“_Nothing mars or misleads the influence that issues from a pure and
humble and unselfish character. A man’s gifts may lack opportunity, his
efforts may be misunderstood and resisted; but the spiritual power of a
consecrated will needs no opportunity and can enter where the doors are
shut._”--Dean Paget.
|Macneillie read and re-read this letter with the awful craving of a man
whose love has for years been starved of all knowledge of the beloved,
except the mere knowledge that she was still in the world. He had, of
course, seen her name daily in the papers, and had known what plays she
was acting in, but of her real life he had known nothing. He had tried
to think that her marriage though necessarily falling below his ideal
of married life might at any rate be as happy as the average, might at
least be tranquil and not without a certain comfortable respectability.
But the brief account given in Ralph’s letter, and the many details
which he could so easily read between the lines--filled him with misery.
The post had brought him as usual a mass of correspondence; with a sigh
of impatience he ran through it, then pushing it aside caught up his hat
and hurriedly left the house. He was in no humour to climb the hill-side
to the wishing-well; instead, he passed through the village, over
Callander Bridge, and taking a little footpath across the meadows,
sought out a favourite nook of his beside the river Teith, which wound
its peaceful course through the hayfields. A tiny wood had sprung up
near this walk at one part, and Macneillie had a special affection for
a certain beech-tree which stood just at a bend in the river, and under
its shade many of his pleasantest holiday hours were spent. He
threw himself down now on the sloping bank beneath it. Everything
was curiously still and peaceful; Ben Ledi rose majestically in the
distance, framed by soft foliage in the foreground, and the river was
emphatically one of those which “glideth at his own sweet will,” a great
contrast to the Leny, which dashed and foamed through its rocky pass.
It was just this calm peacefulness he longed for in his inward struggle.
With all the vividness of one blessed or cursed with a powerful
imagination, he realised Christine as she now was. He knew instinctively
that her heart had awakened from its sleep, that, with the dead failure
of the _mariage de convenance_, her love which had only lain dormant
had returned--but had returned of course to torture her. Hitherto he
had been able to think of Sir Roderick Fenchurch with a sort of
impartiality. He knew so very little about him; and it was Macneillie’s
nature to think well of people until they disillusioned him; he had even
felt a sort of compassion for the man, because he knew that he could
never really possess Christine’s heart as he, for a time at any rate,
had possessed it. But Ralph’s picture of what the husband really was
behind his society mask had driven out all gentler thoughts, had filled
the Scotsman’s heart with loathing, had over-clouded his whole world.
Macneillie was, however, before all things, an honest man. He had not
accepted conventionally the first religious truths put before him, he
had thought much, he had waited patiently, had learnt by degrees, and
the hard training of his life had borne its fruit--it was impossible
now, that he should remain for long in darkness. It flashed upon him
that his trouble came from having stepped out of the right order; for a
time he had lost that absolute trust in God’s education of every human
being, which had for many years been his stronghold. The words of
Ralph’s letter came back to him--“brutes like Sir Roderick are enough to
have staggered even your prophet Erskine of Linlathen.”
The name of Thomas Erskine in itself awakened within him a whole train
of memories, for he was one of the many thousands who have been rescued
by the writings of that barrister, laird and saint from falling a prey
to the spirit of unbelief which is the reaction alike from Calvinism and
ceremonialism.
Lying under the shade of the beech-tree, the fresh air from the hills
playing softly about his uncovered head, he tried to picture to himself
what Erskine would have thought of this mistaken marriage, with its
unhappy results, and there came back to his mind a passage in “The
Spiritual Order,” in which the writer spoke of the strange difficulty of
retaining faith in God’s loving purpose when confronted with the evils
of the lanes and closes of great towns which seem to be mere hot-beds of
vice and profligacy. How look on those and still believe that education
was God’s whole purpose in creation? “It would be impossible,” said
Erskine, “did we not also realise that _there is no haste with God_.”
Clearly then it was the imperfection of his own nature, the
weakness--not the strength--of his love for Christine, which made him so
desperately impatient at the thought of her suffering; for her sake
he must learn to be “strong and patient,” learn to love with a diviner
love, to wait with a more perfect trust. The letter had come to him
like a call to arms, he was perfectly conscious that it marked a fresh
turning-point in his life; he had learnt more of Christine and her
difficulties than he had known for years, and the only way in which he
could interpret the meaning of it all was that he should pray for her in
her grievous need more unceasingly than he had yet done.
And so the time passed by, and at the close of the six weeks’ engagement
Ralph returned to Callander for the few days that remained before
Macneillie’s company was to open at Southbourne with “The Winter’s Tale.”
It felt more like a home-coming than he could have imagined possible.
His friend was delighted to have him back again; old Mrs. Macneillie
was scarcely less so, and the servants gave him a cordial welcome, for
though his illness had given a good deal of trouble in the house, he had
the gift of winning hearts, and the forlorn plight in which he had first
arrived had awakened all the best sympathies of the hospitable Scottish
household. He fancied that Macneillie’s deep-set grey eyes were somewhat
graver in expression than before, but his manner, with its touch of
quaint, dry humour, was exactly the same as usual, and it was not until
the Tuesday morning when they set off early to walk together to the
Trossachs, that any allusion was made to the contents of the letter.
Then, at last, as they walked along the shores of Loch Vennachar,
Macneillie put a direct question about Christine.
“I am glad you got to know Lady Fenchurch,” he said. “Where did she go
after leaving Edinburgh?”
“She went up to the Highlands a fortnight ago to a place called Mearn
Castle, which belongs to a Mrs. Strathavon-Haigh, a widowed cousin of
Sir Roderick’s--a very fast widow, if what I heard in Edinburgh is
true. Lady Fenchurch did not want to go there, but said her husband
particularly wished her to accept the invitation. So she had given up
her original plan of taking Charlie to the sea, and hoped the Highland
air would do him as much good.”
“I suppose she was right to try to please her husband,” said Macneillie,
“but Mearn Castle is one of the most abominable country houses going.”
“She seemed to know very little about it,” replied Ralph, “only disliked
this gay widow, and wanted to go to some quiet place where rest would
have been more possible. But she evidently tries to do what can be done
for her brute of a husband. Oh! if you could have seen her patience, her
dignity, while that scoundrel was abusing her! I wish I could horse-whip
him!”
“No need,” said Macneillie, in a low voice, “for every brutal word he
will one day have to give account.” Something in his manner, with its
deep conviction that every wrong should in the future be righteously
avenged, silenced Ralph. He felt ashamed of his vehement impatience, and
was not sorry that, as they approached Loch Achray, Macneillie led away
from the subject by asking after the shepherd’s son.
They had passed the Hotel, and were walking through the Trossachs, when
they overtook a gentleman’s servant laden with a soda-water syphon and
a great basket of fruit which he was evidently carrying down to Loch
Katrine.
Glancing at the man, Ralph gave an exclamation of astonishment.
“Why, Linklater! is it you? I was speaking to Mr. Macneillie about you
only just now.”
The man’s face lighted up as he returned Ralph’s cordial greeting, and
he looked searchingly at Macneillie, having very often heard that the
actor was one of Lady Fenchurch’s oldest friends.
“I little thought to see you here, sir,” he said, turning to Ralph. “We
came this morning from Stronachlachar, for there was a good wind for
sailing, and Master Charlie was wanting to set foot on Ellen’s Isle.
He’s there now, with her ladyship, and I came on to the Hotel to get
these things for lunch.”
“They have left Mearn Castle then?” said Ralph in surprise.
“Well, sir,” said Linklater, with a little hesitation in his manner, “if
you’ve not already heard, maybe I had better tell you the whole truth,
for all the world must know it as soon as her ladyship sues for a
divorce.”
Macneillie made an inarticulate exclamation. Like one in a dream he
listened to the man’s brief account. It appeared that Sir Roderick
had seduced the young wife of one of the game-keepers on the Castle
estate--that the enraged husband discovering him had given him such a
castigation that it had been impossible to hush up the affair, and that
Lady Fenchurch, on learning the truth, had left Mearn Castle.
There was a pause when the man had ended. Ralph waited for his companion
to ask some question, to make some comment, but Macneillie walked on in
absolute silence, evidently too deeply engrossed in his own reflections
to be even conscious that he was not alone.
This, then, was the meaning of his inward perception of Christine’s
grievous need! In this fortnight, during which his whole soul had been
absorbed in prayer for her, she had lived through the most awful crisis
of her life, and now she was near to him in her forlorn, unprotected,
worse than widowed condition. He must at any rate, inquire if she would
see him, ask if he could in any way help her, and here in this quiet
spot there was fortunately no danger that idle talkers would comment on
their meeting. He pencilled a few words in German on one of his cards
and turned to Linklater.
“Give this to your mistress,” he said, the title somehow sticking in his
throat. “I will take a boat and row out to the island in a few minutes,
and you can bring back the answer.”
By this time they had walked through the glen and had reached the
picturesque landing-place. Linklater hailed the Stronachlachar boatman,
and set off for the island, and the others followed more leisurely,
Ralph taking both oars and Macneillie sitting in the stern, though
the far-away look in his eyes scarcely qualified him for the duties of
steersman.
The story which Linklater had told them had been so entirely unexpected,
and was in itself so revolting, that neither of them felt inclined to
talk. To Macneillie, moreover, it was as though he had suddenly heard
of the death of the man who had saddened his life; to all intents and
purposes he considered Sir Roderick as dead to Christine, for he came
of a race which for more than three hundred years has always regarded
adultery as the dissolution of a marriage. To him there had never been
the least question as to the distinct teaching of Christ on this point,
he believed that His words clearly sanctioned divorce for infidelity to
the marriage bond and gave freedom to the innocent one. No _man_ could
rightly put asunder those who were married; sin only or death could part
them. But proved infidelity was as truly the divider as love was the
bond of union; the legal ceremonies, whether of marriage or of divorce,
were but the appointed and expedient symbols of spiritual facts--the
outward signs of the birth and death of married life.
The seven years of his solitude had taught Macneillie a stern
self-control, and whatever he felt as they rowed across the lake was not
allowed to appear at all in his face. Ralph glanced at him from time to
time and marvelled, perhaps only now realising of what splendid stuff
his hero was made, and how nobly he held in check that difficult
temperament with which actors, artists and musicians are usually
endowed.
“Which side is the best landing-place?” he asked as they drew near to
the lovely wooded island.
“To the right in that bit of a creek,” said Macneillie, beginning to pay
heed to the steering. “There is the boat, I see, but the men are both
out of it.”
As he spoke they glided into the little, rocky cleft with its
overhanging trees, its moss-grown boulders, its patches of crimson
heather and purple ling. Then came a few minutes of utter silence, as
they waited for Linklater’s return; Ralph felt anxious and restless,
each minute seemed to him an hour, and he feared that perhaps after all
Christine Greville would refuse to see any one. As for Macneillie he
just waited like one who is intently listening, but Ralph was not
sure that the listening was for Christine’s voice or for the servant’s
approaching footsteps, he had a suspicion that it was for something much
more inward.
At length, to his great relief, there came a rustling among the boughs
and a trampling of feet, and in a minute Linklater was striding down
over the rocks towards the boat, bearing a note in his hand. Macneillie
thanked him as he took the missive, and unfolding it less deftly than
might have been expected of a seasoned actor, read the following words:
“You are the only man I could bear to speak to yet; please come.”
He promptly stepped on shore, but Ralph lingered.
“I will stay in the boat,” he suggested, “and have a pipe.”
“Master Charlie is very anxious you should come and help him with his
Kodak, sir,” said Linklater, respectfully. “He’s just up here at the
top, and her ladyship is at the further side of the island, sketching.”
“Very well, then, I’ll come,” said Ralph, and he followed his friend up
the steep ascent.
In a little clearing at the top they found the small boy, who gave a
war-whoop of delight as Ralph emerged from the brushwood.
“If I hadn’t had such an awful longing for gooseberries, Dugald would
never have met you!” he said gleefully. “Auntie is over there making a
sketch, she’s hidden right away by the trees, but don’t go to her just
yet, do stay and help us lay the things out for lunch, Dugald is going
to make a fire and boil some water, he thinks Auntie will like some tea,
she’s been having such dreadful headaches the last few days.” Macneillie
heard no more, he left Ralph and the child, and Dugald Linklater, and
made his way straight through the tangle of shrubs, trees, and bushes,
in the direction that Charlie had indicated. There was a gleam of white
between the green leaves--it was the sun lighting up the sketching-block
on her easel; in another moment he had parted the thickly-growing
branches and had seen her once more.
She was sitting on a fallen tree--not attempting to sketch, but with her
elbows propped on her knees and her face hidden by one of those shapely
white hands he had so often kissed; the sun made a dazzling glory of
her fair hair; her light grey dress and grey straw hat seemed exactly
to harmonise with the green trees and the patches of heather. She had
always had that instinct of fitness which makes some women know
exactly what to wear, and when to wear it.
Macneillie stood for a minute watching intently the down-bent head, his
heart throbbing so fast that he felt half-choked. At last, putting
force upon himself, he moved forward. His step recalled her from her sad
reverie, and starting to her feet with the nervous alarm of one who has
lately undergone some great shock, she looked round as though in terror
of pursuit. That startled movement, and the momentary expression he had
seen in her pale face, strengthened Macneillie as nothing else could
have done; he forgot all about himself, realised only that she wanted
his protection.
“You need not be afraid,” he said, taking her hand in his, “of what use
are old friends if not to help you in time of need?”
She struggled hard to reply, but her eyes swam with tears, her lips
refused to frame a word.
“Let us sit down here and talk things over quietly,” said Macneillie;
“as I wrote to you just now, Dugald Linklater told us what had passed at
Mearn Castle.”
“He told you what he knew,” said Christine in a broken voice. “He
could not tell you of my interview with Sir Roderick.” She paused for a
minute, then the pent-up torrent of words broke forth. “I have heard
of women, yes, and of men, too, refusing to be separated from a guilty
partner; but there must at least be a genuine repentance to make such a
plan even moral. There was none with Sir Roderick. He was vexed at
the discovery, but he made light of the sin itself. In my presence he
laughed over the affair. The house seemed like hell. I could not have
stayed in it another hour!”
The look of shrinking horror in her face tortured Macneillie, who could
so well understand how her whole being recoiled from the foul atmosphere
that had surrounded her. It was because he understood how she felt
herself degraded by all she had lived through that he intuitively
stretched out his hand for hers, and held it in a strong, firm clasp.
“Do not dwell on all this,” he said, “but tell me how I can help you.”
His quiet, tender voice, the reverence of his manner quickly soothed
her. She looked up into his face, and by that mere look seemed to draw
in endless stores of strength and comfort.
“Do you know,” she exclaimed with seeming irrelevance, “what Ralph
Denmead said about the day you found him in the Pass of Leny, when he
was lying there ill and half-starved, and looked up to see you bending
over him? He said it was like looking up into the face of the Christ!”
“Poor boy!” said Macneillie. “He was in an awful plight, no one with a
grain of kindliness in his nature could have passed him by. He has made
me his debtor for life now, though; it is through him that I have met
you to-day.”
“We little thought,” said Christine, “that those two children in St.
James’s Park, playing with their boat, would have anything to do with
our future. How is it, though, that you are grateful to him for bringing
about this meeting? It is I who am grateful to him. But you who have so
much to forgive--you who have avoided me all these years----?”
“I dared not seek you out,” said Macneillie, “our paths parted
naturally, and it was safer so. What could I have done for you then? But
now all is different. Are none of your people coming to be with you?”
“There is no one to come. As you heard, I daresay, my father died four
years ago.”
“Yes, I saw the notice in the papers,” said Macneillie.
“He lived just long enough,” she resumed, “to see how miserably his
scheme had failed. I had married to please him and to help the family.
Well, my sister’s husband, with no help at all from me or my position,
got an excellent appointment in Ceylon, so there again the scheme proved
useless. Three years ago my mother went out to live with her there, she
could do nothing to make me less miserable, and it only pained her to
see my unhappiness. She realises things less at a distance, and now she
is too much of an invalid to bear the return voyage. A year ago they
sent me back Charlie, Clara’s little boy, and he has been a great
comfort. Except for him I am quite alone.”
“I want you to understand,” said Macneillie, “that it is still my
highest happiness to serve you. It is quite possible that in the
difficult position you are in you may need the help of a friend.”
“Do I deserve your friendship?” she said questioningly; “you stood
aloof all these years--you would not be my friend then, though I asked
you.”
“If I had been a worse man I should have accepted the place you offered
in your company,” said Macneillie; “or perhaps if I had been a better
man, I could entirely have effaced myself and dared to take such a
perilous post. But as things were, it seemed best to go right away. Did
you not understand?”
“Yes, yes,” she said in a choked voice. “I understood--and honoured you.
Is it only seven years since you and I acted together? It seems to me
a life-time. All that has gone between has been a sort of dreadful
nightmare. And the worst of it was the feeling that I had deserved the
misery, had deliberately chosen the low level and fought against you
when you tried to drag me up. Oh, it is so long since I had a real
friend to talk to--may I tell you all?”
“Of course,” he said, gently. “Why not?”
“After a year of it I had grown almost desperate,” she said, clenching
her hands tightly, like one in pain, “and the season’s work had tired
me out; it seemed no use to try any longer even to live an honest life.
There was only one thing that still held me back. I knew if I sank lower
still it would grieve you more than all, and the thought of the pain I
had already given you was always with me. Then one Sunday afternoon I
happened to be alone. Sir Roderick had gone to stay with some friends
for the Ascot week, and there came to me a little girl bringing a note
from Lucy Seymour--you remember how soon after you and I were engaged we
had been able to help her when she was in great trouble. Well, she wrote
that her husband had died abroad and that she had just returned with her
child, was herself dying and wanted to see me. I went to her at once
and found her in great poverty, and in terror of being turned out of her
lodgings before the end. Her life, she said, had been a very happy one,
thanks to you and me. Oh, if you could have heard her gratitude for
the past. Every word she said seemed to draw me back from the horrible
indifference that had paralysed me--she somehow stirred up all my best
memories. She had heard that you were in America, or she would have
appealed first to you, for the help had been chiefly your doing.”
“Did she die?” asked Macneillie.
“Yes, about ten days after that Sunday. I had promised to send her
little girl to school, and to befriend her, if, later on, she went into
the profession, and after that Lucy seemed actually to long for death,
young as she was. I saw her every day, and the last night they sent word
to the theatre that there was a sudden change for the worse. Directly my
part was over, I went to her; she died very happily and peacefully, just
as day was breaking. I had never seen any one die before, and on the
stage death is always made somehow to seem like an end, a grand sort of
finale. But Lucy’s death was not like an end at all, it was as quiet
and serene as if she had been merely turning a page in a book. I can’t
describe to you how it altered all my ideas. Afterwards there was her
little girl to care for, and that helped me too, and though I knew
everything must still be hard, I tried after that--tried my very best
to please Sir Roderick, and as far as I could to make our home life more
endurable. We had each of us been much to blame in marrying without any
real love, and I knew that I must ‘dree my weird,’ as you used to say.
Well, it is over now--over, and I can hardly yet realise things. Last
night I wrote to my solicitor.”
“I hope he is a good one,” said Macneillie.
“_Yes_, Mr. Marriott, of Basinghall Street; but I am half afraid whether
he himself is back yet from his voyage.”
“Ralph Denmead may know, he is an old friend of his. I will inquire. But
in any case many months are sure to pass before all the legal forms are
gone through, and in the meantime you will have to live as quietly and
guardedly as possible. Have you realised that?”
“Yes,” she said, with a little shiver. “A fortnight of country-house
life, in such a place as Mearn Castle, makes one realise evil more
keenly than years on the stage.”
She remembered miserably the people she had met there--men and women so
utterly unprincipled that she loathed and despised them. She remembered
the callous indifference with which her husband had observed all the
annoyances to which she was subjected. She remembered the age-long
hours, unoccupied by professional work--barren of all that could be
called employment.
And then, turning from the past as from some hideous dream, she thought
how restful it was to be here in this little island, with the man
whose heart had never faltered from its allegiance, the lover whose
self-sacrificing constancy was as untiring as the love of God. Never
from his lips would she have heard such words as had filled her with a
sense of degradation at Meam Castle. It was the depth of his love,
the fineness of his reverence, which kept him now from expressing the
passion which she knew filled his heart. He would wait till the law had
declared her freedom--would wait and think only of how she could best be
shielded from the strife of tongues.
“If you are really at a loss for some quiet place, and for friends
who can rightly protect you, why should you not go for a time to the
Herefords’ house near Firdale?” said Macneillie.
“I know them very slightly,” she objected. “Besides, is not that meant
for people who have no money?”
“Monkton Verney is for all, I think, who are in need--it’s a Cave of
Adullam--and though you don’t know Mr. and Mrs. Hereford well, you know
Miss Claremont and she is the practical head of things.”
“I will at any rate write to her, she is a wonderful woman for
understanding,” said Christine. “I am glad you reminded me of her.”
Macneillie stood up, for he knew that it would be unwise to stay longer,
and that he must somehow tear himself away.
“Write and let me know whether you go there,” he said; “and don’t forget
that if I can do anything for you in any way, I have at least the right
of an old friend. I see the steamer over yonder, and before long a host
of people will be at the landing-stage and some of them may be rowing
out to visit Ellen’s Isle. Even here, in this paradise, Satan walks you
see in the shape of the gossiping British tourist; and your face and
mine are public property. I might do harm by staying here.”
“Not even here,” she sighed, “in this lonely place? And it’s so long
since I saw you!”
He took her hand in his, and held it for a minute tenderly; looking into
his face, the beauty of its expression of strong patience startled her.
“No, not even here,” he said with a quiet smile. “Your reputation is too
precious to me. But remember that in any difficulty or danger I have the
first right to help you.”
His courage nerved her to face the parting and even to assume an air of
cheerfulness.
“I must come back to Charlie,” she said. “He is sure to be hungry, and
there will be plenty of time for you to have lunch, too, before any
tourists molest us.”
So together they walked to the little encampment, where they found the
photographers fraternising over the Kodak, while Dugald had the tea
just ready. And since laughter and tears are not far apart, and the very
people who have lived through a tragedy are happily the ones most
easily moved to see all that is humorous in daily life, there followed
a cheerful meal which might have surprised and even shocked a mere
superficial observer of life, but contained elements of comfort in it
for all who understood the griefs and trials of human-kind.
Crowning it all was the unalloyed happiness of the child, whose beaming
face and ringing laughter soothed Christine’s sore heart as nothing else
could have done.
“_Auf wiederschen!_” said Macneillie, when the last moment had come,
and Christine said nothing, but all her soul seemed in her eyes as she
lifted them to his.