Matravers never altogether forgot the sensations with which he awoke
on the following morning. Notwithstanding a sleepless night, he rose
and made a deliberate toilet with a wonderful buoyancy of spirits. The
change which had come into his life was a thing so wonderful that he
could scarcely realize it. Yet it was true! He had found the one
experience in life which had hitherto been denied him, and he was
amazed at the full extent of its power and sweetness. He felt himself
to be many years younger! Old dreams and enthusiasms were suddenly
revived. Once more his foot seemed to be poised upon the threshold of
life! After all, he had not yet reached middle age! He was surprised
to find himself so young. Marriage, although so far as regarded
himself he had never imagined it a possible part of his life, was a
condition against which he held no vows. Instinctively he felt that
with Berenice, existence must inevitably become a fuller and a richer
thing. The old days of philosophic quietude, of self-contained and
cultured ease, had been in themselves very pleasant, but his was
altogether too large a nature to become in any way the slave of habit.
He looked forward to their abandonment without regret,--what was to
come would be a continuation of the best part of them set to the
sweetest music. He was conscious of holding himself differently as he
entered his breakfast-room! Was it his fancy, or was the perfume of
his little bowl of roses indeed more sweet this morning, the sunshine
mellower and warmer, the flavour of his grapes more delicate? At any
rate, he ate with a rare appetite, and then whilst he smoked a
cigarette afterwards, an idea came to him! The colour rose in his
cheeks,--he felt like a boy. In a few minutes he was walking through
the streets, smiling softly to himself as he thought of his strange
errand.
He found his way to a jeweller's shop in Bond Street, and asked for
pearls! They were the only jewels she cared for, and he made a
deliberate and careful choice, wondering more than once, with a
curious sort of shyness, whether the man who served him so gravely had
any idea for what purpose he was buying the ring which had been the
object of his first inquiry. He walked home with a little square box
in his hand, and a much smaller one in his waistcoat pocket. On the
pavement he had hesitated for a moment, but a glance at his watch had
decided him. It was too early to go and see her yet. He walked back to
his rooms! There was a little work which he must finish during the
day. He had better attempt it at once.
On his desk a letter was waiting for him. With a little tremor of
pleasure he recognized her handwriting. He took it over to the tall
sunny window, with a smile of anticipation upon his lips. He broke the
seal and read:
"My love, the daylight has come, and I am here where you
left me, a very happy and yet a very unhappy woman! Is it
indeed only a few hours since we parted? It all seems so
different. The starlight and the night wind and the deep,
sweet silence have gone! There is a great shaft of yellow
light in the sky, and a bank of purple clouds where the sun
has risen. Only the perfume of your roses lying crushed in
my lap remains to prove to me that it has not all been a
very sweet dream. Dearest, I have a secret to tell you,--the
sorrow of my life. The time has come when you must, alas!
know it. Last night it was enough for me to hear you tell me
of your love! Nothing else in the world seemed worthy of a
moment's thought. But as you were leaving, you whispered
something about our marriage. How sweetly it sounded,--and
yet how bitterly! For, dear, I can never marry you. I am
already married! I can see you start when you read this. You
will blame me for having kept this secret from you. Very
likely you will be angry with me. Only for the love of God
pity me a little!
"My story is so commonplace. I can tell it you in a few
sentences. I married when I was seventeen at my father's
command, to save him from ruin. My husband, like my father,
was a city merchant. I did not love him, but then I did not
know what love was. My girlhood was a miserable one. My
father belonged to the sect of Calvinists. Our home was
hideous, and we were poor. Any release from it was welcome.
John Drage, the man whom I married, had one good quality. He
was generous. He bought me pictures, and books--things which
I always craved. When my father's command came, it did not
seem a hardship. I married him. He was not so much a bad
man, perhaps, as a weak one. We lived together for four
years. I had one child, a little boy. Then I made a horrible
discovery. My husband, whom I knew to be a drunkard, was
hideously, debasingly false to me. The bald facts are these.
I myself saw him drunk and helped into his carriage by one
of those women whose trade it is to prey upon such
creatures. This was not an exceptional occurrence. It was a
habit.
"There, I have told you. It would have hurt me less to have
cut off my right hand. But there shall be no
misunderstanding, nor any concealment between us. I left
John Drage's house that night. I took little Freddy with me;
but when I refused to return, he stole the child away from
me. Then I drew a sharp line at that point in my life. I had
neither friend nor relation, but there was some money which
had been left me soon after my marriage. I lived alone, and
I began to write. That is my story. That is why I cannot
marry you.
"Dear, I want you, now that you know my very ugly history,
to consider this. Whilst I was married, I was faithful to my
husband; since then I have been faithful to my self-respect.
But I have told myself always that if ever the time came
when I should love, I would give myself to that man without
hesitation and without shame. And that time has come, dear.
You know that I love you! Your coming has been the great
awakening joy of my life. Nothing that has gone before,
nothing that the future may hold, can ever trouble me if we
are together--you and I. I have suffered more than most
women. But you will help me to forget it.
"I sit here with my face to the morning, and I seem to see a
new life stretching out before me. Is not love a beautiful
thing! I am not ambitious any more. I do not want any other
object in life than to make you happy, and to be made happy
by you. I began this letter with a heavy heart and with
trembling fingers. But now I am quite calm and quite happy.
I know that you will come to me. You see I have great faith
in your love. Thank God for it!
"BERENICE."
The letter fluttered from Matravers' fingers on to the floor. For
several minutes he stood quite still, with his hand pressed to his
heart. Then he calmly seated himself in a little easy chair which
stood by his side, with its back to the window. He had a curious
sense of being suddenly removed from his own personality,--his own
self. He was another man gazing for the last time upon a very familiar
scene.
He sat there with his head resting upon the palm of his hand, looking
with lingering eyes around his little room, even the simplest objects
of which were in a sense typical of the life which he was abandoning.
He knew that that life, if even its influence had not been wide, had
been a studiously well-ordered and a seemly thing. A touch of that
ultra aestheticism, which had given to all his writings a peculiar tone
and individuality, had permeated also his ideas as to the simplest
events of living. All that was commonplace and ugly and vicious had
ever repelled him. He had lived not only a clean life, but a sweet
one. His intense love for pure beauty, combined with a strong dash
of epicureanism, had given a certain colour to its outward form as
well as to its inward workings. Even the simplest objects by which
he was surrounded were the best of their kind,--carefully and
faithfully chosen. The smallest details of his daily life had always
been governed by a love of comely and kindly order. Both in his
conversation and in his writings he had studiously avoided all
excess, all shadow of evil or unkindness. His opinions, well chosen
and deliberate though they were, were flavoured with a delicate
temperateness so distinctive of the man and of his habits. And now, it
was all to come to an end! He was about to sever the cords, to cut
himself adrift from all that had seemed precious, and dear, and
beautiful to him. He, to whom even the women of the streets had been
as sacred things, was about to become the established and the open
lover of a woman whom he could never marry. To a certain extent it was
like moral shipwreck to him. Yet he loved her! He was sure of that.
He had called himself in the past, as indeed he had every right to,
something of a philosopher; but he had never tried to harden within
himself the human leaven which had kept him, in sympathy and
kindliness, always in close touch with his fellows. And this was its
fruit! To him of all men there had come this....
Soon he found himself in the street, on his way to her. Such a letter
as this called for no delay. It was barely twelve o'clock when he rang
the bell at her house. The girl who answered it handed him a note. He
asked quickly for her mistress.
She left an hour ago by the early train, he was told. She has gone
into the country.
She had made up her mind quite suddenly, and had not even taken her
maid. The address would probably be in the letter.
Still standing on the doorstep, he tore open the note and read it.
There were only a few lines.
"Dearest, can you take a short holiday? I have a fancy to
have you come to me at my little house in Devonshire. London
is stifling me, and I want to taste the full sweetness of my
happiness. You see I do not doubt you! I know that you will
come. Shall you mind a tiresome railway journey? The address
is Bossington Old Manor House, Devonshire, and the station
is Minehead. Wire what train you are coming by, and I will
send something to meet you.
"BERENICE."