THE CANKER WORM OF DOUBT.
Mr. Tremain did not again see Miss Hildreth after she left him standing
by the fountain in the little wood, until they met in the green-room an
hour before the play.
She had gone from him then with scorn and anger in her words, and with
scorn and defiance in her heart; she met him now with cold and
indifferent hauteur, amounting almost to insolence.
Philip had stood for a long time alone beside the marble boy Narcissus,
revolving moodily the sharp home truths she had thrust upon him. He did
not forget one curl of her lip, one flash of her eyes, one inflection
of her clear voice, as she flung back the love he offered; flung it back
with bitter disdain and contempt. And yet, curiously enough, he was not
angry with her; there was no such positive element in his feelings as
that; he seemed to himself to hold, as it were, an outsider's position,
and to look on and judge her from an outsider's point of view.
Was it her own complete indifferentism, her absolute disbelief in the
ordinary delusions of life, her cynical acceptance of the contradictions
of destiny, together with her sudden outburst of passionate derision,
that had produced in him this state of cool analysis and judicial
judgment?
He had pleaded his love fervently enough under the glamour of the
moonlight and her loveliness, and he had meant what he said then; he
would gladly have taken her in his arms, and given his answer to her
letter in a fond and foolish lover's way; but--and here lay the
difficulty--she must return to him as she had gone from him, the same
yielding, loving, believing, if wilful Patty; he could accept no other;
no new Patricia, no woman whose eyes spoke of the fires of conflict,
whose face had that written upon it which tells of the lower depths of
mental pain and struggle.
For Philip, as we know, was above all things, masterful, and his idea of
dual happiness was autocratic rather than constitutional; he would share
no divided throne and sceptre, even with the woman of his heart; he must
reign, and he alone, and she must be the empire over which he ruled
unquestioningly.
All this had been in his heart, though unspoken, when he pleaded with
her to return to their old relations, and, unconsciously, perhaps, there
was an echo of his despotism even in his tenderest words. However that
may have been, Patricia would have none of it. She was not to be won by
pity when passion had failed.
And so it was that as she stood tall and beautiful before him, with her
rich white draperies clinging about her in sensuous lines and curves,
her face pale with suppressed emotion, her eyes dark with endurance, she
tossed back his proffered gift, his reawakened love--a love that would
share no rights and no prerogatives--and, with the fine irony of a woman
who sees her advantage and presses it, thrust back and away from her all
appeal from out the past, touched though it was with the pure gold of
that time when love and youth, belief and trust, went hand in hand
together.
Even yet, then, after ten long years of experience and knowledge, Philip
could not read her heart aright. And she, should she forgive him? Give
up the unequal game, lay down her arms, acknowledge herself vanquished,
and creep timidly back into his embrace, repentant and abject, meek and
thankful?
Then she looked at Philip's face, calm and quiet and victorious, with
just a touch of wearied assurance in its smile, and her heart leapt up
again in sudden protest and passion. No, she would not yield, she would
never yield until she saw him suffering, through a woman, some portion
of the pain and humiliation he had inflicted upon her. Then, when
expiation brought forth the fruit of atonement, why then--ah, then Miss
Hildreth would reconsider.
It was Miss Rosalie James who first introduced the canker of doubt in
Philip's mind concerning Patricia, of suspicion regarding her past.
It had never occurred to him to speculate upon the possible experiences
and circumstances which must have made up the ten years of their
separation.
Miss Hildreth had passed the greater part of that time abroad, and his
news of her had not only been meagre but nil, for after the first few
weeks of her absence, during which her name had been on every one's
lips, coupled with her broken engagement, and her inherited fortune, it
was rarely mentioned, and never in Philip's presence.
The most perfectly controlled human heart cannot so entirely root up
envy and malice as not to cavil somewhat at the perversity of
Providence, in showering benefits with both hands upon a fellow mortal,
who certainly cannot so thoroughly deserve them as oneself. However, if
destiny will be so blindly prejudiced, why let us become as indifferent
to it as possible, and in perfecting ourselves in this fine-art forget
both the name and existence of our once bosom friend.
This was society's philosophy regarding Patricia Hildreth, and thus for
ten long years her place had been vacant in the circles of the great
world, and she herself forgotten as completely as the snows of last
year. "Mais où sont les neiges d'antan?" may be asked of more things
than Musset dreamed of, when he wrote his sad and bitter reproach.
Miss James had met Philip late in the afternoon of George Newbold's
_festa_, as he was strolling idly about the garden-paths, the inevitable
cigarette between his lips, and his hands, as was his fashion, clasped
loosely behind him. He caught sight of the small dark figure coming
towards him down the terrace steps, and though at first impatient of the
interruption, something in the thin outline of face and form, the
lassitude of step and bearing, touched a chord of compassion in his kind
heart.
He had not indeed been altogether insensible to the nature of Miss
James's feeling towards him; no man is quite so dull and hard as not to
be touched by the unasked devotion of a woman; it is wonderful when that
devotion is directed to one's self how unselfish and pure, though
hopeless, it appears! Philip's heart might be in the position of being
captured in the rebound, but Miss James was not the one to do it;
nevertheless her attraction to him, to call it by no warmer name, was
harmless, if ineffectual, and not unpleasant.
Thus argued Mr. Tremain, though in justice to him let it be said the
argument was not carried on in words, scarcely in sensations; it was
negative rather than positive. He met her therefore with that deference
and attention which made his slightest service a distinction, lifting
his hat and throwing aside his half-smoked cigarette as he did so. Miss
James looked at him steadily for a moment, watching him as he tossed
away the end of burning paper.
"Oh, I am sorry you should do that," she said, in her rather hard voice.
"I don't in the least object to cigarettes; in fact, I like them."
But Philip only smiled and shook his head.
"Oh, I've had quite enough of it, Miss James, I assure you. I was only
smoking as a distraction and to make the time go."
"Has it been such a long day?" she asked, a trifle sharply. She knew Mr.
Tremain and Patricia had not met that day, and shrewdly suspected the
reason of his restlessness, and though she acknowledged to herself the
hopelessness of her own hopes, she could not endure to have it brought
home to her by him.
"Very long," replied Philip, candidly; "it's a way time has of never
weighing his goods. The hours that _be_ go by on lagging steps, the
hours to come rush and tumble one on top of the other, and are never in
the future but always in the past."
"I should think that rather depended upon one's occupation," responded
Miss James, tritely. "If one's copybook was to be trusted, time never
halted or stood still. 'Time Flies,' with a very large T and F is among
my earliest recollections."
Mr. Tremain laughed a little as he replied:
"You shame me, Miss James, into an open confession of laziness. To be
lazy is to find time out of joint, and in consequence out of touch with
one. One can only be legitimately lazy on board a yacht, or fishing;
under such circumstances action becomes criminal. By the way, let me
congratulate you on your distinct success as Mrs. Bouncer, last
evening. I asked for you after rehearsal, but did not see you."
"No," replied Miss James, slowly, "I did not come back to the theatre."
As she spoke a dull flush rose to her cheeks, for she remembered how and
where she passed those two hours, when all the world were absorbed in
the miniature playhouse. With one of those strange sudden waves of
perception she saw again a broken feather-fan and golden-hued rose lying
together on the velvet carpet, and Vladimir Mellikoff, tall and dark and
smiling, holding back the heavy _portières_, through which she escaped
trembling and doomed.
She caught her breath and went on a little nervously:
"I am very flattered to be praised by you, Mr. Tremain. I can't bear
Mrs. Bouncer myself; she is quite antipathetic to me."
"Then surely you deserve all the more praise," said Mr. Tremain,
courteously. "If to be out of accord with one's rôle results so
favourably I shall devoutly pray that Henri de Flavigneul and I may be
at daggers drawn this evening."
"But what would Miss Hildreth say to that?" asked the girl, sharply, and
looking up so quickly as to catch the sudden frown of annoyance that
spread over Mr. Tremain's face at the mention of Patricia's name.
"Ah, Miss Hildreth," he replied, with assumed carelessness. "I had not
taken her into consideration."
"And yet Miss Hildreth is not one to be left unconsidered?" said Miss
James, questioningly. "She is not one to be easily passed over." Then,
with a sudden change of manner, she added: "You have known Miss Hildreth
a long time, have you not, Mr. Tremain?"
Philip looked down at her a little startled and surprised. Was she
laughing at him--this pale, quiet, almost insignificant girl--or mocking
him? Surely the subject of his and Patricia's broken engagement had
been public property too long to have escaped her knowledge. Was it
impertinence or ignorance that dictated the question? But Miss James's
face was placid and mildly interested as she looked up at him with a
little smile, and waited for him to speak.
"Oh, yes, I have known Miss Hildreth for some years," he replied,
shortly; and then with an abrupt laugh: "but I have not seen her for
almost as long as I have known her."
"Ah," said Miss James, meditatively, "she has been abroad for ten years,
and ten years makes such a difference in one's knowledge of another.
Only think what might not happen in ten years!"
"Apparently Miss Hildreth's experiences have been more or less narrow,"
answered Philip, annoyed that the conversation should have turned upon
Patricia, and yet unable to keep from discussing her.
"Oh, do you think so?" asked Miss James, with quite a look of surprised
inquiry in her eyes. "To be sure you ought to know; but do you think
she--any woman--could come back quite unchanged after ten years abroad?"
There was so much of veiled controversy in her tones that Philip at once
found himself looking at the matter from her point of view, and debating
his own question with a decided negative bias.
"What do you mean?" he said at last, after a moment's delay. "What do
you think are some of the experiences that may have come in Miss
Hildreth's way--or any woman's--during ten years' absence abroad?"
"That would depend so much as to where one went, what countries, or
towns, or cities; whom one associated with; and how one lived. Each
country has its own peculiar influences, dangers, casualties, but some
countries have the two former more developed. Russia, for example; in
Russia one instinctively looks for dangers, intrigues, conspiracies. Has
Miss Hildreth ever been to Russia, Mr. Tremain?"
Miss James was treating the subject with so much gravity and
impressiveness that Philip felt himself carried along with her, and
inclined to look at Patricia's past career and its attendant
trivialities in a serious and grave light.
"I really cannot answer you in detail, Miss James," he said, "but
collectively I should say that nothing was more probable than Miss
Hildreth's being perfectly familiar with Russia, and Russian society, in
all its phases."
"Yes, I should say so too," answered Miss James, nodding her head in
confirmation of her words. "In fact I am sure of it. Mr. Tremain, do you
think Miss Hildreth has ever before met and known Count Mellikoff?"
They had been walking up and down a garden-path, but she stopped when
she put this question and faced him. Philip of course, also stopped, and
for a moment there was silence between them.
"That is an extraordinary question," he said at last; "have you any
reason for asking it, Miss James?"
"But you have not answered me yet," she protested; "when you do so I
will reply to you. Do you think Miss Hildreth has ever before seen and
known Count Mellikoff; say in Paris, or St. Petersburg?"
"To the best of my belief Count Mellikoff is a stranger to America, Miss
James."
"But is Count Mellikoff a stranger to Miss Hildreth, Mr. Tremain?"
"That is beyond me to answer," replied Philip, with an unconscious
inflection of curiosity in his tone.
"Then I will answer for you," said Rosalie, her thin sharp voice growing
rounder and fuller, "but you must bear in mind I have no reality to go
upon, only surmise and observation. Very well, then, I say Miss Hildreth
has not only met and known Count Mellikoff before, but she has known him
well, and she is afraid of him. That surprises you, Mr. Tremain, and yet
I don't know why it should. You must remember you have seen nothing of
Miss Hildreth for ten years, and you know nothing--positively
nothing--of her life during that time. Why shouldn't she have known
Count Mellikoff, and why shouldn't she have reason to fear him? Ten
years is a very long time; long enough to drink deep of experience; long
enough to plant, and sow, and reap. Long enough to lose more than one
friend, make more than one enemy; long enough to sink oneself to the
neck in intrigue, and to bury oneself in crime. May not Miss Hildreth
have eaten of the tree of knowledge, and found the evil overweigh the
good? May not Count Mellikoff have been her friend, and become her
enemy? Is it not possible that each is striving to outwit the other, and
each is afraid of the other? I see you think me rather mad, Mr. Tremain,
and credit me with a morbid love of melodrama, or a desire to make
mountains out of mole-hills. Ah, very well, let us say no more about it:
only when next you see Miss Hildreth and Count Mellikoff together,
watch his manner towards her, and see for yourself if he carries himself
as a stranger to her. Ten years is a long time for a woman to wander
about the world alone."
She finished abruptly, and turned away from him, leaving him without
another word.
Philip's meditations, if unpleasant before, were now distinctly
disagreeable. He disliked mystery, and above all things and most of all
he disliked it in connection with a woman. In his eyes all women should
be, like Cæsar's wife, above suspicion, and it hurt and galled him that
even a shadow of aspersion should rest on Patricia's fair fame.
And yet, as Miss James had said, ten years was a long time, and Miss
Hildreth gave no explanation, beyond a vague and general one, as to how
she had spent that time. Might there not be some secret bound up in
those years; some secret between herself and Vladimir Mellikoff, which
it was wisest to leave so buried? Was it possible of belief that in all
that time Patricia had never consoled herself for the lost love of her
youth?
Hers was an impetuous nature, open to sudden convictions, quick to act,
ardent, impressionable; with such a temperament in the hands of Vladimir
Mellikoff, what imprudence might not have taken place? Even a secret
marriage, and a subsequent purgatory of disenchantment, were not
impossible consequences. Indeed, the range of possibilities was so
varied and so unsatisfactory, Mr. Tremain felt himself unable either to
seize or exorcise them.
At the tea hour that same day, Miss James asked suddenly, in a lull of
conversation, bending forward and addressing Patricia in her highest
voice:
"Oh, Miss Hildreth, by the way, Mr. Tremain and I have been discussing
your long absence from your native land, and your possible and probable
experiences. Will you tell me, for it was rather a question of
difference between us, have you ever been to Russia; do you know St.
Petersburg?"
Something in Rosalie's sharp, hard tones commanded attention, and when
she finished all eyes were turned upon Patricia, as she sat in a
high-backed chair; her tea-gown of marvellous old lace and fluttering
ribbons seeming but a fitting setting to her delicate beauty. Vladimir
Mellikoff put down his cup of untasted tea, and drew near the central
group.
Miss Hildreth looked up a little surprised at Rosalie's earnestness. She
raised the tiny apostle spoon in her fingers, and studied it attentively
as she answered:
"Oh, yes, indeed, Miss James, I have done the whole grand tour. I know
my London, my Paris, and my Petersburg thoroughly, and like a loyal
American place the Peerage and the Almanach de Gotha next to my Bible."
Her voice was clear and mocking, and a trifle artificial.
"And may I also be permitted to ask a question, mademoiselle?" said
Count Mellikoff, advancing towards her and bowing slightly.
Patricia raised her delicate eyebrows in cool superciliousness. "Oh,
certainly, Count Mellikoff; in what way can I add to your knowledge?"
She put out her hand with the empty tea-cup, and Dick Darling flew to
take it from her; the outstretched hand trembled ever so little, and the
spoon fell to the floor.
"Since you know my home, mademoiselle, Petersburg, I do not make a
blunder when I suppose you to have known it socially as well as----"
"According to Baedeker," broke in Miss Hildreth, with a little laugh.
"Make your mind easy, Count Mellikoff; your Court and your _grand monde_
showed me nothing but civilities."
"That goes without the saying, mademoiselle," replied Vladimir, still
more gravely. "And, pardon me, it is pleasant to speak on home subjects
to one who understands them so well; did you, then, when at Court, or in
society, did you ever meet the most brilliant man of his time, the most
fascinating, handsome, rich young noble of all Russia? You will recall
him at once when I name him. Mademoiselle, did you ever know Count
Stevan Lallovich?"
There was silence for a moment as Vladimir Mellikoff asked his question,
and for a moment after, during which all eyes were again turned towards
Patricia. She had started forward a little, and half rose up from her
chair; her face had grown suddenly pale, and her eyes, beneath their
dark pencilled brows, flashed strangely.
It was but a moment, a second of time, a heart-throb, then she
controlled herself, and, with one of her lightest, most mocking laughs,
sank back upon her chair, sweeping her laces about her royally.
"Count Stevan Lallovich," she said, very distinctly; "you ask me if I
knew Stevan Lallovich? My dear Count Mellikoff, your very question is
superfluous. Could any woman who knew Petersburg, fail to know Stevan
Lallovich? The handsomest man of his day, as you have said, and the most
unscrupulous." Then she turned to Miss Darling: "My dear Dick, will you
beg Esther for another cup of tea, and boiling, my dear, positively
boiling. You see, Count, among other Russian peculiarities, I cling to
my Russian tea."
"I see, mademoiselle," replied Mellikoff, gravely. "May you always prove
as loyal to all things Russian."
Mr. Tremain had not been present during this little passage at arms, but
Miss James, as she sat before her mirror that evening "making-up" her
small sallow face into a hard-visaged, calculating Mrs. Bouncer,
congratulated herself upon her strategy.
"My shot told," she was thinking, as she painted in another wrinkle,
"it almost took Miss Hildreth off her guard. She is not likely to forget
herself again; but I have seen her once without her mask, and that is
enough. Oh yes, 'it moves, it moves.'"
Then, with Galileo's immortal words on her lips, she added a final touch
to her eyebrows, and glided quickly away, appearing a few moments later
in the flies, and calling forth Mr. Robinson's encomiums upon her as a
model of punctuality.