neck. “If you had told me before, I never would have called you Jackie,
although I love it, and John is so horridly formal. I shall feel as if I
were addressing my husband’s double, or something. Do you really hate
it—Jackie?”
“Yes.”
“Well! . . . I won’t any more. But you must do something for me in
return. You must take me to the country to-day.”
“I really could not take the risk.”
“Then take me to Kensington Gardens.”
“I am so sorry—I think I told you I had several engagements. You
see—you are generally occupied all day, with one thing or another. I
have been thrown on my own resources, and now I cannot get out of these
engagements I have made.”
“But you always used to come home to luncheon.”
“Now that you have so many American friends in London I did not fancy
you would miss me; and as several of my own old friends are in town, I
thought it a good opportunity to show them some attentions.”
“Why don’t you bring them to the house?”
“I could not think of fatiguing you, and men prefer to dine at a club,
anyway.”
The words “Margarethe Styr” were shrieking in Mabel’s brain, but she was
very proud, and rarely impolitic in any but small matters. Her mother
had soothed her growing jealousy by assuring her that the great singer
was far too occupied, now that all artistic London was running after
her, to spare time for any man. Mabel could not crush her natural
suspicions, particularly as she had discovered that he had once more
thrown over the much-enduring Foreign Office, but she was determined not
to alienate this puzzling young Englishman, whom she understood less
every day, by “making scenes.” “Don’t bore him!” Lady Pat had warned her
before leaving for France. “Give him his head and don’t ask him
questions. He would not confide in himself if he could help it. He
worships you and is far too lazy to pursue any woman, or even to respond
to her advances. But don’t bore him.”
Mabel, with all the American girl’s independence of spirit, and firm
belief in the inferiority of man, found such advice little to her taste,
but, loving as she did, was willing to accept any that would help her to
enchain her husband’s languid affections. But more than once of late she
had turned cold as she asked herself if ever she could understand him,
become really intimate with him. And now, kind and thoughtful as he
still was, another fear was whispering. It seemed to her confirmed by
his refusal of her simple request. While she might control the more
direct expressions of her jealousy, the temptation was irresistible to
indulge in the ancient formulæ. She dropped her arms and turned away
with a quivering lip.
“I don’t believe you love me any longer!”
“How can you say such a thing?”
“Do you?”
“Of course.”
She wheeled about and regarded him steadily. It occurred to him that she
looked less vapidly pretty than usual.
“If you ceased to care for me,” she said stammeringly, her eyes widening
with fear, “you would kill me. I never could stand it—never—I think
that is all there is to me.”
“What a dear little thing you are. As if any man could help caring for
the most charming wife in England. But you should have married Stanley,
who is always exactly the same. I am afraid I am not. But as for the
rest—do not be silly. Now I must run. Take care of yourself and don’t
think of going for a drive of more than an hour.”
He tapped her on the cheek, dropped a kiss on her forehead, and departed
in haste lest she think of a new argument. Mabel ran into her own room
and fell on her divan, weeping wildly. But although she luxuriously let
nature have her way for ten minutes or more, she finally drank a
sedative, and then set her childish mouth in a straight hard line. There
were several American women in England that had acquired conspicuous
influence over their husbands—whom, no doubt, they had once had found
as incomprehensible as her wonderful Jackie. If they had succeeded, so
could she. It only required time and patience; and the return of her old
buoyant health, which would enable her to companion him once more. If
necessary, she would study politics and talk to old statesmen. But at
this prospect she shuddered, and at the same moment her eye fell upon a
shelf containing the works of Balzac, Maupassant, Bourget, and several
other French authors, which one of her young married friends of their
race had sent her, bound in white vellum, as a wedding present. They had
been accompanied by a recommendation to read them and soon. She had
never taken one from the shelf upon which her servant had arranged them.
LIII
LOVE
“Ketch ’em alive! Ketch ’em alive!” The fly-paper vender had the note of
spring in his voice, and other and more distant street cries betrayed
the same almost plaintive quickening under the influence of the warmth
and light so long withdrawn. Ordham let himself out of the house looking
as hard as he felt, but in a few moments the pagan beauty of the morning
and the gay face of London in her springtime laughed his ill humor away
and banished the memory of his wife. No city is more beautiful than
London during her brief season of sunshine, with the flower boxes set
like little Italian balconies on her grim old houses, the vivid close
green of parks and squares, the endless processions of open carriages
filled with smartly dressed folk from all parts of the world; some in
the native finery of countries so far from occidental that they give the
scene a touch of opera bouffe. As Ordham walked toward Dover Street he
fancied he could hear the birds singing in Hyde Park—a colony that
dwelt in a tree beside his bedroom window had awakened him early with
their chattering—see the swans sailing on the lake in the park of St.
James. It was good to be alive, good to belong by divine right to the
one really great city in the world, and as he presented six-pence to
several of his friends the crossing sweepers—more for the pleasure of
receiving their blessing than because he had the least idea they needed
it—he smiled at them so radiantly that more than ever they were
convinced he was the sweetest young gentleman that ever gave siller, and
‘oped he would be ‘appy for ever and ever.
Ordham felt that he had every reason to be happy. Were not he and
Margarethe Styr going for a long day in the country, a long unbroken
day? Although they had carried out their programme and visited many
sights, still was it their first whole day together. Rehearsals demanded
by the heterogeneous mass of singers they had been able to borrow from
German cities had stolen many of her free days; she had felt obliged to
attend three receptions arranged in her honour and receive once; and
during the coming week practically all her spare time would be occupied
with rehearsals for _Tannhäuser_ and _Lohengrin_, for she had not sung
the rôles of Elizabeth and Elsa for several years. But these hours they
had snatched together had been wholly delightful, their spirits had been
high to the edge of excitement; both took a nervous delight in playing
with a danger that would soon finish, leave them face to face either
with tragedy or a vast and cynical philosophy. It was tacitly understood
that this was to be their last period of companionship, and although
Ordham alternated between the pit of melancholy when alone and an almost
fierce sensation of happiness while with this woman, whom he found more
surely his than in the old days when his eyes were closed, he refused at
any time to ask more of fate or to dwell upon the future. But that he
was no longer the languid manageable youth of less than a year ago he
knew as well as she. If he too put ambition before love, accepted the
consequences of his marrying, it was because he chose to do so, not
because of the woman’s subtle manipulation. Ordham sometimes found an
added food for sadness in the knowledge that he had left the best of his
youth behind him, but was wise enough to congratulate himself that his
acute attack of racial industry had cleared his blood of blinding
humours.
But only to Styr was there any change in his appearance, and as he
entered her sitting room this morning he looked the archetype of
conquering youth, of splendid young English manhood. His mouth, which of
late had often been consciously firm, was as soft and boyish as when
they had met at Neuschwanstein, and his eyes, always luminous, were
sparkling with anticipation. Not the least of his attractions to Styr
was his perfect grooming, for being artist as well as woman, she hated
the sight of “artistic” men. She herself looked very smart, as he
immediately told her, in an entire costume of tan-coloured cloth. As the
day was warm and she could not wear a wrap, and as her tailor was the
best in Paris, her frock followed every line and curve of her perfect
figure. But as she had concluded to ignore the fact that Ordham was man
as well as soul, and circumstances protected them both, she saw no
reason for making herself clumsy and uncomfortable, as if he were a boy
and she his guardian! Moreover, she was not averse from leaving in his
memory as many charming pictures of herself as might be composed.
“How delicious it is merely to be alive!” she exclaimed with that
enthusiasm which, when the sullenness of her face was routed by the mere
pagan joy of living, was not the least of her fascinations. “Where are
we going?” she added, as they entered a hansom.
“I have not the least idea.” But in a moment he lifted the trap and
directed the cabby to drive to Euston Station.
They alighted at Bushey, and, hiring a carriage for the day, drove or
strolled through the old English lanes, with their high scented hedges,
past houses built for subjects of Elizabeth, visited the tomb of Bacon
at St. Albans, and even stared at the splendours of Hatfield House like
veritable tourists, Ordham characteristically neglecting to mention that
he had dined and slept there more than once. They idled on commons and
in woods almost as full of light, lunched at the famous inn of Harrow,
sat on the tomb favoured by Byron in the old town’s churchyard, hung
over high-walled fences to inhale the perfume of flowers that the
island’s moisture makes so rich, and to stare at the immense masses of
pink and white hawthorn; bought fruit of a farmer (grown under glass, of
course!) and sat on his wall to eat it. Few counties in England have
more charms than Hertfordshire, and not its least is that it is
practically undiscovered by the tourist.
They dined in the inn at Stanmore, dismissing their carriage, as they
could take the train at this beautiful old town, which invited them to
linger as long as it was light. They soon forsook the enormous joints,
the mess of greens, the peas as round and hard as marbles, and an apple
dumpling like a tunnel filled with the débris of many wrecks, and
wandered forth once more. The streets were very narrow, the houses, of a
dozen centuries, covered with ivy close cut; the church looked as old as
England. At this hour the little town was silent and outwardly deserted,
but one expected every moment to hear the sound of a horn, to see the
London coach dash round a corner, a post-chaise with a lady in powder
and patches at the window. Stanmore is so close to London that it was
the first town reached by the mounted courier galloping through the dawn
to tell the country that Victoria was queen, but it is as old and quiet
and forgotten as if it were lost in one of the great counties of the
north.
Gypsy wagons were halted on one corner of the heath, and the women
cooked supper in the early twilight while the men lay on the ground and
smoked their pipes. Their children, catching sight of two prosperous
strangers, ran without prompting to beg. Ordham and Margarethe gave them
silver, then, declining to have their fortunes told, in other words
getting rid of them, strolled out over the heath. This large piece of
waste land is as wild as anything in America, broken and rough of
surface and covered with tangled grasses and shrubs. Beyond was what
looked to be a black mass of woods, but the glimpse of a gateway
suggested that they might be but the generously planted trees of a park.
A grey church spire of some distant hamlet stood out sharply against a
red band of afterglow. There was an intermittent tinkle of cow-bells,
but no other sound.
They sat down in the very centre of the heath and watched the twilight
gather, that long English twilight without chill or dew which brings
with it something of the mystery of night while still holding in a loose
embrace the safeguards of day. At that hour the flowers smell more
sweetly, the night moths flutter among them, and man feels that his
day’s work is done. A pungent scent rose from the gorse of Stanmore
Heath, but Margarethe, who had felt as exhilarated all day as if she
were a girl unexpectedly alone with a man secretly loved, felt her
spirits drop. She remembered who she was and one of her objects in
coming to London. So far not a word had passed between them concerning
his married life. They had renewed the old intimate friendship in
snatches that made them eager for more, but had found much to talk about
in the monuments they visited, the most tactful programme for Covent
Garden, in many subjects of common impersonal interest. But Margarethe
had determined upon at least one crossed and dotted conversation with
Ordham, and she believed this to be the time.
Ordham, too, was silent, staring straight before him with an expression
which Styr had seen before when words lagged, an expression of mingled
abstraction, astonishment, and apprehension.
“I want the whole story,” she said abruptly.
He turned to her with a start and flush. “The whole story?”
“Yes. All that has happened since we parted in Munich.”
“I thought we were to ignore the subject of my marriage.”
“To ignore is not to forget. I have tormented myself with so many
versions—possibilities—how shall I call it? I want the truth. It will
lay the ghost.”
“I am afraid you will hate me. I was an inconceivable ass.”
“No—it is wonderful that the story should be always the same and always
different! But I hate generalities. I cannot go on confounding you with
millions of other men. I want the specific incidents, your own version.
A man’s viewpoint is always his best excuse.”
“Very well.” And as his love for her had always appealed to the
carefully secluded fount of truth in his nature, for love would be
wholly truth were it not for life, he told the story from beginning to
end, omitting neither the skilful plot he had since unravelled, nor his
own abject surrender.
“I loved Mabel; there can be no doubt of that. I suppose that the long
root of such love is the axis of life. It permits millions to marry
every day that have little or no prospect of educating or even
supporting possible offspring; but if they paused to forecast, in other
words, if their brains were not in a state of toxic poisoning from this
love secretion, whatever it may be, the race would soon put an end to
itself. Perhaps in time the law will step in and forbid marriages before
the man is thirty and the woman twenty-five. As for the turbulence of
desire and suffering—after one has endured the acute stage for a
certain length of time, there is bound to be a decline and reaction. Man
simply cannot suffer and desire at concert pitch forever. Moreover, did
the law forbid the banns, a man would take jolly good care to keep out
of harm’s way. But I know now that even had Mabel been all they made me
believe, all that she looked, I should have ceased to care tuppence for
her, although no doubt rather later. It is not necessary to explain the
reason to you. A man may love many times in his life, but only one woman
takes full and complete possession of his inner kingdom, as you have
called it. Man is a sultan. One woman is his sultana; the others,
absorbing enough during their little hour, are the caprices of his
desultory harem. It is odd that his legal wife should so often be but
one of these casual minor passions, and the woman he may never possess
the one to persuade him of the immortality of love. It is a nice comment
upon the makeshifts of civilization.”
Styr stirred uneasily. She was white, for the story had cut her even
more deeply than she had anticipated. It is not pleasant to hear your
chosen idol draw a picture of his youthful passion, his first abandon
for another woman. She had clenched her long hands, and a blast from the
furnace of her soul sped in the direction of Grosvenor Square. But she
answered judicially: “The first study of civilized nations is every
possible precaution against anarchy. They are doing their little best;
we can only wait until the world grows wiser.” Then she laughed with a
fair assumption of gayety. “It is something more than humorous that I
should be the one to say that, not you: I, Margarethe Styr, and you,
John Ordham, so soon to be a hereditary legislator of the most wisely
governed country on earth. Well! Never mind! I have played many rôles in
my life.”
“Will you not tell me that story now?” he asked eagerly. “You have half
promised, more than once. And I am sick of outrageous concoctions. The
truth could not be worse.”
“The truth is always worse, when there is any foundation for gossip at
all. No!” she said violently, her voice harsh with the revolt let loose
by his own story. “I will never tell you. It is only because I have
lived so much, suffered so much, weathered a thousand storms, that I
have been able to listen to all you have told me to-night without hating
you. Were it otherwise, were I ten years younger, it would be months
before I should want even to look at you again. You could never stand a
similar—a far worse test. This life may not be for us, but at all
events you shall never hear from my lips what would make you—Ah! Bah!”
“Do you believe in another life?” he asked, tactfully ignoring this
outburst, in which he secretly exulted.
“This inner life of ours does not undergo death and resurrection for
nothing,” she replied sullenly. “Nor is imagination a mere offshoot of
the active mind. If it means anything, it means that somewhere, in some
future incarnation, or on some more satisfactory planet, its supernormal
efforts will become the facts of existence. And what then? Still subtler
and more imperative wants that can only be realized in a higher state
still? It makes one incline to Buddhism and Nirvana.”
“Either way of looking at it is a poor compensation for the
disappointments of this life, when you are young, at least; and when you
are old, you don’t care. The trouble is with civilization. We need a new
religion. Perhaps the solution is in a combination of the Eastern and
Western forms. It is as significant that Christianity has converted but
one-third of the Earth’s peoples as that the remaining two-thirds are an
anomaly in this eve of the twentieth century. The last are too
supercilious in their ancient wisdom to borrow anything from us. We are
raw conceited schoolboys, too ignorant, and worse, to help ourselves
from their abundant stores. Perhaps the time will come.”
Margarethe suppressed her feminine resentment at generalities in the
twilight. “Well, that may be one of your many missions. But it was not a
personal craving alone that made me demand the history of these last ten
months. It is an immense relief to me to know that your eyes are opened,
that you are no longer blinded by either love or cunning. I have a
strong suspicion, and so has Excellenz, that they do not intend you
shall go abroad. I have heard since my arrival of your wife’s consuming
ambition to be a beauty in London, of her detestation of Continental
life, the third, or fourth, fiddle she would be forced to play for many
years. They will keep you here if they can.”
“I have heard nothing of all this, but I shouldn’t wonder—and it makes
no difference. As soon as my wife is able to travel, I go to whatever
post is open to me. I should go the day you left London had I not given
my word to remain here until September or thereabouts.”
“And what if she refuses to go with you?”
Ordham smiled grimly. “I have not the faintest idea she will refuse to
go with me when she is persuaded that no argument or threat will keep me
at home. I can understand that she will hate to leave
London,—England,—but she will accompany me. Small doubt of that.”
Margarethe set her teeth. It was with some difficulty that she clung to
the programme she had worked out before arriving in England. To
manipulate him until his wife should be abhorrent and desertion
inevitable, with the consequent scandal and disaster, was not the part
she had set herself to play in his life. But when the rich soil of a
woman’s nature, long covered with the volcanic ashes of old passions,
which conserve and fertilize, is sprouting with the roses and the
toadstools of a new passion, the rôles of operatic masterpieces are mere
play to that of the disinterested friend. Margarethe had come to this
renewal of their intimacy secure in the belief that her passions were
either dead or safely entombed; but they had revealed themselves,
insolent and powerful, when, shaken with the tumults of Isolde, she had
met his eyes that first night in Covent Garden. She was appalled, but
her will lost nothing of its strength, she had practised self-control
for many years; and by one of those profound and obscure contradictions,
ever manifesting themselves in human nature, her idealism recovered from
its late inertia and entered upon a new lease. The more insistently and
unequivocally love spoke, the more determined she grew that descend to
that buried plane set thick with awful corpses she would not, those dead
foul memories that must forever make the materializing of love mean but
one more carnal experience. Once she could have idealized this bond,
even had she known Ordham in her ignorant youth, a thousand times more
had she met him with a mature mind and a past of even comparative
ignorance; but now, the moment she gave herself, all power of idealism
would be slain, and she believed that she should kill herself—perhaps
him as well.
Nor was self-control an unendurable tax. She had passed that first and
best period of reproductiveness, when passion drowns reason, nor had she
reached that age when so many women fatally awaken to the fact that but
a bit of youth remains and they had best make the most of it. Moreover,
perhaps the vitalest point of all, she was a great artist with the world
at her feet. Poor women, that had only their good intentions to bulwark
them! She threw them a passing sympathy.
“Perhaps it is not necessary,” she said abruptly, “but I should like
your promise that you will permit nothing to interfere with your career,
the public exercise of your best energies. I know that you will not
reply, ‘Of course!’ and that if you make me the promise you will keep
it.”
“The promise is not necessary, but you shall have it if you wish. What
else have I left? Were it not for that prospect of future usefulness and
activity—I don’t care to think of what I should become—or be doing at
the present moment.”
“Speculation would be throwing away good time, for without the abilities
which are driving you into a career you would not be you. But what you
must husband at present are your opportunities. In some subtle way, your
wife, supported by your mother, who seems to have great political
influence—I believe you told me that two of her cousins or uncles are
in the present cabinet?—might rear obstacles, create postponements,
until the government wiped you off its slate as a trifler who was
blocking the way of more serious men.”
He sat up in a sudden fright. “I’ll go to the F. O. to-morrow and ask
definitely for a post in September, giving my word that nothing less
than a mortal illness shall prevent my departure the moment I get
orders.”
She leaned forward eagerly, and, taking his hand, held it against her
breast, which was neither cold nor calm. “You promise me that, you swear
it,” she whispered.
He trembled violently, his lids dropped, and he made a sudden movement
as if to take her in his arms. She stood up.
“Gypsies have strong eyes,” she said lightly.
“So much the better,” said Ordham.
“If you kiss me, this will be the last time we shall ever be alone.”
“Again, so much the better. I am going to kiss you, and I am willing to
take the consequences. If you run from me, you will stumble.”