"Did it never occur to you?"
"An egotist to whom you have made perpetual sacrifices?" He repeated the words in a singular tone; a tone that denoted neither exactly indignation nor incredulity, but (strange as it may seem) a sudden violent curiosity for news about himself.
"You are selfish," said Rowland; "you think only of yourself and believe only in yourself. You regard other people only as they play into your own hands. You have always been very frank about it, and the thing seemed so mixed up with the temper of your genius and the very structure of your mind, that often one was willing to take the evil with the good and to be thankful that, considering your great talent, you were no worse. But if one believed in you, as I have done, one paid a tax upon it."
Roderick leaned his elbows on his knees, clasped his hands together, and crossed them, shadewise, over his eyes. In this att.i.tude, for a moment, he sat looking coldly at his friend. "So I have made you very uncomfortable?" he went on.
"Extremely so."
"I have been eager, grasping, obstinate, vain, ungrateful, indifferent, cruel?"
"I have accused you, mentally, of all these things, with the exception of vanity."
"You have often hated me?"
"Never. I should have parted company with you before coming to that."
"But you have wanted to part company, to bid me go my way and be hanged!"
"Repeatedly. Then I have had patience and forgiven you."
"Forgiven me, eh? Suffering all the while?"
"Yes, you may call it suffering."
"Why did you never tell me all this before?"
"Because my affection was always stronger than my resentment; because I preferred to err on the side of kindness; because I had, myself, in a measure, launched you in the world and thrown you into temptations; and because nothing short of your unwarrantable aggression just now could have made me say these painful things."
Roderick picked up a blade of long gra.s.s and began to bite it; Rowland was puzzled by his expression and manner. They seemed strangely cynical; there was something revolting in his deepening calmness. "I must have been hideous," Roderick presently resumed.
"I am not talking for your entertainment," said Rowland.
"Of course not. For my edification!" As Roderick said these words there was not a ray of warmth in his brilliant eye.
"I have spoken for my own relief," Rowland went on, "and so that you need never again go so utterly astray as you have done this morning."
"It has been a terrible mistake, then?" What his tone expressed was not willful mockery, but a kind of persistent irresponsibility which Rowland found equally exasperating. He answered nothing.
"And all this time," Roderick continued, "you have been in love? Tell me the woman."
Rowland felt an immense desire to give him a visible, palpable pang.
"Her name is Mary Garland," he said.
Apparently he succeeded. The surprise was great; Roderick colored as he had never done. "Mary Garland? Heaven forgive us!"
Rowland observed the "us;" Roderick threw himself back on the turf. The latter lay for some time staring at the sky. At last he sprang to his feet, and Rowland rose also, rejoicing keenly, it must be confessed, in his companion"s confusion.
"For how long has this been?" Roderick demanded.
"Since I first knew her."
"Two years! And you have never told her?"
"Never."
"You have told no one?"
"You are the first person."
"Why have you been silent?"
"Because of your engagement."
"But you have done your best to keep that up."
"That "s another matter!"
"It "s very strange!" said Roderick, presently. "It "s like something in a novel."
"We need n"t expatiate on it," said Rowland. "All I wished to do was to rebut your charge that I am an abnormal being."
But still Roderick pondered. "All these months, while I was going on! I wish you had mentioned it."
"I acted as was necessary, and that "s the end of it."
"You have a very high opinion of her?"
"The highest."
"I remember now your occasionally expressing it and my being struck with it. But I never dreamed you were in love with her. It "s a pity she does n"t care for you!"
Rowland had made his point and he had no wish to prolong the conversation; but he had a desire to hear more of this, and he remained silent.
"You hope, I suppose, that some day she may?"
"I should n"t have offered to say so; but since you ask me, I do."
"I don"t believe it. She idolizes me, and if she never were to see me again she would idolize my memory."
This might be profound insight, and it might be profound fatuity.
Rowland turned away; he could not trust himself to speak.
"My indifference, my neglect of her, must have seemed to you horrible.
Altogether, I must have appeared simply hideous."
"Do you really care," Rowland asked, "what you appeared?"
"Certainly. I have been d.a.m.nably stupid. Is n"t an artist supposed to be a man of perceptions? I am hugely disgusted."