Vivette did not without regret see Peter go. But she had seen enough to
realise that his adventures were at an end. She surrendered him to a
better claim, as always she had decided to do. Her comedy, she told
herself, had on the whole finished happily. Vivette had the fortunate
ability to be done for ever with things ended. She was too thoroughly a
player to wish the curtain raised upon a story technically finished.
Peter, too, had rung down the veil on his pilgrimage. He wanted to take
up his life from the moment at which he had looked for Miranda in an
empty house. It all came vividly to his mind again. The short ride home
was thronged with scenes from his life of a boy. They rose from the
stirred pools of memory. He could see pale clusters of the evening
primrose, and smell the laden air of a place where he had waited for her
long ago. He saw a heap of discoloured paper dimly lit by a struck
match, lying in a far corner of a raftered room where he had lost her.
How could this girl have become a stranger? It was impossible. Yet it
was also impossible that he for five years had neglected to look for
her. He had not remembered her for five years. He could not now believe
it. The five years confronted him, inexorably accusing.
He reached Curzon Street, and at once looked for his mother. She could
tell him all there was to know of Miranda, and in the morning he would
go to her. His mother came from her room as Peter arrived on the stairs.
"You are tired, mother. You want to sleep?"
"We will talk in the morning, Peter."
"Not to-night?"
"It is not necessary to-night."
Mrs. Paragon smiled mysteriously, and added:
"You will find her in the drawing-room."
Peter's heart bounded.
"She is here?" he breathlessly asked.
He looked at the door between them. Mrs. Paragon kissed him good night
without a word, and went into her room.
When Peter went in to Miranda he saw himself explaining away the years
in a rush of eloquence. He would torrentially claim Miranda. He would
persuade and overwhelm her.
Miranda, for her part, waited eagerly upon the event. She had decided to
be mistress of herself till for herself she had judged that Peter's
mother was right. She pretended she was not yet sure that Peter had
never ceased to care. She wanted to play delicately with her glad
conviction.
But Peter could not speak, and Miranda could not play. He came towards
her and stood a moment. His lips foolishly quivered, and the veil upon
Miranda was torn. Her hand went out to him. She saw she had moved only
when Peter dropped beside her chair. There was nothing now to explain.
He just crept to her heart and rested.
The meeting of their eyes was not yet to be endured. They came together
in a darkness of their own.
Gradually the trouble went out of their passion--a stream, no longer
broken, but running deep. To Peter it seemed that the tranquil rhythm of
the bosom where he lay had never failed.
"Why have we waited till now?" Peter softly wondered. "It cannot be
true. I have come to you from yesterday."
They were together a little longer, shyly approaching the wonder of
their meeting, with broken words--fragments of speech pieced out with
looks and touches.
When Miranda had left him, Peter pondered in her chair the things he had
intended to say. He could not now believe they had so wonderfully taken
everything for granted. Surely when morning came his peace and joy would
vanish. Nothing would remain but his plans of yesterday for a holiday.
In the morning Miranda met him as a sensible woman with commonplaces to
discuss. She had decided that Peter should carry out his plan for a
voyage. She would stay in London, and be ready for his return. Peter
demurred:
"Why should I go now?" he asked. "I have given all that up."
"I want you to go," she insisted.
"But you will come with me, Miranda?" pleaded Peter.
"I will come to the edge of your journey."
Peter felt that Miranda was right. He would come to her with a mind
blown fresh by the sea. No wraith of an experience unshared would
survive into the perfect day of their marriage. The scattered rays of
his passion were to be focussed anew in a dedication absolute and
untroubled. The present was haunted by the shadows he had pursued. They
flitted between them, to be immediately recognised for shadows and to be
put away; but, even so, their joy was faintly marred by the accusing
years. Let them be utterly forgotten.
Miranda that evening went on board Peter's yacht. They lay till sunset
off the Isle of Wight, till a red glow lit the western cliffs. Then
Miranda went over the side, and from a small boat watched the beautiful
ship vanish into the open sea. Peter stood to the last, erect and still,
and as the distance widened between them Miranda wanted for a moment to
call him back. Her sensitive idealism seemed out of reason now that her
lover was disappearing into the haze.
Then she overcame her moment of regret. She had given him up to the
burning sea, into whose spaces he sailed. He would come back to her
inspired with the light and freedom of blue water. He would find her
each day in the triumphing sun, in the gleam of breaking surf, in
perfume carried from an Indian shore, in the shining of far mountains.
He would fling out his love to catch at all the loveliness into which he
was passing. The coloured earth should paint and refashion her; the sea
should consecrate her; permanent hills, seen far off, should invest her
in queenliness. Her hand should be upon him in the velvet wind. Her
mystery should fall upon him out of the deep sky.
Could she regret days which were thus to glorify her? Filled with
happiness, exultant and sure, she strained no longer after the lost
ship. Peter had disappeared into a yellow mist that girdled all the
visible sea. But already she saw him returning to claim in her all the
beauty into which he sailed.