INFATUATION
Filled with the determination to set aside foolish jealousies and
cultivate a more generous trust in human nature, the Collector returned
to his administrative duties in camp which were designed to bring him
personally into contact with the villagers in his jurisdiction.
His bachelor experience of social life in the East had, unfortunately,
not helped to supply him with much confidence in his own sex. However,
men were not all ravening wolves let loose upon society, and it was an
undeniable fact that no man, however unprincipled, would dare to make
love to a married woman without her encouragement, or attempt to seduce
her from her lawful allegiance without her co-operation. And Joyce was
incorruptible because of her love for her child.
Yet there were times when Meredith's heart yearned wistfully for his
beloved wife, and for the power of second sight that he might see how
things were going in his absence; and since he was denied that faculty,
it was not a little comfort to him to know that Honor Bright was in
intimate companionship with Joyce. He liked to think of her influence
exerted to assist the development of the childlike mind; for Honor
Bright was "one of the best," and would some day make some lucky fellow
a splendid wife; of that there was no doubt whatever. It seemed a
mystery that she was still unmarried when she had been out in India for
a year or more! and Meredith wondered what men were about. It did not
strike him that Honor was not to be had for the asking.
It was well, however, for the Collector's peace of mind and the work
upon which he was engaged, that he did not know of the motor drives
which were to provide a surprise for him one day.
"People are beginning to talk about them," Honor ventured, with
reference to their frequency, shy of being misunderstood and afraid of
being considered interfering; but she had not forgotten Ray Meredith's
parting words spoken with wistful meaning--"Take care of my wife, she is
such a kid!"
She had accepted the responsibility and it was weighing heavily upon
her.
"Very impertinent of 'people,'" said Joyce in return.
"You have to live among them, and in your position they want to look up
to you as a sort of 'Caesar's wife,'" said Honor smiling. "But it is, of
course, a matter that lies between you and your husband entirely. If
_he_ doesn't object----"
"He knows nothing about my learning to drive, as it is to be a surprise.
What concern is it of any one else?"
"We generally stand or fall by what people think of us--don't we?
However much we would like to ignore the fact, it remains
unquestionable. If we do things liable to misconstruction, we are likely
to suffer in the eyes of the world--and you see it every day. You
yourself disapproved of and condemned Mrs. Fox, whose ways none of us
admire or can stand."
"Oh, Honey!" reproachfully--"would you compare me with Mrs. Fox? Why she
does scandalous things!"
"God forbid that I should! but Mrs. Fox did not begin by doing
scandalous things. When she grew used to doing unconventional things she
became consciously scandalous. Everything happens by degrees--even
deterioration."
"But you don't think there is any harm in my going for drives with
Captain Dalton, Honey? He is so different. He is not the kind of man who
gets women talked about, I should imagine. Why, half the time, he is
glum and absent-minded, and he treats me just like a child." Joyce never
resented Honor's plain-speaking.
"It is no business of mine," said Honor, "except that you are my friend
and I am jealous for your honourable standing here. I know nothing of
Captain Dalton, but that he is a man like most others--and you might,
some day, meet with a surprise."
"What sort of surprise?" laughed Joyce sceptically.
"I don't know--but you'll remember that I warned you. Meantime, go easy
with your favours. You are rather generous, you know."
Honor was thinking of Joyce's innocent demonstrativeness--inseparable
from herself--which some men might not understand, and the doctor was
but human after all. She had seen her toying with his watch-chain while
arguing against following his advice for the good of her health; leading
him by the hand to visit her baby in its crib; seizing the lapels of his
coat in a moment of eager excitement. On each of these occasions Honor
had been apart from them, an observer at a distance, engaged by others
in conversation and desirous of appearing unconscious of the doctor's
existence. Since the day she had shown silent disapproval of him on the
steps of the Mission Bungalow, he had made no effort to bring about a
better understanding and she was wounded to the quick, though she
steeled herself to show utter indifference. Yet the sight of the doctor
with Joyce in such intimate circumstances--latterly made more so by the
frequent drives--had caused Honor's heart to twist with sudden anguish;
for it was difficult to forget the day at his bungalow when he had
fought for her life and called her the bravest girl he knew. A wordless
sympathy had grown up between them since that day. His eyes had held for
her a special message. Though he was "not seeking her for a wife" she
felt that he had liked her more than a little, and she----?
Now they were less than strangers; and Joyce, beautiful and confiding,
was innocently flattering him with her preference. Where would it end?
While Honor watched the development of Joyce's friendship with Captain
Dalton, she was also aware of a change in Jack. Tommy had drawn her
attention to Mrs. Fox's efforts to enslave Jack, whose own demeanour was
beginning to show that all was not right with him. A new
self-consciousness was apparent in his manner towards her, and he made
blundering efforts to avoid being left alone in her company. He was
evidently afraid of her--afraid of himself, too--because of the evil
impulses her insidious influence had aroused in him.
The fact was, Jack had arrived at a just appreciation of the truism,
"Opportunity makes the thief." His respect for Mrs. Fox had expired
after the episode on her moonlight verandah, and though he had made
excuses for her, he was conscious they had rung hollow. Yet, in spite of
his strict upbringing and the knowledge of danger, he had come to the
psychological point when Opportunity was certain to make him a thief,
for the memory of those kisses burned fiercely. He was as one who, by
steeping himself in the vice of intoxication, begets a craving for
alcohol, and he felt that his powers of resistance were on the wane. His
cherished "ideal" was forgotten, and her portrait reposed face downward
among envelopes and papers in his dispatch-box, while he kept out of
Mrs. Meredith's way and neglected Honor Bright.
"Jack's not the same man," Tommy confided to Honor. "He eats little and
talks less. That woman will bring him to grief. I'd cheerfully shoot
her."
"What's the matter with Jack?" Honor asked, surprised. "What does he
admire in her? I have no patience with him."
"I don't know that he admires her. It's an infatuation. She has cast a
spell over him somehow, since the night he dined with her alone, and he
can't resist it. She writes to him almost every day."
"And he answers her notes?"
"Of course."
"Jack is weak. I simply have no use for such weakness," said Honor
contemptuously. "There is more hope for the villain who is deliberately
bad than for the wobbly wretch who hasn't the strength to resist
temptation. When the one repents, he is at least sincere; the other can
never be depended upon to repent sincerely."
"I never heard that before," grinned Tommy. "You would rather have Jack
sin deliberately with his eyes open than fail in his efforts to keep
straight?"
"I have no patience for 'failures.' One could be angry with him for
sinning deliberately, but hardly contemptuous. As it is, I have no
opinion of Jack."
Tommy made no complaint, for it was all to his own advantage. Though he
was fond of Jack he had always regarded him as a dangerous rival, who so
far had been merciful in not exerting his fascinations upon the only
girl in their small circle at Muktiarbad. Since he was such a fool as to
prefer dangling after a married woman, ten years his senior, his blood
be on his own head.
One evening, a few days later, Mrs. Fox discovered Jack Darling alone in
the billiard-room knocking about the balls while waiting for someone to
join him in a game. The rules of the Muktiarbad Club were lenient
towards the ladies, who thus enjoyed privileges denied to them at larger
stations. Mrs. Fox was therefore free to enter, and Jack was obliged to
submit to his fate and comply with her request for a lesson in the
science of "screws" and "potting." He had been priding himself on his
wisdom and self-control in retiring from tennis and the society of the
ladies, and had not reckoned on the perseverance of the one lady he
wished to avoid.
They played till others arrived; Jack was oddly moved by the sight of
her slender hand, exquisitely feminine and appealing, as it poised the
cue or lay on the green cloth of the table. Little intimacies were
inevitable as he was further called upon to instruct her in the
formation of a "bridge," or the handling of a cue; and he soon forgot
his desire to escape, in the involuntary thrills her contact gave him.
Eventually, she gracefully resigned in favour of a couple of members who
looked their anxiety to play, and carried Jack off to escort her home.
"You are quite sure you do not mind?" she asked softly.
"Why should I mind?" he fenced awkwardly.
"Because you have behaved lately as though you did not--not--like
me...."
"Have I?" he asked, flushing red in the darkness. "That isn't true."
"I thought, perhaps, it was not true. That is why I was determined to
have this opportunity for a talk."
She did most of the talking while he barely listened, being conscious
only of the thumping of his capitulating heart. But neither made any
allusion to the tender episode on the verandah, from which Jack dated
his undoing.
In a quiet lane where the shadows lay deepest, he was asked to strike a
match. Convicted of lack of courtesy, Jack hurriedly produced his
cigarette case and offered it to her with confused apologies.
"No thanks. Only a lighted match. I want to show you something," she
said plaintively. And while he struck a light she rolled back her silk
sleeve and displayed for his benefit a purple bruise on her shoulder
where it curved down to the arm; an ugly, evil-looking thing staining
the marble purity of the flesh.
"How did that happen?" he asked greatly shocked and very sympathetic.
"Can't you guess?"
"Good God!--is it possible? Is he such a cad as all that?" What else was
Jack to think?
"Perhaps I had better say no more about it, only I thought you had
better know." Only the inference was possible, and Jack stood
stock-still burning with indignant fury that a woman should be subjected
to such brutality at the hands of a man. The match burned down to his
finger-tips and fell to the ground leaving the two in the shadows of the
silent road.
"It makes me feel pretty mad--what can I do?" he asked helplessly as she
drew the sleeve down.
"You can do nothing--but give me a little tenderness and love," she said
with a sob, letting him take her in his arms.
"You poor little woman!"
"It is so lovely to feel that you care, Jack! Nothing matters so long as
you care!" She clung to his neck inviting and returning his kisses.
Further down the lane as they walked with his arm about her, they were
startlingly rung out of the way by a cyclist who had come on them
unawares. It was Tommy who had neglected to light his lamp, as the
night, though dark, was clear and starry and municipal regulations were
lax.
"Do you think he recognised us?" Mrs. Fox asked anxiously.
"Without a doubt," Jack spoke with annoyance.
"But it's only Tommy and you are his friend. He won't give us away." She
had no idea of the shame and embarrassment that Jack suffered at the
thought that he had given his chum ocular proof of his folly, for Tommy
had confessed that he despised Mrs. Fox, and that he had encouraged
Bobby Smart to break away from her clutches. That there was truth in the
gossip concerning Mrs. Fox and young Smart he could no longer doubt, but
this made very little difference to him. As matters stood, he was
committed and could not go back. Nor did he wish to. At least Tommy was
loyal and would not give him away to the Station. Thoughts of the
Station brought thoughts of Mrs. Meredith and Honor Bright whose
good-fellowship he valued. Honor stood for all that was best in
womanhood, and to be worthy of her companionship a man had to be as
straight as a die. Joyce Meredith was "not in the same boat," though
she, too, was a "bit of 'All-right.'" Her sister--? what chance had he
of ever meeting her sister?--Jack laughed as he shook off a tendency to
morbid regret and bade Mrs. Fox a resolute farewell at her gate. He had
plenty to do preparing a judgment he had to deliver in court the
following day, and begged to be excused. Another day--perhaps----
Mrs. Fox fixed the day and parted from him tenderly, full of
satisfaction at the success of her clever fiction. The accident which
had occasioned the bruise had been of the commonest, but it had served
her gallantly.
Contrary to Jack's expectations, Tommy was not at all in the mood to
rag, being silent for the greater part of dinner. However, when the
genial influence of a whisky-and-soda had had time to work on his
spirits, the young policeman apologised for not having carried a light
on his bicycle. It was his way of introducing the subject which was
haunting him with forebodings.
"That's all right," said Jack. "But as one whose job is to enforce the
law, I should imagine you would be more particular."
"If that's all the law-breaking I do, I shan't come to grief, my son. It
is very different in your case. 'Can a man take coals to his bosom and
not be burned?'"
"What the devil are you driving at?"
"I get a tidy lot of wisdom out of old Solomon and I commend you to take
up the dissertation from where I left off. You'll find a good deal to
set you thinking."
"Where am I to find it?" Jack asked with determined good-humour.
"Proverbs--sixth, twenty-eighth; read from there, onward."
"Thanks. I'll see what he has to say concerning such stupendous truths."
"I commend you also to try him for advice on seeking a wife," said
Tommy. "It will help you to form a judgment. Listen:
"'_Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above
rubies_'----"
"Blessed old cynic!" interjected Jack, adding, he had heard that before.
"'_The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her_'--mark the word,
'trust'.... '_She will do him good, not evil all the days of her life._'
I can't remember it all, there is such a lot. He goes on to say, '_Her
husband is known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the
land.... Strength and honour are her clothing and she shall rejoice in
time to come_----'"
"Personally, I should prefer something more decent as a garment,"
murmured Jack, while Tommy searched his brains.
"'_She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in her tongue is the law of
kindness. She looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth not
the bread of idleness. Her children rise up and call her blessed; her
husband also, and he praiseth her. Many daughters have done virtuously,
but thou excellest them all. Favour is deceitful and beauty is vain: but
a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised. Give her of the
fruit of her hands; and let her own works praise her in the gates._'"
"Is that all?"
"Isn't it enough?"
"And you mean to say you expect to find such a paragon of perfection in
modern times?" Jack asked, pouring out some more whisky.
"Till I do, I shan't marry," said Tommy.
"Here's luck to you!" said Jack raising his glass to his lips,
unconvinced. "I'm afraid you'll live to be an old bachelor."
"I'm afraid I shall, though I have found her already," murmured Tommy.