"She will fall asleep again, and to-morrow will be quite well. But
what a near escape!" And he lingered with Mérat, feeling it were
better she should know everything, yet loth to tell her that he had
known all the while that Ulick was trying to persuade Evelyn to go
away with him. But Mérat must know that Ulick had been staying at
Berkeley Square.
"I suppose Monsignor comes here to see her?"
"He has been here, Sir Owen."
Owen would have liked to question her, but it did not seem honourable
to do so, and after a little talk about the danger of yielding to
religious impulses, he noticed that Mérat was drifting from him,
evidently thinking such discussions useless.
On the landing he told her that Ulick had gone away with the opera
company, and that it was not likely that he and mademoiselle would
see each other again.
"But when Mr. Dean comes back to London?" Mérat answered.
"Well, hardly even then; after a crisis like this she will not be
anxious to see him. You know, Mérat, he was staying with me at
Berkeley Square; and I knew of his visits here, only it seemed to me
the only way to save her from religion was by getting her to go back
to the stage."
Owen took breath; he had told his story, or as much as was necessary,
omitting the fact that he was an accomplice in the love-making which
had led to attempted suicide.
"You don't think I was right?"
"Well, Sir Owen, you see, I don't think mademoiselle will ever go
back to the stage."
"You think that, Mérat? Well, then, the only thing to save her from
religion is marriage. I don't mind telling you, nor is there any
need to tell you--you must know--that I have always wanted her to be
my wife, only she would not marry me, and for some reason impossible
to get at."
"Mademoiselle is like nobody else; _elle avait toujours son idée_."
"_Parfaitement, comme disent les paysannes de chez vous, d'une bête
qui ne ressemble pas au troupeau et qui allait toujours._"
"_Oui, mademoiselle a eu toujours son idée_. So Sir Owen thinks it
was fear of going back to the stage that persuaded mademoiselle to--"
"Something like that, Mérat. She liked Mr. Dean."
"But you are first in her thoughts, Sir Owen."
"That isn't astonishing. We have known each other so long. Now, after
what has happened, perhaps she will think differently about
marriage, do you understand, Mérat. She may think differently
to-morrow, for instance, and it would be better for all of us--for
you, for myself, for her. Don't you agree?"
"Well, Sir Owen, there is nothing I should like more than to see
mademoiselle married, only--"
"Only you don't think she'll marry me?"
"_Comme monsieur a dit, elle a eu toujours son idée._"
"But after the great shock surely she will see that marriage is the
only way." Owen continued to talk of marriage a little while longer,
and all the way home his thoughts ran on his chance of persuading
Evelyn to marry him. It did not seem possible that she could refuse
after the shock. The chances were all with him: he would catch her
in a moment when her faith in religion would be weakened, for she
must see that it had not saved her from attempted suicide; all the
chances were in his favour, and he hardly doubted at all he would be
able to persuade her to marry him. Once she agreed she would carry
it out; nothing she hated as much as any alteration of plan.
His mind wandered back into the past years, and he recalled little
facts significant of her character. However loud the storm she would
cross the Channel, though there was no reason for it--merely, as she
said, because it had been arranged to cross that day. He could
remember the dress she wore on that occasion, and the expression of
her face. Other instances equally trivial floated into his mind,
every one strangely vivid, delighting him because they were
characteristic of her. If he could only get her to say she would
marry him. It would be unnecessary to explain why he had sent Ulick
to her. Or he might explain. It didn't matter. Ulick would pass out
of their lives, and all this miserable business would be forgotten.
The quickest way of being married was in a registry office, but would
Evelyn look upon a civil marriage as sufficient? Once the civil
marriage was an accomplished fact, she could be married afterwards
in Church, even in a Catholic church; he would go there if it
pleased her to go. Besides, Evelyn really looked upon marriage more
as a civil than as a religious obligation. His thoughts continued to
chatter, keeping him up late, till long after midnight, and awaking
him early. And the sun seemed to him to have dawned on his wedding
day. But even if they were to be married in a registry office a best
man would be required. So his thoughts went to Harding, whom he knew
to be in London. But Harding would be busy with his writing until
the afternoon, and Owen strode about Bond Street, visiting the shops
of various picture dealers, welcoming any acquaintance whom he
happened to meet, walking to the end of the street with him, and
spending the last hour--from three to four--in the National Gallery,
whither he had gone to see some new acquisitions. But the new
pictures did not interest him. "My thoughts are elsewhere."
And turning from the new Titian, it seemed to him that he might drive
to Victoria Street; Harding's work must be over for the day.
"My dear Harding, you don't mind my interrupting you?" And he envied
his friend's interest in his manuscripts when the writer put them
away.
"You are not disturbing me; my secretary didn't come to-day, and
everything is habit. I can no longer write except by dictation."
"If I had known that I would have called in the morning."
"Again some drama in which Evelyn Innes is concerned," Harding said
to himself.
"Harding, I have come to ask your advice; you'll give me the very
best. But you will have to hear the whole story."
"Well, I am a story-teller, and like to hear stories."
Owen told him how he had met Ulick Dean at Innes', and had invited
him to stop at Berkeley Square, and how gradually the idea that he
could make use of Ulick in order to tempt Evelyn back to the stage
had come into his mind. Anything to save her from religion, from
Monsignor.
Owen caught Harding looking at him from under his shaggy eyebrows,
and anger had begun to colour his cheeks when Harding said:
"Don't you remember, Asher, coming here a couple of years ago, and--"
"Yes, I know. You predicted that Ulick Dean and I would become
friends, and you are right; we did."
"And you preferred that Evelyn should be his mistress rather than
that she shall go over to Monsignor?"
"I am not ashamed to confess I did; anything seemed better--but there
is no use arguing the point. What I have come to tell you is that
rather than go away with him she tried to kill herself." And he told
Harding the story.
"What an extraordinary story! But nothing is extraordinary in human
nature. What we consider the normal never happens. Nature's course
is always zigzag, and no one can predict a human action."
"Well, then, my good friend, when you have done philosophising--I
don't mean to be rude, but you see my nerves have been at strain for
the last four-and-twenty hours; you will excuse me. My notion now is
that everything has happened for the best." And he confided to
Harding his hopes of being able to persuade Evelyn to marry him.
"Only by marriage can she be saved, and I think I can persuade her."
And he babbled about her appearance last night after her long sleep,
comparing her with the portrait in his room. The painter had omitted
nothing of her character; all that had happened he read into the
picture--the restless spiritual eyes, and the large voluptuous
mouth, and the small high temples which Leonardo would like to draw.
The painting of this picture was as illusive as Evelyn herself, the
treatment of the reddish hair and the grey background.