ON THE WAY DOWN.
That evening Marie did not leave her room. She did not come down to
dinner, Judith O'Connor took her up some food, which Marie scarcely
touched. She was not in bad spirits; she was not in bad humour. She
was at a loss--at a dead standstill. She could see nothing in the
future, nothing farther back in the past than the events of that
day--the things he had said to her in that memorable walk round the
square.
What had been the meaning of his words? There was no harder riddle to
read on all the earth. He loved her still, and thought her good enough
for him, though she knew she was not. She had given him every faculty
of her heart and soul; she could take none of those back from him; the
spaces they had held were now occupied by love, and when love came to
abide with her, all her possessions had left her as though she had
died.
Now he was asking her to give him time to let him try himself still
further before he asked her to carry out the promise she had given him
of becoming his wife; nay, more than that, he had asked her to
withdraw for the present that promise.
Why?
Because of some scruple which had arisen in his mind with regard to
what took place in St Paul's at their betrothal. Why should religious
scruples separate people who loved one another? People of different
religions married, and were happy. She had heard of an English lady
who married a Mahometan, and having been twenty years his wife,
declined to come back to her people. No doubt pious people were
greatly shocked at a Christian woman marrying a Mahometan; but men and
women of different Christian sects married, and no one made an outcry.
Why should religion make any difference between two people who loved
and were loyal?
George--this noble George, her George--was too conscientious. He had
got some ridiculous notion into his head. He loved her still; she
could see that in all he did and said. He loved her as warmly as ever.
She was essential to his happiness; but some over-scrupulous notion
had affrighted him; and made him think that he was unworthy of her. He
unworthy of her!
What should she do now? Nothing. She would go on as though nothing had
occurred to disturb the relations between them. He told her, before
this cloud had fallen upon them, that his life would be worthless to
him if she did not share it. Now he might do or say what he pleased;
she would never be forced from his side. No; she was engaged to him,
and in ordinary cases, when women are engaged to men, they expect the
men to marry them, unless there is some excellent reason for not doing
so. In this case no reason existed for his not marrying her. If he had
grown tired of her; if he had relented having asked her to marry him;
if he had met anyone he liked better, she would be eager to release
him. But nothing of the kind entered into the present case. He loved
her still, as he had loved her all along, and his life's happiness
would be endangered if she allowed him to break with her now. Besides,
this scruple that was upon him would not last; it would pass away.
What an unlucky coincidence she should have introduced him to
Parkinson! No doubt that man of science had had something--much--to do
with the unfortunate change which had taken place in George. Well,
that could not be helped now. She must only try and undo the harm, and
how could she possibly undo it if she gave him up in this way? No;
whatever might happen, she would never let him go from her, when going
from her would do him harm, not good.
She had no scruple about throwing that foolish promise to the winds;
or rather it was not that the promise was foolish, but that it was
foolish to think it applied to him. When he had extracted that pledge
or promise or vow from her, she most assuredly meant to keep it, as he
and she then meant it; but she had never thought such a condition
could be applied to him. If at the time he had asked her if she would
pledge herself to repudiate him if his religious opinions changed, she
would have refused to do so. To keep that pledge to the letter would
be to break it to the spirit; for the spirit was that she was so to
pledge herself, in order that he and she might not be separated
hereafter. That was the only inducement she recognised in making that
promise. She would not have made it for all the world if she thought
it could possibly come between him and her. Even taking the religious
view solely, she must not think of giving him up. For as he had been
first disturbed in his faith while he was friendly, in love with her,
the best chance of his recovering from his folly would lie in having
her near him always; for not only would this supply him with a quiet,
unobtrusive advocate, but in her, and in her alone, could he have by
him a woman who could not only sympathise with his conscientious
struggles, but who had been near him, and in a way with him, through
the wild terrors of the first onset on his faith. Plainly her duty to
Heaven and to him was refusal of his request for freedom, refusal to
give him up this ring.
Fools would think this resolution unfeminine, unmaidenly. Let fools
think as they pleased. What did she care for what fools thought? She
cared for George more than for all the world, sages and fools,
besides. If it were good for him, she would give him up. If it were
good for him, she would cleave to him all her life. What were fools or
sages to her? Not the tiniest flake of the ashes falling there into an
ashpan of the grate compared to George. He was the sun in her system,
and nothing on earth existed in light that did not proceed from him.
But, after all, was she not trying to make up her mind on a point
which had not yet arisen? He had not asked her to give him up her
ring. He had not told her he wished their engagement at an end. He
loved her, and she loved him, and they had had no quarrel, and there
was no sensible reason for their parting, and they should not part.
No; if all Europe tried to tear her away from his side, she would not
go until he bade her go. And if she thought he was going to send her
away she would go down on her knees and cling to him, and ask him to
kill her there and then rather than send her from him.
'Oh, love, I bless you! All the pains I suffer by love now I would not
change for all the happiness of my former life. It is dearer to suffer
through love than to be joyous without it; for to suffer through love
is to share a lover's pain, and that is the highest of earthly
pleasure save to rejoice in a lover's joy.'
She determined to try and clear up the situation no further, but to
let matters take their course. She told herself she felt no doubt
whatever of the issue; George would become himself again, and he and
she would be just as though no cloud had ever darkened the sky above
them.
She rose, and busied herself about the room, partly in packing, and
partly in turning over a dozen times things she had no need to take
with her.
Early in the afternoon of the next day, the whole party left London
for Stratford-on-Avon.
Fortunately they had a compartment to themselves. At first George
hoped and prayed some stranger might get in; but Nevill did all he
could to prevent this. He insisted upon their making the carriage
present a crowded appearance. He made Kate sit at one of the windows
looking on the platform, and Marie on the other. He littered the seats
with handbags, umbrellas, newspapers, rugs, and every other kind of
light baggage that accompanies the person. He stood up himself, and
made George stand up too, so as to prevent anyone on the platform
seeing into the remoter half of the compartment; and when anyone
looking like a traveller approached, he glanced over his shoulder, and
shook his head regretfully at the traveller.
'Of course I might have reserved this compartment by half-a-crown to
the man, or by booking in advance. But I never tip railway servants. I
consider tipping railway servants a sign of weakness in a traveller.
You don't find a man who has pranced over a dozen continents tipping
railway servants. He would prefer to ride on the buffer. He would
rather walk the distance on his head. He would rather eat hard-boiled
eggs all his life for breakfast, dinner, and supper. Why should you
tip a railway official? Do you tip a soldier on the battle-field when
he has fired each round? And yet a soldier fires at the enemies of his
country, and the railway official only facilitates your chances of
being smashed in a railway accident. There is some sense in giving a
cabman more than his fare, for some time or another he may have the
opportunity of running over you. But why tip a railway porter? Miss
Gordon, do you think a man, when he is lashed to a gun and about to be
blown from it, ought suddenly to put his hand in his pocket, and sing
out to the man with the fuze or trigger-line, "Hallo, Corporal Bosco,
here's sixpence to drink my health when the job is done!"?'
'I don't see how he could put his hand in his pocket if he were very
securely lashed.'
'I did not say "very securely" lashed. I said "lashed." But suppose I
grant you the pocket, and put the thing to you in another way? By
Jove, we're off at last! Ah, this solitude is delightful. Only three
stops on the way down. I think you ought to pass a vote of thanks to
me for securing ourselves against intrusion. Come, we'll put Osborne
in the chair, and give him a casting vote. What makes you look so
blue, Osborne? Only for me you never could have had this _otium cum
dignitate_. Suppose you had undertaken to keep this compartment, you
would have known no other way of doing it than of crawling up
servilely to the guard, touching your hat to him, and tipping him
half-a-dollar-crown, I mean. I don't see why a man of no intellect
like you should be allowed to fatten on my genius. Why should you,
like the gentlemen of England, sit in your compartment at ease, while
I have been squandering my genius to save you from the rude shock of
the world? You owe me half-a-crown, Osborne. As an honourable man you
owe me half-a-crown. Come, my man, pay up. No welshing, my boy; pay
up.'
George made a prodigious effort to rouse himself, and replied, with a
smile,--
'If you had got in anyone in whose presence you would have to be
silent, I should not mind giving him or you a crown.'
'Not bad for you,' Nevill rejoined, with an exaggerated air of a
connoisseur. 'Not bad for you. Well, Osborne, let us drop the
sledge-hammers, and shake hands. Let us patch up a hollow truce, and
await a more favourable opportunity of smashing one another. But to
resume that most important subject, how to keep women out of a
compartment that is not a smoking one. The best plan I know of is to
leave on the seat you intend occupying a bottle of gin, and by its
side a small tumbler. I admit the experiment is a bold one, but it is
effective.'
The train had gradually been gaining in speed, and Nevill had
gradually raised his voice to overcome the growing clatter of the
wheels. Here he paused for awhile, and then ran on again,--
'It is marvellous how one becomes accustomed to anything. When I was
young I could drown the row of a car. Now I can talk eighteen hours
end on in a carriage flying at express rate, and never hurt my throat
a bit. It is a wonder Darwin took no notice of this. I think I'll
suggest to him to write a chapter, and call it "The Survival of the
Shrillest." A hurricane on land, or a storm at sea, is nothing to talk
through. But I confess I was once hurt--deeply hurt. I was taken by a
friend to see the printing of a London morning paper. When we got to
the machine-room there were eight machines all going at the one time.
Such a clash and row I never heard near me before. I had been talking
to the friend who was with me until then. There I stopped. I tried
twice to make him hear, and failed. I looked round, and saw two men
leaning against one of the machines. One was telling the other a long
story. Every now and then they both laughed immoderately. I felt
degraded to think I could not make myself heard, when these men were
talking with as much ease as I am now to you.'
There was a general laugh. Even George could not resist the humour of
hearing this man gravely saying he was talking with ease, while his
voice was raised to a shrill cry, and the great forked vein of his
forehead stood out black upon the plain of his flushed swarthy skin!
He joined in the laugh himself after a moment.
'Never mind,' he cried gaily; 'I haven't had an hour of it yet; and I
am game to go on for fourteen hours more, I lay the odds.'
No one seemed disposed to bet. By this time the noise of the wheels
had become so loud, that it was impossible to talk with ease.
To the mind of melancholy there is hardly anything more depressing
than a railway journey, particularly in winter, through the middle of
England. Leafless trees and isolated houses, with now and then a white
hamlet, town, or village, are the only objects that break the vast
extent of plain. A large stretch of country is under water, and above
the surface of the dismal swamp protrude skeleton trees and the tops
of fences.
George Osborne needed no depressing influence from Nature. He had gone
through more trying hours. That day he took the long walk, starting
from London Bridge, and, having girt half London, ended at St Paul's,
had been much more acutely trying to him; but there was a dull, dark,
cold misery about this journey such as he had never felt the like of
before.
What was he doing? Whither was he leading her? Where was he himself
going? He had not been fair to her. He had not been fair to himself.
She was looking paler than of old, and when his unexpected glances
found her eyes fixed on him, in those eyes there was always a look of
mournful brooding and unextinguishable devotion. What would be the end
of all this? the end of her? the end of him? Would to God the end of
him had come before he had met this girl!
Look at her now! The old sprightliness had left her face, and in its
place dwelt the more subduing expression of melancholy. What man,
being a man and nothing more, and knowing he was dear to that most
dear of women, could forbear folding her in his arms, and pressing her
to his breast? But there was more in man than humanity. Of old he used
to think in addition to humanity there was divinity in man--a possible
high and beautiful spirit better and stronger than the unembodied
angels. Now--ah, what a blank, dreary waste now! Dreary as that waste
of water out there, comfortless as that sky, barren as those ghostly
trees. What had man, according to his present rudderless theory, in
addition to his humanity? What?
Supposing birth was the beginning and death the end of man, what was
there more in man than his humanity? The question had never yet
presented itself to his mind in that light. It was worth looking at
the subject from this point of view before passing it by hastily,
finally. Let him look at the case impartially. No. It was dreary
enough within and without; he could not stand an examination in the
abstract face to face with that dreary landscape, and this dreary
mental interior. Let him regard the matter in the concrete. Here was
Marie. Here was he.
Nothing new had been imported into his humanity since he had seen
Marie; nothing old had been taken away. The same code which governed
his relations with his fellow-man before he had left Stratford was the
code he still held. He would not wilfully injure man or woman now. All
the human qualities he had previously considered admirable in man or
woman he considered admirable still. Because of any change in his
spiritual outlook, he would treat a dog no worse now than a year ago.
He had in no way altered his general conduct, or his moral code. He
loved and respected his mother as much as ever, and felt as
affectionately towards his sisters. What, then, had been changed in
him? Nothing but his faith. His faith had not been changed, but lost.
It was as though he had possessed ten mental faculties heretofore, and
now owned only nine.
He had lost a mental or spiritual faculty--what then? That was his own
individual personal loss. It hurt no one else; it profited no one
else. It was a matter purely between Heaven and himself. It had
shocked his mother, but it had not changed the relations between her
and him.
What! What was he coming at? What was he gradually approaching? What
part of his brain had been dead, benumbed, until now? What glory and
overwhelming joy lay right in his path? Let him put the matter soberly
to himself. Suppose the alteration in his faith had caused no change
in the relations between him and his mother, why should it cause any
change between Marie and himself?
Why should he give up Marie any more than his mother?
There was that Promise, that Vow.
But now he looked on that vow, or the object of it, as valueless. The
very terms of it were now void. It was purposeless. She had made a vow
to him from which he could, of course, release her, since, from his
present standpoint, that vow was of no more value than the breath
which uttered it.
He threw up his head, and looked around. Nevill was directing Kate's
attention to something in the landscape. Marie's eyes were fixed
mournfully upon him. He stooped forward, caught both her hands in his,
and drew her towards him, until his lips could reach her ear. Then he
said,--
'Marie, Marie, forgive me, my darling! I have been a great fool! Oh,
my love, will you forgive me for all my queer conduct, and all my
queer words of late? Nothing of the kind ever can occur again. Never,
my Marie. Will you forgive me?'
She looked in his face with tears of joy in her eyes.
'Oh, thank God; thank God, George!'
'Nothing of the kind shall ever come between us again, my own love.'
She replied with only a radiant smile.
He touched her forehead with his lips, and then released her hands.
The great cloud which had fallen upon them had lifted, and its shadow
was quickly drifting away.