INTROSPECTION.
The party at the Folly had broken up at last, and, going the way of all
things terrestrial, was already numbered among the pleasures of the have
been.
Mrs. Newbold had flitted seaward with little Marianne, her husband, her
maid, and a small army of dress-baskets and boxes. The golden glory of
July held the gardens and woods, the terraces and parterres, in the
spell of midsummer colouring; flinging abroad with generous hand its
meed of sunshine, its wealth of fruit, its richness of blossom, its long
hours of fullest beauty, when the intense blue heavens above, the
smiling earth below, and the very atmosphere of soft delicious haze
seemed to palpitate with their own tropical luxuriance.
Mrs. Newbold's island home never looked more enchanting or enchanted
than in this "royal month," and yet it was just at this perfected time
that stern fashion decreed she should leave it, and seek for pleasure
and relaxation within the narrow limits and confined area of George
Newbold's yacht. And Esther, with a courage worthy of a better cause,
never dreamed of disputing fashion's mandate, but bore with heroic
fortitude the thousand and one restrictions entailed upon her by
existence in the _Deerhound_; for even in that most luxurious schooner
her convenience had to suit itself to space.
And so, while the _Deerhound_ lay moored at Newport, and Mrs. Esther
entertained and was entertained with almost royal splendour, and the
long summer days were given up to feasting and amusement, and the long
summer nights to dancing and intrigue, the Folly was deserted, its
blinds close drawn, its hospitable doors locked and barred; and the
roses came to perfection, and ran riot in their wantonness, showering
their petals in such lavish prodigality that the garden paths lay strewn
and heaped with the crimson and white of their livery.
Even as in ancient Rome a certain youthful emperor, satiated with every
guise of amusement, worn out with pleasure and fulfilled desire, buried
the companions of his licentiousness beneath an avalanche of
rose-leaves, which, as they fell, became their grave-clothes and their
pall.
And have we of to-day no likeness to this pagan Heliogabalus? Do not we
bury the best-beloved of our past beneath a cere-cloth, formed of the
sweet sentiments of forgetfulness; and, turning from their appealing
eyes and sadly accusing faces, enter with fresh zest and renewed
enthusiasm upon the untried excitements of the hour? Are we, after two
thousand years of Christ's humanity, and the awful lessons of Gethsemane
and Golgotha, so much less pagan?
Mrs. Newbold had taken Dick Darling with her in her flitting; she had
come to have a very true affection for that somewhat crude young lady,
for Esther possessed so much of the alchemist's power as to recognise
pure gold when she found it; and also Miss Darling's outspoken
admiration for Patricia Hildreth acted as a salve to her disappointed
and fruitless projects.
To Dick herself the prospect of three weeks or a month at Newport on
board the most perfectly appointed yacht of the squadron, with unlimited
license to enjoy the passing hour to the full, was, in her own
phraseology, "just too most awfully nailing!" She danced and she
flirted, the latter in her own half-boyish fashion. She smoked
everybody's cigarettes save her own. She won the ladies' single-handed
lawn tennis tournament, and sported the prize--a jewelled racket and
ball brooch--with frank delight in her own prowess. She drove Freddy
Slade's tandem up and down Bellevue Avenue all one morning, and sailed
Jack Howard's microscopic cutter out to the Narrows and back in the
afternoon.
She was, indeed, as happy as the day was long; like Browning's
'Duchess,' "she loved whate'er she looked on, and her looks went
everywhere." And then, oh, happy thought, were there not more worlds to
conquer in the immediate future? Did not visions of New London, Shelter
Island, Mount Desert, and the Isle of Shoales stretch out in endless
perspective before her? What girl could dare to be otherwise than
sublimely happy so long as the sea laughed, and the sun shone, and there
were such beneficent factors in the scheme of life and Providence as
horses, and dogs, and boats, to say nothing of men and boys, who were
but the playthings of existence?
And through all those long, luxurious summer days, Mr. Tremain remained
in town, returning a curt negative to all alluring invitations.
He had not seen Mrs. Newbold again after his momentous interview with
Mademoiselle Lamien; indeed, he had left the Folly immediately after it,
walking into New Brighton, and proving but a sorry companion to John
Mainwaring, during their journey to New York.
To tell the truth, he felt himself to be somewhat of a traitor to
Esther, in that he had permitted himself to become a traitor to the
memory of Patricia. He could not quite forget or put from him Esther's
earnest words, Esther's eyes filled with tears, and Esther's undeviating
fidelity to the love of his youth; that love from which he had now
deliberately and by his own act cut himself off for ever. He knew that
to Esther he could only appear as the most weak and vacillating of men;
his own words rang too clearly in his ears to allow him for one moment
to doubt what her judgment upon his action would be.
There are two things no woman can excuse or palliate in a man:
disaffection from herself where she has once been the first object of
his devotion, or disaffection to an ideal which she has set up as a
fetich, and to which unswerving fidelity is expected as a matter of
right. Esther had set up in this position the old love of ten years ago
that had existed between himself and Patricia; she had, so to speak, dug
its dead body from out its unquiet grave, and breathing into it her own
vitality and desire, had set herself to work to re-create answering
sentiments in his heart. With the impetuosity of woman's nature, which
considers no office so legitimately its own as that of binding up broken
hearts, and reuniting broken troths, she endeavoured now to re-construct
and rehabilitate this passion of his youth, never pausing to reflect
upon his attitude in the case, or the probabilities of failure which
amounted to certainties.
She had failed, it was true; but that is only half a failure that
leaves matters at the point from which they started. There is always
room for hope so long as certain premises remain unchanged. Philip was
still unbound and unfettered, and Patricia was still Patricia Hildreth.
Were not these sufficient foundations on which to build as fancy
dictated?
Reflecting on this, and on his own position from Esther's point of view,
Mr. Tremain could not but acknowledge that his proposal to Mdlle.
Lamien, and their partial engagement, could only be regarded by Esther
in the light of direst treachery. Any reasons he might bring to bear in
defence of his present situation and the circumstances that had led up
to it, would, he knew, be scoffed at and scouted by his staunch little
friend. Of what use would it be for him to enter into the physiological
side of the question? He could not hope to explain to her the vague,
impersonal power that drove him on to this finale. Should he plead that
he was not altogether a free agent, and advance in confirmation of this
the subtle illusive resemblance of Mdlle. Lamien to another some one,
equally shadowy and unreal, he would be met with an incredulous smile,
and a suggestion that since he could urge no stronger reason than that
of a chance likeness, why need he hesitate to _exploiter_ his delusion?
Or why choose Adèle Lamien's negative unreality, in place of Patricia
Hildreth's positive personality?
It would be vain also to remind Esther that not only had Patricia twice
deliberately refused him in words, but by open raillery and covert
mockery had emphasized those refusals, more times than his pride cared
to count. No, Esther would be convinced by none of these things; it was
worse than hopeless to expect it of her, and therefore worse than
useless to appeal to her. In selecting Adèle Lamien for his future wife,
he had cut himself adrift from his own life, and from the close sympathy
and intimacy of those few friends whose affection had made existence
worth living.
He realised perfectly that in thus choosing a woman upon whose past lay
not only the blight of secrecy but the curse of suspicion, he made that
past his own with all its weight of shame and sin, nay, perhaps, even of
crime, at which she had so vaguely hinted. He knew now that in that
moment of surprise and overmastering passion, when the spell of her
music and her presence held him against his will, he had not reasoned,
he had not considered. He had let the potency of the moment bear him
away; he had, indeed, seen dimly what the outcome must inevitably be,
and yet he had allowed himself to drift on with the current, and made no
resistance.
His love, his pride, smarting and burning beneath the cool insolence of
Patricia's scorn, hurried him on to such a declaration as should be
final, and break for ever the bonds of those ten years that had held him
so long, and galled him so intolerably. He would be free, and Patricia
should see and recognise his freedom and own its justice, even though
she laughed gaily and jested mockingly upon it.
It was indeed in this half defined and scarcely acknowledged
retaliation, that he now found his chief solace, for the matter of his
new engagement cannot be said to have contributed to his happiness.
Still, if fate was so untoward as to eliminate all the higher degrees of
perfection from his destiny, it was at least something gained to know
that he retained the power of wounding one woman through another. It was
not the greatest or grandest revenge, nay, it had something pitifully
mean and ignoble about it; but it was revenge, and Philip was still
human enough not to have mastered that divine perfection, which kisses
the hand bearing the rod, and blesses the scourge even while the blows
fall.
In the meantime he hugged his secret, and kept his unhappiness to
himself; refused to mingle with his own kind, and rarely stirred from
out his chambers, except for the daily walk to and from his office, and
grew silent, morose, unapproachable.
The July days came and went with lingering, regretful steps; but they
brought him no comfort. He grew to hate the long, bright, cruel hours,
during which the sun shone so fiercely in the intense blue sky whose
wide expanse was unsoftened by cloud or mist; even as he came to loathe
the short midsummer nights, with the flooding moonlight and the radiant
stars set in the vaulted firmament of God's glory.
No news and no word came to him from Mdlle. Lamien; he had neither seen
nor heard from her since their unsatisfactory parting. He had waited
expecting each day some expression from her, some recognition or
repudiation of the promise that bound him; but each day brought him only
disappointment, until at last, as the days grew into weeks, he ceased
expecting and accepted his position almost with relief. He was ready and
waiting whenever Mdlle. Lamien should signify her need of him; he would
not lift a finger to break the slight chain that bound him, but neither
would he by act or word rivet that chain closer.
Of Patricia he knew absolutely nothing; not even the echo of her name
reached him. That most energetic of society chronicles, _Town Optics_,
was never counted in his literature, though, had he known it, even that
authority was silent concerning her movements. She had apparently
dropped out of his life as completely as even he could desire; and, as
he acknowledged with a bitter smile, she was not likely to vex or
trouble him more, in the changed conditions of his future.
Ah, well, let her rest in peace! Patty, his wilful, loving, perverse
little Patty, had been dead to him for ten long years.
But with the last week of July, Mr. Tremain aroused himself, and,
throwing off his lethargy, hastily packed a light portmanteau and betook
himself to a certain landing-stage down in the city's depths; and as the
sun set in a harmony of gorgeous splendour over Bowling Green and Castle
Garden, making a golden symbol of Trinity's tall spire, and flooding the
city with transient beauty, he stood upon the deck of a small steamer,
bound for the rocky shores of Maine, and, two days later, had vanished
amidst the deep far-stretching pine forests of that eastern state,
pitching his tent beside an outlet of wild Hemlock Lake, and lost
completely to civilisation in the form of post, or telegraph, or daily
paper.