Gerald was standing at the window looking out when Franklin entered, and
Helen, in the place where he had left her, met the gaze of her affianced
with a firm and sombre look. There was a moment of silence while
Franklin stood near the door, turning a hesitant glance from Gerald's
back to Helen's face, and then Helen said, 'Gerald and I have been
quarrelling.'
Franklin, feeling his way, tried to smile. 'Well, that's too bad,' he
said. He looked at her for another silent moment before adding, 'Do you
want to go on? Am I in the way?'
'No, I don't want to go on, and you are very welcome,' Helen answered.
Her eyes were fixed on Franklin and she wondered at her own
self-command, for, in his eyes, so troubled and so kindly, she seemed to
see mutual memories; the memory of herself lying in the wood and saying
'I'm sick to death of it'; the memory of herself standing here and
saying to him 'I'm a broken-hearted woman.' And she knew that Franklin
was seeing in her face the same memories, and that, with his intuitive
insight where things of the heart were concerned, he was linking them
with the silent figure at the window.
'I suppose,' he said, going to the fire and standing before it, his
back to the others, 'I suppose I can't help to elucidate things a
little.'
'No, I think they are quite clear,' said Helen, 'or, at all events, you
put an end to them by staying; especially'--and she fixed her gaze on
the figure at the window--'as Gerald is going now.'
But Gerald did not move and Franklin presently remarked, 'Sometimes, you
know, a third person can see things in another way and help things out.
If you could just, for instance, talk the matter over quietly, before
me, as a sort of adviser, you know. That might help. It's a pity for old
friends to quarrel.'
Gerald turned from the window at this. He had come down from the heights
and knew that he had risen there too lightly, and that the tangles of
lower realities must be unravelled before he could be free to mount
again--Helen with him. He knew, at last, that he had made Helen very
angry and that it might take some time to disentangle things; but the
radiance of the heights was with him still, and if, to Helen's eye, he
looked fatuous, to Franklin, seeing his face now, for the first time, he
looked radiant.
'Helen,' he said, smiling gravely at her, 'what Kane says is very
sensible. He is the one person in the world one could have such things
out before. Let's have them out; let's put the case to him and he shall
be umpire.'
Helen bent her ironic and implacable gaze upon him and remained silent.
'You think I've no right to put it before him, I suppose.'
'You most certainly have no right. And you would gain nothing by it.
What I told you just now was true.'
'I can't accept that.'
'Then you are absurd.'
'Very well, I am absurd, then. But there's one thing I have a right to
tell Kane,' Gerald went on, unsmiling now. 'I owe it to him to tell him.
He'll think badly of me, I know; but that can't be helped. We've all got
into a dreadful muddle and the only way out of it is to be frank. So I
must tell you, Kane, that Althea and I have found out that we have made
a mistake; we can't hit it off. I'm not the man to make her happy and
she feels it, I'm sure she feels it. It's only for my sake, I know, that
she hasn't broken off long ago. You are in love with Althea, and I am in
love with Helen; so there it is. I'm only saying what we are all
seeing.' Gerald spoke gravely, yet at the same time with a certain
blitheness, as though he took it for granted, for Franklin as well as
for himself, that he thus made both their paths clear and left any
hazardous element in their situations the same for both. Would Althea
have Franklin and would Helen have him? This was really all that now
needed elucidation.
A heavy silence followed his words. In the silence the impression that
came to Gerald was as if one threw reconnoitring pebbles into a well,
expecting a swift response of shallowness, and heard instead, after a
wondering pause, the hollow reverberations of sombre, undreamed-of
depths. Franklin's eyes were on him and Helen's eyes were on him, and he
knew that in both their eyes he had proved himself once more, to say the
least of it, absurd.
'Mr. Digby,' said Franklin Kane, and his voice was so strange that it
sounded indeed like the fall of the stone in far-off darkness, 'perhaps
you are saying what we all see; but perhaps we don't all see the same
things in the same way; perhaps,' Franklin went on, finding his way,
'you don't even see some things at all.'
Gerald had flushed. 'I know I'm behaving caddishly. I've no right to say
anything until I see Althea.'
'Well, perhaps not,' Franklin conceded.
'But, you know,' said Gerald, groping too, 'it's not as if it were
really sudden--the Althea side of it, I mean. We've not hit it off at
all. I've disappointed her frightfully; it will be a relief to her, I
know--to hear'--Gerald stammered a little--'that I see now, as clearly
as she does, that we couldn't be happy together. Of course,' and he grew
still more red, 'it will be she who throws me over. And--I think I'd
better go to her at once.'
'Wait, Gerald,' said Helen.
He paused in his precipitate dash to the door. Only her gaze, till now,
had told of the chaos within her; but when Gerald said that he was going
to Althea, she found words. 'Wait a moment. I don't think that you
understand. I don't think, as Franklin says, that you see some things at
all. Do you realise what you are doing?'
Gerald stood, his hand on the door knob, and looked at her. 'Yes; I
realise it perfectly.'
'Do you realise that it will not change me and that I think you are
behaving outrageously?'
'Even if it won't change you I'd have to do it now. I can't marry
another woman when I'm in love with you.'
'Can't you? When you know that you can never marry me?'
'Even if I know that,' said Gerald, staring at her and, with his
deepening sense of complications, looking, for him, almost stern.
'Well, know it; once for all.'
'That you won't ever forgive me?' Gerald questioned.
'Put it like that if you like to,' she answered.
Gerald turned again to go, and it was now Franklin who checked him.
'Mr. Digby--wait,' he said; 'Helen--wait.' He had been looking at them
both while they interchanged their hostilities, and yet, though watching
them, he had been absent, as though he were watching something else even
more. 'What I mean, what I want to say, is this----' he rather
stammered. 'Don't please go to Althea directly. I'm to go to her this
evening. She asked me to come and see her at six.' He pulled out his
watch. 'It's five now. Will you wait? Will you wait till this evening,
please?'
Gerald again had deeply flushed. 'Of course, if you ask it. Only I do
feel that I ought to see her, you know,' he paused, perplexed. Then, as
he looked at Franklin Kane, something came to him. The cloud of his
oppression seemed to pass from his face and it was once more
illuminated, not with blitheness, but with recognition. He saw, he
thought he saw, the way Franklin opened for them all. And his words
expressed the dazzled relief of that vision. 'I see,' he said, gazing on
at Franklin, 'yes, I see. Yes, if you can manage that it will be
splendid of you, Kane.' Flooded with the hope of swift elucidation he
seized the other's hand while he went on. 'It's been such a dreadful
mess. Do forgive me. You must; you will, won't you? It may mean
happiness for you, even though Helen says it can't for me. I do wish you
all good fortune. And--I'll be at my club until I hear from you. And I
can't say how I thank you.' With this, incoherently and rapidly
pronounced, Gerald was gone and Franklin and Helen were left standing
before each other.
For a long time they did not speak, but Franklin's silence seemed caused
by no embarrassment. He still looked perplexed, but, through his
perplexity, he looked intent, as though tracing in greater and greater
clearness the path before him--the path that Gerald had seen that he was
opening and that might, Gerald had said, mean happiness to them all. It
was Helen watching him who felt a cruel embarrassment. She saw Franklin
sacrificed and she saw herself unable to save him. It would not save him
to tell him again that she would never marry Gerald. Franklin knew, too
clearly for any evasion, that Althea's was the desperate case, the case
for succour. She, Helen, could be thrown over--for they couldn't evade
that aspect--and suffer never a scratch; but for Althea to throw over
Gerald meant that in doing it she must tear her heart to pieces.
And she could not save Franklin by telling him that she had divined his
love for her; that would give him all the more reason for ridding her of
a husband who hadn't kept to the spirit of their contract. No, the only
way to have saved him would have been to love him and to make him know
and feel it; and this was the only thing she could not do for Franklin.
She took refuge in her nearest feeling, that of scorn for Gerald. 'It's
unforgivable of Gerald,' she said.
Franklin's eyes--they had a deepened, ravaged look, but they were still
calm--probed hers, all their intentness now for her. 'Why, no,' he said,
after a moment, 'I don't see that.'
Helen, turning away, had dropped into her chair, leaning her forehead on
her hand. 'I shall never forgive him,' she said.
Franklin, on the other side of the fire, stood thinking, thinking so
hard that he was not allowing himself to feel. He was thinking so hard
of Helen that he was unconscious how the question he now asked might
affect himself. 'You do love him, Helen? It's him you've always loved?'
'Always,' she said.
'And he's found it out--only to-day.'
'He didn't find it out; I told him. He came to reproach me for my
engagement.'
Franklin turned it over. 'But what he has found out, then, is that he
loves you.'
'So he imagines. It's not a valuable gift, as you see, Gerald's love.'
Again Franklin paused and she knew that, for her sake, he was weighing
the value of Gerald's love. And he found in answer to what she said his
former words: 'Why, no, I don't see that,' he said.
'I'm afraid it's all I do see,' Helen replied.
He looked down upon her and after a silence he asked: 'May I say
something?'
She nodded, resting her face in her hands.
'You're wrong, you know,' said Franklin. 'Not wrong in feeling this way
now; I don't believe you can help that; but in deciding to go on feeling
it. You mustn't talk about final decisions.'
'But they are made.'
'They can't be made in life. Life unmakes them, I mean, unless you set
yourself against it and ruin things that might be mended.'
'I'm afraid I can't take things as you do,' said Helen. 'Some things are
ruined from the very beginning.'
'Well, I don't know about that,' said Franklin; 'at all events some
things aren't. And you're wrong about this thing, I'm sure of it. You're
hard and you're proud, and you set yourself against life and won't let
it work on you. The only way to get anything worth while out of life is
to be humble with it and be willing to let it lead you, I do assure you,
Helen.'
Suddenly, her face hidden in her hands, she began to cry.
'He is spoiled for me. Everything is spoiled for me,' she sobbed. 'I'd
rather be proud and miserable than humiliated. Who wants a joy that is
spoiled? Some things can't be joys if they come too late.'
She wept, and in the silence between them knew only her own sorrow and
the bitterness of the desecration that had been wrought in her own love.
Then, dimly, through her tears, she heard Franklin's voice, and heard
that it trembled.
'I think they can, Helen,' he said. 'I think it's wonderful the way joy
can grow if we don't set ourselves against life. I'm going to try to
make it grow'--how his poor voice trembled, she was drawn from her own
grief in hearing it--'and I wish I could leave you believing that you
were going to try too.'
She put down her hands and lifted her strange, tear-stained face.
'You are going to Althea.'
'Yes,' said Franklin, and he smiled gently at her.
'You are going to ask her to marry you before she can know that Gerald
is giving her up.'
He paused for a moment. 'I'm going to see if she needs me.'
Helen gazed at him. She couldn't see joy growing, but she saw a
determination that, in its sudden strength, was almost a joy.
'And--if she doesn't need you, Franklin?'
'Ah, well,' said Franklin, continuing to smile rather fixedly, 'I've
stood that, you see, for a good many years.'
Helen rose and came beside him. 'Franklin,' she said, and she took his
hand, 'if she doesn't have you--you'll come back.'
'Come back?' he questioned, and she saw that all his hardly held
fortitude was shaken by his wonder.
'To me,' said Helen. 'You'll marry me, if Althea won't have you. Even if
she does--I'm not going to marry Gerald. So don't go to her with any
mistaken ideas about me.'
He was very pale, holding her hand fast, as it held his. 'You mean--you
hate him so much--for never having seen--that you'll go through with
it--to punish him.'
She shook her head. 'No, I'm not so bad as that. It won't be for
revenge. It will be for you--and for myself, too; because I'd rather
have it so; I'd rather have you, Franklin, than the ruined thing.'
She knew that it was final and supreme temptation that she put before
him, and she held it there resolved, so that if there were one chance
for him he should have it. She knew that she would stand by what she
said. Franklin was her pride and Gerald her humiliation; she would never
accept humiliation; and though she could see Franklin go without a
qualm, she could, she saw it clearly, have a welcome for him nearly as
deep as love's, if he came back to her. And what she hoped, quite
selflessly, was that the temptation would suffice; that he would not go
to Althea. She looked into his face, and she saw that he was tormented.
'But, Helen,' he said, 'the man you love loves you; doesn't that settle
everything?'
She shook her head again. 'It settles nothing. I told you that I was a
woman with a broken heart. It's not mended; it never can be mended.'
'But, Helen,' he said, and a pitiful smile of supplication dawned on his
ravaged little face, 'that's where you're so wrong. You've got to let it
soften and then it will have to mend. It's the hard hearts that get
broken.'
'Well, mine is hard.'
'Let it melt, Helen,' he pleaded with her, 'please let it melt. Please
let yourself be happy, dear Helen.'
But still she shook her head, looking deeply at him, and in the
negation, in the look, it was as if she held her cup of magic steadily
before him. She was there, for him, if he would have her. She kept him
to his word for his sake; but she kept him to his word for hers, too.
Yes, he saw that though it was for his sake, it was not for his
alone--there was the final magic--that her eyes met his in that long,
clear look. It was the nearest he would ever come to Helen; it was the
most she could ever do for him; and, with a pang, deep and piercing, he
felt all that it meant, and felt his love of her avowed in his own eyes,
and recognised, received in hers. Helplessly, now, he looked at her, his
lips pressed together so that they should not show their trembling, and
only a little muscle in his cheek quivering irrepressibly. And he
faltered: 'Helen--you could never love me back.'
'Not in that way,' said Helen. She was grave and clear; she had not a
hesitation. 'But that way is ruined and over for me. I could live for
you, though. I could make it worth your while.'
He looked, and he could say nothing. Against his need of Helen he must
measure Althea's need of him. He must measure, too--ah, cruel
perplexity--the chance for Helen's happiness. She was unhesitating; but
how could she know herself so inflexible, how could she know that the
hard heart might not melt? For the sake of Helen's happiness he must
measure not only Gerald's need of her against his own and Gerald's power
against his own mere pitifulness, but he must wonder, in an agony of
sudden surmise, which, in the long-run, could give her most, the loved
or the unloved man. In all his life no moment had ever equalled this in
its fulness, and its intensity, and its pain. It thundered, it rushed,
it darkened--like the moment of death by drowning and like the great
river that bears away the drowning man. Memories flashed in it, broken
and vivid--of Althea's eyes and Helen's smile; Althea so appealing,
Helen so strong; and, incongruous in its remoteness, a memory of the
bleak, shabby little street in a Boston suburb, the small wooden house
painted brown, where he was born, where scanty nasturtiums flowered on
the fence in summer, and in winter, by the light of a lamp with a ground
glass shade, his mother's face, careful, worn, and gentle, bent over the
family mending. Where, indeed, had the river borne him, and what had
been done to him?
Helen's voice came to him, and Helen's face reshaped itself--a strange
and lovely beacon over the engulfing waters. She saw his torment and she
understood. 'Go to her if you must,' she said; 'and I know that you
must. But don't go with mistaken ideas. Remember what I tell you.
Nothing is changed--for me, or in me. If Althea doesn't want you
back--or if Althea does want you back--I shall be waiting.' And, seeing
his extremity, Helen, grave and clear, filled her cup of magic to the
brim. As she had said that morning, she said now--but with what a
difference: 'Kiss me good-bye, Franklin.'
He could not move towards her; he could not kiss her; but, smiling more
tenderly than he could have thought Helen would ever smile, she put her
arms around him and drew his rapt, transfigured face to hers. And
holding him tenderly, she kissed him and said: 'Whatever happens--you've
had the best of me.'