John Derringham reached Wendover--by the road and the lodge gates--in an
impossible temper. He had left the orchard house coming as near to a
quarrel with his old master as such a thing could be. He absolutely
refused to let himself dwell upon the anger he had felt; and if Fate had
given him a distinct and pointed chance to ask the fair Cecilia for her
lily hand, when he knocked at her sitting-room door before dinner, he
would no doubt have left the next day--summoned again to London by his
Chief--an engaged man. But this turn of events was not in the
calculations of Destiny for the moment, and he found no less a person
than Mr. Hanbury-Green already ensconced by his hostess's side. They
were both smoking and looked very comfortable and at ease.
"I just came in to tell you I shall be obliged to tear myself away
to-morrow," John Derringham said, "and cannot have the pleasure of
staying to the end of the week in this delightful place."
Mrs. Cricklander got up from her reclining position among the cushions.
This was a blow. She wished now she had not encouraged Mr. Hanbury-Green
to come and sit with her; it might be a lost opportunity which it would
be difficult to recapture again. But she had felt so very much annoyed
at Mr. Derringham's capriciousness, displayed the whole of the Monday,
and then at his absenting himself to-day, having gone to see the
Professor, of course--since he was out of the house at tea-time when she
had sent to his room to enquire--that she had determined to see what a
little jealousy would do for him. But if he were off on the morrow this
might not be a safe moment to try it.
Mr. Hanbury-Green, however, had not the slightest intention of giving up
his place, in spite of several well-directed hints, and sat on like one
belonging to the spot.
So they all had to go off to dress without any longed-for word having
been spoken. And Mrs. Cricklander was far too circumspect a hostess to
attempt to arrange a _tête-à-tête_ after dinner under the eye of an
important social leader like Lady Maulevrier, whom she had only just
succeeded in enticing to stay in her country house. So, with the usual
semi-political chaff, the evening passed, and good-nights and good-bys
were said, and early next day John Derringham left for London.
He would write--he decided--and all the way up in the train he buried
himself in the engrossing letters and papers he had received from his
Chief by the morning's post.
And for the next six weeks he was in such a turmoil of hard work and
deep and serious questions about a foreign State that he very seldom had
time to go into society, and when at last he was a little more free,
Mrs. Cricklander, he found, had not returned from Paris, whither she
always went several times a year for her clothes.
But they had written to one another once or twice.
He had promised in the last letter that he would go down to Wendover
again for Whitsuntide, and this time he firmly determined nothing should
keep him from his obvious and delectable fate.
Mrs. Cricklander had no haunting fears now. She could discover no reason
for John Derringham's change towards her. Arabella had been mute and had
put it down to the stress of his life. This tension with the foreign
State, it leaked out, had been known to the Ministers for a week before
it had been made public--that, of course, was the cause of his
preoccupation, and she would simply order some especially irresistible
garments in Paris, and bide her time.
He wrote the most charming letters, though they were hardly long enough
to be called anything but notes; but there was always the insinuation in
them that she was the one person in the world who understood him, and
they were expressed with his usual cultivated taste.
It was sheer force of will that kept John Derringham from ever thinking
of Halcyone. He resolutely crushed the thought of her every time it
presented itself, and systematically turned to his work and plunged into
it, if even a mental vision of her came to his mind's eye.
He felt quite calm and safe when, two days before he was expected at
Wendover, the idea came to him to propose himself to the Professor, so
as not to have to go and see him and endure his cynical reflections
_after_ he should be engaged to his hostess.
Mr. Carlyon had wired back, "Come if you like," and on this evening in
early June John Derringham arrived at the orchard house.
Cheiron made no allusion to the matter that had caused them to part with
some breezy words upon his old pupil's side. Mrs. Cricklander or
Wendover might not have existed; their talk was upon philosophy and
politics, and contained not the shadow of a woman--even Halcyone was not
mentioned at all.
Whitsuntide fell late that year, at the end of the first week in June,
and the spring having been exceptionally mild, the foliage was all in
full beauty of the freshest green.
It was astonishingly hot, and every divine scent of the night came to
John Derringham as he went out into the garden before going to bed. A
young setting half-moon still hung in the sky, and there were stars. One
of those nights when all the mystery of life seems to be revealing
itself in the one word--Love. The nightingale throbbed out its note in
the copse amidst a perfect stillness, and the ground was soft without a
drop of dew.
John Derringham, hatless, and with his hands plunged in the pockets of
his dinner coat, wandered down the garden towards the apple tree,
picking an early red rosebud as he passed a bush--its scent intoxicated
him a little. Then he went to the gate, and, opening it, he strolled
into the park. Here was a vaster and more perfect view. It was all
clothed in the unknown of the half dark, and yet he could distinguish
the outline of the giant trees. He went on as if in some delicious
dream, which yet had some heart-break in it, and at last he came to the
tree where he and Halcyone had sat those seven years ago, when she had
told him of what consisted the true point of honor in a man. He
remembered it all vividly, her very words and the cloud of her soft hair
which had blown a little over his face. He sat down upon the fallen log
that had been made into a rude bench; and there he gazed in front of
him, unconscious now of any coherent thought.
Suddenly he was startled by a laugh so near him and so soft that he
believed himself to be dreaming, but he looked round and quickly rose to
his feet, and there at the other side of the tree he saw standing the
ethereal figure of a girl, while her filmy gray garments seemed to melt
into the night.
"Halcyone!" he gasped. "And from where?"
"Ah!" she said as she came towards him. "You have invaded my kingdom.
Mortal, what right have you to the things of the night? They belong to
me--who know them and love them."
"Then have compassion upon me, sweet dryad!" he pleaded, "who am but a
pilgrim who cannot see his way. Let me shelter under your protection and
be guided aright."
She laughed again--a ripple of silver that he had not guessed her voice
possessed. Her whole bearing was changed from the reserved, demure and
rather timid creature whom he knew. She was a sprite now, or a nymph, or
even a goddess, for her brow was imperious and her mien one of assured
command.
"This is my kingdom," she said, "and if you obey me, I will show you
things of which you have never dreamed--" and then she came towards the
tree and sat upon the high forked branch of the broken bough while she
pointed with shadowy finger to the part which was a bench. "Sit there,
Man of Day," she ordered, "for you cannot see beyond your hand. You
cannot know how the living things are creeping about, unafraid now of
your cruel power. You cannot discern the difference in the colors of the
fresh young bracken and the undergrowth; you cannot perceive the birds
asleep in the tree."
"No, indeed, Lady of Night," he said, "I admit I am but a mole, but you
will let me perceive them with your eyes, will you not?"
She slipped from her perch suddenly, before he could put out a
protesting hand to stop her, and glided out of his view into the dark of
the copse, and from there he heard the intoxicating silver laughter
which maddened his every sense.
"Halcyone! Witch!" he called. "Come back to me--I am afraid, all alone!"
So she came, appearing like a materializing wraith from the shadow, and
with an undulating movement of incredible grace she was again seated
upon her perch, the fallen forked branch of the tree.
John Derringham was experiencing the strongest emotion he had ever felt
in his life.
A maddening desire to seize the elusive joy--to come nearer--to assure
himself that she was real and not a spirit of night sent to torture and
elude him--overcame all other thought. The startling change from her
deportment of the day--the very way she glided about was as the movement
of some other being.
And as those old worshipers of Dionysus had grown intoxicated with the
night and the desire of communion with the beyond, so he--John
Derringham--cool, calculating English statesman--felt himself being
drawn into a current of emotion and enthrallment whose end could only be
an ecstasy of which he did not yet dare to dream.
It was all so abnormal--to see her here, a shadow, a tantalizing soft
shadow with a new personality--it was no wonder he rubbed his eyes and
asked himself if he were awake.
"Come with me," she whispered, bending nearer to him, "and I will show
you how the wild roses grow at night."
"I will follow you to Hades," he said, "but I warn you I cannot see a
yard beyond my nose. You must lead me with your hand, if so ethereal a
spirit possesses a hand."
Again the silver laugh, and he saw her not, but presently she appeared
from behind the tree. She had let down her misty, mouse-colored hair,
and it floated around her like a cloud.
Then she slipped a cool, soft set of fingers into his, and led him
onward, with sure and certain steps, while he blundered, not knowing
where to put his feet, and all the time she turned every few seconds and
looked at him, and he could just distinguish the soft mystery of her
eyes, while now and then, as she walked, a tendril of her floating hair
flew out and caressed his face, as once before, long ago.
"There are fairy things all about us," she said. "Countless pink
campions and buttercups, with an elf in each. They will feel your giant
feet, but they will know you are a mortal and cannot help your ways,
because, you poor, blind bat, you cannot see!"
"And you?" he asked. "Who gave you these eyes?"
"My mother," she answered softly, "the Goddess of the Night."
And then she drew him on rapidly and stealthily, and he saw at last, in
the open space where the stars and the sinking moon gave more light,
that they were approaching the broken gate, and were near the terraced
garden, which now was better kept.
When they got to this barrier to their path, Halcyone paused and leaned
upon it.
"Mortal," she said, "you are wandering in a maze. You have come thus far
because I have led you, but you would have fallen if you had walked so
fast alone. Now look, and I will show you the lily-of-the-valley
cups--there are only a few there under the shelter of the gray stone
arch. Come."
And she opened the gate, letting go of his hand as she glided beyond.
"I cannot and will not hazard a step if you leave me," he called, and
she came back and gave him again her soft fingers to hold. So at last
they reached the summer house at the end of the second terrace, where
the archway was where old William kept his tools.
There were very few flowers out, but a mass of wild roses, and still
some May tulips bloomed, while from the meadow beneath them came that
indescribable freshness which young clover gives.
John Derringham knew now that he was dreaming--or drunk with some nectar
which was not of earth. And still she led him on, and then pointed to
the old bench which he could just see.
"We shall sit here," she said, "and Aphrodite shall tell us your
future--for see, she, too, loves the night and comes here with me."
And to his intense astonishment, as he peered on to the table, he saw a
misty mass of folds of silk, and there lay the goddess's head, that
Halcyone had shown to him that day in the long gallery more than a month
ago.
He was so petrified with surprise at the whole thing that he had ceased
to reason. Everything came now as a matter of course, like the
preposterous sequence of events in a dream. The Aphrodite lay, as a
woman caressed, half buried in her silken folds, but Halcyone lifted her
up and propped her against a stone vase which was near, letting the silk
fall so that the broken neck did not show, and it seemed as if a living
woman's face gazed down upon them.
John Derringham's eyes were growing more accustomed to the darkness, or
Halcyone really had some magic power, for it seemed to him that he could
see the divine features quite clearly.
"She is saying," the soft voice of his companion whispered in his ear,
"that all the things you will grasp with your hands are but dreams--and
the things that you now believe to be dreams are all real."
"And are you a dream, you sweet?" asked John Derringham. "Or are you
tangible, and must I drink the poison cup, after all?"
"I would give you no noxious wine," she answered. "If you were strong
and wise and true, only the fire which I have stolen from heaven could
come to you."
"Long ago," he said, "you gave me an oak-leaf, dryad, and I have kept it
still. What now will you grant to me?"
"Nothing, since you fear--" and she drew back.
"I do not fear," he answered wildly. "Halcyone!--sweetheart! I want
you--here--next my heart. Give me--yourself!"
Then he stretched out his arms and drew her to him, all soft and loving
and unresisting, and he pressed his lips to her pure and tender lips.
And it seemed as if the heavens opened, and the Night poured down all
that was divine of bliss.
But before he could be sure that indeed he held her safely in his arms,
she started forward, releasing herself. Then, clasping Aphrodite and her
silken folds, with a bound she was far beyond him, and had disappeared
in the shadow of the archway, on whose curve the last rays of moonlight
played, so that he saw it outlined and clear.
He strode forward to follow her, but to his amazement, when he reached
the place, she seemed to vanish absolutely in front of his eyes, and
although he lit a match and searched everywhere, not the slightest trace
of her could he find, and there was no opening or possible corner into
which she could have disappeared.
Absolutely dumbfounded, he groped his way back to the bench, and sitting
down buried his head in his hands. Surely it was all a dream, then, and
he had been drunk--with the Professor's Falernian wine--and had wandered
here and slept. But, God of all the nights, what an exquisite dream!