by Hugh Walpole
After a long time she said, “Rachel dear. What is it?”
Rachel clung to her, holding her fiercely. At last, looking up but away from Lizzie, she said, “Oh! if you hadn’t been here. I don’t know — I simply don’t know what — I think it’s this night. This awful night. It’s so close and the storm is so long coming.”
“Has anything particular happened?”
“Yes. The Duchess has told Roddy about — about Francis — or I think she has. Roddy’s said nothing to me, but I ought to speak to him, to tell him.... I’ve put it off.”
Lizzie said softly. “You must tell him, Rachel. You know that you must. It’s the only thing. I thought it would come to that sooner or later.”
“But it’s more than that. I’m not well. I don’t know what it is, but I’ve never felt like it before, and it makes me more frightened than I’ve ever been. To-night I’ve been more frightened.”
But Lizzie was thinking.
“Has your grandmother told many people?”
“I don’t know. I know nothing; that’s what makes it so hard. It’s all had a climax to-night. There was an awful dinner at old Lady Carloes’ and it was so hot and stuffy that I nearly fainted. I had to leave. And then, coming here ...”
Rachel began to tremble again and, creeping close to Lizzie, she held her tighter.
“Lizzie ... in the cab coming here ... Francis ... I had such thoughts. I couldn’t have believed....”
Lizzie’s eyes gazed out into the square, far away — not like a Pool to-night, Mr. Breton. All hard and cruel and even the Nymph has no softness.
She kissed Rachel. “It’s the night, dear. When the weather’s like this it affects one. London’s awful to-night. There’ll be such a storm soon.”
“But it’s worse, Lizzie. I seem to-night to have seen myself as I am — more clearly than before. My priggishness — talking so much about Truth and then — the things I do. Roddy, Francis, all the same. I’ve treated them all badly. I’ve been true to no one. I’m no good....”
“Promise me, dear, that you’ll tell him — your husband — everything — to-morrow. Promise me.”
“But Lizzie, perhaps — —”
“No — no — no. Everything. To-morrow.”
“He’ll hate me. He’ll — —”
“No matter. You must. To-morrow.”
Rachel was silent. Then she looked into Lizzie’s face. “Yes,” she said, “I will.”
Then, with a little sigh, she fainted.
V
When she rose to a realization of life again she was lying upon Lizzie’s bed and the storm had broken over the house. Lizzie was holding her hand; the thunder roared. Coming with stealthy steps closer and closer, sometimes to creep stealthily away again, sometimes to break, with crashing splendour, upon their very heads.
The lightning flung Lizzie’s bedroom into pale brilliance and was gone; Life leapt into vision, then surrendered to the candle flare, then leapt again.
Rachel smiled faintly. She felt around her and about her a great peace. She knew that all her terror had departed; her one thought now was to return to Roddy and tell him everything.
She sat up. “How silly of me to faint. It’s a thing I’ve never done in my life. How did you get me here?”
“The maid and I carried you in. It’s better for you in here.”
“I think I’ll go now, Lizzie dear.”
“Wait a little while.”
They stayed in silence. Then they heard the rain that lashed the windows.
“Isn’t the rain terrific?... Oh! Lizzie, it’s all gone, all the terror, all that awful fright.” She added solemnly, “I don’t believe I’ll ever feel like that again. It’ll never come back — I’m sure of it.”
Rachel sat silently for a moment, then turned and buried her head in Lizzie’s dress.
“Lizzie dear, I’ve been so frightened — of something else.”
“Of what?”
“I’m going to have a child. I’ve known it for some time. At first I wasn’t sure. Then I knew. I was frightened and miserable. Then, as with every day I seemed to grow fonder and fonder of Roddy I became glad about it. Then very happy — —”
“Oh, Rachel dear, I’m so glad!”
“Yes. But now, with this, about Roddy it’s all dreadful again. If he should turn on me now just when I’ve begun to care.”
She sat up in bed, her eyes staring, her hands clutching the clothes.
“Lizzie, if it should come right! — if it should! Just think what a child would mean for him; he’s so brave, lying there all day, making himself amused and interested. I watch him often and wonder where all that courage comes from. I couldn’t have done it.... But now, if the child’s a boy, he’ll be able to put all his old strength and keenness into him — and the Place! Think what it will mean to him to have that!”
“And for you?” asked Lizzie.
“I believe it’s what I’ve wanted. Oh! if only things are all right with Roddy, then I can start again and have some decent pride about it all. I’ve made such a mess of things so far.”
They talked for a little. Then Rachel got up and dressed.
“I’m all right now. Everything seems to have cleared. I’ll tell Roddy everything to-morrow, Lizzie dear.”
“Come and see me as soon as ever you can, won’t you?”
“I will.”
Rachel said good night. She held Lizzie’s shoulders.
“Lizzie, you’re wonderful. Don’t think I don’t know how wonderful you are. I’ll never forget what you’ve been to-night. And if it’s all right to-morrow. Oh! I am going to be happy.”
“That’s all right,” said Lizzie. “Don’t go and get frightened again.”
“I’ll never be so frightened as I was to-night — never.”
“I’m afraid you’ve got dreadfully wet,” she said to the cabman.
“It don’t matter, mum — but it does come down.”
Lizzie stood in the doorway and waved her hand.
The rain slashed the panes and whipped the shining deserted streets. Very far away the faint whisper of thunder bade the town farewell.
CHAPTER VI
MARCH 13th: RODDY TALKS TO THE DEVIL AND THE DUCHESS DENIES GOD
“Que désirez-vous savoir plus précisément?’ Mais le porte-drapeau répondit: ‘Non, pas maintenant ... apres ...’”
A l’Extrême Limite. Artzybachev.
I
That afternoon had been a difficult one for Roddy. He felt, lying so eternally on his back, the vagaries of the English weather. There were days when the wind was in the park, when sunshine flashed and flung shadows, when the water of the pond glittered and every duck and baby thrilled with life. Then it was very hard to lie still, and memories of days — riding days and swimming days and hunting days — would persecute him. But there were dark wet hours when his room seemed warm and cosy — then he was happy.
On a day of thunder, like this afternoon, his one desire was to get out; never had he felt the bars of his cage so sharply, with so intense an irritation as on to-day.
Massiter broke the chain of his thoughts and he was glad. Four days now and Rachel had said nothing; many times he had thought that she was going to speak, but the moments had passed. He had not slept for two nights — over and over he turned the question as to what he was to do.
Had he been up and about, some solution would have naturally come, he thought, but, lying here, thinking so interminably with one’s body tied to one like a stone, nothing seemed clear or easy.
This was the worst day in the world to make thinking simple. The leaden sky pressed one down and held one’s brain.
“I’m goin’ to have a jolly bad evenin’,” said Roddy, “I know I am.”
Massiter was a relief; there was no need to talk whilst Massiter was there and his fat cheerful body restored one’s balance. The same, sensible world that had once been Roddy’s own and had, of late, slipped away from him, was restored when Massiter w
as there. Nevertheless one hour of Massiter was enough. Roddy could detect in Massiter’s attitude that pity moved him to additional cheerfulness, and this was irritating; then Massiter’s clumsy efforts to avoid topics that might be especially tactless — that also was tiresome.
Roddy was glad when Rachel and John Beaminster came down and relieved him, and then the moment arrived when he thought again that Rachel was going to speak, and perhaps if he had made a movement of affection he would have caught her, but always when some expression of feeling was especially demanded of him did he feel the least able to produce it.
The whole relationship between them depended on such slender incidents; one word from anybody and there would be no more confusion or doubt; the situation had the maddening tip-toe indecision of a dream.
“I’m going to have a bad time to-night,” he thought. “It’s no use giving in to the thing.” He faced it deliberately; if only he could think clearly, but the damned weather.... Well, he and Jacob must face the night as best they could.
The dog lay flat near the window, moving restlessly under the close air, but pricking his ears at every movement that Roddy made, ready to come to him at any instant.
“That old dog cares for me more than anyone else does — and I only appreciated him after I was laid up — Rummy thing!” Roddy was conscious that high above him, somewhere near the ceiling, hovered a Creature, born of this damnable evening, and that did he allow himself to relax for a moment, down that hovering Creature would come. Very faintly, as it were from a great distance, he could catch its whisper in his ear. “What’s the good of this?... What’s the good of this? What did you always say? What would you have said about anyone placed as you are now? Better for him to get out.”
“Damn you, shut up....”
He was in great physical pain, the pain that always came to him when he was tired out, but that was nothing to the mental torture. Twisted figures — Rachel, Breton, himself, the Duchess — passed before him, mingling, separating, sometimes coming to him as though they were there with him in the room. He had not, even on the day that had told him that he would never get up again, felt so near to utter defeat as he was now. He had been proud of himself, proud of his resistance to what, with another man, might have appeared utter catastrophe, proud of his dogged determination. “To have the devil beat....” To-night this same devil was going to be too much for him, did he not fight his very hardest, and the cruelty of it was that this weather took all one’s vitality out of one, drained one dry, left one a rag.
“Curse you, get out,” he muttered, clenching his teeth, then whistled and brought Jacob instantly to his side. The dog jumped on to the long sofa, taking care not to touch his master’s legs. Then he moved up into the hollow of Roddy’s arm and lay there warm against Roddy’s side.
“What’s the use?” The Creature was close to him, his breath warm and damp like the night air. “She doesn’t care for you. You can see that she doesn’t. She’s been in love with her cousin for ever so long, only you didn’t know. Wouldn’t she have told you that she was a friend of his if there had been nothing more than that in it? What a fool you are — lying here all broken up, simply in the way of her happiness, no good to yourself or anyone else.”
“I wish the thunder would come and smash you up....” Then, more desperately, “What if that’s right? if I were to clear out....”
“After all,” said the Creature, “you’ve never before seen yourself as you really are. You thought that you were all right because you could use your legs and arms. Now you know what you are — You’re nothing — only something that many people must trouble to keep alive — useless — useless! Why not?”
Yes, Roddy did see himself to-night, sternly; as in the old days he might have looked upon someone and judged him unfit, so now he would confront himself. “It’s quite true. You’ve got nothing — nothing to show, you’ve no intellect, you’re selfish, you despise all kinds of people for all kinds of reasons. You’ve stood a little pain — so can any man. You’d better get out — no one will know.”
“Yes,” said the Creature, very close to him now. “You can do it so easily. That morphia that you’ve had once or twice — an overdose. No one would suppose.... She would never know, and you’d be rid for ever of all this wrong and you’d free so many people from so much trouble.”
“Jacob, my son,” he whispered, “do you hear what they’re saying?”
He went right down, down to the depths of a pit that closed about his head, filled his eyes with darkness, was suffocating.
“Yes, he’s beaten,” he heard them say. “We’ve succeeded at last. We’ve succeeded....”
But they had not.
With an effort of will that was beyond any power that he had believed himself to possess, he pulled himself up.
“There’s one thing you’ve forgotten.” He gasped as he came struggling up.
He took the Creature in his hands, wrung its neck and flung it out of the window.
“There’s one thing you’ve forgotten. There’s my love for her. That’s strong enough for anything. That’s reason enough for living even though she doesn’t want it. I’ll beat you all with that ... go back to hell, the lot of you.”
II
“I must never let it happen like that again. What a state this weather can get one into....”
But he had come back to his senses. His brain was clear; he could think now. The great point was that it was of no use to think of himself in this affair. “Rachel, Rachel’s the only thing that matters.”
Then upon that came the decision. “That old woman’s got to pay for it. She’s been wantin’ to give Rachel a bad time. She’s tried to. Her mouth’s got to be stopped however old and ill she is!”
He was fiercely, furiously indignant with her — vanished, it appeared, all his affection, the sentiment of years. “I’ve got to defend Rachel from her, no knowin’ whom she’s been tellin’.” Roddy still found it impossible to admit more than one idea at a time, and the idea now was that “he must stop the old lady dead.”
His brain came round now to Breton, and halted there. What kind of fellow, after all, was he? What, after all, did Roddy know about him that he could so easily condemn him?
To-night, fresh from the battle with the Creature, Roddy’s view of the world was painted with new colours. The man had been condemned for things that his father had done, and one recognized, here in London, how difficult it was for a fellow to climb up once he had been pushed down.
Was the man in love with Rachel? Well, Roddy did not know that he could blame him for that? ... difficult enough, surely, for anyone not to be. But was he? What, after all, was he like?
Then swiftly the answer came to him. See the man.... Talk to him ... know him. He stared at the idea, felt already new energy in his bones and a surging victory over the lethargy of this awful evening at the suggestion of some definite action.
But see him, yes, and see him here and see him soon. His impatience leapt now hotly upon him; he pulled Jacob’s ears. “That’s the ticket, old boy, ain’t it? See what kind of a ruffian this is! My word, but wouldn’t the old lady hate it if she knew?”
But, and at this the room flared with the thrill of it, why not have her here to meet him? Confront her with him.
He was cool now. Here was matter that needed careful handling. Still as vigorous now as in his most active days was his impatience. Was something in the way, cobwebs, barriers, obstacles of any sort? Brush them aside, beat them down!
Here was a plan. Here, too, most happily at hand, was the Duchess’s punishment.
All these years had the old lady been refusing to set eyes upon her grandson, therefore, how dramatic would it be were she confronted with him unexpectedly. Out of the heart of that meeting would come most assuredly the truth about Rachel.
There, in a flash, solid, substantial, beautifully compact, magnificently splendid his plan lay before him. He would have them there. Rachel, the Duchess, this Breton,
all of them there before him. They should come ignorant, unprepared, Breton first, then Rachel, then the Duchess.
Having them there he would quite simply say that someone had been pouring into his ears a story of friendship to which he might take objection.
He would then, very quietly.... But here he paused. Oh! he knew what he would do. He smiled at the thought of the success of his plan.
When he had made his little speech to them all there would never again be any danger of scandal. The old lady would never again have any single word to say.
The thought that Rachel might be angry at his deceptive plot did not disturb him. When she had heard his little speech she would not say that — and here, suddenly, he knew how deeply, in his heart, he trusted her.
But what if, after all, it should be a lie on the old lady’s part? Was he not doing wrong to take things so far without a question to anyone else, Christopher or Lizzie Rand?
But this was Roddy. Here both his pride and his impatience were concerned. He did not wish that the business should pass beyond its present bounds. He could not go from person to person asking them whether they trusted his wife. And then he could not wait. Here was a plan that killed the danger at one blow, something direct, open, with sharply defined issues. Oh! Rachel should see how he loved her!
“All these days,” he said to Jacob, “I’ve been worryin’ about her, but I knew — yes, I knew — that she was comin’ to me all right.” He thought of a day long before and of Miss Nita Raseley and of a meeting in the garden. “I’ll show her that I can forgive, too, if it’s necessary. Not because I care so little, but, by God, because I care so much. No,” he thought, shaking his head over it, “she doesn’t love me, not yet. But she’s beginnin’ to belong to me. She’s coming.”
There was also the thought that the Duchess was an old, sick woman and that the scene might be too much for her strength. “Not she,” he grimly decided, “that’s the kind of thing she lives on. Anyway, I owe her one. Didn’t do her any harm comin’ to me the other day, won’t do her any harm now. I know her.”