Clytie's last words rang in Kent's ears all night. She loved him. She
had surrendered herself to his kiss, she had told him her heart in
plain, unequivocal language. In the first blaze of this happiness he did
not perceive the gloomy background of their love. All that he could feel
was that Clytie had left the life to which he had been a stranger, that
she had come back to live in his daily company in the old helpful way,
that, furthermore, her simple friendship had changed into something
unutterably sweeter. He looked into the future and found it glowing with
many rose tints of beauty. He saw Clytie and himself carrying out to its
fullest his brave gospel of work--to its fullest because of their belief
and trust in one another. He saw Clytie painting noble pictures, drawing
strength and confidence from his sympathy--himself stimulated to great
achievement, the prose of life transmuted into sonorous epic, lyrical
gladness, elegiac grace. The fever in his blood kept him awake as image
after image passed before his fancy. But whether the vision was of
Clytie walking by his side through the gaslit streets, or of Clytie's
glorious head strained back to view the effect of brush strokes he had
suggested, or of Clytie sitting by the table as he worked, the lamp
between them, it ended always with the warm touch of Clytie's lips
beneath his, and the low, clear voice, “I love you.”
This exaltation is common to most men when a strong love comes to them.
But to Kent it was all the intenser through the peculiarities of his
nature. He had lived without the sphere of women. The passionateness of
his temperament had thrown itself utterly into another channel. His work
had been his love, his wife, the centre of all his energies, all his
hopes. The craving for the unknown complement of existence had
found satisfaction in the added line upon line, the growing bulk of
manuscript, the builder's thrill when the creation of his own brain is
materialising itself course by course into a majestic edifice. Besides,
action, whether it was spending hours in a musty library in the exciting
search after a reference, or tramping for miles in the keen mountain air
of Norway, always fascinated him and compelled the entire energy of his
being. He beheld the earth after his wholesome fashion and saw that it
was good. To him life was complete. Things, therefore, not contained
within his sphere he looked upon as superfluities. Woman was a
superfluity; the impulses of sex repugnant. The very intensity of
his nature made him shrink all the more strenuously from the sexual
principle upon which love is built. When, however, love came to him,
in spite of himself, he was dazed with it, terrified. On that January
morning when he buried his face in the faint perfume of Clytie's
handkerchief he felt himself overcome with a kind of horror. The fierce
consciousness that he would give his soul to hold her in his arms and
kiss her hair and eyes and lips was to him a torture of debasement. This
morbidness was due only to the violence of the reaction. It lasted but
a short while, and toned down into a feeling of disloyalty to Clytie's
friendship in daring to love her. But time at last adjusted his moral
balance, when it was too late, and Clytie was lost to him. And then his
love was purified into a deep, passionate devotion that was its own joy
and recompense. If circumstances had remained unchanged, Kent would have
carried this deeper than romantic love with him to the grave. It had
grown into his inmost heart, informing that subconsciousness that makes
a man's individual life. Even during the last few months, when they were
meeting in frank, friendly fashion, his love had altered very little in
kind. He believed her to be a happy wife, loving her husband, with whom
in a moment of bitterness he had once silently measured himself. The
precious boon of her friendship was regained, nothing more, and it was
given to him, under no false pretences on his part, but all the more
tenderly because she knew of his devotion. Secure in the impression of
her happiness, he would never have wavered in word or thought from his
straightforward, simple loyalty, and his days would have passed in quiet
contentment, saddened a little, perhaps, by regrets for what might have
been, but never tormented by longings for the impossible.
But conditions were no longer the same. Clytie had renounced her married
life. Except as a memory of bitterness it had no place in her thoughts.
Except by a legal fiction she was her own mistress once more, free to
go and come, think and act. Even in name she would be Clytie Davenant
again, and she had spoken to him in that strange tone he had never heard
before, and had come nearer to him as her touch lay upon his arm. The
whole pent up passion of Kent's life had gone forth into that kiss. For
Kent the world was changed, and the night a dream of unutterable things.
But by the morning it had brought counsel. This love, acknowledged on
both sides--whither would it tend? A great problem. So great a one,
indeed, that Kent was tempted to shirk grappling with it. Courage and a
stout heart, he said to himself, and all would be well. But one cannot
rid one's self in this easy way of responsibilities. If you shake them
from your shoulders, they shackle themselves about your feet. Kent felt
thus fettered as he lay awake. Moreover, his early misgivings concerning
Hammerdyke came, like the curses in the proverb, home to roost. If he
had spoken to Clytie then, before her marriage, possibly she might have
been spared all this suffering. He wished that he had obtained from
Wither all the particulars of the ugly rumours that had been afloat,
investigated them, confronted Clytie bravely with the truth, and so
saved her from wrecking her life. And yet he felt that he could not
have done so. Well, what was past was past. The present and the future
contained enough matter to engage his attention. He lay for some time in
bed trying to solve these perplexities. At last, at half-past nine, he
rose, dressed, and went into his sitting-room to prepare his breakfast.
This was a simple process. On a couple of gas-stoves, connected by
india-rubber piping with the two gas-jets in his room, he placed a
kettle and a saucepan, the latter containing eggs. Then he spread a
little cloth on a clear space of his dresser-table, and brought out his
crockery and other breakfast requisites from one of the under-cupboards.
A ham somewhat cut into, butter, and marmalade he procured from a safe
in a third little room on the landing which he used as a combined larder
and lumber-room. For years Kent had enjoyed the simple Bohemianism of
this Sunday morning meal. He could linger over it easefully without the
weekday glance at his watch, when time was short. There was the Sunday
paper, a weekly review or two, the long, undisturbed after-breakfast
pipe. It was a time when he could release himself with free conscience
from his busy life and enjoy his leisure. But this morning the eggs
seemed stale, the ham tasteless, the journals dull, and he found himself
looking at his watch. He would go down and see Clytie at eleven, an hour
which he had himself arbitrarily fixed upon, and he was counting the
minutes. It is surprising how long minutes are when you count sixty of
them.
At last eleven o'clock came and Kent descended the stairs. But Clytie
was out. Mrs. Gurkins, who answered his ring on Clytie's bell, informed
him that Miss Davenant would not be in for lunch. Perhaps she would be
back during the afternoon. So Kent went upstairs again, disappointed,
and, after vainly trying to occupy himself, seized his hat and went out
for a long tramp through Putney and Wimbledon. His heart was full
of strange emotions that beset him for many hours, making them seem
hopelessly long. Of the two Clytie passed by far the happier day.
In the afternoon, on his return, he heard voices in the studio. He
knocked and entered. Clytie was there with Winifred.
“Can I come in?”
“Of course,” said Clytie. “Why do you ask? We have been expecting you
ever so long. In fact we have kept tea waiting for you.”
He put down his hat and stick, nodded as usual to Winifred, and
advanced, through force of later habit, with outstretched hand, to
Clytie. She laid her fingers in his slowly, looked up at him from her
chair by the stove, and laughed.
“You forget I am no longer a visitor, Kent,” she said rebukingly.
“Only this once, then,” he answered, “to welcome you back among us.”
“Where have you learned to make pretty speeches?” asked Clytie.
She was pleased with the words and gave his hand a sudden pressure.
Kent brought a chair up to where Clytie and Winifred were sitting, tried
to talk lightly, and failed. A silence came over the little party. Tea
caused a distraction, and they fell to discussing indifferent subjects,
odds and ends of gossip, but in a desultory fashion that each found
strange. At last Clytie rose, cut the Gordian knot in her impulsive way.
“I am going to do one or two things in the sitting-room,” she said. “You
two have a talk until I come back.”
Kent opened the door for her. On the threshold she turned and whispered
to him: “Talk to Winifred a little. You will do each other good.”
He closed the door after her and went back to Winifred.
“So we have her with us again.”
“Yes,” she replied gently, “and I don't know whether to feel sorry or
glad.”
“Did you know--had you any idea that she was unhappy? I never knew till
yesterday--or the day before.”
“I think I knew--before--perhaps because I am a woman. It made my heart
ache.”
“But she is not unhappy now,” said Kent. “Therefore you ought to be
glad.”
Winifred glanced at him swiftly. In spite of the brown softness of her
eyes they were woman's eyes, capable of quick, subtle perceptions.
“But will she be happy, Kent?” she asked, bending down over her
needlework. As she had not been able to paint, she had taken in hand, by
way of feminine comfort, some sewing for Clytie.
“What do you mean?” he asked, with a man's preference to answer a
concrete question rather than a delicately hinted suggestion.
“Will not this tie that cannot be loosed hamper her all through her
life?”
“God knows!” he said gloomily. And then, brightening, he added: “But we
have her with us for always, Winifred, and we who love her can try to
make her forget it.”
“Ah, can we, my dear Kent?” she said, putting her work and both hands in
her lap and looking at him. “You love her, but you can't love her as
I do. Oh, no, no,” she added as he smiled and shook his head. “You may
think you do, but it is not possible. You have found faults in Clytie
and scolded her--oh, very kindly and sympathetically, I know, but still
in your eyes Clytie can do wrong. In mine she can't--and there is the
difference. Clytie is not like other girls. She is like no one in the
world. Everything must give way to her. If Clytie were to do something
you would think _dreadful_--commit a murder--I feel that she would be
justified in doing it, and I should love her all the more tenderly and
dearly.”
“God bless your loving little heart!” cried Kent. “Love like yours could
make the most miserable creature on earth happy.”
“Ah, no, Kent. What could I do for her? Listen: I was a poor,
friendless, ignorant, uninteresting little girl when I first met Clytie.
And she was kind to me. She seemed so brave and strong and clever and
beautiful, I quite shrank from her. I felt so small and humble beside
her. And she singled me out from among all the rest of the girls at the
Slade School, and made me her friend. I never could tell what she found
in me.”
“She can tell, and I can, too,” exclaimed Kent with abrupt
enthusiasm--“the purest, tenderest flower of a soul that ever breathed!”
“Oh, Kent!” said Winifred as the colour rose to her dark cheeks. “You
must not say things like that. Clytie has done everything for me,
everything--and I----”
“You have helped Clytie as no one else could have done,” said Kent, “and
you are doing it now.”
“Am I?”
“Yes; don't you see how bright and happy you have made her?”
“She is brighter than I should have thought,” said Winifred musingly.
“But will it last?”
“We must try to make it lasting, you and I,” said Kent softly.
He pondered for a moment over the love in each of their hearts, the
girl's and the man's. How exquisitely pure and selfless hers seemed to
be! He could not realise it in all its beauty, but his perceptions had
been refined enough for him to be profoundly touched.
“You have taught me something, Winifred,” he said after a pause, during
which she had quietly resumed her sewing. “I am happier than I have been
all day.”
Clytie returned soon afterwards. She looked curiously at the faces of
her two friends, and then, divining, perhaps, something of what had
passed between them, went up to Winifred and kissed her. After this they
talked more freely--of old habits, plans for the future. The latter were
vague, for Winifred's marriage with Treherne was fixed for the early
part of the next year, and the studio without Winifred was unrealisable.
Still the plans were food for much intimate gossip, which some may liken
to the very salt of life.
When Winifred had gone, Kent went with Clytie into the sitting-room,
where, furnished with hammer and nails, he hung the few pictures that
Clytie had brought with her, together with some that had been lying
about the studio. It was a delight to him to perform this little service
for her, and she too felt the woman's happiness of being surrendered to
a man's helpfulness. He fetched from his own rooms a bookstand, which
he secured against the wall, a few curios, and an armful of the dainty
cushions, chair backs, and curtain sashes with which his sister Agatha
in misguided zeal had years ago supplied his drawers and cupboards.
“They are not as artistic as your odds and ends, you know,” he said by
way of apology. “But until you can get some together they will be more
cheerful to look at than Mrs. Gurkins's efforts.”
He had just completed his scheme of decoration when Mrs. Gurkins came
up to lay the cloth for Clytie's dinner. Clytie detained him as he was
about to go.
“Won't you stay and dine with me?” she said half timidly.
She felt that she could not dismiss him. To do so on conventional
grounds would be the silliest prudery. Besides, a sense of helplessness
had come over her, and she wanted him by her side, longed for him to
think and act for her. The touch of any incident bordering ever so
slightly on the dramatic would at that moment have sufficed to free
the spring of feminine reserve and loosen passionate expression of her
longing for his presence. But the simple commonplace of the situation
saved her. Kent's eyes brightened at the invitation.
“And we can have a long evening afterwards?” he asked half pleadingly.
“Of course,” said Clytie, with an inward smile.
On Monday morning Kent, as he was starting for the Museum, put his head
in at Clytie's sitting-room door. She was at breakfast, having risen
rather later than usual. By her side was an open letter. As Kent entered
she pushed back her chair and looked up at him, a gleam of gladness
eclipsing in her eyes a late expression of pain. Kent noticed the sudden
change.
“You have been sad, Clytie,” he said in his rough tenderness. “That is
not right. Did you not promise me last evening that you would be happy,
very happy?”
“So I shall be,” she answered, taking his hand in hers and turning away
her head. “Only there are things that cut one to the heart. You are a
man; you can't understand a woman--no man can, no matter how he loves
her. Look, read that--the end of the sordid story of my latter life. Oh,
Kent, I am not worth your love! This thing has degraded me enough, and
this last insult----Oh, read it and see. It would be better that you
should know of how little account I really am.”
Kent took the letter which she thrust into his hand, and, without having
read it, tore it into tiny pieces which he scattered through the open
window to the four winds. Then he came and put one arm around her.
“Because one man insults you, dear, it is all the more reason that I
should love and shield you. That part of your life is dead now. You said
yourself this letter was the end. Let it be so, Clytie.”
His delicacy and tenderness moved her very deeply. Womanlike, she had
wanted him to read the paper, and yet loved him all the more for not
having done so. The letter was her own note to Thornton, which he had
returned with “You can go to the devil!” scrawled across it. The sheer
brutality had made her lose, as it were, her self-respect, had presented
her to her own eyes as a thing of naught, unworthy of the reverential
love that Kent brought her. How could she honestly be to him the
brightest and noblest of women with that scrawled thing dragging her
down? Accordingly his actions and words gladdened her. She looked up at
him, and he read as in some magical book the spell of tenderness that
swam in her eyes. Then he threw himself on his knees before her and
buried his face in her lap.
“Oh, my love, my love!”
And, stirred to her depths with a passionate thrill that was like a
great pain, she threw her arms round his neck and kissed him.