Then, forgetting him, she stared at the dim light of the window, her
eyes wide open and fixed, her lips parted with long shuddering sighs.
Slowly her breathing grew quieter. Hilary watched her face.
"Mary," he said in low voice.
She started, turning her blank unseeing eyes upon him.
"Be careful what you do now.... You are hardening your heart.... Judge
not, that you be not judged.... When pain comes to us, it is a symptom,
a sign that something is wrong in our life. We must look through the
pain to what caused it, and set it right. We must do it humbly, not
setting ourselves up above the sinner. If another has sinned against
us, let us see why. Are we free of blame for that sin? If we had been
all that we should have been, would this have happened? Let us try to
understand.... They that have eyes to see, let them see...."
There was no response in those blank eyes, no sign that she had heard.
In her intense preoccupation she simply stared at him instead of at the
window.
Mary was making up her mind. Something in her heard and registered
Hilary's words; but they did not enter into the question that was
absorbing her. This was a purely practical question. She had to decide
what she was going to do _now_. And those well-known phrases uttered
in Hilary's deep urgent voice as though they were new--they to all
appearance passed by her like the idle wind.
She could see already what she was going to do. She was not going to
make a scandal, nor have any one talking about her or pitying her.
Enough, that she had complained to Hilary!... This thing should be as
if it never had been, so far as her outward life went--no one should
know. She would not "leave" her husband. But the sinner would not go
unpunished.... She knew well how to punish him. She knew how to make
him suffer....
Now, resolved, she rose to her feet.
"The baby! He always wakes about five--if I'm not there he'll be
frightened. I must go back at once."
Hilary looked piercingly at her.
"You're going back then?"
"Yes, I'm going back. You told me to, didn't you?"
Her tone and look were cool, faintly mocking.
"It's snowing hard," said Hilary.
He put out the lamp--a grey light filled the room.
"No matter--it's only a little way."
"I'll get a carriage for you--"
"No--I'd rather go back as I came."
"But you can't--you haven't any dry clothes--"
"No matter--it's only for a moment."
She went quickly into the bedroom, and came back in her limp white
dress and slippers. She took the heavy India shawl and drew it over her
head. Its damp folds completely covered her. Only her face was visible,
white, composed, with a curious sinister light in it.
She put her hand out of the folds to Hilary. With that gesture he felt
her put him away. He knew he was included in her unforgivingness, he
had become a part of something she wanted to banish. She would hate
him for knowing....
"Hilary," she said, "I want you to promise me something. Promise never
to speak of this--not to any one else, I know you wouldn't--but not to
me. Never speak of it to me again."
He dropped her hand, stood looking at her, and slowly his face became
as inflexible as her own.
"You shut me out, then?... I count for nothing with you? You reject
what you came here for--my help, my ... counsel...."
"No one can help me. You can't understand."
"You came to me, not for help or counsel. You came for sympathy,
thinking I would stand with you against your husband. You counted on my
feeling for you--you have always counted on it, though you would never
admit it to yourself--"
"I don't know why I came.... But it was no use."
"No. Because you won't let it be. You'll go your own way ... repay
evil for evil. I can see it in your face. I always knew you had it in
you.... Oh, Mary, has it all gone for nothing--all that you said you
believed in for so many years? Was it all on the surface--the first
time life comes hard to you will you throw it all away?... No, I won't
let you, I've cared too much for you--"
"What you say is no use, Hilary. You might as well promise."
"Of course not.... You know I won't."
"Then good-bye."
She looked at him indifferently and turned away. Noiselessly she left
the house. She hoped that she might return unseen to her home, and
rejoiced that no one was apt to be out so early. The snow fell thickly,
blindingly, and covered her footsteps. The air was sweet, less cold
than in the night, the wind had gone down. Each branch and twig was
ridged with snow; it lay in a broad unbroken sheet over all surfaces,
and seemed to give out light in the dim dawn.
As she approached the house, she wondered how she was to get in; the
street-door locked with a catch and she had no key. But as she went up
on the steps she heard the baby crying, and barely noticed that the
door opened to her touch; some one had turned the catch back.... She
ran upstairs. Laurence was in the room, dressed, holding the child,
trying to quiet it. She threw off her shawl, put out her arms for the
boy, gathered him to her breast. His cries ceased.
A flash of surprise and relief had lit Laurence's face at her entrance,
but now he stood, looking pale and gloomy.
"How long has he been crying?" she asked.
"I don't know--not very long."
Still holding the child, she tried to light a spirit-lamp to heat some
milk; Laurence silently helped her. When she had laid the baby on the
bed, with his bottle, she said:
"You know I went out?"
"Yes, and I know where you went, too!"
Laurence's voice trembled, and his lips; she had noticed when he was
lighting the lamp how his hands shook. His face showed deep lines that
made him look ten years older. But Mary said with icy calmness:
"You didn't expect me to stay here, did you?"
"I know where you went," he repeated, his eyes dully flaming. "You ran
to him, to--"
She was changing her dress for a warm wrapper, but suddenly she turned
on him.
"Is that woman in the house?"
"No--she's gone."
"How is she gone--where?"
"What does it matter to you?... She went to the station, if you want to
know. She meant to take the first train out."
"She can't go like that--like a thief in the night!... You are
responsible toward her, Laurence."
"Don't worry about my responsibility. I'll take care of it."
"Yes, I suppose you will."
His harassed desperate eyes rested on Mary, searching, piercing.
"And you," he said thickly, "are responsible to me."
"For what?"
"For this whole thing--it's your fault."
"Is it indeed?"
"It is!... and your action tonight proves it. Flying out of the
house--to your lover."
Mary was seated with her back to him, changing her wet shoes and
stockings. She laughed--ironical laughter, deep with scorn.
"Yes, laugh! I know it's true!... Oh, I don't know what your actions
have been, how can I know?... But I know your feeling, I know it hasn't
been with me, but with some one else. You married me with that feeling
in your heart--you did me a great wrong. I couldn't stand it.... For
what I've done that's wrong, by God, you're responsible!"
Mary put on her slippers and stood up, tying the cord of the
dressing-gown round her waist. She looked at him with cutting contempt.
"I don't care what you think.... But if I were a man I wouldn't try to
shift my responsibility for my own sins to some one else."
"Will you take your own responsibility? Do you see that you've been
wrong toward me?"
"No. I see that you're trying to throw the wrong on me to save
yourself. Perhaps you want me to ask your forgiveness?"
"Yes, by God, I do."
She looked at him, under her long lids, with a blue icy gleam. Silence
fell--charged throbbing silence; all the bitterness of those spoken
words, all their venom, distilled in it. Words that sting and burn like
fire--that leave ineffaceable scars....
Laurence waited a moment, then with a look of rage and anguish at
her as she stood with averted face, he went out of the room, and she
heard him leave the house. She was standing by the window, she saw him
pass, his hat pulled down over his eyes, his coat flapping open. He
disappeared in the veil of snow. A sharp pang shot through her. But she
stood motionless.
On the bed the baby lay sucking at his bottle, holding it lovingly with
his frail hands, making gurgling contented sounds. And now she heard
the other children in the nursery, she must attend to them, there was
no one else now to do it.
She was busy with the children for some hours. Then, leaving them all
together in the nursery, she went into the big bedroom which had been
Laurence's as well as hers, and set about removing all his clothes
and other belongings into the smaller room at the back of the house
where he sometimes slept. This room she arranged carefully, with her
accustomed neatness, putting everything in convenient order, seeing
that the lamp was filled and a fire laid ready for lighting.
In going and coming she had to pass the closed door of Nora's room. At
last she stopped at this door, hesitated a moment, then flung it open.
The room was swept and empty of all personal belongings--only there
lingered a faint stale scent--Nora had been given to cheap perfumes.
A look of disgust contracted Mary's pale face. She took out the key,
locked the door on the outside, opened a window in the hall and flung
the key far out into the snow.
She went once more into the neighbouring room and took from the
table something she suddenly recollected to have seen lying there
among Laurence's papers. It was a little leather case, containing a
daguerreotype of herself, done at the age of sixteen. She had given it
to Laurence when they were betrothed, and he had carried it through the
four years of the war. The case was worn and shabby. She opened it and
looked at the picture--a charming picture it was. The graceful dress,
with its full skirt, and frilled fichu covering the girlish shoulders,
the pure oval face framed in banded hair.... Laurence had loved it.
Mary took it into her room, and with tears running down her cheeks, she
seized the fire-tongs, smashed the picture to pieces, and threw the
whole thing into the waste-basket.