Kitabı oku: «Captain Desmond, V.C.», sayfa 12

BOOK II

 
"In the reproof of chance
Lies the true proof of men."
 

– Shakespeare.

CHAPTER XVII.
YOU WANT TO GO!

 
"White hands cling to the tightened rein,
Slipping the spur from the booted heel,
Tenderest voices cry 'Turn again!'
Red lips tarnish the scabbarded steel.
High hopes faint on a warm hearth-stone;
He travels the fastest who travels alone."
 

– Kipling.

For the first six weeks of the new year life flowed serenely enough in the bungalow on the mound.

Relieved of the greater part of her burden, and re-established in her husband's heart, Evelyn Desmond blossomed like a flower under the quickening influences of spring. Light natures develop best in sunshine: and so long as life asked no hard things of her, Evelyn could be admirably sweet-tempered and self-forgetful – even to the extent of curbing her weakness for superfluous hats and gloves and shoes. A genuine sacrifice, this last, if not on a very high plane. But the limits of such natures are set, and their feats of virtue or vice must be judged accordingly.

To Honor, whose very real sympathy was infallibly tinged with humour, the bearing of this regenerate Evelyn suggested a spoilt child who, having been scolded and forgiven, is disposed to be heroically, ostentatiously good till next time; and her goodness at least was whole-hearted while it lasted. She made a genuine effort to handle the reins of the household: waxed zealous over Theo's socks and shirts; and sang to his accompaniment in the evenings. Her zest for the tennis-courts waned. She joined Frank and Honor in their frequent rides to the polo-ground, and Kresney found himself unceremoniously discarded like a programme after a dance.

Wounded vanity did not improve his temper, and the ever-present Linda suffered accordingly. For Kresney, though little given to the weakness of generosity, never failed to share his grievances liberally with those about him.

"What is this that has come to little Mrs Desmond?" he demanded one evening on a querulous note of injury. "Whenever I ask her to play tennis now she always manages to be engaged. I suppose, because they have won that confounded Punjab Cup, she thinks she must give herself airs like the rest of them. But I tell you what, Linda, we have got to make her understand that she is not going to get money out of us, and then chuck us in the dirt like a pair of old gloves, – you see? You must tell her you are in a hole now, because of that three hundred rupees; that you have been forced to get cash from me to go on with, and to let me know about your little business with her; and you are afraid I may refer the matter to her husband. It would bring his cursed pride down with a run if he knew that his wife had practically borrowed money from me, and he could say nothing against us for helping her. It is she who would suffer; and I am not keen to push her into a hot corner if she can be made to behave decently enough to suit me. So just let her know that I will make no trouble about it so long as she is friendly, like she used to be. Then you can ask her to tea; and I bet you five rupees she accepts on the spot!"

Meantime Evelyn Desmond went on her way, in ignorance of the forces that were converging to break up her newly-gotten peace of mind. For the time being her world was filled and bounded by her husband's personality. The renewal of his tenderness and his trust in her eclipsed all the minor troubles of life: and with the unthinking optimism of her type she decided that these would all come right somehow, some time, sooner or later.

What Desmond himself thought did not transpire. Evelyn's happiness gave him real satisfaction; and if he were already beginning to be aware that his feeling for her left the innermost depths of his nature unstirred, he never acknowledged the fact. A certain refinement of loyalty forbade him to discuss his wife, even with himself. Her ineffectualness and the clinging quality of her love made an irresistible appeal to the vein of chivalry which ran, like a thread of gold, through the man's nature; and if he could not forget, he could at least try not to remember, that her standard of uprightness differed widely and radically from his own.

When Kresney's tactics resulted in a partial revival of her friendliness towards him, Desmond accepted the fact with the best grace he could muster. Since his promise to the man made definite objection impossible, he decided that the matter must be left to the disintegration of time; and if Kresney could have known how the necessity chafed Desmond's pride and fastidiousness of spirit, the knowledge would have added relish to his enjoyment of Evelyn's society.

Thus the passing of uneventful days brought them to the middle of February – to the end of the short, sharp Northern winter, and the first far-off whisper of the wrath to come; brought also to Honor Meredith a sudden perception that her year with the Desmonds was very nearly at an end. John's latest letter announced that he hoped to get back to the life and work he loved by the middle of April; and the girl read that letter with such strangely mixed feelings that she was at once puzzled and angered by her own seeming inconsistency. John had always stood unquestionably first in her life. It would be altogether good to have him with her again – to be able to devote herself to him entirely as she had dreamed of doing for so many years. And yet… There was no completing the broken sentence, which, for some unaccountable reason, ended in a sigh.

Honor was sitting at the time in her favourite corner of the drawing-room, on a low settee constructed out of an empty case, cunningly hid, and massed with cushions of dull red and gold. As her lips parted in that unjustifiable sigh she looked round at the familiar pictures and hangings; at Desmond's well-worn chair, and the table beside it with his pipe-rack, a photo of his father, and half a dozen favourite books; at the graceful outline of Evelyn's figure where she stood by the wide mantelshelf arranging roses in a silver bowl, her head tilted to one side, a shaft of sunlight from one of the slits of windows, fifteen feet up the wall, turning her soft fair hair to gold.

From Evelyn's figure, Honor's glance travelled to the photograph of Desmond on the piano, and lingered there with a softened thoughtfulness of gaze. What deep roots she had struck down into the lives of these two since her first sight of that picture! A year ago the man had been a mere name to her; and now —

The clatter of hoofs, followed by Desmond's voice in the verandah, snapped the thread of her thought, and roused Evelyn from the contemplation of her roses.

"Theo is back early!" she exclaimed: and on the words he entered the room, elation in every line of him, an unusual light in his eyes.

"What has happened to make you look like that?" she asked. "Somebody left you a fortune?"

Desmond laughed, with a peculiar ring of enjoyment.

"No fear! Fortunes don't grow hereabouts! But we've had stirring news this morning. A big party of Afridis has crossed the Border and fired a village, murdering and looting cattle and women on a very daring scale. The whole garrison is under orders for a punitive expedition. We shall be off in ten days, if not sooner."

Evelyn's colour ebbed while he was speaking, and she made a quick movement towards him. But Desmond taking her shoulders between his hands, held her at arm's length, and confronted her with steadfastly smiling eyes.

"No, no, Ladybird – you're going to be plucky and stand up to this like a soldier's wife, for my sake. The Frontier's been abnormally quiet these many months. It will do us all good to have a taste of real work for a change."

"Do you mean … will there be much … fighting?"

"Well – the Afridis don't take a blow sitting down. We have to burn their crops, you see; blow up their towers; enforce heavy fines, and generally knock it into their heads that they can't defy the Indian Government with impunity. Yes; it means fighting – severe or otherwise, according to their pleasure."

"Pleasure! – It sounds simply horrible; and you – I believe you're glad to go!"

"Well, my dear, what else would you have? Not because I'm murderously inclined," he added smiling. "Every soldier worth his salt is glad of a chance to do the work he's paid for. But that's one of the things I shall never teach you to understand!"

Evelyn turned hurriedly back to her roses. Her throat felt uncomfortably dry, and two tears had escaped in spite of herself.

"How long will you be gone?" she asked, addressing her question to the flowers.

"A month or six weeks. Not longer."

"But won't any one be left to guard the station? In this horrible place we women don't seem to count a bit. You all rush off after a lot of stupid Afridis."

"Not quite all. An infantry regiment will come up from Pindi: and we leave Paul's squadron behind. Just like his luck to be out of it, poor old man. But six weeks will be gone in no time. This sort of thing is part and parcel of our life up here. You're not going to fret about it, Ladybird – are you?"

He turned her face gently towards him. To his astonishment eager entreaty shone through her tears, and she caught his hand between her own.

"No, Theo, I needn't fret, because – if somebody has to stay – it can just as easily be you. You're married and Major Wyndham isn't."

Desmond stepped back a pace, incredulous anger in his eyes. "Evelyn! Are you crazy? It's not the habit of British officers to sneak behind their wives when they're wanted at the front. It comes hard on you: but it's the price a woman pays for marrying a soldier and there's no shirking it – "

For answer she clung to his hand, pressing it close against her heart. Instinctively she understood the power of her weakness, and exercised it to the full. Perhaps, also, an undefined fear of Kresney gave her courage to persist; and the least mention of the man's name at that instant might have averted many things.

"Only this time, please," she murmured, bringing the beseeching softness of her eyes and lips very close to his set face. "You'll be sorry afterwards if you leave me alone – just now."

"Why just now? Besides, you won't be alone. You will have Honor."

"Yes. But I want you. It has all been so lovely since Christmas. Theo – darling, – I can't let you go, and – and perhaps be killed by those horrid Afridis. Every one knows how brave you are. They would never think you shirked the fighting. And Major Wyndham would do anything you asked him. Will you —will you?"

Desmond's mouth hardened to a dogged line, and he drew a little away from her; because her entreaty and the disturbing nearness of her face made resistance harder than he dared allow her to guess.

"My dear little woman, you haven't the smallest notion what you are asking of me. I never bargained for throwing up active service on your account; and I'll not give the fellows a chance to insult you by flinging marriage in my teeth."

"That means – you insist on going?"

"My dear – I can do nothing else."

She threw his hand from her with a choking sob.

"Very well, then, go – go! I know, now, that you don't really – care, in your heart – whatever you may say."

And turning again to the mantelpiece, she laid her head upon her arms.

For a few moments Desmond stood regarding her, a great pain and tenderness in his eyes.

"It is rather cruel of you to put it that way, Ladybird," he said gently. "Can't you see that this isn't a question – of caring, but simply of doing my duty? Won't you try and help me, instead of making things harder for us both?"

He passed his hand caressingly over her hair, and a little shiver of misery went through her at this touch.

"It's all very well to talk grandly about duty," she answered in a smothered voice. "And it's no use pretending to love me – when you won't do anything I ask. But – you want to go."

Desmond sighed, and instinctively glanced across at Honor for a confirmation of his resolve not to let tenderness undermine his sense of right. But that which he saw banished all thought of his own heartache.

She sat leaning a little forward, her hands clasped tightly over Meredith's letter, her face white and strained, her eyes luminous as he had never yet seen them.

For the shock of his unexpected news had awakened her roughly, abruptly to a very terrible truth. Since his entrance into the room she had seen her phantom palace of friendship fall about her like a house of cards; had seen, rising from its ruins, that which her brain and will refused to recognise, but which every pulse in her body confirmed beyond possibility of doubt.

Desmond's eyes looking anxiously into hers, roused her to a realisation of her urgent need to be alone with her incredible discovery. Her lips lost their firmness; the hot colour surged into her cheeks; and smoothing out John's letter with uncertain fingers, she rose to her feet.

But in rising she swayed unsteadily; and in an instant Desmond was beside her. He had never before seen this girl's composure shaken, and it startled him.

"Honor, what has upset you so?" he asked in a low tone. "Not bad news of John?" For he had recognised the writing.

She shook her head, fearing the sound of her own voice, and his unfailing keenness of perception.

"You must be ill, then. I was afraid you were going to faint just now. Come into the dining-room and have a glass of wine."

She acquiesced in silence. It would be simplest to let him attribute her passing weakness to physical causes. And she went forward blindly, resolutely, with a proud lift of her chin, never looking at him once.

He walked beside her, bewildered and distressed, refraining from speech till she should be more nearly mistress of herself, and lightly holding her arm, because she was so evidently in need of support. She tightened her lips and mastered an imperious impulse to free herself from his touch. His unspoken solicitude unnerved her; and a sigh of pure relief escaped her when he set her down upon a chair, and went over to the sideboard for some wine.

She sipped it slowly, supporting her head, and at the same time shielding her eyes from his troubled scrutiny. He sat beside her, on the table's edge, and waited till the wineglass was half empty before he spoke.

"Did you feel at all ill this morning? I'll go for Mackay at once to make sure there's nothing wrong."

"No – no." There was a touch of impatience in her tone. "Please don't bother. It is nothing. It will pass."

"I didn't mean to vex you," he answered humbly. "But you are not the sort of woman who goes white to the lips for nothing. Either you are ill, or you are badly upset. You promised John to let me take his place while he was away, and if you are in any trouble or difficulty, – don't shut me out. You have done immensely much for both of us. Give me the chance to do a little for you. Remember, Honor," his voice took a deeper note of feeling, "you are more to me than the Major's sister or Ladybird's friend. You are mine, too. Won't you tell me what's wrong?"

At that she pulled herself together and faced him with a brave semblance of a smile.

"I am very proud to be your friend, Theo. But there are times when the truest friendship is just to stand on one side and ask no questions. That is what I want you to do now. Please believe that if you could help me, even a little, I would not shut you out."

"I believe you – and I'll not say another word. You will go and lie down, perhaps, till tiffin time?"

"No. I think I will go to Ladybird. She badly needs comforting. You broke your news to us rather abruptly, you know. We are not hardened yet, like Frank, to the boot-and-saddle life here."

"I'm sorry. It was thoughtless of me. We are all so used to it. One's apt to forget – "

He rose and took a few steps away from her; then, returning, stood squarely before her. She had risen also, partly to prove her own strength, and partly to put an end to the strain of being alone with him.

"Honor," he asked, "was I hard with Ladybird? And am I an unpardonable brute if I insist on holding out against her?"

"Indeed, no! You mustn't dream of doing anything else."

She looked full at him now, forgetful of herself in concern for him.

"I was half afraid – once, that you were going to give way."

"Poor Ladybird! She little guessed how near I came to it. And maybe that's as well, after all."

"Yes, Theo. It would be fatal to begin that way. I quite see how hard it is for her. But she must learn to understand. When it comes to active service, we women must be put altogether on one side. If we can't help, we are at least bound not to hinder."

Desmond watched her while she spoke with undisguised admiration.

"Would you say that with the same assurance, I wonder, if it were John? Or if it happened to be – your own husband?"

A rush of colour flooded her face, but she had strength enough not to turn it aside.

"Of course I would."

"Then I sincerely hope you will marry one of us, Honor. Wives of that quality are too rare to be wasted on civilians!"

This time she bent her head.

"I should never dream of marrying any one – but a soldier," she answered very low. "Now I must go back to my poor Evelyn and help her to see things more from your point of view."

"How endlessly good to us you are," he said with sudden fervour. "I know I can count on you to keep her up to the mark, and not let her make herself too miserable while we are away."

"Yes – yes. I am only so thankful to be here with her – this first time."

He stood aside to let her pass; and she went out quickly, holding her head higher than usual.

He followed at a little distance, still perplexed and thoughtful, but refraining from the least attempt to account for her very unusual behaviour. What she did not choose to tell him he would not seek to know.

On the threshold of the drawing-room he paused.

His wife still stood where he had left her, disconsolately fingering her roses, her delicate face marred with weeping. Honor went to her straightway; and putting both arms round her kissed her with a passionate tenderness, intensified by a no less passionate self-reproach.

At the unnerving touch of sympathy Evelyn's grief broke out afresh.

"Oh, Honor – Honor, comfort me!" she sobbed, unaware of her husband's presence in the doorway. "You're the only one who really cares. And he is so – so pleased about it. That makes it worse than all!"

A spasm of pain crossed Desmond's face, and he turned sharply away.

"Poor little soul!" he reflected as he went; "shall I ever be able to make her understand?"

CHAPTER XVIII.
LOVE THAT IS LIFE!

 
"Love that is Life;
Love that is Death,
Love that is mine!"
 

– Gipsy Song.

Not until night condemned her to solitude and thought did Honor frankly confront the calamity that had come upon her with the force of a blow, cutting her life in two, shattering her pride, her joy, her inherent hopefulness of heart.

The insignificant fact that her life was broken did not set the world a hair's breadth out of gear; and through the day she held her head high, looking and speaking as usual, because she still had faith and strength and courage; and, having these, the saddest soul alive will not be utterly cast down.

She spent most of her time with Evelyn; and succeeded in so far reconciling her to Theo's decision that Evelyn slipped quietly into the study, where he sat reading, and flinging her arms round him whispered broken words of penitence into the lapel of his coat; a proceeding even more disintegrating to his resolution than her attitude of the morning.

Honor rode out to the polo-ground with them later on in the day, returning with Paul Wyndham, who stayed to dinner, a habit that had grown upon him since the week at Lahore. She wondered a little afterwards what he had talked of during the ride, and what she had said in reply; but since he seemed satisfied, she could only hope that she had not betrayed herself by any incongruity of speech or manner.

During the evening she talked and played with a vigour and cheerfulness which quite failed to deceive Desmond. But of this she was unaware. The shock of the morning had stunned her brain. She herself and those about her were as dream-folk moving in a dream while her soul sat apart, in some vague region of space, noting and applauding her body's irreproachable behaviour. Only now and then, when she caught Theo's eyes resting on her face, the whole dream-fabric fell to pieces, and stabbed her spirit broad awake.

Desmond himself could not altogether shut out anxious conjecture. By an instinct he could hardly have explained, he spoke very little to the girl, except to demand certain favourite pieces of music, most of which, to his surprise, she laughingly refused to play. Only, in bidding her good-night, he held her hand a moment longer than usual, smiling straight into her eyes; and the strong enfolding pressure, far from unsteadying her, seemed rather to revive her flagging fortitude. For who shall estimate the virtue that goes out from the hand-clasp of a brave man, to whose courage is added the strength of a stainless mind?

At last it was over.

She had left the husband and wife together, happy in a reconciliation of her own making; had dismissed Parbutti, bolted the door behind her, and now stood like one dazed, alone with God and her grief, which already seemed old as the stars, – a thing preordained before the beginning of time.

She never thought of turning up the lamp; but remained standing very straight and still, her hands clenched, all the pride of her maidenhood up in arms against that which dominated her, by no will of her own.

She knew now, past question, – and the certainty crimsoned her face and neck, – that she had loved him unwittingly from the moment of meeting; possibly even from that earlier moment when she had unerringly picked out his face from among many others. Herein lay the key to her instinctive recoil from too rapid intimacy; the key to the peculiar quality of her intercourse with him, which had been from the first a thing apart; as far removed from her friendship with Wyndham as is the serenity of the foothills from the life-giving breath of the heights.

And now – now that she had been startled into knowledge, the whole truth must be confronted, the better to be combated; – the truth that she loved him – with everything in her – with every thought, every instinct of soul and body. Nay, more, in the very teeth of her shame and self-abasement, she knew that she was glad and proud to have loved him, and no lesser man, even though the fair promise of her womanhood were doomed to go down unfulfilled into the grave.

Not for a moment did she entertain the cheap consolatory thought that she would get over it; or would, in time, give some good man the husk of her heart in exchange for the first-fruits of his own. She held the obsolete opinion that marriage unconsecrated by love was a deadlier sin than the one into which she had fallen unawares; and which, at least, need not tarnish or sadden any life save her own. This last brought her sharply into collision with practical issues. In the face of her discovery, dared she – ought she to remain even a week longer under Theo's roof?

Her heart cried out that she must go; that every hour of intercourse with him was fraught with peril. The fact that his lips were sealed availed her nothing; for these two had long since passed that danger point in platonic friendship when words are discarded for more direct communing of soul with soul. Theo could read every look in her eyes, every tone of her voice, like an open book, and she knew it; though she had never acknowledged it till now. All unconsciously he would wrest her secret from her by force of sympathetic insight; and she, who implicitly believed in God, who held suicide to be the most dastardly sin a human being can commit, knew that she would take her own life without hesitation rather than stand proven disloyal to Evelyn, disgraced in the eyes of the man she loved. She did not think this thing in detail. She merely knew it, with the instinctive certainty of a vehement temperament that feels and knows apart from all need of words.

Her character had been moulded by men – simple, upright men; and she had imbibed their hard-and-fast notions of honour, of right and wrong. She had power to turn her back upon her love, to live out her life as though it were not, on two conditions only. No one must ever suspect the truth. No one but herself must suffer because of it. Conditions hard to be fulfilled.

"Oh, Theo!"

The cry broke from her unawares – a throb of the heart made vocal. It roused her to reality, to the fact that she had been standing rigidly in the middle of the room, – how long she knew not, – seeing nothing, hearing nothing, but the voice of her tormented soul.

She went forward mechanically to the dressing-table, and leaning her hands upon it, looked long and searchingly into her own face. Her pallor, the ivory sheen of her dress, and the unnatural lustre of her eyes, gave her reflection a ghostly aspect in the dim light; and she shuddered. Was this to be the end of her high hopes and ideals, – of her resolute waiting and longing and praying for the very best that life and love could give? Was it actually she, – John's sister – her father's daughter – who had succumbed to this undreamed-of wrong?

At thought of them, and of their great pride in her, all her strained composure went to pieces. She sank into a chair and pressed both hands against her face. But no tears forced their way between her fingers. A girl reared by four brothers is not apt to fall a-weeping upon every provocation; and Honor suffered the more keenly in consequence.

Suddenly the darkness was irradiated by a vision of Theo, as he had appeared on entering the drawing-room that morning, in the familiar undress uniform that seemed a part of himself; bringing with him, as always, his own magnetic atmosphere of alertness and vigour, of unquestioning certainty that life was very much worth living. Every detail of his face sprang clearly into view, and for a moment Honor let herself go.

She deliberately held the vision, concentrating all her soul upon it, as on a face that one sees for the last time, and wills never to forget. It was an actual parting, and she felt it as such – a parting with the man who could never be her friend again.

Then, chafing against her momentary weakness, she pulled herself together, let her hands fall into her lap with a slow sigh that was almost a sob, and wondered, dully, whether sleep would come to her before morning. Certainly not until she had considered her position dispassionately, – neither ignoring its terrible possibilities, nor exaggerating her own sense of shame and disgrace, – and had settled, once for all, what honour and duty demanded of her in the circumstances.

One fact at least was clear. Her love for Theo Desmond was, in itself, no sin. It was a force outside the region of will, – imperious, irresistible. But it set her on the brink of a precipice, where only God and the high compulsion of her soul could withhold her from a plunge into the abyss.

"Mine own soul forbiddeth me: there, for each of us, is the eternal right and wrong." For Honor there could be no thought, no question of the false step, or of the abyss; and sinking on her knees she poured out her heart in a passionate prayer for forgiveness, for light and wisdom to choose the right path, and power to walk in it without faltering to the end.

When at last she rose, her lips and eyes had regained something of their wonted serenity. She knew now that her impulse to leave the house at once had been selfish and cowardly; that Evelyn must not be deserted in a moment of bitter need; that these ten days must be endured for her sake – and for his. On his return, she could find a reasonable excuse for spending a month elsewhere till John should come to claim her. Never in all her life had she been called upon to make so supreme an effort of self-mastery; and never had she felt so certain of the ultimate result.

She turned up the lamp now, and looked her new life bravely in the face, strong in her reliance on a Strength beyond her own, – a Strength on which she could make unlimited demands; which had never failed her yet, nor ever would to the end of time.