Sergius got up from his chair and stood by the fire. He was obviously
becoming engrossed by the conversation. Anthony could at least notice
this with thankfulness.
"Anthony, I see you've got a fresh knowledge of Vernon since I was with
you yesterday," Sergius continued; "some new knowledge of his nature."
"Perhaps I have."
"How did you get it?"
"Does that matter?"
"You have heard of something about him?"
"No."
"You have seen him, then; I say, you have seen him?"
Anthony hesitated. He pushed the champagne bottle over towards Sergius.
It had been placed on a little table near the fireplace.
"No; I don't want to drink. Why on earth don't you answer me, Anthony?"
"I have always felt that Vernon was a coward. His conduct to you shows
it. He was--or seemed--your friend. He saw you deeply in love with
this--with Olga. He chose to ruin her after he knew of your love. Who
but a coward could act in such a way?"
An expression of dark impatience came into the eyes of Sergius.
"You are confusing treachery and cowardice, and you are doing it
untruthfully. You have seen Vernon."
Anthony thought for a moment, and then said:
"Yes, I have."
"By chance, of course. Why did you speak to him?"
"I thought I would."
Sergius was obviously disturbed and surprised. The deeply emotional, yet
rigid calm in which he had been enveloped all the evening was broken at
last. A slight excitement, a distinct surface irritation, woke in him.
Anthony felt an odd sense of relief as he observed it. For the
constraint of Sergius had begun to weigh upon him like a heavy burden
and to move him to an indefinable dread.
"I wonder you didn't cut him," Sergius said. "You're my friend. And
he's--he's--"
"He's done you a deadly injury. I know that. I am your friend, Serge; I
would do anything for you."
"Yet you speak to that--devil."
"I spoke to him because I'm your friend."
Sergius sat down again, with a heavy look, the look of a man who has
been thrashed, and means to return every blow with curious interest.
"You parsons are a riddle to me," he said in a low and dull voice. "You
and your charity and your loving-kindness, and your turning the cheek to
the smiter and all the rest of it. And as to your way of showing
friendship--"
His voice died away in something that was almost a growl, and he stared
at the carpet. Between it and his eyes once more the mist seemed rising
stealthily. It began to curl upwards softly about him. As he watched it,
he heard Anthony say:--
"Sergius, you don't understand how well I understand you."
The big hand of the clock had left the half-hour after ten behind him.
Anthony breathed more freely. At last he could be more explicit, more
unreserved. He thought of a train rushing through the night, devouring
the spaces of land that lie between London and the sea that speaks,
moaning, to the South of England. He saw a ship glide out from the
dreary docks. Her lights gleamed. He heard the bell struck and the harsh
cry of the sailors, and then the dim sigh of a coward who had escaped
what he had merited. Then he heard Sergius laugh.
"That again, Anthony!"
"Yes. I didn't meet Vernon by chance at all."
"What? You wrote to him, you fixed a meeting?"
"I went to Phillimore Place, to his house."
Sergius said nothing. Strange furrows ploughed themselves in his young
face, which was growing dusky white. He remained in the attitude of one
devoted entirely to listening.
"You hear, Sergius?"
"Go on--when?"
"To-day. I decided to go after I met you yesterday night--and after I
had seen that woman die--unprepared."
"What could she have to do with it?"
"Much. Everything almost."
Anthony got up now, almost sprang up from his chair. His face was
glowing and working with emotion. There was a choking sensation in his
throat.
"You don't know what it is," he said hoarsely, "to a man with--with
strong religious belief to see a human being's soul go out to blackness,
to punishment--perhaps to punishment that will never end. It's
abominable. It's unbearable. That woman will haunt me. Her despair will
be with me always. I could not add to that horror."
His eyes once more sought the clock. Seeing the hour, he turned, with a
kind of liberating relief, to Sergius.
"I couldn't add to it," he exclaimed, almost fiercely, "so I went to
Vernon."
"Why?"
"Sergius--to warn him."
There was a dead silence. Even the rain was hushed against the window.
Then Sergius said, in a voice that was cold as the sound of falling
water in winter:--
"I don't understand."
"Because you won't understand how I have learnt to know you, Sergius, to
understand you, to read your soul."
"Mine too?"
"Yes; I've felt this awful blow that's come upon you--the loss of Olga,
her ruin--as if I myself were you. We haven't said much about it till
yesterday. Then, from the way you spoke, from the way you looked, from
what you said, even what you wouldn't say, I guessed all that was in
your heart."
"You guessed all that?"
Sergius was looking directly at Anthony and leaning against the
mantelpiece, along which he stretched one arm. His fingers closed and
unclosed, with a mechanical and rhythmical movement, round a china
figure. The motion looked as if it were made in obedience to some
fiercely monotonous music.
"Yes, more--I knew it."
Sergius nodded.
"I see," he said.
Anthony touched his arm, almost with an awe-struck gesture.
"I knew then that you--that you intended to kill Vernon. And--God
forgive me!--at first I was almost glad."
"Well--go on!"
Anthony shivered. The voice of Sergius was so strangely calm and level.
"I--I--" he stammered. "Serge, why do you look at me like that?"
Sergius looked away without a word.
"For I, too, hated Vernon, more for what he had done to you even than
for what he had done to Olga. But, Sergius, after you had gone, in the
night, and in the dawn too, I kept on thinking of it over and over. I
couldn't get away from it--that you were going to commit such an awful
crime. I never slept. When at last it was morning, I went down to my
district; there are criminals there, you know."
"I know."
"I looked at them with new eyes, and in their eyes I saw you, always
you; and then I said to myself could I bear that you should become a
criminal?"
"You said that?"
The fingers of Sergius closed over the china figure, and did not
unclose.
"Yes. I almost resolved then to go to Vernon at once and to tell him
what I suspected--what I really knew."
The clock struck eleven. Anthony heard it; Sergius did not hear it.
"Then I went to sit with that wretched woman. Already I had resolved, as
I believed, on the course to take. I had no thought for Vernon yet, only
for you. It seemed to me that I did not care in the least to save him
from death. I only cared to save you--my friend--from murder. But when
the woman died I felt differently. My resolve was strengthened, my
desire was just doubled. I had to save not only you, but also him. He
was not ready to die."
Anthony trembled with a passion of emotion. Sergius remained always
perfectly calm, the china figure prisoned in his hand.
"So--so I went to him, Sergius."
"Yes."
"I saw him. Almost as I entered he received your letter, saying that you
forgave him, that you would call to-night after eight o'clock to tell
him so, and to urge on his marriage with Olga. When he had read the
letter--I interpreted it to him; and then I found out that he was a
coward. His terror was abject--despicable; he implored my help; he
started at every sound."
"To-night he'll sleep quietly, Anthony."
"To-night he has gone. Before morning he will be on the sea."
The sound of the wind came to them again, and Sergius understood why
Anthony had said: "Rough at sea to-night."
Suddenly Sergius moved; he unclosed his fingers: the ruins of the china
figure fell from them in a dust of blue and white upon the mantelpiece.
"No--it's too late, Sergius. He went at eleven."
Sergius stood quite still.
"You came here to-night to keep me here till he had gone?"
"Yes."
"That's why you--"
He stopped.
"That's why I came. That's why I broke my pledge. I thought wine--any
weapon to keep you from this crime. And, Sergius, think. Vernon dead
could never have restored Olga to the place she has lost. That, too,
must have driven me to the right course, though I scarcely thought of it
till now."