“My dear child,” answered Marion gently, “he was my husband.”
“I never can realise it,” said Dolly. “Do you remember, I used to ask you if you did not sometimes forget it yourself?”
“I never forgot it.” Mrs. Darche’s voice had a wonderful gravity in it, without the least sadness. She was a woman without affectation.
“No,” said Dolly thoughtfully, “I suppose you never had a chance. It is of no use, Marion dear,” she added after a little pause, and in a different tone, as though she were tired of pretending a sort of subdued sympathy, “it is of no use at all! I can never be sorry, you know — so that ends it. Why, just think! You are free to marry any one you please, to begin life over again. How many women in your position ever had such a chance? Not but what you would have been just as free if you had got a divorce. But — somehow, this is much more solidly satisfactory. Yes, I know — it is horrid and unchristian — but there is just that — there is a solid satisfaction in—”
She was going to say “in death,” but thought better of it and checked herself.
“It will not make very much difference to me just yet,” said Marion. “Meanwhile, as I said, he was my husband. I shall wear mourning a short time, and then — then I do not know what I shall do.”
“It must be very strange,” answered Dolly.
“What, child?”
“Your life. Now you need not call me child in that auntly tone, as though you were five hundred thousand years older and wiser and duller than I am. There are not six years between our ages, you know.”
“Do not resent being young, Dolly.”
“Resent it! No, indeed! I resent your way of making yourself out to be old. In the pages of future history we shall be spoken of as contemporaries.”
Mrs. Darche smiled, and Dolly laughed.
“School-book style,” said the girl. “That is my morning manner. In the evening I am quite different, thank goodness! But to go back — what I meant was that your own life must seem very strange to you. To have loved really — of course you did — why should you deny it? And then to have made the great mistake and to have married the wrong man, and to have been good and to have put up the shutters of propriety and virtue — so to say, and to have kept up a sort of Sunday-go-to-meeting myth for years, expecting to do it for the rest of your life, and then — to have the luck — well, no, I did not mean to put it that way — but to begin life all over again, and the man you loved not married yet, and just as anxious to marry you as ever—”
“Stop, Dolly! How do you know?” Marion knit her brows in annoyance.
“Oh! I know nothing, of course. I can only guess. But then, it is easy to guess, sometimes.”
“I am not so sure,” answered Marion thoughtfully, and looking at Dolly with some curiosity.
As for Brett, he said nothing to any one, when the news of John Darche’s death reached New York. He supposed that people would take it for granted that in the course of time he would marry Marion, because the world knew that he had formerly loved her, and that she had made a mistake in not accepting him and would probably be quite willing to rectify it now that she was free. There had always been a certain amount of inoffensive chaff about his devotion to her interests. But he himself was very far from assuming that she would take him now. He knew her better than the world did, and understood the unexpected hesitations and revulsions of which she was capable, much better than the world could.
He took a hopeful view, however, as was natural. For the present he waited and said nothing. If she chose to go through the form of mourning, he would go through the form of respecting it while it lasted. Society is the better for most of its conventionalities, a fact of which one may easily assure oneself by spending a little time in circles that make bold to laugh at appearances. A man may break the social barriers for a great object’s sake, or out of true passion — as sheer necessity may force a man to sleep by the road side. But a man who habitually makes his bed in the gutter by choice is a madman, and one who thinks himself above manners and conventionalities is generally a fool. There is nothing more intolerable than eccentricity for its own sake, nor more pitiful than the perpetual acting of it to a gallery that will not applaud.
For some time Brett continued to come and see Marion regularly, and she did not hesitate to show him that he was as welcome as ever. Then, without any apparent cause, his manner changed. He became much more grave than he had ever been before, and those who knew him well were struck by an alteration in his appearance, not easily defined at first, but soon visible to any one. He was growing pale and thin.
Vanbrugh strolled into his office on a warm day in early June and sat down for a chat. Brett’s inner sanctum was in the Equitable Building, measured twelve feet by eight, and was furnished so as to leave a space of about six feet by four in the middle, just enough for two chairs and the legs of the people who sat in them. Vanbrugh looked at his friend and came to the just conclusion that something was materially wrong with him.
“Brett,” he said, suddenly, “let us run over to Paris.”
“I cannot leave New York at present,” Brett answered, without hesitation, as though he had already considered the question of going abroad.
“Not being able to leave New York is a more or less dangerous disease which kills a great many people,” observed Vanbrugh. “You must leave New York, whether you can or not. I do not know whether you are ill or not, but you look like an imperfectly boiled owl.”
“I know I do. I want a change.”
“Then come along.”
“No, I cannot leave New York. I am not joking, my dear fellow.”
“I see you are not. I suppose it is of no use to ask what is the matter. If you wanted help you would say so. You evidently have something on your mind. Anything I can do?”
“No, I wish there were. I will tell you some day. It is something rather odd and unusual.”
Brett was not an imaginative man, or Vanbrugh, judging from his appearance and manner, would almost have suspected that he was suffering from some persecution not quite natural or earthly. He had the uneasy glance of a man who fancies himself haunted by a sight he fears to see. Vanbrugh looked at him a long time in silence and then rose to go.
“I am sorry, old man,” he said, with something almost like a sigh. “You live too much alone,” he added, turning as he was about to open the door. “You ought to get married.”
Brett smiled in rather a ghastly fashion which did not escape his friend.
“I cannot leave New York,” he repeated mechanically.
“Perhaps you will before long,” said Vanbrugh, going out. “I would if I were you.”
He went away in considerable perplexity. Something in Brett’s manner puzzled him and almost frightened him. As a lawyer, and one accustomed to dealing with the worst side of human nature, he was inclined to play the detective for a time; as a friend, he resolved not to inquire too closely into a matter which did not concern him. In fact, he had already gone further than he had intended. Only a refined nature can understand the depth of degradation to which curiosity can reduce friendship.
A day or two later Vanbrugh met Dolly Maylands at a house in Tuxedo Park where he had come to dine and spend the night. There were enough people at the dinner to insure a little privacy to those who had anything to say to one another.
“Brett is ill,” said Vanbrugh. “Do you know what is the matter with him?”
“I suppose Marion has refused him after all,” answered Dolly, looking at her plate.
Vanbrugh glanced at her face and thought she was a little pale. He remembered the conversation when they had been left together in the library after John Darche’s trial, and was glad that he had then spoken cautiously, for he connected her change of colour with himself, by a roundabout and complicated reasoning more easy to be understood than to explain.
“Perhaps she has,” he said coolly. “But I do not think it is probable.”
“Mr. Brett does
not go to see her any more.”
“Really? Are you sure of that, Miss Maylands?”
“Marion has noticed it. She spoke to me of it yesterday. I wondered—”
“What?”
“Whether there had been any misunderstanding. I suppose that is what I was going to say.” She blushed quickly, as she had turned pale a moment before. “You see,” she continued rather hurriedly, “people who have once misunderstood one another may do the same thing again. Say, for instance, that he vaguely hinted at marriage — men have such vague ways of proposing—”
“Have they?”
“Of course — and that Marion did not quite realise what he meant, and turned the conversation, and that Mr. Brett took that for a refusal and went away, and lost his appetite, and all that — would it not account for it?”
“Yes,” assented Vanbrugh with a smile. “It might account for it — though Harry Brett is not a school girl of sixteen.”
“Meaning that I am, I suppose,” retorted Dolly, anxious to get away from the subject which she had not chosen, and to lead Vanbrugh up to what she would have called the chaffing point. But he was not in the humour for that.
“No,” he said quietly. “I did not mean that.” And he relapsed into silence for a time.
He was thinking the matter over, and he was also asking himself whether, after all, he should not ask Dolly Maylands to marry him, though he was so much older than she. That was a possibility which had presented itself to his mind very often of late, and from time to time he determined to solve the question in one way or the other, and be done with it. But when he wished to decide it, he found it capable of only two answers; either he must offer himself or not. Sometimes he thought he would and then he fancied that he ought to prepare Dolly for so grave a matter by giving up chaff when they were together. But the first attempt at putting this resolution into practice was a failure whenever he tried it. Chaff was Dolly’s element, — she pined when she was deprived of it. The serious part of her nature lay deep, and there were treasures there, hidden far below the bright tide of rippling laughter. Such treasures are sometimes lost altogether because no one discovers them, or because no one knows how to bring them to the surface.
As he sat by her side in silence, Vanbrugh was impelled to turn suddenly upon Dolly and ask her to marry him, without further diplomacy. But he reflected upon the proverbial uncertainty of woman’s temper and held his peace. He had never made love to her, and there had never been anything approaching to a show of sentiment between them until that memorable afternoon when the trial was over. Moreover Russell Vanbrugh was a very comfortable man. Nothing less grammatically incorrect could express the combination of pleasant things which made up his life. He was not lonely, in his father’s house — indeed, he was not lonely anywhere. He was contented, rich enough to satisfy all his tastes, popular in a certain degree among those he liked, peaceful, never bored, occupying, as it were, a well upholstered stall at the world’s play, when he chose to be idle, and busy with matters in which he took a healthy, enduring interest when he chose to work. To marry would be to step into an unknown country. He meant to make the venture some day, but he had just enough of indolence in his character to render the first effort a little distasteful. Nevertheless, he was conscious that he thought more and more of Dolly, and that he was, in fact, falling seriously in love with her, and foreseeing that there was to be a change in their relations, there arose the doubt, natural in a man not over-vain, as to the reception he might expect at her hands.
When Dolly next saw Marion Darche she proceeded to attack the question in her own way. Marion was still in town, hesitating as to what she should do with her summer. She had no house in the country. The place which had belonged to her husband had gone with such little property as he had still owned at the time of his conviction to repair some of the harm he had done.
The windows of the library were open, and a soft south-easterly breeze was blowing up from the square bringing a breath of coming summer from the park leaves. Those who love New York, even to the smell of its mud, know the strange charm of its days and evenings in late spring. Like the charm of woman, the charm of certain great cities can never be explained by those who feel it to those who do not. There were flowers in the library, and Dolly sat down near the windows and breathed the sweet quiet air before she spoke.
“Harry Brett is ill,” she said.
“Ill? Seriously?” Marion had started slightly at the news.
“Not ill at home,” explained Dolly. “Mr. Vanbrugh spoke of it the other night.”
“Oh—” Marion seemed relieved. “Perhaps that is the reason why he does not come to see me,” she added rather inconsequently, after a moment’s pause.
Dolly turned in her seat and looked into her friend’s eyes.
“Marion,” she said gravely. “You know that is not the reason why he does not come.”
“I know? What do you mean, Dolly?”
In spite of the genuine and innocent surprise in the tone, Dolly was not satisfied.
“He has asked you to marry him and you have refused him,” she said with conviction.
“I?”
For a moment Marion Darche stared in amazement. Then her eyes filled with tears and she turned away suddenly. Her voice was unsteady as she answered.
“No. He has not asked me to marry him.”
“Are you quite sure, dear?” insisted Dolly. “You know men have such odd ways of saying it, and sometimes one does not quite understand — and then a word, or a glance — if a man is very sensitive — you know—”
“Do not talk like that,” said Marion, a little abruptly.
A short silence followed, during which she moved uneasily about the room, touching the objects on the table, though they needed no arrangement. At last she spoke again, out of the dusk from the corner she had reached in her peregrination.
“If he asked me to marry him, I should accept him,” she said in a low voice.
Dolly was silent in her turn. She had not expected a direct confidence so soon, and had not at all foreseen its nature, when it came almost unasked.
“It is very strange!” she exclaimed at last.
“Yes,” echoed Marion Darche, quite simply. “It is very strange.”
It was long before the mystery was solved, and Dolly did not refer to it in the meantime. Brett did not go abroad, nor did he leave New York for more than a few days during the summer, though it was almost inconceivable that his business should require his constant presence during the dull season, and he could certainly have left matters to his partner, had he not had some very good reason for refusing to take a holiday.
Mrs. Darche took Cousin Annie with her and wandered about during a couple of months, visiting various places which did not interest her, falling in with acquaintances often, and sometimes with friends, but rather avoiding those she met than showing any wish to see much of them.
To tell the truth, the great majority showed no inclination to intrude upon her privacy. People understood well enough that she should desire to be alone and undisturbed, considering the strange circumstances through which she had passed during the winter and spring. Moreover Brett’s conduct elicited approval on all sides. It was said that he showed good taste in not following Mrs. Darche from place to place, as he might easily have done, and as most men in his position undoubtedly would have done, for it was quite clear that he was seriously in love. All his friends had noticed the change of appearance and manner, and others besides Vanbrugh had advised him to take a rest, to go abroad, to go and shoot bears, in short, to do one of the many things which are generally supposed to contribute to health and peace of mind. Then it was rumoured that he was working harder than usual, in view of his approaching marriage, that he was not so well off as had generally been supposed, and that he wished to forestall any remarks to the effect that he was going to marry Mrs. Darche for the sake of her fortune, which was considerable. In short, people said everything they could think of,
and all the things that are usually thought of in such cases, and when they had reached the end of their afflictions they talked of other friends whose doings formed a subject of common interest.
Mrs. Darche did not find much companionship in her cousin, but that was not exactly what she required or expected of Mrs. Willoughby. She wanted the gray, colourless atmosphere which the widowed lady seemed to take about with her, and she liked it merely because it was neutral, restful and thoroughly unemotional. She did not think of creating new diversions for herself, nor of taking up new interests. Her life had been so full that this temporary emptiness was restful to her. She was surprised at finding how little the present resembled what she had expected it to be, so long as it had been still a future. As yet, too, there was an element of uncertainty in it which did not preclude pleasant reflections. Though she had said to Dolly that Brett’s conduct was changed, she could still explain it to herself well enough to be satisfied with her own conclusions. Doubtless he felt that it was yet too soon to speak or even to show by his actions that he had anything to say. She could well believe — and indeed it was flattering — that he abstained from seeing her because he felt that in her presence he might not be able to control his speech. She called up in her memory what had taken place many months previously when she had sent for him and had told him that she needed a large sum of money at short notice — how he had lost his head on that occasion, and allowed words to break out which both of them had regretted. Since there was now no obstacle in the way, it would of course be harder for him than ever to act the part of a disinterested friend, even for the short time — the shortest possible — during which she went through the form of wearing mourning for John Darche. She could still say to herself that it was delicate and tactful on Brett’s part to act as he was acting, although she sometimes thought, or wished, that he might have allowed what was passing in his mind to betray itself by a glance, a gesture or a gentle intonation. It was certainly pushing the proprieties to the utmost to keep away from her altogether. Even when he wrote to her, as he had occasion to do several times during the summer, he confined himself almost entirely to matters of business, and the little phrase with which he concluded each of his communications seemed to grow more and more formal. There had always been something a little exaggerated in Harry Brett’s behaviour. It had been that perhaps, which in old times had frightened her, had prevented her from accepting him, and had made her turn in mistaken confidence to the man of grave moderation and apparently unchanging purpose who had become her husband.
Complete Works of F Marion Crawford Page 648