Since the thing was to be, there was nothing to be gained by
postponement. So decided the Duchess, and however fond of airing her
own sentiments and securing her own way Lady Ethel might be, on
ordinary occasions, for once she raised no objection. She was
perfectly willing that her marriage with Sir John Chetwynd should
take place at once. Perhaps in her home Lady Ethel was not quite the
plastic lay figure she was wont to appear in public, and the Duchess
had spoken to her most intimate and confidential friends of the
approaching nuptials with almost a sigh of relief, and a whispered
word.
"She has indeed been very difficult to manage, and really, though I
am speaking of my own daughter, I never can quite understand Ethel;
she is not like other girls. It will be a huge responsibility shifted
from my shoulders when she is married."
And everybody had wondered what the girl had seen in Sir John, that
he should have taken her fancy. To the outside world and to those who
had not come within the immediate charm of his manner and bearing, it
did offer food for speculation, and since his engagement he had grown
greyer and stiffer and more professionally precise than ever.
But he suited Lady Ethel, or she fancied he did; which answered the
purpose quite as well. She had always detested very young men; she
liked a man whom she could look up to and lean upon, and certainly
this she could do with perfect faith as regarded her _fiancé_. Now
Duchesses are no more exempt from the weary ills which weak flesh is
heir to than their less favoured brothers and sisters, and in the
early summer the Duchess began to complain of certain aches and pains
and to bethink her that Sir John's advice might be worth following;
so she drove over to Camelot Square and was shown into the waiting
room with the rest of his patients. She had some little time to wait,
and while the Duchess sat tapping her foot impatiently at the delay,
Ethel looked round the spacious apartment and decided on certain
improvements she would effect when she should preside over John's
establishment.
And then the door was flung open, and Soames, the eminently correct
footman, ushered them into his master's presence.
The Duchess advanced gushing a little.
"So good of you to see us so soon! I was positively timid at coming
without an appointment, even with Ethel."
"It is you who are good, Duchess, to give me such an unexpected
pleasure."
Sir John touched Ethel's cheek lightly with his lips and motioned his
visitors to be seated.
"Now is not that a pretty speech from a professional man! Ah, you
lovers, you are all alike, and when you are married--Ah! then you are
all the same."
"What an accusation! I hope Ethel does not credit it, or I shall
never be permitted an opportunity of refuting such a calumny."
"I know too well how highly Mamma thinks of you, John," said Ethel,
prettily.
"Well, I admit it--I do admire you immensely--I admire your power,
your position, your ability to make an income--a large income,
sitting comfortably in an arm chair. And then there is such solidity
in a doctor's profession--people are always ill."
"Mamma is ill herself," broke in Lady Ethel, "and that is why we have
intruded to-day."
"I hope it is nothing serious, my dear Duchess."
"How sweet of you! Ah, I am a martyr! I have hay fever to such a
distressing extent that I am positively ashamed to go into society."
Her daughter laughed.
"We were at the Opera last night, and Mamma's sneezes were most
_mal-à-propos._ It was very embarrassing."
"Yes, I am convinced that Romeo glowered at me, and at church on
Sunday it was such a charming sermon, so encouraging and tactful, I
sneezed violently in the man's best moments. At my age I cannot
consent to become a public infliction, yet I feel I am a nuisance."
"Mamma said, as soon as we got home--'I shall go and consult Sir
John,'" cooed Ethel.
"And now you can cure me?" The Duchess looked anxiously into the
grave face opposite.
"I have not the slightest doubt you will be entirely recovered in a
few days at most," said Sir John reassuringly; "you have caught a
severe cold."
"Nothing of the sort, I assure you. I have had colds before, and I
know better."
"What, better than your doctor?" The stern face relaxed, and Sir John
laughed.
"Well, better than my future son-in-law. Now I beg you not to be
obstinate. Give me something potent--one of those drugs that work
such instantaneous wonders."
"I fear they are not in the Pharmacopoeia."
"I don't think it is kind of you to discourage me."
"But if I make you well in a week, will not that satisfy your Grace?"
"I shall be radiant."
"I will write you a prescription."
"Thanks! What an invaluable husband you will make with all that
knowledge at your finger ends! I need have no misgivings as to
Ethel's health, and she has always been so subject to chills. The
risk of entrusting one's daughter to an unobservant man is shocking,
but to a physician! To have for one's daily companion a great and
renowned doctor, what an advantage--what a security!"
"Really, mamma, to hear you talk one would suppose that I was an
invalid, and I never remember to have suffered from anything worse
than the measles."
"When Ethel comes to me she will be guarded as sacredly as a girl can
be."
Sir John smiled kindly at his betrothed.
"I have made but a few protestations of what I feel for her; perhaps
I am more reserved than I should be, but I am no longer a boy. I
doubt whether I ever was very romantic, even in my younger days, but
I think that she and I understand each other, and if we don't tiff
and 'make it up,' if we have been engaged three months and have never
had a quarrel, that does not mean that my affection is not most
sincere and deep."
"I should hope we like each other too well to quarrel," said Lady
Ethel haughtily.
Like! After all, was it love on either side? Sir John asked himself.
"My dear Sir John," broke in the Duchess pompously. "A few words from
such a man as yourself impress me more profoundly than rhapsodies
from another. Ethel, just look out of the window and see if the
carriage is waiting. We are going to take the Lancaster girls to the
Academy, and Payne has driven round to fetch them while we had our
consultation with you."
"Yes, mamma, it is there."
"I will follow you in a minute, Ethel; say good-bye to John--," and
when the door had closed upon her daughter, she began hurriedly:
"It is hardly the time and place perhaps, but you will pardon that.
I--really, it is very awkward. Can you not help me, Sir John? The
weeks are slipping by, and I should, I confess, like to make my
arrangements for leaving home, but until I know definitely what yours
are--."
"Mine?"
"Yes; yours and Ethel's."
A light broke in upon Sir John's somewhat obtuse mind. He had no
desire to expedite matters, but then he was not the principal person
to be consulted, and it certainly was not for him to raise any
objection, so he acted immediately on the hint given him.
"My dear Duchess, what can I say? The matter rests entirely in your
hands. Let it be when you please. In another month I shall be
comparatively free, and we can visit Switzerland if Ethel wishes."
The Duchess smiled. "That you must arrange with Ethel herself, and
perhaps you had better broach the subject yourself to her. Girls are
apt to be a little curious on these points."
"Then I will ask her to fix the day for our marriage." He bowed with
old-fashioned gallantry over the pearl-grey suede, held out in
farewell, and the Duchess rustled away with Soames, the deferential,
in close attendance.
Soames did not like the idea of a mistress, but these "accidents" he
was well aware, would happen in the best regulated families, so he
was now bent on making friends with the Mammon of Unrighteousness in
the shape of the Duchess of Huddersfield and the bride elect.
Left alone, Sir John stood upright, his hand on the back of his chair
and his brows tightly drawn together.
Well, why not? What possible excuse could he make to his own heart
for the delay?
None, none. And yet he felt a good deal as if a thunderbolt had
fallen from the skies at his feet, and it was more or less of a shock
to him.
Presently he rang his bell.
"Who comes next, Soames?"
"Lady Rutherven, Sir John, but--but a lady who has no appointment has
been waiting for more than an hour, and I thought perhaps you would
see her first. She seems very ill."
"Show her in!"
A second later the door swung open again and Soames announced:
"Miss Blackall!"
Sir John started, but recovered himself in the next instant.
"Take a seat, madam."
He waved her to a chair and for several minutes they looked at each
other without speaking. The woman was the first to break the silence.
"I have come back," she said with a nervous laugh. "I am ill; I
thought you might try to cure me."
She had seated herself, but he remained standing.
What a handsome woman she had become, he was thinking, and how
expensively dressed! There was something strange in the very
familiarity of the countenance presented to him. It had altered much
from what he remembered it, but curiously enough he remembered it the
more vividly because of that very alteration.
"What is your trouble?" he asked huskily--"Why have you
consulted--me?"
"It is my lungs. I don't know--let us call it a whim. I thought you
would do me good if anyone could." She paused a second: "You used to
be my husband once."
"Once! Well, I am willing to be your doctor."
"I suppose you would do your best for a dog if it were dying,
wouldn't you? though you might not care if it recovered."
"I have a very faithful dog," he said significantly.
Bella winced.
"Dogs ask so little for their love. Oh, I didn't come here without a
struggle. And I knew you would speak like this. But I have been
abroad so long, and on the voyage home I got worse, and women--women
of your sort who had taken no notice of me, suddenly grew kind. I
said to myself, 'Bella, it looks bad for you when ladies forget how
common you are,' and then the thought struck me, London meant you! As
a patient I might come to your house and be let in. You are clever
and you are great; if I had any self-respect I could not ask you; but
I have not, you know; I never had any and'--and--I am--frightened! It
keeps me awake at nights, the fear. I--I am not going to--die?"
"I have said I will do what I can for you."
"You will sound me?"
"Loosen your dress."
As he bent over her she raised her hand as if to smoothe his hair,
and the colour came into her face, but she did not touch him.
Her fingers, from which she had drawn her gloves, were laden with
rings--rings which he had not given her. His breath came a little
faster as he stooped over her neck.
"Don't be scared to tell me the truth," she said; "I guess I'm pretty
bad. You need not take the trouble to lie about it."
He examined her thoroughly and replaced the stethoscope before he
spoke.
"Your lungs are not right. They used to be."
"Oh," she replied bitterly, "I used to be. I have come too late--is
that what you mean?"
"I mean that you must exercise great care and avoid excitement. Don't
brood--don't worry yourself by misgivings, which will only do you
harm. Go away from England when the summer is over; go where the sun
shines and the air is mild. Lead a life of ease and indolence. I can
say no more."
"And then?"
"And then I see no reason why you should not live for years to come."
Bella flung her hands out with a sort of despair.
"Your prescription is impossible," she said dully.
"Impossible?"
"I have only just come over from the States. I have an engagement at
the Empire for six months. I have got to stay."
"You will be very unwise. The laws of health demand that you should
cancel any such contract."
"Beggars can't be choosers. I must sing to live. It is my trade now."
He sighed. "You do not look as if you were in pecuniary
difficulties."
"Well, I make money easily enough, but it melts like ice cream;
everything is so beastly dear."
"Are you not with--him?"
"Him? Oh no; he left me years ago. I am alone--very much alone. It
seems sometimes as if I had spent the best part of my life alone. I
am so dull I--I wonder why I dread to die. There! I can follow your
advice so far as this; I'll take the greatest care of myself--in
London. I am glad I came to you, though it does not seem to have
delighted you much. I suppose if--if I had run straight and stayed
with you, I might have been quite well, eh?"
"That is difficult to say. Bella, have you--it is a foolish question,
but--have you ever regretted?"
She laughed recklessly.
"Oh, as to that--what is the good of looking back, anyhow? I have and
I haven't--when I have been sick it has been awful lonesome. You
didn't grieve much, that's certain. And you got your title soon after
I went. It was lucky for you. Scot! I should have been Lady Chetwynd
if I had stopped with you, wouldn't I?"
"You would have been an honest woman."
"Ah!" She rose from her chair and looked curiously round the room. "I
remember those bronzes," she said; "they used to hang in your little
library in the old house. You are a good deal changed in the face;
your manner is just the same. You were always a good fellow, I will
say that. I know it better than I used to now I have had so--since I
have been--"
"Hush--the past is dead. I was not so patient and tender with you as
I should have been."
"You saw that--you had made a mistake, but you tried to hide how
sorry you were--I know you did that and I--well, I didn't marry you
to make you sorry. Do you know how we lived--he and I, when I left
you? He took me to Paris; and didn't we make the dollars spin, the
pair of us--rather; and then one fine morning we heard a beastly bank
had gone smash and he had lost pretty well all he had got."
"And you left him?"
A smile curled the corners of her mouth.
"No," she said, slowly; "I didn't. We took two little rooms over a
baker's shop in the High Street, Islington, and I stuck to him. I
used to go out in an evening and do the marketing with a hand basket,
to get it cheap. When we wanted a change we would take a bus to the
Park and look at the swells across the railings; and sometimes Saidie
gave us tickets for the theatres. Seems odd, don't it? but it's a
fact. I was livelier then than ever I've been in my life. While he
was fond of me--he showed me he was fond of me, you see."
"You were capable of love, then, after all?" he said bitterly.
"I don't know. I loved the freedom I think, anyway, and perhaps I
took him with it. I don't know! what does it matter? It was a release
for you and you are glad that it happened, eh? now that the shame of
it is forgotten? We were never suited to each other, were we?"
"Why speak of what is past?"
"You see, if I had remained with you I should have been no happier,"
said Bella, reflectively; "you expected too much from me."
"I did my best to make you happy."
"Yes, perhaps! then if I had been more grateful and different, would
you be glad if I was with you still?"
"I cannot answer that question. I loved you--I had no thought for any
human being outside yourself."
"But now," she persisted, "now that the wound is old, do you not say
to yourself, 'it was better so'? Suppose that you and I were still
what we were once to each other, would you be happy to know that I
was your wife to-day?"
"I beg you to be silent. It is impossible that we can discuss such a
question."
She came close to his chair.
"I am," she said with a sort of feverish eagerness, "no more of a
lady now than I was then. I am just what I used to be when I made you
ashamed of my ignorance and my mistakes. But if I were pure, if I had
never been divorced, if I were standing here your faithful wife,
would you be glad?"
"Hush! You are paining yourself and me."
"Jack!"
"For God's sake be still!"
She fell on her knees beside him.
"Jack, say you would be glad."
"If you had never left me, if you had remained my faithful wife,
heaven knows that I should be a happier man!"
Bella burst into tears and sobbed convulsively, then pressed her
handkerchief to her mouth. It was bright with blood when she withdrew
it.
"Oh, be careful of yourself," said John Chetwynd, terribly moved;
"you must do what I advise."
"I'll try. I wonder why you should care one way or the other. It is
more than I deserve--you make me so sorry and ashamed. I shall never
see you any more, shall I?"
"I cannot."
"No; I understand, I ought not to ask you. Well, good-bye. There is
my address if you should take a notion to come. It is only a six
months' engagement over here, and if I'm not long for this wicked
world, I may not live to finish it. Keep my card. If one day you
should feel that you could come--just once. You don't hate me?"
"Hate you? No."
"I dare not ask you to forgive; but I begin to know and feel what my
action towards you really meant. Jack, see I am on my knees. Forgive
me!"
"I do. I forgive. If I was hard to you; if, as you say, I expected
and exacted too much from you, may God forgive me."
The tears were still raining down Bella's cheeks.
"Kiss me, Jack."
He shrank back. "You must not ask me that. I cannot."
"Is it that you despise me so utterly?"
"No, no; you don't understand. I--"
"Kiss me."
"Why do you make me speak? I am going to be married again. I kissed
her--a young girl--in this room half an hour ago. I could not outrage
her trust in me."
A sort of stung expression came into the face of the kneeling woman
and she staggered to her feet.
"You are going to take another wife! My God! I never thought--I never
dreamt. It seemed so--so--impossible. I hope she will make you
happier than I did."
"Oh, hush, hush!"
"She is one of your own class--a lady? What is her name?"
"I would rather not mention it. Give me your hand and let us part in
peace."
"Tell it me," she pleaded. "What name do you call her by?"
"Ethel."
"Ethel and Bella. Ah, Ethel is far the nicer name. We didn't think
once that you would ever be telling me you were going to be married
to someone else, did we? It feels queer, and it hurts me--a little, I
think. Good-bye, Jack. I see now why you could not kiss me--it would
not be right of you. She is a young girl and she might find it hard
to forgive you if she knew. I am going. You used to have a bell on
your table, I recollect, with a little white knob that you pressed
when Mary was to go to the hall door. Do you use it still? Oh, I see.
Let me press it instead of you, may I? I sha'n't feel so much as if
you were turning me out. Good-bye." She said the word lingeringly,
tenderly. "Say 'Bella' once again, for the sake of old times."
Jack Chetwynd took the slender trembling hand in his with God knows
what of anguish and pity stirring at his heart.
"Good-bye--Bella."
And the door fell to.
She was gone.
He could hear her hollow cough as she passed down the tesselated
corridor.