Suddenly, he was aware of a beam of light striking across the court. The door had opened. He saw Mary Nando standing there, looking out into the night.
"Jordan—Jordan."
Her voice was soft, suppressed, like the voice of a woman in a sick-room. She was peering about for him, her eyes unused to the darkness.
"What will she say to me?" he thought, as he went towards her; and yet he felt that he knew what she would say. It was fate.
He saw her wide eyes in a face that still seemed tremulous and mobile with emotion.
"Jordan——"
"How is she?" he asked. "Asleep?"
"No, not asleep."
Those expressive eyes of hers were fixed on him. She was waiting, and he seemed to know all that was in her mind, and all that the woman in her asked of him.
"Will she see me?"
Mary Nando drew a quick breath.
"You have something to say to her, Dan?"
"Yes."
She waited, trembling, expectant.
"It may seem a strange time to say it, mother, and yet it is the right time."
And suddenly she caught him by the shoulders.
"Man, son—you are going to ask her to marry you?"
"I am."
"Jordan, God bless you! I felt it—I knew. O, I'm proud of my lad."
She kissed him, she clung to him and held him close, weeping a little.
"Oh, my dear, go to her. She is lying there with her face to the wall. I have tried, but she seems frozen; she cannot speak."
"I'll go, mother. But will you go first?"
"No, no. It is not me she wants, but you."
She drew him in by the arm, eagerly, devotedly. They went up the stairs together, and it was Mrs. Mary who opened the door. He felt the gentle pressure of her hand as he went in, and she closed the door after him.
He saw something move in the bed; a white face was turned for a moment and then turned away again. He heard a little protesting cry, half sob, half moan.
It conquered him; it made him one great, generous impulse. He went to her, bent over her.
"Douce."
She struggled a little, tried to hide her face, but he would not suffer her stark resistance. He sat on the bed and held her in his arms.
"Douce, I'm loving you. You are going to marry me."
And suddenly the soul and body of her relaxed. She clung to him; she hid her face against him, and broke out into weeping.
"O, Jordan, I—I——"
"There—there. Kiss me, child, kiss me."
XXXVI
The time came when Jordan realized that he had to do a thing that required courage. He had to tell Mrs. Merris. At the first thought of it he had put the suggestion aside with a little shrug of self-scorn. What need was there to tell her? What claim had he upon her that he should go to her and blurt out this intimate thing? How could he assume that it would have any interest for her, this coming marriage of his? Nay, surely, such a confession might seem to her superfluous and impertinent, a sort of apology for some piece of behaviour that made the very apology a lout's insult. "Madam, I have to tell you that I am about to be married." "Indeed, sir! I hope the interesting event will prove the beginning of much good fortune." Delicately raised eyebrows and a little stately air of surprise! "Really, Mr. March, and did you think it your duty to tell me?"
No, he would not tell her.
Later, he realized that he had to tell her. It did not matter so much what she might say or think, but he had to be right with himself, be honest with his future. He had to close that open door which had given him such fatal glimpses of a larger world, her world.
He was in a curious state between happiness and sadness. He had to allow that he had a very real tenderness for Douce, and that the course he had chosen had brought him love and gratitude and passionate kisses. He had not forgotten Maurice St. Croix's face on the morning after that tragic night. "March, God bless you! I shall never forget this." He still saw the shine in Mary Nando's eyes when he had refused to have the house in Red Alley meddled with. "No, let it be. Some things are better forgotten." He had the good will and the love of these dear people; he was looked at by a pair of dark eyes which seemed to regard him as something more than a man. Even old Sylvester had shown some emotion when Maurice had brought him to Douce at Spaniards Court.
"Mr. March, there are some words of mine that I would like to be forgotten."
Yes, the thing was well done; it had brought happiness to some people, and a glow to his own heart, but how final it was, how solemn! He saw himself anchored here, in harbour before he had adventured on the high seas, sails furled, guns tampioned and covered up. It troubled him. It filled him with vague doubts, a dread of some fatal disharmony. But Douce was a dear little thing. He would grow very fond of her; she was wise, and gently yet strangely passionate. He was responsible for her, more responsible than most men would be for their wives. Never must he hurt her, or make her remember how life had brought them together.
O well, he would settle down. He would work hard, and perhaps he would build another house, a house for his wife and children. Surely a man should be satisfied with good and simple things, with the quiet joys of a home, with little hands that clung, with games and laughter and clean kisses? What more could he desire? Did he ask for pain, and stress, and struggle, midnight rides, and storms at sea, musket shots, sword-play, the wrestling of man with man, something to conquer, something to win? Why, surely, he had had his adventures, his fights, and his love affairs? Life could not go on being an adventure. A man had to be content with one landscape. He could not always be yearning for the valley over the hill.
But he had to tell Mrs. Merris.
Yet, when Jordan reached the end of the familiar street he wished to turn back. He saw Garter Street lying still and vivid in the spring sunlight, brickwork warm and red, window sashes clean and white, masses of colour showing where a red may tree or a golden laburnum spread outwards over a garden wall. A woman was selling flowers, basket on hip, her eyes looking up at the windows. A coach was drawn up close to Mrs. Mariana's house, and for a moment Jordan found that coach an excuse for turning back.
The excuse vanished when a lady in a red-and white-flowered gown and a gentleman in a sky-blue coat came out of the house next to Mrs. Merris's, entered the coach, and drove off. The lady half smiled at Jordan as the coach passed him. He walked on. He found himself on her doorstep. He raised his hand to the brass knocker.
Sambo was rolling his eyes at him and showing his white teeth.
"Yes, sah. Will yon step in, sah?"
She was alone, and sitting by her favourite window, with a book in her lap. Her first glance at him made her wise. Something had happened to him, though she did not know what that something was. It was not that he was gravely formal, or awkwardly self-conscious, or vaguely austere, or smiling as a man smiled when there is no smile in his heart. He had looked at her steadily for a moment as though he were half afraid to look, and he did not look at her again for quite a long while. He was immensely self-controlled, dressed up in some ceremonial mood of his own making.
"I hope, madam, that you will not accuse me of presumption if I call you my friend?"
"Why—no, Mr. March."
"I am glad," he said; "because one tells all one's news to friends."
"Both good and bad news?"
"The good and the bad."
"Particularly the bad. One should always keep one's good news for one's enemies."
He smiled faintly, and as though he found it difficult to smile.
"I suppose that is true, madam. My news is that I am to be married."
It seemed to him that there was a moment of intense stillness in the room. She did not move, nor was he aware of any change in her expression.
"Why, surely, that is good news?"
She raised her eyes to his; their soft brownness seemed veiled with black; they told him nothing; he saw neither anger nor surprise in them; they seemed to
watch and to listen, if eyes could be said to listen.
"I wished my friends to know. These things happen suddenly."
"Yes, such things are sudden."
She made a little gracious gesture.
"Won't you tell me? Sit down and tell me."
He had meant to tell her the bare truth about his coming marriage, that and no more, nor had it seemed to him likely that she would wish to hear more. Of what real interest could it be to her? And had the case been such a one that the woman in her had good cause to be interested it might never have been told. He hesitated. He stood with his hands resting on the back of a chair. Then he sat down, and in the doing of it came sensibly nearer to her. After all, why should he not tell her? To tell any ordinary woman would have been very like an act of disloyalty to Douce, but Mrs. Merris was not an ordinary woman, and he wanted her to understand. Yes, he wanted that more fiercely than he knew; the desire was at the back of all his hesitation—urging, persuading, protesting, using Mrs. Mariana herself as a silent pleader. He wanted to stand right with her, and it was a very human wish. He had no thought of making any boast of what he had done. He wanted her to know; that was all. "It happened thus, and thus. No one can say that I was not right in doing what I have done. Let us leave it at that."
He told her, but in the doing of it he did not deal in emotion. And in some subtle way she seemed to be helping him to tell her, willing him to tell her. She sat there, outwardly calm in the wise gentleness of her dignity, her eyes steady and attentive, the sex in her subdued to a soft light. She concealed everything that might have betrayed anything of herself to him. Her dignity required that, her dignity and his quiet yet striving candour. She guessed that he had not meant to tell her all, however much he may have wished to have told it, but that the telling of it had given him—not happiness—but a sense of deep relief. He had shown himself. The air might be clear and cold, but there were no obscuring clouds.
"You were quite right," she said, "utterly right."
She spoke with a gentle confidence, and she did not let him feel her fears. A marriage based on pity, for that was what her intuition divined it to be! He had not hinted even at such a thing as pity, and she doubted whether he realized that pity was the main inspiration. But how could she tell him that? What right had she to warn him? Would it not be gross treachery to that little woman who loved him, and to whom he must mean so much? Pity! Yes, but pity might grow into something else. Douce had the right over a love that might be in the bud. None but a very selfish or a very sensual woman could take away that child's chance of being happy and of being loved.
"I am glad you have told me," she said, as he stood to take his leave of her; "For it makes me know that we are friends."
"I had hardly dared to claim so much, madam."
She was smiling, and the inwardness of her smile was beyond him. How different he must be with men, and how different he may have been with other women! But he had the gentleness of a big fellow; he could be devoted, shrewd yet simple in his homage. She wondered how much he had guessed, whether he had guessed anything!
"Well, I wish you all the good things in the world, Mr. Jordan."
He bent over her hand, and, pausing by the door, stood looking at her.
"I may call on your sometimes, madam?"
"Why, yes. Bring your little wife to see me."
"I will," he said, and went out thinking that he was the only one who had a secret to hide, and that behind her eyes there was nothing but good will.
She leant forward and watched Jordan go down the street. He walked with the air of a man who had accomplished something, and at the end of the street he turned to look back. She withdrew quickly so that he should not see her, for that act of looking back was full of significance.
"I wonder?" she thought, "I wonder? What a lottery it is! For marriage may be either wings or a chain. This little thing, what will she make of him? Is she big enough for such a man?"
She was sad, troubled, aware of a sudden loneliness and of a sense of loss. There was more in the mood than she would allow; the thing had gone deeper than she had imagined; perhaps she knew it while she refused to let herself acknowledge it.
But she was concerned, too, for Jordan. She knew men very thoroughly, the big and the little, the greedy and the generous, the men who would never be more than a collection of appetites, those rare men who could be so much more.
"It depends on the woman," she thought, "always and always. Women keep a man back, the lure of women, the hunger for them. He may never get beyond petticoats and those eternal adventures. But what a pity! The man who is to accomplish things should have not more than two or three women in his life, three at the most, and if he is fortunate he will end by having only one. One—who matters. But she must matter very much—more, even, than his work, more than anything else in the world."
XXXVII
So Jordan was married.
And with his marriage and the coming of this little red-haired thing into his life, life itself seemed to change, and all the old familiar landmarks suddenly moved themselves elsewhere. Tom and Mary Nando had passed away to the new house, taking with them Meg and Polly, and also many pieces of old furniture which Jordan had known since boyhood. The house in Spaniards Court was the same, but the faces were different. Something had gone out of it, that old familiar feeling, the comfortable homeliness, that large and easy smile, the smell of old Nando's pipe, the gentle alertness of Mrs. Mary's brown eyes. For years Jordan had flung into the house like a boy, spread himself, taken everything gratefully but for granted, called upon Meg or Poll, had things brought him, and been treated as a little man-god, without his realizing how comfortable two or three assiduous women make a place. He had been watched, and his ways studied, and he had not known it. The degree of sweetness of his coffee or his chocolate, the sorts of pudding he liked, these had been matters of importance. His linen had been looked to, his stockings darned, his coats brushed and pressed, his shoes sent to the cobbler when necessary. The domestic machinery had run very smoothly, and like most men he had forgotten to ask who supplied the oil.
But now he saw new faces, new furniture. Douce had two girls to cook and clean for her. She had ideas of her own; she began to alter the details of Jordan's life, as well as its atmosphere.
At first it amused him. He was full of much tenderness for her.
Jordan was happy with her, in spite of the sense of strangeness about the house, and the queer feeling that something was not there, but in a little while he became aware of other impressions. Stillness, watchfulness! He would come in from the fencing-school and find Douce seated in Mary Nando's parlour, diligently sewing, or reading, or setting down her accounts. He had brought her a little writing-table with drawers, and she had had it placed in the window, and he would see her red head and white neck against the criss-cross of the lattice. Douce, the housewife, the mistress. Her eyes had grown more expressive; they looked very dark in her creamy face, and they would brighten suddenly and then again grow dark. He noticed that she looked at him in a particular way whenever he entered the room after being out of the house.
That particular look puzzled Jordan. It was a loving look, but there was more than love in it, or rather—it was a love that watched.
One day on coming in he called into the kitchen and gave an order to one of the wenches:
"Kate, make supper half an hour earlier."
For years he had called to Meg for what he wanted, going in afterwards to tell Mary Nando of it if the order he had given had trespassed on her authority, but now the house was his. And yet not quite his. He found Douce sewing. She looked up at him, was silent a moment, and then spoke:
"Jordan, when you wish something done, dear, will you tell me?"
"Why, of course. I was going to tell you, sweetheart."
"I mean—I wish to give the orders to the servants. As mistress it is my business."
He bent down and touched her hair.
"Sorry, Douce.
Of course you shall rule the wenches. I was not thinking."
"Thank you, Jordan."
But there was a touch of austerity about her mouth and eyes, and she did not respond to his caress, and though he granted that she was right he was a little surprised at her standing so strictly for her authority.
Jordan had led a free life, and during those first weeks of happiness he did not realize that when a man marries he surrenders a part of his liberty, unless the wife has an exceptional understanding of the man and is willing to be exceptional. His love for Douce was different from her love for him. His had been born of pity and a generous tenderness, and even when he was loving her he was giving more than he was taking. He had loved other women, and in the back of his mind hung the picture of another woman. Douce's love was like a single flower on the plant of her being. It fed and lived upon him, and upon him alone. It was passionate, absorbing, jealously devoted.
She did not like Jordan out of her sight. She wished him to spend the evenings alone with her, while she snuggled up on his knees with her head upon his shoulder. She showed no sign of wearying of this love-making, or of realizing that a man may tire of it and wish to stretch his limbs and use his tongue on matters other than little endearments. Her love was exacting, and that is love's tragedy. A man may be exacting, and the woman will exult in it, but an exacting woman may kill the love she yearns to hold.
One night Jordan went out to Tom's coffee-house, nor was it a mere matter of pleasure. He had two or three gentlemen to meet there who wished to make arrangements for polishing up their sword-play. And Jordan stayed late. There was no disguising the fact that he found it good to be among men, to feel himself a master among them, to listen to the big male voices. A man must rub shoulders with men. He must have his arguments, his friendships, his quarrels, his strivings, his hours in the wind, his moments when the muscles harden and the heart beats hard.
Douce was sitting up for him. She was sewing. She raised those solemn dark eyes of hers to his face, and their scrutiny puzzled him. She did not smile.
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