Beyond saying that he thought for various reasons we should see less of each other, Fulton had made no effort to keep Lucy and me apart. If he had an adviser in this, that adviser was Schuyler. The idea, I suppose, was that Lucy, unopposed, would soon tire of the affair, as she had tired of others in her extreme youth, and return to her duty, if not to her affection. But we only loved each other the more. And the various exasperations of delay became hard to bear. Lucy, when what seemed to her a reasonable time had pa.s.sed, and Fulton had not yet made up his mind about the divorce, was against delay. We had warned Fulton we had played the game, why should we lose time to do so? I had to argue with her against the next steamer for foreign parts, and to persuade her (half persuade her) that in the long run patience would serve us best. "Now," I said, "we don"t feel that we need anyone but ourselves. But we both love people--our own kind of people. If John won"t play fair (we called it that) our own kind of people will be on our side, no matter what we do. But we should have John"s word for it that he is not going to play fair, before we take any drastic step."
The Fultons left Aiken, and after what seemed to me a decent delay of a few days, I followed them to New York. John seemed further than ever from coming to a decision, so Lucy thought. But she evinced a more patient spirit. For the young woman with credit and a fondness for clothes New York is a great solace, even if she is half broken-hearted.
"The contract with the Russian has gone through," she said; "John will make a lot of money. I tell him that it"s horrid to get rich by making things that are used to kill people with, but he says there are too many people in the world, and that most of them would be the better for a little killing--so he"s given me a fine credit, and I"m buying all the clothes I need."
"Lucy, I don"t think you ought to spend his money--any more than you absolutely have to--considering."
"We spoke of that. He said I"d hurt him enough, and that while I was still ostensibly his wife, he wished me to have all that he could give me."
"While you are still ostensibly his wife? That sounds as if--Oh, as if he was going to step out, Lucy, doesn"t it?"
"Sometimes he talks as if it was all arranged. He says, "Next year, if you shouldn"t happen to be with me, I"ll do so and so," and all that sort of talk. At other times he talks of building a big house down on Long Island--just the kind of house I"ve always wanted--just as if he was sure that I would still be living with him."
Well, one day Fulton came to my hotel and sent up his card. I went down to him as quickly as I could finish dressing. He said:
"Sorry to trouble you, but my time isn"t quite my own. This seemed a golden opportunity. We"ve a lot to talk over. I"ve a taxi outside.
Will you drive around a little?"
"Certainly, if you"ll just wait while I telephone."
I called up Lucy.
"I can"t meet you this morning, I am to have a talk with John. Somehow I feel sure that something is going to be decided." My heart was beating quick and fast. I was unaccountably excited. This excitement seemed to communicate itself to Lucy. She said as much.
"I"m terribly excited," she said, and her voice had a kind of wild, triumphant note in it. "You"ll tell me everything the minute you can?"
"Of course. Good luck."
"Good luck."
We drove across Forty-third Street and up the crowded Avenue for several blocks without speaking. Then Fulton smiled a little and spoke in a level, easy voice.
"Perhaps," he said, "the water is not so cold as it looks. Shall we take the plunge?"
"By all means," I said. My heart was thumping nervously. I hoped he would not notice it.
"Lucy and I," he said, "as you know, were wonderfully happy for a good many years. Until last winter, I was never away from her over night.
And then, only because of a financial crisis. I have never even looked at another woman with desire, or thought of one. Until last winter, Lucy was the same about other men. She was a wonderful little mother to her kids, and the most faithful, loving, valiant wife that ever belonged to a man full of cares and worries."
"I know all this, John," I said; "I could wish that you had been unhappy together."
"I wish to make several things clear," he said. "According to all civil and moral law, I am an absolutely undivorceable man. There is only one ground for divorce in this state. To clear the decks for you and Lucy, I should have to smirch myself and take a black eye."
"But the people who count always understand these things."
"In order to secure my own unhappiness, to make it everlasting, I should have to perjure myself. I know that it is the custom of the country for married gentlemen who are no longer loved to perjure themselves. But it seems to me a custom that would bear mending.
However, it is not yet a question of that."
"Still undecided?"
"No. My mind is made up. I am prepared to step down and take my black eye on certain conditions."
I bowed my head.
"Lucy," he said, "doesn"t love the children as much as I do. She has allowed herself to forget how dear they are to her, so it would have to be understood among us three that I should retain the children. You see, I"ve got to keep something of what belongs to me--to keep me going. Lucy will agree to this, because just now all she wants is new clothes and you. There is another point upon which I feel that I must be satisfied."
"What is that?"
"How long is your young people"s infatuation for each other going to last? If it is to be brief and evanescent, it would be absurd for me to take a black eye. But if it is to be stable and enduring, I should be ashamed to stand in the way of it. Knowing something of Lucy"s history, how long do you think her fancy for you will last?"
"These things are on the lap of the G.o.ds."
"Well, then, yours for her? Now, I know that my love for her, which has been tried by fire and ice and time, will last until I die, or lose my reason. With me it is not a question of _thinking_, but of _knowing_. How long do you _know_ that your love for her will last?"
"That is an impossible question to answer. I think it will always last."
"Thought won"t do, Archie, on this all-important phase of the situation, we must have the light of definite knowledge. Now, as a man who has had many love affairs, some innocent and some not, you should have a good working knowledge of your endurance in such matters. If you were cast away on a desert island with a very pretty woman, you to whom women have always been necessary, you from whose hand there has always been some woman or other ready to eat, how long would your love for Lucy last?"
I was amazed momentarily by his question, but it was not one which I could answer.
"A week?" He rather shot this at me, and for a moment there was a satiric gleam in his eye.
I nodded.
"You _know_ that it would last a week?"
I began to feel a little angry, and I said, quite sharply: "I _know_ it."
"A month?"
"Yes, a month."
Both our voices had risen. His became easy and level once more.
"A year, Archie?"
"How can I know that, John?" I tried to meet his quick change of manner. "I _think_ so. I"m very sure of it."
"But you don"t know?"
"I can"t _know_."
"And if the very pretty woman on the island came to you in the night and said she had seen hob-goblin eyes in the dark, and was afraid--how long, though you still love her, would you be faithful to Lucy? A man like you, in good health, with an incompletely developed moral sense?"
"We are getting nowhere," I said, determined to keep my temper.
"We are getting to this," said he, "that if a year from today, you and Lucy still love each other, and have been faithful to each other, and still want each other--you shall have each other."