"Such black hair," she murmured. "Ah, how I love it! I love black hair. How it shines, how soft it is! I hate grey hair. It is horrid.
No, I have not killed him. He will wake again when we have sailed and are far away from Sitka."
These words drove from me the last veil of clinging sleep. I kept my arms round her and said:
"But, Suzee, I can"t take you with me. I promised your husband to-night I would not."
"That"s nothing," she replied lightly; "promises are nothing when one loves. And you love me, Treevor; you must love me, and I am coming with you, you can"t drive me away."
The ship"s bells sounded overhead on deck as she spoke. The sound seemed a warning. I knew our ship was due to leave in the morning; I did not know quite when. If it left the quay with the girl on board, the horror of a broken promise would cling to me all my life.
"I can"t take you, it is impossible. You must go back and try to forget you have ever seen me. You must go now at once, our ship is leaving soon."
"I know," said Suzee tranquilly; "and I shall be so happy when it starts."
I pushed her aside and got up from the berth. The cabin window stood wide open. In the position the ship was it was easy to come in and out through it from the quay. She must have entered that way.
"You must go," I said between my teeth. I was afraid of myself.
Overhead I heard movements and clanking chains and shuffling feet. Our ship was leaving, and she was still on board with me.
"Go out of that window now, instantly, or I shall put you out."
"You will not, Treevor," beginning to cry; "you won"t be so unkind. I only want to stay with you; let me stay."
She was half-sitting on the edge of my berth, clinging to it with both hands. She was pale with an ivory pallor, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s rose in sobs under the transparent muslin of her vest.
The ship gave a great heave under our feet.
The blood beat so in my head and round my eyes I could hardly see her.
I moved to her, clinging to one blind object. I bent over her and lifted her up. She was like a doll in weight. She was nothing to me.
As she realised my intention she seemed to turn into a wild animal in my arms. She bit and tore at my wrists, and scratched my face with her long sharp nails.
The ship was moving now and I was desperate.
I walked with her to the window and put her feet over the ledge.
We neither of us spoke a word. She clung to my neck so I thought she must overbalance me and drag me through with her.
With all my force I pushed her outwards and away from me. Her hands broke from my neck and scratched down my face till the blood ran from it.
"Don"t struggle so," I warned her; "you will drop into the sea if you do." For a blue crack opened already between the moving ship and the quay.
Words were useless. She bit and struggled and clung to me like a cat mad with fear and rage.
With an effort I leant forward and half threw, half dropped her on the woodwork. She fell there with a gasping cry, and I drew the window to and shut it.
The ship rose and fell now and the blue water gleamed in an ever-widening track between its side and the quay.
I leant against the window gla.s.s and watched her through it. She had struggled to her knees and now knelt there weeping and stretching out little ivory tinted hands to the departing ship. My own eyes were full, and only through a mist could I see her kneeling there, a brilliant spot of colour in dazzling light on the deserted quay.
I turned away at last as we struck out on the open water. There, on my berth, facing me as I stumbled back to it, lay a little yellow jacket.
I threw myself upon it and put my hand over my eyes, while the ship made out beyond the fairy islands. And the gold night pa.s.sed over and melted into the new day.
PART TWO
THE VIOLET NIGHT
CHAPTER IV
AT THE STUDIO
I was back in London again, back in my studio with the dull grey light of the city falling through the windows, and all the vivid glory, the matchless splendour of the North lay like a past dream in the background of my memory. But still how clear the dream, how bright each moment of it, and how long to my retrospective vision! Was it possible I had only been there three or four months? It seemed like as many years. For time has this peculiarity, that joy and action shorten it while it is pa.s.sing, but lengthen it when it is past. A week in which we have done nothing of note, but spent in stationary idleness, how long and tedious it seems, yet in looking back upon it, it appears short as a day; while a week in which we have travelled far, seen several cities and been glad in each, though the gilded moments have danced by on lightning feet, when we look back upon that week it seems as if we have lived a year.
It was there, bright, radiant in my mind, the picture of those blue days and golden northern nights, and how the light of the picture seemed to gather round, and centre in a sweet youthful face with the blue stone earrings, hanging against the creamy neck, beside the rounded cheek, and the cl.u.s.ter of red flowers bound on each temple against the smooth black hair!
I settled myself lower in the deep roomy armchair, and pushed my feet forward to the blazing fire. There was still half an hour before I could decently ring for tea, and it was too dark already to work. I had had a hard and disagreeable morning, too, and felt I needed rest and quiet thought. How the red flame leapt in the grate, and what a rich, warm, wine-dark colour it threw all round my red room! I rose and drew the heavy crimson curtains across the windows to shut out their steely patches of grey that spoiled the harmony of colour. I returned to my chair and glanced round with satisfaction. Fitted and furnished and hung with every beautiful shade of red, my studio always delighted and charmed my vision.
My friends said I had papered and furnished it in red to throw up the white limbs and contours of my models, and this had something to do with it, for hardly any colour shows off white flesh to better advantage, though pale blue in this matter runs it close; but this was not the prompting motive. Rather it was that in England where all is so cold and tame and grey, from morals to colours, I liked to surround myself with this glowing barbaric crimson, this warm inviting tint.
My eye in wandering from floor to ceiling rested finally on the empty easel, the numerous white unused sheets of paper near it. I felt in despair. Not even a sketch of a Phryne yet! Not even a model found!
Not even the idea of where to find one!
I had been seeing models all the morning, and how wearisome and vexatious, and even, towards the end, how repulsive that becomes! The wearying search after something that corresponds to the perfect ideal in one"s brain, the constant raising of hope and ensuing disappointment as a misshapen foot or crooked knee destroys the effect of neck and shoulder, produce at last an intolerable irritation. I had dismissed them all finally, and they had trailed away in the rain, a dismal procession of dark-clothed women.
A quarter of an hour of red stillness in that comfortable room had pa.s.sed, and the warmth and quiet of it had crept over me and into me, gradually soothing away all vexations, when a knock came on the door and in answer to my, "Come in," some one entered the room behind me.
"I am so glad to find you."
I started to my feet at the sound of the soft voice, and went forward to the door.
"Viola! how good of you to come." I took both her hands and drew her into the firelight which sparkled gratefully on her tall slender figure and the fair waves of hair under her velvet hat.
"May I stay and have tea with you? I have shopping all the afternoon and as I was driving past I thought I would see if you were in and disengaged."
"I shall be delighted," I said as I wheeled another armchair up to the fire.
"You are sure? You have nothing else to do?"
"Nothing, really nothing," I said, walking to the electric lights and switching them on; "and if I had, I would leave it all to have tea with you."