"HE NEVER KNEW!"
Ronnie saw Dick off by the mid-day train.
After the train had begun to move, Dick leaned from the window, and said
suddenly: "Ronnie! talk to your wife about her Leipzig letter, and--_the
kid_, you know."
Ronnie kept pace with the train long enough to say: "I wish you wouldn't
call it the 'kid,' Dick; it is the 'Infant.' And Helen declines to talk
of it."
Then he dropped behind, and Dick flung himself into a corner of his
compartment, with a face of comic despair. "Merciful heavens," he said,
"slay that Infant!"
Meanwhile Ronnie was saying to a porter: "When is the next train for
town?"
"One fifty-five, sir."
"Then I have no chance now of catching the three o'clock from town, for
Hollymead?"
"Not from town, sir. But there is a way, by changing twice, which gets
you across country, and you pick up the three o'clock all right at
Huntingford, four ten."
"Are you sure, my man? I was told there was no way across country."
"The one fifty-five is the only train in the day by which you can do it,
sir. I happen to know, because I have a sister lives at Hollymead, so
I've done it m'self. If trains aren't late, you hit off the three
o'clock at Huntingford."
"Thanks," said Ronnie, noting down particulars. Then he walked rapidly
back to the hotel.
"I can't stand it," he said. "I shall bolt! With me off her hands, she
can go and have a jolly Christmas at the Dalmains. She is always welcome
there. I must get away alone and think matters out. I know everything is
all wrong, and yet I don't exactly know what has come between us. I only
know I am wretched, and so is she. It is still the poison of the Upas.
If I knew why she suddenly considered me utterly, preposterously,
altogether, selfish, I would do my level best to put it right. But I
don't."
He found Helen in the hall, anxiously watching the door. She took up a
paper, as he came in.
"Helen," he said, "do you mind if we lunch punctually at one o'clock? I
am going out before two."
"Why, certainly we will," said Helen. "You must have had a very early
breakfast, Ronnie. But don't overdo, darling. Remember what Dick said.
Shall I come with you?"
"I would rather go alone," said Ronnie. "I want to think things over."
She rose and stood beside him.
"Ronnie dear, we seem to have lost all count of days. But, as a matter
of fact, to-morrow is Christmas Day. Would you like to go home this
afternoon? We can order a car for two o'clock, and be at the Grange for
tea. Ronnie, wouldn't it be rather lovely? Think of the little cosy
tea-table, and your own especial chair, and the soft lamp-light--"
She paused abruptly. The mental picture had recalled to both the evening
on which they last stood together in that golden lamplight.
Ronnie hesitated, looking at the floor. Then he raised his eyes to
Helen's. "I don't think I could bear it," he said, turned from her
quickly, and went upstairs.
In his room he scribbled a note.
"My wife--I am awfully sorry, but I simply _had_ to bolt. Don't be
alarmed. I have gone home to the Grange. I believe, when I am by myself
in the house where we spent the three years I thought so perfect and so
happy, I shall find out what is the matter; I shall get to the very root
of the Upas tree.
"I know I somehow hurt you horribly on the night I reached home, by
asking you to come to the studio to hear me play my 'cello; but, before
God, I haven't the faintest idea why!
"You would not have said what you did, had you known I was ill; but
neither would you have said it, unless it had been true. If it was true
then, it is true now. If it is true now, we can't spend Christmas Day
together.
"I want you to go to the Dalmains by motor, as soon as you find this,
and have a jolly, restful time with them. You look worn out.
"RONNIE."
"P.S.--I am obliged to leave this in my room. I hope you will find it
there. I don't even know where your room is, Helen, in this beastly
hotel."
Ronnie considered his postscript; then crossed out "beastly" and
substituted "large." But "beastly" still showed, pathetically, beneath
the line. And, by-and-by, the heart of Ronnie's wife, from which all
clouds had suddenly rolled away, understood it, and wept over it, and
kissed it; and thought "beastly" a dear word! It was so quaintly like
Ronnie to substitute "large" for "beastly."
All clouds had rolled away, before Helen read the note; for this is what
had happened.
* * * * *
Ronnie had excused himself when lunch was half over.
Helen let him go, trying to act on Dr. Dick's advice not to worry him by
seeming to watch or follow him.
So she sat on alone, finishing luncheon, and thus did not see Ronnie
walk out of the front door, carrying his bag.
Soon afterwards she passed into the hall, and sat dipping into the
papers and thinking over her talk with Dick.
Presently a page stepped up to her with a letter on a salver.
Her heart stood still as she saw the stamp, the post-mark, and the
writing. It was from Aubrey Treherne, forwarded from Hollymead.
Helen was sorely tempted for a moment to burn it unread. She had
suffered so much through a former letter in that handwriting. She
suddenly realised how cruelly Aubrey's words about Ronnie had, in the
light of Ronnie's subsequent behaviour, eaten into her soul.
She looked at the fire. She rose and moved towards it, the letter in her
hand.
Then better counsels prevailed.
She went slowly upstairs to her sitting-room, closed the door, sat down,
and opened Aubrey's letter.
It contained a smaller envelope sealed, on which was written: "Read
letter first."
She opened the folded sheets.
"DEAR HELEN,
"Yes, you are right about God's Word not returning void. Your own words,
I admit, only hardened me; but those at the end of your letter broke me
up. I am so very far removed from light and fellowship, love and
forgiveness. I doubt if I can ever get back into the way of peace.
"But, anyhow, before the great Feast of Peace upon earth, goodwill
toward men, I can take a first step by fully confessing the great wrong
I did to you and to your husband rather more than a month ago, on the
evening which he spent at my flat.
"Possibly you have found it out already; but possibly not, as I hear he
has been very seriously ill.
"The evening he was here, he was more or less queer and light-headed,
but he was full of you, and of his delight in going home. I suppose this
all helped to madden me. No need to explain why. You know.
"He had found a letter from you at the _Poste Restante_; but, rushing
around to his publishers, etc., had not had time to read it.
"When he remembered it and found it in his pocket-book, he stood with
his back to my stove, in great excitement, and tore it open; I sitting
by.
"As he unfolded the large sheets of foreign paper, a note flew out from
between them, and fell, unseen by him, to the floor.
"I put my foot on it. I gathered, from extracts he read me from the
letter, that this note was of importance.
"When he found in a postscript that you mentioned an enclosure, he
hunted everywhere for it; not thinking, of course, to look under my
foot.
"He then concluded, on my instigation, that, after all, you had not
enclosed any note.
"At the first opportunity I transferred it to my pocket, made an excuse
to leave the room, and read it.
"Helen, believe me, had I known beforehand the news that note contained,
I don't think I could have been such a fiend.
"But once having done it, I carried it through. I allowed your husband
to go home in total ignorance of the birth of his son. It was I who put
the word 'astonishing' into his telegram; and, in my letter to you, I
led you to suppose I had heard the news from him.
"I don't know exactly what I expected to gain from all this. But, in a
condition of mad despair, I seemed playing my very last card; and I
played it for all it was worth--which apparently was not much!
"I did plenty of other devilish work that night--chiefly mental
suggestion. This is the only really confessable thing.
"The letter your husband never saw, is in the enclosed envelope. He will
like to have it now.
"Thus, as you see, the Word has not returned unto you void. It brings
you the only reparation I can make.
"AUBREY TREHERNE."
Helen tore open the sealed envelope, and found her little pencil note,
the tender outpouring to Ronnie, written three days after her baby's
birth.
So Ronnie never saw it--he never knew! He came home without having the
remotest idea that she had been through anything unusual in his absence.
He had heard no word or hint of the birth of his little son. Yet she had
called him utterly, preposterously, altogether, selfish, because he had
quite naturally expected her to be as interested as ever in his pursuits
and pleasures.
Oh, Ronnie, Ronnie!
* * * * *
She flew to his room, hoping he had not yet gone out.
On the table she found a note addressed to herself.
She tore it open, read it--- then went back into the sitting-room, and
pealed the bell.
"Send my maid to me at once, and the hall-porter."
They arrived together.
Helen had just written a long telegram to her housekeeper.
She spoke to the hall-porter first.
"Send off this telegram, please. Then procure the fastest motor-car you
can find, to run me over to Hollymead this afternoon. We can be ready to
start in half-an-hour's time."
Then she turned to her maid.
"Jeffreys, we go home for Christmas after all. Mr. West has gone on by
train. We must pack as promptly as possible, and start in half-an-hour.
We may perhaps get home before him. I doubt whether he can catch
anything down from town before the five o'clock."
She flew to her room, pressing Ronnie's sad little note to her heart.
All the world looked different! Ah, what would it be, now, to tell him
of his little son! But she must get home before him. Supposing Ronnie
went upstairs alone, and found the baby!