On the morning Madame Beattie went, a strange intermittent procession
trickled by the house, workmen, on their way to different activities,
diverted from their usual road, and halting an instant to salute the
windows with a mournful gaze. Some of them took their hats off, and the
few who happened to catch a glimpse of Madame Beattie gave eager
salutation. At one time a group of them had collected, and these Esther
looked down on with a calm face but rage in her heart, wondering why she
must be disgraced to the last. But when Madame Beattie really went there
was no one in the street, and Esther, a cloak about her, stood by the
carriage in a scrupulous courtesy, stamping a little, ostensibly to keep
her feet warm but more than half because she was in a fever of
impatience lest the unwelcome guest should be detained. Madame Beattie
was irritatingly slow. She arranged herself in the hack as if for a
drive long enough to demand every precaution. Esther knew perfectly well
she was being exasperating to the last, and in that she was right. But
she could hardly know Madame Beattie had not a malevolent impulse toward
her: only a careless understanding of her, an amused acceptance. When
she had tucked herself about with the robe, undoing Denny's kind offices
and doing them over with a tedious moderation, she put out her arms to
draw Esther into a belated embrace. But Esther could not bear
everything. She dodged it, and Madame Beattie, not at all rebuffed, gave
her hoarse little crow of laughter.
"Well," said she, "I leave you. But not for long, I daresay."
"You'll be coming back by spring," said Esther, willing to turn off the
encounter neatly.
"I might," said Madame Beattie, "if Susan dies and leaves me everything.
But I sha'n't depend on seeing you. We shall meet, of course, but it'll
be over there." Again she laughed a little at a disconcerted stare from
Esther. "Tell him to go along," she said. "You'd better make up your
mind to Italy. Everything seems right, there, even to New
Englanders--pretty nearly everything. _Au revoir_."
She drove away chuckling to herself, and Esther stood a moment staring
blankly. It had actually happened, the incredible of which she had
dreamed. Madame Beattie was going, and now she herself was following too
soon to get the benefit of it.
Lydia was out that morning and Denny, who saw her first, drew up of his
own accord. It was not to be imagined by Denny that Madame Beattie and
Lydia should have spent long hours jogging together and not be grateful
for a last word. Madame Beattie, deep in probing of her little hand-bag,
looked up at the stopping of the hack, and smiled most cordially.
"Come along, imp," said she. "Get in here and go to the station with
me."
Lydia stepped in at once, very glad indeed of a word with her unpopular
friend.
"Are you truly going, Madame Beattie?" she asked, adding tumultuously,
since there was so little time to be friendly, "I'm sorry. I like you,
you know, Madame Beattie."
"Well, my dear," said Madame Beattie good-naturedly, "I fancy you're the
only soul in town that does, except perhaps those nice workmen I've
played the devil with. I only hope they'll succeed in playing the devil
themselves a little, even if I'm not here to coach them. I've explained
it all very carefully, just as I got the dirty little man to explain it
to me, and I think they'll be able to manage. When it all comes out you
can tell Jeff I did it. I began it when I thought it might be of some
advantage to me, but I've told Andrea to go on with it. It'll be more
amusing, on the whole."
"Go on with what?" inquired Lydia.
"Never mind. But you must write me and tell me how the election went. I
won't bother you with my address, but Alston Choate'll give it to you.
He intends to keep his eye on me, the stupid person. I wouldn't come
over here again if I were paid for it."
At the station Lydia, a little sick and sorry, because she hated changes
and also Madame Beattie kept some glamour for her, stepped out and gave
her old friend a firm hand to help her and then an arm to lean on.
Madame Beattie bade Denny a carelessly affectionate farewell and left
him her staunch ally. She knew how to bind her humbler adherents to her,
and indeed with honesty, because she usually liked them better than the
people who criticised her and combated and admired her from her own
plane. After the trunks were checked and she still had a margin of time,
she walked up and down the platform leaning on Lydia's arm, and talked
about the greyness of New England and the lovely immortalities of Italy.
When they saw the smoke far down the track, she stopped, still leaning
on Lydia.
"You've been a droll imp," she said. "If I had money I'd take you with
me and amuse myself seeing you in Italy. Your imp's eyes would be
rounder than they are now, and you'd fall in love with some handsome
scamp and find him out and grow up and leave him and we'd take an
apartment and sit there and laugh at everything. You can tell Jeff--"
the train was really nearing now and she bent and spoke at Lydia's
ear--"tell him he's going to be a free man, and if he doesn't make use
of his freedom he's a fool. She's going to run away. With Reardon."
"Who's going to run away?" Lydia shrilled up into her face. "Not
Esther?"
"Esther, to be sure. I gather they're off to-night. That's why I'm going
this morning. I don't want to be concerned in the silly business, though
when they're over there I shall make a point of looking them up. He'd
pay me anything to get rid of me."
The train was in, and her foot was on the step. But Lydia was holding
her back, her little face one sharp interrogation.
"Not to Europe?" she said. "You don't mean they're going to Europe?"
"Of course I do," said Madame Beattie, extricating herself. "Where else
is there to go? No, I sha'n't say another word. I waited till you
wouldn't have a chance to question me. Tell Jeff, but not till to-morrow
morning. Then they'll be gone and it won't be his responsibility.
Good-bye, imp."
She did not threaten Lydia with envelopment in her richness of velvet
and fur. Instead, to Lydia's confusion and wonder, ever-growing when she
thought about it afterward, she caught up her hand and gave it a light
kiss. Then she stepped up into the car and was borne away.
"I don't believe it," said Lydia aloud, and she walked off, glancing
down once at the hand that had been kissed and feeling gravely moved by
what seemed to her an honour from one of Madame Beattie's standing.
Lydia was never to forget that Madame Beattie had been a great lady, in
a different sense from inherited power and place. She was of those who
are endowed and to whom the world must give something because they have
given it so much. Should she obey her, and tell Jeff after the danger of
his stopping Esther was quite past? Lydia thought she would. And she
owned to herself the full truth about it. She did not for an instant
think she ought to keep her knowledge in obedience to Madame Beattie,
but she meant at least to give Jeff his chance. And as she thought, she
was walking home fast, and when she got there she hurried into the
library without taking off her hat, and asked the colonel:
"Where's Jeff?"
The colonel was sitting by the fire, a book in his hand in the most
correct position for reading. He had been deep in one of his friendly
little naps and had picked the book up when he heard her step and held
it with a convincing rigour.
"He's gone off for a tramp," said he, looking at her sleepily. "He'd
been writing and didn't feel very fit. I advised him to go and make a
day of it."
Anne came in then, and Lydia stared at her, wondering if Anne could
help. And yet, whatever Anne said, she was determined not to tell Jeff
until the morning. So she slowly took off her things and made brisk
tasks to do about the house. Only when the two o'clock train was nearly
due she seized her hat and pinned it on, slipped into her coat and
walked breathlessly to the station. She was there just before the train
came in and there also, a fine figure in his excellently fitting
clothes, was Reardon. He was walking the platform, nervously Lydia
thought, but he seemed not to be waiting for any one. Seeing her he
looked, though she might have fancied it, momentarily disconcerted, but
took off his hat to her and turned immediately to resume his march.
Suppose Esther came, Lydia wondered. What should she do? Should she stop
her, block her way, bid her remember Jeff? Or should she watch her to
the last flutter of her hatefully pretty clothes as she entered the car
with Reardon and, in the noise of the departing train, give one loud
hurrah because Jeff was going to be free? But the train came, and
Reardon, without a glance behind, though in a curious haste as if he
wanted at least to escape Lydia's eyes, entered and was taken away.
Again Lydia went home, and now she sat by the fire and could not talk,
her elbows on her knee, her chin supported in her hands.
"What is it?" Anne asked her. "You look mumpy."
Yes, Lydia, said, she was mumpy. She thought she had a cold. But though
Anne wanted to minister to her she was not allowed, and Lydia sat there
and watched the clock. At the early dark she grew restless.
"Farvie," said she, "shouldn't you think Jeff would come?"
"Why, no," said he, looking at her over his glasses, doing the
benevolent act, Lydia called it. "There's a moon, and he'll probably get
something to eat somewhere or even come back by train. It isn't his
night at the school."
At six o'clock Lydia began to realise that if Esther were going that day
she would take the next train. It would not be at all likely that she
took the "midnight" and got into New York jaded in the early morning.
She put on her hat and coat, and was going softly out when Anne called
to her:
"Lyd, if you've got a cold you stay in the house."
Lydia shut the door behind her and sped down the path. She thought she
should die--Lydia had frequent crises of dying when the consummations of
life eluded her--if she did not know whether Esther was going. Yet she
would not tell Jeff until it was too late, even if he were there on the
spot and if he blamed her forever for not telling him. This time she
stayed in a sheltering corner of the station, and not many minutes
before the train a dark figure passed her, Esther, veiled, carrying her
hand-bag, and walking fast. Lydia could have touched her arm, but
Esther, in her desire of secrecy, was trying to see no one. She, too,
stopped, in a deeper shadow at the end of the building. Either she had
her ticket or she was depending on the last minute for getting it.
Lydia, with a leap of conjecture concluded, and rightly, that she had
sent Sophy for it in advance. The local train came in, bringing the
workmen from the bridge, still being repaired up the track, and Lydia
shrank back a little as they passed her. And among them, finishing a
talk he had taken up on the train, was, incredibly, Jeff. Lydia did not
parley with her dubieties. She slipped after them in the shadow, came up
to him and touched him on the arm.
"Jeff!" she said.
He turned, dropped away from the men and stood there an instant looking
at her. Lydia's heart was racing. She had never felt such excitement in
her life. It seemed to her she should never get her breath again.
"What's the matter?" said Jeff. "Father all right?"
"She's going to run away with Reardon," said Lydia, her teeth clicking
on the words and biting some of them in two. "He went this afternoon.
They're going to meet."
"How do you know?"
Neither of them, in the course of their quick sentences, mentioned
Esther's name.
"Madame Beattie told me. Look over by that truck. Don't let her see
you."
Jeff turned slightly and saw the figure by the truck.
"She's going to take this train," said Lydia. "She's going to Reardon. O
Jeff, it's wicked."
Lydia had never thought much about things that were wicked. Either they
were brave things to do and you did them if you wanted to, or they were
underhand, hideous things and then you didn't want to do them. But
suddenly Esther seemed to her something floating, tossed and driven to
be caught up and saved from being swamped by what seas she knew not.
Jeff walked over to the dark figure by the truck. Whether he had
expected it to be Esther he could not have said, but even as it shrank
from him he knew.
"Come," said he. "Come home with me."
Esther stood perfectly silent like a shrinking wild thing endowed with a
protective catalepsy.
"Esther," said he, "I know where you're going. You mustn't go. You
sha'n't. Come home with me."
And as she did not move or answer he put his arm through hers and guided
her away. Just beyond the corner of the station in a back eddy of
solitude, she flung him off and darted three or four steps obliquely
before he caught her up and held her. Lydia, standing in the shadow, her
heart beating hard, heard his unmoved voice.
"Esther, you're not afraid of me? Come home with me. I won't touch you
if you'll promise to come. I can't let you go. I can't. It would be the
worst thing that ever happened to you."
"How do you know," she called, in a high hysterical voice, "where I'm
going?"
"You were going with somebody you mustn't go with," said Jeff. "We won't
talk about him. If he were here I shouldn't touch him. He's only a
fool. And it's your fault if you're going. But you mustn't go."
"I am going," said Esther, "to New York, and I have a perfect right to.
I shall spend a few days and get rested. Anybody that tells you anything
else tells lies."
"The train is coming," said Jeff. "Stand here, if you won't walk away
with me, and we'll let it go."
She tried again to wrench herself free, but she could not. Lydia,
standing in the shadow, felt a passionate sympathy. He was kind, Lydia
saw, he was compelling, but if he could have told the distracted
creature he had something to offer her beyond the bare protection of an
honourable intent, then she might have seen another gate open besides
the one that led nowhere. Almost, at that moment, Lydia would have had
him sorry enough to put his arms about her and offer the semblance of
love that is divinest sympathy. The train stopped for its appointed
minutes and went on.
"Come," said Jeff, "now we'll go home."
She turned and walked with him to the corner. There she swerved.
"No," said Jeff, "you're coming with me. That's the place for you.
They'll be good to you, all of them. They're awfully decent. I'll be
decent, too. You sha'n't feel you've been jailed. Only you can't walk
off and be a prisoner to--him. Things sha'n't be hard for you. They
shall be easier."
Lydia, behind, could believe he was going on in this broken flow of
words to soothe her, reassure her. "Oh," Lydia wanted to call to him,
"make love to her if you can. I don't care. Anything you want to do I'll
stand by, if it kills me. Haven't I said I'd die for you?"
But at that moment of high excitement Lydia didn't believe anything
would kill her, even seeing Jeff walk away from her with this little
wisp of wrong desires to hold and cherish.
Jeff took Esther up the winding path, opened the door and led her into
the library where his father sat yawning. Lydia slipped round the back
way to the kitchen and took off her hat and coat.
"Cold!" she said to Mary Nellen, to explain her coming, and warmed her
hands a moment before she went into the front hall and put her things
away.
"Father," said Jeff, with a loud cheerfulness that sounded fatuous in
his own ears, "here's Esther. She's come to stay."
The colonel got on his feet and advanced with his genial courtesy and
outstretched hand. But Esther stood like a stone and did not touch the
hand. Anne came in, at that moment, Lydia following. Anne had caught
Jeff's introduction and looked frankly disconcerted. But Lydia marched
straight up to Esther.
"I've always been hateful to you," she said, "whenever I've seen you.
I'm not so hateful now. And Anne's a dear. Farvie's lovely. We'll all do
everything we can to make it nice for you."
Jeff had been fumbling at the back of Esther's veil and Anne now, seeing
some strange significance in the moment, put her quick fingers to work.
The veil came off, and Esther stood there, white, stark, more tragic
than she had ever looked in all the troubles of her life. The colonel
gave a little exclamation of sorrow over her and drew up the best chair
to the fire, and Anne pushed back the lamp on the table so that its
light should not fall directly on her face. Then there were commonplace
questions and answers. Where had Jeff been? How many miles did he think
he had walked? And in the midst of the talk, while Lydia was upstairs
patting pillows and lighting the fire in the spare-chamber, Esther
suddenly began to cry in a low, dispirited way, no passion in it but
only discouragement and physical overthrow. These were real enough tears
and they hurt Jeff to the last point of nervous irritation.
"Don't," he said, and then stopped while Anne knelt beside her and, in a
rhythmic way, began to rub one of her hands, and the colonel stared into
the fire.
"Perhaps if you went upstairs!" Anne said to her gently. "I could really
rub you if you were in bed and Lydia'll bring up something nice and
hot."
"No, no," moaned Esther. "You're keeping me a prisoner. You must let me
go." Then, as Jeff, walking back and forth, came within range of her
glance, she flashed at him, "You've no right to keep me prisoner."
"No," said Jeff miserably, "maybe not. But I've got to make sure you're
safe. Stay to-night, Esther, and to-morrow, when you're rested, we'll
talk it over."
"To-morrow," she muttered, "it will be too late."
"That's it," said Jeff, understanding that it would be too late for her
to meet Reardon. "That's what I mean it shall be."
Anne got on her feet and held out a hand to her.
"Come," she said. "Let's go upstairs."
Esther shrank all over her body and gave a glance at Jeff. It was a
cruel glance, full of a definite repudiation.
"No, no," she said again, in a voice where fear was intentionally
dominant.
It stung him to a miserable sorrow for her and a hurt pride of his own.
"For God's sake, no!" he said. "You're going to be by yourself, poor
child! Run away with Anne."
So Esther rose unwillingly, and Anne took her up to the spacious chamber
where firelight was dancing on the wall and Lydia had completed all
sorts of hospitable offices. Lydia was there still, shrinking shyly into
the background, as having no means of communication with an Esther to
whom she had been hostile. But Esther turned them both out firmly, if
with courtesy.
"Please go," she said to Anne. "Please let me be."
This seemed to Anne quite natural. She knew she herself, if she were
troubled, could get over it best alone.
"Mayn't I come back?" she asked. "When you're in bed?"
"No," Esther said. "I am so tired I shall sleep. You're very kind. Good
night."
She saw them to the door with determination even, and they went
downstairs and sat in the dining-room in an excited silence, because it
seemed to them Jeff might want to see his father and talk over things.
But Jeff and his father were sitting on opposite sides of the table, the
colonel pretending to read and Jeff with his elbows on the table, his
head resting on his hands. How was he to finish what he had begun? For
she hated him, he believed, with a childish hatred of the discomfort he
had brought her. If there were some hot betrayal of the blood that had
driven her to Reardon he almost thought, despite Addington and its
honesties and honours, he would not lift his hand to keep her. Addington
was very strong in him that night, the old decent loyalties to the
edifice men and women have built up to protect themselves from the beast
in them. Yet how would it have stood the assault of honest passion,
sheer human longing knocking at its walls? If she could but love a man
at last! but this was no more love than the puerile effort of a meagre
discontent to make itself more safe, more closely cherished, more
luxuriously served.
"Father," said he at last, breaking the silence where the clock ticked
and the fire stirred.
"Yes," said the colonel. He did not put down his book or move his finger
on it. He meant, to the last line of precaution, to invite Jeff's
confidence.
"Whatever she does," said Jeff, "I'm to blame for it."
"Don't blame yourself any more," the colonel said. "We won't blame
anybody."
He did not even venture to ask what Esther would be likely to do.
"I don't understand--" said Jeff, and then paused and the sentence was
never finished. But what he did not understand was the old problem: how
accountability could be exacted from the irresponsible, how an ascetic
loyalty to law could be demanded of a woman who was nothing but a sweet
bouquet of primitive impulses, flowered out of youth and natural
appetites. He saw what she was giving up with Reardon: luxury, a kindly
and absolutely honest devotion. If she went to him it would be to what
she called happiness. If he kept her out of the radius of disapproval,
she might never feel a shadow of regret. But Reardon would feel the
shadow. Jeff knew him well enough to believe that. It would be the old
question of revolt against the edifice men have built. You thought you
could storm it, and it would capitulate; but when the winter rigours
came, when passion died and self got shrunken to a meagre thing, you
would seek the shelter of even that cold courtyard.
"Yes," he said aloud, "I've got to do it."
All that evening they sat silent, the four of them, as if waiting for an
arrival, an event. At eleven Anne came in.
"I've been up and listened," she said. "She's perfectly quiet. She must
be asleep."
Jeff rose.
"Come, father," he said. "You'll be drowsy as an owl to-morrow. We'd
better get up early, all of us."
"Yes," said Anne. She knew what he meant. They had, somehow, a
distasteful, puzzling piece of work cut out for them. They must be up to
cope with this strange Esther.
Lydia fell asleep almost, as the cosy saying goes, as soon as her head
touched the pillow. She was dead tired. But in what seemed to her the
middle of the night, she heard a little noise, and flew out of bed,
still dazed and blinking. She thought it was the click of a door. But
Esther's door was shut, the front door, too, for she crept into the hall
and peered over the railing. She went to the hall window and looked out
on the dark shrubbery above the snow, and the night was still and the
scene so kind it calmed her. But she could not see, beyond the
shrubbery, the black figure running softly down the walk. Lydia went
back to bed, and when the "midnight" hooted she drew the clothes closer
about her ears and thought how glad she was to be so comfortable. It was
not until the next morning that she knew the "midnight" had carried
Esther with it.