Gerard gave the man who was holding the ponies a five-franc piece, and
drove back at a break-neck pace. Minna’s revelation and taunts had set
him in a frame of mind bordering on madness. He did not stop to question
the truth of her statement. It cast too lurid a light upon the dark
places of the mystery of four years ago. His egregious folly danced
before his eyes. The wrong inflicted on a heroic woman and a loyal man
loomed before him in ghastly significance. He could not hide behind
sophistries. He was _not_ a bad man, to contemplate the consequences
of his actions with cynical complacency. Deep down in him lingered the
conscience of the moral, if invertebrate, Briton. His conscience was
appalled at the irreparable injury. Minna was suddenly transformed from
the desired flesh feminine into an unthinkable hate. Irene assumed a new
radiance of martyrdom.
In the searchlight that was sweeping his horizon, he saw her
transcendent faith in his equal greatness of soul; saw, too, his own
ignoble narrowness of comprehension. He had been a fool, besotted by
his own brutality. He lashed the ponies viciously. A man translates into
external fury the shudder that a flash of self-knowledge sends through
his soul.
Yet the story he had heard was amazing; compelling credence,
as Tertullian has it, _quia impossible_. All its elements were
characterised by a marvellous intensity. What he had taken for a vulgar
intrigue had really been a drama of fierce passions and noble heroisms,
in which he alone had played a vulgar part. His gorge rose at the idea
of the sorry figure he must have appeared in the eyes of each of the
three.
The ponies dashed, sweating and dusty, up to the front of the Villa
Benedetta, before he realised how the journey had been accomplished.
Mrs. Delamere, summoned in haste, descended to meet him. Seeing him
alone and agitated, and the ponies dripping, she grew pale.
“Where is Minna?”
“She has twisted her ankle. Wouldn’t drive back with me. You are to send
a closed landau for her at once. You will find her at the _Séjour du
Soleil_, on the road before you get to Var.”
“Aren’t you going back with the carriage?”
“No,” he replied brusquely. “You send it. You needn’t be alarmed. She is
not hurt.”
“Then I suppose I may guess the reason----?”
“You may guess anything you choose, Mrs. Delamere,” said Gerard. “Good
evening.” And turning the ponies, he drove off.
Half an hour later he was back in his hotel, where he spent the evening
trying to face the situation. There was only one course open to him.
Humiliation at Irene’s feet. It was but her due. And then? He was
baffled. He would offer remarriage. Perhaps she would accept. After
all, he had been her husband, she his wife. In his commonplace system
of ethics, the fact counted for much. But Irene was different from
other women. He had a dim conception of her as something spiritual and
masterful. Had she been of commoner mould, perhaps he would not have
chafed at his shackles. What a worm he had been! In his chastened mood,
the meanness of his eager belief in her guilt smote him sorely. He
had been a blackguard all through. Gradually, as the hours passed,
the atmosphere of remorse grew denser, and through it, by a kind of
spiritual refraction, the illusory image of the long set sun of love
appeared above his horizon.
His late pursuit of the female had, in some coordinating fashion, put
him on the track of the feminine. The convulsion in his mind caused
him to grasp at elusive supports. Remorse craved atonement. The many
astounding factors in his situation, when he grew tired of considering
each in turn, all combined to produce a queer, unnatural sentimentality.
Without the dew of womanly sympathy, life seemed parched with sudden
aridness. He lay awake that night, deluding himself into the longing for
a lost paradise. He made magnanimous resolves. He would win back Irene,
humble himself before Hugh. The next day he started for London, his head
swimming with sick and angry fantasies.
And meanwhile, in her darkened room at Nice, Minna was regarding the mad
betrayal of her secret in dazed and despairing terror.
*****
Two days afterwards, Gerard paused in the doorway at the foot of the
familiar staircase in the Temple, where Hugh’s chambers were situated,
and scanned the list of names. The one he sought was still there. He
hesitated for a moment, biting the ends of his moustache. His last
meeting with Hugh had been unpleasant. The memory galled his pride.
Perhaps it would be better to carry out an alternative plan, and obtain
knowledge of Irene’s whereabouts from Harroway, or from Miss Beechcroft,
her aunt. His heart failed him. He winced in anticipation before the
steel-blue of Hugh’s eyes and the supercilious tones of his voice. Then
suddenly conscious of the lack of moral courage, he threw angrily
away the stump of cigar he was holding in his fingers, and mounted
the stairs. The oak was unsported. He knocked; a voice bade him enter.
Hugh’s clerk rose from a paper-heaped desk, and advanced to meet the
visitor.
“Is Mr. Colman in?”
“No, sir,” said the clerk. “He hasn’t been gone more than half an hour.”
“When will he be back?”
“Monday morning, sir. This is Saturday. He doesn’t often come to
chambers on Saturday afternoons.”
“Do you know where I can find him?” asked Gerard, growing impatient.
The clerk did know. Lawyer’s clerks are certain about most things.
“Mr. Colman is at home, at his private residence.”
“Where is that?”
“Are you a client, sir?” asked the clerk, with an air of importance.
“No, confound you,” exclaimed Gerard. “My name is Merriam. Perhaps you
have heard of it. What’s your master’s address?”
“Fifty-two Windsor Terrace, Hyde Park, sir,” replied the clerk promptly.
Gerard nodded and withdrew. But for his previous hesitation, he would
have gone on to Harroway. As his self-esteem, however, was piqued,
he hailed a cab in the Strand, and continued his quest of Hugh in the
direction indicated. He leaned over the panels, his gloves in his great
sunburnt hands, and tried to distract his thoughts by contemplation of
the busy thoroughfares. Their unchanged aspect impressed him with the
returned wanderer’s illogical astonishment. But for his own incidented
career during his absence he might have left them only yesterday. Life
seemed to have stood still in London. He half pitied its stagnation. He
himself had whirled through time; had made a fortune, braved countless
adventures. Every day had differed from its predecessor. He had lived,
while this unchanging scene had gone mechanically on, day after day,
like the reiterated performance of some gigantic spectacle. The Strand,
the Haymarket, Piccadilly Circus, held his attention, but when the cab
turned off through the dull, decorous streets between Regent Street and
Oxford Street, he leaned back in the cab, and his thoughts were again
bent anxiously inwards. Again he felt the nervous reluctance to meet
Hugh, tried to formulate in his mind the explanation and apology whose
accomplishment was the main object of his visit. He had often styled
himself, boastingly, a plain man. But a plain man is very much like
a plain cook, unable to cope successfully with anything beyond the
commonplace. His errand dealt with extraordinary issues. How should he
fulfil it? And there was Hugh’s fiery temper to be reckoned with, and
his command of scathing speech. Gerard had always been just a little
afraid of Hugh in the old days, and the half-acknowledged habit of
timorousness still survived.
The cab drove down Oxford Street, past the Marble Arch, and turned
up one of the thoroughfares leading north. A quiet street to the
left contained Windsor Terrace. Gerard alighted at Number Fifty-two,
dismissed the cabman, and knocked at the door. A maid-servant opened. On
seeing him, she started and looked at him in some bewilderment.
“Is Mr. Colman in?” asked Gerard.
“No, sir.”
“When do you expect him?”
“Quite soon, sir.”
“Could I come in and wait?”
“There is Mrs. Colman upstairs, sir,” said the maid, perplexedly.
“Mrs. Colman!” echoed Gerard.
The announcement confused him. He had reckoned upon finding Hugh in
bachelor quarters. He had left Mrs. Colman in Nice. For a moment or
two his lip curled at a satirical thought. Probably one of Hugh’s
indiscretions. It was one of those houses from which the general visitor
was excluded. He glanced at the servant, whose perturbation became
evident. He drew out his card-case.
“Would you tell your mistress that an old friend of Mr. Colman’s has
very important business with him, and asks the favour to be allowed to
wait until he returns?”
Jane took the card and ran up the stairs. Gerard remained in the hall.
Suddenly he was aware of the dim stirrings of past association. There
was something familiar in the girl’s features and voice. Of whom did she
remind him? He tapped his foot irritably, seeking to get upon the track.
Presently Jane returned, with a flushed face.
“Will you come up to the drawing-room, sir?”
She preceded him up the stairs, held open the drawing-room door. As she
stood aside to let him pass, he again looked at her sharply. Certainly
he had seen her before. She gave him no time for enquiries, for as soon
as he had entered, she quickly closed the door and disappeared. Gerard
walked across the tastefully furnished room, whose arrangements bore
evidence of the hand of a refined woman. As he glanced round him, his
eye fell upon a photograph of Irene in a silver frame. He crossed to
the table on which it was, examined it closely. It was evidently quite
recent. She had grown older, he thought; her face, spiritualised.
He felt vaguely disappointed. The portrait did not suggest the woman
crushed by contumely whose face would grow radiant at the news he was
bringing her. For lately he had begun to regard himself somewhat as her
deliverer. Her aspect of serenity gave him apprehensive qualms. On the
same table was a photograph of Hugh, proud, with his head thrown back,
looking somewhat scornfully at the beholder. In the centre, hidden from
the first casual glance by a vase with flowers, was the photograph of
a pretty two-year-old boy. A dawning uneasiness, too dim as yet for
suspicion, had just arisen in his mind, when, turning away from
the table, he noticed upon the mantelpiece two richly chased silver
candlesticks, which were strikingly familiar. They used to be Irene’s
most cherished possessions, heirlooms in her family. Had she given
them to Hugh? Quickly he looked about the room. Against the wall hung a
signed Seymour Haden that had belonged to his wife. What did it mean?
Beneath stood a little cane work-basket. Scarcely aware of his purpose,
he turned over the silks and spools. A fragment of paper bore a
pencilled set of directions for some fancy stitch. It was in Irene’s
handwriting. Gerard put his hand to his forehead, drew it away moist.
Some books were lying on a table. He strode impetuously thither. The top
one was “_The New Atlantis_, by Hugh Colman.” Gerard took it up. On the
fly-leaf was written, “Irene, from Hugh.” Irene, Irene everywhere.
Then swiftly the lost association connected with the servant found its
place in his brain. She was one of their Sunnington servants. Her name
returned to his memory--Jane, a favourite of Irene’s. With a sudden
exclamation of amazement, foreboding and anger, he rushed to the table
with the photographs, and seeing that of the boy, scanned it intently.
At this moment the door opened and Irene herself entered the room. She
was very calm, though pale, and she looked straight into his eyes. For
a moment or two they regarded one another in silence, Gerard, with his
back to the light of the window, still holding the photograph.
“How do you come to be in this house?” he said, somewhat hoarsely..
“It is my own,” she answered steadily. “Mine and my husband’s.”
“And this?”
“Is our son,” said Irene.
He looked at her, stupefied by anger and lacerated vanity. The
photograph fell from his fingers on to the carpet.
“You mean that he is your--protector,” he said.
Irene’s eyes flashed dangerously.
“I don’t know what your object in coming here is. I thought it was
important business. I came down to spare my husband the possible pain
of an interview. It seems that you have come to insult me. Hugh is my
lawful husband. We were married three years ago. If your object was to
learn this, you have attained it.”
She spoke haughtily, drawing herself up in all her dignity. His presence
offended her. Feminine delicacies rose in hot revolt within her. Yet she
could not repress an almost savage thrill at the contrast between him
and the man who was now her husband.
How had she ever stupefied herself into the delusion that she loved him?
He looked coarse and commonplace. A movement of his neck to free itself
from pressure of the collar revealed a small mole, horribly familiar to
her. She shuddered in all her being. Yet she faced him bravely.
“If that is all,” she added, “we can spare each other the discomfort of
further conversation.”
“But it isn’t all, Irene,” he burst out, with genuine spirit. “I swear
insult was the last thing in my thoughts. I never knew of this. I came
to get your address from Colman--to ask your forgiveness. But I don’t
understand. Tell me. Are you really his wife?”
“I have already said so,” replied Irene. “If you are come to ask my
forgiveness for your action towards me, I am prepared to grant it.
But--I am Hugh’s wife.”
“And seeing you his wife, I don’t understand. Unless I have been made an
utter fool of a second time by a woman.”
An ugly expression passed across his face. She looked so calm,
self-contained; her whole attitude suggested aloofness. He began to
feel his old discomfort in her presence, accentuated by the exasperating
position in which he found himself. He cursed the day that turned
his steps to Minna Hart. Had this been her revenge--this out and out
mockery?
“I owe you an apology,” he said grimly. “I left a woman calling herself
Mrs. Colman in Nice--Minna Hart. She informed me that she had been
secretly married to Colman. That he had spent the night of the murder
with her. I came straight from Nice here to tell you of my remorse and
to offer you reparation. It seems she was lying. I humbly apologise.”
He laughed the short derisive laugh of indignation, and took three or
four short impatient paces to and fro. Irene’s eyes flashed a second
time.
“You have been fooled,” she said. “She cannot be his wife, since I am.”
He turned round upon her suddenly. “Perhaps it’s you that have been
fooled.”
“What do you mean?”
“Perhaps her story is true, and I may still have the pleasure of asking
for your pardon. The registers in Somerset House will tell me.”
“Do you mean to accuse my husband of marrying me while his first wife
was alive? I would not believe a hundred registers!”
“Either he or she must be lying,” said Gerard.
“She is the liar!” cried Irene, thrilled with the magnificence of her
faith. “I suppose she told it you in the same calm frame of mind as when
I last saw her.”
It was Irene’s one ungenerosity. But a woman is not apt to choose her
weapons when the man she loves is slandered by another woman. Primitive
instincts get beyond control. But her words were an illumination to
Gerard.
“That very evening she came to tell us her secret.”
“I will never believe it. And I would sooner die than insult him by
asking. There is no need for us to talk further. I appreciate your
motive in coming.”
Her words were a signal of dismissal. She moved towards the bell. But
quick steps were heard on the stairs, and in a moment Hugh entered the
room. He stood for a second transfixed with amazement at the sight of
Gerard. Then quickly recovered himself.
“What are you doing here?” he asked haughtily.
He crossed the room, and stood by Irene’s side, hand on hips, looking
very fiercely at his enemy. Involuntarily Irene slid her hand beneath
his arm. And so the two confronted Gerard. A spasm of the old jealous
envy passed through his heart. If he had been a primaeval savage he
would have leaped at Hugh’s throat.
“I have come from the Mrs. Colman who resides at Nice,” he replied.
Hugh’s heart gave a great throb. For a moment the ground seemed to be
slipping from under his feet. He collected himself quickly.
“Explain yourself,” he said.
“I have lately had the pleasure of meeting Miss Minna Hart at Nice.
She confessed to a secret marriage with you, and entered upon such
explanations as proved to me how baseless were my suspicions of--the
present Mrs. Colman.”
“And you came to take your revenge. It is worthy of you.”
“Mrs. Colman will bear me out when I say that I came with other motives.
Your second marriage was an entire surprise to me. As great a one as the
first.”
“But the girl was lying to you--duping you. Can’t you understand?” cried
Irene, breathlessly, looking from one man to the other, waiting in an
agony of mystification for Hugh’s indignant denial.
Hugh set his teeth and strode up to Gerard, and looked him close in the
eyes.
“Damn you!” he said, “couldn’t you have spared us this!”
“Then it is true?” cried Irene, aghast. “That that girl is your
wife--and I am not?”
Hugh turned quickly from Gerard, and moved a pace nearer to her, and
said, with a certain sad stateliness:
“Yes, dear, it is quite true.”
She stood for a moment or two white and trembling, as if stricken by
a mortal malady. There was a dead silence. She looked at Hugh fixedly.
Then she turned slowly and walked towards the door.
Gerard was frightened. The flabby conscience was wrung. This was the
second time he had stabbed her to the heart. For the moment he forgot
everything save her innocence and her anguish. He overtook her in two or
three sudden strides.
“For God’s sake, Irene--I’m an infernal blackguard--forgive me.”
But, her back towards him, she waved him away, with outstretched hand,
and in a few seconds had left the room.
“Now, we two,” said Hugh, drawing himself up. “What are your
intentions?”
“What intentions can I have?” replied Gerard, sullenly. “You heard what
I just said to Irene.” Hugh turned away with a gesture of helplessness,
and catching sight of the boy’s photograph lying on the floor where
Gerard had dropped it, he stooped mechanically and picked it up.
“I think you had better go,” he said, wearily, fingering the frame; “and
if you have anything of the man left in you, you will leave her alone,
and hold your tongue about all this.”
“I have no object in making it public,” replied Gerard.
“Very well,” said Hugh, looking at the boy’s portrait.
Gerard left the house, and drew a great breath on reaching the open air.
He had made a fool of himself again. He had taken his revenge; had eaten
the food of the humble. He wished, in a futile way, that he had not
acted on Minna Hart’s confession. His Quixotic impulses had led him to
ignominious upheaval among the sheep. Fate was serving him shabbily. He
walked to the Marble Arch and idly entered the Park. His head was full
of the past interview. Hugh Colman’s attitude had produced an irritating
sense of discomfort. He had attacked him in the anticipation of
unmasking a villain. He had unmasked him, and found the same proud,
always bitterly envied man. Furthermore, he had found himself the
villain.
For a hundred yards he tried to sentimentalise over his final and
irrevocable loss of Irene. But he was honest enough to abandon the
attempt. He called himself a fool for his lovesick pains; consoled
himself with the assurance that she never was and never could be his
style. Yet he felt sick of life, sick of his blundering and ill-used
self. He walked on aimlessly.
At last he found himself in the Broad Walk of Kensington Gardens. It
came on to rain from a leaden March sky. He hailed a cab, entered it and
closed the panels.
“Where to, sir?” asked the driver, through the trap-door in the roof.
Gerard did not know. He mentioned his club. The cab started. The sudden
decision brought his future plans before his mind. Somehow England
seemed a cold, tame, unattractive place. His visions of a country estate
in Norfolk lost their charm. He wished he had never left Africa.
“I’ll soon clear out of this beastly country again,” he said to himself.