Basset started. “Followed Mary!” he exclaimed.
“What else? I have looked for it from the first. I’ve pressed you to come to an understanding with her for that reason. Why the devil can’t you? If you leave it much longer you’ll be too late! Too late! And, by G — d, I’ll never forgive you!” with a fresh spirt of passion. “Never! Never, man!”
“I’ve not said that I meant to do it.”
“You’ve not said!” Audley replied contemptuously. “Do you think that I don’t know that she’s all the world to you? Do you think that I’ve no eyes? Do you think that when you sit there watching her from behind your book by the hour together, I have not my sight? Man, I’m not a fool! And I tell you that if you’re not to lose her you must speak! You must speak! Stand by another month, wait a little longer, and Philip Audley will put in his oar, and I’ll not give that for your chances!” He snapped his fingers.
“Why should he put in his oar?” Basset asked sullenly. His face had turned a dull red.
John Audley shrugged his shoulders. “Do you think that she is without attractions?”
“But Audley lives in another world.”
“The more likely to have attractions for her!”
“But surely he’ll look for — for something more,” Basset stammered.
“For a rich wife? For an alliance, as the saying is? And sleep ill of nights? And have bad dreams? No, he is no fool, if you are. He sees that if he marries the girl he makes himself safe. He makes himself safe! After me, it lies between them.”
“I take it that he does think himself safe.”
“Not he!” Audley replied. He was stooping over the ashes, warming his hands, but at that he jumped up. “Not he! he knows better than you! And fears! And sleeps ill of nights, d — n him! And dreams! But there, I must not excite myself. I must not excite myself. Only, if he once begins, he’ll be no laggard in love as you are! He’ll not sit puling and peeping and looking at the back of her head by the hour together! He’ll be up and at her — I know what that big jowl means! And she’ll be in his arms in half the time that you’ve taken to count her eyelashes!” He turned in a fresh fit of fury and seized his candle. “In his arms, I tell you, fool, while you are counting her eyelashes. Well, lose her, lose her, and I never want to see you again, or her! Never! I’ll curse you both!”
He stumbled to the door and went out, a queer, gibbering, shaking figure; and Basset had no doubt at such moments that he was mad. But on this occasion he was afraid — he was very much afraid, as he sat pondering in his chair, that there was method in his madness!
CHAPTER XIII
PETER PAUPER
The impression which the events of the evening had made on Mary’s mind was still lively when she awoke next day. It was not less clear, because like the feminine letter of the ‘forties, crossed and recrossed, it had stamped itself in two layers on her mind, of which the earlier was the more vivid.
The solitude in which her days had of late been spent had left her peculiarly open to new ideas, while the quiet and wholesome life of the Gatehouse had prepared her to answer any call which those ideas might make upon her. Rescued from penury, lifted above anxiety about bed and board, no longer exposed to the panic-fears which in Paris had beset even her courageous nature, Mary had for a while been content simply to rest. She had taken the sunshine, the beauty, the ease and indolence of her life as a convalescent accepts idleness, without scruple or question.
But this could not last. She was young, nature soon rallied in her, and she had seen things and done things during the last two years which forbade her to accept such a limited horizon as satisfied most of the women of that day. Unlike them, she had viewed the world from more than one standpoint; through the grille of a convent school, from the grimy windows of a back-street in Paris; again, as it moved beneath the painted ceilings of a French salon. And now, as it presented itself in this retired house.
Therefore she could not view things as those saw them whose standpoint had never shifted. She had suffered, she still had twinges — for who, with her experience, could be sure that the path would continue easy? And so to her Mr. Colet’s sermon had made a strong appeal.
It left the word which Mr. Colet had taken for his text sounding in her ears. Borne upward on the eloquence which earnestness had lent to the young preacher, she looked down on a world in torment, a world holding up piteous hands, craving, itself in ignorance, the help of those who held the secret, and whose will might make that secret sufficient to save. Love! To do to others as she would have others do to her! With every day, with every hour, with every minute to do something for others! Always to give, never to take! Above all to give herself, to do her part in that preference of others to self, which could alone right these mighty wrongs, could find work for the idle, food for the hungry, roofs for the homeless, knowledge for the blind, healing for the sick! Which could save all this world in torment, and could
“Build a Heaven in Hell’s despair!”
It was a beautiful vision, and in this her first glimpse of it, Mary’s fancy was not chilled by the hard light of experience. It seemed so plain that if the workman had his master’s profit at heart, and the master were as anxious for the weal of his men, the interests of the two would be one. Equally plain it seemed that if they who grew the food aimed at feeding the greatest number, and they who ate had the same desire to reward the grower, if every man shrank from taking advantage of other men, if the learned lived to spread their knowledge, and the strong to help the weak, if no man wronged his neighbor, but
“Each for another gave his ease,”
then it seemed equally plain that love would indeed be lord of all!
Later, she might discover that it takes two to make a bargain; that charity does bless him who gives but not always him who takes; even, that cheap bread might be a dear advantage — that at least it might have its drawbacks.
But for the moment it was enough for Mary that the vision was beautiful and, as a theory, true. So that, gazing upward at the faded dimity of her tester, she longed to play her part in it. That world in torment, those countless hands stretched upward in appeal, that murmur of infinite pain, the cry of the hungry, of the widow, of men sitting by tireless hearths, of children dying in mill and mine — the picture wrought on her so strongly, that she could not rest. She rose, and though the hoar frost was white on the grass and the fog of an autumn morning still curtained the view, she began to dress.
Perhaps the chill of the cold water in which she washed sobered her. At any rate, with the comb in one hand and her hair in the other, she drifted down another line of thought. Lord Audley — how strange was the chance which had again brought them together! How much she owed him, with what kindness had he seen to her comfort, how masterfully had he arranged matters for her on the boat. And then she smiled. She recalled Basset’s ill-humor, or his — jealousy. At the thought of what the word implied, Mary colored.
There could be nothing in the notion, yet she probed her own feelings. Certainly she liked Lord Audley. If he was not handsome, he had that air of strength and power which impresses women; and he had ease and charm, and the look of fashion which has its weight with even the most sensible of her sex. He had all these and he was a man, and she admired him and was grateful to him. And yesterday she might have thought that her feeling for him was love.
But this morning she had gained a higher notion of love. She had learned from Etruria how near to that pattern of love which Mr. Colet preached the love of man and woman could rise. She had a new conception of its strength and its power to expel what was selfish or petty. She had seen it in its noblest form in Etruria, and she knew that her feeling for Lord Audley was not in the same world with Etruria’s feeling for the curate. She laughed at the notion.
“Poor Etruria!” she meditated. “Or should it be, happy Etruria? Who knows? I only know that I am heart-whole!”
And she knotted up her hair and, Diana-like, went out into the pure biting
air of the morning, along the green rides hoary with dew and fringed with bracken, under the oak trees from which the wood-pigeons broke in startled flight.
But if the energy of her thoughts carried her out, fatigue soon brought her to a pause. The evening’s excitement, the strain of the adventure had not left her, young as she was, unscathed. The springs of enthusiasm waned with her strength, and presently she felt jaded. She perceived that she would have done better had she rested longer; and too late the charms of bed appealed to her.
She was at the breakfast table when Basset — he, too, had had a restless night and many thoughts — came down. He saw that she was pale and that there were shadows under her eyes, and the man’s tenderness went out to her. He longed, he longed above everything to put himself right with her; and on the impulse of the moment, “I want you to know,” he said, standing meekly at her elbow, “that I am sorry I lost my temper last evening.”
But she was out of sympathy with him. “It is nothing,” she said. “We were all tired, I think. Etruria is not down yet.”
“But I want to ask your — —”
“Oh dear, dear!” she cried, interrupting him with a gesture of impatience. “Don’t let us rake it up again. If my uncle has not suffered, there is no harm done. Please let it rest.”
But he could not let it rest. He longed to put his neck under her foot, and he did not see that she was in the worst possible mood for his purpose. “Still,” he said, “you must let me say — —”
“Don’t!” she cried. She put her hands to her ears. Then, seeing that she had wounded him, she dropped them and spoke more kindly. “Don’t let us make much of little, Mr. Basset. It was all natural enough. You don’t like Lord Audley — —”
“I don’t.”
“And you did not understand that we had been terribly frightened, and had good reason to be grateful to him. I am sure that if you had known that, you would have behaved differently. There!” with a smile. “And now that I have made the amende for you, let us have breakfast. Here is your coffee.”
He knew that she was holding him off, and all his alarms of the night were quickened. Again and again had John Audley’s warning recurred to him and as often he had striven to reject it, but always in vain. And gradually, slowly, it had kindled his resolution, it had fired him to action. Now, the very modesty which had long kept him silent and withheld him from enterprise was changed — as so often happens with diffident man — into rashness. He was as anxious to put his fate to the test as he had before been unwilling.
Presently, “You will not need to tell your uncle about Lord Audley,” he said. “I’ve done it.”
“I hope you told him,” she answered gravely, “that we were indebted to Lord Audley for our safety.”
“You don’t trust me?”
“Don’t say things like that!” she cried. “It is foolish. I have no doubt that in telling my uncle you meant to relieve me. You have helped me more than once in that way. But — —”
“But this is a special occasion?”
She looked at him. “If you wish us to be friends — —”
“I don’t,” he answered roughly. “I don’t want to be friends with you.”
Then, ambiguous as his words were, she saw where she stood, and she mustered her presence of mind. She rose from her seat. “And I,” she said, “am not going to quarrel with you, Mr. Basset. I am going now to learn how Etruria is. And then I shall see my uncle.”
She escaped before he could answer.
Once or twice it had crossed her mind that he looked at her with intention; and once reading that look in his eyes she had felt her color rise, and her heart beat more quickly. But the absence on her side of any feeling, except that which a sister might feel for a kind brother, this and the reserve of his manner had nipped the fancy as soon as it budded. And if she had given it a second thought, it had been only to smile at her vanity.
Now she had no doubt of the fact, no doubt that it was jealousy that moved him, and her uppermost, almost her only feeling was vexation. Because they had lived in the same house for five months, because he had been useful and she had been grateful, because they were man and woman, how foolish it was! How absurd! How annoying! She foresaw from it many, many, inconveniences; a breach in their pleasant intercourse, displeasure on her uncle’s part, trouble in the house that had been so peaceful — oh, many things. But that which vexed her most was the fear that she had, all unwittingly, encouraged him.
She believed that she had not. But while she talked to Etruria, and later, as she went down the stairs to interview her uncle, she had this weight on her mind. She strove to recall words and looks, and upon the whole she was sure that she could acquit herself, sure that of this evil no part lay at her door. But it was very, very vexatious!
On the threshold of the library she wrested her thoughts back to the present, and paused a moment, considering what she should say to her uncle.
She need not have troubled herself, for he was not there. At the first glance she took the room to be empty; a second showed her Basset. She turned to retire, but too late; he stepped between her and the door and closed it. He was a little paler than usual, and his air of purpose was not to be mistaken.
She stiffened. “I came to see my uncle,” she said.
“I am the bearer of a message from him,” he answered. “He asked me to say that he considers the matter at an end. He does not wish it to be mentioned again. Of course he does not blame you.”
“But, Mr. Basset — —”
But he would not let her speak. “That was his message,” he continued, “and I am glad to be the messenger because it gives me a chance of speaking to you. Will you sit down?”
“But we have only just parted,” she remonstrated, struggling against her fate. “I don’t understand what you want — —”
“To say? No, I am going to explain it — if you will sit down.”
She sat down then with the feeling that she was trapped. And since it was clear that she must go through with it, she was glad that his insistence hardened her heart and dried up the springs of pity.
He went to the fire, stooped and moved the wood. “You won’t come nearer?” he said.
“No,” she replied. How foolish to trap her like this if he thought to get anything from her!
He turned to her and his face was changed. Under his wistful look she discovered that it was not so easy to be hard, not so easy to maintain her firmness. “You would rather escape?” he said, reading her mind. “I know. But I can’t let you escape. You are thinking that I have trapped you? And you are fearing that I am going to make you unhappy for — for half an hour perhaps? I know. And I am fearing that you are going to make me unhappy for — always.”
No, she could not retain her hardness. She knew that she was going to feel pity after all. But she would not speak.
“I have only hope,” he went on. “There is only one thing I am clinging to. I have read that when a man loves a woman very truly, very deeply, as I love you, Mary” — she started violently, and blushed to the roots of her hair, so sudden was the avowal— “as I love you,” he repeated sorrowfully, “I have read that she either hates him or loves him. His love is a fire that either warms her or scorches her, draws her or repels her. I thought of that last night, as I thought of many things, and I was sure, I was confident that you did not hate me.”
“Oh no,” she answered, unsteadily. “Indeed, indeed, I don’t! I am very grateful to you. But the other — I don’t think it is true.”
“No?” he said, keeping his eyes on her face. “And then, you don’t doubt that I love you?”
“No.” The flush had faded from her face and left her pale. “I don’t doubt that — now.”
“It is so true that — you know that you have sometimes called me Peter? Well, I would have given much, very much to call you Mary. But I did not dare. I could not. For I knew that if I did, only once, my voice would betray me, and that I should alarm you before the t
ime! I knew that that one word — that word alone — would set my heart upon my sleeve for all to see. And I did not want to alarm you. I did not want to hurry you. I thought then that I had time, time to make myself known to you, time to prove my devotion, time to win you, Mary. I thought that I could wait. Now, since last night, I am afraid to wait. I doubt, nay I am sure, that I have no time, that I dare not wait.”
She did not answer, but the color mounted again to her face.
He turned and knocked the fire together with his foot. Then he took a step towards her. “Tell me,” he said, “have I any chance? Any chance at all, Mary?”
She shook her head; but seeing then that he kept his eyes fixed on her and would not take that for an answer, “None,” she said as kindly as she could. “I must tell you the truth. It is useless to try to break it. I have never once, not once thought of you but as a friend, Peter.”
“But now,” he said, “cannot you regard me differently — now! Now that you know? Cannot you begin to think of me as — a lover?”
“No,” Mary said frankly and pitifully. “I should not be honest if I said that I could. If I held out hopes. You have been always good to me, kind to me, a dear friend, a brother when I had need of one. And I am grateful, Mr. Basset, honestly, really grateful to you. And fond of you — in that way. But I could not think of you in the way you desire. I know it for certain. I know that there is no chance.”
He stood for a moment without speaking, and seeing how stricken he looked, how sad his face, her eyes filled with tears. Then, “Is there any one else?” he asked slowly, his eyes on her face.
She did not answer. She rose to her feet.
“Is there any one else?” he repeated, a new note in his voice. He moved forward a step.
“You have no right to ask that,” she said.
“I have every right,” he replied. “What?” he continued, moving still nearer to her, his whole bearing changed in a moment by the sting of jealousy. “I am condemned, I am rejected, and I am not to ask why?”
Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman Page 587