IRREVOCABLE
Heart thudding against her ribs, Claire advanced into the room. Ever
since she had received Alexis' letter asking her to come and see him she
had lived for this moment alone. And yet, now that it was upon her, she
was conscious only of a cold dread, a dreary fear. Her last glimpse of
Alexis had been in the clutches of delirium. He had then been calling
frantically upon the name of another woman. Much water had passed
beneath the bridges since, congealed, stagnant water, bitter as the
unshed tears lying so heavily upon her heart.
She advanced timidly into the room and Alexis rose to greet her. A
wine-colored lounging robe enhanced his fairness. The smile upon his
lips was both pathetic and perfunctory. Taking her proffered hand, he
led Claire to a chair. For a moment they gazed at each other
self-consciously.
"This is good of you, Claire, I know I don't deserve it," he said
finally.
She smiled sturdily beneath her tears.
"You asked me to come, didn't you? That is why I am here. I am glad you
are better, Alexis."
"Oh, I'm practically well now. I expect to go out again in a few days."
She noticed that he ignored the beginning of her sentence and his
embarrassment touched her. She looked about the room in search of a
topic of conversation. Her absent eyes fell upon several large jars
filled with flowers. "What lovely roses, and what masses of them!" she
exclaimed impulsively. Then could have bitten out her tongue. Had they
perhaps been sent by Mrs. Schuyler?
A triumphant gleam swept over his face. He forgot to be self-conscious.
"Yes, aren't they wonderful! It's quite like the old days, isn't it? You
see, Claire, I--I am discovered!"
"You are discovered?" she stammered.
He ran a hand through his tumbled hair with the old arrogant gesture.
"Yes, my return has leaked out somehow the last few days, and although
it hasn't appeared in the papers as yet, the exciting fact seems to have
spread rather swiftly."
Within her lap Claire's gloved hands tightened upon each other.
"Are--are you glad, Alexis?" her voice faltered.
He laughed oddly. "Am I human, Claire?"
"Yes, yes, I know! But don't you dread having them find out?"
He looked at her in angry bewilderment.
"Find out what?" Could she be alluding to Anne?
"Why, that you have forgotten how to play," she murmured almost in
tears.
He sprang up and loomed over her with the air of a young god. His hands
upon her slight shoulders, he shook her gently.
"Ah, but it has come back, Claire. It came back like a flash, just as
suddenly as it left me. Listen!"
He strode over to the piano, and taking his violin out of the case,
fingered it caressingly.
"Of course, they won't let me practice yet. And I am all thumbs. But
listen!"
Violin nestled beneath his chin, he began to play. Superlatively toned,
the instrument hummed beneath his sweeping bow like a human thing. The
penetrating sweetness pierced Claire's heart. It sang a plaintive
melody, simple as an ancient love song. The mellow tones rose higher and
higher, finally repeating themselves in head notes clear and brittle as
crystal. As the last note shrilled lingeringly upon the air, Claire
smiled through tears into Alexis' exalted face.
"Oh, Alexis, how happy I am for you! Shall you play in public again
soon?"
He replaced the violin within its case, and crossing the room sat down
beside her. "I hope to be ready for a recital the middle of January.
From now on I shall practice every moment. Do you remember my old
manager, Rosenfield? I've engaged him again. Funny fellow, but
enthusiastic as ever."
"Have you made any special plans?" Claire's voice was strained. Would he
never come to the point?
"Well," he hesitated a moment, dreading how she might take what he was
going to say, "Yes, I have. The doctors wanted me to go South for the
rest of the winter, but I couldn't bear to go away so far from" he
faltered a little--"so far from New York and Rosenfield. I'm so anxious
to get to work again. So we compromised on Long Island. The air is
wonderful there. I have taken Karzimova's house, the Russian actress,
you know, until the first of May. It is an Italian villa, and rather
gorgeous. She didn't want to rent it, although she is in Europe, but
when they cabled her who I was and that I had been ill, she gave in
rather graciously, and let me have it for a ridiculous price. They say
she is mad about music."
So this was what she had come to hear? She was to lose Alexis entirely,
then?
"When are you moving out?"
"In about a week, I believe. Don't you think it is the best thing I can
do?"
"Oh, Alexis, if you are happy, what more can I ask?" Her brimming eyes
touched him to the quick.
"Little Claire, what a gentle thing you are. Far too dear for an
egotistical brute like me." He touched her gloved hand, and gazed down
at her stormily. He noted with surprise that she was looking almost
pretty. Her hat was actually becoming, and the long earrings lent her an
elfin charm. What had she been doing to herself? Was the pathetic desire
to attract him at the root of the change? The tragedy of it! Was it
possible that he had ever possessed this girl, of whose body he retained
scarcely a recollection? The very thought seemed incestuous. She was not
a woman but a sister. The little Claire of nursery days, the older
Claire of flushed cheeks and timid ardors, yes, her image was still
vivid, and even dear, so intermingled with her companionship were his
earliest recollections. But Claire, the wife of a few hectic months, the
submissive puppet of rare and intermittent contacts, was unthinkable.
She had existed only within the hideous confines of his disordered
brain.
His silence, his gaze filled Claire with horrible confusion. She blushed
crimson. Within the hurricane of his glance her soul shivered, exposed,
naked. What blasting thought, what ignoble memory lurked behind those
stormy eyes? Shame seared her as with a hot iron. Yet her surrender had
been as pure as it had been entire. Was she not Alexis' wife? Bone of
his bone and flesh of his flesh? Did not she carry within her body his
seed? With a heroic effort, she raised her head and their eyes clashed.
"What are you thinking of?" she inquired with a quiet hauteur, which
surprised him.
His answer skirted the truth warily.
"That you should never have married me, Claire. We shall never be happy
together. It was all a horrible mistake. Let us undo it, dear."
"I cannot divorce you, if that is what you mean." Her hands were clasped
convulsively upon each other.
"But, Claire, we do not love each other. I--I----" he faltered.
"Yes, I know, you love another woman. You don't have to tell me that,
Alexis." Her smile was grim.
"But, I want to marry her," he blurted cruelly. "You must divorce me,
Claire."
The searing crimson drained from her face, leaving it the livid hue of
marble.
"We are husband and wife, Alexis. No human being can undo that now."
He sprang out of the chair and strode up and down the room.
"That toqué idea of yours! The idea is mediæval and has died out like a
thousand other superstitions."
"Not among the Roman Catholics, Alexis!" Her eyes begged for mercy.
"Oh, Claire, be reasonable. Be up to date. These aren't the Dark Ages!"
"Oh, poor Alexis." Claire covered her face with trembling fingers. "Is
it as bad as all that? But you know I have already told you, you can
have a separation any time you wish. I will go away, far away. You need
never see me again!" Her voice ended with a sob.
Struck with remorse, he looked down upon her haggardly.
"What an utter brute I am. But don't you see? It is partly for your
sake, too. Suppose you should meet some one else who could really make
you happy? Some one good, some one entirely different from me. Wouldn't
it be a tragedy if just because a few words had been mumbled over us by
an unknown priest, you couldn't marry this other man more suited to you
in every way than I am?"
"But it isn't the priest who mumbles the formula that counts. He is only
an instrument. It is the spirit behind it all. We swore before God in
his house to remain together until death us do part. It was a sacred
oath. Nothing but death can dissolve it."
"If you swore to remain with me until death, why are you willing to have
a separation? Isn't that against your principles, too?"
His irony cut her to the quick.
"I cannot remain with a man who does not love me," she replied quietly,
"any more than I could live with any other."
"And supposing I love some one else and want to marry her?"
"It would be impossible. It wouldn't be legal."
"But I am neither Roman Catholic, nor Unitarian. I wear no label or tag
of any sort, thank the pagan gods. And as I do happen to want to marry
another woman, I warn you now that if you refuse to get a divorce
against me, I shall do something desperate."
"Alexis, Alexis!" The tortured cry sprang from her involuntarily. "What
can I do? I am ready to die to make you happy, but I cannot consent to a
divorce. It would be a sin. A living lie!"
"A sin! A living lie! That is all cant and gibberish. I was sorry for
you a while ago, Claire. I pitied you from the bottom of my heart. But
you are hard as stone. If you had consented to do what I asked I would
have been happy to settle half of my future income upon you, as I am
taking up my violin again. But you are like a rock, as fixed in your
mold as a fossil in its shelf of prehistoric stone."
She wrung her hands. "Oh, Alexis, don't speak to me of money! I'd rather
kill myself than to take a penny from you under such conditions."
He eyed her wrathfully.
"But even that satisfaction is denied you by your church!"
"How you hate me!" She rose to her feet and faced him drearily.
His expression softened. "No, Claire. I never have hated you. You are
mistaken. I even loved you once--as a sister."
"As a sister!" She flung her hands out before her blindly. "My God, what
a fool, what an ignoble fool you must think me! And I did it all for the
best. You were so ill, so distraught. So unlike yourself. The doctors
advised me to do it. And you asked me, yourself. There was no other
woman! I was so young, I loved you. I had always loved you, Alexis. The
gift of myself seemed small in comparison with your need. I never
thought it would bring unhappiness to you. Women seemed to mean so
little in your life."
He stepped towards her uncertainly, a horrified question back of the
anger in his eyes.
"But didn't you know, didn't you understand why I asked you?"
Cold perspiration broke over her quivering body. The claw-like dread
clutched once more at her heart.
"What do you mean, Alexis?"
He laughed cruelly.
"The interesting little scene in my room, so beautifully stage-managed
by my dear mother?"
She rose with a cry. "Alexis! You think I did--that?"
"Why not?" he shrugged. "The doctor said I needed a wife. That was a
good way to provide me with one. When a child refuses to take medicine,
it must be forced down his throat." He laughed excitedly.
"But Alexis, how? Why?"
She fell limply into a chair and he saw by her stricken face that she
was innocent. He was seized by devastating remorse. He ceased his pacing
abruptly.
"But Claire, this is terrible! I have been judging you all this time
when you were innocent. I might have known better!"
Claire looked at him in amazement.
"So you think I arranged with your mother to have her find me in your
room?" A slow anger flamed in her pale cheeks. "I may be a fool, but I'm
not vile. I--I think I will go now." She drew herself out of the chair
and started for the door. He followed her in a few swift strides.
"Claire, this is horrible. You must let me explain."
She avoided his touch with a visible shiver.
"It isn't necessary. I understand only too well. I think I knew it all
from the first, only I refused to let myself. I suppose my aunt
threatened to put me out of the house if you didn't marry me?"
"Yes," he hung his head. "But I really didn't mind, Claire. I didn't
care what happened to me, and I'd always been fonder of you than any one
else. Only it--it disgusted me to think you were not quite--straight."
She looked at him beneath heavy lids. Her bruised eyes hurt him.
"Why didn't you ask me, Alexis?" she said, simply.
"How could I? I was afraid you couldn't deny it." He stepped towards
her. "Oh, Claire, please forgive me if you can!" He seized her hand, but
she drew it away quickly.
"There's nothing to forgive, Alexis. It was quite natural that you
should think as you did. And I--I was an infatuated fool. Oh, it is all
a horrible muddle!" she wailed. (Tied to the body of a festering love
was what he had said!) Hands to her lips to stifle a rising cry, she
staggered towards the door.
With a remorseful gesture, he put her cape about her shoulders. His
hands where they grazed her neck were icy. (The festering body of a dead
love!) The old dizziness suddenly seized her.
"I must go!" she exclaimed wildly. She must not faint, she would not
faint!
He took her outflung hands and pressed them repentantly.
"Is your taxi waiting for you?" His voice was husky.
"Yes, oh yes."
"Try to forgive me."
As she entered the elevator his voice echoed hollowly down the hall,
"Good-by."