"Peter"s going to see old Cousin Vic might be unexpected; but I don"t think you can call it preposterous."
"It"s preposterous to have another man racing about the world trying to do you good, by Jove!"
"He wasn"t trying to do you good so much as not to do you harm. He thought he"d done that, apparently, by interfering with Cousin Henry"s affairs in the first place. His asking the old Marquise to come to the rescue was only an attempt to make things easier for you."
He sprang to his feet. "And he"s got me where I must either call his bluff or--or--or accept his beastly sacrifice."
He tugged fiercely, first at one end, then at the other, of the bristling, horizontal mustache. Drusilla tried to speak calmly.
"He"s not making a sacrifice if there was nothing for him to give up."
"That"s what I must find out."
She considered it only loyal to say: "It"s well to remember that in making the attempt you may do more harm than good. "Where the apple reddens, never pry, lest we lose our Edens"--You know the warning."
"Yes, I know. That"s Browning. In other words, it means, let well enough alone."
"Which isn"t bad advice, you know."
"Which isn"t bad advice--except in love. Love won"t put up with reserves. It must have all--or it will take nothing."
He dropped into a low chair at the corner of the hearth. Wielding the poker in both hands, he knocked sparks idly from a smoldering log. It was some minutes before she ventured to say:
"And suppose you discovered that you couldn"t _get_ all?"
"I"ve thought that out. I should go home, and ask to be allowed to join the first punitive expedition sent out--one of those jolly little parties from which they don"t expect more than half the number to come back. There"s one just starting now--against the Carrals--up on the Tibet frontier. I dare say I could catch it."
Again some minutes went by before she said: "Is it as bad as all that?"
"It"s as bad as all that."
She got up because she could no longer sit still. His pain was almost more than she could bear. At the moment she would have given life just to be allowed to lay her hand soothingly on his shoulder or to stroke his bowed head. As it was, she could barely give herself the privilege of taking one step toward him, and even in doing this she was compelled to keep behind him, lest she should betray herself in the approach.
"Couldn"t I--?"
The offer of help was in the tone, in its timid beseeching.
He understood it, and shook his head without looking up.
"No," he said, briefly. "No. No one can."
She remained standing behind him, because she hadn"t the strength to go away. He continued to knock sparks from the log. Repulsed from the sphere of his suffering, she was thrown back on her own. She wondered how long she should stand there, how long he would sit, bending like that, over the dying fire. It was the most intolerable minute of her life, and yet he didn"t know it. Just for the instant she resented that--that while he could get the relief of openness and speech, she must be condemned forever to shame and silence. If she could have thrown herself on her knees beside him and flung her arms about his neck, crying, "I love you; I love you! Whoever doesn"t--_I_ do!--_I_ do!" she would have felt that life had reached fruition.
The minutes became more unendurable. In sheer self-defense she was obliged to move, to say something, to break the tensity of the strain.
One step--the single step by which she had dared to draw nearer him, stretching out yearning hands toward him--one step sufficed to take her back to the world of conventionalities and commonplaces, where the heart"s aching is taboo.
She must say something, no matter what, and the words that came were: "Won"t you have another cup of tea?"
He shook his head, still without looking up. "Thanks; no."
But she was back again on her own ground, back from the land of enchantment and anguish. It was like returning to an empty home after a journey of poignant romance. She was mistress of herself again, mistress of her secret and her loneliness. She could command her voice, too. She could hear herself saying, as if some one else were speaking from the other side of the room:
"It seems to me you take it too tragically to begin with--"
"It isn"t to begin with. I saw there was a screw loose from the first.
And since then some one has told me that she was--half in love with him, by Jove!--as it was."
She remained standing beside the tea-table. "That must have been Cousin Henry. He"d have a motive in thinking so--not so much to deceive you as to deceive himself. But if it"s any comfort to you to know it, I"ve talked to them both. I suppose they spoke to me confidentially, and I haven"t felt justified in betraying them. But rather than see you suffer--"
He put the poker in its place among the fire-irons and swung round in his chair toward her. "Oh, I say! It isn"t suffering, you know. That is, it isn"t--"
She smiled feebly. "Oh, I know what it is. You don"t have to explain.
But I"ll tell you. I asked Peter--or practically asked him--some time ago--if he was in love with her--and he said he wasn"t."
His face brightened. "Did he, by Jove?"
"And when I told her that--the other day--she said--"
"Yes? Yes? She said--?"
"She didn"t put it in so many words--but she gave me to understand--or _tried_ to give me to understand--that it was a relief to her--because, in that case, she wasn"t obliged to have him on her mind. A woman _has_ those things on her mind, you know, about one man when she loves another."
He jumped up. "I say! You"re a good pal. I shall never forget it."
He came toward her, but she stepped back at his approach. She was more sure of herself in the shadow.
"Oh, it"s nothing--"
"You see," he tried to explain, "it"s this way with me. I"ve made it a rule in my life to do--well, a little more than the right thing--to do the high thing, if you understand--and that fellow has a way of getting so d.a.m.nably on top. I can"t allow it, you know. I told you so the other day."
"You mean, if he does something fine, you must do something finer."
He winced at this. "I can"t go on swallowing his beastly favors, don"t you see? And hang it all! if he is--if he _is_ my--my rival--he must have a show."
"And how are you going to give him a show if he won"t take it?"
He started to pace up and down the room. "That"s your beastly America, where everything goes by freaks--where everything is queer and inconsequent and tortuous, and you can"t pin any one down."
"It seems to me, on the contrary, that you have every one pinned down.
You"ve got everything your own way, and yet you aren"t satisfied. Peter has taken himself off; old Cousin Vic has paid the debts; and Olivia is ready to go to church and marry you on the first convenient day. What more can you ask?"
"That"s what _she_ said, by Jove!--the old Marquise. She said the question would never be raised unless I raised it."
Drusilla tried to laugh. "Eh, bien? as she"d say herself."
He paused in front of her. "Eh, bien, there is something else; and," he added, tapping his forehead sharply, "I"ll be hanged if I know what it is."
She was about to say something more when the sound of the shutting of the street door stopped her. There was much puffing and stamping, with shouts for Jane to come and take an umbrella.