When this story had come to the ears of Nan and Morgan, they whispered
“The fire!” and crept away from one another sooner than disturb a
subject of which they could not bear to speak.
The fire had taken place at night, and had not been in itself of any
importance. “You see nothing but a few tarred sheds burning,” Silas had
cried, in a frenzy of desperation to Morgan, “and folk will come to me
to-morrow to say you acted gallantly, or what not. Why shouldn’t you,
seeing only wood and flames? You don’t hear it coming after you with
great light strides and flaming fingers....”
“Silas, you’re afraid,” Morgan had said gravely.
Silas had checked himself at that; he had quavered, and made an effort
to recover. The accusation had fallen like a plummet into the
uncontrolled waters of his mind. He had quavered, and almost gibbered at
Morgan; so greatly fallen beneath his normal standard of pride and
independence that he had been shocking to hear and see. He had tried to
defend himself, “Not afraid, only helpless, helpless....”
Nan and Morgan had stood, hearing him beseech them not to leave him. Nan
knew then that Silas was betrayed by fear into revealing something he
usually kept very, very carefully concealed; that was why the exposure
was so shocking and so degrading; and Morgan seeing it with her eyes
stood beside her, both equally hurt, and equally craving to rescue
Silas. But he, in his mingled panic and resentment, had had nothing but
insults for them, and, nearly screaming, told Morgan to clear out.
“Shall I stay with you?” Nan had asked.
He had hesitated; he wanted to fling her out, he tried to make himself
say, “No, go!” but his extreme terror was stronger than this flicker of
his other, antagonistic. He said, “Yes, you can stay,” a heat of hatred
for her passing over him as he said it.
X
They had sat in silence after Morgan had gone, because Silas had
forbidden her to speak. She was glad of the hush, for she felt that she
had passed through a great empty din and that the brass vacancy of
cymbals was still clanging in her ears. The scene had wounded her, and
had roused emotions that bewildered her. Why should she resent (to the
extent of stretching out deterrent hands, as she had done,) the betrayal
of Silas by himself? Somewhere, though she would neither have probed nor
acknowledged, she had believed that underneath her fear and pity lay
hatred of Silas; she had even tried to extend her pity into a reassuring
mental scorn. Yet to him, who never spared others, she had had the
impulse to cry, “Spare yourself.” She had suffered from seeing him
untrue to his own tradition.
They sat in silence, Silas tearing at the seat of a rush-bottomed chair,
Nan watching the unequal glow in the sky outside the windows. She found
herself trembling from time to time. Not with fear of the fire, but with
disgust and regret of that noisy scene. She wished that something would
happen to restore him to his ancient formidable credit, something to
remove that disquieting sense of his fraudulence. She turned away from
him, but next moment was glancing at him again; he was destroying the
seat of the chair, shred by shred, his fine hands pulling at the rushes
with a peevish haste and his head bent obstinately away from
observation. Every time a siren hooted he hunched himself more closely
together, as though the compression of his limbs would afford him some
protection.
“I think the glare is dying down, Silas,” she said gently.
He hunched himself fretfully away.
He was thinking, “They are full of forbearance and long-suffering. Am I
to be taught gratitude? perhaps through disaster? They would let God
himself look into every corner of their minds. Little children!” For the
moment, under the effect of his fear, he did not brand them as lacking
in savour. Their limpidity seemed to him as desirable as the absence of
danger. If danger might but be removed he would abandon as the price his
own arrogant passions. He was humbled now to another standard of life.
Weary of battle and opposition, peace appeared to him sweet and seemly,
now that he had been granted tumult,—a tumult not of his own making, and
entirely out of the control of his stage-managing. He thought again,
“They have never a quick word against me. Nan gave me a stick, and I
broke it and said I wanted no stick, because I knew she expected me to
show pleasure. I am sure that after I broke it she had tears in her
eyes. But why should she try to coax me with presents? or I allow myself
to be coaxed?” He shuddered at the long scream of a siren, and reflected
that they had probably kept the extent of the fire from him, knowing
that he could not verify. For an instant he caught hold of the idea that
the fire might get across the village to the abbey, and destroy that;
and a little flash of old wicked glee passed across him. But it died
away. He imagined the fire travelling down his own street, men and women
flying before it, and he himself forgotten, engulfed,—perhaps even
purposely left to perish. At this point he spoke, “Are you there, Nan?”
She was there. “I never meant you any harm, Nan,” he said surprisingly.
Warm-hearted, she was at his side as the words left his lips. “No,
Silas, I know that....” “That’ll do,” he said pushing her away.
But he had now started upon another train of thought, which he adopted
and amplified with his usual vehemence. “God preserve me, and I will
live to befriend Nan and Linnet.” Obscurely he had the instinct of
propitiation, offering his intention as a bribe to a very angry god; and
partially in his chastened mood,—albeit but the vile chastening of
terror,—he yielded to the stirrings of his own repressed sentimentalism.
Simplicity, limpidity, were perhaps not the poor and bloodless
attributes he had thought. Their case might be turned convincingly by a
skilful advocate. He, Silas, had the mettle of strife within him; those
other two had not: (The fire! the fire! in the meanderings of his
arguments he had almost forgotten the fire. In the rush of recollection
he knotted his fingers together till they cracked. He was horribly
afraid.) Those two did not fight and wrestle with chimeras, muscles
knotted and sweat pouring, as Silas did. Their minds were not ridden by
demons. They did not sight everywhere a portent, a dark enemy or a
fiercely fair ally. He had scorned them as easy, milky, satisfied,—he
knew well the run of the familiar epithets. He had tried to scorn them;
he had forsworn their kindness. He had crushed his love for them, and
his longing to allow the warm tide of that love to flow in solace over
him. He had been proud, and had driven his craft ever to sea, courting
the gales and riot, rather than accept the broad comfort of the haven.
Proud! proud! how superbly proud! how proportionately base the physical
fear that could humble such a spirit of arrogance in man!