" ... Naaman came with his horses and with his chariot, and stood
at the door of the house of Elisha.
And Elisha sent a messenger unto him, saying, Go and wash in Jordan
seven times, and thy flesh shall come again to thee, and thou shalt
be clean.
But Naaman was wroth, and went away, and said, Behold, I thought,
He will surely come out to me, and stand, and call on the name of
the Lord his God, and strike his hand over the place, and recover
the leper.
Are not Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the
waters of Israel, may I not wash in them, and be clean ...?"
II KINGS 5:9-12.
1
When a man has crossed the water-shed of forty, his power of
recuperation is sorrily reduced. Perhaps he succumbs less easily to
illness or injury, the bruises may take longer to shew themselves, but
they also take far longer to disappear.
I found this literally and metaphorically true during the weeks when I
lay at "The Sanctuary." After my one painful descent to the telephone, I
returned to bed and stayed there for a month. One part of my body after
another swelled and changed colour; I was pitifully weak, and for the
first time in my life my nerves seemed to have gone limp. The memory of
my fight with Grayle haunted me, I could not concentrate my mind on
anything and I lacked the native buoyancy to want to get well. Bertrand
and George were obviously anxious, but even to oblige them I could not
put forth strength which was not in me; the weeks rolled by, and I
remained a listless and, I am afraid, an exacting and irritable invalid.
As my name had not been published, as I could in fact plead serious
ill-health at the time of the inquest on Beresford, I saw no purpose in
thrusting myself on the public until I knew what explanation Grayle
proposed to give. Curious enquirers were simply informed that I had met
with an accident. In the early days we used to watch the bulletins of
Grayle's health and the formation of the new government in parallel
columns; and the second made more rapid progress than the first. The
chief offices were allotted, one after another, and the minor positions
down to the last Junior Lordship of the Treasury; at the beginning it
was occasionally stated that "at one time Colonel Grayle's name was
mentioned in connection with" this or that or the other appointment;
gradually the references to him became rarer until his own paper wrote
his political epitaph and announced with conventional regret that, while
the Prime Minister was believed to have been hoping to make use of his
services, his present condition of health put the acceptance of any
office out of the question.
Bertrand smiled grimly, as he shewed me the paragraph, but I was
impatiently waiting until Grayle's condition of health enabled him to
give me a lead. It came at last through the medium of Bertrand on a
night when he had been dining at the House and had seen Grayle for the
first time since the fire. I am a tolerably humane man and, though I had
struck upon provocation and in defence of my own life, I regretted the
state to which I had reduced my opponent. He now walked with two
crutches and a sling for his foot in place of the one stick; his head
was generously bandaged, and, though a curious faint down was beginning
to appear on the exposed portions of his scalp, he no longer wore a
moustache, and his eyebrows were singed out of existence.
A circle of his friends was bombarding him with questions and comments
from all sides at once--"You had a near shave," "Were you badly hurt?"
And then the inevitable enquiry--"How did it start?"
Grayle began a roaming description of the garage and loft, its
tinder-dry wood-work, its equipment of inflammable papers and the like.
"There was a large quantity of petrol there, too," he explained
confidentially, "but I don't want this talked about. I had no business
to have it there; it was too near the house; the place--as we've amply
shewn--was in no sense fire-proof. I should have the County Council or
some other damned interfering body on my back, if it came out; I'm not
claiming from the insurance company, as it is, for fear of too many
questions. They let me down lightly at the inquest, because there was no
one who could give evidence. So this is a secret session," he ended with
a laugh, as he began to hoist himself away towards a chair.
One or two of his companions followed and relieved him of his crutches,
as he sat down.
"But how did it start?" he was asked again.
"The lamp was overturned," Grayle answered promptly. "You see, I got a
message that this poor fellow Beresford--he was the deluded fanatic who
was always getting locked up for seditious pamphlets, you know--that he
wanted to see me on urgent business, so I went off, expecting to find
that the fellow was in trouble again--I knew him slightly, you see; we'd
met at people's houses--when I got there, we sat and talked a bit. Well,
he was lame--like me...."
He paused and pulled at the bandage on his head.
"Where had I got to?" he asked a moment later.
"You sat and talked," Bertrand put in from behind.
Grayle turned round quickly and caught sight of him for the first time.
"You're the very man I've been wanting to see!" he exclaimed; and then
to the others, "Excuse me a minute."
Bertrand pulled up a chair, as they withdrew.
"You must be grateful to me for coming when I did," he began. "The story
didn't seem to be going with much of a swing."
"You can leave my explanation to take care of itself," Grayle answered
shortly.
"I felt I could make it a bit fuller," Bertrand suggested.
Grayle looked at him enquiringly.
"I see. Well, you're at liberty to tell your tale, and I'll tell mine.
Or we can both leave it where it is. I admit that some people aren't
quite satisfied at present, but I manage to get rid of them,--as you've
seen. If you want me even to drop a hint that there was an attempt
at----?"
His lips formed the word, but he did not utter it; and the unexpected
silence was surprisingly sinister.
"It's no business of mine what lies you tell," Bertrand answered. "Is
that all you wanted to say? If so, I'll move along."
In the week before Christmas O'Rane returned from Melton to find me
immovably billeted upon him. After the first greetings he sat silent and
reflective. I could see that he wanted to talk and did not know how to
begin. The room was his wife's, and there were still marks by the lock,
where he had burst it from the wood-work. God knows what his thoughts
must have been! As I looked at his slight figure, lazily reposing in a
long chair, and at his self-possessed, unrevealing face, I found it hard
to picture the scene when he broke in the door. And for the thousandth
time since that day of tragedy I asked myself what had been left him in
life and longed for him to ask at least for sympathy, if he knew that I
could give him no more help.
When he spoke, it was to make some comment on the war. The month-old
rumour that the cabinet had broken on the question of peace negotiations
was still flourishing. Rather than face another winter in the trenches
the German Government was alleged to have made an offer to evacuate
Belgium and northern France with the alternative of a threat, in the
event of the war's continuing, that every neutral and allied ship
sailing under whatsoever flag would be sunk at sight without warning. A
school that was faint-hearted in asserting itself, even if it were not
faint-hearted in the prosecution of the war, whispered that we must not
miss our market and--in Bertrand's phrase--refuse terms now that we
should have to accept gratefully and after the loss of another half
million men in six months' time. The rival school of stalwarts
proclaimed with great show of reason that Germany would talk of peace
only at her own convenience--or necessity--and that her needs were our
opportunity.
We went on to talk of the new government and its prospect of life. In
the week before I was incapacitated political passion in London rose
higher than I have ever known it. The old government, tired and
indolent, half-hearted and uncaring, was losing the war beyond hopes of
recovery. The new government had intrigued its way into place, selling
its soul to Lord Northcliffe, as Faust sold his soul to the devil.... As
a very independent member I was privileged to hear both opinions in
approximately equal numbers and certainly with equal violence of
expression. I described to O'Rane two characteristic meetings within
five minutes of each other. I had been walking from my office to lunch
at the County Club one day, when I stopped to observe an unusual number
of cars and a considerable crowd of loafers outside the Reform Club.
George Oakleigh came up from behind and asked what I was watching.
"It's the party meeting," he explained. "Aren't you going?"
"Not invited, George," I said. "I'm left out of these pleasant little
gatherings. What are they meeting about?"
"To hear a statement from Asquith. There'll be a vote of confidence, I
suppose. He's still the leader of the Liberal Party!" he proclaimed with
a note of challenge.
"This partisan enthusiasm is new to you," I commented.
Any hint of raillery was lost on him.
"I daresay it is!" he cried. "I was a candid friend in the old '06
parliament, I've voted against them a score of times, but, when I see
how they held the country together in the first shock of the war, when I
see what they did.... And now to be turned out by a low press conspiracy
and a man who owes his political salvation to Asquith, a man who was
pulled out of the gutter at the time of the Marconi scandal ... when
the whole party nearly split. My God! talk about gratitude in politics!"
He hurried away still most unwontedly explosive, and I followed more
slowly. At the corner of St. James' Square I found Beresford also
watching the crowd. (It was our last meeting before he called on me in
the afternoon of our tragic expedition.)
"They're broken! Their noses are in the dirt,--and thank God for it!" he
cried, pointing excitedly across the road. "_They_ were responsible!
_They_ dragged us into the war, it was _their_ war, _their_ diplomacy!
Asquith, Haldane and Grey. And now they're in the gutter!"
I remember walking on to luncheon with both conceptions to digest as an
appetiser.
O'Rane and I talked long of political futures. The Government had
resigned without challenge or defeat; we may have felt that we ought to
have been consulted, as a compliment to the unfailing support which we
had given; we might even dislike the new ministry's mode of birth, but
we agreed in thinking that we must give the new management a trial
before reverting to those who had failed to keep order in their own
home. Suddenly O'Rane interrupted me with a question which shewed that
his thoughts had been for some time at a distance from domestic
politics.
"Er--Stornaway," he said with noticeable nervousness. "You remember when
you came to see me at Melton some weeks ago? You were going to set
enquiries on foot to find out where Sonia had got to."
I told him what had been done and how we had failed. There had not been
many days for me between giving my promise of help and involving myself
in the encounter with Grayle, but George and his sleuth-hound colleague
continued to ransack every resource suggested by friendship or
professional pique. And at the end of three weeks they were as near
finding her as at the beginning.
"She is either staying with friends or hiding away in rooms somewhere,"
I told O'Rane as my conclusion. "And I can't suggest any way of tracking
her down. It's a waste of time to advertise; she's hiding, because she
doesn't want to be found. If I may advise you, wouldn't it be wiser to
leave her where she is? I take it that you've stopped proceedings?"
"I've stopped proceedings," he answered, and his chin dropped forward on
to his chest so that I should not see the movements of his thin face.
"Then there's nothing to discuss with her. If at any time in the future
she or you want to regain your liberty, you can start out to get in
touch with her then. Any question of stopping her allowance is mere
persecution--and I don't even know that it's likely to be successful
persecution. She drew a cheque for twenty pounds on the day she left
Grayle; and she's not drawn a penny since. It'll take some time to
exhaust her balance, and, if she finds that her quarterly cheque isn't
being paid regularly, you know even better than I do that she'll starve
or beg or work her fingers to the bone before she'll give in."
O'Rane was long without answering. Then he dragged himself out of the
chair, shook hands and bade me good-night.
"I must have a look for her myself," he murmured, as though he were
thinking aloud.
"O'Rane, she's clearly avoiding you," I pleaded. "Will it do any good?"
"I _must_ meet her!" he cried tremulously.
If I said a very brutal thing then, I said it because I thought that in
the long run it was kindest.
"Let me tell you one thing before you go," I begged him. "O'Rane, you're
not facing realities, you know; you're playing with the idea of
reconciliations, you think that it's possible to get your wife back and
to live with her again. My dear boy, you must use your imagination.
Think of the mental process that took her away, think what her
experience has been, think what her mental state must be now. She will
never come back to you. And you couldn't live with her, even if she
did." O'Rane went out of the room without answering by word or gesture.
2
On Christmas Day George came into my room after dinner. He betrayed
considerable excitement and was carrying a stout red book in one hand.
"I've tracked her down!" he exclaimed almost before the door was closed.
"Tracked who down?" I asked without any great interest.
"Sonia. I caught sight of her at the Savoy--outside the Savoy,
rather--after lunch. The Maitlands were giving a party, and, as we came
out into the court-yard, Gerald Deganway put up his eye-glass and dug me
in the ribs. Then I saw her in some kind of livery or uniform, driving a
car. She didn't see me, and I don't think she wanted to be seen, because
she was sitting rather hunched up and with her face turned away.... Then
an old general stumped out and told her where to go; she said, 'Yes,
sir,' turned the head of the car and drove away. I just had time to see
the number and I spent a useful hour or two this afternoon finding who
it belonged to. Apparently the old boy calls himself Brigadier-General
Sir Andrew Lampwood. Now we'll turn him up in 'Who's Who.'"
He dropped into a chair, filled a pipe and began to turn the pages.
General Lampwood, I gathered from his fragmentary recital, had been
educated at Eton and Sandhurst ... had served in Egypt, India, Egypt
again and South Africa ... despatches, medals, clasps ... a widower with
two sons ... one house in Wilton Crescent and another in Norfolk ...
Naval and Military, Turf, Ranelagh....
"Well, if Raney wants her, he knows where to find her," he ended. "I
suppose you've never met this Lampwood? No more have I." He shut the
book with a snap and drummed with his knuckles on the binding. "No
wonder we couldn't find her; she's probably living in rooms near by,
driving for him all day.... I'm surprised that nobody should have seen
her till to-day; she's so well-known, and it's the sort of thing the
picture-papers love to get hold of." He sniffed contemptuously.
"'Recruit to the Ranks of Society War-Workers!' ... I suppose she can
only just have felt that she must do something and have somewhere to
live----"
"Do you find people still talking about her?" I interrupted.
"They always have and they always will." He lay back and smoked for a
few moments in a reflective silence. "Ever since she came out.... Of
course, she's a really beautiful woman--always has been--and she's got a
lot of glib society patter and she _can_ make herself almost
irresistible to most men. As she would say herself, her technique is
perfect. And, if you never waste your energy on emotions, I suppose
you're left with a tremendous lot for your precious technique. She can
be so charming to everyone, when she likes, that she'll make a success
of anything from a sticky dinner to a charity bazaar. She was always a
success, she knew it, she got temperamentally drunk on it--until I think
that the only thing she cared about was being admired, wanted, loved....
And now she's driving a car for a dug-out general...."
"But what are people saying about her?" I persisted.
"Oh, the old scandal's been toned down to almost nothing. She was being
seen about with Grayle too much, and Raney put his foot down and said it
was to stop." He grinned maliciously. "Lady Pentyre told me at lunch
to-day that it was perfectly abominable the way people went about
_inventing_ lies--and about a _sweet_ girl like that! It came so well
from Lady Pentyre."
He smoked in silence until O'Rane came in for the five minutes that he
always spared me on his way to bed. George repeated what he had told me
and asked if there was anything that he could do.
O'Rane listened without any change of expression and then said that he
would write to Lady Dainton.
"There's nothing more you'd like me to do?" George asked again.
There was a moment's hesitation in which O'Rane's unsmiling face became
graver.
"Well, I can't do it for myself," he said and paused again. "I--I wonder
if it would be possible for you to get a word with Sonia--find out what
time she starts in the morning and then intercept her----"
"Well?" George encouraged him.
"I wouldn't bother you, if I could see," O'Rane resumed apologetically.
"Tell her that if she wants anything----"