pretty girl; she had high spirits, cleverness of wit and tongue; an
extraordinary sense of the possibilities of her own talent. And she
was essentially a woman. It was because of her sex that she was at
a disadvantage in her power to experience active life; but it was
also because of her sex, and not because she could command equality
of knowledge or understanding with them, that these three men sought
her and desired her. If she had refused all of them it was because
either she thought none of them was worthy of her love; or because she
had such confidence in her own individuality that she preferred to go
forward alone. That is, because she thought that the gift she had for
the world was greater than the gift which these men desired of her. Was
it that she proposed to remain unmarried, to ignore love? Her response
to Harry and Monty had proved that this was not so. She could not stand
alone. Patricia shrank from the knowledge; but it was forced upon her
in her present mood. And presently she made, aside from all these
specious exaggerations of the value of knowledge for its own sake, a
genuine discovery.
To the question which rebelliously she put to her own challenge,
"Why should they be so much ... more learned ... than I?" came an
answer which was a revelation. It was unwelcome. She disliked it, and
presently would fall upon her own intuition and perhaps destroy it. But
for the moment it was valid. Patricia was not incapable of such flights
of intuition, and--as she did now--she generally over-valued them as
truths. The answer which she received from herself in the course of
this singular vision was: "Because they are all interested in something
else besides themselves."
She awoke from her dream to find that the party was still in progress;
and that the man beside her was still speaking with unabated zest of
the theatre, which seems to be an unrivalled subject for monologue.
With a yawn, Patricia saw that the whole of her analysis had passed
within a few minutes. Nevertheless she remembered it very clearly;
and she was still, as the result of her intellectual pilgrimage, very
serious.
iv
It is one thing to receive such an inspiration as this, however, and it
is quite another to believe it. To believe it, that is, as one believes
in such things as breakfast, or to-morrow, or relativity. Consequently
Patricia felt already a little vague. She was not satisfied even with
her inspiration, though it had descended in a dream. She knew that it
was a feminine intuition, and feminine intuitions, however acute, are
as the interpretations of the stars or the palm or the tealeaf--never
so remarkable or so celebrated as when they are confirmed. And as she
conned her problem, Patricia had a very singular notion. She found
herself thinking:
"I shall ask Edgar."
She was astounded at herself. She almost begged herself to repeat
something half-heard which had seemed incredible. "Oh, I couldn't
ask him!" she said, as if in answer, "I shan't see him again. Of
course I shall see him again. How absurd! I mustn't be silly. He's my
friend." And with that a low small laugh escaped her lips. Her thoughts
strayed into a fresh vein. She wondered what would have happened if
the others had not come into the studio, if Monty and she had still
been alone there. She knew that she would not still have been in the
studio at all, since she would have been driven to leave the house
long before. And her mind leapt back to that suggestion about Edgar.
Again she had that consciousness of refuge in him. "I should have ...
I should have...." Then, very quietly indeed, but also with conclusive
sharpness: "I couldn't...."
If only one could do things as they came into one's head, all the same,
how easy life would be!
Patricia sighed. She interrupted the young theatrical enthusiast,
who was talking about societies which were being formed in all the
villages in England for the performance of Euripides in Gilbert
Murray's translation.
"What nonsense!" she said, still only half-attentive to what her new
friend was saying, and without conscious rudeness. "I'm going home now.
Thank you very much for looking after me. I'm quite well again."
And with that she rose and went quickly to the door of the studio.
Monty followed.
v
He made no attempt to conceal his pursuit from the other guests. He
was too obviously afraid that Patricia might slip out of the house,
and so escape him. And the urgency of his desire to speak with her
was extreme. He arrived in the hall just as she disappeared into the
room where her hat and coat had been left; and Monty waited there
in the dimmed light, a sombre figure, with his head lowered and his
broad shoulders bowed. To Patricia, emerging, he was like an emissary
of the Inquisition, so appalling, even to her expectant eye, was his
appearance. She lifted her own shoulders with a slight brusqueness, her
head high, and her breath rapid.
"Good-night," said Patricia, quickly. She moved towards the front door.
"Not yet." It was an appeal, a deep whisper.
"No, no. I'm going."
"I must see you--speak to you--for an instant. Patricia...."
Monty had interposed himself in order that she might not reach the
door without touching him, and as Patricia could not have borne this
contact she was checked instantly. She stood, hesitant; and then with
bowed head followed the direction of his entreating arm and stepped
into the room at the farther side of the hall. It was the amber-hued
drawing-room in which Edgar had seen Monty a few evenings previously,
a lofty room which the electric light caused to become faintly and
alluringly luminous. There was a fire, and the room was warm; but
Patricia was shivering a little as she stood a short distance from the
door, facing him. Monty followed her into the room, closing the door.
"Won't you come over to the fire?" he said in his gentlest tone. "I
can't let you go like this without a word."
Still that careful modulation, still the raised note at the end of the
sentence! She went nearer to the fire, and Monty stood near her, by the
table.
"Aren't you going to forgive me?" he asked, suddenly. His manner was
slightly changed. A familiarity had entered it, as though they had
a secret understanding; but he was still bearing himself with soft
respect. Nevertheless, beneath his humility there was ironic contempt
for her sex which betrayed him.
Patricia started at the tone, at the discovery. The tears came to her
eyes. She felt she had no use at all for such false contrition as he
was prepared to display. It was not forgiveness Monty desired. He was
deliberately pandering to a mentality which his sensual cynicism led
him to despise. Having, apparently, no belief in purity in women,
he was prepared elaborately to connive at its cunning or hysterical
assumption and to submit to its merely formal placation. He was the
diplomat, playing a familiar game, bargaining with vanity; not a
penitent. And to Patricia such insolent flattery was more offensive
than a brazen making-light of the episode would have been.
"Don't talk like that, Monty," she begged. "It isn't forgiveness you
need; and you know it. I can't talk about forgiving. Surely you see
that."
"I want you to believe that in asking you here--" began Monty,
cajolingly, still with that cringing air which masked watchfulness for
any sign of emotion or relenting.
Patricia laughed--uncontrollably.
"Oh, Monty!" she exclaimed; and there were still tears in her voice at
the knowledge that he held her to be simply a common piece of woman's
flesh, to be won still, so long as he sacrificed to her false delicacy,
assumed, perhaps, for the sake of bargaining.
"It's true," he persisted, with more energy. Patricia turned aside,
weary of the encounter, sickened at his cynical insincerity.
"I've told you I don't want to talk about forgiveness," she said. "I
couldn't forgive you, because there's no question of that. It's myself
that I can't forgive. It was idiotic of me to try and play a game I'm
not fitted for, and I'm ashamed of myself. Isn't that enough?"
"Then you'll come again?" he questioned, as if puzzled.
"No," she said. "I've had my lesson. I've been silly and wicked; but
you've been worse. And you're still being worse, you know. You're
under-rating me. You think I'm pretending. You think you've only got
to flatter me to find I'm no better than ... the rest--I suppose." She
shrugged. "I'm not pretending. I'm going."
"I love you," Monty told her. "You were surprised. You were
shocked...." He was still persisting in his former attitude because
his imagination was not quick enough to anticipate the changes of this
chameleon. But he was admiring her perhaps more than he had already
done, and finding her still very desirable.
"I was horrified," Patricia said slowly. "But we're not talking about
the same thing." She was very serious now. And the fact that she was
serious made her again baffling to Monty, who had expected tears or
reproaches or formal forgiveness, and was trying to discover some new
point of contact which would at least gain time. Given time, he thought
he was always assured of victory; but he was in a difficulty. She had
changed, slipping out of his power to dominate her; and he had not the
key to the change, for that lay in Patricia's singular vision.
"We're talking about...."
"No," said Patricia. "I came here in a reckless state, because I'd been
very miserable; and you asked me to come because you wanted to make
love to me."
"And I frightened you," said Monty quickly. "Poor little girl!"
"You did me a lot of good," answered Patricia. "You shocked me into my
senses."
Monty stared at her, his dark eyes glowing, and his face once more
alight with admiration. She saw him moisten his lips, and saw his hands
clenched by his sides. But also, from another point altogether, she
heard a faint incomprehensible sound. At once she strained her ears;
but Monty had heard no sound, and continued to stare at her. The sound
Patricia thought she had heard was a tiny crunching of gravel outside
the house. She stared back at Monty, her nerves quivering. Dread was
back in her heart.
"There's nothing to fear," said Monty, in his level voice of
reassurance. "I'm not going to lose my head again as I did early in the
evening. I beg your pardon for that." Patricia bowed her head again
in acknowledgment of his apology; but she was no longer heeding his
tactical advances. As he spoke, her eyes were glancing from Monty to
the window. She looked so slim and fair, with the golden light of the
room evoking the gold in her hair and the delicate gleam of colour in
her cheeks, that Monty was moved anew as he had been earlier in the
evening. He was engrossed in her, his eyes avid and his excitement
intense. "By God, you know, you're beautiful, Patricia," he whispered.
"Look here, we'll go together to the East, and you shall see all those
wonders for yourself." She did not seem to be listening. Monty played
his trump card. "We'll be married, d'you see, and go straight to the
East together; and you shall have...."
In his eagerness, Monty came towards her, his hands outstretched. He
was continuing, with increasing vehemence, when Patricia interrupted
him. She would have cried out that what he offered was unthinkable,
but, as she made the effort to speak, her eyes were caught by something
that stifled the words. She could only stand there, looking beyond
Monty, to the doorway, her lips parted as if in the act of speech, her
body rigid with amazement. For there, just within the room, silhouetted
against the golden door, was another person--a woman, heavily cloaked,
with the hood of her dark cloak shrouding her face, a woman who had
heard the last speech as she swiftly and silently opened the door, and
who stood perfectly white, as if she were stone. Within the fold of the
hood Patricia saw two glittering eyes. All else was white, ghastly.
"Really!" said the woman, in a breathless tone, as if she were stricken
with illness. "Monty!"
It was Blanche Tallentyre.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: BLANCHE
i
She had seemed haggard when first Patricia had noticed her at the
September party, and again upon their second meeting; but now, in that
light, hooded, and in extremity of emotion, Blanche was a picture of
unhappiness such as Patricia had never known. The long line of her face
was sharply cut by the edge of the dark hood; her lips were a piteous
thin gash of brilliance, almost like a new cut; her eyes were black
diamonds. She stood within the room, pressed back against the door,
listening and watching, her bleak glance entirely for Monty.
There was an instant's silence after her anguished cry. Monty's
outstretched hands fell once more to his side. Patricia did not move:
she was too horrified to do so. During that instant, when even the
studio revelry was ignored, the hearts of all three might have stopped
beating for all the motion visible. Then Patricia saw that Blanche's
low breast was rising and falling very quickly, and the dark cloak fell
away from her neck and showed the hollows at the base of Blanche's
throat. But Blanche paid no heed. She was entirely absorbed in the
moment. Only when Monty moved ever so little towards her did she speak.
"I didn't expect to find anybody here," Blanche said, hoarsely. "I
didn't expect to find you...." She hesitated, and with a sort of dreary
sarcasm completed her sentence, "... making a proposal of marriage. It
seems rather odd. I didn't ... expect it. I wonder if you quite mean
it...."
Monty said to Patricia:
"We're interrupted, you see." His shoulders were a little raised; but
his face gave no sign of whatever emotion he might be feeling. With
the emergency, he had slipped back into that unreadable air of reserve
which at first had been for Patricia such a strong attraction. It
showed, she now knew, as much caution as self-control; but the silent
person in a quarrel is always at an advantage. His head was sunk upon
his shoulders, and the heavy outline of his jaw was projected, as
though his teeth were firmly clenched.
"I see we're interrupted." Patricia took two or three steps towards
the door. She was still in a state of suppressed excitement, and was
half blind with the continued emotional tension. "Mrs. Tallentyre," she
said, impulsively. "Monty didn't quite mean his proposal of marriage;
but if he had meant it I shouldn't have ... taken it seriously. How
d'you do?"
For the first time Blanche took notice of Patricia. She turned her eyes
from Monty and looked from Patricia's head to her feet, as if with
intent deliberately to ignore her. When she spoke again her eyes were
averted.
"What are you doing here?" she asked coldly. She was imperious, like a
mistress who has discovered a servant in the act of prying.
"Monty has a party," answer Patricia, trying to control her excitement
and to speak in an ordinary tone. "But I don't understand what.... What
is it to do with you?" In spite of her effort, and perhaps because of
it, she found herself trembling with anger. "I don't understand you."
Blanche sneered. A look of contempt passed across her face. The bitter,
anxious eyes darted at Patricia a quick glance of scorn.
"You're impertinent!" she cried, and was again as if frozen.
"No, Blanche. This is really intolerable, you know," put in Monty,
anger in his own contemptuous tone. "We're not at the Lyceum now.
Patricia is here as my guest."
"And you are proposing to her. I interrupted you. I'm sorry." Blanche
gave a brusque laugh. But she did not move from her position at the
door.
"And now I'm going," said Patricia. She made as if to do so, but looked
from one to the other of them in uncertainty that was not without
indignation. Her heart was fluttering.
"No. You asked what right I had to...." Blanche moved her arm stiffly,
and Patricia saw its wretched thinness, and the ugly bone at the elbow.
"Of course, I haven't any right...."
"You really mustn't make a scene, my dear Blanche," interposed
Monty. "It's quite out of the piece, so to speak. You interrupted a
conversation...."
"I came, because I wanted to see you, Monty," said Blanche. "But the
conversation I interrupted concerns me very vitally. Miss Quin, you
may not be to blame. I can't tell. It's all so ... peculiar. You're
only a vain little fool, of course. But Monty has no right to offer you
marriage."
"I can assure you," answered Patricia, with undesignedly offensive
coolness which arose from her fear and her effort at self-control,
"that that doesn't in the least matter."
"And now, good-night, Patricia. I'll see you to the door," said Monty.
"No!" Blanche pressed back. "Miss Quin: Monty and I have quarrelled. We
quarrelled here a fortnight ago, and he has not answered my letters----"
"My dear Blanche! The story of our quarrel--" Monty approached, seizing
Blanche's arm. He could quite easily have torn her from the door and
made way for Patricia, and that was clearly his object. His hand was
to her elbow, and Blanche was already bent to exert her strength in
resistance. But as Monty's grip tightened, she said in a very low tone:
"Do you want me to scream, and bring the others? Then let go my arm."
Patricia's saw Monty's teeth bared, his left fist clenched. And then he
stood back a little way.
"You're doing yourself no good, you know," he said presently, in his
caressing voice. "Only harm. Poor fool that you are."
"Miss Quin----"
Patricia spoke entreatingly. She went closer to Blanche, her voice low
and her hands appealing.
"Mrs. Tallentyre, is there any _need_ for me to hear? I was going when
you came: my one wish is to go now. You're mistaken in me. You needn't
have any thought----"
"Please let me tell you. For a fortnight I have been ill. I have
written to Monty, and he has not answered my letters. This afternoon
I received, without a letter, a thousand pounds in bank-notes. From
Monty, you understand. A thousand pounds. It was my solatium. I was to
take the thousand pounds, and--good-bye! You understand that, also?
You're very quick."
During all this time, Monty stood with his back turned to Blanche, and
his hands in his pockets. He appeared not to be listening, but to be
thinking of another matter. Such disregard was to be expected of him;
but at this point he showed that he had been listening intently. He
wheeled round with angering insolence, his eyes widely opened, his head
thrown back.
"Oh," said Monty, as if with surprise. "You've come to chaffer!"
ii
Blanche flinched, and Patricia--stung to loyalty for one so helpless in
face of the power to insult--felt a sudden outgoing of pity for her.
"You poor thing!" she cried vehemently. "You're suffering!"
"Oh, don't be sentimental!" cried Blanche, in a harsh, impatient voice.
She jerked her head in pain. "I haven't come to chaffer, and I've got
no use for your school-girl sympathy. Keep that for your own wounds.
I'm dealing with real things, as Monty will discover in a minute. You,
with your silly baby face, haven't the heart to understand. You.... But
I'm forgetting. Monty won't like me to speak harshly to his promised
bride. He'll----"
"I'm not!" shouted Patricia, suddenly out of control. "I _wouldn't_!"
She was sparkling with temper; and yet remained staring at Blanche. Her
feelings were in tumult--indignation in conflict with fear, and both
with pity. "Nothing can keep me from being sorry for you," she said,
"because you're unhappy. I don't like you. I don't _like_ you. But I'm
sorry for you."
"Well, that's very nice," drawled Blanche. "It's so nice for women to
feel for one another."
"If you've not come for Patricia's pity, and not come to raise the
thousand pounds, which, after all, is quite a generous sum--" began
Monty.
"During all the time we've known each other, I've taken no money from
you, Monty. D'you realise that? You couldn't realise it! It's not in
your nature to realise it, because you're avaricious yourself, and
find avariciousness.... Oh, God...." Blanche's voice dropped wearily.
"Haven't I heard your views of money.... Don't I know you, Monty? How
_well_ I know you. Too well! No, I haven't come for money. I don't want
it. I wouldn't take money----"
"But, my dear, you _must_," Monty said. He turned quickly, and came
towards her, ignoring Patricia, whom he had forgotten. "It's the only
thing I can give you. Look, I'll make it two thousand. I want to be
generous----"
"Generous! My God!" whispered Patricia. She raised her hands in
an unconscious gesture. Was it really thus that Monty--that such
men--computed generosity? In guineas? She was distraught.
"But it's no good to think that you and I can go on," Monty was
continuing. "We can't go on." Even here he was speaking slowly and
deliberately, in that thick, sweet voice which was so seldom raised
beyond quietness. "Our interest is gone. The whole thing's finished,
you know."
Blanche looked at him, her face drawn, and her lips parted in a
miserable smile.
"Finished, yes," she said. "You're tired of me. That I realise. I
realised it long ago. _Tant pis._ But it isn't finished." She shook
her head. "Five years ago I was tired of Fred. I met _you_. Now you're
tired. But you've forgotten Fred."
"Fred!" exclaimed Monty. "What's he got to do with it?" His voice was
suddenly coarse with cruelty. "He doesn't count. It's nothing to do
with him."
"That's why I came," said Blanche, very low. "All this time Fred's been
wondering why I didn't care for him...."
"Look here, Blanche," said Monty, quietly. "It's no good to threaten
me. You know that!"
"I'm not threatening you, my dear," returned Blanche, with a shudder.
"But it seems that Fred's found a little girl he wants to marry."
"Fred!" cried Monty. He seemed astounded. Behind his air of surprise
his thoughts moved with the speed of lightning. "What d'you mean?"
"Just that. You see, he's had me watched," answered Blanche. "He says
he's got all he needs. So I've brought you back your money. He's
vengeful, Monty. He'll go for damages."
iii
Patricia conceived the situation. Blanche, consumed with that hot,
wasting love which is concentrated upon the fear of loss, watched,
trapped by a husband as unscrupulous as herself; Monty, at first
passionate, as he had been with Patricia herself, and with more
success, with his love tiring, bent upon extrication, also watched,
trapped; herself, a spectator, half-guilty as the result of foolish
recklessness, trapped here, but possessing the power of flight. She
could escape, and would eventually do so; but there was no escape
for Blanche. There was none, perhaps, for Monty. Ugly love, ugly
renunciation, and a squalid sequel; and what then! No hope for
Blanche! Nothing for that poor, haggard woman with the ugly elbows
and the glittering wretched eyes of a dumb creature in pain. There
was even no future for her. Patricia was appalled. And Monty's clumsy
attempt--so grossly insensitive--to close the intrigue with money....
Why had he chosen this way? A quarrel there had been, a parting, some
coarse-grained assumption and deliberate plan to make the parting
"equitable" and final. He must have had some urgent reason. Herself?
Monty gave a jeering laugh.
"Well, done, Fred," he said quietly. And then, after a pause: "And
where's his evidence? He's bluffing, Blanche."
"You _say_ that...." Blanche contemptuously answered. "He's not
bluffing, Monty. He's got an object. I _know_. And it isn't money. It's
the little girl."
"But, good God, what's that to do with me?" demanded Monty. "Or, for
that matter, with you? Nothing. Nothing whatever. Any little girl, at
Fred's age, isn't going to be particularly squeamish about marriage.
You've only to look at Fred, too. She must be out for what she can get.
Oh, no, it's absurd. Take it from me, Blanche, he's bluffing!"
While Patricia, more impressed than ever, was filled with consternation
at this inside glimpse of the working of Monty's mind, Blanche sighed.
Perhaps it was no revelation to her? Were, then, _all_ people at bottom
coarse, cynical? Was she herself? Patricia recoiled from a question.
Again she had the sense of comparing those anxious, ghastly eyes to
the eyes of a monkey, which seem to hold all misery, and anxiously to
survey a treacherous and sophisticated and bewildering world. So might
her own eyes have looked if they had indeed, at this moment, mirrored
her dread.