However, as I did not own the house, I was not at liberty to prevent him living where he liked. I made up my mind to avoid him and let it go at that. It began to be apparent that his movements were influenced in a large degree by my own. I wondered if he meant to dog me from island to island during the rest of my journey.
On the day following my arrival I began to dictate to Miss May the novel of which I had spoken, or rather a correct transcript of the proceedings that had brought me where I was. You already know the story, and if you care to read it again you have only to turn to the first chapter of this volume and begin at the point where she did. It took me the whole of that forenoon to finish the opening instalment, as I wanted to put it into a shape that would not necessitate its being re-written. Miss May proved a splendid amanuensis and, as requested, made no comments till the lunch hour arrived, though I could not help seeing that she was filled with interest as well as vivid curiosity.
When I began to allude to Statia and to detail her conversations with me, my typewriter"s face was at times suffused with pink. I fancied, when I came to the place where I asked Statia to be my wife, that Marjorie was about to refuse to continue, but she merely drew a very long breath and let her nimble fingers touch the requisite keys. When Tom"s sister declined my offer I heard a light sigh that I took to mean relief. The tale of my visit to the Herald office and of writing the advertis.e.m.e.nt clearly interested her. She wrote rapidly when I told about the handsome woman who wished the acquaintance of an elderly gentleman, on whom to lavish her beautiful face and form, with her "object matrimony."
When I said we would let that chapter suffice for the day she sat back from the table and uttered an uneasy little laugh.
"It"s not so bad," she was kind enough to say. "I may have to change my mind about your project. But are you going on as you have begun, exposing every thought--making the world your confidant. I am afraid few people could afford to do that."
"Precisely," I said. "Men have written fiction so vividly that people have believed it truth. I am going to write truth in such a manner that people will take it for excellent fiction. Yes, I shall follow Oth.e.l.lo"s advice, "nothing extenuate nor set down aught in malice." It is a camera you are operating, my dear, not a typewriting machine."
That afternoon we took a long drive, to Farley Hill, which point is said to be nine hundred feet above the sea. I was tranquil enough now. We were alone except for the driver, whose back was toward us. The long stretches of sugar cane made a pleasing prospect. Every individual we met, mostly people of various degrees of negro lineage, addressed us pleasantly. The trade-winds from the east, that blow over Barbados six months in the year, brought ozone to our lungs and coolness to our faces. The road for the entire distance was smooth and hard. It was one of the most delightful drives I had ever taken and there was nothing to mar the occasion.
We pa.s.sed the evening after dinner in our joint sitting room, with the windows wide open and retired early.
"You are the most honest man I ever met," said Miss May, the next morning, when she was in the midst of her work. She had just written this paragraph:
I have led a life as regards women that I now think worse than idiotic. I have followed one after another of them, from pillar to post, falling madly in love, getting the blues, losing heart, all that sort of thing. I have never been intimately acquainted with a pure, honest girl of the better cla.s.ses, except one.
"Was there ever another man who would put such things about himself in cold type?"
"But, listen," I said, defensively. "See what follows:
I need sadly to be educated by a woman who will not hold out temptation. I have an idea that a few months pa.s.sed abroad, in the society of such a woman, will make another man of me.
"Marjorie, my life, I was right. It has made another man of me. I shall never be what I was before--never as long as I breathe."
She shook her head, half doubtfully, but declined to discuss the subject further. When she came to Hume"s question, "What is to keep you from falling in love with your secretary?" she seemed troubled until she had received the answer I gave him, declaring that my "secretary" would be sent home with a month"s advance wages if she allowed me to forget that I was merely her employer. Then she broke the rule we had adopted, and I could not blame her.
"You are evidently of a forgetful nature," she said. "The promise you made your friend does not agree with some of the foolish things you have tried to say to me."
"But, my angel, I had not met you when I made that a.s.sertion. I was speaking of an imaginary woman. Men are not expected to do impossible things. Besides, you do not realize how very ill I had been. I think we shall get on better if you will reserve your comments till the end of each chapter, when I shall be delighted to hear as many as you like."
She returned good naturedly to the machine, and recorded the balance of the chapter that is numbered two in this volume. When I said we had done enough for one day, she answered that she thought a little work in the afternoon would hurt neither of us; and that, for her part, she would be glad to begin again after lunch. It was plain that she was becoming interested and wanted to get on as fast as possible. Pleased at this, I consented to her plan. It was only half past eleven when she stopped and a rest of two or three hours would put us both right again.
"I don"t think I realized you had been so terribly ill," she said, taking a rocker and placing herself at ease.
"I don"t like to talk much about it, or even to think of it," was my reply, "but you may be sure it was hard enough. I would rather endure any pain than the awful depression that accompanies neurasthenia. When I recovered it seemed as if I had died and been resurrected. My old life was gone and I did not wish to recall it. The new one was full of new possibilities and dreams. How happy I shall be when they are all fulfilled!"
"And were you so very--very wicked?" she asked, constrainedly. "I cannot believe it when I look at you. Vice ought to leave some distinguishing mark, but your face is as innocent as a babe"s."
"You are very kind to say so. But I want to talk about that still less than about my illness. Both of them have come to an end."
"Let us trust so," she said, gently.
How gently and sweetly she did say it!
The third chapter, which we did that day before taking our drive, called for no interruption on her part with one exception, and that was because she did not quite catch one word. It was in relation to the letter of credit that I had brought.
"Did you say two thousand?" she asked, "or three?"
"Two thousand," I answered, and she went on rapidly, talking down the words as they fell from my lips. The account of Charmion"s performance at Koster and Bial"s disturbed her visibly, but she went bravely to the end.
"Do you really mean that this exposure took place in a New York theatre, at a regular performance?" she asked, when I said that was the end.
"Exactly as described."
"It is shameful!" she exclaimed, angrily. "If women had charge of the theatres such things would not be permitted."
"You forget," I replied, "that half the audience were women--ladies, if you please."
She bit her lip.
"You ought not to put it in the story, at any rate," she said. "It will only encourage people with debased minds to go to view it."
"By the time my book is published there will probably be an entire change of programme," said I. (I wonder if there will.)
Another drive, another chatty evening, another morning, and we went on again. Miss May smiled occasionally as I told of my preparations for making this voyage and of engaging a berth for her before I had even received her reply to my advertis.e.m.e.nt in the Herald. Then she listened with interest to the letter (the first one) I received from Miss Brazier, breaking our rule enough to remark, "That"s a bright girl." I took her own reply from my pocket to give it verbatim, upon which she said--
"Have you kept that all this time? Tear it up now and throw it in the wastebasket."
"Tear it up?" I echoed. "Money wouldn"t buy that little note!"
When the end of the fourth chapter was reached, and we took our noonday rest, she spoke at some length about Statia. She wanted me to tell her more than appeared in the story. That was the kind of woman one could admire, she declared.
"And yet, how can I judge a girl who has always been under the watchful eye of a kind father or brother?" she added, thoughtfully. "Who can say what evil might have crept into her life, had she been compelled to face the cruel world and fight for her bread?"
"But you have done that," I protested, "and are to-day as sweet and pure as if all the fathers and brothers on earth formed your guard."
She turned on me suddenly.
"How do you know?" she demanded. "You know nothing whatever about me.
Oh, Mr. Camran, there are things in my life that would make a novel even more interesting than this one of yours. But I could not sit down and expose my errors as you do. I could not! no, I could not!"
I said that all the errors of her young life must be wholly in imagination. She was like some child at a first confession, trying to magnify a baby fault into goods big enough for its new market. She made no reply, but went silently into her chamber where she remained till lunch time. When she came out the matter had slipped my mind and did not recur to me till long afterward.
The fifth chapter occupied us during most of the afternoon. Miss May showed great interest when Mr. Wesson appeared on the scene and much more when she herself was first presented. My intense anxiety to meet her seemed to strike her as odd, for she uttered little "oh"s" and "ah"s" when I described our first meeting. When she came to the expression "she was not handsome," she said "I should think not!" in a tone of disdain.
At the end of the chapter she had to talk about it as usual.
"Well, it is something to see one"s photograph, as it appears to another," she said, smiling. "I don"t understand, though, how I managed to produce such a favorable impression. I really had little idea I should be the successful applicant when you left my room that day. I wasn"t even certain that I ought to accept, if you offered it to me. I had never heard of an arrangement exactly like it. We were strangers to each other. I had a place that I detested, but how could I be sure you would prove a more considerate employer than the one I was to leave? Had it not been for my desperate plight I must have told you frankly that I could not go."
"You are not sorry--yet?" I whispered.
"Oh, no! And you can prevent my ever being sorry, if you will."
It was useless to begin the old argument. I went down to see if the carriage was ready. Wesson sat in the hallway, where the draft of air was strongest, and did not see me until I was close to him. When he realized my proximity he closed the book in his hands with a bang and looked much confused. But he had not performed the action quickly enough for his purpose.
I had seen what he was reading: