Katherine had that instant removed her dressing-gown after the brushing
of her hair, which now hung in two long plaits. She was in the act of
slipping into bed. The carpet in the passage was thick, and she heard no
sounds, so that the first thing which startled her was the actual
opening of the door of her room, which it had not been her custom to
lock.
For one second a blind terror shook her, and then all her nerve and
resource returned. She stood there magnificent in her anger and
resentment. She had no female instinct instantly to seize the
dressing-gown to cover herself. She stood straight up in her cheap
nainsook nightgown, all the beautiful lines of her tall, slender figure
showing in the soft shaded light.
Gerard Strobridge was like a man drunk with wine. His eye flamed and he
trembled with excitement. The bed, a small old wooden one, was between
them with a writing-table at the foot. So that to reach her he must go
round by the fire.
This he did, while he whispered hoarsely:
"Katherine--I love you--madly--I had to come to you, darling girl!" Then
he stopped within a few feet of her, literally sobered by the expression
of her face. It showed not an atom of fear--rather the proud contempt of
an empress ordering the death of a presuming slave.
She did not speak for a moment; she seemed to draw up to her full
height, and even to grow taller; she was only an inch or two less than
himself. And if the scorn of eyes could kill, he would have lain there
dead.
"Darling!" he cried, and went forward to take her in his arms.
She stepped back only one step and spoke at last, her deep tones low.
"If you dare to touch me, I will kill you--I am not afraid of you, you
know--You are only a beast, after all--and I am the man with the club."
"Beautiful fiend!"--but he hesitated--He was no coward, and cared not a
jot for her threats, only his fastidiousness was assailed by the thought
of a struggling, fighting woman in his embrace, when he had come there
for--Love! It would be wiser, perhaps, to cajole her. He was too
intoxicated with passion to realise that it would also seem more
dignified!
"Katherine, do not be so horribly unkind, darling girl! I love you
wildly, I tell you, and I want you to be mine."
"What for?" She was perfectly calm still, and never moved from her
place.
"That we may be happy, you sweet thing. I want to hold you in my arms
and caress you, and make us both forget that there is anything else in
the whole wide world but our own two selves!"
And exalted by this enchanting picture, he drew a little closer and held
out his hands.
"I tell you plainly--if you come one step nearer to me, you do so at
your own risk. I will tear the flesh from your face with my nails, and
strangle you." Her voice was absolutely deadly in its icy intentness. "I
am not weak, and I despise your mean action in coming here to-night too
greatly to have any fear."
The breeding in him responded to this sting.
"My mean action--!" but his voice faltered a little, and she interrupted
him before he could argue further.
"Yes--I am a dependent in your aunt's house here, earning my living, and
you chance my being disgraced and sent away for your own shamefully
selfish ends. Indeed, you are teaching me the lesson of the depth to
which an aristocrat can sink."
He drew back, and some of the fire died out of him. Her words cut him
like a knife, but he was too overwrought with emotion yet to give in and
leave her.
"Katherine--my darlings--forgive me!" he cried, brokenly. "I admit I am
mad with love, but you shall never suffer for it--give yourself to me,
and I will take you away from all drudgery. You shall have a house where
you like. I will protect you and teach you all you desire to know. You
shall lead an intellectual life worthy of your brain. We can travel in
Italy and France, and I shall worship and adore you--Katherine, my
sweet!"
The tones of his cultivated voice vibrated with deep feeling, and he
looked all that was attractive as he stood there in his faultless
evening clothes, pleading to her as though he were but a humble
suppliant for grace, and she a queen.
But Katherine was not in the least touched, although her awakened
critical faculties realised fully the agreeable companion he would
probably make as a lover, with his knowledge of the world, and his
polished homage to women. There was something fierce and savagely
primitive at this moment in her faithfulness to Algy. For all the
strongly sensuous side of her nature, any other man's caresses appeared
revolting to her. It was _the man_, not _men_, who could arouse her
passionate sensibility.
"You ask me to be your mistress, then--is that it?" her voice was coldly
level, like one discussing a business proposition.
His whole face lit up again--there was hope perhaps after all.
"Of course, darling--What else?"
"It is an insult--but I am not concerned with that point. My views are
perhaps not orthodox. I am merely interested in my side of the affair,
which is that I have not the slightest wish for the post. I will be no
man's mistress--do you hear?"
"Katherine, can I not make you love me, sweet?"
She laughed softly. It was a dangerous sound, ominous as that which a
lioness might make when she purrs.
"Not if you stayed on your knees for a thousand years! I have loved one
man in my life with the kind of love which you desire--I know exactly
what it means, and probably I shall never love another in that way--I
sacrificed him for my idea. I had will enough to leave him, feeling for
him what perhaps you feel for me. So do you think, then, that you could
move me in the least!--You whom I do not love, but--despise!"
All this time, she stood there utterly desirable in her thin raiment,
which she had never sought to cover. Indeed, now that she saw that she
was going to win the game, she took joy that he should understand what
he had lost, so that his punishment should be the more complete: there
was nothing pitiful or tender about Katherine Bush. Her strange, strong
character had no mercy for a man who had shown her that he was not
master of himself--above all things, she admired self-control.
Gerard Strobridge suffered, as she spoke, as perhaps he had never done
in his life before. If he had been one whit less of a gentleman, he
would not now have conquered himself; he would have seized her in his
arms, and made her pay for her scalding words. The effect of tradition
for centuries, however, held him even beyond the mad longing which again
thrilled through his blood as he looked at her.
He flung himself into the armchair and buried his head in his hands.
"My God!" he cried, hoarsely, "how you can torture--can you not? I knew
when I watched you in church that you could be cruel as the grave--but I
thought to-day when you looked at me there in my aunt's sitting-room,
that to me perhaps you meant to be kind; your face is the essence of
passion--it would deceive any man."
"Then it is well that you should be undeceived--and that we should
understand one another. What did you think you would gain by coming here
to-night?--My seduction? And some pleasure for yourself." She was
horribly scornful again. "You never thought of me--It does not matter
what my personal views are about such relations; you do not know them,
and I do not believe that I have given you reason to think that you
might treat me with want of respect; but your action shows that you do
not respect me, I can only presume, because of my dependent position,
and because you despise my class--since you would certainly not have
behaved so to any of your aunt's guests."
He writhed a little at her taunt, and his face was haggard now as he
looked up at her.
"There is no use in my asking you to forgive me--but it is not true that
I do not respect you, or that I have acted as I have for the reason
that I despise your class--That is a hateful thought. I came here
to-night because I am a man--and was simply mad with longing for you
after the tantalization of the last two days, and never being able to
speak a word to you." His breath came rather fast, and he locked
together his hands. "I love you--I would have come had you been the
highest lady in the land. My action was not premeditated--it was
yielding to a sudden strong temptation because I was sitting there in
the smoking-room thinking of you, and I heard the noise of your soft
footfall overhead, and suddenly all the furious passion in me would no
longer be denied and cried out for you!"
He rose and came over to her, and sitting down on the edge of the bed,
he held out his arms to her in supplication. "It swept away all the
civilisation in me. Nature breaks asunder all barriers in the best of us
at times--and you are so adorably dear--Katherine--darling--I have done
this thing, and now it is too late for me to plead for your pardon--but
I love you more wildly than I have ever loved a woman in my life.--You
could make me your slave, Katherine, if you would only give yourself to
me. I would chase away the memory of that other and teach you all the
divine things of love there are to learn in life."
She moved and stood by the fireplace. She was shivering a little, half
from cold.
"I forbid you to say another word on this subject," she said gravely,
but with less of her former scorn. "Neither you nor any other man could
rob me of the memory of my once dear lover--but I would rather not hate
you--so I appeal to that part of you that I still think is a gentleman
to go at once out of my room."
He followed her to the fire almost overcome again by the picture she
presented in her straight thin garment, virgin white and plain. He
wildly desired to unplait that thick soft hair and bury his face in
it--he longed to hold her to his heart. But he restrained himself.
There was complete silence for a second or two, and then across the park
in the church tower, midnight pealed, tolling the dying year.
They both lifted their heads to listen, unconsciously counting the
strokes, and then when the last one struck, and the joyous bells rang
out, something in their sound melted the anger and contempt in
Katherine's soul. She looked at him, his refined, distinguished face
very pale and utterly dejected now. And the broad-minded, level-headed
judgment which she brought to bear on all matters told her that she had
no right to great anger and made her realise for the first time that she
was actually to blame perhaps for this situation having developed since
she had not sufficiently considered what might be the possible result of
arresting a man's attention through the eyes and ears.
"Listen," she said gently, holding out her beautiful hand. "Here is the
New Year--I do not want to begin it with any hard thoughts--After all, I
understand you--and I forgive you. I believe I have been in some measure
to blame. I cannot ever be your love--but I am very lonely--won't you be
my true knight and friend?"
She had touched the deepest chord of his being. The tears sprang to his
fine grey eyes; he knelt down upon the rug and bent and kissed her
knees.
"Indeed, I will--I swear it, darling--And whatever suffering it brings
to me, I will never make you regret your sweet forgiveness of me, and
your resumed trust in me to-night."
She leaned forward, and for an instant smoothed his thick brown hair in
blessing.
He took her hands and kissed the palms, and then without another word,
he rose and went towards the door. There he turned and looked at her,
standing in the firelight, the dark oak-panelled room only lit by the
one small electric-shaded lamp by the bed. He looked and looked, as
though his famished eyes must surfeit themselves with the vision. It was
fair enough to see!
And then he noiselessly quitted the room and went on down the stairs to
the smoking-room as silently as he had come.