Osmond was sitting in his playhouse under the tree. He did not expect
Rose to come, but he had things to think about, and in the playhouse he
never felt alone. He was studying his own life as it had been and as it
was. The past looked to him all submission and a still endurance. He
marveled that a man could live so long and not look man's lot in the
face. A thousand passions had been born in him at once, and they seemed
almost equally good to him because they were all so strong. He sat there
drunk with the lust of power and reviewing his desires as, one by one,
they came and smiled upon him.
First he desired a woman, the one woman, Rose, not now romantically
through the mist of dreams, but as the wild man wants his mate. Was that
love? he asked himself, in this dispassionate scrutiny, and decided
that, as men chose to name it, it was love. They crowned it with
garlands, they sang about it and drank to it, but that was only to make
it sweeter.
He remembered again the passion of protection he had felt for her, the
desire to slay whatever crossed her path. That was hate, he knew, and it
seemed to him good. All these things were the forces that made up life,
and life was a battle.
And then, as he did intermittently after every wave of thought, he
remembered that Peter was in love with Rose, he recalled the gay
certainty of the boy when he had said he could make her happy, and he
saw her in Peter's arms. And this was jealousy.
At once he rose to his feet and listened. A step was coming nearer,
heavy and halting, pausing for frequent rests. The familiar sound of it
and the appeal of a presence not yet known made him knit his brows and
peer forward through the dark. When the step ceased again, for an
interval, he cried out, "Grannie!"
"Why, dear, you there?" called grannie.
He ran to her and put his arm about her, and so they came onward to the
chair which had been a throne for Rose. When she had sunken into it, he
began to scold her gently. She had not been so far from home for many a
day. She had chosen night and a rough path. Why did she do it?
"I had to see you, dear," said grannie. "Maybe I didn't consider how
hard it would be, but when I started out, I wasn't thinking much about
my aches and pains. I had to see you. So I just dressed me and came."
"But, grannie, it's the middle of the night!"
"Yes, child, I suppose it is. Night or day, it's all one. Osmond, her
father's going to take her away from here."
"Rose!"
"Yes, dear, she's going. Do you think it's best to let her go with him?"
"No! It's outrageous and impossible."
"I thought you'd say so. Well, Osmond, she meant to go away to-morrow
morning without seeing you. But she sent you her love. It seemed to me
that.... So I thought you'd better have it to-night."
She heard him breathing heavily, but he did not speak. Once he walked
away from her and back again.
"What has made her want to go?"
"She doesn't want it. But he has worked upon her. He's told her she is
bad; some dreadful things I guess he said. I don't believe in that man,
Osmond. I never did, first minute I laid eyes on him."
"No, grannie, he's not to be believed."
"I thought maybe you'd better have the night-time to think it over in.
You may want to do something."
"Grannie, what can I do?"
"I don't know, son. But you're the head of the house."
Again he strode away on his impatient march, and grannie waited and
prayed a little, and thought how her knees ached and how she hoped God
would help him. He was back again.
"You know how it is with me?" he said roughly.
"Yes, child."
"It's a big proposition."
"It's the biggest there is, son. I've just been telling her so."
"Rose? What has Rose said?"
"Not much. Only I had the feeling, when I was with her, that she loved
you and didn't hardly know about your loving her. So I came down here."
"You did right to come."
Grannie drew a long breath. The thing was out of her hands, now, she
knew. What his hands would do with it did not yet appear. She rose.
"Well, son," she said, "I'll go back. Come with me to the wall. Then
I'll manage it alone."
He did go with her, helping her in a tender silence, and at the door she
kissed him good-night.
"What time is breakfast, grannie?"
"Eight o'clock."
The next morning when they had assembled in the dining-room, grannie,
standing with a hand on the back of her chair, waited. Her face had a
flush of expectation. Her eyes sought the window.
"There!" she said, "he's coming. Peter, I've moved your place. Osmond
will sit opposite me."
"Osmond!" Peter almost shouted it.
"Yes," said grannie, in what seemed pride. "I thought Osmond would be
here."
Osmond came in, a workman in his blouse, fresh from cold water and the
night's stern counseling. Rose, hearing his step, could not, for a
minute, look at him, because he had once forbidden it. The commonplace
room, with the morning light in it, swam before her. After he had spoken
to grannie, he walked up to her and offered his hand. Then their eyes
met. Hers were full of tears, and through their blur, even, his face
looked stern and beautiful.
"I wanted to see you," Osmond said; and she answered, feeling his
kindness as from some dim distance,--
"To say good-by?"
"No, not to say good-by."
Then they sat down, and there was no constraint, but a good deal of
talking; and, strangely, it was Osmond who led it. He did not touch upon
things of wider interest than his own garden ground, where he was at
home. He had pleasant chronicles of the work to give grannie, and
MacLeod took a genial interest. Only Peter sat, wide-eyed at the turn
things were taking, and Rose grew paler and left her plate untouched.
She did not know whether it was joy that moved her, or grief at parting
with him. Only the morning seemed like no other morning. When they rose
from the table, Osmond turned at once to MacLeod.
"May I see you for a minute or two?" he asked. "We'll go into the west
room, grannie."
While Peter started forward, as if to help or hinder as the case might
be when he understood it, Osmond had led the way, still with the air of
being master of the house, and Rose stood with downcast eyes, as if
miserably conscious that the interview would concern her. Inside the
west room, cool in the morning, and with a restful bareness about it, a
retreat where people went to sleep or read, Osmond turned at once to the
man whom, at that moment, he delighted in as a worthy foe. Osmond had
never known before the keen, salt taste of victory. All his triumphs up
to this time had been as slow as the growth of a tree that recovers
itself after lopped branches. Now he felt the anticipation of combat.
"We needn't sit down," he said rapidly, yet with self-possession. He
looked taller, even, MacLeod thought with wonder. His dark eyes were
full of fire. "I love your daughter," said Osmond, in a full, steady
voice. He chose the words the poets had taught him to use simply, and
also, perhaps, the novels he had been reading since he had known Rose.
"My dear fellow!" cried MacLeod expansively. And then, remembering the
peculiar circumstances of the case, "I'm sorry, devilish sorry for you."
Osmond smiled. He felt capable, if there were no other way of doing it,
of wresting the lady's fate from evil chances with his hands. Yet he
liked MacLeod to resist. It made the fight more splendid.
"She must not go back with you," he said. "You are not to insist on it.
Don't insist. That will save us all trouble."
MacLeod had gathered himself together. He put his hand in his pocket and
meditatively brought out his pipe, fingering the case with an absent and
lingering interest, as if he felt the call to a lost rite.
"My dear fellow," he said again, "this is too bad. I'm sorry."
"Rose will remain here," said Osmond briefly. "My grandmother will take
the kindest care of her."
"But I can't allow it, you know," said the father, still with tolerance.
"Rose is due in Paris. We're both due there. It's very good of you, very
hospitable and all that,--but you mustn't carry this Lochinvar business
too far. It's too rapid a world, you know. I'm too busy, my dear fellow.
That's the truth."
Osmond stood gazing at him reflectively, not in doubt or hesitation, but
because he liked the look of so big an animal, and considering that it
would be charming to see the creature yield. Osmond had not sharpened
his weapons or even decided what they were. He only knew MacLeod must
bend, and that there was in himself a big, even an invincible force to
make him.
"Rose is not going," he said quietly.
Then MacLeod laughed. The morning was hurrying by and this vaporing was
a hindrance to be shuffled off. "You say you love my daughter?" he
remarked, with a veiled meaning in the tone. "What then? You don't
propose to marry her?" The tone said further, "You don't tell me you
propose to marry anybody?"
"I only said I loved her," returned Osmond simply. "I thought it would
be well for you to know that. It seemed fairer."
MacLeod smiled again, as if he were smiling down on something. Osmond
opened the door, knowing where he should find her. She was there at the
end of the hall, sitting in one of the high-backed chairs, her hands in
her lap, her head bent sweetly as she listened. She was pale, and there
was terror in her face. As Osmond read that, his own passion quieted,
and he spoke with perfect gentleness:--
"Rose, will you come here?"
She obeyed at once, and they three were in the room together and Osmond
had closed the door. He put out his hand to her, and without hesitation
she gave him hers.
"Rose," he said, "I have been telling your father you will not go back
with him."
Her eyes dilated. Her lips parted eagerly.
"I have said I would," she began; but he forestalled her.
"I have forbidden it, Rose. I have told him I forbid it."
His touch on her hand seemed to be leading her, drawing her into his own
breast. They looked at each other, and both forgot the other presence in
the room. The color came back slowly to her cheeks, and Osmond's eyes
filled with tears.
"Answer, dear," he said, with the same gentleness. "Let me hear you
answer."
"Very well," she returned, like a gentle child. "Shall I go now,
Osmond?"
He led her to the door, opened it, and closed it after her. Then he
glanced at his adversary. MacLeod had sunk into a chair and was sitting
astride it, his chin bowed upon its back. He looked terror-stricken. One
hand held a little box, and he was tendering it to Osmond.
"Open it," he gasped. "Crush one in your handkerchief. Let me smell it."
Osmond ignorantly but deftly did it, and held the handkerchief to
MacLeod's face. MacLeod breathed at it greedily. He lifted his left hand
as if it were half useless to him. "Rub it," he said savagely. "Wring it
off. Such pain! my God, such pain!"
In a moment more the attack was over, and he looked like an old man,
inexplicably ravaged. Osmond's question sprang impetuously.
"Is it--excitement?"
MacLeod smiled a little and moistened his lips.
"You think you did it?" he suggested. "No. You didn't do it. It
comes--of itself--like a thief in the night, like the very devil.
Nobody's to know it. Understand that."
"Then you need her with you!" Osmond broke out, in a fresh
understanding.
"Need her? need Rose? Get that out of your mind. The world is full of
women. She'll go back with me, but not because I need her."
He walked past Osmond and out through the empty hall, and slowly, but
still erect, to the driveway and the road. Osmond stood watching him. He
saw him straighten more and more, and assume his wonted carriage though
without its buoyancy. Osmond followed for a little distance, but when
MacLeod turned to look at him and then went on again, he stepped over
the wall and crossed the lot to his own plantation. MacLeod, he knew,
was going to Electra's for a last word, and for himself, he had struck
his one sharp, quick blow for Rose. She should have an interval alone,
to make her abiding decision calmly, and when the moment came for
MacLeod's going, Osmond would be there again, to hearten her.
But MacLeod, when Osmond had really turned aside, halted more and more.
At last he was sick with fear of that enemy inside his breast. There was
no moment now, he knew, when he might not expect it, tearing away at the
delicate harmonies within the gates of life. What would happen when the
pain grew fiercer still? The enemy would let in that other he refused to
think upon, though even that was more tolerable than having this evil
creature claw at him when men could see him cringe. And as life itself
is death when it is once sapped of power, he threw up his head and
strode on faster. One step with the old vigor and abandon--and there it
was again.