The crash at last came on the firm of O'Donnell. The business was
sold; but the creditors would not be as severe on the old man as he
would be on himself. They refused to leave him absolutely penniless;
and when the whole affair was wound up he found he had a sum of money
which, if carefully invested, would secure the declining years of his
wife and himself against absolute want.
Eugene was offered the managership of the old business, but would not
take it, saying, with words of gratitude for the offer, that he would
rather seek his fortune in another field, and that Rathclare would
always in his mind be haunted by the ghost of their more prosperous
years.
He told his personal friends that while he was abroad on his honeymoon
he had had his voice tried, and competent judges told him that, with
study, he could make a living by it. He had always a desire to go on
the stage. He was not too old to begin now. He intended selling up all
his immediate personal belongings, and on the proceeds of the sale he
calculated that he and his wife could, with great thrift, manage to
live until he was able to earn money by singing.
Three months after the last call, James O'Donnell and his wife had
given up their large house in Rathclare, and taken a modest cottage in
Glengowra, where they purposed passing the remainder of their days,
and Eugene O'Donnell and his wife were settled in lodgings in London.
By this time, all that had hitherto been concealed by Lavirotte was
revealed. He had anticipated Cassidy's story by himself telling Dora
of the infatuation he had once experienced for Nellie Creagh; and
having explained to her that this condition of mind or heart had
immediately preceded the onslaught he made on O'Donnell, she adopted
his view, namely, that the whole thing was the outcome of an abnormal
mental condition likely to arise once in the lifetime of the average
man. He explained to her that upon certain occasions the sanest and
greatest of men had behaved like idiots or poltroons, and that the
very desperation of his circumstances at the time had left him to
drift into a flirtation, which had never gone beyond a dozen civil
words on one particular occasion.
She believed all he said; and once she got over the first shock of the
affair, banished it for ever from her mind, as though it had no longer
any more existence than the moonlight of last month.
Lavirotte and O'Donnell were now as inseparable as ever. They attended
the same lessons together, and Dora waited for Lavirotte with Nellie
at Eugene's lodgings, where the two unmarried lovers now met, when
they met indoors.
Lavirotte had still some of the money Lionel Crawford gave him, and
when the affairs of the dead man were investigated it was found that
he had some money left. This naturally became Dora's.
Eugene's reverse of fortune arose at a time when his father believed
matters would still come right, and that there would be no risk in his
son's marrying. But the reverse of fortune, or rather the
disappointment of expectations, had come upon Lavirotte before he was
married, and while there was yet time to prevent a headlong plunge of
their two lives into an uncertain future.
He had put the whole matter cogently to Dora. He had told her that
both he and Eugene were advised by the best judges to study music in
Italy for about two years before appearing on the stage. To ensure
success this was essential.
Would it not then be wiser that they should wait as they now were,
until he came back from Italy fully qualified to take his place in the
front rank of tenors? Everyone said his voice was excellent. Everyone
said it required training. He proposed to go to Italy with the
O'Donnells, and he suggested that she should stay where she was, in
the lodgings she now occupied, until his return. Eugene approved of
this he said. Nellie thought it hard on her, Dora.
Dora smiled faintly, and sighed and said: "No doubt the men knew best.
They were sure to be wiser over the affair than she."
He said they were both very young still, and could afford to wait in
order to be sure of success.
When he was gone she wept to think that her life seemed destined to be
one of delays in love. After all had been settled between her and
Dominique, he had been compelled to leave her, to leave London, and to
live hundreds of miles away. The sea, and weary leagues of miles, had
separated them long; and often in those early days of dereliction she
had imagined that the space was bridgeless, and that he would never
stand by her side again, take her hand in his, call her his own.
Then he had come to London, and that tyranny of search for the
treasure had come between them and parted them again. Before she knew,
in that London period, what absorbed Dominique's time, she had taken
it for granted that it was something upon which there was little or no
need to fear the risks.
Now, this separation between her and Dominique, which would
necessitate his going to Italy, seemed of greater import than any
which had occurred before. Ireland was a portion of these kingdoms in
which people spoke the same language as she did. She had the average
knowledge of school-girl French, and could speak to him, after a
fashion, in his own tongue. Now he was to go among people of whom she
knew little, and be subject to conditions with which she was wholly
unfamiliar.
What could be harder on a girl than that she should love as she loved,
and be so constantly, so completely denied? It seemed to her that,
notwithstanding his professions of unmixed devotion, there was always
something which occupied more of his attention than thoughts of her.
This was a cruel reflection for her, who could think of nothing but
him all day, all night. He was the sun, the moon, of her existence.
How could he, if she were to take his words literally, love her as she
loved him, when he could say he loved her above all other things on
earth, and yet could neglect her for the ordinary pursuits of material
advancement? She did not understand such matters. She heard that love
in woman was an essence, in man an accident. This she believed now.
But why could not the accident of his love be complete, even for a
while? Why could not his regard for her be so all-absorbing as to make
everything else seem small; her love for him dwarfed all other things
when brought into comparison with it?
But there was now no use in thinking, no use in even mental protest.
He, being a man, was naturally wiser than she, being a woman, and
there could be no doubt this going of his to Italy was approved of by
all other men, who were also wiser than she.
It was in sorrowful mood she parted from him. The slenderness of their
means, and the great distance between London and Milan, made it
unlikely he should return more than once or twice during the two years
or so. He, however, promised faithfully to come back at the end of the
first year, if not before, and on this understanding they parted; he,
Eugene O'Donnell, and Nellie getting into the train at Charing Cross,
with brave words and encouraging gestures; she weeping a little there
and then, and much after.
They had arranged between them that each was to write to the other
once a week. He was much better than this, for during the first two or
three months he wrote her always twice, and sometimes thrice a week.
Then his letters dropped to once a week, and after that to once a
fortnight. He playfully explained to her that as during the earlier
portion of their separation he had exceeded his promise, he was
persuaded she would now allow him a little latitude out of
consideration of that.
To this she answered in a cheerful letter that she was quite willing
to adopt his suggestion. She wept in writing her cheerful letter, and
cried in posting it.
"If he wrote me twenty times a week," she cried, "when he first went
away, I want to hear forty times a week from him now."
As time went on, the letters from Dominique to her decreased in
frequency. A whole month passed without a line. Then six weeks. Then
two months, and by the end of the first year he had not written to her
for three whole months, although during that time she had never failed
to write to him every week.
At the end of the first year, Eugene O'Donnell said to his wife one
day:
"I don't think the godfather of our boy"--they had now a little son, a
few months old--"is quite as attentive as he should be to Dora, and I
greatly fear he has got entangled, in some other affair. You know
Luigia?"
"What!" cried Mrs. O'Donnell, in astonishment. "You don't mean that
handsome flower-girl?"
"Yes," said Eugene, "that handsome flower-girl to whom we took such a
liking."
For a moment Mrs. O'Donnell looked perplexed. "It would hurt me to the
heart," she said, "to think that poor Dora should have any further
reason to suspect him. I do not like him, you know. How can it be that
he who made love to Dora, who is dark, should care for this handsome
Italian girl, who is fair-skinned and light-haired?"
"The unusualness, partly," said Eugene, "and partly, Nellie, that
she----" He paused, and did not finish the sentence.
"That she what?" said the young wife, with a perplexed look upon her
face.
"That she resembles you."
"Good Heavens, Eugene! what a horrible thought! I shall never be able
to look with patience at Lavirotte again. Who is this coming here?"
"I don't know; I will go and see." After a few moments, Eugene
returned.
"A telegram," he said, "with bad news, Nellie."
"My mother? Your father? Your mother? Who is it?" she cried. "I know
someone is dead."
"Yes," he said quietly, "but none of those."
"Then, in God's name, who?"
"Dora."
She had come out of the sunlight, which pierced the windows of that
tower, and had fallen swiftly beneath the shadow of the old man's
arms.