Treats of Further Incidents in the House with the White Door
The mud on the suburban road sucked about the feet of Mavering's horse.
So he came again at night to the hospital above the river and to the
brick house with the white door and pillars. Another horse was fastened
at the gate. A fat, grinning negro woman opened the door, and when he
entered the room, Helen started forward with an exclamation, a red spot
on each cheek that did not belong there; Rachel smiled graciously and
came towards him in the manner of polished and experienced hospitality;
and the man who stood backed against the chimney-piece, his shoulders
covering half of it and looking as massive as the brickwork, was Morgan
Map. He gathered his yellow eyebrows at seeing Mavering, moved, swayed
an instant, then clicked his teeth and waited stiffly with back set to
the brickwork.
"Ah, captain!"
Morgan growled something indistinguishable. Mavering's wide mouth had on
its widest smile, and in his soul was pleasure and appreciation.
"We have here," he thought, "a tidy little game."
He sat down and described the late battle, and considered. Morgan
finally took his hat.
"Are you going into the city, Mavering?"
"Don't wait for me. Oh! It occurs to me--that paper you lost,
containing, you recollect, certain specifications, was captured and went
South." He had the thread of his fluency in hand now. "The object for
which it appeared to have been drawn up was, as perhaps you have
heard"--a pause--"not entirely attained, and I don't know that it may
not itself have been destroyed. Probably not. At any rate, witnesses
could be found down there in time, affidavits and so on, as to what it
contained and the circumstances of its--its loss, which contents and
circumstances and their purport are only known to you, to me, and to the
person to whom the specifications referred. I propose, if you don't
mind, to make Mrs. Mavering a fourth."
"You'd better ride into the city with me."
"I should be pleased to oblige you, but it's not my funeral. I have my
own obsequies in process. Why make myself likely to become a secondary
corpse at another man's?"
"Then I'd like a few minutes' talk."
"Another time. My dear sir, why worry? why be anxious? You can't do
otherwise than exactly as you may be requested."
"That means there must be a deal," said Morgan, simply. "All right."
Mavering thought, "Blanked if I don't admire him!" and said: "Not a
deal--rather, I imagine, a surrender to stated terms."
"Where are you staying?" Morgan asked.
"Oh, never mind about me. I have that singular dislike just mentioned to
the rôle of a secondary corpse. But let me suggest specifically that you
might come out here in the course of your convenience and receive from
Mrs. Mavering what we will call, perhaps, advice. My opinion is that it
will be the--let us say--advice which you'll have to follow; but, of
course, your own judgment, sagacity, talents for strategic
combination--believe me. I have the highest admiration for them--will be
the best of guides."
Morgan said, "All right," quite simply, and Mavering again thought,
"Blanked if I don't admire him!" admiring him, perhaps personally, at
least dramatically, out of his own fund of appreciation for things that
were fit and consistent. The massive simplicity of Morgan, the primitive
unscrupulousness, the bulk and unity of desire in him, the shape and
size and weight of bone, all seemed to fit together. He was not
problematical--at least, not divided--not, in latter-day terms,
"differentiated"--within himself. "I suppose I know what Mrs. Mavering
would say. She needn't bother," Morgan continued, and stooped and kissed
Helen, who seemed to droop under his touch. Mavering admired him without
interruption. "A pyramid, an Assyrian bas-relief, a stately savage
unsophisticated by altruism and the Ten Commandments. I'd give something
to know what he is going to do. What _can_ he do?" He thought he would
take any reasonable odds that Helen loved this one rather than the
problematical anchorite, and would not give him up. In that case what
would Rachel do? The anchorite might be gone on his disembodied
adventure by this time, neither capable of nor interested in doing
anything mundane. But when Morgan was gone, and Helen, looking up
suddenly, asked, "Have you seen Gard?" the progress of his speculation
turned with abrupt angle.
"Good God! I apologize! I've seen him since the battle, Miss Bourn, but
had no conversation."
Helen was silent, and Rachel said:
"But you and Captain Map were very mysterious."
"True, without doubt it seemed so." He paused, studied the ceiling a
moment, and continued: "Map allowed a paper to fall into the hands of
the enemy, which accidentally did no harm, but in which unscrupulous and
self-seeking parties might find opportunity to make him trouble. I
should not say that he was at fault on a point of carelessness. In fact,
the plan, in a way, was admirable. I observe that the night is brilliant
and picturesque. If Mrs. Mavering will walk out with me, whereever the
ground is not intolerably sloppy, I will leave with her a hint which she
may deliver to Map, if he calls for it, and may indicate the substance
of it to Miss Bourn, if she sees fit."
Rachel put her cloak on and the two went out, leaving Helen before the
fire. She leaned her head on one hand so that her fingers were pushed
into her hair; the other hung over the arm of the chair, and looked
slight, listless, and pathetic.
The white steamer lay at the wharf, almost ready for departure. Mavering
broke the silence.
"I endeavor earnestly to become interested in another man's obsequies. I
fail. Do I go back to the city to-night, Rachel, a pariah, settled in my
caste? The question has more to me than an academic interest. If I go,
it will be something in the mood to find satisfaction in meeting and
doing vicious gun practice with Morgan Map, who is presumed to be
waiting in a solitary place a quarter of a mile down the road. Possibly
he is not. I don't know what his game will be."
Rachel had shrunk back when he began, and now stood still.
"You promised me--you said--"
"Very likely; the promise is broken."
A board fence was beside the road; she clung to it and shivered with the
old, half-forgotten terror.
"There was something else you were to tell me," she said at last. He
told her briefly the incident of the dropped paper, and concluded:
"It's no concern of mine, or yours, unless you're interested in this
girl, who appears to be the singularly efficient motive, of the state of
whose affections I am not informed. One of the last things that Windham
said to me was to tell you about it and tell you to save the girl,
meaning, I take it, with more precision of phrase, that you are to shunt
Map into the ditch, which you evidently can do if you want to. No doubt,
it will be my matrimonial duty to help, though the ethical side of
matrimony you wouldn't expect to appeal to me. No more it does. Is there
any side that appeals to you? What are you afraid of?"--with sudden
savageness--"of me? Keep your disgust to yourself, then, till I'm gone.
I'll get Map strung up if you like, or shot, or blotted out by
persuasion. Windham's probably dead, and doesn't care. Map's a damned
scoundrel like me, and a deal more concentrated. As for--"
Rachel caught his arm and stared up at him:
"Gard! What do you mean?"
And Mavering laughed.
"Gard, is it? This little melodrama is well done. Exit John Mavering
into the jaws of hell. What comes next? My pearl of a wife, my gentle
and frightened dove, _will_ you kindly state what you are up to?"
"It's Helen--"
"Helen! Helen, avaunt! I'm done."
"Oh, Jack, it all depends on him! Don't you see?"
"I see you care much for Windham, and perhaps yon girl with the yellow
hair, and have a sensitive dislike for me. Gods! she's pretty, yon girl,
but she ought to be fatter. I don't know whether Windham's dead or not,
but he looked like a consumptive plaster-cast when I saw him--been
ploughed and harrowed by a shell and made ready to be planted for
immortality, I inferred, but didn't inquire. What do I care for him or
the said girl who is pretty but should be fatter? What do I care for
you? I don't know. But if you propose matrimony for the two, I'll go so
far in friendship as to tell him he'd much better be planted. Am I such
slime to your cultured taste? Say so, then, and, by God! you've seen the
last of me."
Rachel recovered herself. She still held his arm. She pressed nearer and
was silent a moment. The steamer below the bank was brightly lit, the
docks bustling and noisy. "You needn't go. Come and help me, and ask
what you like. I think you love me a little. Perhaps I was wrong in the
beginning."
They went back towards the house. Mavering admitted a degree of
bewilderment. When Rachel was in a state of self-possession, it was
difficult not to feel inferior. There were times--moments of
weakness--when Mavering confessed a sensation towards her, never
elsewhere directed, and which might be called respect--a hesitation, a
summons somehow to draw back the great muddy river of event as well as
the confluent stream of his own imperturbable comment, to turn them
aside from pouring over her. It must have cost time and selection to
make Rachel, and the Mississippi lacked discrimination.
Helen sat as before, listlessly. Rachel knelt beside her and whispered.
Helen started; the listless hand gripped the arm of the chair with a
vigor that tore the cushion. She broke from Rachel's arms.
"Where is he?"
"Gods!" murmured Mavering, in deprecation. "This race of women! About
six miles back of the Creek landing."
"The steamer goes out at ten. Pack a basket, Rachel."
Helen left the room with a rush. Mavering looked after her with wakened
interest. "Who and what is this?" Rachel came to him and pleaded.
"I owe her everything. You left me so desperate--"
"I left you? I seem to have forgotten that."
"I thought there was nothing more for me. She brought me to life again.
Help her, Jack. I think we can neither of us change. I think it will be
the old story again. But I'll try."
Mavering looked down and felt a touch of compunction curious to himself.
"I suppose the anchorite was correct--problematical, but accurate. I
don't carry your price. You're too expensive for me. As to the
anchorite. I'll find him and bring him back, dead or alive. That's
cheap, but the rest of it is expensive."
A half hour later the white steamer was ploughing down the river.
Mavering, in the long, nearly empty cabin, stretched himself on a sofa,
denounced the execrable taste of steamboat furnishing, and went
philosophically to sleep. Helen, on the upper deck, stared at the
starlit Virginia shore.