BY MOONLIGHT
May waited within the gates of the Lodgings for some moments. She did
not open the door and enter the house. She walked up and down on the
gravelled court. She wanted to be alone, to speak to no one just now;
her heart was full of weariness and loneliness.
When she felt certain that Boreham was safely away, she went to the
gates and out into the narrow street again, where she could hear subdued
sounds of the evening traffic of the city.
The dusky streets had grown less dim; the shining overhead was more
luminous as the moon rose.
The old buildings, as she passed them on her solitary walk, looked
mysterious and aloof, as if they had been placed there magically for
some secret purpose and might vanish before the dawn. This was the
ancient Oxford, the Oxford of the past, the Oxford that was about to
pass away, leaving priceless memories of learning and romance behind it,
something that could never be again quite what it had been. Before dawn
would it vanish and something else, still called Oxford, would be
standing there in its place?
May was tempted to let her imagination wander thus, and to see in this
mysterious Oxford the symbol of the personality of a single man, a
personality that haunted her when she was alone, a personality which,
when it stood before her in flesh and blood, seemed to fill space and
obliterate other objects.
She had, in the chapel, re-affirmed over and over again her resolution
to overcome this obsession, and now, as she walked that evening, her
heart cried out for indulgence just for one brief moment, for permission
to think of this personality, and to read details of it in every moonlit
facade of old Oxford, in every turn of the time-worn lanes and passages.
The temptation had come upon her, because it was so dreary to be loved
by Boreham. His talk seemed to mark her spiritual loneliness with such
poignant insistence; it made it so desperately plain to her that those
sharp cravings of her heart could not be satisfied except by one man. It
had made her see, for the first time, that the sacred dead, to whom she
had raised a shrine, was a memory and not a present reality to her; and
this thought only added to her confusion and her grief.
What was there to hold on to in life?
"O, put thy trust in God!" came the answer.
"Help me to make the mischance of my life a motive for greater moral
effort. Help me to be a willing sacrifice and not an unwilling victim."
And as she uttered these words she moved with more rapid steps.
Shadows were visible on the roadway; roofs glimmered and the edges of
the deep window recesses were tinged with a dark silver. She passed
under the walls of All Souls and emerged again into the High. A figure
she recognised confronted her. She tried to pass it without appearing to
be aware of it, and she hurried on with bent head. But it turned, and
Bingham's voice spoke to her.
"Mrs. Dashwood," he called softly.
She was forced to slacken her pace. "Oh, Mr. Bingham!" she said, and he
came and walked by her, making pretence that he was disturbing her
solitude because he had never been told the dinner-hour at the Lodgings,
when Lady Dashwood invited him, and, what was more important, he had
forgotten to say that he would be very glad if Mrs. Dashwood would make
use of him as a cicerone if she wanted any more sight-seeing in Oxford
and the Warden was unable to accompany her. This was the pretence he put
before her.
Then, when he had said all this and had walked a few yards along the
street with her, he seemed to forget that his business with her ought to
be over, and remarked that he had been trying to save Boreham's soul.
"His soul!" said May, with a sigh.
"I've been trying to make him work."
"Doesn't he work?" asked May.
"No, he preaches," said Bingham. "If he had a touch of genius he might
invent some attractive system of ethics in which his own characteristics
would be the right characteristics; some system in which humility and
patience would take a back seat."
May could not help smiling a little, Bingham's voice was so smooth and
soft; but she felt Boreham's loneliness again and ceased smiling.
"Or he might invent a new god," said Bingham, "a sort of composite
photograph of himself and the old gods. He might invent a new creed to
go along with it and damn all the old creeds. But he is incapable of
construction, so he merely preaches the destruction of Sodom and
Gomorrah, which is a soft job. Wherever he is, there is Sodom and
Gomorrah! You see my point? Egotism is always annoyed at egotisms. An
egotist always sees the egotism of other people. The egotism of those
round him, jump at him, they get on his nerves! He has to love people
who are far, far away! You see my point? Well, I've been trying to make
him take on a small bit of war work!"
"And will he take it?" asked May.
"I don't know," said Bingham; "I've just left him, a prey to conflicting
passions."
May was silent.
"Are you going back to King's?" asked Bingham.
She and Bingham were walking along, just as she and Boreham had been
walking along the same street, past these same colleges not an hour ago.
Was she going back to the Lodgings? Yes, she thought, in fact she knew
she was going back to the Lodgings.
"May I see you to the Lodgings?" asked Bingham.
There seemed no alternative but to say "Yes."
"There are many things I should like to talk over with you, Mrs.
Dashwood," said Bingham, stepping out cheerfully. "I should like to roam
the universe with you."
"I'm afraid you would find me very ignorant," said May.
"I would present you with facts. I would sit at your feet and hold them
out for your inspection, and you, from your throne above, would
pronounce judgment on them."
"It is the ignorant people who always do pronounce judgment," said May.
"So that will be all right. You spoke of Mr. Boreham preaching. Well,
I've just been preaching. It's a horrid habit."
Bingham gave one of his surprising and most cultured explosions of
laughter. May turned and looked at him with her eyebrows very much
raised.
"I am laughing at myself," he explained. "I thought to buy things too
cheaply."
May looked away, pondering on the meaning of his words. At last the
meaning occurred to her.
"You mean you wanted to flatter me, and--and I began to talk about
something else. Was that what made you laugh?" she asked.
"That's it," said Bingham. "I wanted to flatter you because it is a
pleasure to flatter you, and I forgot what a privilege it was."
"Ah!" said May, quietly.
"Cheap, cheap, always cheap!" said Bingham. "Cheapness is the curse of
our age. The old Radical belief in the right to buy cheaply, that poison
has soaked into the very bone of politics. It has contaminated our
religion. The pulpit has decided in favour of cheap salvation."
May looked round again at Bingham's moonlit profile.
"No more hell!" he said, "no more narrow way, no more strait gate to
heaven! On the contrary, we bawl ourselves blue asserting that the way
is broad, and that every blessed man Jack of us will find it. Yes," he
went on more slowly, "we have no use now for a God who can deny to any
one a cheap suburban residence in the New Jerusalem. And so," he added,
"I flatter you, stupidly, and--and you forgive me."
They walked on together for a moment in silence.
"I don't deserve your forgiveness," he said. "But I desire your
forgiveness. I desire your toleration as far as it will go. Perhaps, if
you were to let me talk on, I might go too far for your toleration," and
now he turned and looked at her.
"You would not go too far," said May. "You are too much detached; you
look on----" and here she hesitated.
"Oh, damn!" said Bingham, softly; "that is the accursed truth," and he
stared before him at the cracks in the pavement as they stood out
sharply in the moonlight.
"You mustn't mind," said May, soothingly.
"I do mind," said Bingham; "I should like to be able to take my own
emotions seriously. I should like to feel the importance of my being
highly strung, imaginative, a lover of beauty and susceptible to the
charms of women. Instead of which I am hopelessly critical of myself. I
see myself a blinking fool, among other fools." Bingham's lips went on
moving as if he were continuing to speak to himself.
"When a woman takes you and your emotions seriously, what happens then?"
asked May very softly, and she looked at him with wide open eyes and her
eyebrows full of inquiry.
"Ah!" sighed Bingham, "that was long ago. I have forgotten--or nearly."
Then he added, after a moment's silence: "May I talk to you about the
present?"
"Yes, do," said May.
"There!" said Bingham, resentfully, "see how you trust me! You know that
if I begin to step on forbidden ground, you have only to put out your
finger and say 'Stop!' and I shall retire amiably, with a jest."
"That is part of--of your--your charm," said May, hesitatingly.
"My charm!" repeated Bingham, in a tone of sarcasm.
"I'm sorry I used the word charm," said May. "I will use a better term,
your personality. You are so alarming and yet so gentle."
Bingham turned and gazed at her silently. They were now very near the
Lodgings.
"Thanks," he said at last. "I know where I am. But I knew it before."
A great silence came upon them. Sounds passed them as they walked; men
hurried past them, occasionally a woman, a Red Cross nurse in uniform.
The sky above was still growing more and more luminous. All the rest of
the way they walked in silence, each thinking their own thoughts,
neither wishing to speak. When they reached the Lodgings Bingham walked
into the court with her.
"Won't you come in?" she asked, but it was a mere formality, for she
knew that he would refuse.
"It's too late," he said.
"And you are coming to dinner to-morrow at eight?" She laid emphasis on
the hour, to hide the fact that she was really asking whether he meant
to come at all, after their talk about his personality.
"Yes, at eight," he said. "Good-bye."
As he spoke the moon showed full and gloriously, coming out for a moment
sharply from the fine gauzy veil of grey that overspread the sky, and
the Court was distinct to its very corners. The gravel, the shallow
stone steps at the door, the narrow windows on each side of the door,
the sombre walls; all were illumined. And Bingham's face, as he lifted
his cap, was illumined too. It was a very dark face, so dark that May
doubted if she really had quite grasped the details of it in her own
mind. His eyes seemed scarcely to notice her as she smiled, and yet he
too smiled. Then he went back over the gravel to the gate without saying
another word. She did not look at his retreating figure. She opened the
door and went in. Other people in the world were suffering. Why can't
one always realise that? It would make one's own suffering easier to
bear.
The house seemed empty. There was not a sound in it. The dim portraits
on the walls looked out from their frames at her. But they had nothing
to do with her, she was an outsider!
She walked up the broad staircase. She must endure torture for
two--nearly three more days! The hours must be dealt with one by one,
even the minutes. It would take all her strength.
At the head of the stairs she paused. Her desire was to go straight to
her room, and not to go into the drawing-room and greet her Aunt Lena.
Gwendolen would very likely be there in high spirits--the future
mistress of the house--the one person in the world to whom the Warden
would have to say, "May I? Can I?"
"Don't be a coward! Other people in the world are suffering besides
you," said the inner voice; and May went straight to the drawing-room
door and opened it.
The room was dark except for a glimmer from a red fire. May was going
out again, and about to close the door, when her aunt's voice called to
her, and the lights went up on each side of the fireplace. May pushed
the door back again and came inside.
"Aunt Lena!" she called.
Lady Dashwood had been sitting on the couch near it. She was standing
now. It was she who had put up the lights. Her face was pale and her
eyes brilliant.
"May, it's all over!" she called under her breath.
May stood by the door. It was still ajar and in her hand.
"All over! What is all over?" she asked apprehensively.
"Shut the door!" said Lady Dashwood, in a low voice.
May shut the door.
"Gwendolen has broken off her engagement!" said Lady Dashwood,
controlling her voice.
May always remembered that moment. The room seemed to stretch about her
in alleys fringed with chairs and couches. There was plenty of room to
walk, plenty of room to sit down. There was plenty of time too. It was
extraordinary what a lot of time there was in the world, time for
everything you wanted to do. Then there was the portrait over the
mantelpiece. He seemed to have nothing to do. She had not thought of
that before. He was absolutely idle, simply looking on. And below these
trivial thoughts, tossed on the surface of her mind, flowed a strange,
confused, almost overwhelming, tide of joy.