“Divorce,” she said with a reckless little laugh— “and the end of things for me.”
“On what grounds?” he demanded doggedly. “Does he threaten you?”
She made no movement or reply, reclining there, one hand on her wine-glass, the smile still curving her lips. And he repeated his question in a low, distinct voice — too low for Neergard to hear; and he was still listening.
“Grounds? Oh, he thinks I’ve misbehaved with — never mind who. It is not true — but he cares nothing about that, either. You see” — and she bent nearer, confidentially, with a mysterious little nod of her pretty head— “you see, Jack Ruthven is a little insane. . . . You are surprised? Pooh! I’ve suspected it for months.”
He stared at her; then: “Where are you stopping?”
“Aboard the Niobrara.”
“Is Mrs. Fane a guest there, too?”
He spoke loud enough for Rosamund to hear; and she answered for herself with a smile at him, brimful of malice:
“Delighted to have you come aboard, Captain Selwyn. Is that what you are asking permission to do?”
“Thanks,” he returned dryly; and to Alixe: “If you are ready, Gerald and I will take you over to the Niobrara in the motor-boat—”
“Oh, no, you won’t!” broke in Neergard with a sneer— “you’ll mind your own business, my intrusive friend, and I’ll take care of my guests without your assistance.”
Selwyn appeared not to hear him: “Come on, Gerald,” he said pleasantly; “Mrs. Ruthven is going over to the Niobrara—”
“For God’s sake,” whispered Gerald, white as a sheet, “don’t force me into trouble with Neergard.”
Selwyn turned on him an astonished gaze: “Are you afraid of that whelp?”
“Yes,” muttered the boy— “I — I’ll explain later. But don’t force things now, I beg you.”
Mrs. Ruthven coolly leaned over and spoke to Gerald in a low voice; then, to Selwyn, she said with a smile: “Rosamund and I are going to Brookminster, anyway, so you and Gerald need not wait. . . . And thank you for coming over. It was rather nice of you” — she glanced insolently at Neergard— “considering the crowd we’re with. Good-night, Captain Selwyn! Good-night, Gerald. So very jolly to have seen you again!” And, under her breath to Selwyn: “You need not worry; I am going in a moment. Good-bye and — thank you, Phil. It is good to see somebody of one’s own caste again.”
A few moments later, Selwyn and Gerald in their oilskins were dashing eastward along the coast in the swiftest motor-boat south of the Narrows.
The boy seemed deathly tired as they crossed the dim lawn at Silverside. Once, on the veranda steps he stumbled, and Selwyn’s arm sustained him; but the older man forbore to question him, and Gerald, tight-lipped and haggard, offered no confidence until, at the door of his bedroom, he turned and laid an unsteady hand on Selwyn’s shoulder: “I want to talk with you — to-morrow. May I?”
“You know you may, Gerald. I am always ready to stand your friend.”
“I know. . . . I must have been crazy to doubt it. You are very good to me. I — I am in a very bad fix. I’ve got to tell you.”
“Then we’ll get you out of it, old fellow,” said Selwyn cheerfully. “That’s what friends are for, too.”
The boy shivered — looked at the floor, then, without raising his eyes, said good-night, and, entering his bedroom, closed the door.
As Selwyn passed back along the corridor, the door of his sister’s room opened, and Austin and Nina confronted him.
“Has that damfool boy come in?” demanded his brother-in-law, anxiety making his voice tremulous under its tone of contempt.
“Yes. Leave him to me, please. Good-night” — submitting to a tender embrace from his sister— “I suppose Eileen has retired, hasn’t she? It’s an ungodly hour — almost sunrise.”
“I don’t know whether Eileen is asleep,” said Nina; “she expected a word with you, I understand. But don’t sit up — don’t let her sit up late. We’ll be a company of dreadful wrecks at breakfast, anyway.”
And his sister gently closed the door while he continued on to the end of the corridor and halted before Eileen’s room. A light came through the transom; he waited a moment, then knocked very softly.
“Is it you?” she asked in a low voice.
“Yes. I didn’t wake you, did I?”
“No. Is Gerald here?”
“Yes, in his own room. . . . Did you wish to speak to me about anything?”
“Yes.”
He heard her coming to the door; it opened a very little. “Good-night,” she whispered, stretching toward him her hand— “that was all I wanted — to — to touch you before I closed my eyes to-night.”
He bent and looked at the hand lying within his own — the little hand with its fresh fragrant palm upturned and the white fingers relaxed, drooping inward above it — at the delicate bluish vein in the smooth wrist.
Then he released the hand, untouched by his lips; and she withdrew it and closed the door; and he heard her laugh softly, and lean against it, whispering:
“Now that I am safely locked in — I merely wish to say that — in the old days — a lady’s hand was sometimes — kissed. . . . Oh, but you are too late, my poor friend! I can’t come out; and I wouldn’t if I could — not after what I dared to say to you. . . . In fact, I shall probably remain locked up here for days and days. . . . Besides, what I said is out of fashion — has no significance nowadays — or, perhaps, too much. . . . No, I won’t dress and come out — even for you. Je me déshabille — je fais ma toilette de nuit, monsieur — et je vais maintenant m’agenouiller et faire ma prière. Donc — bon soir — et bonne nuit—”
And, too low for him to hear even the faintest breathing whisper of her voice— “Good-night. I love you with all my heart — with all my heart — in my own fashion.”
He had been asleep an hour, perhaps more, when something awakened him, and he found himself sitting bolt upright in bed, dawn already whitening his windows.
Somebody was knocking. He swung out of bed, stepped into his bath-slippers, and, passing swiftly to the door, opened it. Gerald stood there, fully dressed.
“I’m going to town on the early train,” began the boy— “I thought I’d tell you—”
“Nonsense! Gerald, go back to bed!”
“I can’t sleep, Philip—”
“Can’t sleep? Oh, that’s the trouble, is it? Well, then, sit here and talk to me.” He gave a mighty yawn— “I’m not sleepy, either; I can go days without it. Here! — here’s a comfortable chair to sprawl in. . . . It’s daylight already; doesn’t the morning air smell sweet? I’ve a jug of milk and some grapes and peaches in my ice-cupboard if you feel inclined. No? All right; stretch out, sight for a thousand yards, and fire at will.”
Gerald strove to smile; for a while he lay loosely in the arm-chair, his listless eyes intent on the strange, dim light which fell across the waste of sea fog. Only the water along the shore’s edge remained visible; all else was a blank wall behind which, stretching to the horizon, lay the unseen ocean. Already a few restless gulls were on the wing, sheering inland; and their raucous, treble cries accented the pallid stillness.
But the dawn was no paler than the boy’s face — no more desolate. Trouble was his, the same old trouble that has dogged the trail of folly since time began; and Selwyn knew it and waited.
At last the boy broke out: “This is a cowardly trick — this slinking in to you with all my troubles after what you’ve done for me — after the rotten way I’ve treated you—”
“Look here, my boy!” said Selwyn coolly, crossing one knee over the other and dropping both hands into the pockets of his pajamas— “I asked you to come to me, didn’t I? Well, then; don’t criticise my judgment in doing it. It isn’t likely I’d ask you to do a cowardly thing.”
“You don’t understand what a wretched scrape I’m in—”
“I don’t yet; but you’re going to tell me—”
“Philip, I can’t — I simply cannot. It’s so contemptible — and you warned me — and I owe you already so much—”
“You owe me a little money,” observed Selwyn with a careless smile, “and you’ve a lifetime to pay it in. What is the trouble now; do you need more? I haven’t an awful lot, old fellow — worse luck! — but what I have is at your call — as you know perfectly well. Is that all that is worrying you?”
“No — not all. I — Neergard has lent me money — done things — placed me under obligations. . . . I liked him, you know; I trusted him. . . . People he desired to know I made him known to. He was a — a trifle peremptory at times — as though my obligations to him left me no choice but to take him to such people as he desired to meet. . . . We — we had trouble — recently.”
“What sort?”
“Personal. I felt — began to feel — the pressure on me. There was, at moments, something almost of menace in his requests and suggestions — an importunity I did not exactly understand. . . . And then he said something to me—”
“Go on; what?”
“He’d been hinting at it before; and even when I found him jolliest and most amusing and companionable I never thought of him as a — a social possibility — I mean among those who really count — like my own people—”
“Oh! he asked you to introduce him into your own family circle?”
“Yes — I didn’t understand it at first — until somehow I began to feel the pressure of it — the vague but constant importunity. . . . He was a good fellow — at least I thought so; I hated to hurt him — to assume any attitude that might wound him. But, good heavens! — he couldn’t seem to understand that nobody in our family would receive him — although he had a certain footing with the Fanes and Harmons and a few others — like the Siowitha people — or at least the men of those families. Don’t you see, Philip?”
“Yes, my boy, I see. Go on! When did he ask to be presented to — your sister?”
“W-who told you that?” asked the boy with an angry flush.
“You did — almost. You were going to, anyway. So that was it, was it? That was when you realised a few things — understood one or two things; was it not? . . . And how did you reply? Arrogantly, I suppose.”
“Yes.”
“With — a — some little show of — a — contempt?”
“Yes, I suppose so.”
“Exactly. And Neergard — was put out — slightly?”
“Yes,” said the boy, losing some of his colour. “I — a moment afterward I was sorry I had spoken so plainly; but I need not have been. . . . He was very ugly about it.”
“Threats of calling loans?” asked Selwyn, smiling.
“Hints; not exactly threats. I was in a bad way, too—” The boy winced and swallowed hard; then, with sudden white desperation stamped on his drawn face: “Oh, Philip — it — it is disgraceful enough — but how am I going to tell you the rest? — how can I speak of this matter to you—”
“What matter?”
“A — about — about Mrs. Ruthven—”
“What matter?” repeated Selwyn. His voice rang a little, but the colour had fled from his face.
“She was — Jack Ruthven charged her with — and me — charged me with—”
“You!”
“Yes.”
“Well — it was a lie, wasn’t it?” Selwyn’s ashy lips scarcely moved, but his eyes were narrowing to a glimmer. “It was a lie, wasn’t it?” he repeated.
“Yes — a lie. I’d say it, anyway, you understand — but it really was a lie.”
Selwyn quietly leaned back in his chair; a little colour returned to his cheeks.
“All right — old fellow” — his voice scarcely quivered— “all right; go on. I knew, of course, that Ruthven lied, but it was part of the story to hear you say so. Go on. What did Ruthven do?”
“There has been a separation,” said the boy in a low voice. “He behaved like a dirty cad — she had no resources — no means of support—” He hesitated, moistening his dry lips with his tongue. “Mrs. Ruthven has been very, very kind to me. I was — I am fond of her; oh, I know well enough I never had any business to meet her; I behaved abominably toward you — and the family. But it was done; I knew her, and liked her tremendously. She was the only one who was decent to me — who tried to keep me from acting like a fool about cards—”
Did she try?”
“Yes — indeed, yes! . . . and, Phil — she — I don’t know how to say it — but she — when she spoke of — of you — begged me to try to be like you. . . . And it is a lie what people say about her! — what gossip says. I know; I have known her so well — and — I was like other men — charmed and fascinated by her; but the women of that set are a pack of cats, and the men — well, none of them ever ventured to say anything to me! . . . And that is all, Philip. I was horribly in debt to Neergard; then Ruthven turned on me — and on her; and I borrowed more from Neergard and went to her bank and deposited it to the credit of her account — but she doesn’t know it was from me — she supposes Jack Ruthven did it out of ordinary decency, for she said so to me. And that is how matters stand; Neergard is ugly, and grows more threatening about those loans — and I haven’t any money, and Mrs. Ruthven will require more very soon—”
“Is that all?” demanded Selwyn sharply.
“Yes — all. . . . I know I have behaved shamefully—”
“I’ve seen,” observed Selwyn in a dry, hard voice, “worse behaviour than yours. . . . Have you a pencil, Gerald? Get a sheet of paper from that desk. Now, write out a list of the loans made you by Neergard. . . . Every cent, if you please. . . . And the exact amount you placed to Mrs. Ruthven’s credit. . . . Have you written that? Let me see it.”
The boy handed him the paper. He studied it without the slightest change of expression — knowing all the while what it meant to him; knowing that this burden must be assumed by himself because Austin would never assume it.
And he sat there staring at space over the top of the pencilled sheet of paper, striving to find some help in the matter. But he knew Austin; he knew what would happen to Gerald if, after the late reconciliation with his ex-guardian, he came once more to him with such a confession of debt and disgrace.
No; Austin must be left out; there were three things to do: One of them was to pay Neergard; another to sever Gerald’s connection with him for ever; and the third thing to be done was something which did not concern Gerald or Austin — perhaps, not even Ruthven. It was to be done, no matter what the cost. But the thought of the cost sent a shiver over him, and left his careworn face gray.
His head sank; he fixed his narrowing eyes on the floor and held them there, silent, unmoved, while within the tempests of terror, temptation, and doubt assailed him, dragging at the soul of him, where it clung blindly to its anchorage. And it held fast — raging, despairing in the bitterness of renunciation, but still held on through the most dreadful tempest that ever swept him. Courage, duty, reparation — the words drummed in his brain, stupefying him with their dull clamour; but he understood and listened, knowing the end — knowing that the end must always be the same for him. It was the revolt of instinct against drilled and ingrained training, inherited and re-schooled — the insurgent clamour of desire opposed to that stern self-repression characteristic of generations of Selwyns, who had held duty important enough to follow, even when their bodies died in its wake.
And it were easier for him, perhaps, if his body died.
He rose and walked to the window. Over the Bay of Shoals the fog was lifting; and he saw the long gray pier jutting northward — the pier where the troopships landed their dead and dying when the Spanish war was ended.
And he looked at the hill where the field hospital had once been. His brother died there — in the wake of that same duty which no Selwyn could ignore.
After a moment he turned to Gerald, a smile on his colourless face:
“It will be all right, my boy. You
are not to worry — do you understand me? Go to bed, now; you need the sleep. Go to bed, I tell you — I’ll stand by you. You must begin all over again, Gerald — and so must I; and so must I.”
CHAPTER X
LEX NON SCRIPTA
Selwyn had gone to New York with Gerald, “for a few days,” as he expressed it; but it was now the first week in October, and he had not yet returned to Silverside.
A brief note to Nina thanking her for having had him at Silverside, and speaking vaguely of some business matters which might detain him indefinitely — a briefer note to Eileen regretting his inability to return for the present — were all the communication they had from him except news brought by Austin, who came down from town every Friday.
A long letter to him from Nina still remained unanswered; Austin had seen him only once in town; Lansing, now back in New York, wrote a postscript in a letter to Drina, asking for Selwyn’s new address — the first intimation anybody had that he had given up his lodgings on Lexington Avenue.
“I was perfectly astonished to find he had gone, leaving no address,” wrote Boots; “and nobody knows anything about him at his clubs. I have an idea that he may have gone to Washington to see about the Chaosite affair; but if you have any address except his clubs, please send it to me.”
Eileen had not written him; his sudden leave-taking nearly a month ago had so astounded her that she could not believe he meant to be gone more than a day or two. Then came his note, written at the Patroons’ Club — very brief, curiously stilted and formal, with a strange tone of finality through it, as though he were taking perfunctory leave of people who had come temporarily into his life, and as though the chances were agreeably even of his ever seeing them again.
The girl was not hurt, as yet; she remained merely confused, incredulous, unreconciled. That there was to be some further explanation of his silence she never dreamed of doubting; and there seemed to be nothing to do in the interval but await it. As for writing him, some instinct forbade it, even when Nina suggested that she write, adding laughingly that nothing else seemed likely to stir her brother.
Works of Robert W Chambers Page 354