It was on Friday, that one day of the week when Brodrick was kept late at the office of the "Morning Telegraph." And it was August, two months after the coming of Gertrude Collett. Tanqueray, calling to see Jane, as he frequently did on a Friday, about five o"clock in the afternoon, found her in her study, playing with the baby.
She had the effrontery to hold the baby up, with his little naked legs kicking in Tanqueray"s face. At ten months old he was a really charming baby, and very like Brodrick.
"Do you like him?" she said.
He stepped back and considered her. She had put her little son down on the floor, where, by an absurd rising and falling motion of his rosy hips, he contrived to travel across the room towards the fireplace.
Tanqueray said that he liked the effect of him.
"The general effect? It _is_ heartrending."
"I mean his effect on you, Jinny. He makes you look like some nice, furry animal in a wood."
At that she s.n.a.t.c.hed the child from his goal, the sharp curb of the hearthstone, and set him on her shoulder. Her face was turned up to him, his hands were in her hair. Mother and child they laughed together.
And Tanqueray looked at her, thinking how never before had he seen her just like that; never before with her body, tall for sheer slenderness, curved backwards, with her face so turned, and her mouth, fawn-like, tilting upwards, the lips half-mocking, half-maternal.
It was Jinny, shaped by the powers of life.
"Now," he said, "he makes you look like a young Maenad; mad, Jinny, drunk with life, and dangerous to life. What are you going to do with him?"
At that moment Gertrude Collett appeared in the doorway.
She returned Tanqueray"s greeting as if she hardly saw him. Her face was set towards Jane Brodrick and the child.
"I am going," said Jane, "to give him to any one who wants him. I am going to give him to Miss Collett. There--you may keep him as long as you like."
Gertrude advanced, impa.s.sive, scarcely smiling. But as she took the child from Jane, Tanqueray saw how the fine lines of her lips tightened, relaxed, and tightened again, as if her tenderness were pain.
She laid the little thing across her shoulder and went from them without a word.
"He goes like a lamb," said Jane. "A month ago he"d have howled the house down."
"So that"s how you"ve solved your problem?" said Tanqueray, as he closed the door behind Miss Collett.
"Yes. Isn"t it simple?"
"Very. But you always were."
From his corner of the fireside lounge, where he seated himself beside her, his eyes regarded her with a grave and dark lucidity. The devil in them was quiet for a time.
"That"s a wonderful woman, George," said she.
"Not half so wonderful as you," he murmured. (It was what Brodrick had once said.)
"She"s been here exactly two months and--it"s incredible--but I"ve begun another book. I"m almost half through."
His eyes lightened.
"So it"s come back, Jinny?"
"You said it would."
"Yes. But I think I told you the condition. Do you remember?"
She lowered her eyes, remembering.
"What was it you said?"
"That you"d have to pay the price."
"Not yet. Not yet. And perhaps, after all, I shan"t have to. I mayn"t be able to finish."
"What makes you think so?"
"Because I"ve been so happy over it."
Of a sudden there died out of her face the fawn-like, woodland look, the maternal wildness, the red-blooded joy. She was the hara.s.sed and unquiet Jinny whom he knew. It was so that her genius dealt with her.
She had been swung high on a strong elastic, luminous wave; and now she was swept down into its trough.
He comforted her as he had comforted her before. It was, he a.s.sured her, what he was there for.
"We"re all like that, Jinny, we"re all like that. It"s no worse than I feel a dozen times over one infernal book. It"s no more than what you"ve felt about everything you"ve ever done--even Hambleby."
"Yes." She almost whispered it. "It _is_ worse."
"How?"
"Well, I don"t know whether it is that there isn"t enough time--yet, or whether I"ve really not enough strength. Don"t tell anybody I said so.
Above all, don"t tell Henry."
"I shouldn"t dream of telling Henry."
"You see, sometimes I feel as if I was walking on a tight-rope of time, held for me, by somebody else, over an abyss; and that, if somebody else were suddenly to let go, there I should be--precipitated. And sometimes it"s as if I were doing it all with one little, little brain-cell that might break any minute; or with one little tight nerve that might snap.
It"s the way Laura used to feel. I never knew what it was like till now.
Poor little Laura, don"t you remember how frightened we always were?"
He was frightened now. He suggested that she had better rest. He tried to force from her a promise that she would rest. He pointed out the absolute necessity of rest.
"That"s it. I"m afraid to rest. Lest--later on--there shouldn"t be any time at all."
"Why shouldn"t there be?"
"Things," she said wildly and vaguely, "get hold of you. And yet, you"d have thought I"d cut myself loose from most."
"Cut yourself looser."
"But--from what?"