"Brilliant!" repeated his lordship. "Don"t you agree?"
"Absolutely. She is the most brilliant girl in London."
"But heartless," said his lordship pathetically; "she hasn"t one bit of heart."
"There I don"t agree with you. Of course she is strange and rather wild."
"_Tete-montee._ And then the Asiatic streak!"
"True. The fiercest wind cannot take the angles out of the bough of a tree an inch thick. You may break it, but you cannot destroy its angles.
That is so, no doubt, with one"s racial tendencies. The girl is wilful and romantic. It will be very bad for them both if there is no love on her side. She is capable, I should say, of very deep affection."
"She did like me," said his lordship, with emphasis and satisfaction--"she really did. And I wouldn"t encourage it. I had no notion then of marrying. Her singularity, too, made me cautious. I couldn"t believe in her. She talked like an actress in a play. I felt that she was not the woman for me. Essentially she thought as I did, and seemed to comprehend my embarra.s.sment. The worst of it is now--I may have been wrong."
"I doubt it. You may be sure, on the whole, that your instincts were right."
"Still, there is a distinct misgiving. I was drawn toward her, and, when I made up my mind to put an end to the matter, our friendship was severely strained. But it was not broken. Something I saw in her face to-day makes me sure that it was not broken."
While he was speaking the servant entered with a salver, and on the salver was a note. The address showed Sara"s large, defiant hand-writing. Reckage, who had a touch of superst.i.tion in his nature, changed colour and even hesitated before he broke the seal. The coincidence seemed extraordinary and fatal. What did it mean? He read the letter with an irresistible feeling of proud delight.
"20A, ST. JAMES"S SQUARE, W.
"MY DEAR BEAUCLERK,--Will you lunch with us to-morrow at two o"clock?
Papa has invited a friend--a dreadful, boring friend--who has been absent from England for five years. Do you know the man? Sir Piers Harding? But I want some one to encourage me. You? Do!
"Yours sincerely,
"S. L. V. DE TREVERELL.
"P.S.--I am so happy about you and Agnes. Be kind to her always? Won"t you?"
All his life he had found a difficulty in understanding women--the significance of their words, the precise translation of their glances, and their motives generally. He had nourished his experience on French novels; he had corrected it by various friendships; he had crowned it with the confession that one could never tell what the s.e.x meant one way or the other. But this fact remained--he was a c.o.xcomb, and, whenever he owned himself puzzled, it was on a single ground only--how seriously was the lady at stake affected by his charms? Feeling, as he did, the infinite inequality that existed between men, and conscious of his own reputation as a leader among them, it was not in his conscience to encourage any woman whom he did not find especially attractive or useful. Why spoil her chances? Why make her discontented with the average male creature? Had Sara written to him in ordinary circ.u.mstances, inviting him, after some months of mutual coldness, to lunch, he would have replied, with sorrowful dignity, that it was wiser to leave things as they were. But the case had altered. The future d.u.c.h.ess of Marshire was a personage. He made no secret of his admiration for all people of high rank. They represented influence and traditions; what was more, they could exercise a certain power, and introduce, when necessary, the ideas upon which fresh traditions could be based. A friend like Sara de Treverell with her new honours made life itself more rich to him. When he remembered that she was young, handsome, enthusiastic, and impulsive, his pleasure thrilled into something of genuine pa.s.sion. He told himself that he had always been fond of the girl; that hundreds of times he had felt the hardness of his scrupulous position where she was concerned. If he had been asked what especially he conceived his own duty to be now, he would have said that it was not for him to hang back when she showed a coming spirit. But this was not all. He was a gamester; he was ambitious.
"This is very odd," said he, reading Sara"s note for the second time, "very odd. There"s no harm in showing it to you, because there is nothing in it."
He gave it to his friend, and ate, pleasantly, while Orange glanced down the page. His soul"s wish was to be left alone. The effort of forcing himself--not to affect but honestly to feel--an interest in Reckage"s conversation had proved successful. He had indeed put aside his own thoughts, and followed, with the exaggerated earnestness of a mind determined on self-sacrifice, every word his companion had uttered. The spirit invisible wears the laurel of mental victories, but the body has to bear the exhaustion, the scars, and the soreness. He was tired, but he stirred himself again to consider Sara"s note. In the course of that year she had written several letters to Orange--letters about books, new pictures, and new music. Once she had given him a little song of her own composition as something of which she "desired to hear no more for ever." The song was sentimental, and he locked it away, wondering at the time whether she really had an unfortunate affection for Lord Reckage.
But in reading her note that evening he decided against his original fear. Women did not write in that strain to men whom they loved, or had ever loved ... even pa.s.sably well. He returned it to the owner with this comment--
"A woman, you know, is like your shadow: run away from her and she follows you; run after her and she flies from you. That"s an old saying.
It is true so long as she does not love the man. And when she loves the man--well, then she ceases to be a shadow. She becomes a living thing."
"That is no answer at all. If you could read her heart and whole thought at this moment, what would you see there?"
"Unhappiness," said Robert; "discontent."
Reckage took the little sheet and folded it into his pocket-book.
"That"s wonderful," said he, "because the same things are in my mind, too. I wish I could describe my feelings about Agnes. She satisfies the aesthetic side of my nature. But there is another side. And Sara comes nearer to it than she. Mind you, I know my duty in the matter. There are things which one is compelled to do under tremendous penalties. I have chosen, and I must abide by my choice."
Robert looked well at his friend, and saw, in his expression, all that he had known would inevitably, either soon or too late, work to the surface.
"Yet the old tremulous affection lies in me," continued Reckage; "my nerves are in a kind of blaze. You couldn"t tell anything about it, because you don"t know."
The Emperor"s burgundy, no doubt, had warmed his spirit to communicativeness. He drew his chair closer to the table, and talked in a low voice about his ghastly solitude of soul. His engagement to Miss Carillon had not been an agreeable experience.
"And marriage," said he, "will be the crowning point of these unbearable days. In the present state of my feelings it would be awful. Agnes is very kind and most conscientious, but she does not know what is in me, what was always and will always be there. Old reminiscences crowd round me. They are very beautiful, although they are so sad."
"What is one to do?" said Robert, "in the presence of fate and facts? It is necessary to look the affair in the face. Do you, or don"t you, wish to marry Miss Carillon?"
"I do, and I don"t," answered Reckage doggedly. "But I can"t close my eyes to the circ.u.mstances of the case. I found myself hard bested from the very beginning. I knew that I was expected to marry her. I knew, too, that it was a suitable match in every way. But then every girl is, to some extent, accomplished, pious, virtuous, and intelligent. I believe sometimes that my apparent indifference towards Agnes arises from the fact that I respect her--if anything--too much. She seems too remote--that is the word--for the ordinary wear and tear of domesticity.
Other men--who might be called impa.s.sioned lovers--would be less scrupulous. I maintain that devotion of that violent kind is worth absolutely nothing. And I claim to know a little about life and love."
"I should say," said Orange, "that you knew more about mere physiology."
Reckage laughed uneasily.
"You keep your mediaeval views!" said he. "Perhaps I envy you. I can"t say. I don"t think I envy any one. I am quite contented."
"Then what are you driving at?"
"Oh well, a fellow must think. You see, Sara suits me, in a sense. I am not afraid of her. Now a wife is a sacred object. You might as well flirt with the Ten Commandments as fall in love with your wife. I say, never begin love-making with the lady you hope to marry. It will end in disaster. Because the day must come when she will wonder why you have changed. No, a wife should be the one woman in the world with whom you can spend days and weeks of unreproved coldness."
They were now smoking, and the tobacco seemed to produce a tranquillising effect upon his lordship. He closed his lips and amused himself by puffing rings of smoke into the air. When he next spoke, he suggested a visit to the theatre. He had engaged a box for the new burlesque, "_The Blue Princess_."
"It will be very good, and it will cheer us up," said he.
Orange was in no mood for the entertainment, but Reckage"s evident misery seemed to require a fresh scene. The streets, as they left the house, were full of a deep purple fog, through which shone out, with a dull and brazen gleam, the lights of lamps and pa.s.sing carriages. Above them, the sky was but a pall or vapour; the air, charged with the emotions, the struggling energy, the cruelty, confusion, painfulness, and unceasing agitation of life in a vast city, was damp and stifling; a noise of traffic--as loud but not so terrible as a breaking storm--destroyed the peace of night; there were foot pa.s.sengers of every age and description moving like rooks in the wind, over the pavement, and vehicles filled with men and women--an irremediable pilgrimage bound, for the greater part, on pleasure. Robert felt that he would have given gladly the treasures of a universe for just the time to think a little while of his own love. So far that great attachment had brought him aberrations, sorrow, and perplexities; all its sweetness had flown, moth-like, into his heart, there to be burnt--burnt yet left unburied: all its happiness had glorified his life against his will; all its beauty had been starved with a pitiless rigour. What then had remained?
A certain state of mind--a pa.s.sionate resignation to its own indomitable cravings. And now on the eve of his marriage--a marriage never so much as imagined, far less hoped for--he could not have the leisure to behold, through tears of relief, the complete transformation of his destiny--once so frightful, now so joyous. The theatre was crowded, and when the two young men entered their box the burlesque was at the beginning of the second act. The scene represented an orange grove by moonlight, and a handsome girl in spangled muslin was whispering loudly, to an accompaniment of harps, her eternal fidelity to a gesticulating troubadour. Both performers were immensely popular, and the duet, with its refrain--
"Love, I will love thee always, For ever is not too long; Love, e"en in dark and dreary days, This shall be my one song,"
was repeated three times to the smiling, serene, and thoroughly convinced audience. Reckage, who attended public places of amus.e.m.e.nt solely from the desire of exhibiting himself, gave but a side-glance at the stage and turned his opera gla.s.s upon the auditorium.
"Really, town is very full," said he; "I suppose many of them are up for the Hauconberg wedding. There"s old Cliddesdon--just look at him. Did you ever see such an infernal a.s.s? Hullo! I thought that Millie Warfield wouldn"t be far off. She"s a perfect rack of bones. Lady Michelmarsh is getting rather pretty--it"s wonderful how these dowdy girls can work up their profiles after a month or two in town. She was a lump as a bride--a regular lump. You never met anything like it. Aumerle is talking to her now. He was at the Capitol this afternoon. He begins to give himself airs. I can"t stand him. In fact, I cannot understand those fellows on my sub-committee. Sometimes they are--if anything--too civil. A bit servile, in fact. Then they turn out and look as though they would like to make their teeth meet in my backbone. They sulk, and whisper in groups, and snicker. I am getting sick of it. I must get rid of them. By Jove! there"s David Rennes, the painter. I thought he was at Amesbury--with the Carillons, doing Agnes"s portrait. It can"t be finished. She said distinctly in her letter this morning--"I may not add more because I have to give Mr. Rennes a sitting while the light is good." Where"s the letter? I must have left it on the breakfast-table.
Anyhow that is what she said. I"ll catch Rennes" eye and have him up. He is not a bad sort."
The act-drop had now descended, the lights were turned on to their full power, and Orange, following the direction of Reckage"s gaze, saw, in the last row of the stalls, a large man about nine-and-thirty with an emotional, nervous face, a heavy beard, and dense black hair. He was leaning forward, for the seat in front of him was, at the moment, vacant; his hands were tightly locked, his eyes fixed on the curtain. At last Reckage"s determined stare produced its effect. He moved, glanced toward the box, and, in response to his lordship"s signal, left his place. Two minutes later Orange heard a tap at the door.
"That"s right," said Reckage, as Rennes entered, "take Orange"s chair.
He doesn"t care a bit about the play, or anything in it. He is going to get married to-morrow. You know Robert Orange, don"t you? You ought to paint him. Saint Augustine with a future. _Mon devoir, mes livres, et puis ... et puis, madame, ma femme._"
The Emperor"s burgundy, indeed, had not been opened in vain. Rennes could talk well, sometimes brilliantly, often with originality, and, with the tact of all highly sensitive beings, he led the conversation into impersonal themes. He said Miss Carillon"s portrait was not yet finished, but he changed that subject immediately, and the evening, which had been to Orange a trial of patience, ended rather better than it began. Lord Reckage invited Rennes to accompany them home. The artist did not appear, at first, in the mood to accept that invitation. He, too, seemed to have many things he wished to think about undisturbed, and in the silence of his own company. His hesitation pa.s.sed, however; the kindness in his nature had been roused by something unusual, haunting, ominous in Robert"s face.
"I will come," said he.
All the way, on their walk to Almouth House, he kept Reckage amused.
Orange never once felt under the necessity to speak. He was able to dream, to hold his breath, to remember that he loved and was loved again, that he would see her to-morrow--to-morrow quite early, and then, no more unutterable farewells, heart-desolating separations. He surprised himself by saying aloud--"I love you ... I love you." The two men, engrossed in talk, did not hear him. But he had caught the words, and it seemed as though he heard his own voice for the first time.
"You must want some supper," said Reckage--"a rum omelette."