He took her hand and kept it. "Some day you shall tell me a number of things."
She did not cease to look at him, but he saw fear in her eyes. "Some day, perhaps, but not yet."
"No," said he, "not yet--perhaps."
"Will you trust me?"
"I always have."
She sighed. "Oh, you are good. I didn"t know how good." Then she turned to go. "I told you I was going--and I am. Good night."
He put his book down. She let his eyegla.s.s fall. He drew her to his knee, and looked at her.
"It"s not good night," he said. "That"s to come."
She gave him a startled, wide look, and then her lips, before she fled.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE HARDANGER
That enchanted land of sea and rock, of mountains rooted in the water, and water which pierces the secret valleys of the mountains, worked its spell upon our travellers, and freed them from themselves for a while. For awhile they were as singleminded as the boys, content to live and breathe that wine-tinctured air, and watch out those flawless days and serene grey nights. London had sophisticated some of them almost beyond redemption: Francis Lingen was less man than sensitive gelatine; James was the offspring of a tradition and a looking-gla.s.s.
But the zest and high spirits of Urquhart were catching, and after a week Francis Lingen ceased to murmur to ladies in remote corners, and James to care whether his clothes were pressed. Everybody behaved well: Urquhart, who believed that he possessed Lucy"s heart, James, who knew now what he possessed, Vera Nugent, who was content to sit and look on, and Lucy herself, who simply and honestly forgot everything except the beauty of the world, and the joy of physical exertion. She had been wofully ill on the pa.s.sage from Newcastle and had been invisible from beginning to end. But from the moment of landing at Bergen she had been transformed. She was now the sister of her son, a wild, wilful, impetuous creature, a nymph of the heath, irresponsible and self-indulgent, taking what she could get of comfort and cherishing, and finding a boundless appet.i.te for it. It was something, perhaps, to know in her heart that every man in the party was in love with her; it was much more--for the moment at least--to be without conscience in the matter. She had put her conscience to sleep for once, drugged it with poppy and drowsy syrups, and led the life of a healthy and vigorous animal.
Urquhart enjoyed that; he was content to wait and watch. For the time James did not perceive it. The beauty and freshness of this new world was upon him. Francis Lingen, born to cling, threw out tentative tendrils to Margery Dacre.
Margery Dacre was a very pretty girl; she had straw-coloured hair and a bright complexion. She wore green, especially in the water. Urquhart called her Undine, and she was mostly known as the Mermaid. She had very little mind, but excellent manners; and was expensive without seeming to spend anything. For instance, she brought no maid, because she thought that it might have looked ostentatious, and always made use of Lucy"s, who didn"t really want one. That was how Margery Dacre contrived to seem very simple.
For the moment Urquhart took natural command. He knew the country, he owned the motor-boat; he believed that he owned Lucy, and he believed that James was rather a fool. He thought that he had got the better of James. But this could not last, because James was no more of a fool than he was himself, though his intelligence worked in a different way. Things flashed upon Urquhart, who then studied them intensely and missed nothing. They dawned on James, who leisurely absorbed them, and allowed them to work out their own development.
It was very gradually now dawning upon James that Urquhart had a.s.sumed habits of guidance over Lucy and was not aware of any reason why he should relinquish them. He believed that he understood her thoroughly; he read her as a pliant, gentle nature, easily imposed upon, and really at the mercy of any unscrupulous man who was clever enough to see how she should be treated. He had never thought that before. It was the result of his cogitations over recent events. So while he kept his temper and native jealousy under easy control, he watched comfortably--as well he might--and gained amus.e.m.e.nt, as he could well afford to do, from Urquhart"s marital a.s.sumptions. When he was tempted to interfere, or to try a fall with Urquhart, he studiously refrained.
If Urquhart said, as he did sometimes, "I advise you to rest for a bit," James calmly embraced the idea. If Urquhart brought out a cloak or a wrap and without word handed it to her, James, watching, did not determine to forestall him on the next occasion. And Lucy, as he admitted, behaved beautifully, behaved perfectly. There were no grateful looks from her, such as he would expect to see pa.s.s between lovers. Keenly as he watched her, he saw no secret exchange. On the other hand, her eyes frequently sought his own, as if she wanted him to understand that she was happy, as if, indeed, she wanted him to be happy by such an understanding. This gave him great pleasure, and touched him too. If he had been capable of it, he would have told her; but he was not. It was part of his nature to treat those whom he loved _de haut en bas_. He found that it was so, and hated himself for it. The one thing he really grudged Urquhart was his simplicity and freedom from ulterior motive. Urquhart was certainly able to enjoy the moment for the moment"s worth. But James must always be calculating exactly what it was worth, and whether to be enhanced by what might follow it.
He was kinder to her than he had ever been before. In fact, he was remarkably interesting. She told him of it in their solitary moments of greatest intimacy. "This is my honeymoon," she said, "and I never had one before."
"Goose," said he, "don"t attempt to deceive me." But she rea.s.serted it.
"It"s true, James. You may have loved me in your extraordinary way, but I"m sure I didn"t love you. I was much too frightened of you."
"Well," he laughed, "I don"t discover any terrors now." She wouldn"t say that there were none. So far as she dared she was honest.
"We aren"t on an exact equality. We never shall be. But we are much nearer. Own it."
He held her closely and kissed her. "You are a little darling, if that"s what you mean."
"Oh, but it isn"t; it isn"t at all what I mean. Why, you wouldn"t call me "little" if you didn"t know you were superior. Because I"m rather tall for a woman."
He knew that she was right, and respected her for the discernment. "My love," he said, "I"m a self-centred, arrogant beast, and I don"t like to think about it. But you"ll make something of me if you think it worth while. But listen to me, Lucy. I"m going to talk to you seriously." Then he whispered in her ear: "Some day you must talk to me." He could feel her heart beat, he could feel her shiver as she clung.
"Yes," she said very low; "yes, I promise--but not now."
"No," he said, "not now. I want to be happy as long as I can." She started away, and he felt her look at him in the dark.
"You"ll be happier when I"ve told you," she said.
"Why do you say that?"
"Because I shall be happier myself then," she said; and James hoped that she was right about him. One thing amazed him to discover--how women imputed their own virtues to the men they loved. It struck him a mortal blow to realise that his evident happiness would give Lucy joy, whereas hers would by no means necessarily add to his. "What does give me happiness, then?" he asked himself; "what could conceivably increase my zest for life? Evidence of power, exercise of faculty: so far as I know, nothing else whatever. A parlous state of affairs. But it is the difference, I presume, between a giving creature and a getting one which explains all. Is a man, then, never to give, and be happy? Has he ever tried? Is a woman not to get? Has she ever had a chance of it?" He puzzled over these things in his prosaic, methodical way. One thing was clear to everybody there but Urquhart in his present fatuity: Lucy was thriving. She had colour, light in her eyes, a bloom upon her, a dewiness, an auroral air. She sunned herself like a bird in the dust; she bathed her body, and tired herself with long mountain and woodland walks. When she was alone with her husband she grew as sentimental as a housemaid and as little heedful of the absurd. She grew young and amazingly pretty, the sister of her son. It would be untrue to say that, being in clover, she was unaware of it.
For a woman of one-and-thirty to have her husband for a lover, and her lover for a foil, is a gift of the G.o.ds. So she took it--with the sun and green water, and wine-bright air. Let the moralists battle it out with the sophists: it did her a world of good.
CHAPTER XIX
THE MOON-SPELL
Macartney fell easily into habits, and was slow to renounce them.
Having got into the way of making love to his wife, he by no means abandoned it; at the same time, and in as easy a fashion, it came to be a matter of routine with him to play piquet with Vera Nugent after dinner. It was she who had proposed it, despairing of a quartette, or even of a trio, for the Bridge which was a dram to her. Here also James would have been only too happy; but n.o.body else would touch it.
Lucy never played cards; Urquhart, having better things to do, said that he never did. Margery Dacre and Lingen preferred retirement and their own company. Lingen, indeed, was exhibiting his heart to the pale-haired girl as if it was a specimen-piece. "I am really a very simple person," he told her, "one of those who, trusting once, trust for ever. I don"t expect to be understood, I have no right to ask for sympathy. That would be too much to look for in a jostling, market-day world like ours. But I cherish one or two very fragrant memories of kindnesses done. I open, at need, a drawer; and, like the scent of dry rose-leaves, or lavender, a sweet hint steals out that there are good women in the world, that life is not made up of receipted bills. Don"t you understand the value of such treasures? I am sure that you do. You always seem to me so comprehending in your outlook." Margery said that she hoped she was.
It was Lucy"s business immediately after dinner to see that Lancelot was decently abed. The lad took the last ounce out of himself before that time came, and was to be brought by main force to the bath, crimson to the roots of his hair and dripping with sweat. Protesting to the uttermost, still panting with his final burst in the open, she saw to it that he was quiet before she could be so herself. Then she was free, and Urquhart found--or looked for--his chance. The woods called her, the wondrous silver-calm of the northern night. She longed to go; but now she dreaded Urquhart, and dared not trust herself. It had come to this, that, possessed as she was, and happy in possession, he and all that he stood for could blot the whole fair scene up in cold fog. That was how she looked at it in the first blush of her new life.
He didn"t understand that; but he saw that she was nervous, and set himself to rea.s.sure her. He a.s.sumed his dryest tone, his most negligent manner. When she came downstairs from Lancelot, and after watching the card-players, fingering a book or magazine, drifted to the open window and stood or leaned there, absorbing the glory of the night--Urquhart left her, and pulled at his pipe. When she spoke to the room at large--"Oh, you stuffy people, will you never understand that all the world is just out here?" he was the first to laugh at her, though he would have walked her off into that world of magic and dream, straight from the window where she stood. He was a wild idealist himself, and was sure of her. But he must wait her good time.
Often, therefore, she drifted out by herself, and he suffered d.a.m.nably. But she never went far--he comforted himself with that a.s.surance. "She has the homing instinct. She won"t go without me; and she knows that I can"t come--but oh, to be kissing her under those birches by the water"s edge!"
He was not the only one who was aware that she had flitted. Macartney was always intensely aware of it, and being by this time exceedingly fond, it tended to spoil his play. So long as Urquhart left her alone he was able to endure it.
Then came an evening when, tending to the open door, she found Urquhart there before her. He had behaved so admirably that her fears were asleep. He acted with the utmost caution, saying just enough, with just enough carelessness of tone, to keep her unsuspicious. The boreal lights were flashing and quivering in the sky: very soon he saw her absorbed in the wonder and beauty of them. "A night," she said, "when anything might happen!"
"Yes, it looks like that," he agreed. "But that is not what enraptures you."
"What do you think enraptures me?" she wished to know.
"The certainty," he replied, "that nothing will."
She waited a while, then said, "Yes, you are right. I don"t want anything else to happen."
"You have everything you want, here in the house. Safe to hand! Your Lancelot in bed, your James at cards, and myself at the window.
Wonderful! And you are contented?"