There was so much sincerity in his manner, so much simplicity she could not doubt him; and the immensity of the sacrifice he was prepared to make overwhelmed her. It was not merely scandal and the Divorce Court which he was ready to brave now. He had gone beyond the plan contemplated at Bombay. He was willing to go hand in hand with her into the outer darkness, laying down all that he had laboured for unsparingly.
“You would do that for me?” she said. “Oh, you put me to shame!” and she covered her face with her hands.
“You give up your struggle for a footing in the world — that’s what you want, isn’t it?” He pleaded, and she drew her hands away from her face. He believed that? He imagined that she was fighting just for a name, a position in the world? She stared at him in amazement, and forced herself to understand. Since he himself had cared for her enough to remain unmarried, since the knowledge of the mistake which he had made had grown more bitter with each year, he had fallen easily into that other error that she had never ceased to care too.
“We’ll make something of our lives, never fear,” he was saying. “But to marry this man for his position, and he not knowing — oh, my dear, I know how you are driven — but it won’t do! It won’t do!”
She stood in silence for a little while. One by one he had torn her defences down. She could hardly bear the gentleness upon his face and she turned away from him and sat down upon a chair a little way off.
“Stand there, Henry,” she said. A strange composure had succeeded her agitation. “I must tell you something more which I had meant to hide from you — the last thing which I have kept back. It will hurt you, I am afraid.”
There came a change upon Thresk’s face. He was steeling himself to meet a blow.
“Go on.”
“It isn’t because of his position that I cling to Dick. I want him to keep that — yes — for his sake. I don’t want him to lose more by marrying me than he needs must”; and comprehension burst upon Henry Thresk.
“You care for him then! You really care for him?”
“So much,” she answered, “that if I lost him now I should lose all the world. You and I can’t go back to where we stood nine years ago. You had your chance then, Henry, if you had wished to take it. But you didn’t wish it, and that sort of chance doesn’t often come again. Others like it — yes. But not quite the same one. I am sorry. But you must believe me. If I lost Dick I should lose all the world.”
So far she had spoken very deliberately, but now her voice faltered.
“That is my one poor excuse.”
The unexpected word roused Thresk to inquiry.
“Excuse?” he asked, and with her eyes fixed in fear upon him she continued:
“Yes. I meant Dick to marry me publicly. But I saw that his father shrank from the marriage. I grew afraid. I told Dick of my fears. He banished them. I let him banish them.”
“What do you mean?” Thresk asked.
“We were married privately in London five days ago.”
Thresk uttered a low cry and in a moment Stella was at his side, all her composure gone.
“Oh, I know that it was wrong. But I was being hunted. They were all like a pack of wolves after me. Mr. Hazlewood had joined them. I was driven into a corner. I loved Dick. They meant to tear him from me without any pity. I clung. Yes, I clung.”
But Thresk thrust her aside.
“You tricked him,” he cried.
“I didn’t dare to tell him,” Stella pleaded, wringing her hands. “I didn’t dare to lose him.”
“You tricked him,” Thresk repeated; and at the note of anger in his voice
Stella found herself again.
“You accuse and condemn me?” she asked quietly.
“Yes. A thousand times, yes,” he exclaimed hotly, and she answered with another question winged on a note of irony:
“Because I tricked him? Or because I — married him?”
Thresk was silenced. He recognised the truth implied in the distinction, he turned to her with a smile.
“Yes,” he answered. “You are right, Stella. It’s because you married him.”
He stood for a moment in thought. Then with a gesture of helplessness he picked up her cloak. She watched his action and as he came towards her she cried:
“But I’ll tell him now, Henry.” In a way she owed it to this man who cared for her so much, who was so prepared for sacrifice, if sacrifice could help. That morning on the downs was swept from her memory now. “Yes, I’ll tell him now,” she said eagerly. Since Henry Thresk set such store upon that confession, why so very likely would Dick, her husband, too.
But Thresk shook his head.
“What’s the use now? You give him no chance. You can’t set him free”; and Stella was as one turned to stone. All argument seemed sooner or later to turn to that one dread alternative which had already twice that night forced itself on her acceptance.
“Yes, I can, Henry, and I will, I promise you, if he wishes to be free. I can do it quite easily, quite naturally. Any woman could. So many of us take things to make us sleep.”
There was no boastfulness in her voice or manner, but rather a despairing recognition of facts.
“Good God, you mustn’t think of it!” said Thresk eagerly. “That’s too big a price to pay.”
Stella shook her head wistfully.
“You hear it said, Henry,” she answered with an indescribable wistfulness, “that women will do anything to keep the men they love. They’ll do a great deal — I am an example — but not always everything. Sometimes love runs just a little stronger. And then it craves that the loved one shall get all he wants to have. If Dick wants his freedom I too, then, shall want him to have it.”
And while Thresk stood with no words to answer her there came a knocking upon the door. It was gentle, almost furtive, but it startled them both like a clap of thunder. For a moment they stood rigid. Then Thresk silently handed Stella her cloak and pointed towards the window. He began to speak aloud. A word or two revealed his plan to Stella Ballantyne. He was rehearsing a speech which he was to make in the Courts before a jury. But the handle of the door rattled and now old Mr. Hazlewood’s voice was heard.
“Thresk! Are you there?”
Once more Thresk pointed to the window. But Stella did not move.
“Let him in,” she said quietly, and with a glance at her he unlocked the door.
Mr. Hazlewood stood outside. He had not gone to bed that night. He had taken off his coat and now wore a smoking-jacket.
“I knew that I should not sleep to-night, so I sat up,” he began, “and I thought that I heard voices here.”
Over Thresk’s shoulder he saw Stella Ballantyne standing erect in the middle of the room, her shining gown the one bright patch of colour. “You here?” he cried to her, and Thresk made way for him to enter. He advanced to her with a look of triumph in his eyes.
“You here — at this house — with Thresk? You were persuading him to continue to hold his tongue.”
Stella met his gaze steadily.
“No,” she replied. “He was persuading me to the truth, and he has succeeded.”
Mr. Hazlewood smiled and nodded. There was no magnanimity in his triumph.
A schoolboy would have shown more chivalry to the opponent who was down.
“You confess then? Good! Richard must be told.”
“Yes,” answered Stella. “I claim the right to tell him.”
But Mr. Hazlewood scoffed at the proposal.
“Oh dear no!” he cried. “I refuse the claim. I shall go straight to
Richard now.”
He had actually taken a couple of steps towards the door before Stella’s voice rang out suddenly loud and imperative.
“Take care, Mr. Hazlewood. After you have told him he will come to me.
Take care!”
Hazlewood stopped. Certainly that was true.
“I’ll tell Dick to-morrow, here, in your presence,” she said. “And if he wishes it I’ll set him f
ree and never trouble either of you again.”
Hazlewood looked at Thresk and was persuaded to consent. Reflection showed him that it was the better plan. He himself would be present when Stella spoke. He would see that the truth was told without embroidery.
“Very well, to-morrow,” he said.
Stella flung the cloak over her shoulders and went up to the window.
Thresk opened it for her.
“I’ll see you to your door,” he said.
The moon had risen now. It hung low with the branches of a tree like a lattice across its face; and on the garden and the meadow lay that unearthly light which falls when a moonlit night begins to drown in the onrush of the dawn.
“No,” she said. “I would rather go alone. But do something for me, will you? Stay to-morrow. Be here when I tell him.” She choked down a sob. “Oh, I shall want a friend and you are so kind.”
“So kind!” he repeated with a note of bitterness. Could there be praise from a woman’s lips more deadly? You are kind; you are put in your place in the ruck of men; you are extinguished.
“Oh yes, I’ll stay.”
She stood for a moment on the stone flags outside the window.
“Will he forgive?” she asked. “You would. And he is not so very young, is he? It’s the young who don’t forgive. Good-night.”
She went along the path and across the meadow. Thresk watched her go and saw the light spring up in her room. Then he closed the window and drew the curtain. Mr. Hazlewood had gone. Thresk wondered what the morrow would bring. After all, Stella was right. Youth was a graceful thing of high-sounding words and impetuous thoughts, but like many other graceful things it could be hard and cruel. Its generosity did not come from any wide outlook on a world where there is a good deal to be said for everything. It was rather a matter of physical health than judgment. Yes, he was glad Dick Hazlewood was half his way through the thirties. For himself — well, he knew his business. It was to be kind. He turned off the lights and went to bed.
CHAPTER XXVII
THE VERDICT
“SIX, SEVEN, EIGHT,” said Mr. Hazlewood, counting the letters which he had already written since breakfast and placing them on the salver which Hubbard was holding out to him. He was a very different man this morning from the Mr. Hazlewood of yesterday. He shone, complacent and serene. He leaned back in his chair and gazed mildly at the butler. “There must be an answer to the problem which I put to you, Hubbard.”
Hubbard wrinkled his brows in thought and succeeded only in looking a hundred and ten years old. He had the melancholy look of a moulting bird. He shook his head and drooped.
“No doubt, sir,” he said.
“But as far as you are concerned,” Mr. Hazlewood continued briskly, “you can throw no light upon it?”
“Not a glimmer, sir.”
Mr. Hazlewood was disappointed and with him disappointment was petulance.
“That is unlike you, Hubbard,” he said, “for sometimes after I have been deliberating for days over some curious and perplexing conundrum, you have solved it the moment it has been put to you.”
Hubbard drooped still lower. He began the droop as a bow of acknowledgment but forgot to raise his head again.
“It is very good of you, sir,” he said. He seemed oppressed by the goodness of Mr. Hazlewood.
“Yet you are not clever, Hubbard! Not at all clever.”
“No, sir. I know my place,” returned the butler, and Mr. Hazlewood continued with a little envy.
“You must have some wonderful gift of insight which guides you straight to the inner meaning of things.”
“It’s just common-sense, sir,” said Hubbard.
“But I haven’t got it,” cried Mr. Hazlewood. “How’s that?”
“You don’t need it, sir. You are a gentleman,” Hubbard replied, and carried the letters to the door. There, however, he stopped. “I beg your pardon, sir,” he said, “but a new parcel of The Prison Walls has arrived this morning. Shall I unpack it?”
Mr. Hazlewood frowned and scratched his ear.
“Well — er — no, Hubbard — no,” he said with a trifle of discomfort. “I am
not sure indeed that The Prison Walls is not almost one of my mistakes.
We all make mistakes, Hubbard. I think you shall burn that parcel,
Hubbard — somewhere where it won’t be noticed.”
“Certainly, sir,” said Hubbard. “I’ll burn it under the shadow of the south wall.”
Mr. Hazlewood looked up with a start. Was it possible that Hubbard was poking fun at him? The mere notion was incredible and indeed Hubbard shuffled with so much meekness from the room that Mr. Hazlewood dismissed it. He went across the hall to the dining-room, where he found Henry Thresk trifling with his breakfast. No embarrassment weighed upon Mr. Hazlewood this morning. He effervesced with good-humour.
“I do not blame you, Mr. Thresk,” he said, “for the side you took yesterday afternoon. You were a stranger to us in this house. I understand your position.”
“I am not quite so sure, Mr. Hazlewood,” said Thresk drily, “that I understand yours. For my part I have not closed my eyes all night. You, on the other hand, seem to have slept well.”
“I did indeed,” said Hazlewood. “I was relieved from a strain of suspense under which I have been labouring for a month past. To have refused my consent to Richard’s marriage with Stella Ballantyne on no other grounds than that social prejudice forbade it would have seemed a complete, a stupendous reversal of my whole theory and conduct of life. I should have become an object of ridicule. People would have laughed at the philosopher of Little Beeding. I have heard their laughter all this month. Now, however, once the truth is known no one will be able to say—”
Henry Thresk looked up from his plate aghast.
“Do you mean to say, Mr. Hazlewood, that after Mrs. Ballantyne has told her story you mean to make that story public?”
Mr. Hazlewood stared in amazement at Henry Thresk.
“But of course,” he said.
“Oh, you can’t be thinking of it!”
“But I am. I must do it. There is so much at stake,” replied Hazlewood.
“What?”
“The whole consistency of my life. I must make it clear that I am not acting upon prejudice or suspicion or fear of what the world will say or for any of the conventional reasons which might guide other men.”
To Thresk this point of view was horrible; and there was no arguing against it. It was inspired by the dreadful vanity of a narrow, shallow nature, and Thresk’s experience had never shown him anything more difficult to combat and overcome.
“So for the sake of your reputation for consistency you will make a very unhappy woman bear shame and obloquy which she might easily be spared? You could find a thousand excuses for breaking off the marriage.”
“You put the case very harshly, Mr. Thresk,” said Hazlewood. “But you have not considered my position,” and he went indignantly back to the library.
Thresk shrugged his shoulders. After all if Dick Hazlewood turned his back upon Stella she would not hear the abuse or suffer the shame. That she would take the dark journey as she declared he could not doubt. And no one could prevent her — not even he himself, though his heart might break at her taking it. All depended upon Dick.
He appeared a few minutes afterwards fresh from his ride, glowing with good-humour and contentment. But the sight of Thresk surprised him.
“Hulloa,” he cried. “Good-morning. I thought you were going to catch the eight forty-five.”
“I felt lazy,” answered Thresk. “I sent off some telegrams to put off my engagements.”
“Good,” said Dick, and he sat down at the breakfast-table. As he poured out a cup of tea, Thresk said:
“I think I heard you were over thirty.”
“Yes.”
“Thirty’s a good age,” said Thresk.
“It looks back on youth,” answered Dick.
“That’s jus
t what I mean,” remarked Thresk. “Do you mind a cigarette?”
“Not at all.”
Thresk smoked and while he smoked he talked, not carelessly yet careful not to emphasize his case. “Youth is a graceful thing of high-sounding words and impetuous thoughts, but like many other graceful things it can be very hard and very cruel.”
Dick Hazlewood looked closely and quickly at his companion. But he answered casually:
“It is supposed to be generous.”
“And it is — to itself,” replied Thresk. “Generous when its sympathies are enlisted, generous so long as all goes well with it: generous because it is confident of triumph. But its generosity is not a matter of judgment. It does not come from any wide outlook upon a world where there is a good deal to be said for everything. It is a matter of physical health.”
“Yes?” said Dick.
“And once affronted, once hurt, youth finds it difficult to forgive.”
So far both men had been debating on an abstract topic without any immediate application to themselves. But now Dick leaned across the table with a smile upon his face which Thresk did not understand.
“And why do you say this to me this morning, Mr. Thresk?” he asked pointedly.
“Yes, it’s rather an impertinence, isn’t it?” Thresk agreed. “But I was looking into a case late last night in which irrevocable and terrible things are going to happen if there is not forgiveness.”
Dick took his cigarette-case from his pocket.
“I see,” he remarked, and struck a match. Both men rose from the table and at the door Dick turned.
“Your case, of course, has not yet come on,” he said.
“No,” answered Thresk, “but it will very soon.”
They went into the library, and Mr. Hazlewood greeted his son with a vivacity which for weeks had been absent from his demeanour.
“Did you ride this morning?” he asked.
“Yes, but Stella didn’t. She sent word over that she was tired. I must go across and see how she is.”
Mr. Hazlewood interposed quickly:
“There is no need of that, my boy; she is coming here this morning.”
“Oh!”
Dick looked at his father in astonishment.
Complete Works of a E W Mason Page 531