the summer-house.
Margaret pouted. Mrs. Saumarez and Mr. Kennaston were seated not
twenty feet from the summer-house, on the bench which Miss Hugonin had
just left. And when that unprincipled young woman finally rose to her
feet, it must be confessed that it was with a toss of the head and
with the reflection that while to listen wasn't honourable, it would
at least be very amusing. I grieve to admit it, but with Billy's
scruples she hadn't the slightest sympathy.
Then Kennaston cried, suddenly: "Why, you're mad, Kathleen! Woods
wants to marry _you!_ Why, he's heels over head in love with Miss
Hugonin!"
Miss Hugonin turned to Mr. Woods with a little intake of the breath.
No, I shall not attempt to tell you what Billy saw in her countenance.
Timanthes-like, I drape before it the vines of the summer-house. For
a brief space I think we had best betake ourselves outside,
leaving Margaret in a very pitiable state of anger, and shame, and
humiliation, and heartbreak--leaving poor Billy with a heart that
ached, seeing the horror of him in her face.
XXIII
Mrs. Saumarez laughed bitterly.
"No," she said, "Billy cared for me, you know, a long time ago. And
this morning he told me he still cared. Billy doesn't pretend to be
a clever man, you see, and so he can afford to practice some of the
brute virtues, such as constancy and fidelity."
There was a challenging flame in her eyes, but Kennaston let the stab
pass unnoticed. To do him justice, he was thinking less of himself,
just now, than of how this news would affect Margaret; and his face
was very grave and strangely tender, for in his own fashion he loved
Margaret.
"It's nasty, very nasty," he said, at length, in a voice that was
puzzled. "Yet I could have sworn yesterday----" Kennaston paused and
laughed lightly. "She was an heiress yesterday, and to-day she is
nobody. And Mr. Woods, being wealthy, can afford to gratify the
virtues you commend so highly and, with a fidelity that is most
edifying, return again to his old love. And she welcomes him--and the
Woods millions--with open arms. It is quite affecting, is it not,
Kathleen?"
"You needn't be disagreeable," she observed.
"My dear Kathleen, I assure you I am not angry. I am merely a little
sorry for human nature. I could have sworn Woods was honest. But
rogues all, rogues all, Kathleen! Money rules us in the end; and now
the parable is fulfilled, and Love the prodigal returns to make merry
over the calf of gold. Confess," Mr. Kennaston queried, with a smile,
"is it not strange an all-wise Creator should have been at pains to
fashion this brave world about us for little men and women such as
we to lie and pilfer in? Was it worth while, think you, to arch the
firmament above our rogueries, and light the ageless stars as candles
to display our antics? Let us be frank, Kathleen, and confess that
life is but a trivial farce ignobly played in a very stately temple."
And Mr. Kennaston laughed again.
"Let us be frank!" Kathleen cried, with a little catch in her voice.
"Why, it isn't in you to be frank, Felix Kennaston! Your life is
nothing but a succession of poses--shallow, foolish poses meant
to hoodwink the world and at times yourself. For you do hoodwink
yourself, don't you, Felix?" she asked, eagerly, and gave him no time
to answer. She feared, you see, lest his answer might dilapidate the
one fortress she had been able to build about his honour.
"And now," she went on, quickly, "you're trying to make me think you a
devil of a fellow, aren't you? And you're hinting that I've accepted
Billy because of his money, aren't you? Well, it is true that I
wouldn't marry him if he were poor. But he's very far from being poor.
And he cares for me. And I am fond of him. And so I shall marry him
and make him as good a wife as I can. So there!"
Mrs. Saumarez faced him with an uneasy defiance. He was smiling oddly.
"I have heard it rumoured in many foolish tales and jingling verses,"
said Kennaston, after a little, "that a thing called love exists in
the world. And I have also heard, Kathleen, that it sometimes enters
into the question of marriage. It appears that I was misinformed."
"No," she answered, slowly, "there is a thing called love. I think
women are none the better for knowing it. To a woman, it means to take
some man--some utterly commonplace man, perhaps--perhaps, only an idle
_poseur_ such as you are, Felix--and to set him up on a pedestal, and
to bow down and worship him; and to protest loudly, both to the world
and to herself, that in spite of all appearances her idol really
hasn't feet of clay, or that, at any rate, it is the very nicest clay
in the world. For a time she deceives herself, Felix. Then the idol
topples from the pedestal and is broken, and she sees that it is all
clay, Felix--clay through and through--and her heart breaks with it."
Kennaston bowed his head. "It is true," said he; "that is the love of
women."
"To a man," she went on, dully, "it means to take some woman--the
nearest woman who isn't actually deformed--and to make pretty speeches
to her and to make her love him. And after a while--" Kathleen
shrugged her shoulders drearily. "Why, after a while," said she, "he
grows tired and looks for some other woman."
"It is true," said Kennaston--"yes, very true that some men love in
that fashion."
There ensued a silence. It was a long silence, and under the tension
of it Kathleen's composure snapped like a cord that has been stretched
to the breaking point.
"Yes, yes, yes!" she cried, suddenly; "that is how I have loved you
and that is how you've loved me, Felix Kennaston! Ah, Billy told me
what happened last night! And that--that was why I--" Mrs. Saumarez
paused and regarded him curiously. "You don't make a very noble
figure, just now, do you?" she asked, with careful deliberation. "You
were ready to sell yourself for Miss Hugonin's money, weren't you? And
now you must take her without the money. Poor Felix! Ah, you poor,
petty liar, who've over-reached yourself so utterly!" And again
Kathleen began to laugh, but somewhat shrilly, somewhat hysterically.
"You are wrong," he said, with a flush. "It is true that I asked Miss
Hugonin to marry me. But she--very wisely, I dare say--declined."
"Ah!" Kathleen said, slowly. Then--and it will not do to inquire too
closely into her logic--she spoke with considerable sharpness: "She's
a conceited little cat! I never in all my life knew a girl to be quite
so conceited as she is. Positively, I don't believe she thinks there's
a man breathing who's good enough for her!"
Kennaston grinned. "Oh, Kathleen, Kathleen!" he said; "you are simply
delicious."
And Mrs. Saumarez coloured prettily and tried to look severe and
could not, for the simple reason that, while she knew Kennaston to be
flippant and weak and unstable as water and generally worthless, yet
for some occult cause she loved him as tenderly as though he had been
a paragon of all the manly virtues. And I dare say that for many of us
it is by a very kindly provision of Nature that all women are created
capable of doing this illogical thing and that most of them do it
daily.
"It is true," the poet said, at length, "that I have played no heroic
part. And I don't question, Kathleen, that I am all you think me. Yet,
such as I am, I love you. And such as I am, you love me, and it is I
that you are going to marry, and not that Woods person."
"He's worth ten of you!" she cried, scornfully.
"Twenty of me, perhaps," Mr. Kennaston assented, "but that isn't the
question. You don't love him, Kathleen. You are about to marry him for
his money. You are about to do what I thought to do yesterday. But you
won't, Kathleen. You know that I need you, my dear, and--unreasonably
enough, God knows--you love me."
Mrs. Saumarez regarded him intently for a considerable space, and
during that space the Eagle warred in her heart with the one foe
he can never conquer. Love had a worthless ally; but Love fought
staunchly.
By and bye, "Yes," she said, and her voice was almost sullen; "I love
you. I ought to love Billy, but I don't. I shall ask him to release me
from my engagement. And yes, I will marry you if you like."
He raised her hand to his lips. "You are an angel," Mr. Kennaston was
pleased to say.
"No," Mrs. Saumarez dissented, rather forlornly; "I'm simply a fool.
Otherwise, I wouldn't be about to marry you, knowing you as I do for
what you are--knowing that I haven't one chance in a hundred of any
happiness."
"My dear," he said, and his voice was earnest, "you know at least that
what there is of good in me is at its best with you."
"Yes, yes!" Kathleen cried, quickly. "That is so, isn't it, Felix?
And you do care for me, don't you? Felix, are you sure you care for
me--quite sure? And are you quite certain, Felix, that you never cared
so much for any one else?"
Mr. Kennaston was quite certain. He proceeded to explain his feelings
toward her at some length.
Kathleen listened with downcast eyes and almost cheated herself into
the belief that the man she loved was all that he should be. But at
the bottom of her heart she knew he wasn't.
I think we may fairly pity her.
Kennaston and Mrs. Saumarez chatted very amicably for some ten
minutes. At the end of that period, the twelve forty-five express
bellowing faintly in the distance recalled the fact that the morning
mail was in, and thereupon, in the very best of humours, they set
out for the house. I grieve to admit it, but Kathleen had utterly
forgotten Billy by this, and was no more thinking of him than she was
of the Man in the Iron Mask.
She was with Kennaston, you see; and her thoughts, and glances, and
lips, and adoration were all given to his pleasuring, just as her life
would have been if its loss could have saved him from a toothache. He
strutted a little, and was a little grateful to her, and--to do
him justice--received the tribute she accorded him with perfect
satisfaction and equanimity.
XXIV
Margaret came out of the summer-house, Billy Woods followed her, in a
very moist state of perturbation.
"Peggy----" said Mr. Woods.
But Miss Hugonin was laughing. Clear as a bird-call, she poured forth
her rippling mimicry of mirth. They train women well in these matters.
To Margaret, just now, her heart seemed dead within her. Her lover was
proved unworthy. Her pride was shattered. She had loved this clumsy
liar yonder, had given up a fortune for him, dared all for him, had
(as the phrase runs) flung herself at his head. The shame of it was a
physical sickness, a nausea. But now, in this jumble of miseries, in
this breaking-up of the earth and the void heavens that surged about
her and would not be mastered, the girl laughed; and her laughter was
care-free and half-languid like that of a child who is thinking of
something else. Ah, yes, they train women well in these matters.
At length Margaret said, in high, crisp accents: "Pardon me, but I
can't help being amused, Mr. Woods, by the way in which hard luck
dogs your footsteps. I think Fate must have some grudge against you,
Mr. Woods."
"Peggy----" said Mr. Woods.
"Pardon me," she interrupted him, her masculine little chin high in
the air, "but I wish you wouldn't call me that. It was well enough
when we were boy and girl together, Mr. Woods. But you've developed
since--ah, yes, you've developed into such a splendid actor, such a
consummate liar, such a clever scoundrel, Mr. Woods, that I scarcely
recognise you now."
And there was not a spark of anger in the very darkest corner of
Billy's big, brave heart, but only pity--pity all through and through,
that sent little icy ticklings up and down his spine and turned his
breathing to great sobs. For she had turned full face to him and he
could see the look in her eyes.
I think he has never forgotten it. Years after the memory of it would
come upon him suddenly and set hot drenching waves of shame and
remorse surging about his body--remorse unutterable that he ever hurt
his Peggy so deeply. For they were tragic eyes. Beneath them her
twitching mouth smiled bravely, but the mirth of her eyes was
monstrous. It was the mirth of a beaten woman, of a woman who has
known the last extreme of shame and misery and has learned to laugh at
it. Even now Billy Woods cannot quite forget.
"Peggy," said he, brokenly, "ah, dear, dear Peggy, listen to me!"
"Why, have you thought of a plausible lie so soon?" she queried,
sweetly. "Dear me, Mr. Woods, what is the use of explaining things? It
is very simple. You wanted to marry me last night because I was rich.
And when I declined the honour, you went back to your old love. Oh,
it's very simple, Mr. Woods! It's a pity, though--isn't it?--that all
your promptness went for nothing. Why, dear me, you actually managed
to propose before breakfast, didn't you? I should have thought that
such eagerness would have made an impression on Kathleen--oh, a most
favourable impression. Too bad it hasn't!"
"Listen!" said Billy. "Ah, you're forcing me to talk like a cad,
Peggy, but I can't see you suffer--I can't! Kathleen misunderstood
what I said to her. I--I didn't mean to propose to her, Peggy. It was
a mistake, I tell you. It's you I love--just you. And when I asked you
to marry me last night--why, I thought the money was mine, Peggy.
I'd never have asked you if I hadn't thought that. I--ah, you don't
believe me, you don't believe me, Peggy, and before God, I'm telling
you the simple truth! Why, I hadn't ever seen that last will, Peggy!
It was locked up in that centre place in the desk, you remember.
Why--why, you yourself had the keys to it, Peggy. Surely, you
remember, dear?" And Billy's voice shook and skipped whole octaves as
he pleaded with her, for he knew she did not believe him and he could
not endure the horror of her eyes.
But Margaret shook her head; and as aforetime the twitching lips
continued to laugh beneath those tragic eyes. Ah, poor little lady of
Elfland! poor little Undine, with a soul wakened to suffering!
"Clumsy, very clumsy!" she rebuked him. "I see that you are accustomed
to prepare your lies in advance, Mr. Woods. As an extemporaneous liar
you are very clumsy. Men don't propose by mistake except in farces.
And while we are speaking of farces, don't you think it time to drop
that one of your not knowing about that last will?"
"The farce!" Billy stammered. "You--why, you saw me when I found it!"
"Ah, yes, I saw you when you pretended to find it. I saw you when you
pretended to unlock that centre place. But now, of course, I know it
never was locked. I'm very careless about locking things, Mr. Woods.
Ah, yes, that gave you a beautiful opportunity, didn't it? So, when
you were rummaging through my desk--without my permission, by the way,
but that's a detail--you found both wills and concocted your little
comedy? That was very clever. Oh, you think you're awfully smooth,
don't you, Billy Woods? But if you had been a bit more daring, don't
you see, you could have suppressed the last one and taken the money
without being encumbered by me? That was rather clumsy of you, wasn't
it?" Suave, gentle, sweet as honey was the speech of Margaret as she
lifted her face to his, but her eyes were tragedies.
"Ah!" said Billy. "Ah--yes--you think--that." He was very careful in
articulating his words, was Billy, and afterward he nodded his head
gravely. The universe had somehow suffered an airy dissolution like
that of Prospero's masque--Selwoode and its gardens, the great globe
itself, "the cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, the solemn
temples" were all as vanished wraiths. There was only Peggy left--
Peggy with that unimaginable misery in her eyes that he must drive
away somehow. If that was what she thought, there was no way for him
to prove it wasn't so.
"Why, dear me, Mr. Woods," she retorted, carelessly, "what else could
I think?"
Here Mr. Woods blundered.
"Ah, think what you will, Peggy!" he cried, his big voice cracking and
sobbing and resonant with pain. "Ah, my dear, think what you will, but
don't grieve for it, Peggy! Why, if I'm all you say I am, that's no
reason you should suffer for it! Ah, don't, Peggy! In God's name,
don't! I can't bear it, dear," he pleaded with her, helplessly.
Billy was suffering, too. But her sorrow was the chief of his, and
what stung him now to impotent anger was that she must suffer and he
be unable to help her--for, ah, how willingly, how gladly, he would
have borne all poor Peggy's woes upon his own broad shoulders.
But none the less, he had lost an invaluable opportunity to hold his
tongue.
"Suffer! I suffer!" she mocked him, languidly; and then, like a
banjo-string, the tension snapped, and she gave a long, angry gasp,
and her wrath flamed.
"Upon my word, you're the most conceited man I ever knew in my life!
You think I'm in love with you! With you! Billy Woods, I wouldn't wipe
my feet on you if you were the last man left on earth! I hate you, I
loathe you, I detest you, I despise you! Do you hear me?--I hate you.
What do I care if you _are_ a snob, and a cad, and a fortune-hunter,
and a forger, and--well, I don't care! Perhaps you haven't ever
forged anything yet, but I'm quite sure you would if you ever got an
opportunity. You'd be delighted to do it. Yes, you would--you're just
the sort of man who _revels_ in crime. I love you! Why, that's the
best joke I've heard for a long time. I'm only sorry for you, Billy
Woods--_sorry_ because Kathleen has thrown you over--sorry, do you
understand? Yes, since you're so fond of skinny women, I think it's a
great pity she wouldn't have you. Don't talk to me!--she _is_ skinny.
I guess I know. She's as skinny as a beanpole. She's skinnier than I
ever imagined it possible for anybody--_anybody_--to be. And she
pads and rouges till I think it's disgusting, and not half--not
_one-half_--of her hair belongs to her, and that half is dyed. But,
of course, if you like that sort of thing, there's no accounting for
tastes, and I'm sure I'm very sorry for you, even though personally I
_don't_ care for skinny women. I hate 'em! And I hate you, too, Billy
Woods!"
She stamped her foot, did Margaret. You must bear with her, for her
heart is breaking now, and if she has become a termagant it is because
her shamed pride has driven her mad. Bear with her, then, a little
longer.
Billy tried to bear with her, for in part he understood.
"Peggy," said he, very gently, "you're wrong."
"Yes, I dare say!" she snapped at him.
"We won't discuss Kathleen, if you please. But you're wrong about the
will. I've told you the whole truth about that, but I don't blame you
for not believing me, Peggy--ah, no, not I. There seems to be a curse
upon Uncle Fred's money. It brings out the worst of all of us. It has
changed even you, Peggy--and not for the better, Peggy. You've become
distrustful. You--ah, well, we won't discuss that now. Give me the
will, my dear, and I'll burn it before your eyes. That ought to show
you, Peggy, that you're wrong." Billy was very white-lipped as he
ended, for the Woods temper is a short one.
But she had an arrow left for him. "Give it to you! And do you think
I'd trust you with it, Billy Woods?"
"Peggy!--ah, Peggy, I hadn't deserved that. Be just, at least, to me,"
poor Billy begged of her.
Which was an absurd thing to ask of an angry woman.
"Yes, I _do_ know what you'd do with it! You'd take it right off and
have it probated or executed or whatever it is they do to wills, and
turn me straight out in the gutter. That's just what you're _longing_
to do this very moment. Oh, I know, Billy Woods--I know what a temper
you've got, and I know you're keeping quiet now simply because you
know that's the most exasperating thing you can possibly do. I
wouldn't have such a disposition as you've got for the world. You've
absolutely _no_ control over your temper--not a bit of it. You're
_vile_, Billy Woods! Oh, I _hate_ you! Yes, you've made me cry, and I
suppose you're very proud of yourself. _Aren't_ you proud? Don't stand
staring at me like a stuck pig, but answer me when I talk to you!
Aren't you _proud_ of making me cry? Aren't you? Ah, don't talk to
me--don't talk to _me_, I tell you! I don't wish to hear a word you've
got to say. I _hate_ you. And you shan't have the money, that's flat."
"I don't want it," said Billy. "I've been trying to tell you for the
last, half-hour I don't want it. In God's name, why can't you talk
like a sensible woman, Peggy?" I am afraid that Mr. Woods, too, was
beginning to lose his temper.
"That's right--swear at me! It only needed that. You do want the
money, and when you say you don't you're lying--lying--_lying_, do you
understand? You all want my money. Oh, dear, _dear!_" Margaret wailed,
and her great voice was shaken to its depths and its sobbing was the
long, hopeless sobbing of a violin, as she flung back her tear-stained
face, and clenched her little hands tight at her sides; "why _can't_
you let me alone? You're all after my money--you, and Mr. Kennaston,
and Mr. Jukesbury, and all of you! Why _can't_ you let me alone? Ever
since I've had it you've hunted me as if I'd been a wild beast. God
help me, I haven't had a moment's peace, a moment's rest, a, moment's
quiet, since Uncle Fred died. They all want my money--everybody wants
my money! Oh, Billy, Billy, why _can't_ they let me alone?"
"Peggy----" said he.
But she interrupted him. "Don't talk to _me_, Billy Woods! Don't you
_dare_ talk to me. I told you I didn't wish to hear a word you had to
say, didn't I? Yes, you all want my money. And you shan't have it.
It's mine. Uncle Fred left it to me. It's mine, I tell you. I've got
the greatest thing in the world--money! And I'll keep it. Ah, I hate
you all--every one of you--but I'll make you cringe to me. I'll make
you _all_ cringe, do you hear, because I've got the money you're ready
to sell your paltry souls for! Oh, I'll make you cringe most of all,
Billy Woods! I'm rich, do you hear?--rich--_rich_! Wouldn't you be
glad to marry the rich Margaret Hugonin, Billy? Ah, haven't you
schemed hard for that? You'd be glad to do it, wouldn't you? You'd
give your dirty little soul for that, wouldn't you, Billy? Ah, what a
cur you are! Well, some day perhaps I'll buy you just as I would any
other cur. Wouldn't you be glad if I did, Billy? Beg for it, Billy!
Beg, sir! Beg!" And Margaret flung back her head again, and laughed
shrilly, and held up her hand before him as one holds a lump of sugar
before a pug-dog.
In Selwoode I can fancy how the Eagle screamed his triumph.
But Billy's face was ashen.
"Before God!" he said, between his teeth, "loving you as I do, I
wouldn't marry you now for all the wealth in the world! The money has
ruined you--ruined you, Peggy."
For a little she stared at him. By and bye, "I dare say it has," she
said, in a strangely sober tone. "I've been scolding like a fishwife.
I beg your pardon, Mr. Woods--not for what I've said, because I meant
every _word_ of it, but I beg your pardon for saying it. Don't come
with me, please."
Blindly she turned from him. Her shoulders had the droop of an old
woman's. Margaret was wearied now, weary with the weariness of death.
For a while Mr. Woods stared after the tired little figure that
trudged straight onward in the sunlight, stumbling as she went. Then a
pleached walk swallowed her, and Mr. Woods groaned.
"Oh, Peggy, Peggy!" he said, in bottomless compassion; "oh, my poor
little Peggy! How changed you are!"
Afterward Mr. Woods sank down upon the bench and buried his face in
his hands. He sat there for a long time. I don't believe he thought
of anything very clearly. His mind was a turgid chaos of misery; and
about him the birds shrilled and quavered and carolled till the air
was vibrant with their trilling. One might have thought they choired
in honour of the Eagle's triumph, in mockery of poor Billy.
Then Mr. Woods raised his head with a queer, alert look. Surely he had
heard a voice--the dearest of all voices.
"Billy!" it wailed; "oh, Billy, _Billy_!"
XXV
For at the height of this particularly mischancy posture of affairs
the meddlesome Fates had elected to dispatch Cock-eye Flinks to serve
as our _deus ex machina_. And just as in the comedy the police turn
up in the nick of time to fetch Tartuffe to prison, or in the tragedy
Friar John manages to be detained on his journey to Mantua and thus
bring about that lamentable business in the tomb of the Capulets, so
Mr. Flinks now happens inopportunely to arrive upon our lesser stage.