entirely a matter of +choice--the laws of the Church? If he did kill himself, he did.' + +The stranger turned with a little shrug. 'I don't suppose it's a +matter of much consequence to HIM. I fancied I was his only +friend. May I venture to ask why you are interested in the poor +old thing?' + +Lawford's mind was as calm and shallow as a millpond. 'Oh, a +rather unusual thing happened to me here,' he said. 'You say you +often come?' + +'Often,' said the stranger rather curtly. + +'Has anything--ever--occurred?' + +'"Occurred?"' He raised his eyebrows. 'I wish it had. I come here +simply, as I have said, because it's quiet; because I prefer the +company of those who never answer me back, and who do not so much +as condescend to pay me the least attention.' He smiled and +turned his face towards the quiet fields. + +Lawford, after a long pause, lifted his eyes. 'Do you think,' he +said softly, 'it is possible one ever could?' + +'"One ever could?"' + +'Answer back?' + +There was a low rotting wall of stone encompassing Sabathier's +grave; on this the stranger sat down. He glanced up rather +curiously at his companion. 'Seldom the time and the place and +the revenant altogether. The thought has occurred to others,' he +ventured to add. + +'Of course, of course,' said Lawford eagerly. 'But it is an +absolutely new one to me. I don't mean that I have never had such +an idea, just in one's own superficial way; but'--he paused and +glanced swiftly into the fast-thickening twilight--'I wonder: are +they, do you think, really, all quite dead?' + +'Call and see!' taunted the stranger softly. + +'Ah, yes, I know,' said Lawford. 'But I believe in the +resurrection of the body; that is what we say; and supposing, +when a man dies--supposing it was most frightfully against one's +will; that one hated the awful inaction that death brings, +shutting a poor devil up like a child kicking against the door in +a dark cupboard; one might surely one might--just quietly, you +know, try to get out? wouldn't you?' he added. + +'And, surely,' he found himself beginning gently to argue again, +'surely, what about, say, him?' He nodded towards the old and +broken grave that lay between them. + +'What, Sabathier?' the other echoed, laying his hand upon the +stone. + +And a sheer enormous abyss of silence seemed to follow the +unanswerable question. + +'He was a stranger; it says so. Good God!' said Lawford, 'how he +must have wanted to get home! He killed himself, poor wretch, +think of the fret and fever he must have been in--just before. +Imagine it.' + +'But it might, you know,' suggested the other with a smile--'might +have been sheer indifference.' + +'"Nicholas Sabathier, Stranger to this parish"--no, no,' said +Lawford, his heart beating as if it would choke him, 'I don't +fancy it was indifference.' + +It was almost too dark now to distinguish the stranger's features +but there seemed a faint suggestion of irony in his voice. 'And +how do you suppose your angry naughty child would set about it? +It's narrow quarters; how would he begin?' + +Lawford sat quite still. 'You say--I hope I am not detaining you +--you say you have come here, sat here often, on this very seat; +have you ever had--have you ever fallen asleep here?' + +'Why do you ask?' inquired the other curiously. + +'I was only wondering,' said Lawford. He was cold and shivering. +He felt instinctively it was madness to sit on here in the thin +gliding mist that had gathered in swathes above the grass, milk- +pale in the rising moon. The stranger turned away from him. + +'"For in that sleep of death what dreams may come must give us +pause,"' he said slowly, with a little satirical catch on the +last word. 'What did you dream?' + +Lawford glanced helplessly about him. The moon cast lean grey +beams of light between the cypresses. But to his wide and +wandering eyes it seemed that a radiance other than hers haunted +these mounds and leaning stones. 'Have you ever noticed it?' he +said, putting out his hand towards his unknown companion; 'this +stone is cracked from head to foot?... But there'--he rose +stiff and chilled--'I am afraid I have bored you with my company. +You came here for solitude, and I have been trying to convince +you that we are surrounded with witnesses. You will forgive my +intrusion?' There was a kind of old-fashioned courtesy in his +manner that he himself was dimly aware of. He held out his hand. + +'I hope you will think nothing of the kind,' said the other +earnestly; 'how could it be in any sense an intrusion? It's the +old story of Bluebeard. And I confess I too should very much like +a peep into his cupboard. Who wouldn't? But there, it's merely a +matter of time, I suppose.' He paused, and together they slowly +ascended the path already glimmering with a heavy dew. At the +porch they paused once more. And now it was the stranger that +held out his hand. + +'Perhaps,' he said, 'you will give me the pleasure of some day +continuing our talk. As for our friend below, it so happens that +I have managed to pick up a little more of his history than the +sexton seems to have heard of--if you would care some time or +other to share it. I live only at the foot of the hill, not half +a mile distant. Perhaps you could spare the time now?' + +Lawford took out his watch, 'You are really very kind,' he said. +'But, perhaps--well, whatever that history may be, I think you +would agree that mine is even--but, there, I've talked too much +about myself already. Perhaps to-morrow?' + +'Why, to-morrow, then,' said his companion. 'It's a flat wooden +house, on the left-hand side. Come at any time of the evening'; +he paused again and smiled--'the third house after the Rectory, +which is marked up on the gate. My name is Herbert--Herbert +Herbert to be precise.' + +Lawford took out his pocket-book and a card. 'Mine,' he said, +handing it gravely to his companion. 'is Lawford--at least...' +It was really the first time that either had seen the other's +face at close quarters and clear-lit; and on Lawford's a moon +almost at the full shone dazzlingly. He saw an expression--dismay, +incredulity, overwhelming astonishment--start suddenly into the +dark, rather indifferent eyes. + +'What is it?' he cried, hastily stooping close. + +'Why,' said the other, laughing and turning away, 'I think the +moon must have bewitched me too.' + + + +CHAPTER TEN + +Lawford listened awhile before opening his door. He heard voices +in the dining-room. A light shone faintly between the blinds of +his bedroom. He very gently let himself in, and unheard, unseen, +mounted the stairs. He sat down in front of the fire, tired out +and bitterly cold in spite of his long walk home. But his mind +was wearier even than his body. He tried in vain to catch up the +thread of his thoughts. He only knew for certain that so far as +his first hope and motives had gone his errand had proved +entirely futile. 'How could I possibly fall asleep with that +fellow talking there?' he had said to himself angrily; yet knew +in his heart that their talk had driven every other idea out of +his mind. He had not yet even glanced into the glass. His every +thought was vainly wandering round and round the one curious hint +that had drifted in, but which he had not yet been able to put +into words. + +Supposing, though, that he had really fallen into a deep sleep, +with none to watch or spy--what then? However ridiculous that +idea, it was not more ridiculous, more incredible than the actual +fact. If he had remained there, he might, it was just possible +that he would by now, have actually awakened just his own +familiar every-day self again. And the thought of that--though he +hardly realised its full import--actually did send him on tip-toe +for a glance that more or less effectually set the question at +rest. And there looked out at him, it seemed, the same dark +sallow face that had so much appalled him only two nights ago-- +expressionless, cadaverous, with shadowy hollows beneath the +glittering eyes. And even as he watched it, its lips, of their +own volition, drew together and questioned him--'Whose?' + +He was not to be given much leisure, however, for fantastic +reveries like this. As he leaned his head on his hands, gladly +conscious that he could not possibly bear this incessant strain +for long, Sheila opened the door. He started up. + +'I wish you would knock,' he said angrily; 'you talk of quiet; +you tell me to rest, and think; and here you come creeping and +spying on me as if I was a child in a nursery. I refuse to be +watched and guarded and peeped on like this.' He knew that his +hands were trembling, that he could not keep his eyes fixed, that +his voice was nearly inarticulate. + +Sheila drew in her lips. 'I have merely come to tell you, Arthur, +that Mr Bethany has brought Mr Danton in to supper. He agrees +with me it really would be advisable to take such a very old and +prudent and practical friend into our confidence. You do nothing +I ask of you. I simply cannot bear the burden of this incessant +anxiety. Look, now, what your night walk has done for you! You +look positively at death's door.' + +'What--what an instinct you have for the right word,' said +Lawford softly. 'And Danton, of all people in the world! It was +surely rather a curious, a thoughtless choice. Has he had +supper?' + +'Why do you ask?' + +'He won't believe: too--bloated.' + +'I think,' said Sheila indignantly, 'it is hardly fair to speak +of a very old and a very true friend of mine in such--well, +vulgar terms as that. Besides, Arthur, as for believing--without +in the least desiring to hurt your feelings--I must candidly warn +you, some people won't.' + +'Come along,' said Lawford, with a faint gust of laughter; 'let's +see.' + +They went quickly downstairs, Sheila with less dignity, perhaps, +than she had been surprised into since she had left a slimmer +girlhood behind. She swept into the gaze of the two gentlemen +standing together on the hearthrug; and so was caught, as it +were, between a rain of conflicting glances, for her husband had +followed instantly, and stood now behind her, stooping a little, +and with something between contempt and defiance confronting an +old fat friend, whom that one brief challenging instant had +congealed into a condition of passive and immovable hostility. + +Mr Danton composed his chin in his collar, and deliberately +turned himself towards his companion. His small eyes wandered, +and instantaneously met and rested on those of Mrs Lawford. + +'Arthur thought he would prefer to come down and see you +himself.' + +'You take such formidable risks, Lawford,' said Mr Bethany in a +dry, difficult voice. + +'Am I really to believe,' Danton began huskily. 'I am sure, +Bethany, you will-- My dear Mrs Lawford!' said he, stirring +vaguely, glancing restlessly. + +'It was not my wish, Vicar, to come at all,' said a voice from +the doorway. 'To tell you the truth, I am too tired to care a jot +either way. And'--he lifted a long arm--'I must positively refuse +to produce the least, the remotest proof that I am not, so far as +I am personally aware, even the Man in the Moon. Danton at heart +was always an incorrigible sceptic. Aren't you, T. D.? You pride +your dear old brawn on it in secret?' + +'I really--' began Danton in a rich still voice. + +'Oh, but you know you are,' drawled on the slightly hesitating +long-drawn syllables; 'it's your parochial metier. Firm, +unctuous, subtle, scepticism; and to that end your body +flourishes. You were born fat; you became fat; and fat, my dear +Danton, has been deliberately thrust on you--in layers! Lampreys! +You'll perish of surfeit some day, of sheer Dantonism. And fat, +postmortem, Danton. Oh, what a basting's there!' + +Mr Bethany, with a convulsive effort, woke. He turned swiftly on +Mrs Lawford. 'Why, why, could you not have seen?' he cried. + +'It's no good, Vicar. She's all sheer Laodicean. Blow hot, blow +cold. North, south, east, west--to have a weathercock for a wife +is to marry the wind. There's nothing to be got from poor Sheila +but.... + +'Lawford!' the little man's voice was as sharp as the crack of a +whip; 'I forbid it. Do you hear me? I forbid it. Some +self-command; my dear good fellow, remember, remember it's only +the will, the will that keeps us breathing.' + +Lawford peered as if out of a gathering dusk, that thickened and +flickered with shadows before his eyes. 'What's he mean, then,' +he muttered huskily, 'coming here with his black, still carcase-- +peeping, peeping--what's he mean, I say?' There was a moment's +silence. Then with lifted brows and wide eyes that to every one +of his three witnesses left an indelible memory of clear and +wolfish light within their glassy pupils, he turned heavily, and +climbed back to his solitude. + +'I suppose,' began Danton, with an obvious effort to disentangle +himself from the humiliation of the moment, 'I suppose he was-- +wandering?' + +'Bless me, yes,' said Mr Bethany cordially--'fever. We all know +what that MEANS.' + +'Yes,' said Danton, taking refuge in Mrs Lawford's white and +intent gaze. + +'Just think, think, Danton--the awful, incessant strain of such +an ordeal. Think for an instant what such a thing means!' + +Danton inserted a plump, white finger between collar and chin. +'Oh yes. But--eh?--needlessly abusive? I never SAID I +disbelieved him.' + +'Do you?' said Mrs Lawford's voice. + +He poised himself, as if it were, on the monolithic stability of +his legs. 'Eh?' he said. + +Mr Bethany sat down at the table. 'I rather feared some such +temporary breakdown as this, Danton. I think I foresaw it. +And now, just while we are all three alone here together in +friendly conclave, wouldn't it be as well, don't you think, to +confront ourselves with the difficulties? I know--we all know, +that that poor half-demented creature IS Arthur Lawford. This +morning he was as sane, as lucid as I hope I am now. An awful +calamity has suddenly fallen upon him--this change. I own frankly +at the first sheer shock it staggered me as I think for the +moment it has staggered you. But when I had seen the poor fellow +face to face, heard him talk, and watched him there upstairs in +the silence stir and awake and come up again to his trouble out +of his sleep. I had no more doubt in my own mind and heart that +he was he than I have in my mind that I--am I. We do in some +mysterious way, you'll own at once, grow so accustomed, so +inured, if you like, to each other's faces (masks though they be) +that we hardly realise we see them when we are speaking together. +And yet the slightest, the most infinitesimal change is instantly +apparent.' + +'Oh yes, Vicar; but you see--' + +Mr Bethany raised a small lean hand: 'One moment, please. I have +heard Lawford's own account. Conscious or unconscious, he has +been through some terrific strain, some such awful conflict with +the unseen powers that we--thank God!--have only read about, and +never perhaps, until death is upon us, shall witness for +ourselves. What more likely, more inevitable than that such a +thing should leave its scar, its cloud, its masking shadow?--call +it what you will. A smile can turn a face we dread into a face +we'd die for. Some experience, which would be nothing but a +hideous cruelty and outrage to ask too closely about--one, +perhaps, which he could, even if he would, poor fellow, give no +account of--has put him temporarily at the world's mercy. They +made him a nine days' wonder, a byword. And that, my dear Danton, +is just where we come in. We know the man himself; and it is to +be our privilege to act as a buffer-state, to be intermediaries +between him and the rest of this deadly, craving, sheepish +world--for the time being; oh yes, just for the time being. Other +and keener and more knowledgeable minds than mine or yours will +some day bring him back to us again. We don't attempt to explain; +we can't. We simply believe.' + +But Danton merely continued to stare, as if into the quiet of an +aquarium. + +'My dear good Danton,' persisted Mr Bethany with cherubic +patience, 'how old are you?' + +'I don't see quite...' smiled Danton with recovered ease, and +rapidly mobilising forces. 'Excuse the confidence, Mrs +Lawford, I'm forty-three.' + +'Good,' said Mr Bethany; 'and I'm seventy-one, and this child +here'--he pointed an accusing finger at Sheila--is youth +perpetual. So,' he briskly brightened, 'say, between us we're six +score all told. Are we--can we, deliberately, with this mere +pinch of years at our command out of the wheeling millions that +have gone--can we say, "This is impossible," to any single +phenomenon? CAN we?' + +'No, we can't, of course,' said Danton formidably. 'Not finally. +That's all very well, but'--he paused, and nodded, nodding his +round head upward as if towards the inaudible overhead, 'I +suppose he can't HEAR?' + +Mr Bethany rose cheerfully. 'All right, Danton; I am afraid you +are exactly what the poor fellow in his delirium solemnly +asseverated. And, jesting apart, it is in delirium that we tell +our sheer, plain, unadulterated truth: you're a nicely covered +sceptic. Personally, I refuse to discuss the matter. Mere dull, +stubborn prejudice; bigotry, if you like. I will only remark just +this--that Mrs Lawford and I, in our inmost hearts, know. You, +my dear Danton, forgive the freedom, merely incredulously grope. +Faith versus Reason--that prehistoric Armageddon. Some day, and a +day not far distant either, Lawford will come back to us. This-- +this shutter will be taken down as abruptly as by some +inconceivably drowsy heedlessness of common Nature it has been +put up. He'll win through; and of his own sheer will and courage. +But now, because I ask it, and this poor child here entreats it, +you will say nothing to a living soul about the matter, say, till +Friday? What step-by-step creatures we are, to be sure! I say +Friday because it will be exactly a week then. And what's a +week?--to Nature scarcely the unfolding of a rose. But still, +Friday be it. Then, if nothing has occurred, we will, we shall +HAVE to call a friendly gathering, we shall be compelled to have +a friendly consultation.' + +'I'm not, I hope, a brute, Bethany,' said Danton apologetically; +'but, honestly, speaking for myself, simply as a man of the +world, it's a big risk to be taking on--what shall we call it?-- +on mere intuition. Personally, and even in a court of law-- +though Heaven forbid it ever reaches that stage--personally, I +could swear that the fellow that stood abusing me there, in that +revolting fashion, was not Lawford. It would be easier even to +believe in him, if there were not that--that glaze, that shocking +simulation of the man himself, the very man. But then, I am a +sceptic; I own it. And 'pon my word, Mrs Lawford, there's plenty +of room for sceptics in a world like this.' + +'Very well,' said Mr Bethany crisply, 'that's settled, then. With +your permission, my dear,' he added, turning untarnishably clear +childlike eyes on Sheila, 'I will take all risks--even to the +foot of the gibbet: accessory, Danton, AFTER the fact.' And so +direct and cloudless was his gaze that Sheila tried in vain to +evade it and to catch a glimpse of Danton's small agate-like +eyes, now completely under mastery, and awaiting confidently the +meeting with her own. + +'Of course,' she said, 'I am entirely in your hands, dear Mr +Bethany.' + + + +CHAPTER ELEVEN + +Lawford slept far into the cloudy Monday morning, to wake steeped +in sleep, lethargic, and fretfully haunted by inconclusive +remembrances of the night before. When Sheila, with obvious and +capacious composure, brought him his breakfast tray, he watched +her face for some time without speaking. + +'Sheila,' he began, as she was about to leave the room again. + +She paused, smiling. + +'Did anything happen last night? Would you mind telling me, +Sheila? Who was it was here?' + +Her lids the least bit narrowed. 'Certainly, Arthur; Mr Danton +was here.' + +'Then it was not a dream?' + +'Oh no,' said Sheila. + +'What did I say? What did HE say? It was hopeless, anyhow.' + +'I don't quite understand what you mean by "hopeless," Arthur. +And must I answer the other questions?' + +Lawford drew his hand over his face, like a tired child. 'He +didn't--believe?' + +'No, dear,' said Sheila softly. + +'And you, Sheila?' came the subdued voice. + +Sheila crossed slowly to the window. 'Well, quite honestly, +Arthur, I was not very much surprised. Whatever we are agreed +about on the whole, you were scarcely yourself last night.' + +Lawford shut his eyes, and re-opened them full on his wife's calm +scrutiny, who had in that moment turned in the light of the one +drawn blind to face him again. + +'Who is? Always?' + +'No,' said Sheila; 'but--it was at least unfortunate. We can't, I +suppose, rely on Dr Bethany alone.' + +Lawford crouched over his food. 'Will he blab?' + +'Blab! Mr Danton is a gentleman, Arthur.' + +Lawford rolled his eyes as if in temporary vertigo. 'Yes,' he +said. And Sheila once more prepared to make a reposefui +exit. + +'I don't think I can see Simon this morning.' + +'Oh. Who, then?' + +'I mean I would prefer to be left alone.' + +'Believe me, I had no intention to intrude.' And this time the +door really closed. + +'He is in a quiet, soothing sleep,' said Sheila a few minutes +later. + +'Nothing could be better,' said Dr Simon; and Lawford, to his +inexpressible relief, heard the fevered throbbing of the +doctor's car reverse, and turned over and shut his eyes, dulled +and exhausted in the still unfriendliness of the vacant room. His +spirits had sunk, he thought, to their lowest ebb. He scarcely +heeded the fragments of dreams--clear, green landscapes, amazing +gleams of peace, the sudden broken voices, the rustling and +calling shadowiness of subconsciousness--in this quiet sunlight +of reality. The clouds had broken, or had been withdrawn like a +veil from the October skies. One thought alone was his refuge; +one face alone haunted him with its peace; one remembrance +soothed him--Alice. Through all his scattered and purposeless +arguments he strove to remember her voice, the loving-kindness +of her eyes, her untroubled confidence. + +In the afternoon he got up and dressed himself. He could not +bring himself to stand before the glass and deliberately shave. +He even smiled at the thought of playing the barber to that lean +chin. He dressed by the fireplace. + +'I couldn't rest,' he told Sheila, when she presently came in on +one of her quiet, cautious, heedful visits; 'and one tires of +reading even Quain in bed.' + +'Have you found anything?' she inquired politely. + +'Oh yes,' said Lawford wearily; 'I have discovered that +infinitely worse things are infinitely commoner. But that there's +nothing quite so picturesque.' + +'Tell me,' said Sheila, with refreshing naivete. 'How does it +feel? does it even in the slightest degree affect your mind?' + +He turned his back and looked up at his broad gilt portrait for +inspiration. 'Practically, not at all,' he said hollowly. 'Of +course, one's nerves--that fellow Danton--when one's overtired. +You have'--his voice, in spite of every effort, faintly +quavered--'YOU haven't noticed anything? My mind?' + +'Me? Oh dear, no! I never was the least bit observant; you know +that, Arthur. But apart from that, and I hope you will not think +me unsympathetic--but don't you think we must sooner or later be +thinking of what's to be done? At present, though I fully agree +with Mr Bethany as to the wisdom of hushing this unhappy business +up as long as possible, at least from the gossiping outside +world, still we are only standing still. And your malady, dear, +I suppose, isn't. You WILL help me, Arthur? You will try and +think? Poor Alice!' + +'What about Alice?' + +'She mopes, dear, rather. She cannot, of course, quite understand +why she must not see her father, and yet his not being, or, for +the matter of that, even if he was, at death's door.' + +'At death's door,' murmured Lawford under his breath; 'who was it +was saying that? Have you ever, Sheila, in a dream, or just as +one's thoughts go sometimes, seen that door?...its ruinous stone +lintel carved into lichenous stone heads...stonily silent in the +last thin sunlight, hanging in peace unlatched. Heated, hunted, +in agony--in that cold, green-clad shadowed porch is haven and +sanctuary....But beyond--O God, beyond!' + +Sheila stood listening with startled eyes. 'And was all that in +Quain?' she inquired rather flutteringly. + +Lawford turned a sidelong head, and looked steadily at his wife. + +She shook herself, with a slight shiver. 'Very well, then,' she +said and paused in the silence. + +Her husband yawned, and smiled, and almost as if lit with that +thin last sunshine seemed the smile that passed for an instant +across the reverie of his shadowy face. He drew a hand wearily +over his eyes. 'What has he been saying now?' he inquired like a +fretful child. + +Sheila stood very quiet and still, as if in fear of scaring some +rare, wild, timid creature by the least stir. 'Who?' she +merely breathed. + +Lawford paused on the hearth-rug with his comb in his hand. 'It's +just the last rags of that beastly influenza,' he said, and began +vigorously combing his hair. And yet, simple and frank though the +action was, it moved Sheila, perhaps, more than any other of the +congested occurrences of the last few days. Her forehead grew +suddenly cold, the palms of her hands began to ache, she had to +hasten out of the room to avoid revealing the sheer physical +repulsion she had experienced. + +But Lawford, quite unmindful of the shock, continued in a kind of +heedless reverie to watch, as he combed, the still visionary +thoughts that passed in tranced stillness before his eyes. He +longed beyond measure for freedom that until yesterday he had not +even dreamed existed outside the covers of some old impossible +romance--the magic of the darkening sky, the invisible flocking +presences of the dead, the shock of imaginations that had no +words, of quixotic emotions which the stranger had stirred in +that low, mocking, furtive talk beside the broken stones of the +Huguenot. Was the 'change' quite so monstrous, so meaningless? +How often, indeed, he remembered curiously had he seemed to +be standing outside these fast-shut gates of thought, that now +had been freely opened to him. + +He drew ajar the door, and leant his ear to listen. From far away +came a rich, long-continued chuckle of laughter, followed by the +clatter of a falling plate, and then, still more uncontrollable +laughter. There was a faint smell of toast on the air. Lawford +ventured out on to the landing and into a little room that had +once, in years gone by, been Alice's nursery. He stood far back +from the strip of open window that showed beneath the green +blind, craning forward to see into the garden--the trees, their +knotted trunks, and then, as he stole nearer, a flower-bed, +late roses, geraniums, calceolarias, the lawn and--yes, three +wicker chairs, a footstool, a work-basket, a little table on the +smooth grass in the honey-coloured sunshine; and Sheila sitting +there in the autumnal sunlight, her hands resting on the arms of +her chair, her head bent, evidently deeply engrossed in her +thoughts. He crept an inch or two forward, and stooped. There was +a hat on the grass--Alice's big garden hat--and beside it lay +Flitters, nose on paws, long ears sagging. He had forgotten +Flitters. Had Flitters forgotten him? Would he bark at the +strange, distasteful scent of a--Dr Ferguson? The coast was +clear, then. He turned even softlier yet, to confront, rapt, +still, and hovering betwixt astonishment and dread, the blue calm +eyes of his daughter, looking in at the door. It seemed to +Lawford as if they had both been suddenly swept by some unseen +power into a still, unearthly silence. + +'We thought,' he began at last, 'we thought just to beckon Mrs +Lawford from the window. He--he is asleep.' + +Alice nodded. Her whole face was in a moment flooded with red. It +ebbed and left her pale. 'I will go down and tell mother you want +to see her. It was very silly of me. I did not quite recognise at +first...I suppose, thinking of my father--' The words faltered, +and the eyes were lifted to his face again with a desolate, +incredulous appeal. Lawford turned away heartsick and trembling. + +'Certainly, certainly, by no means,' he began, listening vaguely +to the glib patter that seemed to come from another mouth. 'Your +father, my dear young lady, I venture to think is now really on +the road to recovery. Dr Simon makes excellent progress. But, of +course--two heads, we know, are so much better than one when +there's the least--the least difficulty. The great thing is +quiet, rest, isolation, no possibility of a shock, else--' His +voice fell away, his eloquence failed. + +For Alice stood gazing stirlessly on and on into this infinitely +strange, infinitely familiar shadowy, phantasmal face. 'Oh yes,' +she replied, 'I quite understand, of course; but if I might just +peep even, it would--I should be so much, much happier. Do let me +just see him, Dr Ferguson, if only his head on the pillow! I +wouldn't even breathe. Couldn't it possibly help--even a +faith-cure?' She leant forward impulsively, her voice trembling, +anal her eyes still shining beneath their faint, melancholy +smile. + +'I fear, my dear...it cannot be. He longs to see you. But with +his mind, you know, in this state, it might--?' + +'But mother never told me,' broke in the girl desperately, 'there +was anything wrong with his MIND. Oh, but that was quite unfair. +You don't mean, you don't mean--that--?' + +Lawford scanned swiftly the little square beloved and memoried +room that fate had suddenly converted for him into a cage of +unspeakable pain and longing. 'Oh no; believe me, no! Not his +brain, not that, not even wandering; really: but always thinking, +always longing on and on for you, dear, only. Quite, quite master +of himself, but--' + +'You talk,' she broke in again angrily, 'only in pretence! You +are treating me like a child; and so does mother, and so it +has been ever since I came home. Why, if mother can, and you can, +why may not I? Why, if he can walk and talk in the night....' + +'But who--who "can walk and talk in the night?"' inquired a low +stealthy voice out of the quietness behind her. + +Alice turned swiftly. Her mother was standing at a little +distance, with all the calm and moveless concentration of a +waxwork figure, looking up at her from the staircase. + +'I was--I was talking to Dr Ferguson, mother.' + +'But as I came up the stairs I understood you to be inquiring +something of Dr Ferguson, "if," you were saying, "he can +walk and talk in the night": you surely were not referring to +your father, child? That could not possibly be, in his state. +Dr Ferguson, I know, will bear me out in that at least. And +besides, I really must insist on following out medical +directions to the letter. Dr Ferguson I know, will fully concur. +Do, pray, Dr Ferguson,' continued Sheila, raising her voice even +now scarcely above a rapid murmur--'do pray assure my daughter +that she must have patience; that however much even he himself +may desire it, it is impossible that she should see her father +yet. And now, my dear child, come down, I want to have a moment's +talk with Dr Ferguson. I feared from his beckoning at the window +that something was amiss.' + +Alice turned, dismayed, and looked steadily, almost with +hostility, at the stranger, so curiously transfixed and isolated +in her small old play-room. And in this scornful yet pleading +confrontation her eye fell suddenly on the pin in his scarf--the +claw and the pearl she had known all her life. From that her gaze +flitted, like some wild demented thing's, over face, hair, hands, +clothes, attitude, expression, and her heart stood still in +an awful, inarticulate dread of the unknown. She turned slowly +towards her mother, groped forward a few steps, turned once more, +stretching out her hands towards the vague still figure whose +eyes had called so piteously to her out of their depths, and fell +fainting in the doorway. Lawford stood motionless, vacantly +watching Sheila, who knelt, chafing the cold hands. 'She has +fainted?' he said; 'oh, Sheila, tell me--only fainted?' + +Sheila made no answer; did not even raise her eyes. + +'Some day, Sheila' he began in a dull voice, and broke off, and +without another word, without even another glance at the still +face and blue, twitching lids, he passed her rapidly by, and in +another instant Sheila heard the house-door shut. She got up +quickly, and after a glance into the vacant bedroom turned the +key; then she hastened upstairs for sal volatile and eau de +cologne.... + +It was yet clear daylight when Lawford appeared beneath the +portico of his house. With a glance of circumspection that +almost seemed to suggest a fear of pursuit, he descended the +steps, only to be made aware in so doing that Ada was with a kind +of furtive eagerness pointing out the mysterious Dr Ferguson to a +steadily gazing cook. One or two well-known and many a +well-remembered face he encountered in the thin stream of City men +treading blackly along the pavement. It was a still, high evening, +and something very like a forlorn compassion rose in his mind at +sight of their grave, rather pretentious, rather dull, respectable +faces. + +He found himself walking with an affectation of effrontery, and +smiling with a faint contempt on all alike, as if to keep himself +from slinking, and the wolf out of his eyes. He felt restless, +and watchful, and suspicious, as if he had suddenly come down in +the world. His, then, was a disguise as effectual as a shabby +coat and a glazing eye. His heart sickened. Was it even worth +while living on a crust of social respectability so thin and so +exquisitely treacherous? He challenged no one. One or two actual +acquaintances raised and lowered a faintly inquiring eyebrow in +his direction. One even recalled in his confusion a smile of +recognition just a moment too late. There was, it seemed, a +peculiar aura in Lawford's presence, a shadow of a something in +his demeanour that proved him alien. + +None the less green Widderstone kept calling him, much as a bell +in the imagination tolls on and on, the echo of reality. If the +worst should come to the worst, why--there is pasture in the +solitary by-ways for the beast that strays. He quickened his pace +along lonelier streets, and soon strode freely through the little +flagged and cobbled village of shops, past the same small jutting +window whose clock had told him the hour on that first dark +hurried night. All was pale and faint with dying colours now; and +decay was in the leaf, and the last swallows filled the gold air +with their clashing stillness. No one heeded him here. He looked +from side to side, exulting in the strangeness. Shops were left +behind, the last milestone passed, and in a little while he was +descending the hill beneath the elm boughs, which he remembered +had stood like a turreted wall against the sunset when first he +had wandered down into the churchyard. + +At the foot of the hill he passed by the green and white Rectory, +and there was the parson, a short fat, pursy man with wrists +protruding from his jacket sleeves as he stood on tip-toe tying +up a rambling rose-shoot on his trim cedared lawn. The next house +barely showed its old red chimney-tops, above its bowers; the +next was empty, with windows vacantly gazing, its paths peopled +with great bearded weeds that stood mutely watching and guarding +the seldom-opened gate. Then came more lofty grandmotherly elms, +a dense hedge of every leaf that pricks, and then Lawford found +himself standing at the small canopied gate of the queer old +wooden house that the stranger of his talk had in part described. + +It stood square and high and dark in a small amphitheatre of +verdure. Roses here and there sprang from the grass, and a +narrow box-edged path led to a small door in a low green-mantled +wing, with its one square window above the porch. And while, with +vacant mind, Lawford stood waiting, as one stands forebodingly +upon the eve of a new experience he heard as if at a distance the +sound of falling water. He still paused on the country roadside, +scrutinising this strange, still, wooden presence; but at last +with an effort he pushed open the gate, followed the winding +path, and pulled the old iron hanging bell. There came presently +a quiet tread, and Herbert himself opened the door which led into +a little square wood-panelled hall, hung with queer old prints +and obscure portraits in dark frames. + +'Ah, yes, come in, Mr Lawford,' he drawled; 'I was beginning to +be afraid you were not coming.' + +Lawford laid hat and walking-stick on an oak bench, and followed +his churchyard companion up a slightly inclined corridor and a +staircase into a high room, covered far up the yellowish walls +with old books on shelves and in cases, between which hung in +little black frames, mezzo tints, etchings, and antiquated maps. +A large table stood a few paces from the deep alcove of the +window, which was surrounded by a low, faded, green seat, and was +screened from the sunshine by wooden shutters. And here the +tranquil surge of falling water shook incessantly on the air, for +the three lower casements stood open to the fading sunset. On a +smaller table were spread cups, old earthenware dishes of +fruit, and a big bowl of damask roses. + +'Please sit down; I shan't be a moment; I am not sure that my +sister is in; but if so, I will tell her we are ready for tea.' +Left to himself in this quiet, strange old room, Lawford forgot +for a while everything else, he was for the moment so +taken up with his surroundings. + +What seized on his fancy and strangely affected his mind was this +incessant changing roar of falling water. It must be the Widder, +he said to himself, flowing close to the walls. But not until he +had had the boldness to lean head and shoulders out of the +nearest window did he fully realize how close indeed the Widder +was. It came sweeping dark and deep and begreened and full with +the early autumnal rains, actually against the lower walls of the +house itself, and in the middle suddenly swerved in a black, +smooth arch, and tumbled headlong into a great pool, nodding with +tall slender water-weeds, and charged in its bubbled blackness +here and there with the last crimson of the setting sun. To the +left of the house, where the waters floated free again, stood +vast, still trees above the clustering rushes; and in glimpses +between their spreading boughs lay the far-stretching +countryside, now dimmed with the first mists of approaching +evening. So absorbed he became as he stood leaning over the +wooden sill above the falling water, that eye and ear became +enslaved by the roar and stillness. And in the faint atmosphere +of age that seemed like a veil to hang about the odd old house +and these prodigious branches, he fell into a kind of waking +dream. + +When at last he did draw back into the room it was perceptibly +darker, and a thin keen shaft of recollection struck across his +mind--the recollection of what he was, and of how he came to be +there, his reasons for coming and of that dark indefinable +presence which like a raven had begun to build its dwelling in +his mind. He sat on, his eyes restlessly wandering, his face +leaning on his hands; and in a while the door opened and Herbert +returned, carrying an old crimson and green teapot and a dish of +hot cakes. + +'They're all out,' he said; 'sister, Sallie, and boy; but these +were in the oven, so we won't wait. I hope you haven't been +very much bored.' + +Lawford dropped his hands from his face and smiled. 'I have been +looking at the water,' he said. + +'My sister's favorite occupation; she sits for hours and hours, +with not even a book for an apology, staring down into the black +old roaring pot. It has a sort of hypnotic effect after a time. +And you'd be surprised how quickly one gets used to the noise. To +me it's even less distracting than sheer silence. You don't know, +after all, what on earth sheer silence means--even at +Widderstone. But one can just realize a water-nymph. They chatter; +but, thank Heaven, it's not articulate.' He handed Lawford a cup +with a certain niceness and self-consciousness, lifting his +eyebrows slightly as he turned. + +Lawford found himself listening out of a peculiar stillness of +mind to the voice of this suave and rather inscrutable +acquaintance. 'The curious thing is, do you know,' he began +rather nervously, 'that though I must have passed your gate at +least twice in the last few months, I have never noticed it +before, never even caught the sound of the water.' + +'No, that's the best of it; nobody ever does. We are just buried +alive. We have lived here for years, and scarcely know a soul-- +not even our own, perhaps. Why on earth should one? Acquaintances, +after all, are little else than a bad habit.' + +'But then, what about me?' said Lawford. + +'But that's just it,' said Herbert. 'I said ACQUAINTANCES; that's +just exactly what I'm going to prove--what very old friends +we are. You've no idea! It really is rather queer.' He took up +his cup and sauntered over to the window. + +Lawford eyed him vacantly for a moment, and, following rather his +own curious thoughts than seeking any light on this somewhat +vague explanation, again broke the silence. 'It's odd, I suppose, +but this house affects me much in the same way as Widderstone +does. I'm not particularly fanciful--at least, I used not to be. +But sitting here I seem, I hope it isn't a very frantic remark, +it seems as though, if only my ears would let me, I should hear-- +well, voices. It's just what you said about the silence. I +suppose it's the age of the place; it IS very old?' + +'Pretty old, I suppose; it's worm-eaten and rat-eaten and tindery +enough in all conscience; and the damp doesn't exactly +foster it. It's a queer old shanty. There are two or three +accounts of it in some old local stuff I have. And of course +there's a ghost.' + +'A ghost?' echoed Lawford, looking up. + + + +CHAPTER TWELVE + +What's in a name?' laughed Herbert. 'But it really is a queer +show-up of human oddity. A fellow comes in here, searching; +that's all.' His back was turned, as he stood staring absently +out, sipping his tea between his sentences. 'He comes in--oh, +it's a positive fact, for I've seen him myself, just sitting back +in my chair here, you know, watching him as one would a tramp in +one's orchard.' He cast a candid glance over his shoulder. 'First +he looks round, like a prying servant. Then he comes cautiously +on--a kind of grizzled, fawn-coloured face, middle-size, with big +hands; and then just like some quiet, groping, nocturnal +creature, he begins his precious search--shelves, drawers that +are not here, cupboards gone years ago, questing and nosing no +end, and quite methodically too, until he reaches the window. +Then he stops, looks back, narrows his foxy lids, listens--quite +perceptibly, you know, a kind of gingerish blur; then he seems to +open this corner bookcase here, as if it were a door and goes out +along what I suppose might at some time have been an outside +gallery or balcony, unless, as I rather fancy, the house extended +once beyond these windows. Anyhow, out he goes quite deliberately, +treading the air as lightly as Botticelli's angels, until, however +far you lean out of the window, you can't follow him any further. +And then--and this is the bit that takes one's fancy--when you +have contentedly noddled down again to whatever you may have been +doing when the wretch appeared, or are sitting in a cold sweat, +with bolting eyes awaiting developments, just according to your +school of thought, or of nerves, the creature comes back--comes +back; and with what looks uncommonly like a lighted candle in his +hand. That really is a thrill, I assure you.' + +'But you've seen this--you've really seen this yourself?' + +'Oh yes, twice,' replied Herbert cheerfully. 'And my sister, +quite by haphazard, once saw him from the garden. She was +shelling peas one evening for Sallie, and she distinctly saw him +shamble out of the window here, and go shuffling along, mid-air, +across the roaring washpot down below, turn sharp round the high +corner of the house, sheer against the stars, in a kind of +frightened hurry. And then, after five minutes' concentrated +watching over the shucks, she saw him come shuffling back again-- +the same distraction, the same nebulous snuff colour, and a +candle trailing its smoke behind him as he whisked in home.' + +'And then?' + +'Ah, then,' said Herbert, lagging along the bookshelves, and +scanning the book-backs with eyes partially closed: he turned +with lifted teapot, and refilled his visitor's cup; 'then, +wherever you are--I mean,' he added, cutting up a little cake +into six neat slices, 'wherever the chance inmate of the room +happens to be, he comes straight for you, at a quite alarming +velocity, and fades, vanishes, melts, or, as it were, silts +inside.' + +Lawford listened in a curious hush that had suddenly fallen over +his mind. '"Fades inside? silts?"--I'm awfully stupid, but what on +earth do you mean?' The room had slowly emptied itself of daylight; +its own darkness, it seemed, had met that of the narrowing night, +and Herbert deliberately lit a cigarette before replying. His clear +pale face, with its smooth outline and thin mouth and rather long +dark eyes, turned with a kind of serene good-humour towards his +questioner. + +'Why,' he said, 'I mean frankly just that. Besides, it's Grisel's +own phrase; and an old nurse we used to have said much the same. +He comes, or IT comes towards you, first just walking, then with +a kind of gradually accelerated slide or glide, and sweeps +straight into you,' he tapped his chest, 'me, whoever it may be +is here. In a kind of panic, I suppose, to hide, or perhaps +simply to get back again.' + +'Get back where?' + +'Be resumed, as it were, via you. You see, I suppose he is +compelled to regain his circle, or Purgatory, or Styx, whatever +you like to call it, via consciousness. No one present, then no +revenant or spook, or astral body, or hallucination: what's in a +name? And of course even an hallucination is mind-stuff, and on +its own, as it were. What I mean is that the poor devil must have +some kind of human personality to get back through in order to +make his exit from our sphere of consciousness into his. And +naturally, of course to make his entrance too. If like a tenuous +smoke he can get in, the probability is that he gets out in +precisely the same fashion. For really, if you weren't +consciously expecting the customary impact (you actually jerk +forward in the act of resistance unresisted), you would not +notice his going. I am afraid I must be horribly boring you with +all these tangled theories. All I mean is, that if you were +really absorbed in what you happened to be doing at the time, the +thing might come and go, with your mind for entrance and exit, as +it were, without your being conscious of it at all.' There was a +longish pause, in which Herbert slowly inhaled and softly breathed +out his smoke. + +'And what--what is the poor wretch searching FOR? And what--why, +what becomes of him when he does go?' + +'Ah, there you have me! One merely surmises just as one's +temperament or convictions lean. Grisel says it's some poor +derelict soul in search of peace--that the poor beggar wants +finally to die, in fact, and can't. Sallie smells crime. After +all, what is every man?' he talked on; 'a horde of ghosts--like a +Chinese nest of boxes--oaks that were acorns that were oaks. +Death lies behind us, not in front--in our ancestors, back and +back, until--' + +'"Until?"' Lawford managed to remark. + +'Ah, that settles me again. Don't they call it an amoeba? But +really I am abjectly ignorant of all that kind of stuff. We +are ALL we are, and all in a sense we care to dream we are. And +for that matter, anything outlandish, bizarre, is a godsend +in this rather stodgy life. It is after all just what the old boy +said--it's only the impossible that's credible; whatever +credible may mean....' + +It seemed to Lawford as if the last remark had wafted him bodily +into the presence of his kind, blinking, intensely anxious old +friend, Mr Bethany. And what leagues asunder the two men were who +had happened on much the same words to express their convictions. + +He drew his hand gropingly over his face, half rose, and again +seated himself. 'Whatever it may be,' he said, 'the whole thing +reminds me, you know--it is in a way so curiously like my own--my +own case.' + +Herbert sat on, a little drawn up in his chair, quietly smoking. +The crash of the falling water, after seeming to increase in +volume with the fading of evening, had again died down in the +darkness to a low multitudinous tumult as of countless +inarticulate, echoing voices. + +'"Bizarre," you said; God knows I am.' But Herbert still remained +obdurately silent. 'You remember, perhaps,' Lawford faintly began +again, 'our talk the other night?' + +'Oh, rather,' replied the cordial voice out of the dusk. + +'I suppose you thought I was insane?' + +'Insane!' There was a genuinely amused astonishment in the echo. +'You were lucidity itself. Besides--well, honestly, if I may +venture, I don't put very much truck in what one calls one's +sanity: except, of course, as a bond of respectability and a +means of livelihood.' + +'But did you realise in the least from what I said how I really +stand? That I went down into that old shadowy hollow one man, and +came back--well--this?' + +'I gathered vaguely something like that. I thought at first it +was merely an affectation--that what you said was an +affectation, I mean--until--well, to be frank, it was the "this" +that so immensely interested me. Especially,' he added almost +with a touch of gaiety, 'especially the last glimpse. But if it's +really not a forbidden question, what precisely was the other? +What precise manner of man, I mean, came down into Widderstone?' + +'It is my face that is changed, Mr Herbert. If you'll try to +understand me--my FACE. What you see now is not what I really +am, not what I was. Oh, it is all quite different. I know +perfectly well how absurd it must sound. And you won't press me +further. But that's the truth: that's what they have done for +me.' + +It seemed to Lawford as if a remote tiny shout of laughter had +been suddenly caught back in the silence that had followed this +confession. He peered in vain in the direction of his companion. +Even his cigarette revealed no sign of him. 'I know, I know,' he +went gropingly on; 'I felt it would sound to you like nothing but +frantic incredible nonsense. YOU can't see it. YOU can't feel it. +YOU can't hear these hooting voices. It's no use at all blinking +the fact; I am simply on the verge, if not over it, of insanity.' + +'As to that, Mr Lawford,' came the still voice out of the +darkness; 'the very fact of your being able to say so seems to +me all but proof positive that you're not. Insanity is on another +plane, isn't it? in which one can't compare one's states. +As for what you say being credible, take our precious noodle of a +spook here! Ninety-nine hundredths of this amiable world of ours +would have guffawed the poor creature into imperceptibility ages +ago. To such poor credulous creatures as my sister and I he is no +more and no less a fact, a personality, an amusing reality than-- +well, this teacup. Here we are, amazing mysteries both of us in +any case; and all round us are scores of books, dealing just with +life, pure, candid, and unexpurgated; and there's not a single +one among them but reads like a taradiddle. Yet grope between the +lines of any autobiography, it's pretty clear what one has got--a +feeble, timid, creeping attempt to describe the indescribable. As +for what you say your case is, the bizarre--that kind very seldom +gets into print at all. In all our make-believe, all our pretence, +how, honestly, could it? But there, this is immaterial. The real +question is, may I, can I help? What I gather is this: You just +trundled down into Widderstone all among the dead men, and--but one +moment, I'll light up.' + +A light flickered up in the dark. Shading it in his hand from the +night air straying through the open window, Herbert lit the two candles that +stood upon the little chimneypiece behind Lawford's +head. Then sauntering over to the window again, almost as if with +an affectation of nonchalance, he drew one of the shutters, and +sat down. 'Nothing much struck me,' he went on, leaning back on +his hands, 'I mean on Sunday evening, until you said good-bye. It +was then that I caught in the moon a distinct glimpse of your +face.' + +'This,' said Lawford, with a sudden horrible sinking of the +heart. + +Herbert nodded. 'The fact is, I have a print of it,' he said. + +'A print of it?' + +'A miserable little dingy engraving.' + +'Of this?' Herbert nodded, with eyes fixed. 'Where?' + +'That's the nuisance. I searched high and low for it the instant +I got home. For the moment it has been mislaid; but it must be +somewhere in the house and it will turn up all in good time. It's +the frontispiece of one of a queer old hotchpotch of pamphlets, +sewn up together by some amateur enthusiast in a marbled paper +cover--confessions, travels, trials and so on. All eighteenth +century, and all in French.' + +'And mine?' said Lawford, gazing stonily across the candlelight. + +Herbert, from a head slightly stooping, gazed back in an almost +birdlike fashion across the room at his visitor. + +'Sabathier's,' he said. + +'Sabathier's!' + +'A really curious resemblance. Of course, I am speaking only from +memory; and perhaps it's not quite so vivid in this light; but +still astonishingly clear.' + +Lawford sat drawn up, staring at his companion's face in an +intense and helpless silence. His mouth opened but no words came. + +'Of course,' began Herbert again, 'I don't say there's anything +in it--except the--the mere coincidence,' he paused and +glanced out of the open casement beside him. 'But there's just +one obvious question. Do you happen to know of any strain of +French blood in your family?' + +Lawford shut his eyes, even memory seemed to be forsaking him at +last. 'No,' he said, after a long pause, 'there's a little +Dutch, I think, on my mother's side, but no French.' + +'No Sabathier, then?' said Herbert, smiling. 'And then there's +another question--this change; is it really as complete as +you suppose? Has it--please just warn me off if I am in the least +intruding--has it been noticed?' + +Lawford hesitated. 'Oh, yes,' he said slowly, 'it has been +noticed--my wife, a few friends.' + +'Do you mind this infernal clatter?' said Herbert, laying his +fingers on the open casement. + +'No, no. And you think?' + +'My dear fellow, I don't think anything. It's all the craziest +conjecture. Stranger things even than this have happened. There +are dozens here--in print. What are we human beings after all? +Clay in the hands of the potter. Our bodies are merely an +inheritance, packed tight and corded up. We have practically no +control over their main functions. We can't even replace a little +finger-nail. And look at the faces of us--what atrocious +mockeries most of them are of any kind of image! But we know our +bodies change--age, sickness, thought, passion, fatality. It +proves they are amazingly plastic. And merely even as a theory it +is not in the least untenable that by force of some violent +convulsive effort from outside one's body might change. It +answers with odd voluntariness to friend or foe, smile or snarl. +As for what we call the laws of Nature, they are pure assumptions +to-day, and may be nothing better than scrap-iron tomorrow. Good +Heavens, Lawford, consider man's abysmal impudence.' He smoked on +in silence for a moment. 'You say you fell asleep down there?' + +Lawford nodded. Herbert tapped his cigarette on the sill. 'Just +following up our ludicrous conjecture, you know,' he remarked +musingly, 'it wasn't such a bad opportunity for the poor chap.' + +'But surely,' said Lawford, speaking as it were out of a dream of +candle-light and reverberating sound and clearest darkness, +towards this strange deliberate phantom with the unruffled +clear-cut features--'surely then, in that case, he is here now? +And yet, on my word of honour, though every friend I ever had in +the world should deny it, I am the same. Memory stretches back +clear and sound to my childhood. I can see myself with +extraordinary lucidity, how I think, my motives and all that; and +in spite of these voices that I seem to hear, and this peculiar +kind of longing to break away, as it were, just to press on--it +is I,--I myself, that am speaking to you now out of this--this +mask.' + +Herbert glanced reflectively at his companion. 'You mustn't let +me tire you,' he said; 'but even on our theory it would not +necessarily follow that you yourself would be much affected. It's +true this fellow Sabathier really was something of a personality. +He had a rather unusual itch for life, for trying on and on to +squeeze something out of experience that isn't there; and he +seemed never to weary of a magnificent attempt to find in his +fellow-creatures, especially in the women he met, what even--if +they have it--they cannot give. The little book I wanted to show +you is partly autobiographical and really does manage to set the +fellow on his feet. Even there he does absolutely take one's +imagination. I shall never forget the thrill of picking him up in +the Charing Cross Road. You see, I had known the queer old +tombstone for years. He's enormously vivid--quite beyond my +feebleness to describe, with a kind of French verve and rapture. +Unluckily we can't get nearer than two years to his death. I +shouldn't mind guessing some last devastating dream swept over +him, held him the breath of an instant too long beneath the wave, +and he caved in. We know he killed himself; and perhaps lived to +regret it ever after. + +'After all, what is this precious dying we talk so much about?' +Herbert continued after a while, his eyes restlessly wandering +from shelf to shelf. 'You remember our talk in the churchyard? We +all know that the body fades quick enough when its occupant is +gone. Supposing even in the sleep of the living it lies very +feebly guarded. And supposing in that state some infernally +potent thing outside it, wandering disembodied, just happens on +it--like some hungry sexton beetle on the carcase of a mouse. +Supposing--I know it's the most outrageous theorising--but +supposing all these years of sun and dark, Sabathier's emanation, +or whatever you like to call it, horribly restless, by some +fatality longing on and on just for life, or even for the face, +the voice, of some "impossible she" whom he couldn't get in this +muddled world, simply loathing all else; supposing he has been +lingering in ambush down beside those poor old dusty bones that +had poured out for him such marrowy hospitality--oh, I know it; +the dead do. And then, by a chance, one quiet autumn evening, a +veritable godsend of a little Miss Muffet comes wandering down +under the shade of his immortal cypresses, half asleep, fagged +out, depressed in mind and body, perhaps: imagine yourself in his +place, and he in yours!' Herbert stood up in his eagerness, his +sleek hair shining. 'The one clinching chance of a century! +Wouldn't you have made a fight for it? Wouldn't you have risked +the raid? I can just conceive it--the amazing struggle in that +darkness within a darkness; like some dazed alien bee bursting +through the sentinels of a hive; one mad impetuous clutch at +victory; then the appalling stirring on the other side; the +groping back to a house dismantled, rearranged, not, mind you, +disorganised or disintegrated....' He broke off with a smile, +as if of apology for his long, fantastic harangue. + +Lawford sat listening, his eyes fixed on Herbert's colourless +face. There was not a sound else, it seemed, than that slightly +drawling scrupulous voice poking its way amid a maze of enticing, +baffling thoughts. Herbert turned away with a shrug. 'It's +tempting stuff,' he said, choosing another cigarette. 'But +anyhow, the poor beggar failed.' + +'Failed?' + +'Why, surely; if he had succeeded I should not now be talking to +a mere imperfect simulacrum, to the outward illusion of a passing +likeness to the man, but to Sabathier himself!' His eyes moved +slowly round and dwelt for a moment with a dark, quiet scrutiny +on his visitor. + +'You say a passing likeness; do you MEAN that?' + +Herbert smiled indulgently. 'If one CAN mean what is purely a +speculation. I am only trying to look at the thing +dispassionately, you see. We are so much the slaves of mere +repetition. Here is life--yours and mine--a kind of plenum in +vacuo. It is only when we begin to play the eavesdropper; when +something goes askew; when one of the sentries on the frontier of +the unexpected shouts a hoarse "Qui vive?"--it is only then we +begin to question; to prick our aldermen and pinch the calves of +our kings. Why, who is there can answer to anybody's but his own +satisfaction just that one fundamental question--Are we the +prisoners, the slaves, the inheritors, the creatures, or the +creators of our bodies? Fallen angels or horrific dust? As for +identity or likeness or personality, we have only our neighbours' +nod for them, and just a fading memory. No, the old fairy tales +knew better; and witchcraft's witchcraft to the end of the +chapter. Honestly, and just of course on that one theory, +Lawford, I can't help thinking that Sabathier's raid only just so +far succeeded as to leave his impression in the wax. It doesn't, +of course, follow that it will necessarily end there. It might-- +it may be even now just gradually fading away. It may, you know, +need driving out--with whips and scorpions. It might, perhaps, +work in.' + +Lawford sat cold and still. 'It's no good, no good,' he said, 'I +don't understand; I can't follow you. I was always stupid, always +bigoted and cocksure. These things have never seemed anything but +old women's tales to me. And now I must pay for it. And this +Nicholas Sabathier; you say he was a blackguard?' + +'Well,' said Herbert with a faint smile, 'that depends on your +definition of the word. He wasn't a flunkey, a fool, or a prig, +if that's what you mean. He wasn't perhaps on Mrs Grundy's +visiting list. He wasn't exactly gregarious. And yet in a sense +that kind of temperament is so rare that Sappho, Nelson, and +Shelley shared it. To the stodgy, suety world of course it's +little else than sheer moonshine, midsummer madness. Naturally, +in its own charming and stodgy way the world kept flickering cold +water in his direction. Naturally it hissed.... I shall find the +book. You shall have the book; oh yes.' + +'There's only one more question,' said Lawford in a dull, slow +voice, stooping and covering his face with his hands. 'I know +it's impossible for you to realise--but to me time seems like +that water there, to be heaping up about me. I wait, just as one +waits when the conductor of an orchestra lifts his hand and in a +moment the whole surge of brass and wood, cymbal and drum will +crash out--and sweep me under. I can't tell you Herbert, how it +all is, with just these groping stirrings of that mole in my +mind's dark. You say it may be this face, working in! God knows. +I find it easy to speak to you--this cold, clear sense, you know. +The others feel too much, or are afraid, or-- Let me think--yes, +I was going to ask you a question. But no one can answer it.' He +peered darkly, with white face suddenly revealed between his +hands. 'What remains now? Where do I come in? What is there left +for ME to do?' + +And at that moment there sounded, even above the monotonous roar +of the water beyond the window--there fell the sound of a light +footfall approaching along the corridor. + +'Listen,' said Herbert; 'here's my sister coming; we'll ask her.' + + + + +CHAPTER THIRTEEN + +The door opened. Lawford rose, and into the further rays of the +candlelight entered a rather slim figure in a light summer gown. + +'Just home?' said Herbert. + +'We've been for a walk--' + +'My sister always forgets everything,' said Herbert, turning to +Lawford; 'even tea-time. This is Mr Lawford, Grisel. We've been +arguing no end. And we want you to give a decision. It's just +this: Supposing if by some impossible trick you had come in now, +not the charming familiar sister you are, but shorter, fatter, +fair and round-faced, quite different, physically, you know--what +would you do?' + +'What nonsense you talk, Herbert!' + +'Yes, but supposing: a complete transmogrification--by some +unimaginable ingression or enchantment, by nibbling a bunch of +roses, or whatever you like to call it?' + +'Only physically?' + +'Well, yes, actually; but potentially, why--that's another +matter.' + +The dark eyes passed slowly from her brother's face and rested +gravely on their visitor's. + +'Is he making fun of me?' + +Lawford almost imperceptibly shook his head. + +'But what a question! And I've had no tea.' She drew her gloves +slowly through her hand. 'The thing, of course, isn't possible, I +know. But shouldn't I go mad, don't you think?' + +Lawford gazed quietly back into the clear, grave, deliberate +eyes. 'Suppose, suppose, just for the sake of argument--NOT,' he +suggested. + +She turned her head and reflected, glancing from one to the other +of the pure, steady candle-flames. + +'And what was your answer?' she said, looking over her shoulder +at her brother. + +'My dear child, you know what my answers are like!' + +'And yours?' + +Lawford took a deep breath, gazing mutely, forlornly, into the +lovely untroubled peace of her eyes, and without the least +warning tears swept up into his own. With an immense effort he +turned, and choking back every sound, beating hack every thought, +groped his way towards the square black darkness of the open +door. + +'I must think, I must think,' he managed to whisper, lifting his +hand and steadying himself. He caught over his shoulder the +glimpse of a curiously distorted vision, a lifted candle, and a +still face gazing after him with infinitely grieved eyes, then +found himself groping and stumbling down the steep, uneven +staircase into the darkness of the queer old wooden and hushed +and lonely house. The night air cold on his face calmed his mind. +He turned and held out his hand. + +'You'll come again?' Herbert was saying, with a hint of anxiety, +even of apology in his voice. + +Lawford nodded, with eyes fixed blankly on the candle, and +turning once more, made his way slowly down the narrow +green-bordered path upon which the stars rained a scattered light +so feeble it seemed but as a haze that blurred the darkness. He +pushed open the little white wicket and turned his face towards +the soundless, leaf-crowned hill. He had advanced hardly a score +of steps in the thick dust when almost as if its very silence had +struck upon his ear he remembered the black broken grave with its +sightless heads that lay beyond the leaves. And fear, vast and +menacing, fear such as only children know, broke like a sea of +darkness on his heart. He stopped dead--cold, helpless, trembling. +And, in the silence he heard a faint cry behind him and light +footsteps pursuing him. He turned again. In the thick close gloom +beneath the enormous elm-boughs the grey eyes shone clearly +visible in the face upturned to him. 'My brother,' she began +breathlessly--'the little French book. It was I who--who mislaid +it.' + +The set, stricken face listened unmoved. + +'You are ill. Come back! I am afraid you are very ill.' + +'It's not that, not that,' Lawford muttered; 'don't leave me; I +am alone. Don't question me,' he said strangely, looking down +into her face, clutching her hand; 'only understand that I can't, +I can't go on.' He swept a lean arm towards the unseen +churchyard. 'I am afraid.' + +The cold hand clasped his closer. 'Hush, don't speak! Come back; +come back. I am with you, a friend, you see; come back.' + +Lawford clutched her hand as a blind man in sudden peril might +clutch the hand of a child. He saw nothing clearly; spoke almost +without understanding his words. + +'Oh, but it's MUST,' he said; 'I MUST go on. You see--why, +everything depends on struggling through: the future! But if you +only knew-- There!' Again his arm swept out, and the lean +terrified face turned shuddering from the dark. + +'I do know; believe me, believe me! I can guess. See, I am coming +with you; we will go together. As if, as if I did not know what +it is to be afraid. Oh, believe me; no one is near; we go on; and +see! it gradually, gradually lightens. How thankful I am I came.' + +She had turned and they were steadily ascending as if pushing +their way, battling on through some obstacle of the mind rather +than of the senses beneath the star-powdered callous vault of +night. And it seemed to Lawford as if, as they pressed on +together, some obscure detestable presence as slowly, as doggedly +had drawn worsted aside. He could see again the peaceful +outspread branches of the trees, the lych-gate standing in +clear-cut silhouette against the liquid dusk of the sky. A +strange calm stole over his mind. The very meaning and memory of +his fear faded out and vanished, as the passed-away clouds of a +storm that leave a purer, serener sky. + +They stopped and stood together on the brow of the little hill, +and Lawford, still trembling from head to foot, looked back +across the hushed and lightless countryside. 'It's all gone now,' +he said wearily, 'and now there's nothing left. You see, I cannot +even ask your forgiveness--and a stranger!' + +'Please don't say that--unless--unless--a "pilgrim" too. I think, +surely, you must own we did have the best of it that time. Yes-- +and I don't care WHO may be listening--but we DID win through.' + +'What can I say? How shall I explain? How shall I make you +understand?' + +The clear grey eyes showed not the faintest perturbation. 'But I +do; I do indeed, in part; I do understand, ever so faintly.' + +'And now I will come back with you.' + +They paused in the darkness face to face, the silence of the sky, +arched in its vastness above the little hill, the only witness of +their triumph. + +She turned unquestioningly. And laughing softly almost as children +do, the stalking shadows of a twilight wood behind them--they trod +in silence back to the house. They said good-bye at the gate, and +Lawford started once more for home. He walked slowly, conscious +of an almost intolerable weariness, as if his strength had +suddenly been wrested away from him. And at some distance beyond +the top of the hill he sat down on the bank beside a nettled +ditch, and with his book pressed down upon the wayside grass +struck a match, and holding it low in the scented, windless air +turned slowly the cockled leaf. + +Few of them were alike except for the dinginess of the print and +the sinister smudge of the portraits. All were sewn roughly +together into a mould-stained, marbled cover. He lit a second +match, and as he did so glanced as if inquiringly over his +shoulder. And a score or so of pages before the end he came at +last upon the name he was seeking, and turned the page. + +It was a likeness even more striking in its crudeness of ink and +line and paper than the most finished of portraits could have +been. It repelled, and yet it fascinated him. He had not for a +moment doubted Herbert's calm conviction. And yet as he stooped +in the grass, closely scrutinising the blurred obscure features, +he felt the faintest surprise not so much at the significant +resemblance but at his own composure, his own steady, unflinching +confrontation with this sinister and intangible adversary. The +match burned down to his fingers. It hissed faintly in the grass. + +He stuffed the book into his pocket, and stared into the pale +dial of his watch. It was a few minutes after eleven. Midnight, +then, would just see him in. He rose stiffly and yawned in sheer +exhaustion. Then, hesitating, he turned his head and looked back +towards the hollow. But a vague foreboding held him back. A sour +and vacuous incredulity swept over him. What was the use of all +this struggling and vexation. What gain in living on? Once dead +his sluggish spirit at least would find its rest. Dust to dust it +would indeed be for him. What else, in sober earnest, had he been +all his daily stolid life but half dead, scarce conscious, without +a living thought, or desire, in head or heart? + +And while he was still gloomily debating within himself he had +turned towards home, and soon was walking in a kind of reverie, +even his extreme tiredness in part forgotten, and only a far-away +dogged recollection in his mind that in spite of shame, in spite of +all his miserable weakness, the words had been uttered once for all, +and in all sincerity, 'We DID win through.' + +Yet a desolate and odd air of strangeness seemed to drape his +unlighted house as he stood looking up in a kind of furtive +communion with its windows. It affected him with that +discomforting air of extreme and meaningless novelty that things +very familiar sometimes take upon themselves. In this leaden +tiredness no impression could be trustworthy. His lids shut of +themselves as he softly mounted the steps. It seemed a needlessly +wide door that soundlessly admitted him. But however hard he +pressed the key his bedroom door remained stubbornly shut until +he found that it was already unlocked and he had only to turn the +handle. A night-light burned in a little basin on the washstand. +The room was hung, as it were, with the stillness of night. And +half lying on the bed in her dressing-gown, her head leaning on +the rail at the foot, was Alice, just as sleep had overtaken her. + +Lawford returned to the door and listened. It seemed he heard a +voice talking downstairs, and yet not talking, for it ran on and +on in an incessant slightly argumentative monotony that had +neither break nor interruption. He closed the door, and stooping +laid his hand softly on Alice's narrow, still childish hand that +lay half-folded on her knee. Her eyes opened instantly and gazed +widely into his face. A slow vacant smile of sleep came and went +and her fingers tightened gently over his as again her lids +drooped down over the drowsy blue eyes. + +'At last, at last, dear,' she said; 'I have been waiting such a +time. But we mustn't talk much. Mother is waiting up, reading.' + +Faintly through the close-shut door came the sound of that +distant expressionless voice monotonously rising and falling. + +'Why didn't you tell me, dear?' Alice still sleepily whispered. +'Would I have asked a single question? How could I? Oh, if you +had only trusted me!' + +'But the change--the change, Alice! You must have seen that. You +spoke to me, you did think I was only a stranger; and even when +you knew, it was only fear on your face, dearest, and aversion; +and you turned to your mother first. Don't think, Alice, that I +am...God only knows--I'm not complaining. But truth is best +whatever it is. I do feel that. You mustn't be afraid of hurting +me, my dear.' + +Her very hands seemed to quicken in his as now, with sleep quite +gone, the fret of memory returned, and she must reassure both +herself and him. 'But you see, dear, mother had told me that +you--besides, I did know you at once, really; quite inside, you +know, deep down. I know I was perplexed; I didn't understand; but +that was all. Why, even when you came up in the dark, and we +talked--if you only knew how miserable I had been--though I knew +even then there was something different, still I was not a bit +afraid. Was I? And shouldn't I have been afraid, horribly afraid, +if YOU had not been YOU?' She repressed a little shudder, and +clasped his hand more closely. 'Don't let us say anything more +about it, she implored him; 'we are just together again, you and +I; that is all that matters.' But her words were like brave +soldiers who have fought their way through an ambuscade but have +left all confidence behind them. + +Lawford listened; and that was enough just now--that she still, +in spite of doubt, believed in him, and thought and cared for +him. He was too tired to have refused the least kindness. He made +no answer, but leant his head on the cool, slender fingers in +gratitude and peace. And, just as he was, he almost instantly +fell asleep. He woke in the darkness to find himself alone. He +groped his way heavily to the door and turned the handle. But now +it was really locked. Energy failed him. 'I suppose--Sheila...' +he muttered. + + + +CHAPTER FOURTEEN + +Sheila, calm, alert, reserved, was sitting at the open window +when he awoke again. His breakfast tray stood on a little table +beside the bed. He raised himself on his elbow and looked at his +wife. The morning light shone full on her features as she turned +quickly at sound of his stirring. + +'You have slept late,' she said, in a low, mellow voice. + +'Have I, Sheila? I suppose I was tired out. It is very kind of +you to have got everything ready like this.' + +'I am afraid, Arthur, I was thinking rather of the maids. I like +to inconvenience them as little as possible; in their usual +routine, I mean. How are you feeling, do you think, this +morning?' + +'I--I haven't seen the glass, Sheila.' + +She paused to place a little pencil tick at the foot of the page +of her butcher's book. 'And did you--did you try?' + +'Did I try? Try what?' + +'I understood,' she said, turning slowly in her chair, 'you gave +me to understand that you went out with the specific intention of +trying to regain.... But there, forgive me, Arthur; I think I +must be getting a little bit hardened to the position, so far at +least as any hope is in my mind of rather amateurish experiments +being of much help. I may seem unsympathetic in saying frankly +what I feel. But amateurish or no, you are curiously erratic. +Why, if you really were the Dr Ferguson whose part you play so +admirably you could scarcely spend a more active life.' + +'All you mean, Sheila, I suppose, is that I have failed.' + +'"Failed" did not enter my mind. I thought, looking at you just +now in your clothes on the bed, one might for the moment be +deceived into thinking there was a slight--quite the slightest +improvement. There was not quite that'--she hovered for the right +word--'that tenseness. Whether or not, whether you desired any +such change or didn't, I should have supposed in any case it +would have been better to act as far as possible like any +ordinary person. You were certainly in an extraordinarily sound +sleep. I was almost alarmed; until I remembered that it was a +little after two when I looked up from reading aloud to keep +myself awake and discovered that you had only just come home. I +had no fire. You know how easily late hours bring on my +headaches; a little thought might possibly have suggested that I +should be anxious to hear. But no; it seems I cannot profit by +experience, Arthur. And even now you have not answered surely a +very natural question. You do not recollect, perhaps, exactly +what did happen last night? Did you go in the direction even of +Widderstone?' + +'Yes, Sheila, I went to Widderstone.' + +'It was of course absurd to suppose that sitting on a seat beside +the broken-down grave of a suicide would have the slightest +effect on one's--one's physical condition; though possibly it +might affect one's brain. It would mine; I am at least certain of +that. It was your own prescription, however; and it merely +occurred to me to inquire whether the actual experience has not +brought you round to my own opinion.' + +'Yes, I think it has,' Lawford answered calmly. 'But I don't +quite see what suicide has got to do with it; unless-- You know +Widderstone, then, Sheila?' + +'I drove there last Saturday afternoon.' + +'For prayer or praise?' Although Lawford had not actually raised +his head, he became conscious rather of the wonderfully adjusted +mass of hair than of the pained dignity in the face that was now +closely regarding him. + +'I went,' came the rigidly controlled retort, 'simply to test an +inconceivable story.' + +'And returned?' + +'Convinced, Arthur, of its inconceivability. But if you would +kindly inform me what precise formula you followed at Widderstone +last night, I would tell you why I think the explanation, or +rather your first account of the matter, is not an explanation of +the facts.' + +Lawford shot a rather doglike glance over his toast. 'Danton?' he +said. + +'Candidly, Arthur, Mr Danton doubts the whole story. Your very +conduct--well, it would serve no useful purpose to go into that. +Candidly, on the other hand, Mr. Danton did make some extremely +helpful suggestions--basing them, of course, on the TRUTH of your +account. He has seen a good deal of life; and certainly very +mysterious things do occur to quite innocent and well-meaning +people without the faintest shadow of warning, and as Mr. Bethany +himself said, evil birds do come home to roost, and often out of +a clear sky, as it were. But there, every fresh solution that +occurs to me only makes the thing more preposterous, more, I was +going to say, disreputable--I mean, of course, to the outside +world. And we have our duties to perform to them too, I suppose. +Why, what can we say? What plausible account of ourselves have +we? We shall never be able to look anybody in the face again. I +can only--I am compelled to believe that God has been pleased to +make this precise visitation upon us--an eye for an eye, I +suppose, SOMEWHERE. And to that conviction I shall hold until +actual circumstances convince me that it's false. What, however, +and this is all that I have to say now, what I cannot understand +are your amazing indiscretions.' + +'Do you understand your own, Sheila?' + +'My indiscretions, Arthur?' + +'Well,' said Lawford, 'wasn't it indiscreet, don't you think, to +risk divine retribution by marrying me? Shouldn't you have +inquired? Wasn't it indiscreet to allow me to remain here in--in +my "visitation?" Wasn't it indiscreet to risk the moral stigma +this unhappy face of mine must cast on its surroundings? I am not +sure whether such a change as this constitutes cruelty.... Oh, +what is the use of fretting and babbling on like this?' + +'Am I to understand, then, that you refuse positively to discuss +this horrible business any more? You are doing your best to drive +me away, Arthur; you must see that. Will you be very disappointed +if I refuse to go?' + +Lawford rose from the bed. 'Listen just this once,' he said, +seating himself on the corner of the dressing-table. 'Imagine all +this--whatever you like to call it--obliterated. Take this,' he +nodded towards the glass, 'entirely for itself, on its own +merits, as it were. Let the dead past bury its dead. Which, now, +precisely, REALLY do you prefer--him,' he jerked his head in the +direction of the dispassionate youthful picture on the wall, 'him +or me?' + +He was so close to her now that he could see the faintest tremor +on the face that had suddenly become grey and still in the thin +clear sunshine. + +'I own it, I own it,' he went on, slowly; 'the change is more +than skin-deep now. One can't go through what I have gone through +these last few terrifying days, Sheila, unchanged. They have +played the devil with my body; now begins the tampering with my +mind. Not even Danton knows how it will end. But shall I tell you +why you won't, why you can't answer me that one question--him or +me? Shall I tell you?' + +Sheila slowly raised her eyes. + +'It is because, my dear, you don't care the ghost of a straw for +either. That one--he was worn out long ago, and we never knew it. +I know it now. Time and the sheer going-on of day by day, without +either of us guessing at it, wore that down till it had no more +meaning for you or me than any other faded remembrance in this +interminable footling with truth that we call life. And this +one--the whole abject meaning of it lies simply in the fact that +it has pierced down and shown us up. I had no courage. I couldn't +see how feeble a hold I had on life--just one's friends' +opinions. It was all at second hand. What I want to know now is-- +leave me out; don't think, or care, or regard my living-on one +shadow of an iota--all I ask is, What am I to do for you?' He +turned away and stood staring down at the cinders in the fireless +grate. + +'I answer that mad wicked outburst with one plain question,' said +a low, trembling voice; 'did you or did you not go to Widderstone +yesterday?' + +'I did go.' + +'You sat there, just as you said you sat before; and with all +your heart and soul strove to regain--yourself?' + +Lawford lifted a still, colourless face into the sunlight. 'No,' +he said; 'I spent the evening at the house of a friend.' + +'Then I say it is infamous. You cast all this on me. You have +brought me into contempt and poisoned Alice's whole life. You +dream and idle on just as you used to do, without the least care +or thought or consideration for others; and go out in this +condition--go out absolutely unashamed--to spend the evening at a +friend's. Peculiar friends they must be. Why, really, Arthur, you +must be mad!' + +Lawford paused. Like a flock of sheep streaming helter-skelter +before the onset of a wolf were the thoughts that a moment before +had seemed so orderly and sober. + +'Not mad--possessed,' he said softly. + +'And I add this,' cried Sheila, as it were out of a tragic mask, +'somewhere in the past, whether of your own life, or of the lives +of those who brought you into the world--the world which you +pretend so conveniently to despise--somewhere is hidden some +miserable secret. God visits all sins. On you has fallen at last +the payment. THAT I believe. You can't run away, any more than a +child can run away from the cupboard it has been locked into for +a punishment. Who's going to hear you now? You have deliberately +refused to make a friend of me. Fight it out alone, then!' + +Lawford heard the door close, and the dying away of the sound +that had been the unceasing accompaniment of all these later +years--the rustling of his wife's skirts, her crisp, +authoritative footstep. And he turned towards the flooding +sunlight that streamed in on the upturned surface of the +looking-glass. No clear decisive thought came into his mind, only +a vague recognition that so far as Sheila was concerned this was +the end. No regret, no remorse visited him. He was just alone +again, that was all--alone, as in reality he had always been +alone, without having the sense or power to see or to acknowledge +it. All he had said had been the mere flotsam of the moment, and +now it stood stark and irrevocable between himself and the past. + +He sat down dazed and stupid. Again and again a struggling +recollection tried to obtrude itself; again and again he beat it +back. And rather for something to distract his attention than for +any real interest or enlightenment he might find in its pages, he +took out the grimy dog's-eared book that Herbert had given him, +and turned slowly over the leaves till he came to Sabathier once +more. Snatches of remembrance of their long talk returned to him, +but just as that dark, water-haunted house had seemed to banish +remembrance and the reality of the room in which he now sat, and +of the old familiar life; so now the house, the faces of +yesterday seemed in their turn unreal, almost spectral, and the +thick print on the smudgy page no more significant than a story +one reads and throws away. + +But a moment's comparison in the glass of the two faces side by +side suddenly sharpened his attention--the resemblance was so +oddly arresting, and yet, and yet, so curiously inconclusive. +There was then something of the stolid old Saxon left, he +thought. Or had it been regained? Which was it? Not merely the +complexity of the question, but a half-conscious distaste of +attempting to face it, set him reading very slowly and +laboriously, for his French was little more than fragmentary +recollection, the first few pages of the life of this buried +Sabathier. But with a disinclination almost amounting to aversion +he made very slow progress. Many of the words were meaningless to +him, and every other moment he found himself listening with +intense concentration for the least hint of what Sheila was +doing, of what was going on in the house beneath him. He had not +very long to wait. He was sitting with his head leaning on his +hand, the book unheeded beneath the other on the table, when the +door opened again behind him, and Sheila entered. She stood for a +moment, calm and dignified, looking down on him through her veil. + +'Please understand, Arthur, that I am not taking this step in +pique, or even in anger. It would serve no purpose to go on like +this--this incessant heedlessness and recrimination. There have +been mistakes, misconceptions, perhaps, on both sides. To me +naturally yours are most conspicuous. That need not, however, +blind me to my own.' + +She paused in vain for an answer. + +'Think the whole thing over candidly and quietly,' she began +again in a quiet rapid voice. 'Have you really shown the +slightest regard, I won't say for me, or even for Alice, but for +just the obvious difficulties and--and proprieties of our +position? I have given up as far as I can brooding on and on over +the same horrible impossible thoughts. I withdraw unreservedly +what I said just now about punishment. Whatever the evidence, it +is not even a wife's place to judge like that. You will forgive +me that?' + +Lawford did not turn his head. 'Of course,' he said, looking +rather vacantly out of the window, 'it was only in the heat of +the moment, Sheila; though, who knows? it may be true.' + +'Well,' she took hold of the great brass knob at the foot of the +bed with one gloved hand--'well, I feel it is my duty to withdraw +it. Apart from it, I see only too clearly that even though all +that has happened in these last few days was in reality nothing +but a horrible nightmare, I see that even then what you have said +about our married life together can never be recalled. You have +told me quite deliberately that for years past your life has been +nothing but a pretence--a sham. You implied that mine had been +too. Honestly, I was not aware of it, Arthur. But supposing all +that has happened to you had been merely what might happen at any +moment to anybody, some actual defacement (you will forgive me +suggesting such a horrible thing--why, if what you say is true, +even in that case my sympathy would have been only a continual +fret and annoyance to you. And this--this change, I own, is +infinitely harder to bear. It would be an outrage on common sense +and on all that we hold seemly and--and sacred in life, even in +some trumpery story. You do, you must see all that, Arthur?' + +'Oh yes,' said Lawford, narrowing his eyes to pierce through the +sunlight, 'I see all that.' + +'Then we need not go over it all again. Whatever others may say, +or think, I shall still, at least so long as nothing occurs to +the contrary, keep firmly to my present convictions. Mr Bethany +has assured me repeatedly that he has no--no misgivings; that he +understands. And even if I still doubted, which I don't, Arthur, +though it would be rather trying to have to accept one's husband +at second-hand, as it were, I should have to be satisfied. I dare +say even such an unheard-of thing as what we are discussing now, +or something equally ghastly, does occur occasionally. In foreign +countries, perhaps. I have not studied such things enough to say. +We were all very much restricted in our reading as children, and +I honestly think, not unwisely. It is enough for the present to +repeat that I do believe, and that whatever may happen--and I +know absolutely nothing about the procedure in such cases--but +whatever may happen, I shall still be loyal; I shall always have +your interests at heart.' Her words faltered and she turned her +head away. 'You did love me once, Arthur, I can't forget that.' +The contralto voice trembled ever so little, and the gloved hand +smoothed gently the brass knob beneath. + +'If,' said Lawford, resting his face on his hands, and curiously +watching the while his moving reflection in the looking-glass +before him--'if I said I still loved you, what then? + +'But you have already denied it, Arthur.' + +'Yes; but if I said that that too was said only in haste, that +brooding over the trouble this--this metamorphosis was bringing +on us all had driven me almost beyond endurance: supposing that I +withdrew all that, and instead said now that I do still love you, +just as I--' he turned a little, and turned back again, 'like +this?' + +Sheila paused. 'Could ANY woman answer such a question?' she +almost sighed at last. + +'Yes, but,' Lawford pressed on, in a voice almost naive and +stubborn as a child's, 'If I tried to--to make you? I did once, +Sheila.' + +'I can't, I can't conceive such a position. Surely that alone is +almost as frantic as it is heartless! Is it, is it even right?' + +'Well, I have not actually asked it. I own,' he added moodily, +almost under his breath, 'it would be--dangerous.... But there, +Sheila, this poor old mask of mine is wearing out. I am somehow +convinced of that. What will be left, God only knows. You were +saying--' He rose abruptly. 'Please, please sit down,' he said; +'I did not notice you were standing.' + +'I shall not keep you a moment,' she answered hurriedly; 'I will +sit here. The truth is, Arthur,' she began again almost solemnly, +'apart from all sentiment and--and good intentions, my presence +here only harasses you and keeps you back. I am not so bound up +in myself that I cannot realise THAT. The consequence is that +after calmly--and I hope considerately--thinking the whole thing +over, I have come to the conclusion that it would arouse very +little comment, the least possible perhaps in the circumstances, +if I just went away for a few days. You are not in any sense ill. +In fact, I have never known you so--so robust, so energetic. You +will be alone: Mr Bethany, perhaps.... You could go out and come +in just as you pleased. Possibly,' Sheila smiled frankly beneath +her veil, 'even this Dr Ferguson you have invented will be a +help. It's only the servants that remain to be considered.' + +'I should prefer to be quite alone.' + +'Then do not worry about THEM. I can easily explain. And if you +would not mind letting her in, Mrs Gull can come in every other +day or so just to keep things in order. She's entirely +trustworthy and discreet. Or perhaps, if you would prefer--' + +'Mrs Gull will do nicely, Sheila. It's very good of you to have +given me so much thought.' A long and rather arduous pause +followed. + +'Oh, one other thing, Arthur. You sent out to Mr Critchett--do +you remember?--the night you first came home. I think, too, after +the first awful shock, when we were sitting in our bedroom, you +actually referred to--to violent measures. You will promise me, I +may perhaps at least ask that, you will promise me on your word +of honour, for Alice's sake, if not for mine, to do nothing +rash.' + +'Yes, yes,' said Lawford, sinking lower even than he had supposed +possible into the thin and lightless chill of ennui--'nothing +rash.' + +Sheila rose with a sigh only in part suppressed. 'I have not seen +Mr Bethany again. I think, however, it would be better to let +Harry know; I mean, dear, of your derangement. After all, he is +one of the family--at least, of mine. He will not interfere. He +would, perhaps quite naturally, be hurt if we did not take him +into our confidence. Otherwise there is no pressing cause for +haste, at least for another week or so. After that, I suppose, +something will have to be done. Then there's Mr Wedderburn; +wouldn't it be as well to let him know that at least for the +present you are quite unable to think of returning to town? That, +too, in time will have to be arranged, I suppose, if nothing +happens meanwhile; I mean if things don't come right. And I do +hope, Arthur, you will not set your mind too closely on what +may only prove false hopes. This is all intensely painful to me; +of course, to us both.' + +Again Lawford, even though he did not turn to confront it, became +conscious of the black veil turned towards him tentatively, +speculatively, impenetrably. + +'Yes,' he said, 'I'll write to Wedderburn; he's had his ups and +downs too.' + +'I always rather fancied so,' said Sheila reflectively, 'he looks +rather a--a restless man. Oh, and then again,' she broke off +quickly, 'there's the question of money. I suppose--it is only a +conjecture--I suppose it would be better to do nothing in that +direction just for the present. Ada has now gone to the Bank. +Fifty pounds, Arthur; it is out of my own private account--do you +think that will be enough, just, of course, for your PRESENT +needs?' + +'As a bribe, hush-money, or a thank-offering, Sheila?' murmured +her husband wearily. + +'I don't follow you,' replied the discreet voice from beneath the +veil. + +He did actually turn this time and glance steadily over his +shoulder. 'How long are you going for? and where?' + +'I proposed to go to my cousin's, Bettie Lovat's; that is, of +course, if you have no objection. It's near; it will be a +long-deferred visit; and she need know very little. And, of +course, if for the least thing in the world you should want me, +there I am within call, as it were. And you will write? We ARE +acting for the best, Arthur?' + +'So long as it is your best, Sheila.' + +Sheila pondered. 'You think, you mean, they'll all say I ought to +have stayed. Candidly, I can't see it in that light. Surely every +experience of life proves that in intimate domestic matters, and +especially in those between husband and wife, only the parties +concerned have any means of judging what is best for them? It has +been our experience at any rate: though I must in fairness +confess that, outwardly at least, I haven't had much of that kind +of thing to complain of.' Sheila paused again for a reply. + +'What kind of thing?' + +'Domestic experience, dear.' + +The house was quiet. There was not a sound stirring in the still +sunny road of orchards and discreet and drowsy villas. A long +silence followed, immensely active and alert on the one side, +almost morbidly lethargic so far as the stooping figure in front +of the looking-glass was concerned. At last the last haunting +question came in a kind of croak, as if only by a supreme effort +could it be compelled to produce itself for consideration. + +'And Alice, Sheila?" + +'Alice, dear, of course goes with ME.' + +'You realise,' he stirred uneasily, `you realise it may be +final.' + +'My dear Arthur,' cried Sheila, 'it is surely, apart from +mere delicacy, a parental obligation to screen the poor child +from the shock. Could she be at such a time in any better keeping +than her mother's? At present she only vaguely guesses. To know +definitely that her father, infinitely worse than death, had-- +had-- Oh, is it possible to realise anything in this awful cloud? +It would kill her outright.' + +Lawford made no stir. The quietest of raps came at the door. 'The +money from the Bank, ma'am,' said a faint voice. + +Sheila carefully opened the door a few inches. She laid the blue +envelope on the dressing-table at her husband's elbow. 'You had +better perhaps count it,' she said in a low voice--'forty in +notes, the rest in gold,' and narrowed her eyes beneath her veil +upon her husband's very peculiar method of forgetting his +responsibilities. + +'French?' she said with a nod. 'How very quaint" + +Lawford's eyes fell and rested gravely on the dingy page of +Herbert's mean-looking bundle of print. A queer feeling of cold +crept over him. 'Yes,' he said vaguely, 'French,' and hopelessly +failed to fill in the silence that seemed like some rather sleek +nocturnal creature quietly waiting to be fed. + +Sheila swept softly towards the door. 'Well, Arthur, I think that +is all. The servants will have gone by this evening. I have +ordered a carriage for half-past twelve. Perhaps you would first +write down anything that occurs to you to be necessary? Perhaps, +too, it would be better if Dr Simon were told that we shall not +need him any more, that you are thinking of a complete change of +scene, a voyage. He is obviously useless. Besides, Mr Bethany, I +think, is going to discuss a specialist with you. I have written +him a little note, just briefly explaining. Shall I write to Dr +Simon too?' + +'You remember everything,' said Lawford, and it seemed to him it +was a remark he had heard ages and ages ago. 'It's only this +money, Sheila; will you please take that away?' + +'Take it away?' + +'I think, Sheila, if I do take a voyage I should almost prefer to +work my passage. As for a mere "change of scene," that's quite +uncostly.' + +'It is only your face, Arthur,' said Sheila solemnly, 'that +suggest these wicked stabs. Some day you will perhaps repent of +every one.' + +'It is possible, Sheila; we none of us stand still, you know. One +rips open a lid sometimes and the wax face rots before one's +eyes. Take back your blue envelope; and thank you for thinking of +me. It's always the woman of the house that has the head.' + +'I wish,' said Sheila almost pathetically, and yet with a faint +quaver of resignation, 'I wish it could be said that the man of +the house sometimes has the heart. Think it over, Arthur!' + +Sheila, with her husband's luncheon tray, brought also her +farewells. Lawford surveyed, not without a faint, shy stirring of +incredulity, the superbly restrained presence. He stood before +her dry-lipped, inarticulate, a schoolboy caught redhanded in the +shabbiest of offences. + +'It is your wish then that I go, Arthur?' she said pleadingly. + +He handed her her money without a word. + +'Very well, Arthur; if you won't take it,' she said. 'I should +scarcely have thought this the occasion for mere pride.' + +'The tenth,' she continued, as she squeezed the envelope into her +purse, with only the least hardening of voice, 'although I +daresay you have not troubled to remember it--the tenth will be +the eighteenth anniversary of our wedding-day. It makes parting, +however advisable, and though only for the few days we should +think nothing of in happier circumstances, a little harder to +bear. But there, all will come right. You will see things in a +different light, perhaps. Words may wound, but time will heal.' +But even as she now looked closely into his colourless sunken +face some distant memory seemed to well up irresistibly--the +memory of eyes just as ingenuous, and as unassuming that even in +claiming her love had expressed only their stolid unworthiness. + +'Did you know it? have you seen it?' she said, stooping forward a +little. 'I believe in spite of all....' He gazed on solemnly, +almost owlishly, out of his fading mask. + +'Wait till Mr Bethany tells you; you will believe it perhaps from +him.' He saw the grey-gloved hand a little reluctantly lifted +towards him. + +'Good-bye, Sheila,' he said, and turned mechanically back to the +window. + +She hesitated, listening to a small far-away voice that kept +urging her with an almost frog-like pertinacity to do, to say +something, and yet as stubbornly would not say what; and she was +gone. + + + +CHAPTER FIFTEEN + +Raying and gleaming in the sunlight the hired landau drove up to +the gate. Lawford, peeping between the blinds, looked down on the +coachman, with reins hanging loosely from his red squat-thumbed +hand, seated in his tight livery and indescribable hat on the +faded cushions. One thing only was in his mind; and it was almost +with an audible cry that he turned towards the figure that edged, +white and trembling, into the chill room, to fling herself into +his arms. 'Don't look at me,' he begged her, 'only remember, +dearest, I would rather have died down there and been never seen +again than have given you pain. Run--run, your mother's calling. +Write to me, think of me; good-bye!' + +He threw himself on the bed and lay there till evening--till the +door had shut gently behind the last rat to leave the sinking +ship. All the clearness, the calmness were gone again. Round and +round in dizzy sickening flare and clatter his thoughts whirled. +Contempt, fear, loathing, blasphemy, laughter, longing: there was +no end. Death was no end. There was no meaning, no refuge, no +hope, no possible peace. To give up was to go to perdition: to go +forward was to go mad. And even madness--he sat up with trembling +lips in the twilight--madness itself was only a state, only a +state. You might be bereaved, and the pain and hopelessness of +that would pass. You might be cast out, betrayed, deserted, and +still be you, still find solitude lovely and in a brave face a +friend. But madness!--it surged in on him with all the clearness +and emptiness of a dream. And he sat quite still, his hand +clutching the bedclothes, his head askew, waiting for the sound +of footsteps, for the presences and the voices that have their +thin-walled dwelling beneath the shallow crust of consciousness. + +Inky blackness drifted up in wisps, in smoke before his eyes; he +was powerless to move, to cry out. There was no room to turn; no +air to breathe. And yet there was a low, continuous, +never-varying stir as of an enormous wheel whirling in the gloom. +Countless infinitesimal faces arched like glimmering pebbles the +huge dim-coloured vault above his head. He heard a voice above +the monstrous rustling of the wheel, clamouring, calling him +back. He was hastening headlong, muttering to himself his own +flat meaningless name, like a child repeating as he runs his +errand. And then as if in a charmed cold pool he awoke and opened +his eyes again on the gathering darkness of the great bedroom, +and heard a quick, importunate, long-continued knocking on the +door below, as of some one who had already knocked in vain. + +Cramped and heavy-limbed, he felt his way across the room and lit +a candle. He stood listening awhile: his eyes fixed on the door +that hung a little open. All in the room seemed acutely +fantastically still. The flame burned dim, misled in the sluggish +air. He stole slowly to the door, looked out, and again listened. +Again the knocking broke out, more impetuously and yet with a +certain restraint and caution. Shielding the flame of his candle +in the shell of his left hand, Lawford moved slowly, with chin +uplifted, to the stairs. He bent forward a little, and stood +motionless and drawn up, the pupils of his eyes slowly +contracting and expanding as he gazed down into the carpeted +vacant gloom; past the dim louring presence that had fallen back +before him. + +His mouth opened. 'Who's there?' at last he called. + +'Thank God, thank God!' he heard Mr Bethany mutter. 'I mustn't +call, Lawford,' came a hurried whisper as if the old gentleman +were pressing his lips to speak through the letter-box. 'Come +down and open the door; there's a good fellow! I've been knocking +no end of a time.' + +'Yes, I am coming,' said Lawford. He shut his mouth and held his +breath, and stair by stair he descended, driving steadily before +him the crouching, gloating menacing shape, darkly lifted up +before him against the darkness, contending the way with him. + +'Are you ill? Are you hurt? Has anything happened, Lawford?' came +the anxious old voice again, striving in vain to be restrained. + +'No, no,' muttered Lawford. 'I am coming; coming slowly.' He +paused to breathe, his hands trembling, his hair lank with sweat, +and still with eyes wide open he descended against the phantom +lurking in the darkness--an adversary that, if he should but for +one moment close his lids, he felt would master sanity and +imagination with its evil. 'So long as you don't get in,' he +heard himself muttering, 'so long as you don't get in, my +friend!' + +'What's that you're saying?' came up the muffled, querulous +voice; 'I can't for the life of me hear, my boy.' + +'Nothing, nothing,' came softly the answer from the foot of the +stairs. 'I was only speaking to myself.' + +Deliberately, with candle held rigidly on a level with his eyes, +Lawford pushed forward a pace or two into the airless, empty +drawing-room, and grasped the handle of the door. He gazed in +awhile, a black oblique shadow flung across his face, his eyes +fixed like an animal's, then drew the door steadily towards him. +And suddenly some power that had held him tense seemed to fail. +He thrust out his head, and, his face quivering with fear and +loathing, spat defiance as if in a passion of triumph into the +gloom. + +Still muttering, he shut the door and turned the key. In another +moment his light was gleaming out on the grey perturbed face and +black narrow shoulders of his visitor. + +'You gave me quite a fright,' said the old man almost angrily; +'have you hurt your foot, or something?' + +'It was very dark,' said Lawford, 'down the stairs.' + +'What!' said Mr Bethany still more angrily, blinking out of his +unspectacled eyes; 'has she cut off the gas, then?' + +'You got the note?' said Lawford, unmoved. + +'Yes, yes; I got the note.... Gone?' + +'Oh, yes; all gone. It was my choice. I preferred it so.' + +Mr Bethany sat down on one of the hard old wooden chairs that +stood on either side of the lofty hall, and breathing rather +thickly, rested his hands on his knees. 'What's happened?' he +inquired, looking up into the candle. 'I forgot my glasses, old +fool that I am, and can't, my dear fellow, see you very plainly. +But your voice--' + +'I think,' said Lawford, 'I think it's beginning to come back.' + +'What, the whole thing! Oh no, my dear, dear man; be frank with +me; not the whole thing?' + +'Yes,' said Lawford, 'the whole thing--very, very gradually, +imperceptibly. I think even Sheila noticed. But I rather feel it +than see it; that is all.... I'm cornering him.' + +'Him?' + +Lawford jerked his candle as if towards some definite goal. 'In +time,' he said. + +The two faces with the candle between them seemed as it were to +gain light each from the other. + +'Well, well,' said Mr Bethany, 'every man for himself, Lawford; +it's the only way. But what's going to be done? We must be +cautious; must think of--of the others?' + +'Oh, that,' said Lawford; 'she's going to squeeze me out.' + +'You've--squabbled? Oh, but my dear, honest old, HONEST old +idiot, there are scores of families here in this parish, within a +stone's throw, that squabble, wrangle, all but politely tear each +other's eyes out, every day of their earthly lives. It's +perfectly natural. Where should we poor old busybodies be else. +Peace on earth we bring, and it's mainly between husband and +wife.' + +'Yes,' said Lawford, 'but you see, this was not our earthly life. +It was between US.' + +'Listen, listen to the dear mystic!' exclaimed the old creature +scoffingly. 'What depths we're touching. Here's the first serious +break of his lifetime, and he's gone stark staring transcendental. +Ah well.' He paused and glanced quickly about him, with his +curious bird-like poise of head. 'But you're not alone here?' he +inquired suddenly; 'not absolutely alone?' + +'Yes,' said Lawford. 'But there's plenty to think about--and +read. I haven't thought or read for years.' + +'No, nor I; after thirty, my dear boy, one merely annotates, and +the book's called Life. Bless me, his solemn old voice is +grinding epigrams out of even this poor old parochial +barrel-organ. You don't suppose, you cannot be supposing you are +the only serious person in the world? What's more, it's only skin +deep.' + +Lawford smiled. 'Skin deep. But think quietly over it; you'll see +I'm done.' + +'Come here,' said Mr Bethany. 'Where's the whiskey, where's the +cigars? You shall smoke and drink, and I'll watch. If it weren't +for a pitiful old stomach, I'd join you. Come on!' He led the way +into the dining-room. + +He looked sparer, more wizened and sinewy than ever as he stooped +to open the sideboard. 'Where on earth do they keep everything?' +he was muttering to himself. + +Lawford put the candlestick down on the table. 'There's only one +thing,' he said, watching his visitor's rummaging; 'what +precisely do you think they will do with me?' + +'Look here, Lawford,' snapped Mr Bethany; 'I've come round here, +hooting through your letter-box, to tally sense, not sentiment. +Why has your wife deserted you? Without a servant, without a +single-- It's perfectly monstrous.' + +'On my word of honour, I prefer it so. I couldn't have gone on. +Alone I all but forget this--this lupus. Every turn of her little +finger reminded me of it. We are all of us alone, whether we know +it or not; you said so yourself. And it's better to realize it +stark and unconfused. Besides, you have no idea what--what odd +things.... There may be; there IS something on the other side. +I'll win through to that.' + +Mr Bethany had been listening attentively. He scrambled up from +his knees with a half-empty syphon of sodawater. 'See here, +Lawford,' he said; 'if you really want to know what's your most +insidious and most dangerous symptom just now, it is spiritual +pride. You've won what you think a domestic victory; and you can +scarcely bear the splendour. Oh, you may shrug! Pray, what IS +this "other side" which the superior double-faced creature's +going to win through to now?' He rapped it out almost bitterly, +almost contemptuously. + +Lawford hardly heard the question. Before his eyes had suddenly +arisen the peace, the friendly unquestioning stillness, the +thunderous lullaby old as the grave. 'It's only a fancy. It +seemed I could begin again.' + +'Well, look here,' said Mr Bethany, his whole face suddenly +lined and grey with age. 'You can't. It's the one solitary thing +I've got to say, as I've said it to myself morn, noon, and night +these scores of years. You can't begin again; it's all a delusion +and a snare. You say we're alone. So we are. The world's a dream, +a stage, a mirage, a rack, call it what you will--but YOU don't +change, YOU'RE no illusion. There's no crying off for YOU no +ravelling out, no clean leaves. You've got this--this trouble, +this affliction--my dear, dear fellow what shall I say to tell +you how I grieve and groan for you oh yes, and actually laughed, +I confess it, a vile hysterical laughter, to think of it. You've +got this almost intolerable burden to bear; it's come like a +thief in the night; but bear it you must, and ALONE! They say +death's a going to bed; I doubt it; but anyhow life's a long +undressing. We came in puling and naked, and every stitch must +come off before we get out again. We must stand on our feet in +all our Rabelaisian nakedness, and watch the world fade. Well +then, and not another word of sense shall you worm out of my +worn-out old brains after today--all I say is, don't give in! Why, +if you stood here now, freed from this devilish disguise, the +old, fat, sluggish fellow that sat and yawned his head off under +my eyes in his pew the Sunday before last, if I know anything +about human nature I'd say it to your face, and a fig for your +vanity and resignation--your last state would be worse than the +first. There!' + +He bunched up a big white handkerchief and mopped it over his +head. 'That's done,' he said, 'and we won't go back. What I want +to know now is what are you going to do? Where are you sleeping? +What are you going to think about? I'll stay--yes, yes, that's +what it must be: I must stay. And I detest strange beds. I'll +stay, you SHAN'T be alone. Do you hear me, Lawford?--you SHAN'T +be alone!' + +Lawford gazed gravely. 'There is just one little thing I want to +ask you before you go. I've wormed out an extraordinary old +French book; and--just as you say--to pass the time, I've been +having a shot at translating it. But I'm frightfully rusty; it's +old French; would you mind having a look?' + +Mr Bethany blinked and listened. He tried for the twentieth time +to judge his friend's eyes, to gain as best he could some +sustained and unobserved glance at this baffling face. 'Where is +your precious French book?' he said irritably. + +'It's upstairs.' + +'Fire away, then!' Lawford rose and glanced about the room. +'What, no light there either?' snapped Mr Bethany. 'Take this; I +don't mind the dark. There'll be plenty of that for me soon.' + +Lawford hesitated at the door, looking rather strangely back. +'No,' he said, 'there are matches upstairs.' He shut the +door after him. The darkness seemed cold and still as water. He +went slowly up, with eyes fixed wide on the floating luminous +gloom, and out of memory seemed to gather, as faintly as in the +darkness which they had exorcised for him, the strange pitiful +eyes of the night before. And as he mounted a chill, terrible, +physical peace seemed to steal over him. + +Mr Bethany was sitting as he had left him, looking steadily on +the floor, when Lawford returned. He flattened out the book on +the table with a sniff of impatience. And dragging the candle +nearer, and stooping his nose close to the fusty print, he began +to read. + +'Was this in the house?' he inquired presently. + +'No,' said Lawford; 'it was lent to me by a friend--Herbert.' + +'H'm! don't know him. Anyhow, precious poor stuff this is. This +Sabathier, whoever he is, seems to be a kind of clap-trap +eighteenth-century adventurer who thought the world would be +better off, apparently, for a long account of all his sentimental +amours. Rousseau, with a touch of Don Quixote in his composition, +and an echo of that prince of bogies, Poe! What, in the name of +wonder, induced you to fix on this for your holiday reading?' + +'Sabathier's alive, isn't he?' + +'I never said he wasn't. He's a good deal too much alive for my +old wits, with his Mam'selle This and Madame the Other; +interesting enough, perhaps, for the professional literary nose +with a taste for patchouli.' + +'Yet I suppose even that is not a very rare character?' Mr +Bethany peered up from the dingy book at his ingenuous +questioner. 'I should say decidedly that the fellow was a very +rare character, so long as by rare you don't mean good. It's one +of the dullest stupidities of the present day, my dear fellow, to +dote on a man simply because he's different from the rest of us. +Once a man strays out of the common herd, he's more likely to +meet wolves in the thickets than angels. From what I can gather +in just these few pages this Sabathier appears to have been an +amorous, adventurous, emotional Frenchman, who went to the dogs +as easily and as rapidly as his own nature and his period +allowed. And I should say, Lawford, that he made precious bad +reading for a poor old troubled hermit like yourself at the +present moment.' + +'There's a portrait of him a few pages back.' + +Mr Bethany, with some little impatience, turned back to the +engraving. '"Nicholas de Sabathier,"'s he muttered. '"De," +indeed!' He poked in at the foxy print with narrowed eyes. 'I +don't deny it's a striking, even perhaps, a rather taking face. I +don't deny it.' He gazed on with an even more acute +concentration, and looked up sharply. 'Look here, Lawford, what +in the name of wonder--what trick are you playing on me now?' + +'Trick?' said Lawford; and the world fell with the tiniest plash +in the silence, like a vivid little float upon the surface of a +shadowy pool. + +The old face flushed. 'What conceivable bearing, I say, has this +dead and gone old roue on us now?' + +'You don't think, then, you see any resemblance--ANY resemblance +at all?' + +'Resemblance?' repeated Mr Bethany in a flat voice, and without +raising his face again to meet Lawford's direct scrutiny. +'Resemblance to whom?' + +'To me? To me, as I am?' + +'But even, my dear fellow (forgive my dull old brains!), even if +there was just the faintest superficial suggestion of--of that; +what then?' + +'Why,' said Lawford, 'he's buried in Widderstone.' + +'Buried in Widderstone?' The keen childlike blue eyes looked +almost stealthily up across the book; the old man sat without +speaking, so still that it might even be supposed he himself was +listening for a quiet distant footfall. + +'He is buried in the grave beside which I fell asleep,' said +Lawford; 'all green and still and broken,' he added faintly. 'You +remember,' he went on in a repressed voice--'you remember you +asked me if there was anybody else in sight, any eavesdropper? +You don't think--him?' + +Mr. Bethany pushed the book a few inches away from him. 'Who, did +you say--who was it you said put the thing into your head? A +queer friend surely?' he paused helplessly. 'And how, pray, do +you know,' he began again more firmly, 'even if there is a +Sabathier buried at Widderstone, how do you know it is this +Sabathier? It's not, I think,' he added boldly, 'a very uncommon +name; with two b's at any rate. Whereabouts is the grave?' + +'Quite down at the bottom, under the trees. And the little seat I +told you of is there, too, where I fell asleep. You see,' he +explained, 'the grave's almost isolated; I suppose because he +killed himself.' + +Mr Bethany clasped his knuckled fingers on the tablecloth. 'It's +no good,' he concluded after a long pause; 'the fellow's got up +into my head. I can't think him out. We must thrash it out +quietly in the morning with the blessed sun at the window; not +this farthing dip. To me the whole idea is as revolting as it is +incredible. Why, above a century--no, no! And on the other hand, +how easily one's fancy builds! A few straws and there's a nest +and squawking fledglings, all complete. Is that why--is that why +that good, practical wife of yours and all your faithful +household have absconded? Does it'--he threw up his head as if +towards the house above them-- 'does it REEK with him?' + +Lawford shook his head. 'She hasn't seen him: not--not apart. I +haven't told her.' + +Mr Bethany tossed the hugger-mugger of pamphlets across the +table. 'Then, for simple sanity's sake, don't. Hide it; burn it; +put the thing completely out of your mind. A friend! Who, where +is this wonderful friend?' + +'Not very far from Widderstone. He lives--practically alone.' + +'And all that stumbling and muttering on the stairs?' he leant +forward almost threateningly. 'There isn't anybody here, +Lawford?' + +'Oh, no,' said Lawford. 'We are practically alone with this, you +know,' he pointed to the book, and smiled frankly, however +faintly. + +Again Mr Bethany sank into a fixed yet uneasy reverie, and again +shook himself and raised his eyes. + +'Well then,' he said, in a voice all but morose in its +fretfullness, 'what I suggest is that first you keep quiet here; +and next, that you write and get your wife back. You say you are +better. I think you said she herself noticed a slight +improvement. Isn't it just exactly as I foresaw? And yet she's +gone! But that's not our business. Get her back. And don't for a +single instant waste a thought on the other; not for a single +instant, I implore you, Lawford. And in a week the whole thing +will be no more than a dreary, preposterous dream.... You don't +answer me!' he cried impulsively. + +'But can one so easily forget a dream like this?' + +'You don't speak out, Lawford; you mean SHE won't.' + +'It must at least seem to have been in part of my own seeking, or +contriving; or at any rate--she said it--of my own hereditary or +unconscious deserving.' + +'She said that!' Mr Bethany sat back. 'I see, I see,' he said. +'I'm nothing but a fumbling old meddler. And there was I, not ten +minutes ago, preaching for all I was worth on a text I knew +nothing about. God bless me, Lawford, how long we take +a-learning. I'll say no more. But what an illusion. To think +this--this--he laid a long lean hand at arm's length flat upon +the table towards his friend--'to think this is our old jog-trot +Arthur Lawford! From henceforth I throw you over, you old wolf in +sheep's wool. I wash my hands of you. And now where am I going to +sleep?' + +He covered up his age and weariness for an instant with a small +crooked hand. + +Lawford took a deep breath. 'You're going, old friend, to sleep +at home. And I--I'm going to give you my arm to the Vicarage +gate. Here I am, immeasurably relieved, fitter than I've been +since I was a dolt of a schoolboy. On my word of honour: I can't +say why, but I am. I don't care THAT, vicar, honestly--puffed up +with spiritual pride. If a man can't sleep with pride for a +bed-fellow, well, he'd better try elsewhere. It's no good; I'm as +stubborn as a mule; that's at least a relic of the old Adam. I +care no more,' he raised his voice firmly and gravely--'I don't +care a jot for solitude, not a jot for all the ghosts of all the +catacombs!' + +Mr. Bethany listened, grimly pursed up his lips. 'Not a jot for +all the ghosts of all the catechisms!' he muttered. `Nor the +devil himself, I suppose?' He turned once more to glance sharply +in the direction of the face he could so dimly--and of set +purpose--discern; and without a word trotted off into the hall. +Lawford followed with the candle. + +''Pon my word, you haven't had a mouthful of supper. Let me +forage; just a quarter of an hour, eh?' + +'Not me,' said Mr Bethany; 'if you won't have me, home I go. I +refuse to encourage this miserable grass-widowering. What WOULD +they say? What would the busybodies say? Ghouls and graves and +shocking mysteries--Selina! Sister Anne! Come on." + +He shuffled on his hat and caught firm hold of his knobbed +umbrella. 'Better not leave a candle,' he said. + +Lawford blew out the candle. + +'What? What?' called the old man suddenly. But no voice had +spoken. + +A thin trickle of light from the lamp in the street stuck up +through the fanlight as, with a smile that could be described +neither as mischievous, saturnine, nor vindictive, and was yet +faintly suggestive of all three, Lawford quietly opened the +drawing-room door and put down the candlestick on the floor +within. + +'What on earth, my good man, are you fumbling after now?' came +the almost fretful question from under the echoing porch. + +'Coming, coming,' said Lawford, and slammed the door behind them. + + + + +CHAPTER SIXTEEN + +The first faint streaks of dawn were silvering across the stars +when Lawford again let himself into his deserted house. He +stumbled down to the pantry and cut himself a crust of bread and +cheese, and ate it, sitting on the table, watching the leafy +eastern sky through the painted bars of the area window. He +munched on, hungry and tired. His night walk had cooled head and +heart. Having obstinately refused Mr Bethany's invitation to +sleep at the Vicarage, he had sat down on an old low wall, and +watched until his light had shone out at his bedroom window. Then +he had simply wandered on, past rustling glimmering gardens, +under the great timbers of yellowing elms, hardly thinking, +hardly aware of himself except as in a far-away vision of a +sluggish insignificant creature struggling across the tossed-up +crust of an old, incomprehensible world. + +The secret of his content in that long leisurely ramble had been +that repeatedly by a scarcely realised effort it had not lain in +the direction of Widderstone. And now, as he sat hungrily +devouring his breakfast on the table in the kitchen, with the +daybreak comforting his eyes, he thought with a positive mockery +of that poor old night-thing he had given inch by inch into the +safe keeping of his pink and white drawing-room. Don Quixote, +Poe, Rousseau--they were familiar but not very significant labels +to a mind that had found very poor entertainment in reading. But +they were at least representative enough to set him wondering +which of their influences it was that had inflated with such a +gaseous heroism the Lawford of the night before. He thought of +Sheila with a not unkindly smile, and of the rest. 'I wonder what +they'll do?' had been a question almost as much in his mind +during these last few hours as had 'What am I to do?' in the +first bout of his 'visitation.' + +But the 'they' was not very precisely visualised. He saw Sheila, +and Harry, and dainty pale-blue Bettie Lovat, and cautious old +Wedderburn, and Danton, and Craik, and cheery, gossipy Dr +Sutherland, and the verger, Mr Dutton, and Critchett, and the +gardener, and Ada, and the whole vague populous host that keep +one as definitely in one's place in the world's economy as a +firm-set pin the camphored moth. What his place was to be only +time could show. Meanwhile there was in this loneliness at least +a respite. + +Solitude!--he bathed his weary bones in it. He laved his eyelids +in it, as in a woodland brook after the heat of noon. He sat on +in calmest reverie till his hunger was satisfied. Then, +scattering out his last crumbs to the birds from the barred +window, he climbed upstairs again, past his usual bedroom, past +his detested guest room, up into the narrow sweetness of Alice's, +and flinging himself on her bed fell into a long and dreamless +sleep. + +By ten next morning Lawford had bathed and dressed. And at half- +past ten he got up from Sheila's fat little French dictionary and +his Memoirs to answer Mrs Gull's summons on the area bell. The +little woman stood with arms folded over an empty and capacious +bag, with an air of sustained melancholy on her friendly face. +She wished him a very nervous 'Good morning,' and dived down into +the kitchen. The hours dragged slowly by in a silence broken only +by an occasional ring at the bell. About three she emerged from +the house and climbed the area steps with her bag hooked over her +arm. He watched the little black figure out of sight, watched a +man in a white canvas hat ascend the steps to push a blue-printed +circular through the letter-box. It had begun to rain a little. +He returned to the breakfast-room and with the window wide open +to the rustling coolness of the leaves, edged his way very slowly +across from line to line of the obscure French print. + +Sabathier none the less, and in spite of his unintelligible +literariness, did begin to take shape and consistency. The man +himself, breathing, and thinking, began to live for Lawford even +in those few half-articulate pages, though not in quite so +formidable a fashion as Mr Bethany had summed him up. But as the +west began to lighten with the declining sun, the same old +disquietude, the same old friendless and foreboding ennui stole +over Lawford's solitude once more. He shut his books, placed a +candlestick and two boxes of matches on the hall table, lit a +bead of gas, and went out into the rainy-sweet streets again. + +At a mean little barber's with a pole above his lettered door he +went in to be shaved. And a few steps further on he sat down at +the crumb-littered counter of a little baker's shop to have some +tea. It pleased him almost to childishness to find how easily he +could listen and even talk to the oiled and crimpy little barber, +and to the pretty, consumptive-looking, print-dressed baker's +wife. Whatever his face might now be conniving at, the Arthur +Lawford of last week could never have hob-nobbed so affably with +his social 'inferiors.' + +For no reason in the world, unless to spend a moment or two +longer in the friendly baker's shop, he bought six-penny-worth of +cakes. He watched them as they were deposited one by one in the +bag, and even asked for one sort to be exchanged for another, +flushing a little at the pretty compliment he had ventured on. + +He climbed out of the shop, and paused on the wooden doorstep. +'Do you happen to know Mr Herbert Herbert's?' he said. + +The baker's wife glanced up at him with clear, reflective eyes. +'Mr Herbert's?--that must be some little way off, sir. I don't +know any such name, and I know most, just round about like.' + +'Well, yes, it is,' said Lawford, rather foolishly; 'I hardly +know why I asked. It's past the churchyard at Widderstone.' + +'Oh yes, sir,' she encouraged him. + +'A big, wooden-looking house.' + +'Really, sir. Wooden?' + +Lawford looked into her face, but could find nothing more to say, +so he smiled again rather absently, and ascended into the street. + +He sat down outside the churchyard gate on the very bank where he +had in the sourness of the nettles first opened Sabathier's +Memoirs. The world lay still beneath the pale sky. Presently the +little fat rector walked up the hill, his wrists still showing +beneath his sleeves. Lawford meditatively watched him pass by. A +small boy with a switch, a tiny nose, and a swinging gallipot, +his cheeks lit with the sunset, followed soon after. Lawford +beckoned him with his finger and held out the bag of tarts. He +watched him, half incredulous of his prize, and with many a +cautious look over his shoulder, pass out of sight. For a long +while he sat alone, only the evening birds singing out of the +greenness and silence of the churchyard. What a haunting +inescapable riddle life was. + +Colour suddenly faded out of the light streaming between the +branches. And depression, always lying in ambush of the novelty +of his freedom, began like mist to rise above his restless +thoughts. It was all so devilish empty--this raft of the world +floating under evening's shadow. How many sermons had he listened +to, enriched with the simile of the ocean of life. Here they +were, come home to roost. He had fallen asleep, ineffectual +sailor that he was, and a thief out of the cloudy deep had stolen +oar and sail and compass, leaving him adrift amid the riding of +the waves. + +'Are they worth, do you think, quite a penny?' suddenly inquired +a quiet voice in the silence. He looked up into the almost +colourless face, into the grey eyes beneath their clear narrow +brows. + +'I was thinking,' he said, 'what a curious thing life is, and +wondering--' + +'The first half is well worth the penny--its originality! I can't +afford twopence. So you must GIVE me what you were wondering.' + +Lawford gazed rather blankly across the twilight fields. 'I was +wondering,' he said with an oddly naive candour, 'how long it +took one to sink.' + +'They say, you know,' Grisel replied solemnly, 'drowned sailors +float midway, suffering their sea change; purgatory. But what a +splendid pennyworth. All pure philosophy!' + +'"Philosophy!"' said Lawford; 'I am a perfect fool. Has your +brother told you about me?' + +She glanced at him quickly. 'We had a talk.' + +'Then you do know--?' He stopped dead, and turned to her. 'You +really realise it, looking at me now?' + +'I realise,' she said gravely, 'that you look even a little more +pale and haggard than when I saw you first the other night. We +both, my brother and I, you know, thought for certain you'd come +yesterday. In fact, I went into the Widderstone in the evening to +look for you, knowing your nocturnal habits....' She glanced +again at him with a kind of shy anxiety. + +'Why--why is your brother so--why does he let me bore him so +horribly?' + +'Does he? He's tremendously interested; but then, he's pretty +easily interested when he's interested at all. If he can possibly +twist anything into the slightest show of a mystery, he will. +But, of course, you won't, you can't, take all he says seriously. +The tiniest pinch of salt, you know. He's an absolute fanatic at +talking in the air. Besides, it doesn't really matter much.' + +'In the air?' + +'I mean if once a theory gets into his head--the more far-fetched, +so long as it's original, the better--it flowers out into a +positive miracle of incredibilities. And of course you can rout +out evidence for anything under the sun from his dingy old +folios. Why did he lend you that PARTICULAR book?' + +'Didn't he tell you that, then?' + +'He said it was Sabathier.' She seemed to think intensely for the +merest fraction of a moment, and turned. 'Honestly, though, I +think he immensely exaggerated the likeness. As for...' + +He touched her arm, and they stopped again, face to face. 'Tell +me what difference exactly you see,' he said. 'I am quite myself +again now, honestly; please tell me just the very worst you +think.' + +'I think, to begin with,' she began, with exaggerated candour, +'his is rather a detestable face.' + +'And mine?' he said gravely. + +'Why--very troubled; oh yes--but his was like some bird of prey. +Yours--what mad stuff to talk like this!--not the least symptom, +that I can see, of--why, the "prey," you know.' + +They had come to the wicket in the dark thorny hedge. 'Would it +be very dreadful to walk on a little--just to finish?' + +'Very,' she said, turning as gravely at his side. + +'What I wanted to say was--' began Lawford, and forgetting +altogether the thread by which he hoped to lead up to what he +really wanted to say, broke off lamely; 'I should have thought +you would have absolutely despised a coward.' + +'It would be rather absurd to despise what one so horribly well +understands. Besides, we weren't cowards--we weren't cowards a +bit. My childhood was one long, reiterated terror--nights and +nights of it. But I never had the pluck to tell any one. No one +so much as dreamt of the company I had. Ah, and you didn't see +either that my heart was absolutely in my mouth, that I was +shrivelled up with fear, even at sight of the fear on your face +in the dark. There's absolutely nothing so catching. So, you see, +I do know a little what nerves are; and dream too sometimes, +though I don't choose charnelhouses if I can get a comfortable +bed. A coward! May I really say that to ask my help was one of +the bravest things in a man I ever heard of. Bullets--that kind +of courage--no real woman cares twopence for bullets. An old aunt +of mine stared a man right out of the house with the thing in her +face. Anyhow, whether I may or not, I do say it. So now we are +quits.' + +'Will you--' began Lawford, and stopped. 'What I wanted to say +was,' he jerked on, 'it is sheer horrible hypocrisy to be talking +to you like this--though you will never have the faintest idea of +what it has meant and done for me. I mean... And yet, and yet, +I do feel when just for the least moment I forget what I am, and +that isn't very often, when I forget what I have become and what +I must go back to--I feel that I haven't any business to be +talking with you at all. "Quits!" And here I am, an outcast from +decent society. Ah, you don't know--' + +She bent her head and laughed under her breath. 'You do really +stumble on such delicious compliments. And yet, do you know, I +think my brother would be immensely pleased to think you were an +outcast from decent society if only he could be thought one too. +He has been trying half his life to wither decent society with +neglect and disdain--but it doesn't take the least notice. The +deaf adder, you know. Besides, besides; what is all this meek +talk? I detest meek talk--gods or men. Surely in the first and +last resort all we are is ourselves. Something has happened; you +are jangled, shaken. But to us, believe me, you are simply one of +fewer friends-and I think, after struggling up Widderstone Lane +hand in hand with you in the dark, I have a right to say +"friends" than I could count on one hand. What are we all if we +only realized it? We talk of dignity and propriety, and we are +like so many children playing with knucklebones in a giant's +scullery. Come along, he will, some suppertime, for us, each in +turn--and how many even will so much as look up from their play +to wave us good-bye? that's what I mean--the plot of silence we +are all in. If only I had my brother's lucidity, how much better +I would have said all this. It is only, believe me, that I want +ever so much to help you, if I may--even at risk, too,' she +added, rather shakily, 'of having that help--well--I know it's +little good.' + +The lane had narrowed. They had climbed the arch of a narrow +stone bridge that spanned the smooth dark Widder. A few late +starlings were winging far above them. Darkness was coming on +apace. They stood for awhile looking down into the black flowing +water, with here and there the mild silver of a star dim leagues +below. 'I am afraid,' said Grisel, looking quietly up, 'you have +led me into talking most pitiless nonsense. How many hours, I +wonder, did I lie awake in the dark last night, thinking of you? +Honestly, I shall never, NEVER forget that walk. It haunted me, +on and on.' + +'Thinking of me? Do you really mean that? Then it was not all +imagination; it wasn't just the drowning man clutching at a +straw?" + +The grey eyes questioned him. 'You see,' he explained in a +whisper, as if afraid of being overheard, 'it--it came back +again, and--I don't mind a bit how much you laugh at me! I had +been asleep, and had had a most awful dream, one of those dreams +that seem to hint that some day THAT will be our real world, that +some day we may awake where dreaming then will be of this; and I +woke--came back--and there was a tremendous knocking going on +downstairs. I knew there was no one else in the house--' + +'No one else in the house? And you like this?' + +'Yes,' said Lawford, stolidly. 'they were all out as it happened. +And, of course,' he went on quickly, 'there was nothing for me to +do but simply to go down and open the door. And yet, do you know, +at first I simply couldn't move. I lit a candle, and then--then +somehow I got to know that waiting for me was just--but there,' +he broke off half-ashamed, 'I mustn't bother you with all this +morbid stuff. Will your brother be in now, do you think?' + +'My brother will be in, and, of course, expecting you. But as for +"bother," believe me--well, did I quite deserve it?' She stooped +towards him. 'You lit a candle--and then?' + +They turned and retraced their way slowly up the hill. + +'It came again.' + +'It?' + +'That--that presence, that shadow. I don't mean, of course, it's +a real shadow. It comes, doesn't it, from--from within? As if +from out of some unheard-of hiding place, where it has been +lurking for ages and ages before one's childhood; at least, so it +seems to me now. And yet although it does come from within, there +it is, too, in front of you, before your eyes, feeding even on +your fear, just watching, waiting for-- What nonsense all this +must seem to you!' + +'Yes, yes; and then?' + +'Then, and you must remember the poor old boy had been knocking +all this time--my old friend--Mr Bethany, I mean--knocking and +calling through the letter-box, thinking I was in extremis, or +something; then--how shall I describe it?--well YOU came, your +eyes, your face, as clear as when, you know, the night before +last, we went up the hill together. And then...' + +'And then?' + +'And then, we--you and I, you know--simply drove him downstairs, +and I could hear myself grunting as if it was really a physical +effort; we drove him, step by step, downstairs. And--' He laughed +outright, and boyishly continued his adventure. 'What do you +think I did then, without the ghost of a smile, too, at the +idiocy of the thing? I locked the poor beggar in the +drawing-room. I saw him there, as plainly as I ever saw anything +in my life, and the furniture glimmering, though it was pitch +dark: I can't describe it. It all seemed so desperately real, +absolutely vital then. It all seems so meaningless and impossible +now. And yet, although I am utterly played out and done for, and +however absurd it may sound, I wouldn't have lost it; I wouldn't +go back for any bribe there is. I feel just as if a great bundle +had been rolled off my back. Of course, the queerest, the most +detestable part of the whole business is that it--the thing on +the stairs--was this'--he lifted a grave and haggard face towards +her again--'or rather that,' he pointed with his stick towards +the starry churchyard. 'Sabathier,' he said. + +Again they had paused together before the white gate, and this +time Lawford pushed it open, and followed his companion up the +narrow path. + +She stayed a moment, her hand on the bell. 'Was it my brother who +actually put that horrible idea into your mind?--about Sabathier?' + +'Oh no, not really put it into my head,' said Lawford hollowly. +'He only found it there; lit it up.' + +She laid her hand lightly on his arm. 'Whether he did or not,' +she said with an earnestness that was almost an entreaty, 'of +course, you MUST agree that we every one of us have some such +experience--that kind of visitor, once at least, in a lifetime.' +'Ah, but,' began Lawford, turning forlornly away, 'you didn't +see, you can't have realized--the change.' + +She pulled the bell almost as if in some inward triumph. 'But +don't you think,' she suggested, 'that that, like the other, +might be, as it were, partly imagination too? If now you thought +back.' + +But a little old woman had opened the door, and the sentence, for +the moment, was left unfinished. + + + +CHAPTER SEVENTEEN + +There was no one in the room, and no light, when they entered. For +a moment Grisel stood by the open window, looking out. Then she +turned impulsively. 'My brother, of course, will ask you too,' +she said; 'we had made up our minds to do so if you came again; +but I want you to promise me now that you won't dream of going +back to-night. That surely would be tempting--well, not +Providence. I couldn't rest if I thought you might be alone; like +that again.' Her voice died away into the calling of the waters. +A light moved across the dingy old rows of books and as his +sister turned to go out Herbert appeared in the doorway, carrying +a green-shaded lamp, with an old leather quarto under his arm. + +'Ah, here you are,' he said. 'I guessed you had probably met.' He +drew up, burdened, before his visitor. But his clear black +glance, instead of wandering off at his first greeting, had +intensified. And it was almost with an air of absorption that he +turned away. He dumped his book on to a chair and it turned over +with scattered leaves on to the floor. He put the lamp down and +stooped after it, so that his next words came up muffled, and as +if the remark had been forced out of him. 'You don't feel worse, +I hope?' He got up and faced his visitor for the answer. And for +the moment Lawford stood considering his symptoms. + +'No,' he said almost gaily; 'I feel enormously better.' But +Herbert's long, oval, questioning eyes beneath the sleek black +hair were still fixed on his face. 'I am afraid, my dear fellow,' +he said, with something more than his usual curiously indifferent +courtesy, 'the struggle has frightfully pulled you to pieces.' + +'The question is,' answered Lawford, with a kind of tired yet +whimsical melancholy in his voice, 'though I am not sure that the +answer very much matters--what's going to put me together again? +It's the old story of Humpty Dumpty, Herbert. Besides, one thing +you said has stuck out in a quite curious way in my memory. I +wonder if you will remember?' + +'What was that?' said Herbert with unfeigned curiosity. + +'Why, you said even though Sabathier had failed, though I was +still my own old stodgy self, that you thought the face--the +face, you know, might work in. Somehow, sometimes I think it has. +It does really rather haunt me. In that case--well, what then?' +Lawford had himself listened to this involved explanation much as +one watches the accomplishment of a difficult trick, marvelling +more at its completion at all than at the difficulty involved in +the doing of it. + +'"Work in,"' repeated Herbert, like a rather blase child +confronted with a new mechanical toy; 'did I really say that? +well, honestly, it wasn't bad; it's what one would expect on that +hypothesis. You see, we are only different, as it were, in our +differences. Once the foot's over the threshold, it's nine points +of the law! But I don't remember saying it.' He shamefacedly and +naively confessed it: 'I say such an awful lot of things. And I'm +always changing my mind. It's a standing joke against me with +my sister. She says the recording angel will have two sides to my +account: Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays; and Tuesdays, +Thursdays, and Saturdays--diametrically opposite convictions, and +both kinds wrong. On Sundays I am all things to all men. As for +Sabathier, by the way, I do want particularly to have another go +at him. I've been thinking him over, and I'm afraid in some ways +he won't quite wash. And that reminds me, did you read the poor +chap?' + +'I just grubbed through a page or two; but most of my French was +left at school. What I did do, though, was to show the book to an +old friend of ours--my wife's and mine--just to skim--a Mr +Bethany. He's an old clergyman--our vicar, in fact.' + +Herbert had sat down, and with eyes slightly narrowed was +listening with peculiar attention. He smiled a little +magnanimously. 'His verdict, I should think, must have been a +perfect joy.' + +'He said,' said Lawford, in his rather low, monotonous voice, 'he +said it was precious poor stuff, that it reminded him of +patchouli; and that Sabathier--the print I mean--looked like a +foxy old roue. They were, I think, his exact words. We were alone +together, last night.' + +'You don't mean that he simply didn't see the faintest +resemblance?' + +Lawford nodded. 'But then,' he added simply, 'whenever he comes +to see me now he leaves his spectacles at home.' + +And at that, as if at some preconcerted signal, they both went +off into a simple shout of laughter, unanimous and sustained. + +But this first wild bout of laughter over, the first real +bursting of the dam, perhaps, for years, Lawford found himself at +a lower ebb than ever. + +'You see,' he said presently, and while still his companion's +face was smiling around the remembrance of his laughter like +ripples after the splash of a stone, 'Bethany has been absolutely +my sheet-anchor right through. And I was--it was--you can't +possibly realise what a ghastly change it really was. I don't +think any one ever will.' + +Herbert opened his hand and looked reflectively into its palm +before allowing himself to reply. 'I wonder, you know; I have +been wondering a good deal; simply taking the other point of view +for a moment; WAS it? I don't mean "ghastly" exactly (like, say, +smallpox, G.P.I, elephantiasis), but was it quite so complete, so +radical, as in the first sheer gust of astonishment you fancied?' + +Lawford thought on a little further. 'You know how one sees +oneself in a passion--why, how a child looks--the whole face +darkened and drawn and possessed? That was the change. That's how +it seems to come back to me. And something, somebody, dodging +behind the eyes. Yes; more that than even any excessive change of +feature, except, of course, that I also seemed-- Shall I ever +forget that first cold, stifling stare into the looking-glass! I +certainly was much darker, even my hair. But I've told you all +this before,' he added wearily, 'and the scores and scores of +times I've thought it. I used to sit up there in the big spare +bedroom my wife put me up in, simply gloating. My flesh seemed +nothing more than an hallucination: there I was, haunting my +body, an old grinning tenement, and all that I thought I wanted, +and couldn't do without, all I valued and prided myself on-- +stacked up in the drizzling street below. Why, Herbert, our +bodies are only glass or cloud. They melt, don't they, like wax +in the sun once we're out. But those first few days don't make +very pleasant thinking. Friday night was the first, when I sat +there like a twitching waxwork, soberly debating between Bedlam +here and Bedlam hereafter. I even sometimes wonder whether its +very repetition has not dulled the memory or distorted it. My +wife,' he added ingenuously, 'seems to think there are signs of +a slight improvement--a going back, I mean. But I'm not sure +whether she meant it.' + +Herbert surveyed his visitor critically. 'You say "dark," he +said; 'but surely, Lawford, your hair now is nearly grey; well- +flecked at least.' + +Although the remark carried nothing comparatively of a shock with +it, yet it seemed to Lawford as if an electric current had passed +over his scalp, coldly stirring every hair upon his head. But +somehow or other it was easier to sit quietly on, to express no +surprise, to let them do or say what they liked. 'Well' he +retorted with an odd, crooked smile, 'you must remember I am a +good deal older than I was last Saturday. I grew grey in the +grave, Herbert.' + +'But it's like this, you know,' said Herbert, rising excitedly, +and at the next moment, on reflection, composedly reseating +himself. 'How many of your people actually saw it? How many owned +to its being as bad, as complete, as you made out? I don't want +for a moment to cut right across what you said last night--our +talk--but there are two million sides to every question, and as +often as not the less conspicuous have sounder--well--roots. +That's all.' + +'I think really, do you know, I would rather not go over the +detestable thing again. Not many; my wife, though, and a man I +know called Danton, who--who's prejudiced. After all, I have +myself to think about too. And right through, right through-- +there wasn't the least doubt of that--they all in their hearts +knew it was me. They knew I was behind. I could feel that +absolutely always; it's not just eyes and ears we use, there's us +ourselves to consider, though God alone knows what that means. +But the password was there, as you might say; and they all knew I +knew it, all--except'--he looked up as if in bewilderment-- +'except just one, a poor old lady, a very old friend of my +mother's, whom I--I Sabathiered!' + +'Whom--you--Sabathiered!' repeated Herbert carefully, with +infinite relish, looking sidelong at his visitor. 'And it is just +precisely that....' + +But at that moment his sister appeared in the doorway to say that +supper was ready. And it was not until Herbert was actually +engaged in carving a cold chicken that he followed up his +advantage. 'Mr. Lawford, Grisel,' he said, 'has just enriched our +jaded language with a new verb--to Sabathier. And if I may +venture to define it in the presence of the distinguished +neologist himself, it means, "To deal with histrionically"; or, +rather, that's what it will mean a couple of hundred years hence. +For the moment it means, "To act under the influence of +subliminalization'; "To perplex, or bemuse, or estrange with +OTHERNESS." Do tell us, Lawford, more about the little old lady.' +He passed with her plate a little meaningful glance at his +sister, and repeated, 'Do!' + +'But I've been plaguing your sister enough already. You'll +wish...' Lawford began, and turned his tired-out eyes towards +those others awaiting them so frankly they seemed in their +perfect friendliness a rest from all his troubles. 'You see,' he +went on, 'what I kept on thinking and thinking of was to get a +quite unbiased and unprejudiced view. She had known me for +years, though we had not actually met more than once or twice +since my mother's death. And there she was sitting with me at the +other end of just such another little seat as'--he turned--to +Herbert 'as ours, at Widderstone. It was on Bewley Common: I can +see it all now; it was sunset. And I simply turned and asked her +in a kind of a whining affected manner if she remembered me; and +when after a long time she came round to owning that to all +intents and purposes she did not--I professed to have made a +mistake in recognising her. I think,' he added, glancing up from +one to the other of his two strange friends, 'I think it was the +meanest trick I can remember.' + +'H'm,' said Herbert solemnly: 'I wish I had as sensitive a +conscience. But as your old friend didn't recognise you, who's +the worse? As for her not doing so, just think of the difference +a few years makes to a man, and any severe shock. Life wears so +infernally badly. Who, for that matter, does not change, even in +character and yet who professes to see it? Mind, I don't say in +essence! But then how many of the human ghosts one meets does one +know in essence? One doesn't want to. It would be positively +cataclysmic. And that's what brings me around to feel, Lawford, +if I may venture to say so, that you may have brooded a little +too keenly on--on your own case. Tell any one you feel ill; he +will commiserate with you to positive nausea. Tell any priest +your soul is in danger; will he wait for proof? It's misereres +and penances world without end. Tell any woman you love her; will +she, can she, should she, gainsay you? There you are. The cat's +out of the bag, you see. My sister and I sat up half the night +talking the thing over. I said I'd take the plunge. I said I'd +risk appearing the crassest, contradictoriest wretch that ever +drew breath. I don't deny that what I hinted at the other night +must seem in part directly contrary to what I'm going to say +now.' + +He wheeled his black eyes as if for inspiration, and helped +himself to salad. 'It's this,' he said. 'Isn't it possible, isn't +it even probable that being ill, and overstrung, moping a little +over things more or less out of the common ruck, and sitting +there in a kind of trance--isn't it possible that you may have +very largely IMAGINED the change? Hypnotised yourself into +believing it much worse--more profound, radical, acute--and +simply absolutely hypnotizing others into thinking so, too. +Christendom is just beginning to rediscover that there is such a +thing as faith, that it is just possible that, say, megrims or +melancholia may be removed at least as easily as mountains. The +converse, of course, is obvious on the face of it. A man fails +because he thinks himself a failure. It's the men that run away +that lose the battle. Suppose then, Lawford'--he leaned forward, +keen and suave--'suppose you have been and "Sabathiered" +yourself!' + +Lawford had grown accustomed during the last few days to finding +himself gazing out like a child into reality, as if from the +windows of a dream. He had in a sense followed this long, loosely +stitched, preliminary argument; he had at least in part realised +that he sat there between two clear friendly minds acting in the +friendliest and most obvious collusion. But he was incapable of +fixing his attention very closely on any single fragment of +Herbert's apology, or of rousing himself into being much more +than a dispassionate and not very interested spectator of the +little melodrama that Fate, it appeared, had at the last moment +decided rather capriciously to twist into a farce. He turned with +a smile to the face so keenly fixed and enthusiastic with the +question it had so laboriously led up to: 'But surely, I don't +quite see...' + +Herbert lifted his glass as if to his visitor's acumen and set it +down again without tasting it. 'Why, my dear fellow,' he said +triumphantly, 'even a dream must have a peg. Yours was this +unforgettable old suicide. Candidly now, how much of Sabathier was +actually yours? In spite of all that that fantastical fellow, +Herbert, said last night, dead men DON'T tell tales. The last +place in the world to look for a ghost is where his traitorous +bones lie crumbling. Good heavens, think what irrefutable masses +of evidence there would be at our finger-tips if every tombstone +hid its ghost! No; the fellow just arrested you with his creepy +epitaph: an epitaph, mind you, that is in a literary sense +distinctly fertilizing. It catches one's fancy in its own crude +way, as pages and pages of infinitely more complicated stuff take +possession of, germinate, and sprout in one's imagination in +another way. We are all psychical parasites. Why, given his +epitaph, given the surroundings, I wager any sensitive +consciousness could have guessed at his face; and guessing, as it +were, would have feigned it. What do you think, Grisel?' + +'I think, dear, you are talking absolute nonsense; what do they +call it--"darkening counsel"? It's "the hair of the dog," Mr +Lawford.' + +'Well, then, you see,' said Herbert over a hasty mouthful, and +turning again to his victim--'then you see, when you were just in +the pink of condition to credit any idle tale you heard, then I +came in. What, with the least impetus, can one NOT see by +moonlight? The howl of a dog turns the midnight into a Brocken; +the branch of a tree stoops out at you like a Beelzebub crusted +with gadflies. I'd, mind you, sipped of the deadly old Huguenot +too. I'd listened to your innocent prattle about the child +kicking his toes out on death's cupboard door; what more likely +thing in the world, then, than that with that moon, in that +packed air, I should have swallowed the bait whole, and seen +Sabathier in every crevice of your skin? I don't say there wasn't +any resemblance; it was for the moment extraordinary; it was even +when you were here the other night distinctly arresting. But now +(poor old Grisel, I'm nearly done) all I want to say is this: +that if we had the "foxy old roue" here now, and Grisel played +Paris between the three of us, she'd hand over the apple not to +you but to me.' + +'I don't quite see where poor Paris comes in,' suggested Grisel +meekly. + +'No, nor do I,' said Herbert. 'All that I mean, sagacious child, +is, that Mr Lawford no more resembles the poor wretch now than I +resemble the Apollo Belvedere. If you had only heard my sister +scolding me, railing at me for putting such ideas into your +jangled head! They don't affect ME one iota. I have, I suppose, +what is usually called imagination; which merely means that I can +sup with the devil, spoon for spoon, and could sleep in +Bluebeard's linen-closet without turning a hair. You, if I am not +very much mistaken, are not much troubled with that very +unprofitable quality, and so, I suppose, when a crooked and +bizarre fancy does edge into your mind it roots there.' + +And that said, not without some little confusion, and covert +glance of inquiry at his sister, Herbert made all the haste he +could to catch up the course that his companions had already +finished. + +If only, Lawford thought, this insufferable weariness would lift +awhile he could enjoy the quiet, absurd, heedless talk, and this +very friendly topsy-turvy effort to ease his mind and soothe his +nerves. He might even take an interest again in his 'case.' + +'You see,' he said, turning to Grisel, 'I don't think it really +very much matters how it all came about. I never could believe it +would last. It may perhaps--some of it at least may be fancy. But +then, what isn't? What is trustworthy? And now your brother tells +me my hair's turning grey. I suppose I have been living too +slowly, too sluggishly, and they thought it was high time to stir +me up.' + +He saw with extraordinary vividness the low panelled room; the +still listening face; the white muslin shoulders and dark hair; +and the eyes that seemed to recall some far-off desolate longing +for home and childhood. It was all a dream. That was the end of +the matter. Even now, perhaps, his tired old stupid body was +lying hunched up, drenched with dew upon the little old seat +under the mist-wreathed branches. Soon it would bestir itself and +wake up and go off home--home to Sheila, to the old deadly round +that once had seemed so natural and inevitable, to the old dull +Lawford--eyes and brain and heart. + +They returned up the dark shallow staircase to Herbert's +book-room, and he talked on to very quiet and passive listeners +in his own fantastic endless fashion. And ever and again Lawford +would find himself intercepting fleeting and anxious glances at +his face, glances almost of remorse and pity; and thought he +detected beneath this irresponsible contradictory babble an +unceasing effort to clear the sky, to lure away too pressing +memories, to put his doubts and fears completely to rest. + +Herbert even went so far as to plead guilty, when Grisel gave him +the cue, of having a little heightened and overcoloured his story +of the restless phantasmal old creature that haunted their queer +wooden hauntable old house. And when they rose, laughing and +yawning to take up their candles, it was, after all, after a +rather animated discussion, with many a hair-raising ghost story +brought in for proof between brother and sister, as to exactly +how many times that snuff-coloured spectre had made his +appearance; and, with less unanimity still, as to the precise +manner in which he was in the habit of making his precipitant +exit. + +'You do at any rate acknowledge, Grisel, that the old creature +does appear, and that you saw him yourself step out into space +when you were sitting down there under the willow shelling peas. +I've seen him twice for certain, once rather hazily; Sallie saw +him so plainly she asked his business: that's five. I resign.' + +'Acknowledge!' said Grisel; 'of course I do. I'd acknowledge +anything in the world to save argument. Why, I don't know what I +should do without him. If only, now Mr Lawford would give him a +fair chance to show himself reading quietly here about ten +minutes to one, or shelling peas even, if he prefers it. If only +he'd stay long enough for THAT. Wouldn't it be the very thing for +them both!' + +'Of course,' said Herbert cordially, 'the very thing.' + +Lawford looked up at neither of them. He shook his head. + +But he needed little persuasion to stay at least one night. The +prospect of that long solitary walk, of that tired stupid +stooping figure dragging itself along the interminable country +roads seemed a sheer impossibility. 'It is not--it isn't, I swear +it--the other that beeps me back,' he had solemnly assured the +friend that half smiled her relief at his acceptance, 'but--if +you only knew how empty it's all got now; all reason gone even to +go on at all.' + +'But doesn't it follow? Of course it's empty. And now life is +going to begin again. I assure you it is, I do indeed. Only, only +have courage--just the will to win on.' + +He said good-night; shut-to the latched door of his long low +room, ceilinged with rafters close under the steep roof, its +brown walls hung with quiet, dark, pondering and beautiful faces +looking gravely across at him. And with his candle in his hand he +sat down on the bedside. All speculation was gone. The noisy +clock of his brain had run down again. He turned towards the old +oval looking-glass on the dressing-table without the faintest +stirring of interest, suspense, or anxiety. What did it matter +what a man looked like--a now familiar but enfeebled and +deprecating voice seemed to say. He knew that a change had come. +Even Sheila had noticed it. And since then what had he not gone +through? What now was here seemed of little moment, so far at +least as this world was concerned. + +At last with an effort he rose, crossed the uneven floor, and +looked in unmovedly on what was his own poor face come back to +him: changed indeed almost beyond belief from the sleek +self-satisfied genial yet languid Arthur Lawford of the past +years, and still haunted with some faint trace of the set and icy +sharpness, and challenge, and affront of the dark Adventurer, but +that--how immeasurably dimmed and blunted and faded. He had +expected to find it so. Would it (the thought vanished across his +mind) would it have been as unmistakably there had he come +hot-foot, fearing, expecting to find the other? But--was he +disappointed! + +He hardly knew how long he stood there, leaning on his hands, +surveying almost listlessly in the candle-light that lined, +bedraggled, grey, hopeless countenance, those dark-socketed, +smouldering eyes, whose pupils even now were so dilated that a +casual glance would have failed to detect the least hint of any +iris. 'It must have been something pretty bad you were, you know, +or something pretty bad you did,' they seemed to be trying to say +to him, 'to drag us down to this.' + +He knelt down by force of habit to say his prayers; but no words +came. Well, between earthly friends a betrayal such as this would +have caused a livelong estrangement and hostility. The God the +old Lawford used to pray to would forgive him, he thought +wearily, if just for the present he was a little too sore at +heart to play the hypocrite. But if, while kneeling, he said +nothing, he saw a good many things in such tranquillity and +clearness as the mere eyes of the body can share but rarely with +their sisters of the imagination. And now it was Alice who looked +mournfully out of the dark at him; and now the little old +charwoman, Mrs Gull, with her bag hooked over her arm, climbed +painfully up the area steps; and now it was the lean vexed face +of a friend, nursing some restless and anxious grievance against +him--Mr Bethany; and then and ever again it was the face of one +who seemed pure dream and fantasy and yet... He listened intently +and fancied even now he could hear the voices of brother and +sister talking quietly and circumspectly together in the room +beneath. + + + +CHAPTER EIGHTEEN + +A quiet knocking aroused him in the long, tranquil bedroom; and +Herbert's head was poked into the room. 'There's a bath behind +that door over there,' he whispered, `or if you like I'm off for +a bathe in the Widder. It's a luscious day. Shall I wait? All +right,' and the head was withdrawn. 'Don't put much on,' came the +voice at the panel; 'we'll be home again in twenty minutes.' + +The green and brightness of the morning must have been prepared +for overnight by spiders and the dew. Everywhere the gleaming +nets were hung, and everywhere there rose a tiny splendour from +the waterdrops, so clear and pure and changeable it seemed with +their fire and colour they shook a tiny crystal music in the air. +Herbert led the way along a clayey downward path beneath hazels +tossing softly together their twigs of nuts, until they came out +into a rounded hollow that, mounded with thyme, sloped gently +down to the green banks of the Widder. The water poured like +clearest glass beneath a rain of misty sunbeams. + +'My sister always says that this is the very dell Boccaccio had +in his mind's eye when he wrote the "Decameron." There really is +something almost classic in those pines. And I'd sometimes swear +with my eyes just out of the water I've seen Dryads half in +hiding peeping between those beeches. Good Lord, Lawford, +what a world we wretched moderns have made, and missed!' + +The water was violently cold. It seemed to Lawford, as it swept +up over his body, and as he plunged his night-distorted eyes +beneath its blazing surface, that it was charged with some +strange, powerful enchantment to wash away in its icy clearness +even the memory of the dull and tarnished days behind him. If one +could but tie up anyhow that stained bundle of inconsequent +memories called life, and fling it into a cupboard remoter even +than Bluebeard's, and lock the door, and drop the quickly-rusting +key into these living waters! + +He dressed himself with window thrown open to the blackbirds and +thrushes, and the occasional shrill solitary whistling of a +robin. But, like the sour-sweet fragrance of the brier, its +wandering desolate burst of music had power to wake memory, and +carried him instantly back to that first aimless descent into the +evening gloom of Widderstone from which it was in vain to hope +ever to climb again. Surely never a more ghoulish face looked out +on its man before than that which confronted him as with borrowed +razor he stood shaving those sunken chaps, that angular chin. + +And even now, beneath the lantern of broad daylight, just as +within that other face had lurked the undeniable ghost and +presence of himself, so beneath the sunken features seemed to +float, tenuous as smoke, scarcely less elusive than a dream, +between eye and object, the sinister darkness of the face that in +those two bouts with fear he had by some strange miracle managed +to repel. + +'Work in,' the chance phrase came back. It had worked in in sober +earnest; and so far as the living of the next few weeks went, +surely it might prove an ally without which he simply could not +conceive himself as struggling on at all. + +But as dexterous minds as even restless Sabathier's had him just +now in safe and kindly keeping. All the quiet October morning +Herbert kept him talking and stooping over his extraordinary +collection of books. + +'The point is,' he explained to Lawford, standing amid a positive +archipelago of precious 'finds,' with his foot hoisted onto a +chair and a patched-up, sea-stained folio on his knee, 'I +honestly detest the mere give and take of what we are fools +enough to call life. I don't deny Life's there,' he swept his +hand towards the open window--'in that frantic Tophet we call +London; but there's no focus, no point of vantage. Even a +scribbler only gets it piecemeal and through a dulled medium. We +learn to read before we know how to see; we swallow our tastes, +convictions, and emotions whole; so that nine-tenths of the +world's nectar is merely honeydew.' He smiled pleasantly into the +fixed vacancy of his visitor's face. 'That's why I've just gone +on,' he continued amiably, 'collecting this particular kind of +stuff--what you might call riff-raff. There's not a book here, +Lawford, that hasn't at least a glimmer of the real thing in it-- +just Life, seen through a living eye, and felt. As for +literature, and style, and all that gallimaufry, don't fear for +them if your author has the ghost of a hint of genius in his +making.' + +'But surely,' said Lawford, trying for the twentieth time to +pretend to himself that these endless books carried the faintest +savour of the delight to him which they must, he rather forlornly +supposed, shower upon Herbert, 'surely genius is a very rare +thing!' + +'Rare! the world simply swarms with it. But before you can bottle +it up in a book it's got to be articulate. Just for a single +instant imagine yourself Falstaff, and if there weren't hundreds +of Falstaffs in every generation, to be examples of his ungodly +life, he'd be as dead as a doornail to-morrow--imagine yourself +Falstaff, and being so, sitting down to write "Henry IV," or "The +Merry Wives." It's simply preposterous. You wouldn't be such a +fool as to waste the time. A mere Elizabethan scribbler comes +along with a gift of expression and an observant eye, lifts the +bloated old tippler clean out of life, and swims down the ages as +the greatest genius the world has ever seen. Whereas, surely, +though you mustn't let me bore you with all this piffle, it's +Falstaff is the genius, and W. S. merely a talented reporter. + +'Lear, Macbeth, Mercutio--they live on their own, as it were. The +newspapers are full of them, if we were only the Shakespeares to +see it. Have you ever been in a Police Court? Have you ever +WATCHED tradesmen behind their counters? My soul, the secrets +walking in the streets! You jostle them at every corner. There's +a Polonius in every first-class railway carriage, and as many +Juliets as there are boarding-schools. What the devil are you, +my dear chap, but genius itself, with all the world brand new +upon your shoulders? And who'd have thought it of you ten days +ago? + +'It's simply and solely because we're all, poor wretches, dumb-- +dumb as butts of Malmsez; dumb as drummerless drums. Here am I, +ass that I am, trickling out this--this whey that no more +expresses me than Tupper does Sappho. But that's what I want to +mean. How inexhaustibly rich everything is, if you only stick to +life. Here it is packed away behind these rotting covers, just +the real thing, no respectable stodge; no mere parasitic stuff; +not more than a dozen poets; scores of outcasts and vagabonds-- +and the real thing in vagabonds is pretty rare in print, I can +tell you. We're all, every one of us, sodden with facts, drugged +with the second-hand, and barnacled with respectability until-- +until the touch comes. Goodness knows where from; but there's no +mistaking it; oh no!' + +'But what,' said Lawford uneasily, 'what on earth do you mean by +the touch?' + +'I mean when you cease to be a puppet only and sit up in the +gallery too. When you squeeze through to the other side. When you +suffer a kind of conversion of the mind; become aware of your +senses. When you get a living inkling. When you become articulate +to yourself. When you SEE.' + +'I am awfully stupid,' Lawford murmured, 'but even now I don't +really follow you a bit. But when, as you say, you do become +articulate to yourself, what happens then?' + +'Why, then,' said Herbert with a shrug almost of despair, 'then +begins the weary tramp back. One by one drop off the truisms, and +the Grundyisms, and the pedantries, and all the stillborn +claptrap of the marketplace sloughs off. Then one can seriously +begin to think about saving one's soul.' + +'Saving one's soul,' groaned Lawford; 'why, I am not even sure of +my own body yet.' He walked slowly over to the window and with +every thought in his head as quiet as doves on a sunny wall, +stared out into the garden of green things growing, leaves fading +and falling water. 'I tell you what,' he said, turning +irresolutely, 'I wonder if you could possibly find time to write +me out a translation of Sabathier. My French is much too hazy to +let me really get at the chap. He's gone now; but I really should +like to know what kind of stuff exactly he has left behind.' + +'Oh, Sabathier!' said Herbert, laughing. 'What do you think of +that, Grisel?' he asked, turning to his sister, who at that +moment had looked in at the door. 'Here's Mr Lawford asking me to +make a translation of Sabathier. Lunch, Lawford.' + +Lawford sighed. And not until he had slowly descended half the +narrow uneven stairs that led down to the dining-room did he +fully realise the guile of a sister that could induce a hopeless +bookworm to waste a whole morning over the stupidest of +companions, simply to keep his tired-out mind from rankling, and +give his Sabathier a chance to go to roost. + +'I think, do you know,' he managed to blurt out at last 'I think +I ought to be getting home again. The house is empty--and--' + +'You shall go this evening,' said Herbert, 'if you really must +insist on it. But honestly, Lawford, we both think that after +what the last few days must have been, it is merely common sense +to take a rest. How can you possibly rest with a dozen empty +rooms echoing every thought you think? There's nothing more to +worry about; you agree to that. Send your people a note saying +that you are here, safe and sound. Give them a chance of lighting +a fire, and driving in the fatted calf. Stay on with us just the +week out.' + +Lawford turned from one to the other of the two friendly faces. +But what was dimly in his mind refused to express itself. 'I +think, you know, I--' he began falteringly. + +'But it's just this thinking that's the deuce--this preposterous +habit of having continually to make up one's mind. Off with his +head, Grisel! My sister's going to take you for a picnic; we go +every other fine afternoon; and you can argue it out with her.' + +Once alone again with Grisel, however, Lawford found talking +unnecessary. Silences seemed to fall between them as quietly and +restfully as evening flows into night. They walked on slowly +through the fading woods, and when they had reached the top of +the hill that sloped down to the dark and foamless Widder they +sat down in the honey-scented sunshine on a knoll of heather and +bracken, and Grisel lighted the little spirit-kettle she had +brought with her, and busied herself very methodically over +making tea. + +That done, she clasped her hands round her knees, and sat now +gossiping, now silent, in the pale autumnal beauty. There was a +bird wistfully twittering in the branches overhead, and ever and +again a withered leaf would slip circling down from the +motionless beech boughs arched in their stillness above their +heads beneath the thin blue sky. + +'Men, you know,' she began again suddenly, starting out of +reverie, 'really are absurdly blind; and just a little bit +absurdly kindly stupid. How many times have I been at the point +of laughing out at my brother's delicious naive subtleties. But +you do, you will, understand, Mr Lawford, that he was, that we +are both "doing our best"--to make amends?' + + +'I understand--I do indeed--a tenth part of all your kindness.' + +'Yes, but that's just it--that horrible word "kindness"! If ever +there were two utterly self-absorbed people, without a trace, +with an absolute horror of kindness, it is just my brother and I. +It's most of it false and most of it useless. We all surely must +take what comes in this topsy-turvy world. I believe in saying +out:--that the more one thinks about life the worse it becomes. +There are only two kinds of happiness in this world--a wooden +post's and Prometheus's. And who ever heard of any one having the +impudence to be kind to Prometheus? As for a miserable "medium" +like me, not quite a post and leagues and leagues from even +envying a Prometheus, she's better for the powder without the +jam. But that's all nothing. What I can't help thinking--and it's +not a bit giving my brother away, because we both think it--that +it was partly our thoughtlessness that added at least something +to--to the rest. It was perfectly absurd. He saw you were ill; he +saw--he must have seen even in that first Sunday talk--that your +nerves were all askew. And who doesn't know what "nerves" means +nowadays? And yet he deliberately chattered. He loves it--just at +large, you know, like me. I told him before I came out that I +intended, if I could, to say all this. And now it's said you'll +please forgive me for going back to it.' + +'Please don't talk about forgiveness. But when you say he +chattered, you mean about Sabathier, of course. And that, you +know, I don't care a fig for now. We can settle all that between +ourselves--him and me, I mean. And now tell me candidly again--Is +there any "prey" in my face now?' + +She looked up fleetingly into his eyes, leant back her head and +laughed. '"Prey," there never was a glimpse.' + +'And "change"?' Their eyes met again in an infinitely brief, +infinitely bewildering argument. + +'Really, really, scarcely perceptible,' she assured him, 'except, +of course, how horribly, horribly ill you look. And that only +seems to prove to me you must be hiding something else. No +illusion on earth could--could have done that to your face.' + +'You think, I know,' he persisted, 'that I must be persuaded and +cosseted and humoured. Yes, you do; it's my poor old sanity +that's really in both your minds. Perhaps I am--not absolutely +sound. Anyhow. I've been watching it in your looks at each other +all the time. And I can never, never say, never tell you what you +have done for me. But you see, after all, we did win through; I +keep on telling myself that. So that now it's purely from the +most selfish and practical motives that I want you to be +perfectly frank with me. I have to go back, you know; and some of +them, one or two of my friends I mean, are not all on my side. +Think of me as I was when you came into the room, three centuries +ago, and you turned and looked, frowning at me in the +candle-light; remember that and look at me now. What is the +difference? Does it shock you? Does it make the whole world seem +a trick, a sham? Does it simply sour your life to think such a +thing possible? Oh, the hours I've spent gloating on +Widderstone's miserable mask of skin and bone, as I was saying to +your brother only last night, and never knew until they shuffled +me that the old self too was nothing better than a stifling +suffocating mask.' + +'But don't you see,' she argued softly, turning her face away a +little, 'you were a stranger then (though I certainly didn't mean +to frown). And then a little while after we were, well, just +human beings, shoulder to shoulder, and if friendship does not +mean that, I don't know what it does mean. And now, you are-- +well, just you: the you, you know, of three centuries ago! And if +you mean to ask me whether at any precise moment I have been +conscious that this you I am now speaking to was not the you of +last night, or of that dark climb up the hill, why, it is simply +frantic to think it could ever be necessary to say over and over +again, No. But if you mean, Have you changed else? All I could +answer is, Don't we all change as we grow to know one another? +What were just features, what just dingily represented one, as it +were, is forgotten, or rather gets remembered. Of course, the +first glimpse is the landscape under lightning as it were. But +afterwards isn't it surely like the alphabet to a child; what was +first a queer angular scrawl becomes A, and is always ever after +A, undistinguished, half-forgotten, yet standing at last for +goodness knows what real wonderful things--or for just the dry +bones of soulless words? Is that it?" She stole a sidelong glance +into his brooding face, leaning her head on her hand. + +'Yes, yes,' came the rather dissatisfied reply. "I do agree; +perfectly. But then, you see--I told you I was going to talk of +nothing but myself--what did at first happen to me was something +much worse, and, I suppose, something quite different from that.' + +'And yet, didn't you tell us, that of all your friends not one +really denied in their hearts your--what they would call, I +suppose--your IDENTITY; except that poor little offended old +lady. And even she, if my intuition is worth a penny piece, even +she when you go soon and talk to her will own that she did know +you, and that it was not because you were a stranger that she was +offended, but because you so ungenerously pretended to be one. +That was a little mad, now, if you like!' + +'Oh yes,' said Lawford, 'I am going to ask her forgiveness. I +don't know what I didn't vow to take her for a peace-offering if +the chance should ever come--and the courage--to make my peace +with her. But now that the chance has come, and I think the +courage, it is the desire that's gone. I don't seem to care +either way. I feel as if I had got past making my peace with any +one.' + +But this time no answer helped him out. + +'After all,' he went plodding on, 'there is more than just the +mere day to day to consider. And one doesn't realise that one's +face actually IS one's fortune without a shock. And that THAT +gone, one is, as your brother said, just like a bee come back to +the wrong hive. It undermines,' he smiled rather bitterly, 'one's +views rather. And it certainly shifts one's friends. If it hadn't +been just for my old'--he stopped dead, and again pushed slowly +on--'if it hadn't been for our old friend, Mr Bethany, I doubt if +we should now have had a soul on our side. I once read somewhere +that wolves always chase the old and weak and maimed out of the +pack. And after all, what do we do? Where do we keep the homeless +and the insane? And yet, you know,' he added ruminatingly, 'it is +not as if mine was ever a particularly lovely or lovable face! +While as for the poor wretch behind it, well, I really cannot see +what meaning, or life even, he had before--' + +'Before?' + +Lawford met bravely the clear whimsical eyes. 'Before, I was +Sabathiered.' + +Grisel laughed outright. + +'You think,' he retorted almost bitterly, 'you think I am talking +like a child.' + +'Yes,' she sighed cheerfully, 'I was quite envying you.' + +'Well, there I am,' said Lawford inconsequently. 'And now; well, +now, I suppose, the whole thing's to begin again. I can't help +beginning to wonder what the meaning of it all is; why one's duty +should always seem so very stupid a thing. And then, too, what +can there be on earth that even a buried Sabathier could desire?' +He glanced up in a really animated perplexity at the still, dark +face turned in the evening light towards the darkening valley. +And perplexity deepened into a disquieted frown--like that of a +child who is roused suddenly from a daydream by the +half-forgotten question of a stranger. He turned his eyes almost +furtively away as if afraid of disturbing her; and for awhile +they sat in silence... At last he turned again almost shyly. 'I +hope some day you will let me bring my daughter to see you.' + +'Yes, yes,' said Grisel eagerly; 'we should both LOVE it, of +course. Isn't it curious?--I simply KNEW you had a daughter. +Sheer intuition!' + +'I say "some day,"' said Lawford; 'I know, though, that that some +day will never come.' + +'Wait; just wait,' replied the quiet confident voice, 'that will +come too. One thing at a time, Mr Lawford. You've won your old +self back again; you'll win your old love of life back again in a +little while; never fear. Oh, don't I know that awful Land's End +after illness; and that longing, too, that gnawing longing, too, +for Ultima Thule. So, it's a bargain between us that you bring +your daughter soon.' She busied herself over the tea things. +'And, of course,' she added, as if it were an afterthought, +looking across at him in the pale green sunlight as she knelt, +'you simply won't think of going back to-night.... Solitude, I +really do think, solitude just now would be absolute madness. +You'll write to-day and go, perhaps, to-morrow!' + +Lawford looked across in his mind at his square ungainly house, +full-fronting the afternoon sun. He tried to repress a shudder. +'I think, do you know, I ought to go to-day.' + +'Well, why not? Why not? Just to reassure yourself that all's +well. And come back here to sleep. If you'd really promise that +I'd drive you in. I'd love it. There's the jolliest little +governess-cart we sometimes hire for our picnics. Way I? You've +no idea how much easier in our minds my brother and I would be if +you would. And then to-morrow, or at any rate the next day, you +shall be surrendered, whole and in your right mind. There, that's +a bargain too. Now we must hurry.' + + + +CHAPTER NINETEEN + +Herbert himself went down to order the governess cart, and packed +them in with a rug. And in the dusk Grisel set Lawford down at +the corner of his road and drove on to an old bookseller's with a +commission from her brother, promising to return for him in an +hour. Dust and a few straws lay at rest as if in some abstruse +arrangement on the stones of the porch just as the last faint +whirling gust of sunset had left them. Shut lids of sightless +indifference seemed to greet the wanderer from the curtained +windows. + +He opened the door and went in. For a moment he stood in the +vacant hall; then he peeped first into the blind-drawn +dining-room, faintly, dingily sweet, like an empty wine-bottle. +He went softly on a few paces and just opening the door looked in +on the faintly glittering twilight of the drawing-room. But the +congealed stump of candle that he had set in the corner as a +final rancorous challenge to the beaten Shade was gone. He slowly +and deliberately ascended the stairs, conscious of a peculiar +sense of ownership of what in even so brief an absence had taken +on so queer a look of strangeness. It was almost as if he might +be some lone heir come in the rather mournful dusk to view what +melancholy fate had unexpectedly bestowed on him. + +'Work in'--what on earth else could this chill sense of +strangeness mean? Would he ever free his memory from that one +haphazard, haunting hint? And as he stood in the doorway of the +big, calm room, which seemed even now to be stirring with the +restless shadow of these last few far-away days; now pacing +sullenly to and fro; now sitting hunched-up to think; and now +lying impotent in a vain, hopeless endeavour only for the breath +of a moment to forget--he awoke out of reverie to find himself +smiling at the thought that a changed face was practically at the +mercy of an incredulous world, whereas a changed heart was no +one's deadly dull affair but its owner's. The merest breath of +pity even stole over him for the Sabathier who after all had +dared and had needed, perhaps, nothing like so arrogant and +merciless a coup de grace to realise that he had so ignominiously +failed. + +'But there, that's done!' he exclaimed out loud, not without a +tinge of regret that theories, however brilliant and bizarre, +could never now be anything else--that now indeed that the +symptoms had gone, the 'malady,' for all who had not been +actually admitted into the shocked circle, was become nothing +more than an inanely 'tall' story; stuffing not even savoury +enough for a goose. How wide exactly, he wondered, would Sheila's +discreet, shocked circle prove? He stood once more before the +looking-glass, hearing again Grisel's words in the still green +shadow of the beech-tree, 'Except of course, horribly, horribly +ill.' 'What a fool, what a coward she thinks I am!' + +There was still nearly an hour to be spent in this great barn of +faded interests. He lit a candle and descended into the kitchen. +A mouse went scampering to its hole as he pushed open the door. +The memory of that ravenous morning meal nauseated him. It was +sour and very still here; he stood erect; the air smelt faint of +earth. In the breakfast-room the bookcase still swung open. Late +evening mantled the garden; and in sheer ennui again he sat down +to the table, and turned for a last not unfriendly hob-a-nob with +his poor old friend Sabathier. He would take the thing back. +Herbert, of course, was going to translate it for him. Now if the +patient old Frenchman had stormed Herbert instead--that surely +would have been something like a coup! Those frenzied books. The +absurd talk of the man. Herbert was perfectly right--he could +have entertained fifty old Huguenots without turning a hair. 'I'm +such an awful stodge.' + +He turned the woolly leaves over very slowly. He frowned +impatiently, and from the end backwards turned them over again. +Then he laid the book softly down on the table and sat back. He +stared with narrowed lids into the flame of his quiet friendly +candle. Every trace, every shred of portrait and memoir were +gone. Once more, deliberately, punctiliously, he examined page by +page the blurred and unfamiliar French--the sooty heads, the +long, lean noses, the baggy eyes passing like figures in a +peepshow one by one under his hand--to the last fragmentary and +dexterously mended leaf. Yes, Sabathier was gone. Quite the old +slow Lawford smile crept over his face at the discovery. It was a +smile a little sheepish too, as he thought of Sheila's quiet +vigilance. + +And the next instant he had looked up sharply, with a sudden +peculiar shrug, and a kind of cry, like the first thin cry of an +awakened child, in his mind. Without a moment's hesitation he +climbed swiftly upstairs again to the big sepulchral bedroom. He +pressed with his fingernail the tiny spring in the looking-glass. +The empty drawer flew open. There were finger-marks still in the +dust. + +Yet, strangely enough, beneath all the clashing thoughts that +came flocking into his mind as he stood with the empty drawer in +his hand, was a wounding yet still a little amused pity for his +old friend Mr Bethany. So far as he himself was concerned the +discovery--well, he would have plenty of time to consider +everything that could possibly now concern himself. Anyhow, it +could only simplify matters. + +He remembered waking to that old wave of sickening horror on the +first unhappy morning; he remembered the keen yet owlish old face +blinking its deathless friendliness at him, and the steady +pressure of the cold, skinny hand. As for Sheila, she had never +done anything by halves; certainly not when it came to throwing +over a friend no longer necessary to one's social satisfaction. +But she would edge out cleverly, magnanimously, triumphantly +enough, no doubt, when the day of reckoning should come, the day +when, her nets wide spread, her bait prepared, he must stand up +before her outraged circle and positively prove himself her +lawful husband, perhaps even to the very imprint of his thumb. + +'Poor old thing!' he said again; and this time his pity was +shared almost equally between both witnesses to Mr Bethany's +ingenuous little document, the loss of which had fallen so softly +and pathetically that he felt only ashamed of having discovered +it so soon. + +He shut back the tell-tale drawer, and after trying to collect +his thoughts in case anything should have been forgotten, he +turned with a deep trembling sigh to descend the stairs. But on +the landing he drew back at the sound of voices, and then a +footstep. Soon came the sound of a key in the lock. He blew out +his candle and leant listening over the balusters. + +'Who's there?' he called quietly. + +'Me, sir,' came the feeble reply out of the darkness. + +'What is it, Ada? What have you come for?' + +'Only, sir, to see that all was safe, and you were in, sir.' + +'Yes,' he said. 'All's safe; and I am in. What if I had been +out?' It was like dropping tiny pebbles into a deep well--so long +after came the answering feeble splash. + +'Then I was to go back, sir.' And a moment after the discreet +voice floated up with the faintest tinge of effrontery out of the +hush. 'Is that Dr Ferguson, too sir?' + +'No, Ada; and please tell your mistress from me that Dr Ferguson +is unlikely to call again.' A keen but rather forlorn smile +passed over his face. 'He's dining with friends no doubt at +Holloway. But of course if she should want to see him he will see +her to-morrow at any hour at Mrs Lovat's. And--Ada!' + +'Yes, sir?' + +'Say that I'm a little better; your mistress will be relieved to +hear that I'm a little better; still not quite myself say, but, I +think, a little better.' + +'Yes, sir; and I'm sure I'm very glad to hear it,' came fainter +still. + +'What voice was that I heard just now?' + +'Miss Alice's, sir; but she came quite against my wishes, and I +hope you won't repeat it, sir. She promised if she came that +mistress shouldn't know. I was only afraid she might disturb you, +or--or Dr Ferguson. And did you say, sir, that I was to tell +mistress that he MIGHT be coming back?' + +'Ah, that I don't know; so perhaps it would be as well not to +mention him at all. Is Miss Alice there?' + +'I said I would tell her if you were alone. But I hope you'll +understand that it was only because she begged so. Mistress has +gone to St Peter's bazaar; and that's how it was.' + +'I quite understand. Beckon to her.' + +There came a hasty step in the hall and a hurried murmur of +explanation. Lawford heard her call as she ran up the stairs; and +the next moment he had Alice's hand in his and they were groping +together through the gloaming back into the solitude of the empty +room again. + +'Don't he alarmed, dear,' he heard himself imploring. Just hold +tight to that clear common sense, and above all you won't tell? +It must be our secret; a dead, dead secret from every one, even +your mother, for just a little while; just a mere two days or +so--in case. I'm--I'm better, dear.' + +He fumbled with the little box of matches, dropped one, broke +another; but at last the candle-flame dipped, brightened, and +with the door shut and the last pale blueness of dusk at the +window Lawford turned and looked at his daughter. She stood with +eyes wide open, like the eyes of a child walking in its sleep; +then twisted her fingers more tightly within his. 'Oh, dearest, +how ill, how ill you look,' she whispered. 'But there, never +mind--never mind. It was all a miserable dream, then; it won't, +it can't come back? I don't think I could bear its coming back. +And mother told me such curious things; as if I were a child and +understood nothing. And even after I knew that you were you--I +mean before I sat up here in the dark to see you--she said that +you were gone and would never come back; that a terrible thing +had happened--a disgrace which we must never speak of; and that +all the other was only a pretence to keep people from talking. +But I did not believe then, and how could I believe afterwards?' + +'There, never mind now, dear, what she said. It was all meant for +the best, perhaps. But here I am; and not nearly so ill as I +look, Alice; and there's nothing more to trouble ourselves about; +not even if it should be necessary for me to go away for a time. +And this is our secret, mind; ours only; just a dead secret +between you and me.' + +They sat for awhile without speaking or stirring. And faintly +along the hushed road Lawford heard in the silence a leisurely +indolent beat of little hoofs approaching, and the sound of +wheels. A sudden wave of feeling swept over him. He took Alice's +quiet loving face in his hands and kissed her passionately. 'Do +not so much as think of me yet, or doubt, or question: only love +me, dearest. And soon--and soon--' + +'We'll just begin again, just begin again, won't we? all three of +us together, just as we used to be. I didn't mean to have said +all those horrid things about mother. She was only dreadfully +anxious and meant everything for the best. You'll let me tell her +soon?' + +The haggard face turned slowly, listening. 'I hear, I understand, +but I can't think very clearly now, Alice; I can't, dear; my +miserable old tangled nerves. I just stumble along as best I can. +You'll understand better when you get to be a poor old thing like +me. We must do the best we can. And of course you'll see, Dillie, +how awfully important it is not to raise false hopes. You +understand? I mustn't risk the least thing in the world, must I? +And now goodbye; only for a few hours now. And not a word, not a +word to a single living soul.' + +He extinguished the candle again, and led the way to the top of +the stairs. 'Are you there, Ada?' + +'Yes, sir,' answered the quiet imperturbable voice from under the +black straw brim. Alice went slowly down, but at the foot of the +stairs, looking out into the cold, blue, lamplit street she +paused as if at a sudden recollection, and ran hastily up again. + +'There was nothing more, dear?' She said, leaning back to peer +up. + +'"Nothing more?" What?' + +She stood panting a little in the darkness, listening to some +cautious yet uneasy thought that seemed to haunt her mind. 'I +thought--it seemed there was something we had not said, something +I could not understand. But there, it is nothing! You know what a +fanciful old silly I am. You do love me? Quite as much as ever?' + +'More, sweetheart, more!' + +'Good-night again, then; and God bless you, dear.' + +The outer door closed softly, the footsteps died away. Lawford +still hesitated. He took hold of the stairs above his head as he +stood on the landing and leaned his head upon his hands, striving +calmly to disentangle the perplexity of his thoughts. His pulses +were beating in his ear with a low muffled roar. He looked down +between the blinds to where against the blue of the road beneath +the straggling yellow beams of the lamp stood the little cart and +drooping, shaggy pony, and Grisel sitting quietly there awaiting +him. He shut his eyes as if in hope by some convulsive effort of +mind to break through this subtle glasslike atmosphere of dream +that had stolen over consciousness, and blotted out the +significance, almost the meaning of the past. He turned abruptly. +Empty as the empty rooms around him, unanswering were mind and +heart. Life was a tale told by an idiot--signifying nothing. + +He paused at the head of the staircase. And even then the doubt +confronted him: Would he ever come back? Who knows? he thought; +and again stood pondering, arguing, denying. At last he seemed to +have come to a decision. He made his way downstairs, opened and +left ajar a long narrow window in a passage to the garden beyond +the kitchen. He turned on his heel as he reached the gate and +waved his hand as if in a kind of forlorn mockery towards the +darkly glittering windows. The drowsy pony awoke at touch of the +whip. + +Grisel lifted the rug and squeezed a little closer into the +corner. She had drawn a veil over her face, so that to Lawford +her eyes seemed to be dreaming in a little darkness of their own +as he laid his hand on the side of the cart. 'It's a most curious +thing,' he said, 'but peeping down at you just now when the sound +of the wheels came, a memory came clearly back to me of years and +years ago--of my mother. She used to come to fetch me at school +in a little cart like this, and a little pony just like this, +with a thick dusty coat. And once I remember I was simply sick of +everything, a failure, and fagged out, and all that, and was +looking out in the twilight; I fancy even it was autumn too. It +was a little side staircase window; I was horribly homesick. And +she came quite unexpectedly. I shall never forget it--the misery, +and then, her coming.' He lifted his eyes, cowed with the +incessant struggle, and watched her face for some time in +silence. 'Ought I to stay?' + +'I see no "ought,"' she said. 'No one is there?' + +'Only a miserable broken voice out of a broken cage--called +Conscience.' + +'Don't you think, perhaps, that even that has a good many +disguises--convention, cowardice, weakness, ennui; they all take +their turn at hooting in its feathers? You must, you really must +have rest. You don't know; you don't see; I do. Just a little +snap, some one last exquisite thread gives way, and then it is +all over. You see I have even to try to frighten you, for I can't +tell you how you distress me.' + +'Why do I distress you?--my face, my story you mean?' + +'No; I mean you: your trouble, that horrible empty house, and-- +oh, dear me, yes, your courage too.' + +'Listen,' said Lawford, stooping forward. He could scarcely see +the pale, veiled face through this mist that had risen up over +his eyes. 'I have no courage apart from you; no courage and no +hope. Ask me to come!--a stranger with no history, no mockery, no +miserable rant of a grave and darkness and fear behind me. Are we +not all haunted--every one? That forgotten, and the fool I was, +and the vacillating, and the pretence--oh, how it all sweeps +clear before me; without a will, without a hope or glimpse or +whisper of courage. Be just the memory of my mother, the face, +the friend I've never seen; the voice that every dream leaves +echoing. Ask me to come.' + +She sat unstirring; and then as if by some uncontrollable impulse +stooped a little closer to him and laid her gloved hand on his. + +'I hear, you know; I hear too,' she whispered. 'But we mustn't +listen. Come now. It's growing late.' + +The little village echoed back from its stone walls the clatter +of the pony's hoofs. Night had darkened to its deepest when their +lamp shone white on the wicket in the hedge. They had scarcely +spoken. Lawford had simply watched pass by, almost without a +thought, the arching trees, the darkening fields; had watched +rise up in a mist of primrose light the harvest moon to shine in +saffron on the faces and shoulders of the few wayfarers they met, +or who passed them by. The still grave face beneath the shadow of +its veil had never turned, though the moon poured all her flood +of brilliance upon the dark profile. And once when as if in +sudden alarm he had lifted his head and looked at her, a sudden +doubt had assailed him so instantly that he had half put out his +hand to touch her, and had as quickly withdrawn it, lest her +beauty and stillness should be, even as the moment's fancy had +suggested, only a far-gone memory returned in dream. + +Herbert hailed them from the darkness of an open window. He came +down, and they talked a little in the cold air of the garden. He +lit a cigarette, and climbed languidly into the cart, and drove +the drowsy little pony off into the moonlight. + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY + +It was a quiet supper the three friends sat down to. Herbert sat +narrowing his eyes over his thoughts, which, when the fancy took +him, he scattered out upon the others' silence. Lawford +apparently had not yet shaken himself free from the sorcery of +the moonlight. His eyes shone dark and full like those of a child +who has trespassed beyond its hour for bed, and sits marvelling +at reality in a waking dream. + +Long after they had bidden each other good-night, long after +Herbert had trodden on tiptoe with his candle past his closed +door, Lawford sat leaning on his arms at the open window, staring +out across the motionless moonlit trees that seemed to stand like +draped and dreaming pilgrims, come to the peace of their Nirvana +at last beside the crashing music of the waters. And he himself, +the self that never sleeps beneath the tides and waves of +consciousness, was listening, too, almost as unmovedly and +unheedingly to the thoughts that clashed in conflict through his +brain. + +Why, in a strange transitory life was one the slave of these +small cares? What if even in that dark pit beneath, which seemed +to whisper Lethe to the tumultuous, swirling waters--what if +there, too, were merely a beginning again, and to seek a +slumbering refuge there merely a blind and reiterated plunge into +the heat and tumult of another day? Who was that poor, dark, +homeless ghoul, Sabathier? Who was this Helen of an impossible +dream? Her face with its strange smile, her eyes with their still +pity and rapt courage had taken hope away. 'Here's not your rest,' +cried one insistent voice; 'she is the mystery that haunts day +and night, past all the changing of the restless hours. Chance +has given you back eyes to see, a heart that can be broken. Chance +and the stirrings of a long-gone life have torn down the veil age +spins so thick and fast. Pride and ambition; what dull fools men +are! Effort and duty, what dull fools men are!' He listened on +and on to these phantom pleadings and to the rather coarse old +Lawford conscience grunting them mercilessly down, too weary even +to try to rest. + +Rooks at dawn came sweeping beneath the turquoise of the sky. He +saw their sharp-beaked heads turn this way, that way, as they +floated on outspread wings across the misty world. Except for the +hoarse roar of the water under the huge thin-leafed trees, not a +sound was stirring. 'One thing,' he seemed to hear himself mutter +as he turned with a shiver from the morning air, 'it won't be for +long. You can, at least, poor devil, wait the last act out.' If +in this foolish hustling mob of the world, hired anywhere and +anywhen for the one poor dubious wage of a penny--if it was only +his own small dull part to carry a mock spear, and shout huzza +with the rest--there was nothing for it, he grunted obstinately +to himself, shout he would with the loudest. + +He threw himself on to the bed with eyes so wearied with want of +sleep it seemed they had lost their livelong skill in finding it. +Not the echo of triumph nor even a sigh of relief stirred the +torpor of his mind. He knew vaguely that what had been the misery +and madness of the last few days was gone. But the thought had no +power to move him now. Sheila's good sense, and Mr Bethany's +stubborn loyalty were alike old stories that had lost their +savour and meaning. Gone, too, was the need for that portentous +family gathering that had sat so often in his fancy during these +last few days around his dining-room table, discussing with +futile decorum the problem of how to hush him up, to muffle him +down. Half dreaming, half awake, he saw the familiar door slowly +open and, like the timely hero in a melodrama, his own figure +appear before the stricken and astonished company. His eyes +opened half-fearfully, and glanced up in the morning twilight. +Their perplexity gave place to a quiet, almost vacant smile; the +lids slowly closed again, and at last the lean hands twitched +awhile in sleep. + +Next morning he spent rummaging among the old books, dipping +listlessly here and there as the tasteless fancy took him, while +Herbert sat writing with serene face and lifted eyebrows at his +open window. But the unfamiliar long S's, the close type, and the +spelling of the musty old books wearied eye and mind. What he +read, too, however far-fetched, or lively, or sententious, or +gross, seemed either to be of the same texture as what had become +his everyday experience, and so baffled him with its nearness, or +else was only the meaningless ramblings of an idle pen. And this, +he thought to himself, looking covertly up at the spruce +clear-cut profile at the window, this is what Herbert had called +Life. + +'Am I interrupting you, Herbert; are you very busy?' he asked at +last, taking refuge on a chair in a far corner of the room. + +'Bless me, no; not a bit--not a bit,' said Herbert amiably, +laying down his pen. 'I'm afraid the old leatherjackets have been +boring you. It's a habit this beastly reading; this gorge and +glint and fever all at second-hand--purely a bad habit, like +morphia, like laudanum. But once in, you know there's no recovery +Anyhow, I'm neck-deep, and to struggle would be simply to drown.' + +'I was only going to say how sorry I am for having left Sabathier +at home.' + +'My dear fellow--' began Herbert reassuringly. + +'It was only because I wanted so very much to have your +translation. I get muddled up with other things groping through +the dictionary.' + +Herbert surveyed him critically. 'What exactly is your interest +now, Lawford? You don't mean that my old "theory" has left any +sting now?' + +'No sting; oh no. I was only curious. But you yourself still +think it really, don't you?' + +Herbert turned for a moment to the open window. + +'I was simply trying then to find something to fit the facts as +you experienced them. But now that the facts have gone--and they +have, haven't they?--exit, of course, my theory!' + +'I see,' was the cryptic answer. 'And yet, Herbert,' Lawford +solemnly began again, 'it has changed me; even in my way of +thinking. When I shut my eyes now--I only discovered it by +chance--I see immediately faces quite strange to me; or places, +sometimes thronged with people; and once an old well with some +one sitting in the shadow. I can't tell you how clearly, and yet +it is all altogether different from a dream. Even when I sit with +my eyes open, I am conscious, as it were, of a kind of faint, +colourless mirage. In the old days--I mean before Widderstone, +what I saw was only what I'd seen already. Nothing came uncalled +for, unexplained. This makes the old life seem so blank; I did +not know what extraordinarily real things I was doing without. +And whether for that reason or another, I can't quite make out +what in fact I did want then, and was always fretting and +striving for. I can see no wisdom or purpose in anything now but +to get to one's journey's end as quickly and bravely as one can. +And even then, even if we do call life a journey, and death the +inn we shall reach at last in the evening when it's over; that, +too, I feel will be only as brief a stopping-place as any other +inn would be. Our experience here is so scanty and shallow-- +nothing more than the moment of the continual present. Surely +that must go on, even if one does call it eternity. And so we +shall all have to begin again. Probably Sabathier himself.... But +there, what on earth are we, Herbert, when all is said? Who is it +has--has done all this for us--what kind of self? And to what +possible end? Is it that the clockwork has been wound up and must +still jolt on a while with jarring wheels? Will it never run +down, do you think?' + +Herbert smiled faintly, but made no answer. + +'You see,' continued Lawford, in the same quiet, dispassionate +undertone, 'I wouldn't mind if it was only myself. But there are +so many of us, so many selves, I mean; and they all seem to have +a voice in the matter. What is the reality to this infernal +dream?' + +'The reality is, Lawford, that you are fretting your life out +over this rotten illusion. Be guided by me just this once. We'll +go, all three of us, a good ten-mile walk to-day, and thoroughly +tire you out. And to-night you shall sleep here--a really sound, +refreshing sleep. Then to-morrow, whole and hale, back you shall +go; honestly. It's only professional strong men should ask +questions. Babes like you and me must keep to slops.' + +So, though Lawford made no answer, it was agreed. Before noon the +three of them had set out on their walk across the fields. And +after rambling on just as caprice took them, past reddening +blackberry bushes and copses of hazel, and flaming beech, they +sat down to spread out their meal on the slope of a hill, +overlooking quiet ploughed fields and grazing cattle. Herbert +stretched himself with his back to the earth, and his placid face +to the pale vacant sky, while Lawford, even more dispirited after +his walk, wandered up to the crest of the hill. + +At the foot of the hill, upon the other side, lay a farm and its +out-buildings, and a pool of water beneath a group of elms. It +was vacant in the sunlight, and the water vividly green with a +scum of weed. And about half a mile beyond stood a cluster of +cottages and an old towered church. He gazed idly down, listening +vaguely to the wailing of a curlew flitting anxiously to and fro +above the broken solitude of its green hill. And it seemed as if +a thin and dark cloud began to be quietly withdrawn from over his +eyes. Hill and wailing cry and barn and water faded out. And he +was staring as if in an endless stillness at an open window +against which the sun was beating in a bristling torrent of gold, +while out of the garden beyond came the voice of some evening +bird singing with such an unspeakable ecstasy of grief it seemed +it must be perched upon the confines of another world. The light +gathered to a radiance almost intolerable, driving back with its +raining beams some memory, forlorn, remorseless, remote. His body +stood dark and senseless, rocking in the air on the hillside as +if bereft of its spirit. Then his hands were drawn over his eyes. +He turned unsteadily and made his way, as if through a thick, +drizzling haze, slowly back. + +'What is that--there?' he said almost menacingly, standing with +bloodshot eyes looking down upon Herbert. + +'"That!"--what?' said Herbert, glancing up startled from his +book. 'Why, what's wrong, Lawford?' + +'That,' said Lawford sullenly, yet with a faintly mournful +cadence in his voice; 'those fields and that old empty farm--that +village over there? Why did you bring me here?' + +Grisel had not stirred. 'The village...' + +'Ssh!' she said, catching her brother's sleeve; 'that's Detcham, +yes, Detcham.' + +Lawford turned wide vacant eyes on her. He shook his head and +shuddered. 'No, no; not Detcham. I know it; I know it; but it has +gone out of my mind. Not Detcham; I've been there before; don't +look at me. Horrible, horrible. It takes me back--I can't think. +I stood there, trying, trying; it's all in a blur. Don't ask me-- +a dream.' + +Grisel leaned forward and touched his hand. 'Don't think; don't +even try. Why should you? We can't; we MUSTN'T go back.' + +Lawford, still gazing fixedly, turned again a darkened face +towards the steep of the hill. 'I think, you know,' he said, +stooping and whispering, 'HE would know--the window and the sun +and the singing. And oh, of course it was too late. You +understand--too late. And once... you can't go back; oh no. You +won't leave me? You see, if you go, it would only be all. I could +not be quite so alone. But Detcham--Detcham? perhaps you will not +trust me--tell me? That was not the name.' He shuddered violently +and turned dog-like beseeching eyes. 'To-morrow--yes, to-morrow,' +he said, 'I will promise anything if you will not leave me now. +Once--' But again the thread running so faintly through that +inextricable maze of memory eluded him. 'So long as you won't +leave me now!' he implored her. + +She was vainly trying to win back her composure, and could not +answer him at once.... + +In the evening after supper Grisel sat her guest down in front of +a big wood fire in the old book-room, where, staring into the +playing flames, he could fall at peace into the almost motionless +reverie which he seemed merely to harass and weary himself by +trying to disperse. She opened the little piano at the far end of +the room and played on and on as fancy led--Chopin and Beethoven, +a fugue from Bach, and lovely forlorn old English airs, till the +music seemed not only a voice persuading, pondering, and +lamenting, but gathered about itself the hollow surge of the +water and the darkness; wistful and clear, as the thoughts of a +solitary child. Ever and again a log burnt through its strength, +and falling amid sparks, stirred, like a restless animal, the +stillness; or Herbert in his corner lifted his head to glance +towards his visitor, and to turn another page. At last the music, +too, fell silent, and Lawford stood up with his candle in his +hand and eyed with a strange fixity brother and sister. His +glance wandered slowly round the quiet flame-lit room. + +'You won't,' he said, stooping towards them as if in extreme +confidence, 'you won't much notice? They come and go. I try not +to--to speak. It's the only way through. It is not that I don't +know they're only dreams. But if once the--the others thought +there had been any tampering'--he tapped his forehead meaningly-- +'here: if once they thought that, it would, you know, be quite +over then. How could I prove...?' He turned cautiously towards +the door, and with laborious significance nodded his head at +them. + +Herbert bent down and held out his long hands to the fire. +'Tampering, my dear chap: That's what the lump said to the +leaven.' + +'Yes, yes,' said Lawford, putting out his hand, 'but you know +what I mean, Herbert. Anything I tried to do then would be quite, +quite hopeless. That would be poisoning the wells.' + +They watched him out of the room, and listened till quite +distinctly in the still night-shaded house they heard his door +gently close. Then, as if by consent, they turned and looked long +and questioningly into each other's faces. + +'Then you are not afraid?' Herbert said quietly. + +Grisel gazed steadily on, and almost imperceptibly shook her +head. + +'You mean?' he questioned her; but still he had again to read her +answer in her eyes. + +'Oh, very well, Grisel,' he said quietly, 'you know best,' and +returned once more to his writing. + +For an hour or two Lawford slept heavily, so heavily that when a +little after midnight he awoke, with his face towards the +uncurtained window, though for many minutes he lay brightly +confronting all Orion, that from blazing helm to flaming dog at +heel filled high the glimmering square, he could not lift or stir +his cold and leaden limbs. He rose at last and threw off the +burden of his bedclothes, and rested awhile, as if freed from the +heaviness of an unrememberable nightmare. But so clear was his +mind and so extraordinarily refreshed he seemed in body that +sleep for many hours would not return again. And he spent almost +all the remainder of the lagging darkness pacing softly to and +fro; one face only before his eyes, the one sure thing, the one +thing unattainable in a world of phantoms. + +Herbert waited on in vain for his guest next morning, and after +wandering up and down the mossy lawn at the back of the house, +went off cheerfully at last alone for his dip. When he returned +Lawford was in his place at the breakfast-table. He sat on, moody +and constrained, until even Herbert's haphazard talk trickled +low. + +'I fancy my sister is nursing a headache,' he said at last, 'but +she'll be down soon. And I'm afraid from the looks of you, +Lawford, your night was not particularly restful.' He felt his +way very heedfully. 'Perhaps we walked you a little too far +yesterday. We are so used to tramping that--' Lawford kept +thoughtful eyes fixed on the deprecating face. + +'I see what it is, Herbert--you are humouring me again. I have +been wracking my brains in vain to remember what exactly DID +happen yesterday. I feel as if it was all sunk oceans deep in +sleep. I get so far--and then I'm done. It won't give up a hint. +But you really mustn't think I'm an invalid, or--or in my second +childhood. The truth is,' he added, 'it's only my FIRST, come +back again. But now that I've got so far, now that I'm really +better, I--' He broke off rather vacantly, as if afraid of his +own confidence. 'I must be getting on,' he summed up with an +effort, 'and that's the solemn fact. I keep on forgetting I'm-- +I'm a ratepayer!' + +Herbert sat round in his chair. 'You see, Lawford, the very term +is little else than Double-Dutch to me. As a matter of fact +Grisel sends all my hush-money to the horrible people that do the +cleaning up, as it were. I can't catch their drift. Government to +me is merely the spectacle of the clever, or the specious, +managing the dull. It deals merely with the physical, and just +the fringe of consciousness. I am not joking. I think I follow +you. All I mean is that the obligations--mainly tepid, I take it-- +that are luring you back to the fold would be the very ones that +would scare me quickest off. The imagination, the appeal faded: +we're dead.' + +Lawford opened his mouth; 'TEMPORARILY tepid,' he at last all but +coughed out. + +'Oh yes, of course,' said Herbert intelligently. 'Only +temporarily. It's this beastly gregariousness that's the devil. +The very thought of it undoes me--with an absolute shock of +sheepishness. I suddenly realise my human nakedness: that here we +are, little better than naked animals, bleating behind our +illusory wattles on the slopes of--of infinity. And nakedness, +after all, is a wholesome thing to realize only when one thinks +too much of one's clothes. I peer sometimes, feebly enough, out +of my wool, and it seems to me that all these busybodies, all +these fact-devourers, all this news-reading rabble, are nothing +brighter than very dull-witted children trying to play an +imaginative game, much too deep for their poor reasons. I don't +mean that YOUR wanting to go home is anything gregarious, but I +do think THEIR insisting on your coming back at once might be. +And I know you won't visit this stuff on me as anything more than +just my "scum," as Grisel calls the fine flower of my maiden +meditations. All that I really want to say is that we should both +be more than delighted if you'd stay just as long as it will not +be a bore for you to stay. Stay till you're heartily tired of us. +Go back now, if you MUST; tell them how much better you are. Bolt +off to a nerve specialist. He'll say complete rest--change of +scene, and all that. They all do. Instinct via intellect. And why +not take your rest here? We are such miserably dull company to +one another it would be a greater pleasure to have you with us +than I can say. I mean it from the very bottom of my heart. Do!' + +Lawford listened. 'I wish--,' he began, and stopped dead again. +'Anyhow, I'll go back. I am afraid, Herbert, I've been playing +truant. It was all very well while-- To tell you the truth I +can't think QUITE straight yet. But it won't last for ever. +Besides--well, anyhow, I'll go back.' + +'Right you are,' said Herbert, pretending to be cheerful. 'You +can't expect, you really can't, everything to come right straight +away. Just have patience. And now, let's go out and sit in the +sun. They've mixed September up with May.' + +And about half an hour afterwards he glanced up from his book to +find his visitor fast asleep in his garden chair. + +Grisel had taken her brother's place, with a little pile of +needlework beside her on the grass, when Lawford again opened his +eyes under the rosy shade of a parasol. He watched her for a +while, without speaking. + +'How long have I been asleep?' he said at last. + +She started and looked up from her needle. + +'That depends on how long you have been awake,' she said, +smiling. 'My brother tells me,' she went on, beginning to stitch, +'that you have made up your mind to leave us to-day. Perhaps we +are only flattering ourselves it has been a rest. But if it has-- +is that, do you think, quite wise?' + +He leant forward and hid his face in his hands. 'It's because-- +it's because it's the only "must" I can see.' + +'But even "musts"--well, we have to be sure even of "musts," +haven't we? Are YOU?' She glanced up and for an instant their +eyes met, and the falling water seemed to be sounding out of a +distance so remote it might be but the echo of a dream. She +stooped once more over her work. + +'Supposing,' he said very slowly, and almost as if speaking to +himself, 'supposing Sabathier--and you know he's merely like a +friend now one mustn't be seen talking to--supposing he came +back; what then?' + +'Oh, but Sabathier's gone: he never really came. It was only a +fancy--a mood. It was only you--another you.' + +'Who was that yesterday, then?' + +She glanced at him swiftly and knew the question was but a +venture. + +'Yesterday?' + +'Oh, very well,' he said fretfully, 'you too! But if he did, if +he did, come really back: "prey" and all?' + +'What is the riddle?' she said, taking a deep breath and facing +him brightly. + +'Would MY "must" still be HIS?' The face he raised to her, as he +leaned forward under the direct light of the sun, was so +colourless, cadaverous and haggard, the thought crossed her mind +that it did indeed seem little more than a shadowy mask that but +one hour of darkness might dispel. + +'You said, you know, we did win through. Why then should we be +even thinking of defeat now?' + +'"We"!' + +'Oh no, you!' she cried triumphantly. + +'You do not answer my question.' + +'Nor you mine! It WAS a glorious victory. Is there the ghost of a +reason why you should cast your mind back? Is there, now?' + +'Only,' said Lawford, looking patiently up into her face, 'only +because I love you': and listened in the silence to the words as +one may watch a bird that has escaped for ever and irrevocably +out of its cage, steadily flying on and on till lost to sight. + +For an instant the grey eyes faltered. 'But that, surely,' she +began in a low voice, still steadily sewing, 'that was our +compact last night--that you should let me help, that you should +trust me just as you trusted the mother years ago who came in the +little cart with the shaggy dusty pony to the homesick boy +watching at the window. Perhaps,' she added, her fingers +trembling, 'in this odd shuffle of souls and faces, I AM that +mother, and most frightfully anxious you should not give in. Why, +even because of the tiredness, even because the cause seems vain, +you must still fight on--wouldn't she have said it? Surely there +are prizes, a daughter, a career, no end! And even they gone-- +still the self undimmed, undaunted, that took its drubbing like a +man.' + +'I know you know I'm all but crazed; you see this wretched mind +all littered and broken down; look at me like that, then. Forget +even you have befriended me and pretended-- Why must I blunder on +and on like this? Oh, Grisel, my friend, my friend, if only you +loved me!' + +Tears clouded her eyes. She turned vaguely as if for a +hiding-place. 'We can't talk here. How mad the day is. Listen, +listen! I do--I do love you--mother and woman and friend--from +the very moment you came. It's all so clear, so clear: that, and +your miserable "must," my friend. Come, we will go away by +ourselves a little, and talk. That way. I'll meet you by the +gate.' + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE + +She came out into the sunlight, and they went through the little +gate together. She walked quickly, without speaking, over the +bridge, past a little cottage whose hollyhocks leaned fading +above its low flint wall. Skirting a field of stubble, she struck +into a wood by a path that ran steeply up the hillside. And +by and by they came to a glen where the woodmen of a score of +years ago had felled the trees, leaving a green hollow of saplings +in the midst of their towering neighbours. + +'There,' she said, holding out her hand to him, 'now we are +alone. Just six hours or so--and then the sun will be there,' she +pointed to the tree-tops to the west, 'and then you will have to +go; for good, for good--you your way, and I mine. What a tangle-- +a tangle is this life of ours. Could I have dreamt we should ever +be talking like this, you and I? Friends of an hour. What will +you think of me? Does it matter? Don't speak. Say nothing--poor +face, poor hands. If only there were something to look to--to +pray to!' She bent over his hand and pressed it to her breast. +'What worlds we've seen together, you and I. And then--another +parting.' + +They wandered on a little way, and came back and listened to the +first few birds that flew up into the higher branches, noonday +being past, to sing. + +They talked, and were silent, and talked again with out question, +or sadness, or regret, or reproach; she mocking even at +themselves, mocking at this 'change'--'Why, and yet without it, +would you ever even have dreamed once a poor fool of a Frenchman +went to his restless grave for me--for me? Need we understand? +Were we told to pry? Who made us human must be human too. Why +must we take such care, and make such a fret--this soul? I know +it, I know it; it is all we have--"to save," they say, poor +creatures. No, never to SPEND, and so they daren't for a solitary +instant lift it on the finger from its cage. Well, we have; and +now, soon, back it must go, back it must go, and try its best to +whistle the day out. And yet, do you know, perhaps the very +freedom does a little shake its--its monotony. It's true, you +see, they have lived a long time; these Worldly Wisefolk they +were wise before they were swaddled.... + +'There, and you are hungry?' she asked him, laughing in his eyes. +`Of course, of course you are--scarcely a mouthful since that +first still wonderful supper. And you haven't slept a wink, +except like a tired-out child after its first party, on that old +garden chair. I sat and watched, and yes, almost hoped you'd +never wake in case--in case. Come along, see, down there. I can't +go home just yet. There's a little old inn--we'll go and sit down +there--as if we were really trying to be romantic! I know the +woman quite well; we can talk there--just the day out.' + +They sat at a little table in the garden of 'The Cherry Trees,' +its thick green apple branches burdened with ripened fruit. And +Grisel tried to persuade him to eat and drink, 'for to-morrow we +die,' she said, her hands trembling, her face as it were veiled +with a faint mysterious light. + +'There are dozens and dozens of old stories, you know,' she said, +leaning on her elbows, 'dozens and dozens, meaning only us. You +must, you must eat; look, just an apple. We've got to say +good-bye. And faintness will double the difficulty.' She lightly +touched his hand as if to compel him to smile with her. 'There, +I'll peel it; and this is Eden; and soon it will be the cool of +the evening. And then, oh yes, the voice will come. What nonsense +I am talking. Never mind.' + +They sat on in the quiet sunshine, and a spider slid softly +through the air and with busy claws set to its nets; and those +small ghosts the robins went whistling restlessly among the heavy +boughs. + +A child presently came out of the porch of the inn into the +garden, and stood with its battered doll in its arms, softly +watching them awhile. But when Grisel smiled and tried to coax +her over, she burst out laughing and ran in again. + +Lawford stooped forward on his chair with a groan. 'You see,' he +said, 'the whole world mocks me. You say "this evening"; need it +be, must it be this evening? If you only knew how far they have +driven me. If you only knew what we should only detest each other +for saying and for listening to. The whole thing's dulled and +staled. Who wants a changeling? Who wants a painted bird? Who +does not loathe the converted?--and I'm converted to Sabathier's +God. Should we be sitting here talking like this if it were not +so? I can't, I can't go back.' + +She rose and stood with her hand pressed over her mouth, watching +him. + +'Won't you understand?' he continued. 'I am an outcast--a felon +caught red-handed, come in the flesh to a hideous and righteous +judgment. I hear myself saying all these things; and yet, Grisel, +I do, I do love you with all the dull best I ever had. Not now, +then; I don't ask new even. I can, I would begin again. God knows +my face has changed enough even as it is. Think of me as that +poor wandering ghost of yours; how easily I could hide away--in +your memory; and just wait, wait for you. In time even this wild +futile madness too would fade away. Then I could come back. May I +try?' + +'I can't answer you. I can't reason. Only, still, I do know, +talk, put off, forget as I may, must is must. Right and wrong, +who knows what THEY mean, except that one's to be done and one's +to be forsworn; or--forgive, my friend, the truest thing I ever +said--or else we lose the savour of both. Oh, then, and I know, +too, you'd weary of me. I know you, Monsieur Nicholas, better +than you can ever know yourself, though you have risen from your +grave. You follow a dream, no voice or face or flesh and blood; +and not to do what the one old raven within you cries you must, +would be in time to hate the very sound of my footsteps. You +shall go back, poor turncoat, and face the clearness, the utterly +more difficult, bald, and heartless clearness, as together we +faced the dark. Life is a little while. And though I have no +words to tell what always are and must be foolish reasons because +they are not reasons at all but ghosts of memory, I know in my +heart that to face the worst is your only hope of peace. Should I +have staked so much on your finding that, and now throw up the +game? Don't let us talk any more. I'll walk half the way, +perhaps. Perhaps I will walk all the way. I think my brother +guesses--at least MY madness. I've talked and talked him nearly +past his patience. And then, when you are quite safely, oh yes, +quite safely and soundly gone, then I shall go away for a little, +so that we can't even hear each other speak, except in dreams. +Life!--well, I always thought it was much too plain a tale to +have as dull an ending. And with us the powers beyond have played +a newer trick, that's all. Another hour, and we will go. Till +then there's just the solitary walk home and only the dull old +haunted house that hoards as many ghosts as we ourselves to watch +our coming.' + +Evening began to shine between the trees; they seemed to stand +aflame, with a melancholy rapture in their uplifted boughs above +their fading coats. The fields of the garnered harvest shone with +a golden stillness, awhir with shimmering flocks of starlings. +And the old birds that had sung in the spring sang now amid the +same leaves, grown older too to give them harbourage. + +Herbert was sitting in his room when they returned, nursing his +teacup on his knee while he pretended to be reading, with elbow +propped on the table. + +'Here's Nicholas Sabathier, my dear, come to say goodbye awhile,' +said Grisel. She stood for a moment in her white gown, her face +turned towards the clear green twilight of the open window. 'I +have promised to walk part of the way with him. But I think first +we must have some tea. No; he flatly refuses to be driven. We are +going to walk.' + +The two friends were left alone, face to face with a rather +difficult silence, only the least degree of nervousness apparent, +so far as Herbert was concerned, in that odd aloof sustained air +of impersonality that had so baffled his companion in their first +queer talk together. + +'Your sister said just now, Herbert,' blurted Lawford at last. +'"Here's Nicholas Sabathier come to say good-bye" well, I--what I +want you to understand is that it is Sabathier, the worst he ever +was; but also that it is "good-bye."' + +Herbert slowly turned. 'I don't quite see why "goodbye," Lawford. +And--frankly, there is nothing to explain. We have chosen to live +such a very out-of-the-way life,' he went on, as if following up +a train of thought.... 'The truth is if one wants to live at +all--one's own life, I mean--there's no time for many friends. +And just steadfastly regarding your neighbour's tail as you +follow it down into the Nowhere--it's that that seems to me the +deadliest form of hypnotism. One must simply go one's own way, +doing one's best to free one's mind of cant--and I dare say +clearing some excellent stuff out with the rubbish. One +consequence is that I don't think, however foolhardy it may be to +say so, I don't think I care a groat for any opinion as human as +my own, good or bad. My sister's a million times a better woman +than I am a man. What possibly could there be, then, for me to +say?' He turned with a nervous smile. 'Why should it be good-bye?' + +Lawford glanced involuntarily towards the door that stood in +shadow duskily ajar. 'Well,' he said, 'we have talked, and we +think it must be that, until, at least,' he smiled faintly, 'I +can come as quietly as your old ghost you told me of; and in that +case it may not be so very long to wait.' + +Their eyes met fleetingly across the still, listening room. 'The +more I think of it,' Lawford pushed slowly on, 'the less I +understand the frantic purposelessness of all that has happened +to me. Until I went down, as you said, "a godsend of a little +Miss Muffet," and the inconceivable farce came off, I was fairly +happy, fairly contented to dance my little wooden dance and wait +till the showman should put me down into his box again. And now-- +well, here I am. The whole thing has gone by and scarcely left a +trace of its visit. Here I am for all my friends to swear to; and +yet, Herbert, if you'll forgive me troubling you with this stuff +about myself, not a single belief, or thought, or desire remains +unchanged. You will remember all that, I hope. It's not, of +course, the ghost of an apology, only the mere facts.' + +Herbert rose and paced slowly across to the window. 'The longer I +live, Lawford, the more I curse this futile gift of speech. Here +am I, wanting to tell you, to say out frankly what, if mind could +appeal direct to mind, would be merely as the wind passing +through the leaves of a tree with just one--one multitudinous +rustle, but which, if I tried to put into words--well, daybreak +would find us still groping on....' He turned; a peculiar wry +smile on his face. 'It's a dumb world: but there we are. And some +day you'll come again.' + +'Well,' said Lawford, as if with an almost hopeless effort to +turn thought into such primitive speech, 'that's where we stand, +then.' He got up suddenly like a man awakened in the midst of +unforeseen danger, 'Where is your sister?' he cried, looking into +the shadow. And as if in actual answer to his entreaty, they +heard the clinking of the cups on the little, old, green lacquer +tray she was at that moment carrying into the room. She sat down +on the window seat and put the tray down beside her. 'It will be +before dark even now,' she said, glancing out at the faintly +burning skies. + +They had trudged on together with almost as deep a sense of +physical exhaustion as peasants have who have been labouring in +the fields since daybreak. And a little beyond the village, +before the last, long road began that led in presently to the +housed and scrupulous suburb, she stopped with a sob beside an +old scarred milestone by the wayside. 'This--is as far as I can +go,' she said. She stooped, and laid her hand on the cold +moss-grown surface of the stone. 'Even now it's wet with dew.' +She rose again and looked strangely into his face. 'Yes, yes, +here it is,' she said, 'oh, and worse, worse than any fear. But +nothing now can trouble you again of that. We're both at least +past that.' + +'Grisel,' he said, 'forgive me, but I can't--I can't go on.' + +'Don't think, don't think,' she said, taking his hands, and +lifting them to her bosom. 'It's only how the day goes; and it +has all, my one dear, happened scores and scores of times before +--mother and child and friend--and lovers that are all these too, +like us. We mustn't cry out. Perhaps it was all before even we +could speak--this sorrow came. Take all the hope and all the +future: and then may come our chance.' + +'What's life to me now. You said the desire would come back; that +I should shake myself free. I could if you would help me. I don't +know what you are or what your meaning is, only that I love you; +care for nothing, wish for nothing but to see you and think of +you. A flat, dull voice keeps saying that I have no right to be +telling you all this. You will know best. I know I am nothing. I +ask nothing. If we love one another, what is there else to say?' + +'Nothing, nothing to say, except only good-bye. What could you +tell me that I have not told myself over and over again? Reason's +gone. Thinking's gone. Now I am only sure.' She smiled shadowily. +'What peace did HE find who couldn't, perhaps, like you, face +the last good-bye?' + +They stood in utter solitude awhile in the evening gloom. The air +was as still and cold as some grey unfathomable untraversed sea. +Above them uncountable clouds drifted slowly across space. + +'Why do they all keep whispering together?' he said in a low +voice, with cowering face. 'Oh if you knew, Grisel, how they have +hemmed me in; how they have come pressing in through the narrow +gate I left ajar. Only to mock and mislead. It's all dark and +unintelligible.' + +He touched her hand, peering out of the shadows that seemed to +him to be gathering between their faces. He drew her closer and +touched her lips with his fingers. Her beauty seemed to his +distorted senses to fill earth and sky. This, then, was the +presence, the grave and lovely overshadowing dream whose +surrender made life a torment, and death the near fold of an +immortal, starry veil. She broke from him with a faint cry. And +he found himself running and running, just as he had run that +other night, with death instead of life for inspiration, towards +his earthly home. + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO + +He was utterly wearied, but he walked on for a long while with a +dogged unglancing pertinacity and without looking behind him. +Then he rested under the dew-sodden hedgeside and buried his face +in his hands. Once, indeed, he did turn and grind his way back +with hard uplifted face for many minutes, but at the meeting with +an old woman who in the late dusk passed him unheeded on the +road, he stopped again, and after standing awhile looking down +upon the dust, trying to gather up the tangled threads of his +thoughts, he once more set off homewards. + +It was clear, starry, and quite dark when he reached the house. +The lamp at the roadside obscurely lit its breadth and height. +Lamp-light within, too, was showing yellow between the Venetian +blinds; a cold gas-jet gleamed out of the basement window. He +seemed bereft now of all desire or emotion, simply the passive +witness of things external in a calm which, though he scarcely +realised its cause, was an exquisite solace and relief. His +senses were intensely sharpened with sleeplessness. The faintest +sound belled clear and keen on his ear. The thinnest beam of +light besprinkled his eyes with curious brilliance. + +As quietly as some nocturnal creature he ascended the steps to +the porch, and leaning between stone pilaster and wall, listened +intently for any rumour of those within. + +He heard a clear, rather languid and delicate voice quietly speak +on until it broke into a little peal of laughter, followed, when +it fell silent by Sheila's--rapid, rich, and low. The first +speaker seemed to be standing. Probably, then, his evening +visitors had only just come in, or were preparing to depart. He +inserted his latchkey and gently pushed at the cumbersome door. +It was locked against him. With not the faintest thought of +resentment or surprise, he turned back, stooped over the +balustrade and looked down into the kitchen. Nothing there was +visible but a narrow strip of the white table, on which lay a +black cotton glove, and beyond, the glint of a copper pan. What +made all these mute and inanimate things so coldly hostile? + +An extreme, almost nauseous distaste filled him at the thought of +knocking for admission, of confronting Ada, possibly even Sheila, +in the cold echoing gloom of the detestable porch; of meeting the +first wild, almost metallic, flash of recognition. He swept +softly down again, and paused at the open gate. Once before the +voices of the night had called him: they would not summon him +forever in vain. He raised his eyes again towards the window. Who +were these visitors met together to drum the alien out? He +narrowed his lids and smiled up at the vacuous unfriendly +house. Then wheeling, on a sudden impulse he groped his way down +the gravel path that led into the garden. As he had left it, the +long white window was ajar. + +With extreme caution he pushed it noiselessly up, and climbed in, +and stood listening again in the black passage on the other side. +When he had fully recovered his breath, and the knocking of his +heart was stilled, he trod on softly, till turning the corner he +came in sight of the kitchen door. It was now narrowly open, just +enough, perhaps, to admit a cat; and as he softly approached, +looking steadily in, he could see Ada sitting at the empty table, +beneath the single whistling chandelier, in her black dress and +black straw hat. She was reading apparently; but her back was +turned to him and he could not distinguish her arm beyond the +elbow. Then almost in an instant he discovered, as, drawn up and +unstirring he gazed on, that she was not reading, but had +covertly and instantaneously raised her eyes from the print on +the table beneath, and was transfixedly listening too. He turned +his eyes away and waited. When again he peered in she had +apparently bent once more over her magazine, and he stole on. + +One by one, with a thin remote exultation in his progress, he +mounted the kitchen stairs, and with each deliberate and groping +step the voices above him became more clearly audible. At last, +in the darkness of the hall, but faintly stirred by the gleam of +lamplight from the chink of the dining-room door, he stood on the +threshold of the drawing-room door and could hear with varying +distinctness what those friendly voices were so absorbedly +discussing. His ear seemed as exquisite as some contrivance of +science, registering passively the least sound, the faintest +syllable, and like it, in no sense meddling with the thought that +speech conveyed. He simply stood listening, fixed and motionless, +like some uncouth statue in the leafy hollow of a garden, stony, +unspeculating. + +'Oh, but you either refuse to believe, Bettie, or you won't +understand that it's far worse than that.' Sheila seemed to be +upbraiding, or at least reasoning with, the last speaker. 'Ask Mr +Danton--he actually SAW him.' + +'"Saw him,"' repeated a thick, still voice. 'He stood there, in +that very doorway, Mrs Lovat, and positively railed at me. He +stood there and streamed out all the names he could lay his +tongue to. I wasn't--unfriendly to the poor beggar. When Bethany +let me into it I thought it was simply--I did indeed, Mrs +Lawford--a monstrous exaggeration. Flatly, I didn't believe it; +shall I say that? But when I stood face to face with him, I could +have taken my oath that that was no more poor old Arthur Lawford +than--well, I won't repeat what particular word occurred to me. +But there,' the corpulent shrug was almost audible, 'we all know +what old Bethany is. A sterling old chap, mind you, so far as +mere character is concerned; the right man in the right place; +but as gullible and as soft-hearted as a tom-tit. I've said all +this before, I know, Mrs Lawford, and been properly snubbed for +my pains. But if I had been Bethany I'd have sifted the whole +story at the beginning, the moment he put his foot into the +house. Look at that Tichborne fellow--went for months and months, +just picking up one day what he floored old Hawkins--wasn't it?-- +with the next. But of course,' he added gloomily, 'now that's all +too late. He's moaned himself into a tolerably tight corner. I'd +just like to see, though, a British jury comparing this claimant +with his photograph, 'pon my word I would. Where would he be +then, do you think?' + +'But my dear Mr Danton,' went on the clear, languid voice Lawford +had heard break so light-heartedly into laughter, 'you don't mean +to tell me that a woman doesn't know her own husband when she +sees him--or, for the matter of that, when she doesn't see him? +If Tom came home from a ramble as handsome as Apollo to-morrow, +I'd recognise him at the very first blush--literally! He'd go +nuzzling off to get his slippers, or complain that the lamps had +been smoking, or hunt the house down for last week's paper. Oh, +besides, Tom's Tom--and there's an end of it.' + +'That's precisely what I think, Mrs Lovat; one is saturated with +one's personality, as it were.' + +'You see, that's just it! That's just exactly every woman's +husband all over; he is saturated with his personality. Bravo, Mr +Craik!' + +'Good Lord,' said Danton softly. 'I don't deny it!' + +'But that,' broke in Sheila crisply--'that's just precisely what +I asked you all to come in for. It's because I know now, apart +altogether from the mere evidence, that--that he is Arthur. Mind, +I don't say I ever really doubted. I was only so utterly shocked, +I suppose. I positively put posers to him; but his memory was +perfect in spite of the shock which would have killed a--a more +sensitive nature.' She had risen, it seemed, and was moving with +all her splendid impressiveness of silk and presence across the +general line of vision. But the hall was dark and still; her eyes +were dimmed with light. Lawford could survey her there unmoved. + +'Are you there, Ada?' she called discreetly. + +'Yes, ma'am,' answered the faint voice from below. + +'You have not heard anything--no knock?' + +'No, ma'am, no knock.' + +'The door is open if you should call.' + +'Yes, ma'am.' + +'The girl's scared out of her wits,' said Sheila returning to her +audience. 'I've told you all that miserable Ferguson story--a +piece of calm, callous presence of mind I should never have +dreamed my husband capable of. And the curious thing is--at +least, it is no longer curious in the light of the ghastly facts +I am only waiting for Mr Bethany to tell you--from the very first +she instinctively detested the very mention of his name.' + +'I believe, you know,' said Mr Craik with some decision, 'that +servants must have the same wonderful instinct as dogs and +children; they are natural, intuitive judges of character.' + +'Yes,' said Sheila gravely, 'and it's only through that that I +got to hear of the--the mysterious friend in the little +pony-carriage. Ada's magnificently loyal--I will say that.' + +'I don't want to suggest anything, Mrs Lawford,' began Mr Craik +rather hurriedly, 'but wouldn't it perhaps be wiser not to wait +for Mr Bethany? It is not at all unusual for him to be kept a +considerable time in the vestry after service, and to-day is the +Feast of St Michael's and all Angels, you know. Mightn't your +husband be--er--coming back, don't you think?' + +'Craik's right, Mrs Lawford; it's not a bit of good waiting. +Bethany would stick there till midnight if any old woman's +spiritual state could keep her going so long. Here we all are, +and at any moment we may be interrupted. Mind you, I promise +nothing--only that there shall be no scene. But here I am, and if +he does come knocking and ringing and lunging out in the +disgusting manner he--well, all I ask is permission to speak for +YOU. 'Pon my soul, to think what you must have gone through! It +isn't the place for ladies just now--honestly it ain't.' + +'Besides, supposing the romantic lady of the pony-carriage has +friends? Are YOU a pugilist, Mr Craik?' + +'I hope I could give some little account of myself, Mrs Lovat; +but you need have no anxiety about that.' + +'There, Mr Danton. So as there is not the least cause for anxiety +even if poor Arthur SHOULD return to his earthly home, may we +share your dreadful story at once, Sheila; and then, perhaps, +hear Mr Bethany's exposition of it when he DOES arrive? We are +amply guarded.' + +'Honestly, you know, you are a bit of a sceptic, Mrs Lovat,' +pleaded Danton playfully. 'I've SEEN him.' + +'And seeing is disbelieving, I suppose. Now then, Sheila.' + +'I don't think there's the least chance of Arthur returning +to-night,' said Sheila solemnly. 'I am perfectly well aware it's +best to be as cheerful as one can--and as resolved; but I think, +Bettie, when even you know the whole horrible secret, you won't +think Mr Danton was--was horrified for nothing. The ghastly, the +awful truth is that my husband--there is no other word for it-- +is--possessed!' + +'"Possessed," Sheila! What in the name of all the creeps is +that?' + +'Well, I dare say Mr Craik will explain it much better than I +can. By a devil, dear.' The voice was perfectly poised and +restrained, and Mr Craik did not see fit for the moment to +embellish the definition. + +Lawford, with an almost wooden immobility, listened on. + +'But THE devil, or A devil? Isn't there a distinction?' inquired +Mrs Lovat. + +'It's in the Bible, Bettie, over and over again. It was quite a +common thing in the Middle Ages; I think I'm right in saying +that, am I not, Mr Craik?' Mr Craik must have solemnly nodded or +abundantly looked his unwilling affirmation. 'And what HAS been,' +continued Sheila temperately, 'I suppose may be again.' + +'When the fellow began raving at me the other night,' began +Danton huskily, as if out of an unfathomable pit of reflection, +'among other things he said that I haven't any wish to remember +was that I was a sceptic. And Bethany said DITTO to it. I don't +mind being called a sceptic: why, I said myself Mrs Lovat was a +sceptic just now! But when it comes to "devils," Mrs Lawford--I +may be convinced about the other, but "devils"! Well, I've been +in the City nearly twenty-five years, and it's my impression +human nature can raise all the devils WE shall ever need. And +another thing,' he added, as if inspired, and with an immensely +intelligent blink, 'is it just precisely that word in the Revised +Version--eh, Craik?' + +'I'll certainly look it up, Danton. But I take it that Mrs +Lawford is not so much insisting on the word, as on the--the +manifestation. And I'm bound to confess that the Society for +Psychical Research, which has among its members quite eminent and +entirely trustworthy men of science--I am bound to admit they +have some very curious stories to tell. The old idea was, you +know, that there are seventy-two princely devils, and as many as +seven million--er--commoners. It may very well sound quaint to +our ears, Mrs Lovat; but there it is. But whether that has any +bearing on--on what you were saying, Danton, I can't say. Perhaps +Mrs Lawford will throw a little more light on the subject when +she tells us on what precise facts her--her distressing theory is +based.' + +Lawford had soundlessly stolen a pace or two nearer, and by +stooping forward a little he could, each in turn, scrutinise the +little intent company sitting over his story around the lamp at +the further end of the table; squatting like little children with +their twigs and pins, fishing for wonders on the brink of the +unknown. + +'Yes,' Mrs Lovat was saying, 'I quite agree, Mr Craik. +Seventy-two princes, and no princesses. Oh, these masculine +prejudices! But do throw a little more modern light on the +subject, Sheila.' + +'I mean this,' said Sheila firmly. 'When I went in for the last +time to say good-bye--and of course it was at his own wish that I +did leave him; and precisely WHY he wished it is now unhappily +only too apparent--I had brought him some money from the bank-- +fifty pounds, I think; yes, fifty pounds. And quite by the merest +chance I glanced down, in passing, at a book he had apparently +been reading, a book which he seemed very anxious to conceal with +his hand. Arthur is not a great reader, though I believe he +studied a little before we were married, and--well, I detest +anything like subterfuge, and I said it out without thinking, +"Why, you're reading French, Arthur!" He turned deathly white but +made no answer.' + +'And can't you even confide to us the title, Sheila?' sighed Mrs +Lovat reproachfully. + +'Wait a minute,' said Sheila; 'you shall make as much fun of the +thing as you like, Bettie, when I've finished. I don't know why, +but that peculiar, stealthy look haunted me. "Why French?" I kept +asking myself. "Why French?" Arthur hasn't opened a French book +for years. He doesn't even approve of the entente. His argument +was that we ought to be friends with the Germans because they are +more hostile. Never mind. When Ada came back the next evening and +said he was out, I came the following morning--by myself--and +knocked. No one answered, and I let myself in. His bed had not +been slept in. There were candles and matches all over the house +--one even burnt nearly to the stick on the floor in the corner +of the drawing-room. I suppose it was foolish, but I was alone, +and just that, somehow, horrified me. It seemed to point to such +a peculiar state of mind. I hesitated; what was the use of looking +further? Yet something seemed to say to me--and it was surely +providential--"Go downstairs!" And there in the breakfast-room +the first thing I saw on the table was this book--a dingy, ragged, +bleared, patched-up, oh, a horrible, a loathsome little book +(and I have read bits too here and there); and beside it was my +own little school dictionary, my own child's 'She looked up +sharply. 'What was that? Did anybody call?' + +'Nobody I heard,' said Danton, staring stonily round. + +'It may have been the passing of the wind,' suggested Mr Craik, +after a pause. + +'Peep between the blinds, Mr Craik; it may be poor Mr Bethany +confronting Pneumonia in the porch.' + +'There's no one there, Mrs Lovat,' said the curate, returning +softly from his errand. 'Please continue your--your narrative, +Mrs Lawford.' + +'We are panting for the "devil," my dear.' + +'Well, I sat down and, very much against my inclination, turned +over the pages. It was full of the most revolting confessions and +trials, so far as I could see. In fact, I think the book was +merely an amateur collection of--of horrors. And the faces, the +portraits! Well, then, can you imagine my feelings when towards +the end of the book about thirty pages from the end, I came upon +this--gloating up at me from the table in my house before my +very eyes?' + +She cast a rapid glance over her shoulder, and gathering up her +silk skirt, drew out, from the pocket beneath, the few crumpled +pages, and passed them without a word to Danton. Lawford kept him +plainly in view, as, lowering his great face, he slowly stooped, +and holding the loose leaves with both fat hands between his +knees, stared into the portrait. Then he truculently lifted his +cropped head. + +'What did I say?' he said. 'What did I SAY? What did I tell old +Bethany in this very room? What d'ye think of that, Mrs Lovat, +for a portrait of Arthur Lawford? What d'ye make of that, Craik-- +eh? Devil--eh?' + +Mrs Lovat glanced with arched eyebrows, and with her finger-tips +handed the sheets on to her neighbour, who gazed with a settled +and mournful frown and returned them to Sheila. + +She took the pages, folded them and replaced them carefully in +her pocket. She swept her hands over her skirts, and turned to +Danton. + +'You agree,' she inquired softly, 'it's like?' + +'Like! It's the livin' livid image. The livin' image,' he +repeated, stretching out his arm, 'as he stood there that very +night.' + +'What will you say, then,' said Sheila, quietly, 'What will you +say if I tell you that that man, Nicholas de Sabathier, has been +in his grave for over a hundred years?' + +Danton's little eyes seemed, if anything, to draw back even +further into his head. 'I'd say, Mrs Lawford, if you'll excuse +the word, that it might be a damn horrible coincidence--I'd go +farther, an almost incredible coincidence. But if you want the +sober truth, I'd say it was nothing more than a crafty, clever, +abominable piece of trickery. That's what I'd say. Oh, you don't +know, Mrs Lovat. When a scamp's a scamp, he'll stop at nothing. I +could tell you some tales.' + +'Ah, but that's not all,' said Sheila, eyeing them steadfastly +one by one. 'We all of us know that my husband's story was that +he had gone down to Widderstone--into the churchyard, for his +convalescent ramble; that story's true. We all know that he said +he had had a fit, a heart attack, and that a kind of--of stupor +had come over him. I believe on my honour that's true too. But no +one knows but he himself and Mr Bethany and I, that it was a +wretched broken grave, quite at the bottom of the hill, that he +chose for his resting place, nor--and I can't get the scene out +of my head--nor that the name on that one solitary tombstone down +there was--was...this!' + +Danton rolled his eyes. 'I don't begin to follow,' he said +stubbornly. + +'You don't mean,' said Mr Craik, who had not removed his gaze +from Sheila's face, 'I am not to take it that you mean, Mrs +Lawford, the--the other?' + +'Yes,' said Sheila, 'HIS'--she patted her skirts--'Sabathier's.' + +'You mean,' said Mrs Lovat crisply, 'that the man in the grave is +the man in the book, and that the man in the book is--is poor +Arthur's changed face?' + +Sheila nodded. + +Danton rose cumbrously from his chair, looking beadily down on +his three friends. + +'Oh, but you know, it isn't--it isn't right,' he began. 'Lord! I +can see him now. Glassy--yes, that's the very word I said-- +glassy. It won't do, Mrs Lawford; on my solemn honour, it won't +do. I don't deny it, call it what you like; yes, devils, if you +like. But what I say as a practical man is that it's just rank-- +that's what it is! Bethany's had too much rope. The time's gone +by for sentiment and all that foolery. Mercy's all very well, but +after all it's justice that clinches the bargain. There's only +one way: we must catch him; we must lay the poor wretch by the +heels before it's too late. No publicity, God bless me, no. We'd +have all the rags in London on us. They'd pillory us nine days on +end. We'd never live it down. No, we must just hush it up--a home +or something; an asylum. For my part,' he turned like a huge +toad, his chin low in his collar--'and I'd say the same if it was +my own brother, and, after all, he is your husband, Mrs Lawford-- +I'd sooner he was in his grave. It takes two to play at that +game, that's what I say. To lay himself open! I can't stand it-- +honestly, I can't stand it. And yet,' he jerked his chin over the +peak of his collar towards the ladies, 'and yet you say he's +being fetched; comes creeping home, and is fetched at dark by a-- +a lady in a pony-carriage. God bless me! It's rank. What,' he +broke out violently again, 'what was he doing there in a cemetery +after dark? Do you think that beastly Frenchman would have played +such a trick on Craik here? Would he have tried his little game +on me? Deviltry be it, if you prefer the word, and all deference +to you, Mrs Lawford. But I know this--a couple of hundred years +ago they would have burnt a man at the stake for less than a +tenth of this. Ask Craik here. I don't know how, and I don't know +when: his mother, I've always heard say, was a little eccentric; +but the truth is he's managed by some unholy legerdemain to get +the thing at his finger's ends; that's what it is. Think of that +unspeakable book. Left open on the table! Look at his Ferguson +game. It's our solemn duty to keep him for good and all out of +mischief. It reflects all round. There's no getting out of it; +we're all in it. And tar sticks. And then there's poor little +Alice to consider, and--and you yourself, Mrs. Lawford: I wouldn't +give the fellow--friend though he was, in a way--it isn't safe to +give him five minutes' freedom. We've simply got to save you from +yourself, Mrs Lawford; that's what it is--and from old-fashioned +sentiment. And I only wish Bethany was here now to dispute it!' + +He stirred himself down, as it were, into his clothes, and stood +in the middle of the hearthrug, gently oscillating, with his +hands behind his back. But at some faint rumour out of the silent +house his posture suddenly stiffened, and he lifted a little, +with heavy, steady lids, his head. + +'What is the matter, Danton?' said Mr Craik in a small voice; +'why are you listening?' + +'I wasn't listening,' said Danton stoutly, 'I was thinking.' + +At the same moment, at the creak of a footstep on the kitchen +stairs, Lawford also had drawn soundlessly back into the darkness +of the empty drawing-room. + +'While Mr Danton is "thinking," Sheila,' Mrs Lovat was softly +interposing, 'do please listen a moment to me. Do you mean really +that that Frenchman--the one you've pocketed--is the poor +creature in the grave?' + +'Yes, Mrs Lawford,' said Mr Craik, putting out his face a little, +'are we to take it that you mean that?' + +'It's the same date, dear, the same name even to the spelling; +what possibly else can I think?' + +'And that the poor creature in the grave actually climbed up out +of the darkness and--well, what?' + +'I know no more than you do NOW, Bettie. But the two faces--you +must remember you haven't seen my husband SINCE.' You must +remember you haven't heard the peculiar--the most peculiar things +he--Arthur himself--has said to me. Things such as a wife... And +not in jest, Bettie; I assure you....' + +'And Mr Bethany?' interpolated Mr Craik modestly, feeling his +way. + +'Pah, Bethany, Craik! He'd back Old Nick himself if he came with +a good tale. We've got to act; we've got to settle his hash +before he does any mischief.' + +'Well,' began Mrs Lovat, smiling a little remorsefully beneath +the arch of her raised eyebrows, 'I sincerely hope you'll all +forgive me; but I really am, heart and soul, with Old Nick, as Mr +Danton seems on intimate terms enough to call him. Dead, he is +really immensely alluring; and alive, I think, awfully--just +awfully pitiful and--and pathetic. But if I know anything of +Arthur he won't be beaten by a Frenchman. As for just the +portrait, I think, do you know, I almost prefer dark men'--she +glanced up at the face immediately in front of the clock--'at +least,' she added softly, 'when they are not looking very +vindictive. I suppose people are fairly often possessed, Mr +Craik? HOW many "deadly sins" are there?' + +'As a matter of fact, Mrs Lovat, there are seven. But I think in +this case Mrs Lawford intends to suggest not so much that--that +her husband is in that condition; habitual sin, you know--grave +enough, of course, I own--but that he is actually being +compelled, even to the extent of a more or less complete change +of physiognomy, to follow the biddings of some atrocious +spiritual influence. It is no breach of confidence to say that I +have myself been present at a death-bed where the struggle +against what I may call the end was perfectly awful to witness. I +don't profess to follow all the ramifications of the affair, but +though possibly Mr Danton may seem a little harsh, such +harshness, if I may venture to intercede, is not necessarily +"vindictive." And--and personal security is a consideration.' + +'If you only knew the awful fear, the awful uncertainty I have +been in, Bettie! Oh, it is worse, infinitely worse, than you can +possibly imagine. I have myself heard the Voice speak out of +him--a high, hard, nasal voice. I've seen what Mr Danton calls +the "glassiness" come into his face, and an expression so wild +and so appallingly depraved, as it were, that I have had to hurry +downstairs to hide myself from the thought. I'm willing to +sacrifice everything for my own husband and for Alice; but can it +be expected of me to go on harbouring....' Lawford listened on in +vain for a moment; poor Sheila, it seemed, had all but broken +down. + +'Look here, Mrs Lawford,' began Danton huskily, 'you really +mustn't give way; you really mustn't. It's awful, unspeakably +awful, I admit. But here we are; friends, in the midst of +friends. And there's absolutely nothing-- What's that? Eh? Who is +it?... Oh, the maid!' + +Ada stood in the doorway looking in. 'All I've come to ask, +ma'am,' she said in a low voice, 'is, am I to stay downstairs any +longer? And are you aware there's somebody in the house?' + +'What's that? What's that you're saying?' broke out the husky +voice again. 'Control yourself! Speak gently! What's that?' + +'Begging your pardon, sir, I'm perfectly under control. And all I +say is that I can't stay any longer alone downstairs there. +There's somebody in the house.' + +A concentrated hush seemed to have fallen on the little assembly. + +'"Somebody"--but who?' said Sheila out of the silence. 'You come +up here, Ada, with these idle fancies. Who's in the house? There +has been no knock--no footstep.' + +'No knock, no footstep, ma'am, that I've heard. It's Dr Ferguson, +ma'am. He was here that first night; and he's been here ever +since. He was here when I came on Tuesday; and he was here last +night. And he's here now. I can't be deceived by my own feelings. +It's not right, it's not out-spoken to keep me in the dark like +this. And if you have no objection, I would like to go home.' + +Lawford in his utter weariness had nearly closed the door and now +sat bent up on a chair, wondering vaguely when this poor play was +coming to an end, longing with an intensity almost beyond +endurance for the keen night air, the open sky. But still his +ears drank in every tiniest sound or stir. He heard Danton's +lowered voice muttering his arguments. He heard Ada quietly +sniffing in the darkness of the hall. And this was his world! +This was his life's panorama, creaking on at every jolt. This was +the 'must' Grisel had sent him back to--these poor fools packed +together in a panic at an old stale tale! Well, they +would all come out presently, and cluster; and the crested, +cackling fellow would lead them safely away out of the haunted +farmyard. + +He started out of his reverie at Danton's voice close at hand. + +'Look here, my good girl, we haven't the least intention of +keeping you in the dark. If you want to leave your mistress like +this in the midst of her anxieties she says you can go and +welcome. But it's not a bit of good in the world coming +up with these cock-and-bull stories. The truth is your master's +mad, that's the sober truth of it--hopelessly insane, you +understand; and we've got to find him. But nothing's to be said, +d'ye see? It's got to be done without fuss or scandal. But if +there's any witness wanted, or anything of that kind, why, here +you are; and,' he dropped his voice to an almost inaudible hoot, +'and well worth your while! You did see him, eh? Step into the +trap, and all that?' + +Ada stood silent a moment. 'I don't know, sir,' she began +quietly, 'by what right you speak to me about what you call my +cock-and-bull stories. If the master is mad, all I can say to +anybody is I'm very sorry to hear it. I came to my mistress, sir, +if you please; and I prefer to take my orders from one who has +a right to give them. Did I understand you to say, ma'am, that +you wouldn't want me any more this evening?' + +Sheila had swept solemnly to the door. 'Mr Danton meant all that +he said quite kindly, Ada. I can perfectly understand your +feelings--perfectly. And I'm very much obliged to you for all +your kindness to me in very trying circumstances. We are all +agreed--we are forced to the terrible conclusion which--which Mr +Danton has just--expressed. And I know I can rely on your +discretion. Don't stay on a moment if you really are afraid. But +when you say "some one" Ada, do you mean--some one like you or +me; or do you mean--the other?' + +'I've been sitting in the kitchen, ma'am, unable to move. I'm +watched everywhere. The other evening I went into the +drawing-room--I was alone in the house--and... I can't describe +it. It wasn't dark; and yet it was all still and black, like the +ruins after a fire. I don't mean I saw it, only that it was like +a scene. And then the watching--I am quite aware to some it may +sound all fancy. But I'm not superstitious, never was. I only +mean--that I can't sit alone here. I daren't. Else, I'm quite +myself. So if so be you don't want me any more; if I can't be of +any further use to you or to--to Mr. Lawford, I'd prefer to go +home.' + +'Very well, Ada; thank you. You can go out this way.' + +The door was unchained and unbolted, and 'Good-night' said. And +Sheila swept back in sombre pomp to her absorbed friends. + +'She's quite a good creature at heart,' she explained frankly, as +if to disclaim any finesse, 'and almost quixotically loyal. But +what really did she mean, do you think? She is so obstinate. That +maddening "some one"! How they do repeat themselves. It can't be +my husband; not Dr Ferguson, I mean. You don't suppose--oh +surely, not "some one" else!' Again the dark silence of the house +seemed to drift in on the little company. + +Mr Craik cleared his throat. 'I failed to catch quite all that +the maid said,' he murmured apologetically; 'but I certainly did +gather it was to some kind of--of emanation she was referring. +And the "ruin," you know. I'm not a mystic; and yet do you know, +that somehow seemed to me almost offensively suggestive of--of +demonic influence. You don't suppose, Mrs Lawford--and of course +I wouldn't for a moment venture on such a conjecture unsupported- +but even if this restless spirit (let us call it) did succeed in +making a footing, it might possibly be rather in the nature of a +lodging than a permanent residence. Moreover we are, I think, +bound to remember that probably in all spheres of existence like +attracts like; even the Gadarene episode seems to suggest a +possible MULTIPICATION!' he peered largely. 'You don't suppose, +Mrs Lawford...?' + +'I think Mr Craik doesn't quite relish having to break the news, +Sheila dear,' explained Mrs Lovat soothingly, 'that perhaps +Sabathier's out. Which really is quite a heavenly suggestion, for +in that case your husband would be in, wouldn't he? Just our old +stolid Arthur again, you know. And next Mr Craik is suggesting, +and it certainly does seem rather fascinating, that poor Ada's +got mixed up with the Frenchman's friends, or perhaps, even, with +one of the seventy-two Princes Royal. I know women can't, or +mustn't reason, Mr Danton, but you do, I hope, just catch the +drift?' + +Danton started. 'I wasn't really listening to the girl,' be +explained nonchalantly, shrugging his black shoulders and pursing +up his eyes. 'Personally, Mrs Lovat, I'd pack the baggage off +to-night, box and all. But it's not my business.' + +'You mustn't be depressed--must he, Mr Craik? After all, my dear +man, the business, as you call it, is not exactly entailed. But +really, Sheila, I think it must be getting very late. Mr Bethany +won't come now. And the dear old thing ought certainly to have +his say before we go any further; OUGHTN'T he, Mr Danton? So +what's the use of worriting poor Ada's ghost any longer. And as +for poor Arthur--I haven't the faintest desire in the world to +hear the little cart drive up, simply in case it should be to +leave your unfortunate husband behind it, Sheila. What it must be +to be alone all night in this house with a dead and buried +Frenchman's face--well, I shudder, dear!' + +'And yet, Mrs Lovat,' said Mr Craik, with some little show of +returning bravado, 'as we make our bed, you know.' + +'But in this case, you see,' she replied reflectively, 'if all +accounts are true, Mr Craik, it's manifestly the wicked Frenchman +who has made the bed, and Sheila who refu-- But look; Mr Danton +is fretting to get home.' + +'If you'll all go to the door,' said Danton, seizing a fleeting +opportunity to raise his eyebrows more expressively even than if +he had again shrugged his shoulders at Sheila, 'I'll put out the +light.' + +The night air flowed into the dark house as Danton hastily groped +his way out of the dining-room. + +'There's only one thing,' said Sheila slowly. 'When I last saw my +husband, you know, he was, I think, the least bit better. He was +always stubbornly convinced it would all come right in time. +That's why, I think, he's been spending his--his evenings away +from home. But supposing it did?' + +'For my part,' said Mrs Lovat, breathing the faint wind that was +rising out of the west, 'I'd sigh; I'd rub my eyes; I'd thank God +for such an exciting dream; and I'd turn comfortably over and go +to sleep again. I'm all for Arthur--absolutely--back against the +wall.' + +'For my part,' said Danton, looming in the dusk, 'friend or no +friend, I'd cut the--I'd cut him dead. But don't fret, Mrs +Lawford, devil or no devil, he's gone for good.' + +'And for my part--' began Mr Craik; but the door at that moment +slammed. + +Voices, however, broke out almost immediately in the porch. And +after a hurried consultation, Lawford in his stagnant retreat +heard the door softly reopen, and the striking of a match. And Mr +Craik, followed closely by Danton's great body, stole +circumspectly across his dim chink, and the first adventurer went +stumbling down the kitchen staircase. + +'I suppose,' muttered Lawford, turning his head in the darkness, +'they have come back to put out the kitchen gas.' + +Danton began a busy tuneless whistle between his teeth. + +'Coming, Craik?' he called thickly, after a long pause. + +Apparently no answer had been returned to his inquiry: he waited +a little longer, with legs apart, and eyeballs enveloped in +brooding darkness. 'I'll just go and tell the ladies you're +coming,' he suddenly bawled down the hollow. 'Do you hear, +Craik? They're alone, you know.' And with that he resolutely +wheeled and rapidly made his way down the steps into the garden. +Some few moments afterwards Mr Craik shook himself free of the +basement, hastened at a spirited trot to rejoin his companions, +and in his absence of mind omitted to shut the front door. + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE + +Lawford sat on in the darkness, and now one sentence and now +another of their talk would repeat itself in his memory, in much +the same way as one listlessly turns over an antiquated diary, to +read here and there a flattened and almost meaningless sentiment. +Sometimes a footstep passed echoing along the path under the +trees, then his thoughts would leave him, and he would listen and +listen till it had died quite out. It was all so very far away. +And they too--these talkers--so very far away; as remote and yet +as clear as the characters in a play when they have made their +final bow, and have left the curtained stage, and one is standing +uncompanioned and nearly the last of the spectators, and the +lights that have summoned back reality again are being +extinguished. It was only by painful effort of mind that he kept +recalling himself to himself--why he was here; what it all meant; +that this was indeed actuality. + +Yet, after all, this by now was his customary loneliness: there +was little else he desired for the present than the hospitality +of the dark. He glanced around him in the clear, black, stirless +air. Here and there, it seemed, a humped or spindled form held +against all comers its passive place. Here and there a tiny +faintness of light played. Night after night these chairs and +tables kept their blank vigil. Why, he thought, pleased as an +overtired child with the fancy, in a sense they were always +alone, shut up in a kind of senselessness--just like us +all. But what--what, he had suddenly risen from his chair to ask +himself--what on earth are they alone with? No precise answer had +been forthcoming to that question. But as in turning in the +doorway, he looked out into the night, flashing here and there in +dark spaces of the sky above the withering apple leaves--the long +dark wall and quiet untrodden road--with the tumultuous beating +of the stars--one thing at least he was conscious of having +learned in these last few days: he knew what kind of a place he +was alone IN. + +It seemed to weave a spell over him, to call up a nostalgia he +had lost all remembrance of since childhood. And that queer +homesickness, at any rate, was all Sabathier's doing, he thought, +smiling in his rather careworn fashion. Sabathier! It was this +mystery, bereft now of all fear, and this beauty together, that +made life the endless, changing and yet changeless, thing it was. +And yet mystery and loveliness alike were only really appreciable +with one's legs, as it were, dangling down over into the grave. + +Just with one's lantern lit, on the edge of the whispering +unknown, and a reiterated going back out of the solitude into the +light and warmth, to the voices and glancing of eyes, to say +good-bye:--that after all was this life on earth for those who +watched as well as acted. What if one's earthly home were +empty?--still the restless fretted traveller must tarry; 'for the +horrible worst of it is, my friend,' he said, as if to some +silent companion listening behind him, 'the worst of it is, YOUR +way was just simply, solely suicide.' What was it Herbert +had called it? Yes, a cul-de-sac--black, lofty, immensely still +and old and picturesque, but none the less merely a contemptible +cul-de-sac; no abiding place, scarcely even sufficing with its +flagstones for a groan from the fugitive and deluded refugee. +There was no peace for the wicked. The question of course +then came in--Was there any peace anywhere, for anybody? + +He smiled at a sudden odd remembrance of a quiet, sardonic old +aunt whom he used to stay with as a child. 'Children should be +seen and not heard,' she would say, peering at him over his +favourite pudding. + +His eyes rested vacantly on the darkling street. He fell again +into reverie, gigantically brooded over by shapes only +imagination dimly conceived of: the remote alleys of his mind +astir with a shadowy and ceaseless traffic which it wasn't at +least THIS life's business to hearken after, or regard. And as he +stood there in a mysteriously thronging peaceful solitude such as +he had never known before, faintly out of the silence broke the +sound of approaching hoofs. His heart seemed to gather itself +close; a momentary blindness veiled his eyes, so wildly had his +blood surged up into cheek and brain. He remained, caught up, +with head slightly inclined, listening, as, with an interminable +tardiness, measureless anguished hope died down into nothing in +his mind. + +Cold and heavy, his heart began to beat again, as if to catch up +those laggard moments. He turned with an infinite revulsion of +feeling to look out on the lamps of the old fly that had drawn up +at his gate. + +He watched incuriously a little old lady rather arduously alight, +pause, and look up at his darkened windows, and after a momentary +hesitation, and a word over her shoulder to the cabman, stoop and +fumble at the iron latch. He watched her with a kind of wondering +aversion, still scarcely tinged with curiosity. She had succeeded +in lifting the latch and in pushing her way through, and was even +now steadily advancing towards him along the tiled path. And a +minute after he recognised with the strangest reactions the quiet +old figure that had shared a sunset with him ages and ages ago-- +his mother's old schoolfellow, Miss Sinnet. + +He was already ransacking the still faintly-perfumed dining-room +for matches, and had just succeeded in relighting the still-warm +lamp, when he heard her quiet step in the porch, even felt her +peering in, in the gloom, with all her years' trickling +customariness behind her, a little dubious of knocking on a +wide-open door. + +But the lamp lit Lawford went out again and welcomed his visitor. +'I am alone,' he was explaining gravely, 'my wife's away and the +whole house topsy-turvy. How very, very kind of you!' + +The old lady was breathing a little heavily after her ascent of +the steep steps, and seemed not to have noticed his outstretched +hand. None the less she followed him in, and when she was well +advanced into the lighted room, she sighed deeply, raised her +veil over the front of her bonnet, and leisurely took out her +spectacles. + +'I suppose,' she was explaining in a little quiet voice, 'you ARE +Mr Arthur Lawford, but as I did not catch sight of a light in any +of the windows I began to fear that the cabman might have set me +down at the wrong house.' + +She raised her head, and first through, and then over her +spectacles she deliberately and steadfastly regarded him. + +'Yes,' she said to herself, and turned, not as it seemed entirely +with satisfaction, to look for a chair. He wheeled the most +comfortable up to the table. + +'I have been visiting my old friend Miss Tucker--Rev W. Tucker's +daughter--she, I knew, could give me your address; and sure +enough she did. Your road, d'ye see, was on my way home. And I +determined, in spite of the hour, just to inquire. You must +understand, Mr Lawford, there was something that I rather +particularly wanted to say to you. But there!--you're looking +sadly, sadly ill; and,' she glanced round a little inquisitively, +'I think my story had better wait for a more convenient +occasion.' + +'Not at all, Miss Sinnet; please not,' Lawford assured her, +'really. I have been ill, but I'm now practically quite myself +again. My wife and daughter have gone away for a few days; and I +follow to-morrow, so if you'll forgive such a very poor welcome, +it may be my--my only chance. Do please let me hear.' + +The old lady leant back in her chair, placed her hands on its +arms and softly panted, while out of the rather broad serenity of +her face she sat blinking up at her companion as if after a long +talk, instead of at the beginning of one. 'No,' she repeated +reflectively, 'I don't like your looks at all; yet here we +are, enjoying beautiful autumn weather, Mr Lawford, why not make +use of it?' + +'Oh yes,' said Lawford, 'I do. I have been making tremendous use +of it.' + +Her eyelid flickered at his candid glance. 'And does your +business permit of much walking?' + +'Well, I've been malingering these last few days idling at home; +but I am usually more or less my own man, Miss Sinnet. I walk a +little.' + +'H'm, but not much in my direction, Mr Lawford?' she quizzed him, + +'All horrible indolence, Miss Sinnet. But I often--often think of +you; and especially just lately.' + +'Well, now,' she wriggled round her head to get a better view of +him rather stiffly seated on his chair, 'that's very peculiar; +because I too have been thinking lately a great deal of you. And +yet--I fancy I shall succeed in mystifying you presently--not +precisely of you, but of somebody else!' + +'You do mystify me--"somebody else"!' he replied gallantly. 'And +that is the story, I suppose?' + +'That's the story,' repeated Miss Sinnet with some little +triumph. 'Now, let me see; it was on Saturday last--yes, Saturday +evening; a wonderful sunset; Bewley Heath.' + +'Oh yes; my daughter's favourite walk.' + +'And your daughter's age now?' + +'She's nearly sixteen; Alice, you know.' + +'Ah, yes, Alice; to be sure. It is a beautiful walk, and if fine, +I generally take mine there too. It's near; there's shade; it's +very little frequented; and I can wander and muse undisturbed. +And that I think is pretty well all that an old woman like me is +fit for, Mr Lawford. "Nearly sixteen!" Is it possible? +Dear, dear me? But let me get on. On my way home from the Heath, +you may be aware, before one reaches the road again, there's a +somewhat steep ascent. I haven't the strength I had, and whether +I'm fatigued or not, I have always made it a rule to rest awhile +on a most convenient little seat at the summit, admire +the view--what I can see of it--and then make my way quietly, +quietly home. On Saturday, however, and it most rarely occurs-- +once, I remember, when a very civil nursemaid was sitting with +two charmingly behaved little children in the sunshine, and I +heard they were my old friend Major Loder's son's children--on +Saturday, as I was saying, my own particular little haunt was +already occupied.' She glanced back at him from out of her +thoughts, as it were. 'By a gentleman. I say, gentleman; though I +must confess that his conduct--perhaps, too, a little something +even in his appearance, somewhat belied the term. Anyhow, +gentleman let us call him.' + +Lawford, all attention, nodded, and encouragingly smiled. + +'I'm not one of those tiresome, suspicious people, Mr Lawford, +who distrust strangers. I have never been molested, and I have +enjoyed many and many a most interesting, and sometimes +instructive, talk with an individual whom I've never seen in my +life before, and this side of the grave perhaps, am never likely +to see again.' She lifted her head with pursed lips, and gravely +yet still flickeringly regarded him once more. 'Well, I made some +trifling remark--the weather, the view, what-not,' she explained +with a little jerk of her shoulder--'and to my extreme +astonishment he turned and addressed me by name--Miss Sinnet. +Unmistakably--Sinnet. Now, perhaps, and very rightly, you won't +considered THAT a very peculiar thing to do? But you will +recollect, Mr Lawford, that I had been sitting there a +considerable time. Surely, now, if you had recognised my face +you would have addressed me at once?' + +'Was he, do you think, Miss Sinnet, a little uncertain, perhaps?' + +'Never mind, never mind; let me get on with my story first. The +next thing my gentleman does is more mysterious still. His whole +manner was a little peculiar, perhaps--a certain restlessness, +what, in fact, one might be almost tempted to call a certain +furtiveness of behaviour. Never mind. What he does next is to ask +me a riddle! Perhaps you won't think that was peculiar either?' + +'What was the riddle?' smiled Lawford. + +'Why, to be sure, to guess his name! Simply guided, so I +surmised, by some very faint resemblance in his face to his +MOTHER, who was, he assured me, au old schoolfellow of mine at +BRIGHTON. I thought and thought. I confess the adventure was +beginning to be a little perplexing. But of course, very, very +few of my old schoolfellows remain distinctly in my memory now; +and I fear that grows more treacherous the longer I live. Their +faces as girls are clear enough. But later in life most of them +drifted out of sight--many, alas, are dead; and, well, at +last I narrowed my man down to one. And who now, do you suppose +that was?' + +Lawford sustained an expression of abysmal mystification. 'Do +tell me--who?' + +'Your own poor dear mother, Mr Lawford.' + +'HE said so?' + +'No, no,' said the old lady, with some vexation, closing her +eyes. 'I said so. He asked me to guess. And I guessed Mary +Lawford; now do you see?' + +`Yes, yes. But WAS he like her, Miss Sinnet? That was really +very, very extraordinary. Did you see any likeness in his face?' + +Miss Sinnet very deliberately took her spectacles out of their +case again. 'Now, see here, sir; this is being practical, isn't +it? I'm just going to take a leisurely glance at yours. But you +mustn't let me forget the time. You must look after the time for +me.' + +'It's about a quarter to ten,' said Lawford, having glanced first +at the stopped clock on the chimney-piece and then at his watch. +He then sat quite still and endeavoured to sit at ease, while the +old lady lifted her bonneted head and ever so gravely and +benignly surveyed him. + +'H'm,' she said at last. 'There's no mistaking YOU. It's Mary's +chin, and Mary's brow--with just a little something, perhaps, of +her dreamy eye. But you haven't all her looks, Mr Lawford, by any +manner of means. She was a very beautiful girl, and so vivacious, +so fanciful--it was, I suppose the foreign strain showing itself. +Even marriage did not quite succeed in spoiling her.' + +'The foreign strain?' Lawford glanced with a kind of fleeting +fixity at the quiet old figure. 'The foreign strain?' + +Your mother's maiden name, my dear Mr Lawford, surely memory does +not deceive me in that, was van der Gucht. THAT, I believe, is a +foreign name.' + +'Ah, yes,' said Lawford, his rising thoughts sinking quietly to +rest again. 'Van der Gucht, of course. I--how stupid of me!' + +'As a matter of fact, your mother was very proud of her Dutch +blood. But there,' she flung out little fin-like sleeves, 'if you +don't let me keep to my story I shall go back as uneasy as I +came. And you didn't,' she added even more fretfully, 'you didn't +tell me the time.' + +Lawford stared at his watch again for some few moments without +replying. 'It's a few minutes to ten,' he said at last. + +'Dear me! And I'm keeping the cabman! I mast hurry on. Well, now, +I put it to you; you shall be my father confessor--though I +detest the idea in real life--was I wrong? Was I justified in +professing to the poor fellow that I detected a likeness when +there was extremely little likeness there?' + +'What! None at all!' cried Lawford; 'not the faintest trace?' + +'My dear good Mr Lawford,' she expostulated, patting her lap, +'there's very little more than a trace of my dear beautiful Mary +in YOU, her own son. How could there be--how could you expect it +in him, a complete stranger? No, it was nothing but my own +foolish kindliness. It might have been Mary's son for all +that I could recollect. I haven't for years, please remember, had +the pleasure of receiving a visit from YOU. I am firmly of +opinionthat I was justified. My motive was entirely benevolent. +And then--to my positive amazement--well, I won't say hard things +of the absent; but he suddenly turns round on me with a "Thank +you, Miss Bennett." Bennett, hark ye! Perhaps you won't agree +that I had any justification in being vexed and--and affronted +at THAT.' + +'I think, Miss Sinnet,' said Lawford solemnly, 'that you were +perfectly justified. Oh, perfectly. I wonder even you had the +patience to give the real Arthur Lawford a chance to ask your +forgiveness for--or the stranger.' + +'Well, candidly,' said Miss Sinnett severely. 'I was very much +scandalised; and I shouldn't be here now telling you my story if +it hadn't been for your mother.' + +'My mother!' + +The old lady rather grimly enjoyed his confusion. 'Yes, Mr +Lawford, your mother. I don't know why--something in his manner, +something in his face--so dejected, so unhappy, so--if it is not +uncharitablse to say it--so wild: it has haunted me: I haven't +been able to put the matter out of my mind. I have lain awake in +my bed thinking of him. Why did he speak to me, I keep asking +myself. Why did he play me so very aimless a trick? How had he +learned my name? Why was he sitting there so solitary and so +dejected? And worse even than that, what has become of him? A +little more patience, a little more charity, perhaps--what might +I not have done for him? The whole thing has harassed and +distressed me more than I can say. Would you believe it, I have +actually twice, and on one occasion, three times in a day made my +way to the seat--hoping to see him there. And I am not so +young as I was. And then, as I say, to crown all, I had a most +remarkable dream about your mother. But that's my own affair. +Elderly people like me are used--well, perhaps I won't say used-- +we're not surprised or disturbed by visits from those who have +gone before. We live, in a sense, among the tombs; though I would +not have you fancy it's in any way a morbid or unhappy life to +lead. We don't talk about it--certainly not to young people. Let +them enjoy their Eden while they can; though there's plenty of +apples, I fear, on the Tree yet, Mr Lawford.' + +She leant forward and whispered it with a big, simple smile:-- +'We don't even discuss it much among ourselves. But as one gets +nearer and nearer to the wicket-gate there's other company around +one than you'll find in--in the directory. And that is why I have +just come on here tonight. Very probably my errand may seem to +have no meaning for you. You look ill, but you don't appear +to be in any great trouble or adversity, as I feared in my--well, +there--as I feared you might be. I must say, though, it seems a +terribly empty house. And no lights, too!' + +She slowly, with a little trembling nodding of her bonnet, turned +her head and glanced quietly, fixedly, and unflinchingly, out of +the half-open door. 'But that's not my affair.' And again she +looked at him for a little while. + +Then she stooped forward and touched him kindly and trustingly on +the knee. 'Trouble or no trouble,' she said, 'it's never too late +to remind a man of his mother. And I'm sure, Mr Lawford, I'm very +glad to hear you are struggling up out of your illness again. We +must keep a brave heart, forty or seventy, whichever we may be: +"While the evil days come not nor the years draw nigh when thou +shalt say, I have no pleasure in them," though they have not come +to me even yet; and I trust from the bottom of my heart, not to +YOU.' + +She looked at him without a trace of emotion or constraint in her +large, quiet face, and their eyes met for a moment in that brief, +fixed, baffling fashion that seems to prove that mankind is after +all but a dumb masked creature saddled with the vain illusion of +speech. + +'And now that I've eased my conscience,' said the old lady, +pulling down her veil, 'I must beg pardon for intruding at such +an hour of the evening. And may I have your arm down those +dreadful steps? Really, Mr Lawford, judging from the houses they +erect for us, the builders must have a very peculiar notion of +mankind. Is the fly still there? I expressly told the man to +wait, and what I am going to do if--!' + +'He's there,' Lawford reassured her, craning his neck in their +slow progress to catch a peep into the quiet road. And like a +flock of birds scared by a chance comer at their feeding in some +deserted field, a whirring cloud of memories swept softly up in +his mind--memories whose import he made no effort to discover. +None the less, the leisurely descent became in their company +something of a real experience even in such a brimming week. + +'I hope, some day, you will really tell me your dream?' he said, +pushing the old lady's silk skirts in after her as she slowly +climbed into the carriage. + +'Ah, my dear Lawford, when you are my age,' she called back to +him, groping her way into the rather musty gloom, 'you'll dream +such dreams for yourself. Life's not what's just the fashion. And +there are queerer things to be seen and heard just quietly in +one's solitude than this busy life gives us time to discover. +But as for my mystifying Bewley acquaintance--I confess I cannot +make head or tail of him.' + +'Was he,' said Lawford rather vaguely, looking up into the dim +white face that with its plumes filled nearly the whole carriage +window, 'was his face very unpleasing?' + +She raised a gloved hand. 'It has haunted me, haunted me, Mr +Lawford; its--its conflict! Poor fellow; I hope, I do hope, he +faced his trouble out. But I shall never see him again.' + +He squeezed the trembling, kindly old hand. 'I bet, Miss Sinnet,' +he said earnestly, 'even your having thought kindly of the poor +beggar eased his mind--whoever he may have been. I assure you, +assure you of that.' + +'Ay, but I did more than THINK,' replied the old lady with a +chuckle that might have seemed even a little derisive if it had +not been so profoundly magnanimous. + +He watched the old black fly roll slowly off, and still smiling +at Miss Sinnet's inscrutable finesse went back into the house. +'And now, my friend,' he said, addressing peacefully the +thronging darkness, 'the time's nearly up for me to go too.' + +He had made up his mind. Or, rather, it seemed as if in the +unregarded silences of this last long talk his mind had made up +itself. Only among impossibilities had he the shadow of a choice. +In this old haunted house, amid this shallow turmoil no +practicable clue could show itself of a way out. He would go away +for a while. + +He left the door ajar behind him for the moments still left, and +stood for a while thinking. Then, lamp in hand, he descended into +the breakfast-room for pen, ink, and paper. He sat for some time +in that underground calm, nibbling his pen like a harassed and +self-conscious schoolboy. At last he began: + +'MY DEAR SHEILA,--I must tell you, to begin with, that the CHANGE +has now all passed away. I am--as near as man can be--completely +myself again. And next: that I overheard all that was said +to-night in the dining-room. + +'I'm sorry for listening; but it's no good going over all that +now. Here I am, and, as you said, for Alice's sake we must make +the best of it. I am going away for a while, to get, if I can, a +chance to quiet down. I suppose every one comes sooner or later +to a time in life when there is nothing else to be done but just +shut one's eyes and blunder on. And that's all I can do now-- +blunder on....' + +He paused, and suddenly, at the echo of the words in his mind, a +revulsion of feeling--shame and hatred of himself surged up, and +he tore his letter into tiny pieces. Once more he began, 'my dear +Sheila,' dropped his pen, sat on for a long time, cold and inert, +harbouring almost unendurably a pitiful, hopeless longing.... He +would write to Grisel another day. + +He leant back in his chair, his fingers pressed against his +eyelids. And clearer than those which myriad-hued reality can +ever present, pictures of the imagination swam up before his +eyes. It seemed, indeed, that even now some ghost, some revenant +of himself was sitting there, in the old green churchyard, +roofed only with a thousand thousand stars. The breath of +darkness stirred softly on his cheek. Some little scampering +shape slipped by. A bird on high cried weirdly, solemnly, over +the globe. He shuddered faintly, and looked out again into the +small lamplit room. + +Here, too, was quite as inexplicable a coming and going. A fly +was walking on the table beneath his eyes, with the uneasy gait +of one that has outlived his hour and most of his companions. +Mice were scampering and shrieking in the empty kitchen. And all +about him, in the viewless air, the phantoms of another life +passed by, unmindful of his motionless body. He fell into a +lethargy of the senses, and only gradually became aware after a +while of the strange long-drawn sigh of rain at the window. He +rose and opened it. The night air flowed in, chilled with its +waters and faintly fragrant of the dust. It soothed away all +thought for a while. He turned back to his chair. He would wait +until the rain had lulled before starting.... + +A little before midnight the door was softly, and with extreme +care, pushed open, and Mr Bethany's old face, with an intense and +sharpened scrutiny, looked in on the lamplit room. And as if +still intent on the least sound within the empty walls around +him, he came near, and stooping across the table, stared +through his spectacles at the sidelong face of his friend, so +still, with hands so lightly laid on the arms of his chair that +the old man had need to watch closely to detect in his heavy +slumber the slow measured rise and fall of his breast. + +He turned wearily away muttering a little, between an +immeasurable relief and a now almost intolerable medley of +vexations. What WAS this monstrous web of Craik's? What HAD the +creature been nodding and ducketing about?--those whisperings, +that tattling? And what in the end, when you were old and sour +and out-strategied, what was the end to be of this urgent dream +called Life? He sat quietly down and drew his hands over his +face, pushed his lean knotted fingers up under his spectacles, +then sat blinking--and softly slowly deciphered the solitary 'My +dear Sheila' on Lawford's note-paper. 'H'm,' he muttered, and +looked up again at the dark still eyelids that in the strange +torpor of sleep might yet be dimly conveying to the dreaming +brain behind them some hint of his presence. 'I wish to goodness, +you wonderful old creature,' he muttered, wagging his head, 'I +wish to goodness you'd wake up.' + +For some time he sat on, listening to the still soft downpour on +the fading leaves. 'They don't come to me,' he said softly again; +with a tiny smile on his old face. 'It's that old medieval Craik: +with a face like a last year's rookery!' And again he sat, with +head a little sidelong, listening now to the infinitesimal sounds +of life without, now to the thoughts within, and ever and again +he gazed steadfastly on Lawford. + +At last it seemed in the haunted quietness other thoughts came to +him. A cloud, as it were of youth, drew over the wrinkled skin, +composed the birdlike keenness; his head nodded. Once, like +Lawford in the darkness at Widderstone, he glanced up sharply +across the lamplight at his phantasmagorical shadowy companion, +heard the steady surge of multitudinous rain-drops, like the roar +of Time's winged chariot hurrying near; then he too, with +spectacles awry, bobbed on in his chair, a weary old sentinel on +the outskirts of his friend's denuded battlefield. + + + + + +End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Return, by Walter de la Mare + diff --git a/old/rturn10.zip b/old/rturn10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..fe75c08 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/rturn10.zip |
