WITHIN THE PLAYHOUSE
Haward, sitting at the table in Marot’s best room, wrote an answer
to Audrey’s letter, and tore it up; wrote another, and gave it to
Juba, to be given to the messenger waiting below; recalled the negro
before he could reach the door, destroyed the second note, and wrote a
third. The first had been wise and kind, telling her that he was much
engaged, lightly and skillfully waving aside her request--the only
one she made--that she might see him that day. The second had been
less wise. The last told her that he would come at five o’clock to the
summer-house in Mistress Stagg’s garden.
When he was alone in the room, he sat for some time very still, with
his eyes closed and his head thrown back against the tall woodwork
of his chair. His face was stern in repose: a handsome, even a fine
face, with a look of power and reflection, but to-day somewhat worn
and haggard of aspect. When presently he roused himself and took up
the letter that lay before him, the paper shook in his hand. “Wine,
Juba,” he said to the slave, who now reëntered the room. “And close the
window; it is growing cold.”
There were but three lines between the “Mr. Haward” and “Audrey;” the
writing was stiff and clerkly, the words very simple,--a child’s asking
of a favor. He guessed rightly that it was the first letter of her own
that she had ever written. Suddenly a wave of passionate tenderness
took him; he bowed his head and kissed the paper; for the moment
many-threaded life and his own complex nature alike straightened to a
beautiful simplicity. He was the lover, merely; life was but the light
and shadow through which moved the woman whom he loved. He came back
to himself, and tried to think it out, but could not. Finally, with a
weary impatience, he declined to think at all. He was to dine at the
Governor’s. Evelyn would be there.
Only momentarily, in those days of early summer, had he wavered in his
determination to make this lady his wife. Pride was at the root of his
being,--pride and a deep self-will; though because they were so sunken,
and because poisonous roots can flower most deceivingly, he neither
called himself nor was called of others a proud and willful man. He
wished Evelyn for his wife; nay, more, though on May Day he had shown
her that he loved her not, though in June he had offered her a love
that was only admiring affection, yet in the past month at Westover he
had come almost to believe that he loved her truly. That she was worthy
of true love he knew very well. With all his strength of will, he had
elected to forget the summer that lay behind him at Fair View, and to
live in the summer that was with him at Westover. His success had been
gratifying; in the flush of it, he persuaded himself that a chamber of
the heart had been locked forever, and the key thrown away. And lo now!
a touch, the sudden sight of a name, and the door had flown wide; nay,
the very walls were rived away! It was not a glance over the shoulder;
it was full presence in the room so lately sealed.
He knew that Evelyn loved him. It was understood of all their
acquaintance that he was her suitor; months ago he had formally craved
her father’s permission to pay his addresses. There were times in those
weeks at Westover when she had come nigh to yielding, to believing that
he loved her; he was certain that with time he would have his way....
But the room, the closed room, in which now he sat!
He buried his face in his hands, and was suddenly back in spirit in his
garden at Fair View. The cherries were ripe; the birds were singing:
great butterflies went by. The sunshine beat on the dial, on the walks,
and the smell of the roses was strong as wine. His senses swam with the
warmth and fragrance; the garden enlarged itself, and blazed in beauty.
Never was sunshine so golden as that; never were roses so large, never
odors so potent-sweet. A spirit walked in the garden paths: its name
was Audrey.... No, it was speaking, speaking words of passion and of
woe.... Its name was Eloïsa!
When he rose from his chair, he staggered slightly, and put his hand
to his head. Recovering himself in a moment, he called for his hat and
cane, and, leaving the ordinary, turned his face toward the Palace.
A garrulous fellow Councilor, also bidden to his Excellency’s dinner
party, overtook him, and, falling into step, began to speak first of
the pirates’ trial, and then of the weather. A hot and feverish summer.
’Twas said that a good third of the servants arriving in the country
since spring had died of their seasoning. The slaver lying in the York
had thrown thirty blacks overboard in the ran from Barbadoes,--some
strange sickness or other. Adsbud! He would not buy from the lot the
master landed; had they been white, they had showed like spectres!
September was the worst month of the year. He did not find Mr. Haward
in looks now. Best consult Dr. Contesse, though indeed he himself had a
preventive of fever which never failed. First he bled; then to so much
of Peruvian bark--
Mr. Haward declared that he was very well, and turned the conversation
piratewards again.
The dinner at the Palace was somewhat hurried, the gentlemen rising
with the ladies, despite the enticements of Burgundy and champagne. It
was the afternoon set apart for the Indian dance. The bonfire in the
field behind the magazine had been kindled; the Nottoways and Meherrins
were waiting, still as statues, for the gathering of their audience.
Before the dance the great white father was to speak to them; the peace
pipe, also, was to be smoked. The town, gay of mood and snatching at
enjoyment, emptied its people into the sunny field. Only they who
could not go stayed at home. Those light-hearted folk, ministers to a
play-loving age, who dwelt in the house by the bowling green or in the
shadow of the theatre itself, must go, at all rates. Marcia and Lucia,
Syphax, Sempronius, and the African prince made off together, while the
sons of Cato, who chanced to be twin brothers, followed with a slower
step. Their indentures would expire next month, and they had thoughts,
the one of becoming an overseer, the other of moving up country and
joining a company of rangers: hence their somewhat haughty bearing
toward their fellow players, who--except old Syphax, who acted for the
love of it--had not even a bowing acquaintance with freedom.
Mr. and Mrs. Stagg saw their minions depart, and then themselves left
the little white house in Palace Street. Mistress Deborah was with
them, but not Audrey. “She can’t abide the sight of an Indian,” said
the minister’s wife indifferently. “Besides, Darden will be here from
the church presently, and he may want her to write for him. She and
Peggy can mind the house.”
The Capitol clock was telling five when Haward entered the garden by
the Nicholson Street gate. There had arisen a zephyr of the evening,
to loosen the yellow locust leaves and send them down upon the path,
to lay cool fingers upon his forehead that burned, and to whisper low
at his ear. House and garden and silent street seemed asleep in the
late sunshine, safe folded from the storm of sound that raged in the
field on the border of the town. Distance muffled the Indian drums,
and changed the scream of the pipes into a far-off wailing. Savage
cries, bursts of applause and laughter,--all came softly, blent like
the hum of the bees, mellow like the sunlight. There was no one in the
summer-house. Haward walked on to the grape arbor, and found there a
black girl, who pointed to an open door, pertaining not to the small
white house, but to that portion of the theatre which abutted upon the
garden. Haward, passing a window of Mr. Stagg’s domicile, was aware of
Darden sitting within, much engaged with a great book and a tankard of
sack. He made no pause for the vision, and another moment found him
within the playhouse.
The sunlight entered in at the door and at one high window, but yet
the place was dim. The gallery and the rude boxes were all in shadow;
the sunbeams from the door struck into the pit, while those from the
high window let fall a shaft of misty light upon the stage itself, set
for a hall in Utica, with five cane chairs, an ancient settle, and a
Spanish table. On the settle, in the pale gold of the falling light,
sat Audrey, her hands clasped over her knees, her head thrown back, and
her eyes fixed upon the shadowy, chill, and soundless space before her.
Upon Haward’s speaking her name she sighed, and, loosing her hands,
turned toward him. He came and leaned upon the back of the settle. “You
sent for me, Audrey,” he said, and laid his hand lightly upon her hair.
She shrank from his touch. “The minister made me write the letter,” she
said, in a low voice. “I did not wish to trouble you, sir.”
Upon her wrist were dark marks. “Did Darden do that?” demanded Haward,
as he took his seat beside her.
Audrey looked at the bruise indifferently; then with her other hand
covered it from sight. “I have a favor to ask of Mr. Haward,” she said.
“I hope that after his many kindnesses he will not refuse to do me this
greatest one. If he should grant my request, the gratitude which I must
needs already feel toward him will be increased tenfold.” The words
came precisely, in an even voice.
Haward smiled. “Child, you have conned your lesson well. Leave the
words of the book, and tell me in your own language what his reverence
wants.”
Audrey told him, but it seemed to her that he was not listening. When
she had come to an end of the minister’s grievances, she sat, with
downcast eyes, waiting for him to speak, wishing that he would not look
at her so steadily. She meant never to show him her heart,--never,
never; but beneath his gaze it was hard to keep her cheek from burning,
her lip from quivering.
At last he spoke: “Would it please you, Audrey, if I should save this
man from his just deserts?”
Audrey raised her eyes. “He and Mistress Deborah are all my friends,”
she said. “The glebe house is my home.”
Deep sadness spoke in voice and eye. The shaft of light, moving, had
left her in the outer shadow: she sat there with a listless grace; with
a dignity, too, that was not without pathos. There had been a forlorn
child; there had been an unfriended girl; there was now a woman, for
Life to fondle or to wreak its rage upon. The change was subtle; one
more a lover or less a lover than Haward might not have noted it.
“I will petition the Commissary to-night,” he said, “the Governor
to-morrow. Is your having in friends so slight as you say, little maid?”
Oh, he could reach to the quick! She was sure that he had not meant to
accuse her of ingratitude, and pitifully sure that she must have seemed
guilty of it. “No, no!” she cried. “I have had a friend”--Her voice
broke, and she started to her feet, her face to the door, all her being
quiveringly eager to be gone. She had asked that which she was bidden
to ask, had gained that which she was bidden to gain; for the rest, it
was far better that she should go. Better far for him to think her dull
and thankless as a stone than see--than see--
When Haward caught her by the hand, she trembled and drew a sobbing
breath. “‘I have had a friend,’ Audrey?” he asked. “Why not ‘I have a
friend’?”
“Why not?” thought Audrey. “Of course he would think, why not? Well,
then”--
“I have a friend,” she said aloud. “Have you not been to me the kindest
friend, the most generous”--She faltered, but presently went on, a
strange courage coming to her. She had turned slightly toward him,
though she looked not at him, but upward to where the light streamed
through the high window. It fell now upon her face. “It is a great
thing to save life,” she said. “To save a soul alive, how much greater!
To have kept one soul in the knowledge that there is goodness, mercy,
tenderness, God; to have given it bread to eat where it sat among the
stones, water to drink where all the streams were dry,--oh, a king
might be proud of that! And that is what you have done for me.... When
you sailed away, so many years ago, and left me with the minister and
his wife, they were not always kind. But I knew that you thought them
so, and I always said to myself, ‘If he knew, he would be sorry for
me.’ At last I said, ‘He is sorry for me; there is the sea, and he
cannot come, but he knows, and is sorry.’ It was make-believe,--for
you thought that I was happy, did you not?--but it helped me very
much. I was only a child, you know, and I was so very lonely. I could
not think of mother and Molly, for when I did I saw them as--as I had
seen them last. The dark scared me, until I found that I could pretend
that you were holding my hand, as you used to do when night came in
the valley. After a while I had only to put out my hand, and yours
was there waiting for it. I hope that you can understand--I want you
to know how large is my debt.... As I grew, so did the debt. When I
was a girl it was larger than when I was a child. Do you know with
whom I have lived all these years? There is the minister, who comes
reeling home from the crossroads ordinary, who swears over the dice,
who teaches cunning that he calls wisdom, laughs at man and scarce
believes in God. His hand is heavy; this is his mark.” She held up her
bruised wrist to the light, then let the hand drop. When she spoke
of the minister, she made a gesture toward the shadows growing ever
thicker and darker in the body of the house. It was as though she saw
him there, and was pointing him out. “There is the minister’s wife,”
she said, and the motion of her hand again accused the shadows. “Oh,
their roof has sheltered me; I have eaten of their bread. But truth is
truth. There is the schoolmaster with the branded hands. He taught me,
you know. There is”--she was looking with wide eyes into the deepest of
the shadows--“there is Hugon!” Her voice died away. Haward did not move
or speak, and for a minute there was silence in the dusky playhouse.
Audrey broke it with a laugh, soft, light, and clear, that came oddly
upon the mood of the hour. Presently she was speaking again: “Do you
think it strange that I should laugh? I laughed to think I have escaped
them all. Do you know that they call me a dreamer? Once, deep in the
woods, I met the witch who lives at the head of the creek. She told me
that I was a dream child, and that all my life was a dream, and I must
pray never to awake; but I do not think she knew, for all that she is
a witch. They none of them know,--none, none! If I had not dreamed, as
they call it,--if I had watched, and listened, and laid to heart, and
become like them,--oh, then I should have died of your look when at
last you came! But I ‘dreamed;’ and in that long dream you, though you
were overseas, you showed me, little by little, that the spirit is not
bond, but free,--that it can walk the waves, and climb to the sunset
and the stars. And I found that the woods were fair, that the earth
was fair and kind as when I was a little child. And I grew to love and
long for goodness. And, day by day, I have had a life and a world where
flowers bloomed, and the streams ran fresh, and there was bread indeed
to eat. And it was you that showed me the road, that opened for me the
gates!”
She ceased to speak, and, turning fully toward him, took his hand and
put it to her lips. “May you be very happy!” she said. “I thank you,
sir, that when you came at last you did not break my dream. The dream
fell short!”
The smile upon her face was very sweet, very pure and noble. She would
have gone without another word, but Haward caught her by the sleeve.
“Stay awhile!” he cried. “I too am a dreamer, though not like you, you
maid of Dian, dark saint, cold vestal, with your eyes forever on the
still, white flame! Audrey, Audrey, Audrey! Do you know what a pretty
name you have, child, or how dark are your eyes, or how fine this hair
that a queen might envy? Westover has been dull, child.”
Audrey shook her head and smiled, and thought that he was laughing at
her. A vision of Evelyn, as Evelyn had looked that morning, passed
before her. She did not believe that he had found Westover dull.
“I am coming to Fair View, dark Audrey,” he went on. “In its garden
there are roses yet blooming for thy hair; there are sweet verses
calling to be read; there are cool, sequestered walks to be trodden,
with thy hand in mine,--thy hand in mine, little maid. Life is but
once; we shall never pass this way again. Drink the cup, wear the
roses, live the verses! Of what sing all the sweetest verses, dark-eyed
witch, forest Audrey?”
“Of love,” said Audrey simply. She had freed her hand from his clasp,
and her face was troubled. She did not understand; never had she seen
him like this, with shining eyes and hot, unsteady touch.
“There is the ball at the Palace to-morrow night,” he went on. “I must
be there, for a fair lady and I are to dance together.” He smiled.
“Poor Audrey, who hath never been to a ball; who only dances with the
elves, beneath the moon, around a beechen tree! The next day I will go
to Fair View, and you will be at the glebe house, and we will take up
the summer where we left it, that weary month ago.”
“No, no,” said Audrey hurriedly, and shook her head. A vague and
formless trouble had laid its cold touch upon her heart; it was as
though she saw a cloud coming up, but it was no larger than a man’s
hand, and she knew not what it should portend, nor that it would grow
into a storm. He was strange to-day,--that she felt; but then all her
day since the coming of Evelyn had been sad and strange.
The shaft of sunshine was gone from the stage, and all the house was
in shadow. Audrey descended the two or three steps leading into the
pit, and Haward followed her. Side by side they left the playhouse, and
found themselves in the garden, and also in the presence of five or six
ladies and gentlemen, seated upon the grass beneath a mulberry-tree, or
engaged in rifling the grape arbor of its purple fruit.
The garden was a public one, and this gay little party, having tired of
the Indian spectacle, had repaired hither to treat of its own affairs.
Moreover, it had been there, scattered upon the grass in view of the
playhouse door, for the better part of an hour. Concerned with its own
wit and laughter, it had caught no sound of low voices issuing from
the theatre; and for the two who talked within, all outward noise had
ranked as coming from the distant, crowded fields.
A young girl, her silken apron raised to catch the clusters which a
gentleman, mounted upon a chair, threw down, gave a little scream and
let fall her purple hoard. “’Gad!” cried the gentleman. One and another
exclaimed, and a withered beauty seated beneath the mulberry-tree
laughed shrilly.
A moment, an effort, a sharp recall of wandering thoughts, and Haward
had the situation in hand. An easy greeting to the gentlemen, debonair
compliments for the ladies, a question or two as to the entertainment
they had left, then a negligent bringing forward of Audrey. “A little
brown ward and ancient playmate of mine,--shot up in the night to be as
tall as a woman. Make thy curtsy, child, and go tell the minister what
I have said on the subject he wots of.”
Audrey curtsied and went away, having never raised her eyes to note the
stare of curiosity, the suppressed smile, the glance from eye to eye,
which had trod upon her introduction to the company. Haward, remaining
with his friends and acquaintances, gathered grapes for the blooming
girl and the withered beauty, and for a little, smiling woman who was
known for as arrant a scandalmonger as could be found in Virginia.