"I can't tell you," he said again.
Still she looked at him, and again there seemed to be in her eyes that
expression of a child who has seen life without understanding it.
"Perhaps you think I am too young to know good from evil," she said
after a moment. "I am not. I have told you I am older than I look, and
in some things I am older even than my years. Then, too, I belong to
Rosa Mundi. I told you, didn't I? I am her familiar spirit. She has even
called me her angel, or her better self. I know a great many things
about her, and some of them are very sad. May I tell you some of the
things I know?"
He turned his eyes away from her abruptly, with the feeling that he was
resisting some curious magnetism. What was there about this child that
attracted him? He was not a lover of children. Moreover, she was verging
upon womanhood approaching what he grimly termed "the dangerous age."
He filled his pipe deliberately while she waited for his answer, turning
his gaze upon the dazzling line of the horizon.
"You can do as you like," he said at last, and added formally, "May I
smoke?"
She nodded. "Yes, I would like you to. It will keep you from being
bored. I want to tell you about Rosa Mundi, because you do not judge her
fairly. You only know her by repute, and I--I know her heart to heart."
Her voice deepened suddenly, and the man glanced downwards for an
instant, but immediately looked away again. She should tell him what she
would, but by no faintest sign should she imagine that she had succeeded
in arousing his interest. The magnetism was drawing him. He was aware of
the attraction, and with firmness he resisted it. Let her strive as she
would, she would never persuade him to think kindly of Rosa Mundi.
"You think her--bad," said Rosemary, her voice pitched very low. "I
know--oh, I know. Men--some men--are very hard on women like her, women
who have had to hew their own way in the world, and meet temptation
almost before"--her voice quivered a little--"they knew what temptation
meant."
He looked down at her again suddenly and searchingly; but her clear eyes
never flinched from his. They were pleading and a little troubled, but
wholly unafraid.
"Perhaps you won't believe me," she said. "You'll think you know best.
But Rosa Mundi wasn't bad always--not at the beginning. Her dancing
began when she was young--oh, younger than I am. It was a dreadful
uphill fight. She had a mother then--a mother she adored. Did you ever
have a mother like that, I wonder? Perhaps it isn't the same with men,
but there are some women who would gladly die for their mothers.
And--and Rosa Mundi felt like that. A time came when her mother was
dying of a slow disease, and she needed things--many things. Rosa Mundi
wasn't a success then. She hadn't had her chance. But there was a man--a
man with money and influence--who was willing to offer it to
her--at--at--a price. She was dancing for chance coppers outside a San
Francisco saloon when first he made his offer. She--refused."
Rosemary's soft eyes were suddenly lowered. She did not look like a
child any longer, but a being sexless, yet very pitiful--an angel about
to weep.
Courteney watched her, for he could not turn away.
Almost under her breath, she went on: "A few days later her mother began
to suffer--oh, terribly. There was no money, no one to help. She went
again and danced at the saloon entrance. He--the man--was there. She
danced till she was tired out. And then--and then--she was hungry,
too--she fainted." The low voice sank a little lower. "When she came to
herself, she was in his keeping. He was very kind to her--too kind. Her
strength was gone, and--and temptation is harder to resist when one is
physically weak too. When she went back to her mother she had
accepted--his--offer. From that night her fortune was made."
Two tears gathered on the dark lashes and hung there till she put up a
quick hand and brushed them away.
The man's face was curiously softened; he looked as if he desired to dry
those tears himself.
Without looking up she continued. "The mother died--very, very soon.
Life is like that. Often one pays--in vain. There is no bargaining with
death. But at least she never knew. That was Rosa Mundi's only comfort.
There was no turning back for her then. And she was so desolate, so
lonely, nothing seemed to matter.
"She went from triumph to triumph. She carried all before her. He took
her to New York, and she conquered there. They strewed her path with
roses. They almost worshipped her. She tried to think she was happy, but
she was not--even then. They came around her in crowds. They made love
to her. She was young, and their homage was like a coloured ball to
her. She tossed it to and fro, and played with it. But she made game of
it all. They were nothing to her--nothing, till one day there came to
her a boy--no, he was past his boyhood--a young man--rich, well-born,
and honourable. And he--he loved her, and offered her--marriage. No one
had ever offered her that before. Can you realize--but no, you are a
man!--what it meant to her? It meant shelter and peace and freedom. It
meant honour and kindness, and the chance to be good. Perhaps you think
she would not care for that. But you do not know her. Rosa Mundi was
meant to be good. She hungered for goodness. She was tired--so tired of
the gaudy vanities of life, so--so--what is the word--so nauseated with
the cheap and the bad. Are you sorry for her, I wonder? Can you picture
her, longing--oh, longing--for what she calls respectability? And
then--this chance, this offer of deliverance! It meant giving up her
career, of course. It meant changing her whole life. It meant
sacrifice--the sort of sacrifice that you ought to be able to
understand--for she loved her dancing and her triumphs, just as you love
your public--the people who read your books and love you for their sake.
That is different, isn't it, from the people who follow you about and
want to stare at you just because you are prosperous and popular? The
people who really appreciate your art--those are the people you would
not disappoint for all the world. They make up a vast friendship that
is very precious, and it would be a sacrifice--a big--sacrifice--to give
it up. That is the sort of sacrifice that marriage meant to Rosa Mundi.
And though she wanted marriage--and she wanted to be good--she
hesitated."
There was a little pause. Randal Courteney was no longer dissembling his
interest. He had laid his pipe aside, and was watching with unvarying
intentness the downcast childish face. He asked no questions. There was
something in the low-spoken words that held him silent. Perhaps he
feared to probe too deep.
In a few moments she went on, gathering up a little handful of the
shining shingle, and slowly sifting it through her fingers as though in
search of something precious.
"I think if she had really loved the man, it wouldn't have mattered.
Nothing counts like love, does it? But--you see--she didn't. She wanted
to. She knew that he was clean and honourable, worthy of a good woman.
He loved her, too, loved her so that he was willing to put away all her
past. For she did not deceive him about that. He was willing to give her
all--all she wanted. But she did not love him. She honoured him, and she
felt for a time at least that love might come. He guessed that, and he
did his best--all that he could think of--to get her to consent. In the
end--in the end"--Rosemary paused, a tiny stone in her hand that shone
like polished crystal--"she was very near to the verge of yielding, the
young man had almost won, when--when something happened that
altered--everything. The young man had a friend, a writer, a great man
even then; he is greater now. The friend came, and he threw his whole
weight into the scale against her. She felt him--the force of
him--before she so much as saw him. She had broken with her lover some
time before. She was free. And she determined to marry the young man who
loved her--in spite of his friend. That very day it happened. The young
man sent her a book written by his friend. She had begun to hate the
writer, but out of curiosity she opened it and read. First a bit here,
then a bit there, and at last she sat down and read it--all through."
The little shining crystal lay alone in the soft pink palm. Rosemary
dwelt upon it, faintly smiling.
"She read far into the night," she said, speaking almost dreamily, as if
recounting a vision conjured up in the glittering surface of the stone.
"It was a free night for her. And she read on and on and on. The book
gripped her; it fascinated her. It was--a great book. It was
called--_Remembrance_." She drew a quick breath and went on somewhat
hurriedly. "It moved her in a fashion that perhaps you would hardly
realize. I have read it, and I--understand. The writing was wonderful.
It brought home to her--vividly, oh, vividly--how the past may be atoned
for, but never, never effaced. It hurt her--oh, it hurt her. But it did
her good. It showed her how she was on the verge of taking a wrong
turning, of perhaps--no, almost certainly--dragging down the man who
loved her. She saw suddenly the wickedness of marrying him just to
escape her own prison. She understood clearly that only love could have
justified her--no other motive than that. She saw the evil of fastening
her past to an honourable man whose good name and family demanded of him
something better. She felt as if the writer had torn aside a veil and
shown her her naked soul. And--and--though the book was a good book, and
did not condemn sinners--she was shocked, she was horrified, at what it
made her see."
Rosemary suddenly closed her hand upon the shining stone, and turned
fully and resolutely to the man beside her.
"That night changed Rosa Mundi," she said; "changed her completely.
Before it was over she wrote to the young man who loved her and told him
that she could not marry him. The letter did not go till the following
evening. She kept it back for a few hours--in case she repented.
But--though she suffered--she did not repent. In the evening she had an
engagement to dance. The young man was there--in the front row. And he
brought his friend. She danced. Her dancing was superb that night. She
had a passionate desire to bewitch the man who had waked her soul--as
she had bewitched so many others. She had never met a man she could not
conquer. She was determined to conquer him. Was it wrong? Anyway, it was
human. She danced till her very heart was on fire, danced till she trod
the clouds. Her audience went mad with the delight of it. They raved as
if they were intoxicated. All but one man! All but one man! And he--at
the end--he looked her just once in the eyes, stonily, piercingly, and
went away." She uttered a sharp, choking breath. "I have nearly done,"
she said. "Can you guess what happened then? Perhaps you know. The man
who loved her received her letter when he got back that night.
And--and--she had bewitched him, remember; he--shot himself. The
friend--the writer--she never saw again. But--but--Rosa Mundi has never
forgotten him. She carries him in her heart--the man who taught her the
meaning of life."
She ceased to speak, and suddenly, like a boy, sprang to her feet,
tossing away the stone that she had treasured in her hand.
But the man was almost as quick as she. He caught her by the shoulder as
he rose. "Wait!" he said. "Wait!" His voice rang hard, but there was no
hardness in his eyes. "Tell me--who you are!"
She lifted her eyes to his fearlessly, without shame. "What does it
matter who I am?" she said. "What does it matter? I have told you I am
Rosemary. That is her name for me, and it was your book called
_Remembrance_ that made her give it me."
He held her still, looking at her with a growing compassion in his
eyes. "You are her child," he said.
She smiled. "Perhaps--spiritually. Yes, I think I am her child, such a
child as she might have been if--Fate--had been kind to her--- or if she
had read your book before--and not after."
He let her go slowly, almost with reluctance. "I think I should like to
meet your--Rosa Mundi," he said.
Her eyes suddenly shone. "Not really? You are in earnest? But--but---
you would hurt her. You despise her."
"I am sorry for her," he said, and there was a hint of doggedness in his
voice, as though he spoke against his better judgment.
The child's face had an eager look, but she seemed to be restraining
herself. "I ought to tell you one thing about her first," she said.
"Perhaps you will disapprove. I don't know. But it is because of
you--and your revelation--that she is doing it. Rosa Mundi is going to
be married. No, she is not giving up her career or anything--except her
freedom. Her old lover has come back to her. She is going to marry him
now. He wants her for his wife."
"Ah!" It was the man who was eager now. He spoke impulsively. "She will
be happy then? She loves him?"
Rosemary looked at him with her clear, unfaltering eyes. "Oh, no," she
said. "He isn't that sort of man at all. Besides, there is only one man
in the world that she could care for in that way. No, she doesn't love
him. But she is doing the right thing, and she is going to be good. You
will not despise her any more?"
There was such anxious appeal in her eyes that he could not meet it. He
turned his own away.
There fell a silence between them, and through it the long, long roar of
the sea rose up--a mighty symphony of broken chords.
The man moved at last, looked down at the slight boyish figure beside
him, hesitated, finally spoke. "I still think that I should like to meet
Rosa Mundi," he said.
Her eyes smiled again. "And you will not despise her now," she said, her
tone no longer a question.
"I think," said Randal Courteney slowly, "that I shall never despise any
one again."
"Life is so difficult," said Rosemary, with the air of one who knew.
* * * * *
They were strewing the Pier with roses for Rosa Mundi's night. There
were garlands of roses, festoons of roses, bouquets of roses; roses
overhead, roses under foot, everywhere roses.
Summer had returned triumphant to deck the favourite's path.
Randal Courteney marked it all gravely, without contempt. It was her
hour.
No word from her had reached him, but that night he would meet her face
to face. Through days and nights of troubled thought, the resolve had
grown within him. To-night it should bear fruit. He would not rest again
until he had seen her. For his peace of mind was gone. She was about to
throw herself away upon a man she did not love, and he felt that it was
laid upon him to stop the sacrifice. The burden of responsibility was
his. He had striven against this conviction, but it would not be denied.
From the days of young Eric Baron's tragedy onward, this woman had made
him as it were the star of her destiny. To repudiate the fact was
useless. She had, in her ungoverned, impulsive fashion, made him surety
for her soul.
The thought tormented him, but it held a strange attraction for him
also. If the story were true, and it was not in him to doubt it, it
touched him in a way that was wholly unusual. Popularity, adulation, had
been his portion for years. But this was different, this was personal--a
matter in which reputation, fame, had no part. In a different sphere she
also was a star, with a host of worshippers even greater than his own.
The humility of her amazed him. She had, as it were, taken her fate
between her hands and laid it as an offering at his feet.
And so, on Rosa Mundi's night, he went to the great Pavilion, mingling
with the crowd, determined when her triumph was over, to seek her out.
There would be a good many seekers, he doubted not; but he was convinced
that she would not deny him an interview.
He secured a seat in the third row, avoiding almost by instinct any more
conspicuous position. He was early, and while he waited, the thought of
young Eric Baron came to him--the boy's eager-face, the adoration of his
eyes. He remembered how on that far-off night he had realized the
hopelessness of combating his love, how he had shrugged his shoulders
and relinquished the struggle. And the battle had been his even then--a
bitter victory more disastrous than defeat.
He put the memory from him and thought of Rosemary--the child with the
morning light in her eyes, the innocence of the morning in her soul. How
tenderly she had spoken of Rosa Mundi! How sweetly she had pleaded her
cause! With what amazing intuition had she understood! Something that
was greater than pity welled up within him. Rosa Mundi's guardian angel
had somehow reached his heart.
People were pouring into the place. He saw that it was going to be
packed. And outside, lining the whole length of the Pier, they were
waiting for her too, waiting to strew her path with, roses.
Ah! she was coming! Above the wash of the sea there rose a roar of
voices. They were giving her the homage of a queen. He listened to the
frantic cheering, and again it was Rosa Mundi, splendid and brilliant,
who filled his thoughts as she filled the thoughts of all just then.
The cheering died down, and there came a great press of people into the
back of the building. The lights were lowered, but he heard the
movement, the buzz of a delighted crowd.
Suddenly the orchestra burst into loud music. They were playing "Queen
of the Earth," he remembered later. The curtain went up. And in a blaze
of light he saw Rosa Mundi.
Something within him sprang into quivering life. Something which till
that moment he had never known awoke and gripped him with a force
gigantic. She was robed in shimmering, transparent gold--a queen-woman,
slight indeed, dainty, fairy-like--yet magnificent. Over her head,
caught in a jewelled fillet, there hung a filmy veil of gold, half
revealing, half concealing, the smiling face behind. Trailing wisps of
golden gossamer hung from her beautiful arms. Her feet were bound with
golden sandals. And on her breast were roses--golden roses.
She was exquisite as a dream. He gazed and gazed upon her as one
entranced. The tumult of acclamation that greeted her swept by him
unheeded. He was conscious only of a passionate desire to fling back the
golden veil that covered her and see the laughing face behind. Its
elusiveness mocked him. She was like a sunbeam standing there, a
flitting, quivering shaft of light, too spiritual to be grasped fully,
almost too dazzling for the eye to follow.
The applause died down to a dead silence. Her audience watched her with
bated breath. Her dance was a thing indescribable. Courteney could think
of nothing but the flashing of morning sunlight upon running water to
the silver strains of a flute that was surely piped by Pan. He could not
follow the sparkling wonder of her. He felt dazed and strangely
exhilarated, almost on fire with this new, fierce attraction. It was as
if the very soul were being drawn out of his body. She called to him,
she lured him, she bewitched him.
When he had seen her before, he had been utterly out of sympathy. He had
scorned her charms, had felt an almost angry contempt for young Baron's
raptures. To him she had been a snake-woman, possessed of a fascination
which, to him, was monstrous and wholly incomprehensible. She had worn a
strange striped dress of green--tight-fitting, hideous he had deemed it.
Her face had been painted. He had been too near the stage, and she had
revolted him. Her dance had certainly been wonderful, sinuous, gliding,
suggestive--a perfectly conceived scheme of evil. And she had thought to
entrap him with it! The very memory was repulsive even yet.
But this--ah! this was different. This thing of light and air, this
dancing sunbeam, this creature of the morning, exquisite in every
detail, perfectly poised, swifter than thought, yet arresting at every
turn, vivid as a meteor, yet beyond all scrutiny, all ocular power of
comprehension, she set every nerve in him a-quiver. She seized upon his
fancy and flung it to and fro, catching a million colours in her radiant
flights. She made the hot blood throb in his temples. She beat upon the
door of his heart. She called back his vanished youth, the passion
unassuaged of his manhood. She appealed to him directly and personally.
She made him realize that he was the one man who had taught--and could
teach--her the meaning of life.
Then it was over. Like a glittering crystal shattered to fragments, his
dream of ecstasy collapsed. The noise around him was as the roar of
thundering breakers. But he sat mute in the midst of it, as one stunned.
Someone leaned over from behind and spoke to him. He was aware of a hand
upon his shoulder.
"What do you think of her?" said Ellis Grant in his ear. "Superb, isn't
she? Come and see her before she appears again!"
As if compelled by some power outside himself, Courteney rose. He edged
his way to the end of the row and joined the great man there. The whole
house was a seething turmoil of sound.
Grant was chuckling to himself as one well pleased. In Courteney's eyes
he looked stouter, more prosperous, more keenly business-like, than when
he had spoken with him a few nights previously. He took Courteney by the
arm and led him through a door at the side.
"Let 'em yell 'emselves hoarse for a bit!" he said. "Do 'em good. Guess
my 'rose of the world' isn't going to be too cheap a commodity.... Which
reminds me, sir. You've cost me a thousand English pounds by coming here
to-night."
"Indeed?" Courteney spoke stiffly. He felt stiff, physically stiff, as
one forcibly awakened from a deep slumber.
The man beside him was still chuckling. "Yes. The little witch! Said
she'd manage it somehow when I told her you weren't taking any. We had a
thousand on it, and the little devil has won, outwitted us both. How in
thunder did she do it? Laid a trap for you; what?"
Courteney did not answer. The stiffness was spreading. He felt as one
turned to stone. Mechanically he yielded to the hand upon his arm, not
speaking, scarcely thinking.
And then--almost before he knew it--he was in her presence, face to face
with the golden vision that had caught and--for a space at least--had
held his heart.
He bowed, still silent, still strangely bound and fettered by the
compelling force.
A hand that was lithe and slender and oddly boyish came out to him. A
voice that had in it sweet, lilting notes, like the voice of a laughing
child, spoke his name.
"Mr. Courteney! How kind!" it said.
As from a distance he heard Grant speak. "Mr. Courteney, allow me to
introduce you--my wife!"
There was a dainty movement like the flash of shimmering wings. He
looked up. She had thrown back her veil.