hearty, honest laugh.
"I know," he exclaimed gaily, "but this is not the same as the others."
Then, laying his hand on my shoulder, and speaking with the sudden
seriousness that comes so readily to shallow natures, he said, "God has
heard my prayer, old friend. He knows I am weak. He has sent down an
angel out of heaven to help me."
He took her portrait from the mantelpiece and handed it me. It seemed to
me the face of a hard, narrow woman, but, of course, he raved about her.
As he talked, there fluttered to the ground from the heap before him an
old restaurant bill, and, stooping, he picked it up and held it in his
hand, musing.
"Have you ever noticed how the scent of the champagne and the candles
seems to cling to these things?" he said lightly, sniffing carelessly at
it. "I wonder what's become of her?"
"I think I wouldn't think about her at all to-night," I answered.
He loosened his hand, letting the paper fall into the fire.
"My God!" he cried, vehemently, "when I think of all the wrong I have
done--the irreparable, ever-widening ruin I have perhaps brought into
the world--O God! spare me a long life that I may make amends. Every
hour, every minute of it shall be devoted to your service."
As he stood there, with his eager boyish eyes upraised, a light seemed
to fall upon his face and illumine it. I had pushed the photograph back
to him, and it lay upon the table before him. He knelt and pressed his
lips to it.
"With your help, my darling; and His," he murmured.
The next morning he was married. She was a well-meaning girl, though her
piety, as with most people, was of the negative order; and her antipathy
to things evil much stronger than her sympathy with things good. For a
much longer time than I had expected she kept him straight--perhaps, a
little too straight. But at last there came the inevitable relapse.
I called upon him, in answer to an excited message, and found him in the
depths of despair. It was the old story, human weakness, combined with
lamentable lack of the most ordinary precautions against being found
out. He gave me details, interspersed with exuberant denunciations of
himself, and I undertook the delicate task of peacemaker.
It was a weary work, but eventually she consented to forgive him. His
joy, when I told him, was boundless.
"How good women are," he said, while the tears came into his eyes. "But
she shall not repent it. Please God, from this day forth, I'll----"
He stopped, and for the first time in his life the doubt of himself
crossed his mind. As I sat watching him, the joy died out of his face,
and the first hint of age passed over it.
"I seem to have been 'tidying up and starting afresh' all my life," he
said, wearily; "I'm beginning to see where the untidiness lies, and the
only way to get rid of it."
I did not understand the meaning of his words at the time, but learnt it
later on.
He strove according to his strength, and fell. By a miracle his
transgression was not discovered. The facts came to light long
afterwards, but at the time there were only two who knew.
[Illustration: "LYING DEAD."]
It was his last failure. Late one evening I received a hurriedly
scrawled note from his wife begging me to come round.
"A terrible thing has happened," it ran; "Charley went up to his study
after dinner, saying he had some 'tidying up,' as he calls it, to do,
and did not wish to be disturbed. In clearing out his desk he must have
handled carelessly the revolver that he always keeps there, not
remembering, I suppose, that it was loaded. We heard a report, and on
rushing into the room found him lying dead on the floor. The bullet had
passed right through his heart."
Hardly the type of man for a hero! And yet I do not know. Perhaps he
fought harder than many a man who conquers. In the world's courts, we
are compelled to judge on circumstantial evidence only, and the chief
witness, the man's soul, cannot very well be called.
I remember the subject of bravery being discussed one evening at a
dinner party, when a German gentleman present related an anecdote, the
hero of which was a young Prussian officer.
"I cannot give you his name," our German friend explained--"the man
himself told me the story in confidence; and though he personally, by
virtue of his after record, could afford to have it known, there are
other reasons why it should not be bruited about.
"How I learnt it was in this way. For a dashing exploit performed during
the brief war against Austria he had been presented with the Iron Cross.
This, as you are well aware, is the most highly-prized decoration in the
German Army; men who have earned it are usually conceited about it, and,
indeed, have some excuse for being so. He, on the contrary, kept his
locked in a drawer of his desk, and never wore it except when compelled
by official etiquette. The mere sight of it seemed to be painful to him.
One day I asked him the reason. We are very old and close friends, and
he told me.
"The incident occurred when he was a young lieutenant. Indeed, it was
his first engagement. By some means or another he had become separated
from his company, and, unable to regain it, had attached himself to a
Landwehr regiment stationed at the extreme right of the Prussian lines.
"The enemy's effort was mainly directed against the left centre, and for
a while our young lieutenant was nothing more than a distant spectator
of the battle. Suddenly, however, the attack shifted, and the regiment
found itself occupying an extremely important and critical position. The
shells began to fall unpleasantly near, and the order was given to
'grass.'
"The men fell upon their faces and waited. The shells ploughed the
ground around them, smothering them with dirt. A horrible, griping pain
started in my young friend's stomach, and began creeping upwards. His
head and heart both seemed to be shrinking and growing cold. A shot tore
off the head of the man next to him, sending the blood spurting into his
face; a minute later another ripped open the back of a poor fellow lying
to the front of him.
"His body seemed not to belong to himself at all. A strange, shrivelled
creature seemed to have taken possession of it. He raised his head, and
peered about him. He and three soldiers--youngsters, like himself, who
had never before been under fire--appeared to be utterly alone in that
hell. They were the end men of the regiment, and the configuration of
the ground completely hid them from their comrades.
"They glanced at each other, these four, and read each other's thoughts
in each other's eyes. Leaving their rifles lying on the grass, they
commenced to crawl stealthily upon their bellies, the lieutenant
leading, the other three following.
"Some few hundred yards in front of them rose a small, steep hill. If
they could reach this it would shut them out of sight. They hastened on,
pausing every thirty yards or so to lie still and pant for breath, then
hurrying on again, quicker than before, tearing their flesh against the
broken ground.
"At last they reached the base of the slope, and slinking a little way
round it, raised their heads and looked back. Where they were it was
impossible for them to be seen from the German lines.
"They sprang to their feet and broke into a wild race. A dozen steps
further they came face to face with an Austrian field battery.
"The demon that had taken possession of them had been growing stronger
and stronger the further and further they had fled. They were not men,
they were animals mad with fear. Driven by the same frenzy that prompted
other panic-stricken creatures to once rush down a steep place into the
sea, these four men, with a yell, flung themselves, sword in hand, upon
the whole battery; and the whole battery, bewildered by the suddenness
and unexpectedness of the attack, thinking the entire battalion was upon
them, gave way, and rushed pell-mell down the hill.
[Illustration: "COMMENCED TO CRAWL STEALTHILY."]
"With the sight of those flying Austrians the fear, as independently as
it had come to him, left him, and he felt only a desire to hack and
kill. The four Prussians flew after them, cutting and stabbing at them
as they ran; and when the Prussian cavalry came thundering up, they
found my young lieutenant and his three friends had captured two guns
and accounted for half a score of the enemy.
"Next day, he was summoned to headquarters.
"'Will you be good enough to remember for the future, sir,' said the
Chief of the Staff, 'that His Majesty does not require his lieutenants
to execute manoeuvres on their own responsibility, and also that to
attack a battery with three men is not war, but damned tomfoolery. You
ought to be court-martialled, sir!'
"Then, in somewhat different tones, the old soldier added, his face
softening into a smile: 'However, alertness and daring, my young friend,
are good qualities, especially when crowned with success. If the
Austrians had once succeeded in planting a battery on that hill it might
have been difficult to dislodge them. Perhaps, under the circumstances,
His Majesty may overlook your indiscretion.'
"'His Majesty not only overlooked it, but bestowed upon me the Iron
Cross,' concluded my friend. 'For the credit of the army, I judged it
better to keep quiet and take it. But, as you can understand, the sight
of it does not recall very pleasurable reflections.'"
To return to my diary, I see that on November fourteenth we held another
meeting. But at this there were present only "Jephson, MacShaugnassy,
and Self"; and of Brown's name I find henceforth no further trace. On
Christmas Eve we three met again, and my notes inform me that
MacShaugnassy brewed some whiskey-punch, according to a recipe of his
own, a record suggestive of a sad Christmas for all three of us. No
particular business appears to have been accomplished on either
occasion.
Then there is a break until February eighth, and the assemblage has
shrunk to "Jephson and Self." With a final flicker, as of a dying
candle, my diary at this point, however, grows luminous, shedding much
light upon that evening's conversation.
Our talk seems to have been of many things--of most things, in fact,
except our novel. Among other subjects we spoke of literature generally.
"I am tired of this eternal cackle about books," said Jephson; "these
columns of criticism to every line of writing; these endless books about
books; these shrill praises and shrill denunciations; this silly worship
of novelist Tom; this silly hate of poet Dick; this silly squabbling
over playwright Harry. There is no soberness, no sense in it all. One
would think, to listen to the High Priests of Culture, that man was made
for literature, not literature for man. Thought existed before the
Printing Press; and the men who wrote the best hundred books never read
them. Books have their place in the world, but they are not its purpose.
They are things side by side with beef and mutton, the scent of the sea,
the touch of a hand, the memory of a hope, and all the other items in
the sum total of our three-score years and ten. Yet we speak of them as
though they were the voice of life instead of merely its faint,
distorted echo. Tales are delightful _as_ tales--sweet as primroses
after the long winter, restful as the cawing of rooks at sunset. But we
do not write 'tales' now; we prepare 'human documents' and dissect
souls."
He broke off abruptly in the midst of his tirade. "Do you know what
these 'psychological studies' that are so fashionable just now always
make me think of?" he said. "One monkey examining another monkey for
fleas.
[Illustration: "'REMEMBER FOR THE FUTURE, SIR.'"]
"And what, after all, does our dissecting pen lay bare?" he continued.
"Human nature? or merely some more or less unsavoury undergarment,
disguising and disfiguring human nature? There is a story told of an
elderly tramp, who, overtaken by misfortune, was compelled to retire for
a while to the seclusion of Portland. His hosts, desiring to see as much
as possible of their guest during his limited stay with them, proceeded
to bath him. They bathed him twice a day for a week, each time learning
more of him; until at last they reached a flannel shirt. And with that
they had to be content, soap and water proving powerless to go further.
"That tramp appears to me symbolical of mankind. Human Nature has worn
its conventions for so long that its habit has grown on to it. In this
nineteenth century it is impossible to say where the clothes of custom
end and the man begins. Our virtues are taught to us as a branch of
'Deportment'; our vices are the recognised vices of our reign and set.
Our religion hangs ready made beside our cradle to be buttoned upon us
by loving hands. Our tastes we acquire, with difficulty; our sentiments
we learn by rote. At cost of infinite suffering, we study to love
whiskey and cigars, high art and classical music. In one age we admire
Byron and drink sweet champagne: twenty years later it is more
fashionable to prefer Shelley, and we like our champagne dry. At school
we are told that Shakespeare was a great poet, and that the Venus di
Medici is a fine piece of sculpture; and so for the rest of our lives we
go about saying what a great poet we think Shakespeare, and that there
is no piece of sculpture, in our opinion, so fine as the Venus di
Medici. If we are Frenchmen we adore our mother; if Englishmen we love
dogs and virtue. We grieve for the death of a near relative twelve
months; but for a second cousin, we sorrow only three. The good man has
his regulation excellencies to strive after, his regulation sins to
repent of. I knew a good man who was quite troubled because he was not
proud, and could not, therefore, with any reasonableness, pray for
humility. In society one must needs be cynical and mildly wicked: in
Bohemia orthodoxly unorthodox. I remember my mother expostulating with a
friend, an actress, who had left a devoted husband and eloped with a
disagreeable, ugly, little low comedian (I am speaking of long, long
ago).
[Illustration: "'YOU MUST BE MAD.'"]
"'You must be mad,' said my mother; 'what on earth induced you to take
such a step?'
"'My dear Emma,' replied the lady; 'what else was there for me? You know
I can't act. I had to do _something_ to show I was an artiste!'
"We are dressed up marionnettes. Our voice is the voice of the unseen
showman, Convention; our very movements of passion and pain are but in
answer to his jerk. A man resembles one of those gigantic bundles that
one sees in nursemaids' arms. It is very bulky and very long; it looks a
mass of delicate lace and rich fur and fine woven stuffs; and somewhere,
hidden out of sight among the finery, there is a tiny red bit of
bewildered humanity, with no voice but a foolish cry.
"There is but one story," he went on, after a long pause, uttering his
own thoughts aloud rather than speaking to me. "We sit at our desks and
think and think, and write and write, but the story is ever the same.
Men told it and men listened to it many years ago; we are telling it to
one another to-day; we shall be telling it to one another a thousand
years hence; and the story is: 'Once upon a time there lived a man and a
woman who loved him.' The little critic cries that it is not new, and
asks for something fresh, thinking--as children do--that there are
strange things in the world."
At that point, my notes end, and there is nothing in the book beyond.
Whether any of us thought any more of the novel, whether we ever met
again to discuss it, whether it were ever begun, whether it were ever
abandoned--I cannot say. There is a fairy story that I read many, many
years ago that has never ceased to haunt me. It told how a little boy
once climbed a rainbow. And at the end of the rainbow he came to the
most wonderful land that was ever dreamt of. Its houses were built of
gold, and its streets were paved with silver. Its palaces were so
beautiful that no language could describe them, but to merely look at
them satisfied all yearnings. And all the men who dwelt in this city
were great and good; and the women fairer than the women of a boy's
dream. And the name of the city was "The city of things men meant to
do."
[Illustration: THE END]
THE STORY OF AN HOUR.
BY HILDA NEWMAN.
ILLUSTRATIONS BY V. W. NEWMAN.
-----
And this is the end of it all!
The sharp queries and sullen answers, the sobs, tears, and bickerings are
over, and in their stead reigns the cold silence of resolution.
How did it all begin? Neither could tell. Yet the torture of an unworthy
suspicion, and a pride that scorns to answer the doubts of an exacting
love, have apparently sufficed to obliterate the memory of the happiness
of three unclouded years of kindness and love.
[Illustration: "IDLY LOOKING OUT OF THE WINDOW."]
They are going to separate. There is nothing else to do, She says, and
He tacitly agrees, for he knows it is impossible to go on living in this
atmosphere of discontent. And they calmly arrange their affairs, as
though it were merely a question of a few weeks' absence, instead of the
breaking up of their home. He will travel, and She will stay on at their
house a little longer, till her mother goes abroad, when she will join
her, dismissing all the servants, excepting the old nurse who looks
after their child. Ah! it is the thought of their child that makes the
separation so hard, and He feels that the last link between them is
broken, when he yields that little life into the hands of the wife who
does not trust him, thinking bitterly in his heart that he may be taught
to hate him.
She sits in the drawing-room, idly looking out of the window, surprised
at the dead calm that seems to have come over the house. An organ is
playing in the street, and the notes jar on her strained nerves till she
could scream; but she sits still with her hands in her lap, trying to
believe that she is utterly indifferent to present, past, or future, yet
unconsciously listening to the hurried, heavy footsteps overhead, where
her husband is packing his portmanteau. She is quite anxious for a
moment as she remembers she has put away his fur-lined coat that might
be useful if he goes travelling in chilly regions, but she recollects
herself with a start, and does not stir from her seat. She lets the
bitter thoughts come uppermost in her heart now, for she is convinced,
of course, that this parting is the best thing that could take place.
Upstairs, He, quite helpless as to the locality of many necessaries that
have hitherto been prepared for him by thoughtful hands, and not feeling
able to confront his servant's inquiring eyes, is savagely thrusting
linen into an unwilling receptacle, whence ties and collars stick out
provokingly at odd corners, and trying to subdue a queer feeling that
oppresses him when he thinks of her stony indifference.
So the packing goes on, and the organ grinds merrily, and is inwardly
but emphatically cursed by at least two ungrateful people.
At last He is ready, and comes slowly down the stairs, giving some very
audible and offhand orders in the hall respecting his particular
belongings. A close observer might notice that he speaks and laughs a
little too readily. The little, pale woman, sitting motionless in the
room, hears him, and in her heart of hearts hears what he strives to
hide.
[Illustration: "COMES SLOWLY DOWN THE STAIRS."]
After all, it is a great wrench for a man to leave his--well, then,
whose fault is it? And the old arguments and suspicions rise again in
her mind and deaden all other feelings.
He comes into the drawing-room, hat in hand, very firm and very calm.
She does not move.
"Good-bye," he says, holding out his hand.
"Good-bye," she answers, taking it mechanically.
He pauses at the door, and their eyes meet. "It is much better so," she
says, faintly. And he is gone.
Then there is a rushing and singing in her ears. The notes of the organ
rise louder and louder, till they swell into a rich anthem--the garish
daylight changes to the dim light of a church--she walks up the aisle in
a glistening white dress, on which pearldrops shake and tremble. She
hears a dim murmur of voices and rustling of garments, and the scent of
white flowers is heavy in the air. There rises a clear voice, whose
fervour moves her inmost heart, exhorting her to love, honour and
obey--and out of the fulness of her soul she promises. _Oh! God, oh!
God, she meant to keep that promise._
Then comes a confused din of voices and rolling of carriages, but she is
only conscious of the strong arm to which she clings, and the clear face
that bends so tenderly over hers.
With a little sobbing gasp she opens her eyes. Has she been asleep? No,
but the organ has stopped and is rumbling down the street, followed by a
crowd of small boys and girls, whose ears are not sensitive to the
quality of music.
[Illustration: "A WHITE, WILD-LOOKING FACE."]
She rises. Her knees are shaking as she drags herself painfully across
the room, catching a glimpse of a white, wild-looking face in the tall
pier-glass as she clutches the handle of the door, and then the sight of
the empty hat-rack in the hall, the absence of coat and stick, or
fragrant whiff of cigar, bring the irrevocableness of the parting home
to her more vividly than anything--more than the few words of farewell,
the cold handshake, and the slam of the hall door half-an-hour ago. "Was
it only half-an-hour?" she murmurs, staring stupidly at the clock; "it
seems an eternity! And now he is going farther and farther from me,
never to return--never to tease, and praise and love me, for (she sobs)
he did love me once, in spite of everything--never to laugh at me and
call me 'little woman'--never to hold my hand or ask my help again! He
is thinking of his wasted life and love; yes, he will believe he has
wasted it on _me_. He is thinking of our little child--he did not bid
him good-bye--how could he bear to?" Ah! there is still something left
for her to love; but what is left for him? And with bitter tears she
remembers how quietly he gave the child up to her, and how she accepted
the sacrifice as a matter of course, though she knew what it cost him.
[Illustration: "THE NURSERY IS EMPTY."]
With beating heart she goes upstairs. The cosy, pretty nursery is empty.
The nurse has taken the child to Kensington Gardens as usual. She passes
on into their bedroom. It is still in disorder, and she has not the
heart to put it straight, though she feels that a little occupation
would do her good. The sun shines warmly into the room, but she shivers.
There is nothing but loneliness in the house, and that she cannot bear,
for it brings thoughts, and she dares not think.
Hardly knowing what she does, she finds and puts on her hat and gloves,
and turns to go, but, at the very threshold, she stumbles over
something--why, it is the little silver match-box he always uses--and
loses. She must take it to him--then she remembers, and, oh! strange
woman, covers it with tears and kisses. She hurries down the stairs, and
out of the house, and a long way down the street before she knows that
she is hurrying, because she cannot bear to be alone. An awful feeling
of restlessness, of reproach, will not let her be still, and yet she was
so calm a little while ago.
On--on--regardless of curious looks, for her cheeks are tear-stained,
and now and then there is a little catch in her breath, that she cannot
repress.
On--past the quaint old red brick palace, whose history they read
together, past the pond with its toy navy and anxious captains, past
nursemaids, children, and mooning philosophers she hurries, feverishly
longing to reach the chosen nook where a joyous welcome awaits her.
[Illustration: "THE POND AND ITS TOY NAVY."]
Now she is near--but the seat is empty, and the nurse is gossiping in
the distance. She runs on angrily--and stops! For, under a sheltering
tree, He stands bidding their little child good-bye. She can hear his
gentle words, and the soft, cooing answers, and she dumbly stretches out
her arms, as a great wave of love surges in her heart and drowns the
bitter thoughts for ever. In a little while he will go, and then this
tide of love and repentance will have come too late.