A WORD OF VARIOUS MEANINGS
She came up to me swiftly and without hesitation. I had looked for
some embarrassment, but there was none in her face. She met my eyes
full and square, and began to speak to me at once.
‘My lord,’ she said, ‘I must ask one thing of you. I must lay one more
burden on you. After to-day I dare not be here when my countrymen
learn how they are deluded. I should be ashamed to face them, and I
dare not trust myself to the Turks, for I don’t know what they would
do with me. Will you take me with you to Athens, or to some other port
from which I can reach Athens? I can elude the guards here. I shall be
no trouble: you need only tell me when your boat will start, and give
me a corner to live in on board. Indeed I grieve to ask more of you,
for you have done so much for me; but my trouble is great and-- What
is it, my lord?’
I had moved my hand to stop her. She had acted in the one way in
which, had it been to save my life, I could not have. She put what had
passed utterly out of the way, treating it as the merest trick. My
part in it was to her the merest trick; of hers she said nothing. Had
hers then been a trick also? My blood grew hot at the thought. I could
not endure it.
‘When your countrymen learn how they are deluded?’ said I, repeating
her words. ‘Deluded in what?’
‘In the trick we played on them, my lord, to--to persuade them to
disperse.’
I took a step towards her, and my voice shook as I said:
‘Was it all a trick, Phroso?’ For at this moment I set above
everything else in the world a fresh assurance of her love. I would
force it from her sooner than not have it.
She answered me with questioning eyes and a sad little smile.
‘Are we then betrothed?’ she said, in mournful mockery.
I was close by her now. I did not touch her, but I bent a little, and
my face was near hers.
‘Was it a trick to-day, and a trick on St Tryphon’s day also?’ I
asked.
She gave one startled glance at my face, and then her eyes dropped to
the ground. She made no answer to my question.
‘Was it all a trick, Phroso?’ I asked in entreaty, in urgency, in the
wild longing to hear her love declared once, here, to me alone, where
nobody could hear, nobody impair its sweet secrecy.
Phroso’s answer came now, set to the accompaniment of the saddest,
softest, murmuring laugh.
‘Ah, my lord, must you hear it again? Am I not twice shamed already?’
‘Be shamed yet once again,’ I whispered; then I saw the light of
gladness master the misty sorrow in her eyes as I had seen once
before; and I greeted it, whispering:
‘Yes, a thousand times, a thousand times!’
‘My dear lord!’ she said; but then she sprang back, and the brightness
was clouded again as she stood aloof, regarding me in speechless,
distressed puzzle.
‘But, my lord!’ she murmured, so low that I scarcely heard. Then she
took refuge in a return to her request. ‘You won’t leave me here, will
you? You’ll take me somewhere where I can be safe. I--I’m afraid of
these men, even though the Pasha is dead.’
I took no notice of the request she repeated. I seemed unable to speak
or to do anything else but look into her eyes; and I said, a touch of
awe in my voice:
‘You have the most wonderful eyes in all the world, Phroso.’
‘My lord!’ murmured Phroso, dropping envious lids. But I knew she
would open them soon again, and so she did.
‘Yes, in all the wide world,’ said I. ‘And I want to hear it again.’
As we talked we had moved little by little; now we were at the side of
the house, in the deep dull shadow of it. Yet the eyes I praised
pierced the gloom and shone in the darkness; and suddenly I felt arms
about my neck, clasping me tightly; her breath was on my cheek, coming
quick and uneven, and she whispered:
‘Yes, you shall hear it again and again and again, for I am not
ashamed now; for I know, yes, I know. I love you, I love you--ah, how
I love you!’ Her whispers found answer in mine. I held her as though
against all the world: all the world was in that moment, and there was
nothing else than that moment in all the world. Had a man told me then
that I had felt love before, I would have laughed in his face--the
fool!
But then Phroso drew back again; the brief rapture, free from all past
or future, all thought or doubt, left her, and, in leaving her,
forsook me also. She stood over against me murmuring:
‘But, my lord--!’
I knew well what she would say, and for an instant I stood silent. The
world hung for us on the cast of my next words.
‘But, my lord, the lady who waits for you over the sea?’ There sounded
a note of fear in the softly breathed whisper that the night carried
to my ear. In an instant, before I could answer, Phroso came near to
me and laid one hand on my arm, speaking gently and quickly. ‘Yes, I
know, I see, I understand,’ she said, ‘and I thank you, my lord, and I
thank God, my dear lord, that you told me and did not leave me without
shewing me your love; for though I must be very unhappy, yet I shall
be proud; and in the long nights I shall think of this dear island and
of you, though you will both be far away. Yes, I thank heaven you told
me, my dear lord.’ She bent her head, that should have bent to no man,
and kissed my hand.
But I snatched my hand hastily away, and I sprang to her and caught
her again in my arms, and again kissed her lips; for my resolve was
made. I would not let her go. Those who would might ask the rights of
it; I could not let her go. Yet I spoke no word, and she did not
understand, but thought that I kissed her in farewell; for the tears
were on her face and wetted my lips, and she clung to me as though
something were tearing her from me and must soon sunder us apart, so
greedy was her grasp on me. But then I opened my mouth to whisper in
her ear the words which would bid defiance to the thing that was
rending her away and rivet her life to mine.
But hark! There was a cry, a startled exclamation, and the sound of
footsteps. My name was shouted loud and eagerly. I knew Denny’s voice.
Phroso slid from my relaxed arms, and drew back into the deepest
shadow.
‘I’ll be back soon,’ I whispered, and with a last pressure of her
hand, which was warm now and answered to my grasp, I stepped out of
the shelter of the wall and stood in front of the house.
Denny was on the doorstep. The door was open. The light from the lamp
in the hall flooded the night and fell full on my face as I walked up
to him. On sight of me he seemed to forget his own errand and his own
eagerness, for he caught me by the shoulder, and stared at me, crying:
‘Heavens, man, you’re as white as a sheet! Have you seen a ghost? Does
Constantine walk--or Mouraki?’
‘Fifty ghosts would be a joke to what I’ve been through. My God, I
never had such a time! What do you want? What did you call me for? I
can’t stay. She’s waiting.’ For now I did not care; Denny and all
Neopalia might know now.
‘Yes, but she must wait a little,’ he said. ‘You must come into the
house and come upstairs.’
‘I can’t,’ I said obstinately. ‘I--I--I can’t, Denny.’
‘You must. Don’t be a fool, Charley. It’s important: the captain is
waiting for you.’
His face seemed big with news. What it might be I could not tell, but
the hint of it was enough to make me catch hold of him, crying, ‘What
is it? I’ll come.’
‘That’s right. Come along.’ He turned and ran rapidly through the old
hall and up the stairs. I followed him, my mind whirling through a
cloud of possibilities.
The quiet business-like aspect of the room into which Denny led the
way did something to sober me. I pulled myself together, seeking to
hide my feelings under a mask of carelessness. The captain sat at the
table with a mass of papers surrounding him. He appeared to be
examining them, and, as he read, his lips curved in surprise or
contempt.
‘This Mouraki was a cunning fellow,’ said he; ‘but if anyone had
chanced to get hold of this box of his while he was alive he would not
have enjoyed even so poor a post as he thought his governorship.
Indeed, Lord Wheatley, had you been actually a party to his death, I
think you need have feared nothing when some of these papers had found
their way to the eyes of the Government. We’re well rid of him,
indeed! But then, as I always say, these Armenians, though they’re
clever dogs--’
But I had not come to hear a Turk discourse on Armenians, and I broke
in, with an impatience that I could not altogether conceal:
‘I beg your pardon; but is that all you wanted to say to me?’
‘I should have thought that it was of some importance to you,’ he
observed.
‘Certainly,’ said I, regaining my composure a little; ‘but your
courtesy and kindness had already reassured me.’
He bowed his acknowledgments, and proceeded in a most leisurely tone,
sorting the papers and documents before him into orderly heaps.
‘On the death of the Pasha, the government of the island having
devolved temporarily on me, I thought it my duty to examine his
Excellency’s--curse the dog!--his Excellency’s despatch-box, with the
result that I have discovered very remarkable evidences of the schemes
which he dared to entertain. With this, however, perhaps I need not
trouble you.’
‘I wouldn’t intrude into it for the world,’ I said.
‘I discovered also,’ he pursued, in undisturbed leisure and placidity,
‘among the Pasha’s papers a letter addressed to--’
‘Me?’ and I sprang forward.
‘No, to your cousin, to this gentleman. Pursuing what I conceived to
be my duty--and I must trust to Mr Swinton to forgive me--’ Here the
exasperating fellow paused, looked at Denny, waited for a bow from
Denny, duly received it, duly and with ceremony returned it, sighed as
though he were much relieved at Denny’s complaisance, cleared his
throat, arranged a little heap of papers on his left hand, and at
last--oh, at last!--went on.
‘This letter, I say, in pursuance of what I conceived to be my duty--’
‘Yes, yes, your duty, of course. Clearly your duty. Yes?’
‘I read. It appeared, however, to contain nothing of importance.’
‘Then, why the deuce-- I mean--I beg your pardon.’
‘But merely matters of private concern. But I am not warranted in
letting it out of my hands. It will have to be delivered to the
Government with the rest of the Pasha’s papers. I have, however,
allowed Mr Swinton to read it. He says that it concerns you, Lord
Wheatley, more than himself. I therefore propose to ask him to read it
to you (I can decipher English, but not speak it with facility) in my
presence.’ With this he handed an envelope to Denny. We had got to it
at last.
‘For heaven’s sake be quick about it, my dear boy!’ I cried, and I
seated myself on the table, swinging my leg to and fro in a fury of
restless impatience. The captain eyed my agitated body with profound
disapproval.
Denny took the letter from its envelope and read: ‘London, May 21st;’
then he paused and remarked, ‘We got here on the seventh, you know.’ I
nodded hastily, and he went on, ‘My dear Denny--Oh, how awful this is!
I can hardly bear to think of it! Poor, poor fellow! Mamma is terribly
grieved, and I, of course, even more. Both mamma and I feel that it
makes it so much worse, somehow, that this news should come only three
days after he must have got mamma’s letter. Mamma says that it doesn’t
really make any difference, and that if her letter was _wise_, then
this terrible news can’t alter that. I suppose it doesn’t really, but
it seems to, doesn’t it? Oh, do write directly and tell me that he
wasn’t very unhappy about it when he had that horrible fever. There’s
a big blot--because I’m crying! I know you thought I didn’t care
about him, but I did--though not (as mamma says) in _one_ way,
really. Do you think he forgave me? It would kill me if I thought he
didn’t. Do write soon. I suppose you will bring poor dear Charley
home? Please tell me he didn’t think very badly of me. Mamma joins
with me in sincerest sympathy.--Yours _most_ sincerely, Beatrice
Kennett Hipgrave. _P.S._--Mr Bennett Hamlyn has just called. He is
awfully grieved about poor dear Charley. I always think of him as
Charley still, you know. Do write.’
There was a long pause, then Denny observed in a satirical tone:
‘To be thought of still as “Charley” is after all something.’
‘But what the devil does it mean?’ I cried, leaping from the table.
‘“I suppose you will bring poor dear Charley home,’” repeated Denny,
in a meditative tone. ‘Well, it looks rather more like it than it did
a few days ago, I must admit.’
‘Denny, Denny, if you love me, what’s it all about? I haven’t had any
letter from--’
‘Mamma? No, we’ve had no letter from mamma. But then we haven’t had
any letters from anybody.’
‘Then I’m hanged if I--’ I began in bewildered despondency.
‘But, Charley,’ interrupted Denny, ‘perhaps mamma sent a letter
to--Mouraki Pasha!’
‘To Mouraki?’
‘This letter of mine found its way to Mouraki.’
‘All letters,’ observed the captain, who was leaning back in his chair
and staring at the ceiling, ‘would pass through his hands, if he chose
to make them.’
‘Good heavens!’ I cried, springing forward. The hint was enough. In an
instant my busy, nervous, shaking hands were ruining the neat piles of
documents which the captain had reared so carefully in front and on
either side of him. I dived, tossed, fumbled, rummaged, scattered,
strewed, tore. The captain, incapable of resisting my excited energy,
groaned in helpless despair at the destruction of his evening’s work.
Denny, having watched me for a few minutes, suddenly broke out into a
peal of laughter. I stopped for an instant to glare reproof of his
ill-timed mirth, and turned to my wild search again.
The search seemed useless. Either Mouraki had not received a letter
from Mrs Bennett Hipgrave, or he had done what I myself always did
with the good lady’s communications--thrown it away immediately after
reading it. I examined every scrap of paper, official documents,
private notes (the captain was very nervous when I insisted on looking
through these for a trace of Mrs Hipgrave’s name), lists of stores; in
a word, the whole contents of Mouraki’s despatch-boxes.
‘It’s a blank!’ I cried, stepping back at last in disappointment.
‘Yes, it’s gone; but depend upon it, he had it,’ said Denny.
A sudden recollection flashed across me, the remembrance of the subtle
amused smile with which Mouraki had spoken of the lady who was most
anxious about me and my future wife. He must have known then; he must
even then have had Mrs Hipgrave’s letter in his possession. He had
played a deliberate trick on me by suppressing the letter; hence his
fury when I announced my intention of disregarding the ties that bound
me--a fury which had, for the moment, conquered his cool cunning and
led him into violent threats. At that moment, when I realised the
man’s audacious knavery, when I thought of the struggle he had caused
to me and the pain to Phroso, well, just then I came near to
canonising Demetri, and nearer still to grudging him his exploit.
‘What was in the letter, then?’ I cried to Denny.
‘Read mine again,’ said he, and he threw it across to me.
I read it again. I was cooler now, and the meaning of it stood out
plain and not to be doubted. Mrs Bennett Hipgrave’s letter, her wise
letter, had broken off my engagement to her daughter. The fact was
plain; all that was missing, destroyed by the caution or the
carelessness of Mouraki Pasha, was the reason; and the reason I could
supply for myself. I reached my conclusion, and looked again at Denny.
‘Allow me to congratulate you,’ said Denny ironically.
Man is a curious creature. I (and other people) may have made that
reflection before. I offer no apology for it. The more I see of myself
and my friends the more convinced I grow of its truth. Here was the
thing for which I had been hoping and praying, the one great gift that
I asked of fate, the single boon which fortune enviously withheld.
Here was freedom--divine freedom! Yet what I actually said to Denny,
in reply to his felicitations, was:
‘Hang the girl! She’s jilted me!’ And I said it with considerable
annoyance.
The captain, who studied English in his spare moments, here
interposed, asking suavely:
‘Pray, my dear Lord Wheatley, what is the meaning of that
word--“jilted”?’
‘The meaning of “jilted”?’ said Denny. ‘He wants to know the meaning
of “jilted,” Charley.’
I looked from one to the other of them; then I said:
‘I think I’ll go and ask,’ and I started for the door. The captain’s
expression accused me of rudeness. Denny caught me by the arm.
‘It’s not decent yet,’ said he, with a twinkle in his eye.
‘It happened nearly a month ago,’ I pleaded. ‘I’ve had time to get
over it, Denny; a man can’t wear the willow all his life.’
‘You old humbug!’ said Denny, but let me go.
I was not long in going. I darted down the stairs. I suppose a man
tricks his conscience and will find excuses for himself where others
can find only matter for laughter, but I remember congratulating
myself on not having spoken the decisive words to Phroso before Denny
interrupted us. Well, I would speak them now. I was free to speak them
now. Suddenly, in this thought, the vexation at being jilted vanished.
‘It amounts,’ said I to myself, as I reached the hall, ‘to no more
than a fortunate coincidence of opinion.’ And I passed through the
door and turned sharp round to the left.
She was there waiting for me, and waiting eagerly, it seemed, for,
before I could speak, she ran to me, holding out her hands, and she
cried in a low urgent whisper, full of entreaty:
‘My lord, I have thought. I have thought while you were in the house.
You must not do this, my lord. Yes, I know--now I know--that you love
me, but you mustn’t do this. My lord’s honour shan’t be stained for my
sake.’
I could not resist it, and I cannot justify it. I assumed a terribly
sad expression.
‘You’ve really come to that conclusion, Phroso?’ I asked.
‘Yes. Ah, how difficult it is! But my lord’s honour--ah, don’t tempt
me! You will take me to Athens, won’t you? And then--’
‘And then,’ said I, ‘you’ll leave me?’
‘Yes,’ said Phroso, with a little catch in her voice.
‘And what shall I do, left alone?’
‘Go back,’ murmured Phroso almost inaudibly.
‘Go back--thinking of those wonderful eyes?’
‘No, no. Thinking of--’
‘The lady who waits for me over the sea?’
‘Yes. And oh, my lord, I pray that you will find happiness!’
There was a moment’s silence. Phroso did not look at me; but then I
did look at Phroso.
‘Then you refuse, Phroso, to have anything to say to me?’
No answer at all reached me; I came nearer, being afraid that I might
not have heard her reply.
‘What am I to do for a wife, Phroso?’ I asked forlornly. ‘Because,
Phroso--’
‘Ah, my lord, why do you take my hand again?’
‘Did I, Phroso? Because, Phroso, the lady who waits over the sea--it’s
a charmingly poetic phrase, upon my word!’
‘You laugh!’ murmured Phroso, in aggrieved protest and wonder.
‘Did I really laugh, Phroso? Well, I’m happy, so I may laugh.’
‘Happy?’ she whispered; then at last her eyes were drawn to mine in
mingled hope and anguish of questioning.
‘The lady who waited over the sea,’ said I, ‘waits no longer, Phroso.’
The wonderful eyes grew more wonderful in their amazed widening; and
Phroso, laying a hand gently on my arm, said:
‘She waits no longer? My lord, she is dead?’
This confident inference was extremely flattering. There was
evidently but one thing which could end the patient waiting of the
lady who waited.
‘On the contrary she thinks that I am. Constantine spread news of my
death.’
‘Ah, yes!’
‘He said that I died of fever.’
‘And she believes it?’
‘She does, Phroso; and she appears to be really very sorry.’
‘Ah, but what joy will be hers when she learns--’
‘But, Phroso, before she thought I was dead, she had made up her mind
to wait no longer.’
‘To wait no longer? What do you mean? Ah, my lord, tell me what you
mean!’
‘What has happened to me, here in Neopalia, Phroso?’
‘Many strange things, my lord--some most terrible.’
‘And some most--most what, Phroso? One thing that has happened to me
has, I think, happened also to the lady who waited.’
Phroso’s hand--the one I had not taken--was suddenly stretched out,
and she spoke in a voice that sounded half-stifled:
‘Tell me, my lord, tell me. I can’t endure it longer.’
Then I grew grave and said:
‘I am free. She has given me my freedom.’
‘She has set you free?’
‘She loves me no longer, I suppose, if she ever did.’
‘Oh, but, my lord, it is impossible.’
‘Should you think it so? Phroso, it is true--true that I can come to
you now.’
She understood at last. For a moment she was silent, and I, silent
also, pierced through the darkness to her wondering face. Once she
stretched out her arms; then there came a little, long, low laugh, and
she put her hands together, and thrust them, thus clasped, between
mine that closed on them.
‘My lord, my lord, my lord!’ said Phroso.
Suddenly I heard a low mournful chant coming up from the harbour, the
moan of mourning voices. The sound struck across the stillness which
had followed her last words.
‘What’s that?’ I asked. ‘What are they doing down there?’
‘Didn’t you know?’ The bodies of my cousin and of Kortes came forth at
sunset from the secret pool into which they fell: and they bring them
now to bury them by the church. They mourn Kortes because they loved
him; and Constantine also they feign to mourn, because he was of the
house of the Stefanopouloi.’
We stood for some minutes listening to the chant that rose and fell
and echoed among the hills. Its sad cadences, mingled here and there
with the note of sustained hope, seemed a fitting end to the story, to
the stormy days that were rounded off at last by peace and joy to us
who lived, and by the embraces of the all-hiding all-pardoning earth
for those who had fallen. I put my arm round Phroso, and, thus at last
together, we listened till the sounds died away in low echoes, and
silence fell again on the island.
‘Ah, the dear island!’ said Phroso softly. ‘You won’t take me away
from it for ever? It is my lord’s island now, and it will be faithful
to him, even as I myself; for God has been very good, and my lord is
very good.’
I looked at her. Her cheeks were again wet with tears. As I watched a
drop fell from her eyes. I said to her softly:
‘That shall be the last, Phroso, till we part again.’
A loud cough from the front of the house interrupted us. I advanced,
beckoning to Phroso to follow, and wearing, I am afraid, the
apologetic look usual under such circumstances. And I found Denny and
the captain.
‘Are you coming down to the yacht, Charley?’ asked Denny.
’Er--in a few minutes, Denny.’
‘Shall I wait for you?’
‘Oh, I think I can find my way.’
Denny laughed and caught me by the hand; then he passed on to Phroso.
I do not, however, know what he said to her, for at this moment the
captain touched my shoulder and demanded my attention.
‘I beg your pardon,’ said he, ‘but you never told me the meaning of
that word.’
‘What word, my dear captain?’
‘Why, the word you used of the lady’s letter--of what she had done.’
‘Oh, you mean “jilted”?’
‘Yes; that’s it.’
‘It is,’ said I, after a moment’s reflection, ‘a word of very various
meanings.’
‘Ah,’ said the captain, with a comprehending nod.
‘Yes, very various. In one sense it means to make a man miserable.’
‘Yes, I see; to make him unhappy.’
‘And in another to make him--to make him, captain, the luckiest beggar
alive.’
‘It’s a strange word,’ observed the captain meditatively.
‘I don’t know about that,’ said I. ‘Good-night.’