She held out her hands to him; she was smiling adorably.
"Jimmy," she said.
Jimmy's first wild instinct was to rush forward and take her in his arms; then he remembered. He backed away from her a step; he began to tremble.
"What--what have you come here for?" he stammered.
She laughed.
"Jimmy, how rude! You don't look a bit pleased to see me. You--oh, Jimmy, I thought you'd be so happy--so delighted."
She came across to him now; she slipped a hand through his arm; she leaned her cheek against his coat-sleeve; the scent of the lilies she wore mounted intoxicatingly to his head.
He tried not to look at her--he tried to stiffen his arm beneath her cheek; but his heart was thumping--he felt as if he were choking.
There was a moment of silence, then she looked up at him with a little spark of wonderment in her eyes.
"You're not going to forgive me--is that it?" she asked blankly.
She moved away from him; she stood just in front of him, looking into his face with the witching eyes he knew so well.
He would not look at her; he stared steadily over her head at the door beyond; he tried to laugh.
"It's not a question of forgiveness--is it?" he asked jerkily. "You--you chucked me up. You--you told me a lie to get rid of me. It--it isn't a question of forgiveness, do you think?"
She looked nonplussed, then she smiled. She took Jimmy's face between her hands, holding it so that he was forced to meet her eyes; she stood on tiptoe and softly kissed his chin.
"I'm sorry," she said, and now there was a very genuine ring of earnestness in her voice. "I'm more sorry than I can ever say. Forgive me, Jimmy; I've been punished enough. I--oh, if you knew how miserable I've been."
Jimmy stood like a man turned to stone; he stared at her with a sort of dread in his eyes. There were tears in hers; one big tear fell from her long lashes, and splashed down on to the lilies she wore.
After a moment he spoke with difficulty.
"Are you . . . what are you trying to say to me?"
Her hands fell to her sides; she looked down with a touch of shame.
"I'm trying to say that I'm sorry; I'm trying to tell you that I--I don't mind how poor you are. I thought I did, but--oh, Jimmy, I'd rather have you, and no money at all, than--than be as rich as Croesus with--with any other man."
"Cynthia!" Jimmy spoke her name in a stifled voice; she raised her eyes quickly. There was none of the passionate joy in his face which she had so confidently expected; none of the passionate joy in his voice which her heart told her ought to be there. Suddenly he turned aside from her; he put his arm down on the mantelshelf, hiding his face in it.
"Jimmy." She whispered his name with a sort of fear. "Jimmy--what--what is it? Oh, you are frightening me. I thought you would be so glad--so glad." She caught the limp hand hanging against his side; she laid her soft cheek to it.
Jimmy Challoner tore himself free with a sort of rage.
"It's too late--too late," he said hoarsely.
"Too--late!" She stared at him, not understanding. "What--what do you mean? That--that you can't forgive me; that--that you're so angry that--that----"
He swung round, white-faced and quivering.
"It's too late," he said again hopelessly. "I'm engaged to be married. I--oh, why did you ever send me away?" he broke out in anguish.
Her face had paled, but she was still far enough from understanding.
"Engaged to be married--you! To whom, Jimmy?"
He answered her in a voice of stifled rage.
"It's your doing--all your fault. You nearly drove me mad when you sent me away, and I--I----" There was a long pause. "I told you that I met some friends in the theatre that night when you . . . well, I'm engaged to her--to Christine. I've known her all my life. I--I was utterly wretched . . . I asked her to marry me. We're--we're going to be married the day after to-morrow."
Twice she tried to speak, but no words would come. She was as white now as the lilies she wore; her eyes had a stunned, incredulous look in them. She had never even remotely dreamed of this; it was like some crude nightmare. . . . Jimmy engaged! Jimmy who had sworn a thousand times never to love another woman; Jimmy who had been heart-broken when she sent him away. She broke out in vehement protest:
"Oh, no--no!"
"It's true," said Jimmy obstinately. "It's true."
For the moment he was hardly conscious of any feeling except a sort of shock. It had never once crossed his mind that she would come back to him; he could not believe even now that she was in earnest; he found himself remembering that night in her dressing-room at the theatre when she had lied to him, and pretended, and deceived him. Perhaps even this was all part of the play-acting; perhaps she was just trying to win him back again, to make a fool of him afresh.
Cynthia broke out again.
"Well, this girl must be told; she can't care for you. You say you haven't seen her for years. It's--it's absurd!" She took a step towards him. "You must tell her, Jimmy; you must explain to her. She . . . surely there is such a thing as buying her off."
The vulgarity of the expression made him wince; he thought of Christine with a sort of shame.
She would be the last girl in the world, he knew, to wish to hold him to a promise which he was unwilling to fulfil; he thought of her pale face and wistful brown eyes, and he broke out strenuously:
"It's impossible . . . it's too late . . . we are to be married on Thursday; everything is fixed up. I--oh, for God's sake, Cynthia, don't go on talking about it. You drove me to do what I have done. It's too late--I can't go back on my word."
She stood twisting her fingers agitatedly. Suddenly she went to where he stood; she tried to put her arms round his neck, but he resisted fiercely. He held her wrists; he kept his head flung back beyond her reach.
"It's too late, Cynthia--do you hear! I've given my word; I'm not going back on it now. You can't blame me. . . . I--I'd have given my life for this to have happened before--just a few days ago; but now----"
"You don't love me," she accused him passionately; she began to cry. "You said you would never love any woman but me as long as you lived. I thought you cared more for me than I do for you, but now I know you don't--you don't care so much. If you did you would give up this--this girl, whoever she is, without a single thought." Her voice dropped sobbingly. "Oh, Jimmy--Jimmy, don't be cruel; you can't mean It. I love you so much . . . you belonged to me first."
"You sent me away; you lied to me and deceived me."
He felt that he must keep on reminding himself of it; that he dared not for one instant allow himself to forget everything but how beautiful she was, and how much he wanted her.
She fell back from him; she dropped into a chair, hiding her face, and sobbing.
There was a touch of the theatrical in her attitude, but Jimmy was too miserable to be critical. He only knew that she was miserable and on his account, and that he loved her.
He broke out agitatedly:
"Don't, Cynthia--don't cry; you break my heart. . . Oh, for God's sake, don't cry."
"You don't care how miserable I am," she sobbed. "You--you haven't got a heart to break, if you can stand there like a stone and tell me that it's too late. It's not too late; you're not married yet. Tell her the truth; oh! if you love me tell her the truth, Jimmy."
Jimmy was looking at her, but for a moment he only saw the big sitting-room at the hotel where Mrs. Wyatt had died, and the crushed little figure of Christine herself, as he had knelt beside her and drew her head to his shoulder.
"Oh, Jimmy, I've got no one now--no one." Her voice came back to him, a mournful echo; and his own husky answer:
"You've got me, Christine!"
How could he go back on that--how could he add to her weight of sorrow?
"She's got nobody but me in all the world," he said simply; he was looking at Cynthia now, as if he found it easier. "She has just lost her mother, and she's the loneliest little t
hing----" he stopped jaggedly.
For a moment she did not answer; she had stopped sobbing; she was carefully wiping her eyes; she got up and walked over to the glass above the mantelshelf; she looked at herself anxiously.
"Well, I suppose it's good-bye, then," she said heavily; her voice dragged a little. She picked up her gloves and a silver chain-bag which she had thrown down on the table; she turned towards the door. "Good-bye, Jimmy."
Jimmy Challoner did not answer; he could not trust his voice. He walked past her and put his fingers on the door handle to open it for her; he was very white, and his eyes were fierce.
Cynthia stood still for an instant; she was quite close to him now. "Good-bye," she said again faintly.
He tried to answer, but could not find his voice; their eyes met, and the next moment she was in his arms.
He never knew how it happened; never knew if he made the first move towards her, or she to him; but he held her fast, kissing her as he had never kissed little Christine--her eyes, her hair, her warm, tremulous lips.
"You do love me, then, after all?" she whispered.
Jimmy let her go; he fell back against the door, hiding his eyes.
"You know I do," he said hoarsely.
He hated himself for his momentary weakness; he could not bear to look at her; when she had gone, he sat down in the big arm-chair and hid his face in his hands.
His pulses were racing; his head felt on fire.
The day after to-morrow he was to marry Christine. He had given his promise to her, and he knew that it was too late to draw back--too late to break her heart. And yet there was only one woman in all the world whom he loved, and whom he wanted--the woman from whom he had just parted; the woman who was even then driving away down the street with a little triumphant smile on her carefully reddened lips.
CHAPTER XI
HUSBAND AND WIFE
". . . to love, cherish, and to obey till death us do part."
Christine raised her soft brown eyes shyly and looked at Jimmy Challoner.
A ray of sunlight, piercing the stained glass window above the altar, fell on her face and slim figure; her voice was quite clear and steady, though a little sad perhaps, as she slowly repeated the words after the rather bored-looking clergyman.
Jimmy had insisted on being married in a parish where neither of them was known; he had got a special licence, and there was nobody in the church but the verger and Sangster, and a deaf uncle of Christine's, who thought the whole affair a great bother, and who had looked up a train to catch back home the very moment that Christine should have safely passed out of his keeping into her husband's.
He bade them "good-bye" in the vestry; he kissed Christine rather awkwardly, and said that he hoped she would be happy; his voice seemed to imply a doubt. He shook hands with Jimmy and called him a lucky dog; he spoke like a man who hardly realises what he is saying; he shook hands with Sangster and hurried away.
They heard him creaking down the aisle of the church, and the following slam of the heavy door behind him; there was a little awkward silence.
The clergyman was blotting Christine's new name in the register; he looked up at her with short-sighted eyes, a quill pen held between his teeth.
"Would you--er--care to have the pen, Mrs.--er--Challoner?"
He had a starchy voice and a starchy manner.
Christine was conscious of a sudden feeling of utter home-sickness; everybody was so stiff and strange; even Jimmy--dearly as she loved him--seemed somehow like a stranger in his smart coat and brand-new tie, and with the refractory kink in his hair well flattened down by brilliantine.
She wanted her mother; she wanted her mother desperately; she wanted to be kissed and made much of by someone who really wanted her to be happy. Tears smarted in her eyes, but she would not let them fall. Her throat ached with repressed sobs as she took the brand-new quill pen from the white hand extended to her, with a little shy:
"Thank you."
Sangster came forward.
"Shall I take care of it for you, Mrs. Challoner? We must tie a white bow round it, shall we? You will like to keep it, I am sure."
Christine turned to him eagerly. He spoke so kindly; his eyes looked at her with such sympathy. A big tear splashed down on the bosom of her black frock.
She was all in black, poor little Christine, save for white gloves, and some white flowers which Jimmy had sent her to carry. She tried to smile and answer Sangster when he spoke to her, but the words died away in her throat.
The gloomy London church depressed her; her own voice and Jimmy's had echoed hollowly behind them as they made their responses; her hand had shaken badly when she gave it to him to put on her wedding ring.
She was married now; she looked at Jimmy appealingly.
Jimmy was very flushed; when he spoke his voice sounded high and reckless. Christine heard him asking Sangster to come and have some lunch with them; he seemed most anxious that Sangster should come. Christine listened with a queer little sinking at her heart; she had wanted to be alone with Jimmy; she had so looked forward to this--their first meal together as husband and wife; but she bravely hid her disappointment.
"Do come; please do," she urged him.
They all left the church together. Christine walked between the two men down the long aisle; she did not feel a bit as if she had been married; she wondered if soon she was going to wake up and find that she had dreamt it all.
There was a taxi waiting at the church door. She got in, and both men followed. Jimmy sat beside her, but he talked to Sangster all the way. He was terribly nervous; he kept twisting and torturing the new pair of grey gloves which he had never put on; they were all out of shape and creased long before taxi stopped again at the quiet restaurant where they were to lunch.
Christine looked at Jimmy.
"What can I do with my flowers? I--everybody will know if I take them in with me." She blushed as she spoke. Jimmy's own face caught the reflection from hers.
"Oh, leave 'em in the taxi," he said awkwardly. "I'll tell the chap to come back for us in an hour."
He surreptitiously stuffed the new gloves into a coat pocket; he tried to look as if there were nothing very unusual about any of them as he led the way in.
Christine hardly ate anything; she was shy and unhappy. The kind efforts which Sangster made to make her feel at her ease added to her embarrassment. She missed her mother more and more as the moments fled away; she was on the verge of a breakdown when at last the interminable meal was ended.
She had hardly touched the champagne with which Jimmy had insisted on filling her glass; there were two empty bottles on the table, and she wondered mechanically who had drunk it all.
Sangster bade her "good-bye" as they left the restaurant; he held her hand for a moment, and looked into her eyes.
"I hope you will be very happy; I am sure you will."
Christine tried to thank him; she wished he were not going to leave them; she had not wanted him to come with them in the first place, but now she was conscious only of a desire to keep him there. Her heart pounded in her throat as he turned away; she looked apprehensively at Jimmy--her husband now.
He was looking very smart, she thought with a little thrill of pride; she was sure he was quite the best-looking man she had ever seen. He was talking to Sangster, but she could not hear what either of them was saying.
"Be good to her, Jimmy . . . she's such a child."
That was what Sangster was saying; and Jimmy--well, Jimmy flushed uncomfortably as he answered with a sort of bravado:
"Don't be a silly old ass! Do you think I'm going to beat her?"
Then it was all over, and Christine and Jimmy were driving away together.
Jimmy looked at her with a nervous smile.
"Well--we're married," he said eloquently.
"Yes." She raised her beautiful eyes to his face; her heart was throbbing happily. Unconsciously she made a little movement towards him.
Jimmy put out
his hand and let down the window with a run.
"Jove! isn't it hot!" he said.
He was beginning to wonder if he had drunk too much champagne; he passed his silk handkerchief over his flushed face.
"I thought it was rather cold," said Christine timidly.
He frowned.
"Does that mean that you want the window up?" He did not mean to speak sharply; but he was horribly nervous, and Sangster's parting words had not improved matters at all.
Christine burst into tears; she was overstrung and excited; her nerves were all to pieces; she sobbed for a moment desolately.
Jimmy swore under his breath; he did not know what to do. After a moment he touched her--he pressed his silk handkerchief into her shaking hands.
"Don't cry," he said constrainedly. "People will think I've been unkind to you . . . already!" he added with a nervous laugh.
She mopped her eyes obediently; she felt frightened.
The horrible feeling that Jimmy was a stranger came back to her afresh. Oh, was this the kind boy lover who had been so good to her that day her mother died--the kind lover who had taken her in his arms and told her that she had him, that he would never leave her?
She longed so for just one word--one sign of affection; but Jimmy only sat there, hot and uncomfortable and silent.
After a moment:
"Better?" he asked.
"Yes . . ." She tried to control herself; she stammered a little shamed apology. "I'm so sorry--Jimmy."
He patted her hand.
"That's all right."
She took courage; she looked into his face.
"And you do--oh, you do love me?" she whispered.
"Of course I do." He put an awkward arm round her; he pressed her head to his shoulder, so that she could not see his face. "Of course I do," he said again. "Don't you worry--we're going to be awfully happy." He kissed her cheek.
Christine turned and put her arms round his neck; she was only a child still--she saw no reason at all why she should not let Jimmy know how very much she loved him.
The Second Honeymoon Page 7