Late on the afternoon that followed her arrival, Clodagh--with Larry in
attendance--climbed up the uneven path that led from the Orristown
boat-cove to the house. A considerable change had taken place in the
weather since the previous evening. The sky no longer hung low and
motionless above the horizon line; the sea no longer shone white and
polished as a mirror. A gale had sprung up, breaking the clouds and
whipping the sea into small green waves; and more than once, as the
cousins clambered up the rugged track, Asshlin paused to look back at
his small boat, lying with furled sail and shipped oars on the shingle.
"I hope I've beached her high enough," he said. "There will be a big
sea to-night."
Clodagh laughed. The prospect of a storm stirred her. She felt
boundlessly happy, boundlessly confident in this free, open life.
The night before, after Larry had left her, and the first tinge of
twilight had fallen across the old house, there had been a moment in
which the ghosts of memory had threatened to assail her--to come
trooping up the gaunt staircase, and through the great, bare rooms. But
her will had conquered; she had dispelled the phantoms, and had slept
dreamlessly in the big four-post bed.
In the morning she had awakened, as James Milbanke had awakened long
ago, to a world of light and joy. But with this difference, that to him
the world had been a thing to speculate upon and study, while to her it
was a thing familiar--understood--possessed. While she partook of
breakfast and while she visited the stables, she kept Hannah by her
side, learning from her the vicissitudes of the many humble lives
around Orristown that had been known to her since childhood; then,
before the tales had been half recounted, Larry had arrived in his
boat; and the two cousins, like children playing at a long-loved game,
had gone down together to the boat-cove to where the little craft
flashed its white sail like a seagull in the sun, and danced with
impatience to be off across the crisp green waves.
Clodagh's first act on landing, at Carrigmore, had been to visit the
little ivy-covered post-office, in the hope that the Orristown letters
might possibly be intercepted. But the postman had already left the
village, and she had no choice but to wait patiently for Gore's first
letter until her return in the evening. But the postponement had not
been sufficient to damp her spirits; and she had started on her various
expeditions with a very light heart. Last of all, had come the visit to
Mrs. Asshlin, who now rarely left her room, but lay all day in the
semi-light made by drawn blinds, drinking numerous cups of strong tea
and keeping up a fitful murmur of complaint.
With senses that rebelled against the depressing atmosphere, Clodagh
had entered the bedroom and had sat for nearly an hour beside her
aunt's couch, listening with all the patience she could muster to the
oft-repeated tale of discontent and ill-health. Then at last, feeling
that duty could demand no more, she had risen and kissed Mrs. Asshlin's
worn cheek.
"We must have you over in London, Aunt Fan," she said cheerfully. "We
must take you to a really good doctor, and have you made quite well."
But Mrs. Asshlin had shaken her head dubiously.
"I never had faith in really good doctors since Molyneaux came down to
see your poor father."
To this, there seemed no possible response; so Clodagh had kissed her
aunt once more, and, with a promise that she would return the next day,
had slipped silently out of the gloomy room followed by Larry. Outside,
in the vivid daylight, the cousins had looked at each other
involuntarily.
"Sometimes life seems awful, Clo!" Asshlin had said, in a despondent
voice. And with a momentary shock, Clodagh had caught a gleam of the
restlessness, the brooding gloom, that used long ago to settle on the
face of her father.
"Why don't you leave Carrigmore, Larry?" she had said quickly. "It's a
wonderful place to rest in, but it's not the place for the whole of a
man's life."
Asshlin had made a descriptive gesture, indicating the house behind
him; then, with a sudden impulse of confidence, he had thrust his hand
into his pocket, and had drawn out six five-pound notes.
"When this represents the whole exchequer of the next three months,
there isn't much question of foreign travel--or fortune-seeking," he
had said. "Come along! The gale is freshening!"
And Clodagh had obeyed, depressed for the moment by contact with that
hidden poverty of the proud and well-born, that is one of the most
pathetic factors in the scheme of Irish social life. She had longed
ardently to make some suggestion, some offer of help, to this bright,
spirited boy, who was wasting the best years God had given him in
coping with an estate that could never be made to pay, and attending
upon an invalid who hovered perpetually on the borderland of shadows;
but a native comprehension of the position held her dumb. An offer of
help made on the moment of his confidence would set an irrevocable
barrier between them in the very dawning of their renewed friendship.
So she had talked to him of the crops, of the fishing, of the Orristown
live-stock, while the boat carried them back across the bay. And the
sail homeward under the scudding clouds, while the little boat danced
and dipped to the buffeting of the waves, had erased the passing gloom;
and now, as they climbed the steep pathway and passed across the fields
to the house, Clodagh's heart was beating high in her own egotistical
joy at the mere fact of life.
She laughed out of sheer pleasure, as they passed round the house and
four or five dogs rushed forth from the hall to greet them; and
stooping impulsively, she drew Mick close to her and kissed his rough
head.
"Larry, do you remember how you won him from me long ago, and how nobly
you gave him back? I have never forgotten it." She smiled
affectionately at her tall young cousin; and, freeing Mick, led the way
into the house.
On the shabby hall table, where the silver sconces stood as of old, lay
a small heap of letters; and with an exclamation of pleasure, Clodagh
ran forward and picked them up, passing them hastily in review.
There was a thick, important-looking one from Nance. And--yes! the
first letter from Gore--the letter she had been waiting for!
For an instant her face fell. It felt thin and disappointing, as she
held the envelope between her fingers. But almost at once her face
cleared. After all, men had not as much time as women for the writing
of letters! And this had been written on the day of her departure! She
looked at the postmark: "London--10.30." Of course he had only had time
to scribble a line. How good and thoughtful of him even to have sent
that line! She turned and looked at Larry, her face radiant once more.
"Larry," she said, "will you tell Burke that we'll dine in half an
hour, if Hannah has everything ready? And tell them to have candles in
all the sconces. It is to be a dinner party, you know!" She gave a
pleasant little laugh and turned towards the stairs, closing her
fingers over her letters in a delightful, secret sense of anticipation
and possession.
Her own room was filled with a cold grey light as she entered it--a
peculiar light drawn from the wind-swept sky and the pale, agitated
waters; and she noticed, as she crossed the threshold, that the wind
roared draughtily down the wide chimney, in a way that suggested autumn
and autumnal gales. But the circumstance made little impression; she
carried her own world in her heart--and here, in the letter Gore had
written.
In a second impulse of love, she laid the others aside, and opened
Gore's envelope. Drawing out the letter, she held it for a moment
against her face. On this paper his hand had rested when he wrote to
her! There was a sense of personal contact in the mere thought. Then,
at last, with a smile at her own sentiment, she opened it slowly and
smoothed out the pages.
The written lines--scarcely more than a dozen in number--danced for an
instant before her eyes; then focused themselves with terrible
distinctness.
There was no formal beginning to the letter; it was merely a statement
made in sharp, uneven characters, as though the sender had written
under great stress--great emotion or resolve.
"I find," it began, "that you have treated me with an unpardonable
want of honour and want of truth on a matter that concerned me very
deeply--the matter of Deerehurst; and it seems to me, under the
circumstances, only just and right that our engagement should come
to an end. A marriage built upon such a basis could only have one
termination. If this seems hard or abrupt, I can only say that the
knowledge of my mistake has come hardly to me. I shall go abroad
again as soon as I can make my plans. I am glad to think that, as
no one but your sister knew of our engagement, my action can cause
no public comment or unpleasantness for you.
"WALTER GORE."
Clodagh read the lines--read and re-read them. For the first time in
her life, her quick brain failed to respond to a first suggestion;
then, at last, as though the cloud that obscured her mind had been rent
asunder, conception of all that the letter conveyed sprang to her
understanding.
Walter had written this letter! Walter had given her up! Her face
became very white; she swayed a little, looking about her vaguely, as
if for some physical aid; then suddenly revolt took the place of panic.
It was all some horrible mistake. She must go to him--rend the web of
doubt that had divided them--if need be, humble herself, show him the
greatness of her love, until he must condone--must forgive--must
reinstate her in his heart!
Moving swiftly, she crossed the room to the fireplace, drawing out her
watch as she went. With a good horse, she might still catch the last
train from Muskeere--take the night mail from Cork to Dublin--cross to
Holyhead in the morning, and be back in London to-morrow!
She lifted her hand to the frayed and tasselled bell-rope that hung
from the ceiling: then, by a strange impulse, her arm dropped to her
side.
When her journey was accomplished--when she met Gore, what had she to
explain? what had she to confess? The tassel of the bell-rope slipped
from between her fingers.
The vision of herself pleading with him rose vividly before her,--she,
with her passionate impulsiveness; he, with his grave dignity, his
uncompromising integrity. She recalled the peculiar words he had made
use of on the day he had discovered Deerehurst's gift of flowers. "I
should either believe in you--or disbelieve in you!" His critical
attitude in their first acquaintance started to life at the remembrance
of the words. He, who expected of others what he himself performed--he
who, as Nance had said, was "so honourable himself"--how would he
receive the poor, lame story she had to offer? A horrible, confusing
dread closed in about her. A week ago, she would have gone forth
confidently, to make her confession; but now her faith was less. On the
night in Deerehurst's study she had tasted of the tree of
knowledge--had seen things as men see them; and her fearlessness had
been shaken.
She looked helplessly round the bare room filled with cold grey light.
No; Walter would never believe!--Walter would never believe! The
knowledge that she had lied to him even once would stand between them,
condemning her hopelessly. An appalling weight seemed to press her to
the earth. She was cut adrift. She was separated for ever from all
safe, sheltering human things; somewhere in the dim, far regions where
the decrees of fate are made, a knell had been sounded!
She glanced once more round the bare, familiar room, from the great
four-post bedstead to the long window, beyond which lay the green
fields, the wind-swept sky, and the livid line of the sea; then
suddenly she turned, and fled through the open door and out into the
empty corridor.
Asshlin was still standing in the hall, as she came downstairs; at the
sound of her approach he looked up, but in the falling twilight he
noticed nothing unusual in her appearance.
"We've made a great illumination!" he said--"quite a blaze of light!"
Clodagh made no answer; but descending the stairs quickly, passed into
the dining-room.
As on the night years ago, when Milbanke had come to Orristown, the old
room was prepared to do honour to a guest. The tablecloth was laid,
places were set for two, and the great silver sconces were filled with
candles that glowed so brightly that even the dark portraits on the
walls were thrown into relief. But no fire blazed in the wide grate as
on the former occasion, and the curtains of the three long windows were
drawn back, admitting the light from the stormy evening sky.
Clodagh's first glance, as she entered the room, was for these windows,
and her first words concerned them.
"Larry, draw the curtains!" she said.
To her own ears, her voice seemed to come from some distant place--to
sound infinitely thin and far away; but Asshlin seemed to observe
nothing. He went forward obediently and drew the six long curtains.
As the last was pulled into place Burke entered, and carefully laid two
dishes upon the table. A moment later Clodagh took her seat.
"What will you eat, Larry?" she said hurriedly. "Chicken? Ham?"
Asshlin turned to her, as he in his turn took his place.
"What will _you_ have?" he said.
"I? Oh--anything! But talk, Larry! Tell me things! Let's--let's be
gay!"
Asshlin was busy cutting up the chicken. He did not hear the faintly
hysterical note that underran her voice--the note of warning from a
mind trying with panic-stricken haste to evade itself.
He helped her to some chicken; and Burke, laying the plate before her,
went in search of wine.
She toyed for a moment or two with the food, making pretence to eat.
At last Larry looked at her.
"You're eating nothing. Aren't you hungry?"
She started nervously.
"No; I'm not hungry. I--I had a glass of milk in my room. I couldn't
wait for dinner." She tried to laugh, as she told the falsehood.
He accepted the explanation.
"Then you must have a glass of wine now!" he said genially, as Burke
re-entered with a dusty bottle of port. "Give me the bottle, Burke!"
He took it from the old man's hands, and poured some wine into
Clodagh's glass; and as he leant forward, he suddenly saw by the light
of the candles that her eyes were wide and black, her face very white.
"Clo, you're not feeling ill?" he asked, in quick concern.
Clodagh put her hand to her face with a startled gesture.
"No! Do I look ill? It's the storm. The storm has got on my nerves. We
develop nerves in London, you know!" Again she attempted to laugh.
Once more Asshlin accepted her explanation, as something he had no
authority to question.
"I want you to talk, Larry!" she added hurriedly. "I want you to talk.
Say anything! Take me out of myself!"
She raised her glass to her lips and drank some of the wine. It brought
a faint tinge of colour to her cheeks, but only increased the bright
darkness of her eyes.
While Asshlin consumed his dinner, she sat very upright in her chair,
sipping her wine from time to time or breaking small mouthfuls from her
bread.
At last, having hovered anxiously about her, Burke made bold to speak
his thoughts.
"Is it the way the chicken isn't nice, ma'am?" he ventured.
She started, as she had started each time she had been directly
addressed.
"No, Burke! Oh no!" she said hastily. "The chicken is very nice. It's
only that the storm has--has given me a headache."
Burke shook his head sympathetically, as a sudden gale swept round the
house.
"'Tis lookin' for a bad night, sure enough!" he said, as he passed
round the table with the next course.
When the pudding had been served and partaken of by Asshlin, Clodagh at
last pushed back her chair, and with a curiously unstrung movement
walked across the room to the fireplace.
"Larry," she said suddenly, "will you play cards with me when Burke
takes the things away?"
Asshlin looked up with interest.
"By Jove!" he said, "what a good idea!"
When Burke reappeared, solemnly carrying some cheese, Clodagh turned to
him quickly.
"Is there a pack of cards in the house, Tim?" she asked.
He glanced at her white face and upright figure, but his expression
betrayed nothing.
"I do be thinkin' there's a deck some place, if I could lay me mind on
it."
Asshlin leant across the table.
"There's a pack in the drawer of the side-board."
Burke crossed the room, but not over-eagerly; and, opening the drawer,
produced the cards.
"'Tis the deck poor Misther Dinis got from Cork the self-same day----"
he began. Then he stopped considerately; and added under his breath,
"The Almighty God be good to us all!"
Clodagh took the cards from him, and stood very still, fingering them
nervously. At any other time, the thought of playing with cards that
belonged to the dead would have filled her with repugnance; but
to-night all ordinary standards had been lost--all the world was chaos.
She was like one who is slipping down into a bottomless abyss, and
stretches desperate hands towards any straw that might offer respite.
She never changed her position while the table was being cleared; her
only sign of emotion still being shown by the spasmodic way in which
she passed the cards between her fingers. When at last the cloth had
been removed and the candles replaced, she came quickly across the room
and stood looking down upon her cousin.
She still mechanically shuffled the cards; but her glance, as it rested
on Asshlin, was unconscious and absorbed, seeing only its own mental
pictures.
"What shall we play, Larry? What game can two people play?"
Asshlin looked up.
"Piquet," he said, "or euchre."
She nodded.
"Euchre! Yes, euchre!" She drew a chair up to the table and sat down.
"What stakes?"
Asshlin looked uncertain.
"You say!" he suggested a little diffidently.
She gave a nervous start, as a fresh gale shook the windows.
"Thirty shillings a game? Twenty shillings a game?"
For an instant he looked at her amazed; but seeing the unconsciousness
of her expression, his breeding forbade him to offer any objection.
With a reckless excitement he had never before had opportunity to feel,
he leant back in his chair, and taking up the glass Burke had set
beside him, poured out some port and drank it.
"Thirty shillings a game!" he said magnificently.
Clodagh did not seem to hear; certainly she saw nothing of his scruple
and his yielding. Her own thoughts rode and spurred her, pressing her
forward in a wild, panic-stricken search for oblivion.
"Come, Larry! Play!--play! I feel"--she paused and laughed
hysterically--"I feel that, if I were a man to-night, I should drink
all the port in that bottle! I want to forget everything. Play!--play!"
Asshlin picked up the cards that she had laid upon the table. He could
not understand her in this new mood; but he was satisfied not to
understand her. He felt stimulated--lifted above himself--as he had
never been before.
For two hours they played, with luck evenly balanced; then Asshlin made
a reluctant attempt to draw out his watch.
"Did you hear that?" he said, as the wind roared up from the sea like
an invading army. "I ought to be getting home. She'll be worrying about
me."
He spoke firmly enough, but his eyes wandered back to the cards.
Clodagh rose, and, crossing to the sideboard, poured some water into a
glass and drank it.
"No! no!" she said eagerly. "It's quite early. It's only eleven. She
won't expect you yet."
He put his watch back into his pocket; Clodagh returned to her place at
the table; and the play went on.
By twelve o'clock a change had come in their positions. Fortune was no
longer impartial; and Clodagh stood the winner by several games. Again
Asshlin made a movement towards departure. His face was flushed now,
and a look of alarm had begun to mingle with his excitement.
"I--I ought to be going now, Clo," he said a little huskily.
Clodagh gave a sharp laugh. At last it seemed to her that she was
drowning thought--holding at bay the black sense of loss and agony that
threatened to inundate her soul. She threw up her head, and her eyes
challenged her cousin's.
"You are a coward if you go now, Larry! You are afraid to take your
revenge!"
He coloured like a girl, and gave a half-angry, half-embarrassed laugh.
"Don't say that, Clo!"
"Then will you play?"
"I--I oughtn't to."
Again Clodagh laughed--a laugh so nervous and high-pitched that it rang
almost harshly across the room.
"Then you're not an Asshlin!"
"Am I not?" He tilted his chair forward, and leaned upon the table.
"Let's see! Come along! I'm game for anything after that!"
There was a new note in his voice--a fiery note, that seemed to
challenge fate and throw reason to the winds.
It stirred some latent power in Clodagh's brain. A faint colour crossed
the pallor of her face; she half rose from her seat.
"Shall we 'play like the devil,' as father used to say?"
Asshlin threw up his head. It was as if flint and steel had struck--the
spark followed inevitably.
"Yes!" he cried; "we'll play like the devil!"
At one o'clock they rose from the table. Clodagh's face was white
again; but Asshlin's was deeply flushed; and as he stood up,
confronting his cousin, it almost seemed that he had drunk more than
the two glasses of port to which the bottle testified.
"I must go now, Clo," he said. "May I ring for Burke to get me a
lantern?"
Clodagh took a step forward.
"Stay the night, Larry? You can have father's room."
He shook his head and crossed to the fireplace.
"I owe you forty pounds," he said in an unsteady voice. "I'll leave
thirty here"--he drew out the notes he had shown her at Carrigmore, and
laid them under the clock on the mantelpiece--"the other ten I'll--I'll
give you to-morrow."
But Clodagh scarcely heard.
"Do stay! Oh, do stay!"
Again he shook his head, and pulled the bell-rope.
"I've put the notes here--under the clock."
"All right!--all right! But, Larry, can't you stay? It's a horrible
night."
"I can't!" Then, as the door opened and Burke appeared, he turned to
him hastily: "Burke, bring me a lantern. I want to get the boat out."
At last Clodagh's mind was torn from its own concerns.
"The boat! You're not going to cross the bay on a night like this?"
Old Burke came forward, looking from one to the other.
"Wisha, Masther Larry, is it crazy you are?"
Asshlin turned his flushed face on the old servant.
"We're all a bit crazy now and then, Tim. But I was never afraid of the
sea. Get me the lantern!"
Still Burke hesitated. But suddenly Asshlin stepped forward, with a
look so full of pride and domination, that by instinct he succumbed.
"As quick as you can, Burke!"
And the old man hobbled off.
There was silence between the cousins after he had gone. Asshlin leaned
upon the mantelpiece, with his face averted; Clodagh walked nervously
about the room, changing the arrangement of the silver on the
sideboard, snuffing the candles that had begun to gutter, doing any
aimless and unnecessary thing that could blur her sense of impending
solitude. At last she paused in the middle of the room.
"Larry----" she began desperately.
But at the same instant Burke's step sounded in the hall, and his voice
came to them through the open door.
"The lanthern is here, Masther Larry!"
Asshlin started.
"All right! I'm coming!" he called. "Good-night, Clo!" He walked
forward almost awkwardly, and took her cold hand.
She looked up into his face, her own misery blotting out all other
things.
"Larry! can't you stay?"
Asshlin passed his hand across his forehead.
"Don't ask me, Clo! Good-night!"
An instant later he was gone.
She ran out into the hall on the moment that she realised her
desertion.
"Larry!" she called--"Larry!"
But her voice was drowned in the gale, as Burke opened the hall door
and the wind rushed in, filling the wide black hall. There was a
confused suggestion of storm and lantern-light; a vague silhouetted
vision of Burke, bent and small, and of Asshlin, straight, lithe, and
tall. Then the door closed with a thud. Lantern, figures, and storm
were alike shut out from her knowledge. She was alone in the great
house.