Perdita had planned to attend the opera that evening, and afterwards she
meant to look in at Lord Croftus’ party, which had more or less of a
political significance. Her carriage was waiting at the door, and she
herself, in full raiment of festivity, was in the act of coming down
stairs, with a soft silken shawl thrown round her neck and shoulders to
keep out the chill, when she heard the door-bell ring sharply, and some
one was admitted to the hall below. Then the sound of a voice that was
familiar to her came to her ears. Hearing it, the Marquise paused on the
upper landing, holding the folds of her shawl together with her left
hand, and gazing expectantly downward.
“Philip, again!” she murmured. “Something must have happened. Well, let
us see.”
Philip mounted the stairs slowly and heavily, with his hand on the
banisters, and his head bent down. Only when he reached the landing
where Perdita stood did he look up. When she saw the expression on his
face, she took him by the hand without a word, and led him up to the
next floor, and into her boudoir. Some wine was sparkling in a decanter
on the cabinet between the windows. She poured out a glass of this, and
held it to his lips. He had been glancing round the room in an
apprehensive but intent way, and then into her face, as if suspecting
the presence of some one or of something which did not appear. After a
few moments’ pause he drank the wine, and put the glass down.
“If she is here, tell me at once,” he said.
“No one is here but ourselves. Whom do you mean?”
“You know nothing about it?”
“No. What is it?”
“Have you seen my wife lately?”
“Lately? Three or four days ago--a week.”
“Then ... she’s lost!”
“Marion--your wife? Why, Philip ... lost!”
“I thought she might have come here. No, I didn’t think it: I hoped--I
couldn’t believe all at once that she was gone. One tries to dodge such
things as long as possible.” He fetched a deep breath, and took off his
hat, which, up to this moment, he had forgotten to remove. “I beg your
pardon,” he said vaguely, drawing his brows together as if to collect
his wits: “Thank you. You’re going out. I won’t detain you.”
“Sit down, Philip,” said the Marquise, guiding him to a chair as if he
had been a child, or an infirm person. “I am not going out--I am going
to stay here with you. See! I am dressed to receive you,” she added,
throwing off her wrap and smiling. “Now, Philip, we are friends, you
know, and you have confidence in me. Let me help you. At any rate, tell
me!”
“I am ashamed to tell it,” said he heavily. “I have been to blame: but I
never thought of this. It doesn’t seem possible in her!”
“Has your wife left you--has she run away?” asked Perdita, putting into
words, with her accustomed strength of nerve, what Philip shrank from
formulating even in his thought. He did not reply, save by an assenting
silence, and she presently went on: “Are you sure there is no mistake?
She can’t have been gone long; she may come back.”
“She will never come back: she left a letter, to say she thought it best
we should not meet again, after ... some words we had this morning. But
that is a pretext! I had a right to ask her to explain. She must have
made up her mind before; and when she found I knew what--what you told
me--”
“Did you tell her it was I?”
“No: she thought it was the fellow himself who had spoken--she betrayed
herself in thinking he had betrayed her. Oh, what a miserable, pitiable
thing! ’Tis as if she were another woman--she seemed so noble and so
pure! And even Lady Flanders had just been telling me that it was all
nonsense--my imagination.”
“Lady Flanders?”
“I met her in the street an hour ago. She said my suspicions were an
outrage on the truest and purest woman alive; but that I deserved to
suffer the misfortune I imagined, and that if she were Marion, she would
give me my deserts. And when I told her what I knew, she laughed, and
said she knew all that and much more, and that Marion was as innocent as
an angel in spite of it. I didn’t know what to think: but I came home,
ready to kneel down and ask her pardon, if it were true. But she had
taken her opportunity, and gone.”
This story was a surprise for Perdita, and she could not understand it.
It seemed entirely improbable that Lady Flanders could have been sincere
in what she had said; but, then, what could have been her object in
saying it? Was she secretly aiding Moore in his schemes? That was
conceivable, and her ladyship was quite wicked enough: and yet it was
not a characteristic kind of wickedness in her. Moreover, what help
would it give the fugitive couple to make Philip believe for a few
minutes that his wife was innocent? On the other hand, however, what
interest could she have had in making a woman appear innocent of whose
guilt she was persuaded? It was perplexing either way, and caused
Perdita some uneasiness: she regretted having spoken to the old plotter
even so frankly as she had done. But she would get to the bottom of that
matter later: Philip engaged her attention now. The crisis of his
trouble had come on much sooner than she expected, and she was inclined
to share (though with a different feeling) his amazement at his wife’s
action. Perdita felt that she had undervalued Marion’s audacity and
resolution, not to speak of her unscrupulousness. She had been startled
to see her at Vauxhall; but this sudden culmination of the intrigue
showed a spirit stronger and more thoroughgoing than that of the
ordinary intriguer.
“And to think of her doing it for a dapper little tom-tit like Tom
Moore!” said the Marquise to herself. “Well! ’tisn’t he I would have
done it for!” Here she glanced at Philip, who sat relaxed and nerveless,
his chin resting upon his broad chest, his great eyes, haggard and sad,
gazing out beneath the dark level of his brows; his noble figure,
revealed beneath the close-buttoned coat and small-clothes, sunk in a
posture of unconscious grace; his hessians stained with the mire of the
weary miles he had traversed: here was a man to whom, indeed, a woman
might yield her heart, and for whose sake she might imperil her renown.
But what woman in her senses--especially when they were senses so keen
as Marion’s appeared to be--would abandon such a man as this for...? It
roused the Marquise’s indignation.
“She has gone, then, Philip: let her go!” she said, fixing upon him her
sparkling eyes. “I can forgive a woman for anything but being a fool! I
am a woman, and I know--or can imagine--what it is to love. But she has
thrown herself away for nothing. What you loved was something that never
was in her, though you fancied otherwise. You can forget her: and you
will! What is she to you?”
“I won’t forget her yet!” Philip said, lifting his face with a grim
look. “I’ll find her first,” he continued, suddenly rising to his feet,
and tossing back his black tangled hair, “and the man who is with her! I
need occupation, and that will suit me.”
“I believe in revenge as much as anybody,” observed the beautiful
Marquise, tapping her white fingers on the arm of her chair; “but what
you are thinking of is vulgar. Any poor forsaken husband can run after
his wife, and risk losing his life as well as her. There are finer
things to do than that, Philip. Why should you pay them the compliment
of hunting them down? Let them punish each other: they’ll do it soon
enough, and more cruelly than you would!”
“I want the fellow’s blood,” said Philip savagely. “I won’t fight
him--I’ll kill him. I don’t want finer kinds of revenge: they wouldn’t
satisfy what I feel here!” As he spoke, he put his clenched hand over
his heart.
“And after the killing--what? Suicide, to prevent hanging. It mustn’t
be, Philip. Feel that you are well rid of her; and let her know it!”
He shook his head. “How could that be done?”
Perdita waited until his eyes encountered hers. It would be no slight
feat to make a man in Philip’s condition forget his disgrace and
wretchedness by dint of the sheer potency of her personal charm. But
Perdita’s spirit was equal to the attempt, and she was conscious that
she had never been better equipped for success. And if she did succeed
so far, she might safely leave the rest to him. It was a crisis for
herself as well as for him. The craving for adventure, the defiance of
laws, the passion of the heart, which she had been all her life
approaching, might be realized now: if not now, then not at all. Perdita
had a powerful heart, full of courage for any emergency, and with
capacity for trenchant emotion both of love and hate. She had been
lonely and self-poised from her girlhood; she had fenced herself with
the armor of an alert and penetrating mind, and had made good her
defense; but, to a woman, victories like these are little better than
defeat. She had fought to gain that which she would rather lose. She
longed to yield; to give up her sword and shield, and taste the
sweetness of submission. The laws of God and man were against her; but
she perceived that it was only by disregarding these laws that she could
gain her desire; and she had never been taught to love the one, or to
respect the other. She had wished to conquer Philip; to bring him to her
feet, as she had brought other men, and then to draw back, herself
uncompromised and unhurt. But now she found that no such cold triumph
would content her. She was ready to take the further step that separates
the thousand prudent coquettes of the social world from the few who are
daring enough to surrender. All would be lost but love: but was not that
worth all?
These thoughts were stirring in the depths of the look which she bent
upon Philip; and the fire of them searched through the thick clouds of
despondency and wrath that brooded over his mind. An answering fire
began to kindle in his own eyes. For when the fierce emotions of the
soul have been aroused, their sinister heat permeates the blood, and
makes the impulses plastic; so that adultery goes hand-in-hand with
murder.
“There is more than one woman in the world, mon ami,” said Perdita.
“What you have lost by one, you might perhaps more than regain by
another.”
“Ah, Perdita!” muttered Philip, in an inward tone. He drew two or three
deep breaths, and sat down beside her. “Was this destined to be the end
of the story?” he continued. “Why did we not know it long ago? Shall we
revenge each other on those who have injured us?” He took her hand,
which responded to the pressure he gave it. “So this is what was
destined!” he repeated, “and I was a fool to leave you after all!”
“We were neither of us ready then, perhaps,” she said, in the same low
tone in which he had spoken. Speech came slowly to both of them, there
was so much to say. “You gave me a scar which I vowed to requite you
for,” she added with a smile.
“The seal of blood upon our union,” he responded, smiling also. “I have
bled too. How well I remember all that. It was symbolic. You challenged
me to it, and handed me the swords, to make my choice. In the second
pass my foot slipped, and my point touched your breast. You seemed not
to try to parry.”
“If it had passed through my heart, I shouldn’t have minded, then.”
“Were you so unhappy?”
“I was weary. But new life came to me with that wound. You were very
tender ... and very timid!” she said, laughing. “Was I the first woman
whose heart you had endangered?”
“Well, I had my scruples. Your husband was my friend. I’m not sorry that
I did so, now. I should have felt remorse. But that is all past. No
remorse any more! No one can blame us, Perdita. When did you begin to
... think of me?”
“I have never asked my heart many questions, nor let myself listen when
it tried to speak. Perhaps I never cared for you until this moment. But
I wanted you to care for me from the first. It seems so strange, Philip,
to be talking to you without a disguise. I don’t believe I have ever
done that to any one. I wonder how soon I shall get used to it!”
“You will forget that it was strange, soon.”
“And shall we begin to get tired of each other then?”
“God forbid that should ever happen!” exclaimed Philip with a sombre
look.
“Yes; one cannot expect to succeed in this sort of experiment more than
once,” returned Perdita, with a smile. “We should have to try another
fencing match then, and you would have to push your rapier a little
further.” After a pause she continued, “Were you really in love with
your wife, Philip?”
“We must not speak about that.”
“There must be no closed subjects between us, sir!” she said, lifting
her finger playfully. “We don’t belong to society any more, remember: we
have nothing but each other to comfort ourselves with. There is no
intimacy like this intimacy, Philip. A husband and wife represent the
world: but we--what do we represent?”
“Then let us make a new beginning here, and build a wall between us and
the past. We are no longer what we have been: why should we recall the
deeds and thoughts of persons who were not what we are?”
“We have only one thing to be afraid of,” said the Marquise, looking at
him thoughtfully, “and that is fear! Unless you can take your courage in
your hands, mon ami, the time will come when you will need it, and find
it wanting. It is best to think of these things while there is yet time.
If you fear Marion, or your memories of her, do not come near me! I
cannot help you there. In all else I would be as true as steel to you.
But you must be true to me. The worldly honor that we abandon must make
our honor toward each other doubly strong.”
Again Philip rose suddenly to his feet: but instead of standing in one
place he began to pace up and down the room. Perdita, after watching him
keenly for a few moments, leaned back in her chair and remained quite
without movement, save that the changing glitter of the necklace on her
bosom showed that she breathed. Almost any other woman would have
betrayed signs of nervousness or agitation under such circumstances; but
there was in Perdita, notwithstanding her subtlety and superficial
fickleness, a certain strong elemental simplicity of character, that
enabled her, after entering upon a given course, to pursue it with as
much steadiness and singleness of purpose as if no other course were
possible. She was one of those who can sleep soundly on the eve of
execution, or play their last stake and lose it with a smile. And now,
when, as she divined from Philip’s manner, and the changing expressions
that passed across his face, all was once more in doubt between them,
and the issue beyond prophecy, it was not only possible but natural for
her to sit composed and silent, and await what must be to her the final
good or evil of the future. She knew that there were ways in which she
might influence Philip; but with that strange feminine pride that never
avouches itself more strongly than at the moment when all pride seems to
have been surrendered, she would not avail herself of them. Had she
tried to move him at all, it would have been on the other side. At last
he stopped in his walk, and halted before her. She looked up at him with
a smile.
“Well, monsieur, have you thought it all out? Have you realized the
folly of it? Sit down here and tell me your opinion.”
“I am going to play the most ungainly part that can fall to a man,” he
said, in a husky and obstructed voice, which he did not attempt to make
smooth. “Let us part, Perdita. The only thing that gives me resolution
to say this, is that I find it hard to say. But I know myself too well!
I am small and incomplete of nature: hitherto I have deluded myself, and
perhaps others, by a play of intellect which drew attention from my real
feebleness and narrowness, and made me seem to be as broad and as deep
as the reach of my thoughts and imagination. It is all delusion: I can
chatter and contrive, but what I do and feel is petty and cold. There
have been moments when I fancied I had overcome that torpid chill of the
heart, and should be single, at last, in thought and feeling; but the
chill has always come back, and the horizon been blotted out again by
the shadow of my own carcase. Even now it is of myself that I am
talking, instead of about you!”
“That is why you interest me, my friend.”
“Yes; and I might as well stop there. I am not going to hang such a lump
of emptiness as myself round your neck. Even your overflow of life would
not suffice long to vivify me. A man whose wife has been forced to
desert him six months after marriage--a man who, merely by being
himself, could change an innocent and high-spirited girl into a
miserable outcast--such a fellow as that has neither the power nor the
right to claim the love of a woman like you. Perdita, I am not fit even
to commit a genuine sin! May God help me to the decency of keeping
henceforth to myself! What would be, at least, generosity and courage in
you, would be selfish and dastardly in me. It amazes me that I can feel
even the shame and self-contempt that I am trying to give utterance to.
But probably I shall have forgotten that too by to-morrow!”
“All that is very extravagant and impolite,” said Perdita pleasantly.
“You should know better than to abuse a gentleman whom I esteem, and ...
who cannot defend himself! Seriously, Philip, if I am angry with you, it
is because you are quite right. I will not compliment you on your
virtue, because you don’t seem to think of that so much as to be afraid
of becoming a burden on my hands. No--I perceive, underneath your
disguise, a courteous desire to save me from the consequences of my own
rashness. It is the act of a true gentleman, and ... I shall never
forgive it! I must, like you, have some occupation, and since you will
not let me love you, you shall give employment to my hate. It will be
just as amusing, and a great deal more _comme il faut_! And then, some
day--who knows?--your lost Marion may turn up again, neither better nor
worse than other men’s wives, and with her curiosity as to the world
gratified. And then you will be happier than ever. Will you drink
another glass of wine?”
“Yes!” said Philip, pouring it out, and taking the glass in his hand. “I
drink to your new occupation, Perdita. May it bring you satisfaction:
and may you long enjoy it!”
“Stay!” exclaimed she: “let me drink too. But my toast shall be
different. May the day on which I forgive you be the last day I live!”
They drank, and set down their glasses; and exchanged a final look. Was
it hate that he saw in her eyes, or love? Often afterwards that question
recurred to Philip’s mind, and never found a certain answer. But he
always remembered Perdita as she stood there, erect and bright, with a
smile on her beautiful face, and her red lips wet with the red wine.