"For her to take up with anybody else," said Quintan. "To marry, you know. She sacrificed all her opportunities for us; and now, in the inevitable course of things, we are kind of abandoning her when she is old and faded and lonely."
"I consider your aunt one of the most beautiful women in the world," protested Raymond.
"But you can"t put back the clock, old fellow," said Quintan.
"What has the world to offer to an old maid of forty-two? There she is in the empty nest, and not her own nest at that, with all her little nestlings flying over the hills and far away, and the genuine mother-bird varying the monotony by occasionally pecking her eyes out."
Raymond did not know what to answer. He could not be so rude as to make any reflection on Mrs. Quintan, though he was stirred with resentment against her. This n.o.ble, angelic, saintly woman, who in every gesture reminded him of dead queens and historic personages!
It went to his heart to think of her, bereft and lonely, in that splendid house he had so lately quitted. He recognised, in the unmistakable accord between him and her, the fellowship of a pair who, in different ways and in different stations, had yet fought and suffered and endured for what they judged their duty. Forty- two years old! Singular coincidence, in itself almost a bond between them, that he, too, was of an identical age. Forty-two!
Why, it was called the prime of life. He inhaled a deep breath of air; it was the prime of life; until then no one had really begun to live!
"Why don"t you say something?" said Quintan.
"I was just thinking how mistaken you were," returned Raymond.
"There must be hundreds of men who would be proud to win her slightest regard; who, instead of considering her faded or old, would choose her out of a thousand of younger women and would be happy for ever if she would take--" He was going to say them, but that sounded improper, and he changed it, at the cost of grammar, to "him."
Quintan laughed at his companion"s vehemence, and the subject pa.s.sed and gave way to another about shrapnel. But he did not fail, later on, to carry a humorous report of the conversation to his aunt.
"What have you been doing to my old quartermaster?" he said.
"Hasn"t the poor fellow enough troubles as it is, without falling in love with you! He can"t talk of anything else, and blushes like a girl when he mentions your name. He told me yesterday he was willing to die for a woman like you."
"I think he"s a dear, nice fellow," said Miss Latimer, "and if he wants to love me he can. It will keep him out of mischief!"
Raymond saw a great deal of Miss Latimer in the month before they sailed south. Quintan took him constantly to the house, where, in his capacity of humble and devoted comrade, the tall quartermaster was always welcome and made much of. Mrs. Quintan was alive to the value of this attached follower, who might be trusted to guard her son in the perils that lay before him. She treated him as a sort of combination of valet, nurse, and poor relation, asking him all sorts of intimate questions about Howard"s socks and underclothing, and holding him altogether responsible for the boy"s welfare. Her tone was one of anxious patronage, touching at times on a deeper emotion when she often broke down and cried. The quartermaster was greatly moved by her trust in him. The tears would come to his own eyes, and he would try in his clumsy way to comfort her, promising that, so far as it lay with him, Howard should return safe and sound. In his self-abnegation it never occurred to him that his own life was as valuable as Howard Quintan"s. He acquiesced in the understanding that it was his business to get Howard through the war unscratched, at whatever risk or jeopardy to himself.
Those were wonderful days for him. To be an intimate of that splendid household, to drive behind spanking bays with Miss Latimer by his side, to take tea at the Waldorf with her and other semi-divine beings--what a dazzling experience for the ex-clerk, whose lines so recently had lain in such different places.
Innately a gentleman, he bore himself with dignity in this new position, with a fine simplicity and self-effacement that was not lost on some of his friends. His respect for them all was unbounded. For the mother, so majestic, so awe-inspiring; for Howard, that handsome boy whose exuberant Americanism was untouched by any feeling of caste; for Melton and Hubert Henry, his brothers, those lordly striplings of a lordly race; for Miss Latimer, who in his heart of hearts he dared not call Christine, and who to him was the embodiment of everything adorable in women.
Yes, he loved her; confessed to himself that he loved her; humbly and without hope, with no antic.i.p.ation of anything more between them, overcome indeed that his presumption should go thus far.
He did not attempt to hide his feelings for her, and though too shy for any expression of it, and withheld besides by the utter impossibility of such a suit, he betrayed himself to her in a thousand artless ways. He asked for no higher happiness than to sit by her side, looking into her face and listening to her mellow voice. He was thrice happy were he privileged to touch her hand in pa.s.sing a teacup. Her gentleness and courtesy, her evident consideration, the little peeps she gave him into a nature gracious and refined beyond anything he had ever known, all transported him with unreasoning delight. She, on her part, so accustomed to play a minor role herself in her sister"s household, was yet too much a woman not to like an admirer of her own. She took more pains with her dress, looked at herself more often in the gla.s.s than she had done in years. It was laughable; it was absurd; and she joined as readily as anyone in the mirth that Raymond"s devotion excited in the family, but, deep down within her, she was pleased. At the least it showed she had not grown too old to make men love her; it was the vindication of the mounting years; the time, then, had not yet come when she had ceased altogether to count. She had lost her nephews, who were growing to be men; the love she put by so readily when it was in her reach seemed now more precious as she beheld her faded and diminished beauty, the crow"s-feet about her eyes, her hair turning from brown to grey. A smothered voice within her said: "Why not?"
She a.n.a.lysed Raymond narrowly in the long tete-a-tetes they had together. She drew him out, encouraging and pressing him to tell her everything about himself. She was always apprehending a jarring note, the inevitable sign of the man"s coa.r.s.er clay, of his commoner upbringing, the clash of his caste on hers. But she was struck instead by his inherent refinement, by his unformulated instincts of well-doing and honour. He was hazy about the use of oyster-forks, had never seen a finger-bowl, committed to her eyes a dozen little solecisms which he hastened to correct by frankly asking her a.s.sistance; but in the true essentials she never had to feel any shame for him. Clumsy, grotesquely ignorant of the social amenities, he was yet a gentleman.
The night before they were to sail, he came to say good-bye. The war had at last begun in earnest; men were falling, and the Spaniards were expected to make a desperate and b.l.o.o.d.y resistance.
It was a sobering moment for everyone, and, in all voices, however hard they tried to make them brave and gay, there ran an undercurrent of solemnity. Howard and Raymond were to be actors in that terrible drama not yet played; stripped and powder-blackened at their guns, they were perhaps doomed to go down with their ship and find their graves in the Caribbean. Before them lay untold possibilities of wounds and mutilation, of disease, suffering, and horror. What woman that knew them could look on unmoved at the sight of these men, so grave and earnest, so quietly resolute, so deprecatory of anything like braggadocio or over-confidence? It filled Christine Latimer with a fierce pride in herself and them; in a race that could breed men so gentle and so brave; in a country that was founded so surely on the devoted hearts of its citizens.
She was crying as Raymond came to her later on the same evening, and found her sitting in the far end of the drawing-room with the lights turned low. They were alone together, for the quartermaster had left Howard with his mother and his brothers gathered in a farewell group about the library fire. Miss Latimer took both of Raymond"s hands, and, with no attempt to disguise her sorrow, drew him close beside her on the divan. She was overflowing with pity for this poor fellow, whose life had been so hard, in which until now there had neither been love nor friends, whose only human tie was to his mother and to her. Had he known it, he might have put his arms about her and kissed her tear-swollen eyes and drawn her head against his breast. She was filled with a pent-up tenderness for him; a word, and she would have discovered what was until then inarticulate in her bosom. But the tall quartermaster was withheld from such incredible presumption. Her beautiful gown against his common serge typified, as it were, the gulf between them. Her distress, her agitation, were in his mind due to her concern for Howard Quintan; and he told her again and again, with manly sincerity, that he would take good care of her boy.
She knew he loved her. It had been plain to her for weeks past.
She knew every thought in his head as he sat there beside her, thrilled with the touch of her hands, and in the throes of a respectful rapture. Again and again the avowal was on his lips; he longed to tell her how dear she was to him; it would be hard to die with that unsaid, were he to be amongst those who never returned. It never occurred to him that she might return his love.
A woman like her! A queen!
She could easily have helped him out. More than once she was on the point of doing so. But the woman in her rebelled at the thought of taking what was the man"s place. She had something of the exaggerated delicacy of an old maid. It was for him to ask, for her to answer; and the precious moments slipped away. At last, greatly daring, he managed to blurt out the fact that he wanted to ask a favour.
"A favour?" she said.
"Won"t you give me something," he said timidly, "some little thing to take with me to remember you by?"
She replied she would with pleasure. She wanted him to remember her. What was it that he would like?
"There is nothing I could refuse you," she said, smiling.
Raymond was overcome with embarra.s.sment. She saw him looking at her hair; her hair which was her greatest beauty, and which when undone was luxuriant enough to reach below her waist. He had often expressed his admiration for it.
"What would you like?" she asked again.
"Oh, anything," he faltered. "A--a book!"
She could not restrain her laughter. A book! She laughed and laughed. She seemed carried away by an extraordinary merriment.
Raymond thought he had never heard a woman laugh like that before.
It made him feel very badly. He wondered what it was that had made his request so ridiculous. He thanked his stars that he had held his tongue about the other thing. Ah, what a fool he had been! He could not have borne it, had the other been received with the same derision.
"I shall give you my prayer-book," she said at last, wiping her eyes and looking less amused than he had expected. "I"ve had it many years and value it dearly. It is prettily bound in Russia, and if you carry it on the proper place romance will see that it stops a bullet--though a Bible, I believe, is the more correct."
Somehow her tone sounded less cordial. She had withdrawn her hands, and her humour, at such a moment, jarred on him. In spite of his good resolutions he had managed to put his foot into it after all. Perhaps she had begun to suspect his secret and was displeased. He departed feeling utterly wretched and out of heart, and got very scant comfort from his book, for it only reminded him of how seriously he had compromised himself. He was in two minds whether or not to send it back, but decided not to do so in fear lest he might give fresh offence. The next day at dawn the Dixie sailed for the scene of war.
III
Then followed the historic days of the blockade; the first landing on Cuba; the suspense and triumph attending Cervera"s capture; El Caney; San Juan Hill; Santiago; and the end of the war. Howard Quintan fell ill with fever and was early invalided home; but Raymond stayed to the finish, an obscure spectator, often an obscure actor, in that world-drama of fleets and armies. Tried in the fire, his character underwent some noted changes. He developed unexpected apt.i.tudes, became a marksman of big guns, showed resource and skill in boat-work, earned the repeated commendations of his superiors. He put his resolutions to the test, and emerged, surprised, thankful, and satisfied, to find that he was a brave man. He rose in his own esteem; it was borne in on him that he had qualities that others often lacked; it was inspiriting to win a reputation for daring, fearlessness, and responsibility.
He wrote when he could to his mother and Miss Latimer, and at rare intervals was sometimes fortunate enough to hear in turn from them. His mother was ill; the strain of his absence and danger was telling on her enfeebled const.i.tution; she said she could not have got along at all had it not been for Miss Latimer"s great kindness. It seemed that the old maid was her constant visitor, bringing her flowers, taking her drives, comforting her in the dark hours when her courage was nigh spent. "A good and n.o.ble woman," wrote the old lady, "and very much in love with my boy."
That line rang in Raymond"s head long afterwards. He read it again and again, bewildered, tempted and yet afraid to believe it true, moved to the depths of his nature, at once happy and unhappy in the gamut of his doubts. It could not be possible. No, it could not be possible. Standing at the breech of his gun, his eyes on a Spanish gunboat they had driven under the shelter of a fort, he found himself repeating: "And very much in love with my boy. And very much in love with my boy." And then, suddenly becoming intent again on the matter in hand, he slammed the breech-mechanism shut and gave the enemy a six-inch sh.e.l.l.
Then there came the news of his mother"s death. As much a victim of the war as any stricken soldier or sailor at the front, she was numbered on the roll of the fallen. The war had killed her as certainly, as surely, as any Mauser bullet sped from a tropic thicket. Raymond had only the consolation of knowing that Miss Latimer had been with her at the last and that she had followed his mother to the grave. Her letter, tender and pitiful, filled him with an inexpressible emotion. His little world now held but her.
This was the last letter he was destined to receive from her. The others, if there were others, all went astray in the chaotic confusion attendant on active service. The poor quartermaster, when the ship was so lucky as to take a mail aboard, grew accustomed to be told that there was nothing for him. He lost heart and stopped writing himself. What was the use, he asked himself? Had she not abandoned him? The critical days of the war were over; peace was a.s.sured; the victory won, the country was already growing forgetful of the victors. Such were his moody reflections as he paced the deck, hungry for the word that never came. Yes, he was forgotten. There could be no other explanation of that long silence. He was forgotten!
He returned in due course to New York and was paid off and mustered out of the service. It was dusk when he boarded an uptown car and stood holding to a strap, jostled and pushed about by the unheeding crowd. Already jealous of his uniform, he felt a little bitterness to see it regarded with such scant respect. He looked out of the windows at the lighted streets and wondered whether any of those hurrying thousands cared a jot for the men that had fought and died for them. The air, so sharp and chill after the tropics, served still further to dispirit him and add the concluding note of depression to his home-coming. He got off the car and walked down to Fifth Avenue, holding his breath as he drew near the Quintans" house. He rang the bell: waited and rang again.
Then at last the door was unlocked and opened by an old woman.
"Is Miss--Mrs. Quintan at home?" he asked.
"Gone to Europe," said the old woman.
"But Miss Latimer?" he persisted.
"Gone to Europe," said the old woman.
"Mr. Howard Quintan?"
"Gone to Europe!"
He walked slowly down the steps, not even waiting to ask for their address abroad nor when they might be expected to return. They had faded into the immeasurable distance. What more was there to be said or hoped, and his dejected heart gave back the answer: nothing. He slept that night in a cheap hotel. The next day he bought a suit of civilian clothes and sought the office of the auditor"s department. Here he received something more like a welcome. Many of the clerks, with whom he had scarcely been on nodding terms, now came up and shook him warmly by the hand. The superintendent sent for him and told him that his place had been held open, hinting, in the exuberance of the moment, at a slight increase of salary. The a.s.sistant superintendent made much of him and invited him out to lunch. The old darkey door-keeper greeted him like a long-lost parent. Raymond went back to his desk, and resumed with a sort of melancholy satisfaction the interrupted routine of twenty years. In a week he could hardly believe he had ever quitted his desk. He would shut his eyes and wonder whether the war had not been all a dream. He looked at his hands and asked himself whether they indeed had pulled the lanyards of cannon, lifted loaded projectiles, had held the spokes of the leaping wheel. His eyes, now intent on figures, had they in truth ever searched the manned decks of the enemy or trained the sights that had blown Spanish blockhouses to the four winds of heaven? Had it been he or his ghost who had stood behind the Nordenfeldt shields with the bullets pattering against the steel and stinging the air overhead? He or his ghost, barefoot in the sand that sopped the blood of fallen comrades, the ship shaking with the detonation of her guns, the hoa.r.s.e cheering of her crew re-echoing in his half- deafened ears? A dream, yes; tragic and wonderful in the retrospect, filled with wild, bright pictures; incredible, yet true!
He was restless and lonely. He dreaded his evenings, which he knew not how to spend; dreaded the recurring Sunday, interminable in duration, whose leaden hours seemed never to reach their end. His only solace was in his work, which took him out of himself and prevented him from thinking. He made a weekly pilgrimage past the Quintans" house. The blinds were always drawn. It was as dead as one of those Cuban mills, standing in the desolation of burned fields. Once, greatly daring, and impelled by a sudden impulse, he went to the door and requested the address of his vanished friends:
"Grand Hotel, Vevey, Switzerland." He repeated the words to himself as he went back to his boarding-house, repeated them again and again like a child going on an errand, "Grand Hotel, Vevey, Switzerland," in a sort of panic lest he might forget them. He tossed that night in his bed in a torment of indecision. Ought he to write? Ought he to take the risk of a reply, courteous and cold, that he felt himself without the courage to endure? Or was it not better to put an end to it altogether and accept like a man the inevitable "no" of her decision.