the future Lord Lillimore was struck with the Parisian frivolity she
displayed?' said the budding author, cogitating how he might turn the
circumstance into a phrase that would swell the general effect. But
enough of this young man. He was by no means the funniest example of
those Australian tourists whose modes of authorship mark them as chosen
morsels for the comic muse.
Needless to say that Stella was throughout entirely oblivious of the
speculations to which her altered demeanour gave rise. The change,
indeed, was sufficiently startling to attract the attention of one who
had known her in the recent past. And we must all have perceived from
time to time how a theory protects the average mind from any perception
of the truth--the very sun-motes arrange themselves to make the illusion
more credible.
It often happens that the sins into which people are betrayed against
themselves take long, long years to find out. The seeds have surely
been sown, but may it not be that they have died? The sheaves of so
many autumns have been garnered, and yet the tares have not destroyed
the harvest. May it not be a part of the old superstition of sibyl and
prophet that our deeds still travel with us--their noiseless footfalls
ever keeping pace with ours till the moment comes when their shadowy
hands hold us faster than adamantine chains? Do not believe it. The
root of bitterness is there, and unless we are so forgotten of God that
others, rather than ourselves, must suffer for our wrong-doing, the
pulse of life beats in the long-buried germ when we least look for its
resurrection. But there are retributions which are as the shadow of
offences, and follow hard on them like hounds that nothing diverts from
their quarry. Of this kind was the bitter humiliation which fell on
Stella so swiftly after her unhappy marriage. Yet the depths of
listless impassiveness that closed round her at this time were not more
the result of that dismal experience than the reaction after those days
of strange self-abandonment when the whole forces of her mind had been
directed to the effacing all memory of what had been the crowning joy of
her life. The inward fever that had preyed on her during the previous
weeks now had unrestrained course. One of those dark periods of despair
and misanthropical weariness to which the speculative, brooding order of
mind is peculiarly liable when fretted and overworn enfolded her for a
time like a palpable darkness. That eager unwearied curiosity as to the
play and meaning of life which had given her nature so delicately
sensitive a texture, so responsive a chord of sympathy, had completely
deserted her.
She had been betrayed, and the throes of awakening, of cold, hard
disenchantment and disillusion, stifled all spiritual life. At times an
intolerable yearning came over her for the sound of a voice, the sight
of a face, which could not now be recalled by her without a haunting
sense of guilt. And, then, how often it rose up before her: that
picture cruelly limned on her brain of Ritchie's face--vacant,
senseless, dead!
By the end of the voyage, which lasted nearly five weeks, Stella had
recovered something of her old elasticity. Probably the wilful
misanthropy which led her to avoid, as far as possible, all intimacy
with her fellow-passengers, had co-operated with the health-giving
breezes of the sea in restoring her exhausted forces, and expelling the
fever that burned in her veins. A recurring weight on her temples, a
heavy throbbing that would come back at intervals with no assignable
cause, remained. But otherwise her bodily health was restored. The old
trick of laughter came back to her with something of the old interest in
the endless combinations of the great human comedy. But, unfortunately,
the healing process had affected her mind much less than her body. She
was harder, less unselfish, less inclined to scan her own action in the
misfortune of her marriage with self-accusing justice.
She had been betrayed into marrying a sot. She put it into merciless
words with a dull, smouldering resentment, which was directed more
against the infinite treachery that life, as a whole, so often
practises, than against any individual. Laurette, she knew, had played
the traitor. But without any clue to the baseness of her motive, the
action, as that of a sister who believed the meanness might work out her
brother's redemption, appealed to Stella as one of those vicarious
transgressions which, rightly or wrongly, mankind has consented to
regard with more leniency than the falseness prompted by purely egoistic
aims.
Ted, paradoxical as it may seem, she scarcely blamed at all. He himself
had resented her acceptance of his conduct as being beyond his control
more keenly than any reproaches. Yet this was the point of view which
came back to her with irresistible conviction. Needless to say, it
rendered any vivid feeling of indignation impossible. Heredity and
circumstance, the two arch-conspirators of necessity--who could resist
their action when the moral nature is unfortified by any culture of the
soul? And even making allowance for all the complex influences that can
be brought to bear on conduct, could any human being's action be shaped
by himself apart from external forces?
One disastrous result of the knowledge that had so abruptly broken on
Stella in Ritchie's fatal weakness was that she no longer tried to
banish Anselm Langdale from her thoughts. He now appeared to her as the
mainstay of her better life; she clung to his image as a devotee turns
to a relic in the hour of need. As the lassitude of melancholy and
fever lessened, the passion which for a time had been kept in abeyance
returned, and took possession of her as before. His face and the tones
of his voice haunted her night and day; she lived all the hours of their
intercourse over again, till at times the longing only to look at him,
even from afar, burned in her heart like a slow consuming flame. Alas!
this is not the way one thinks of the dead.
It was her dream to sit looking across the sea at dawn, in the starlight
and the white moonlight, till the softly-moving waves were transformed
into the great inland plain of her native country. The tall kangaroo
grass as it bent in soft ripples, the gray-green earth, the distant
lines of weeping myall fringing a watercourse, the vague, wide horizons,
the moaning sough of the wind as it rose in sighing gusts, sweeping over
unpeopled wastes, the muffled beat of the horses' hoofs on the dense
herbage, Langdale riding close beside her, his head bent to catch her
words--each sight and sound came back to her one by one. In some
strange way such visions consoled her. They became the kernel of her
inward life. 'I shall never see him again; but he is my friend--my
companion. Nothing can take that from me'--so she reasoned.
Outwardly the old footing between herself and Ritchie had been resumed.
Stella's whole nature and training made it impossible for her to forego
the _bienseances_ of life in her intercourse with anyone. Unfailing
courtesy and kindliness had been the prevailing notes in her old home.
She could repel with signal success attempts at intimacies which did not
recommend themselves to her as tolerable. But she could not come in
daily contact with one without exercising something of that charm and
urbanity of manner which are the birthright of a cultivated,
well-descended nature.
As for poor Ted, who, in his dumb way, clung to the pathetic theory that
he was responsible for his actions, he endured agonies of contrition
when he thought over his unpardonable offence. For some time he did so
constantly, cursing himself vehemently the while, to have conquered his
deadly enemy for so long, and at the last to fall egregiously when it
most behoved him to be a man. Of all the ways that had ever been
invented of being a complete idiot---- But it is impossible in these
pages to follow the terms that the young man applied to himself. Still,
mentally, one gets used to everything, even to having behaved worse than
the most pitiable jackass of the most varied adjectival quality; and
remorse _per se_ was wholly foreign to him. An immovable belief grew on
him that never again would he permit himself to be delivered over to the
wiles of the devil in such a fashion. He had a small calendar note-book
full of racing memoranda, but none of these were of moment to him
compared to the little crosses in red pencil with which he marked the
flights of the days and weeks. And already Stella belonged to him after
a fashion. He watched over her during the weeks of her lethargic
prostration with touching devotion. It was only when he found that his
constant presence worried her that he absented himself.
There were several other young Australian squatters on board, and though
most of them drank a good deal--while the mere sight and smell of
stimulants at this time made him shudder--yet he was a good deal in
their society. He smoked with them, and lost and won money at various
games of chance, and they daily discussed horses and wool and pastoral
leases, and all the topics that were of mutual interest. Horses
especially never seemed to pall on these young men. The annals of the
Melbourne Cup, of the Derby and the Grand Prix, of jockey clubs and the
careers of jockeys, were at their finger-ends in an astounding way. The
blind devotion of a certain order of minds of the English race to the
achievements of young horses is surely, in its way, one of the most
curious phenomena of the day. Nowhere, probably, does the craze reach a
fuller development than in Australia, where the climate, the universal
love for outdoor amusement, the wide-spread tendency to gamble, and the
paramount importance of the horse as a mode of locomotion, are all
factors that intensify the interest taken in racing.
One of these young men, Aubrey Holland, was a Melbourne acquaintance of
Ted's, and he introduced him to Stella. Finding he had travelled a good
deal in early youth, she one day endeavoured to glean what aspect of the
great centres of art and civilization had most impressed him. Venice?
Oh, that was a rum place--a fellow hired a boat to go about instead of a
cab. Had he been in Rome? No--o, he didn't think so; but stop--wasn't
that the place where they raced a mob of horses bare-backed through one
of the streets? Oh yes, he and his father had been there for three
weeks.
Ted's artistic education was a trifle more advanced; for after a pause
he asked if that wasn't the old village where they dug up little images
with the arms chipped off.
Later, when the two were alone, Ted, seeing Stella smile, asked what the
joke was.
'How did you know they dug up little images in Rome?' she said by way of
answer.
'Oh, don't you remember that little Cupid you told me about that was in
Mrs. Anstey-Hobbs' place? You don't seem to cotton much to her now,
Stella. I believe you like this little beggar of an ape and Dustiefoot
better than anyone on board.'
'Yes; we understand each other.'
'Because none of you talk?'
'That is one reason. Then Dustiefoot has a soul, but does not quite
know it. Jacob hasn't got to a soul yet, and I had one, but lost it, so
that makes a sort of a bond between us.'
'Then it seems I am the only one of the four of us that has a soul? I
can't think how Jacob will live after he parts from you. Shall I try to
buy him?'
'Oh, we cannot set up a menagerie.'
'No; as it is, there's you and me----'
Stella began to laugh, but though Ted was delighted at the sound, he had
not a notion what amused her, so he went on with his calculation: 'And
Dustiefoot, and Maisie, and Ben, and all the luggage.'
The stars were coming out one by one in the ashy-blue sky. The Southern
Cross had now disappeared, for they were sailing through the
Mediterranean, within a day's journey of Brindisi. But there were new
constellations to look for as they began to gleam softly in the depths
of the sky. The glow of the electric light suddenly encircled them.
Ritchie took out his calendar and counted up his red crosses. Stella was
gazing through drooping lashes over the calm gray-blue sea. But instead
of the soft swell of the waves against the ship, she heard the muffled
hoof-beats of horses falling on the thick sward of the wide Peeloo
Plain.
*CHAPTER XLVII.*
They reached Berlin early one November morning, three days after they
landed in Italy. It was a cold bright day, with a thin insubstantial
sort of sunshine and keen gusts of wind laden with the sallow spoils of
autumn. Wherever there was a tree with leaves to shed, this wind
searched them out, and wrenched them off the stalks, and swirled them
away. The rusty red and pale amber of the oak leaves, the delicate
wistful green and yellow of the birches, the deep orange of the
mountain-ashes, the citron of the common kind, the crimson tufts of the
sycamore trees, and the lemon-tinted leaves of the lindens--all were to
be seen in the Thiergarten falling in soft perpetual showers. They
fluttered in the air for a moment, and then swelled the banks of autumn
foliage piled up against tree-trunks and benches and those quiet nooks
in the depths of the wood which even the wind did not readily penetrate.
The pension of the Baroness von Eisengau, which had been recommended to
the Ritchies by Miss Brendover, was close to the Thiergarten; and the
large double windows of the suite of rooms which Ted engaged on the
second _etage_ overlooked the park. The novel sight of a whole wood
being shorn of its leaves and left shivering nakedly under a pale cold
sky caught Stella's eye at once. Here she took her first long walk
since they had left Australian shores. It seemed as though her recovery
had been largely dependent on the sea and its invigorating breezes. The
day after leaving the _Hindoo Fawn_ she felt the old listless languor
and mental miasma stealthily creeping over her. Only those who have for
a time been victimized by that fell _taedium vitae_ which, like a
victorious army, beleaguers the very citadel of life, can realize the
feeling of helpless subjection that fetters the mind under such
assaults. But Stella had so far gained strength that she struggled
against the feeling, and simulated an interest she did not feel in the
variety and movement of travel.
On returning to the pension, Ritchie, who had been out with his groom to
see about hiring horses from the Guldenstern Mews, awaited her with a
telegram that had come from his uncle in London. Directly on landing at
Brindisi, Ted, instead of writing a letter announcing his arrival and
future address, had telegraphed the news--'wiring,' when practicable,
being his favourite mode of correspondence. Now a message had come from
the old man, saying he had not long to live, and requesting his nephew's
presence as soon as possible.
'I suppose I had better start soon. What do you think, Stella?'
'Oh, go, by all means! The poor old man wants to see you. Has he any
children?'
'Two daughters--oldish, I think. I wonder if Hetty and Jemima are like
Larry. They say cousins are often more alike than sisters, and, you
see, my aunt is my mother's sister. She's a good deal older than my
mother, and rather gone in the upper story. When she writes she always
asks the same questions. The last letter I saw of hers, she asked if I
was still in college. You see, the governor told her he had sent me
there; and it wasn't the habit in the families in England to send the
boys to college; so it stuck in the old lady's memory--"Is dear Ted in
college still?" says she, with a heavy stroke under "college." Why do
some women always put strokes in their letters? I used to get letters
once----' Ted suddenly paused, as if struck with the thought that there
are some pre-nuptial reminiscences better left in oblivion.
'Well, go on, Ted,' said Stella, with something of the old sense of fun
struggling to the surface. 'Was it the adjectives that were always
underlined?'
'What are adjectives?'
'Oh, the words that were put before your name, in the letters you used
to get once!'
'"My dearly beloved Edward"--are they adjectives? Oh, the "beloved." A
serious affair? Well, I don't believe you care a snuff. Did you never
feel a bit jealous of anyone, Stella, except that time when Cuth got
engaged? Well, I don't half like going without you. The old aunt will
believe I've left college at last, but she'll never believe I'm married
when she doesn't see you. "And are you really married, dear?" she'll
say every time I see her. And the cousins--I expect they're like
Laurette.'
'In what way?'
'Well, like this--always harking back on any point you don't fully
explain. "But why didn't Stella come?" That's the way Larry would keep
nagging away, till you either made a clean breast of it, or, if that
wasn't to be done, cleared out of her way. I'll tell them straight out
from the beginning you cried your eyes out to come, but I wouldn't let
you because of the fogs. Of course Laurette could well fancy a man and
his wife might part soon after the honeymoon without tears--but elderly
maiden ladies will find it hard to believe. By the way, Stella, how
long is the honeymoon supposed to last? You're not an authority? Lord,
I wish I were! Well, if they don't suck in the first yarn, I'll let
them believe I wanted to have a bit of a shine all by myself. That'll
make the old tabbies sit up--but, of course, being an Australian,
they'll take in anything about me. So they may, when all is told. But
isn't it rather queer, Stella, how a fellow would sooner any hanged yarn
be taken in about him than the truth? It's not only with myself, but
I've noticed it over and over again. I had a fellow book-keeping once
who had been in quod for some months. It got to be known, and he
pretended it was for putting a knife in a chap--whereas it was for
prigging one.'
'Yes; but the truth is generally even more damaging than the "hanged
yarn," you see. I suppose the bookkeeper was one of the thirty-three
per cent. of the educated who go under, and he would be sooner supposed
to stab a man than steal from him.'
'Yes, Stella, you're right. As long as people feel they could be
different they're ashamed of themselves. But if they got to think they
couldn't help it a little bit, and it was all because it was to be,
somehow, why---- Look here, Stella, you've been awfully good, I know,
over this confounded business; but I wish to God you had given me a
rowing, or would speak to me now and then about it--as if you were
afraid, don't you know, that I wouldn't keep straight. You are
frightfully cut up in one way, and yet in another ... sometimes it comes
over me that you fret because you married me--not because I--I was such
an awful idiot.'
Love, even when it has failed to be the saving influence of a man's
life, has a curious power of purging the heavy eye. The aspect of the
matter, put into such plain terms by Ritchie, was so near the truth that
Stella was for a moment conscience-smitten.
'What is the use of talking about it?' she said, lying back in the wide,
padded armchair with half-closed eyes.
'I am a twenty-four-carat muff to bring it up, I know. But, Stella, when
I look at you sometimes I feel as if I could not bear it. Always before
this you walked as if you were treading on air--your eyes dancing. It
didn't matter whether the sun were shining or not, it came in with you.
And now you sit by the hour as if you saw nothing. You do not even
read. I sometimes think if you would lie up properly till your illness
is over it would be better--for you must have some sort of fever hanging
about you. You eat next to nothing, and in the morning you look more
tired than when you went to bed.'
'Leave it to time, Ted,' she said, gently stroking his brown, strong
hand lightly with her slender fingers, which had now a transparent
aspect. She wore no rings except her wedding-ring, and it hung so loose
that once or twice it had dropped off.
*CHAPTER XLVIII.*
Ritchie left for England on the following day, and almost to her own
surprise Stella found that his absence made a blank. She had not
realized till he was gone how his unfailing thoughtfulness led him to
anticipate every wish, how his unceasing attentions folded her round on
every side. At any time he disliked fuss or demonstration, so much that
he would sooner do deeds of kindness or generosity like a thief in the
night, so as to avoid being thanked. But much more was this the case
when Stella's large, melancholy eyes and long impassive reveries touched
him daily with a fresh apprehension of the heinousness of his past
conduct. She had been learning to love him, he thought to himself, when
suddenly on that fatal night she saw him 'sunk below the level of the
brutes.' The phrase had remained in his mind, and he pondered over it
till its full meaning lay revealed.
The dog that sleeps at your door may be stabbed or poisoned, but no form
of indulgence will steal his senses from him so that his master may be
robbed or murdered without a bark to warn him of his danger. The horse
in your stable does not over-drink himself so that he cannot serve you
with his docility and speed. He understood what Stella meant when on
the journey from Italy she said, in connection with some altercation
that had taken place with officials regarding Dustiefoot: 'It is a
superstition with me not to say the lower animals. I never hear the
phrase without thinking of myriads of human lives compared to which the
existence of a toad is a high and holy thing.' He thought over the
matter till a curious impetus was given to his imagination. He imagined
Stella in some extremity crying aloud to him for help on that night at
Monico Lodge--calling him to her aid. No, he could not hear her, he
could not be roused ... he was beyond the reach of all human appeal....
Always when he came to that point he indulged in very strong language
against himself, but his emotion did not end there. He became skilful
in devising ways of serving Stella; and, withal, she knew of old how he
hated to be thanked, and that was an added relief. The good people who
do so much for us, and then wait hat in hand for a speech of grateful
recognition, get hardly used in the end. We learn to avoid them in the
day of calamity far more rigorously than those who wilfully throw
half-bricks at us.
Ted would even have gone to all Wagner's operas with Stella, though
'Lohengrin,' to which he accompanied her on the first night they were in
Berlin, seemed to him devised to keep people beyond hearing.
'Of course,' he admitted, 'you are glad when the soft parts come, but I
would feel so much jollier not to hear any. And then, Stella, to tie a
string to the leg of a pigeon and pretend it is the Holy Ghost.... Do
you think your mother would like it?'
Stella smiled repeatedly at the inquiry. Ted's direct habit of putting
things as they appeared to him into plain phrase never forsook him.
'After all, I think I should enjoy these operas more with you, Ted,' she
said, as they were together the half-hour preceding his departure.
Ted flushed deeply, but did not trust himself to reply.
'Whatever you do, Stella,' he said, after a pause, 'don't you go too
much into the houses of sick people, to catch fever and things. That
Mrs. Schulz you went to see to-day--is it anything catching?'
'No, Ted; it is just poverty, and having her husband imprisoned for
posting up announcements of a Socialistic meeting. Besides, I am not a
favourite of the gods. I am one of the workaday masses who gather up
all the arrows on their targets, and still live on. And then, you know,
one can die only once.'
'But, Moses, what a jolly difference it makes whether one dies before
twenty-four or after eighty! Don't you go and slip me up with any sell
of that kind, whatever you do. We are going to keep our golden
wedding-day one of these years "across the blue Alsatian mountains." Do
you remember how Billy Stein used to sing that, making his voice shiver
like a jelly?'