A space of time seemed to have sped by, and Carden, by some mysterious
mental process, knew that he was still near home, and not, as would have
been natural, in New Zealand. Nay, more, he realised that the unfamiliar
place in which he now found himself was Winson Green Gaol, a place
which, as a child, he had been taught to think of with fear, fear
mingled with a certain sense of mystery and excitement.
Theodore had not thought of the old local prison for years, but now he
knew that he and his father were together there, in a small cell lighted
by one candle. The wall of silence, raised on both sides by shame and
pain, had broken down, but, alas! too late; for, again in some curious
inexplicable way, the young man was aware that he lay under sentence of
death, and that he was to be hanged early in the morning of which the
dawn was only just now breaking.
Yet, strange to say, this knowledge caused him, personally, but little
uneasiness, but on his father's account he felt infinitely distressed,
and he found himself bending his whole mind to comfort and sustain the
old man.
Thus, he heard a voice, which he knew to be his own, saying in an
argumentative tone, "I assure you, father, that an extraordinary amount
of nonsense is talked nowadays concerning--well, the death penalty. Is
it possible that you do not realise that I am escaping a much worse
fate--that of having to live on? I wish, dear dad, that I could persuade
you of the truth of this."
"If only," muttered the old man in response, "if only, my boy, I could
bear it for you;" and Carden saw that his father's face was seared with
an awful look of terror and agony.
"But, indeed, father, you do not understand. Believe me, I am not
afraid--it will not be so bad after all. So do not--pray, pray, father,
do not be so distressed."
And then, with a great start, Theodore Carden awoke--awoke to see the
small, spare figure of that same dear father, clothed in the long,
old-fashioned linen nightshirt of another day, standing by his bedside.
The old man held a candle in his hand, and was gazing down at his only
child with an expression of unutterable woe and grief.
"I will try--I am trying, my boy, not to be unreasonably distressed," he
said.
Theodore Carden sat up in bed.
Since this awful thing had come on him, he had never, even for an
instant, forgotten self, but now he saw that his sufferings were small
compared with those he had brought on the man into whose face he was
gazing with red-rimmed, sunken eyes.
For a moment the wild thought came to him that he might try to explain,
to justify himself, to prove to his father that in this matter he had
but done as others do, and that the punishment was intolerably heavier
than the crime; but then, looking up and meeting Thomas Carden's
perplexed, questioning eyes, he felt a great rush of shame and horror,
not only of himself, but of all those who look at life as he himself had
always looked at it; for the first time, he understood the mysterious
necessity, as well as the beauty, of abnegation, of renunciation.
"Father," he said, "listen. I will not go away alone; I was mad to think
of such a thing. We will go together, you and I,--Lane has told me that
such has been your wish,--and then perhaps some day we will come back
together."
After this, for the first time for many nights, Theodore Carden fell
into a dreamless sleep.
III
A VERY MODERN INSTANCE
Oliver Germaine walked with long, even strides from the Marble Arch to
Grosvenor Gate. It was Sunday morning, early in July, and the
comparatively deserted portion of the Park which he had chosen was, even
so, full of walkers. A good many people, men as well as women, looked at
him pleasantly as he went by, for the young man was an attractive, even
an arresting personality to the type of person who takes part in Church
Parade.
Germaine was tall, slim, dark, so blessed by fate in the mere matter of
eyes, nose and mouth, that his looks were often commented on when his
wife's beauty was mentioned.
So it was that, as he walked quickly by, a rather vexed expression on
his handsome face, almost every man who saw him envied him--if not his
looks then his clothes, if not his clothes then his air of being young,
healthy, and, to use an ugly modern phrase, in perfect condition.
A nursemaid who watched him pass to and fro several times told herself,
rather wistfully, that he was waiting for a loved one, and that the
lady, as is the way with loved ones, was late.
The nursemaid was right in one sense, wrong in another. Oliver Germaine
was waiting for a lady, but the lady was his married sister. Her name
was Fanny Burdon, and her home was in Shropshire. Germaine had a loved
one, but she was already his wife, his beautiful, clever Bella, with
whom he would so much rather have been now, sitting in their pretty
house in West Chapel Street than waiting in the Park for his sister
Fanny.
It was really too bad of Fanny to be late! The more so that she would
certainly feel aggrieved if, when she did come, her brother made her go
straight home with him, instead of taking her down into the crowd of
people who were now seething round the Achilles statue. But if Fanny
didn't come at once, go home they must, for Bella wouldn't like them to
be late--quite a number of people were coming to lunch.
Germaine did not quite know whom, among their crowds of friends, Bella
had asked to come in to-day. But certain people, four or five perhaps,
would assuredly be there--Mrs. Slade, Bella's great "pal," a nice
pretty little woman, with big appealing eyes; also Jenny and Paul
Arabin, distant relations of his wife, and once the young couple's only
link with the exclusive world of which they now formed so intimate a
part.
Then there would be Uvedale.
Germaine's mind dwelt on Uvedale. Bob Uvedale was one of his wife's
admirers--in fact Uvedale made no secret of his infatuation for the
beautiful Mrs. Germaine, but he was a good fellow, and never made either
Bella or himself ridiculous.
Oliver Germaine had remained very simple at heart. He felt sure that
Bella could take care of herself; she always behaved with extraordinary
prudence and sense,--in fact Oliver was now far less jealous of Bella
than he had been in the old days, before she had blossomed into a famous
beauty. She was then rather fond of flirting--but her husband had proved
the truth of the comfortable old adage concerning safety in numbers.
Bella now simply had no time for flirtation! There was no necessity for
her to exert herself, she had only to sit still and be admired and
adored,--adored, that is, in platonic fashion, admired as you admire a
work of art.
Another man who would certainly be lunching with them to-day was Peter
Joliffe.
Joliffe was a clever, quaint fellow, whose mission in life was to make
people laugh by saying funny things in a serious tone. Joliffe was
always fluttering round Bella. He had established himself as a tame cat
about the house, and he had, as a matter of fact, been very useful to
the young couple, piloting Bella when she was only "the new beauty" amid
social quicksands and shallows of which she naturally knew nothing.
Nay, more, Peter Joliffe had introduced the Germaines to some of the
very nicest people they knew,--old-fashioned, well-established people,
delightful old ladies who called Bella "My pretty dear," courtly old
gentlemen who paid her charmingly-turned compliments. Yes, it was nice
to think Joliffe would be there to-day; he always helped to make a party
go off well.
As for Oliver's sister, Fanny, she would have to sit next Henry Buck.
For a brief moment Germaine considered Henry Buck,--Buck who was always
called "Rabbit" behind his back, and sometimes to his face.
Germaine hardly knew how it was that they had come to know poor old
Rabbit so well. They had met him soon after they were married, and ever
since he had stuck to them both with almost pathetic insistence. Oddly
enough, he, Oliver, did not reciprocate Henry Buck's feelings of
admiring friendship. It was not that he disliked the man, but he had a
sort of physical antipathy to him.
The only interesting thing about Henry Buck was his wealth. But then to
many people that made him very interesting, for he was really immensely
rich, and one of those rather uncommon people, who don't know how to
spend their money! Poor Rabbit had been educated at home by a foolish,
widowed mother, who had been afraid of letting him play rough games.
This was perhaps why he was so dull and awkward--not quite like other
people.
Germaine felt rather sorry that Henry Buck would certainly be there
to-day. Considering how very little he did for them--no, that was a
beastly thing to say, even to oneself!--but considering how very
unornamental and uninteresting poor old Rabbit was, it was really very
nice of Bella to be so kind to him. She never seemed to mind his being
there, and she had even managed to force his company on certain people
whose one object in life was to avoid a bore, and who didn't care a
button whether a man was a pauper or a millionaire.
Of course Germaine guessed what had happened to Fanny. She had almost
certainly gone to hear some fashionable preacher--for Fanny was the sort
of woman who likes to cram everything into a visit to London. She was
disappointed if every waking hour did not bring with it some new
sensation, some new amusement, and this was odd--or so her
simple-hearted brother told himself--because all the rest of the year
Fanny was content to lead the dull, stodgy life of a small Shropshire
squire's wife.
Oliver's irritation increased. It was foolish of Fanny to have come to
London just now, in the middle of the season! Hitherto, she and her
husband had always come up for a fortnight just before Christmas, and
then perhaps again just before Easter. Now she had come up alone, and
settled herself into dull lodgings in Marylebone; and then--well, the
young man was vaguely aware that Fanny's visit to town was really a
scouting expedition. She evidently wanted to see for herself how her
brother Oliver and his beautiful wife were "getting on."
Strange to say, Fanny was not quite pleased at Bella's sudden social
success--not pleased, and yet quite willing to profit by it. How queer
that was! How queer, for the matter of that, most women were! But Bella
was not queer--in fact, Bella had been most awfully nice about Fanny,
and had never allowed her to suspect, even by as much as a look, that
her presence was not welcome. Yet Fanny naturally proved "odd man out"
at all those little gatherings to which her lovely sister-in-law made
her so carelessly welcome. Fanny knew nothing of the delightful world in
which Oliver and Bella now moved; she was quite convinced that she
belonged to the very best, exclusive set, and so she did--in Shropshire.
But here in town? Why, she was even ignorant of the new social
shibboleths; all her notions as to what it was the right thing to do, or
to avoid doing, belonged to the year before last!
Take to-day. Fanny would certainly feel cross and disappointed that
Bella was not there, in the Park, too; and, as a matter of fact,
Germaine had tried to make his wife please his sister in the little
matter of Church Parade--but Bella had shaken her head smilingly.
"You know I would do anything for Fanny," she had said, "but really,
darling, you mustn't ask me to do _that_--to go into that big, horrid,
staring crowd. Why should I? It makes one look so cheap! It would only
bore me, and I don't think Fanny would really enjoy having me there,"
and Bella had smiled a little smile.
Germaine had smiled too,--he really couldn't help it! It was quite true
that Fanny would not enjoy seeing Bella looked at, followed,--in a word,
triumphing, in the way she did triumph every time she appeared in a
place where she was likely to be recognised.
Of course it was odd, when one came to think of it, that Bella, who had
been just as pretty two years ago as she was now, should, for some
mysterious reason, have been suddenly discovered, by those whose word is
law in such matters, to be astonishingly, marvellously beautiful!
An involuntary smile again quivered across Oliver Germaine's
good-looking face. He had but little sense of humour, and yet even he
saw something almost comic about it--the way that Bella, his darling,
pretty little Bella, had suddenly been exalted--hoisted up, as it were,
on to a pinnacle. She was now what the Londoners of a hundred years ago
would have called "the reigning toast"--so an amusing old fellow, who
was a great authority on history, had told him a few days ago.
Still, he ought to make allowances for his sister Fanny. It was not in
human nature--or so Oliver believed--for any woman, even for such a good
sort as Fanny undoubtedly was, to be really pleased at another woman's
triumph.
Small wonder that, to use his sister's favourite expression, Fanny could
not make it out! It was unfortunate that Bella's fame--that fame of
which the young husband was half ashamed and half proud--had actually
penetrated to the dull village where his only sister held high state as
wife of the lord of the manor.
Since Fanny had been in town she had said little things to him about
Bella's position as reigning beauty--not altogether kindly or nice
little things. Even yesterday she had observed, with a touch of sharp
criticism in her voice, "I wonder, dear old boy, why you allow Bella's
photograph to appear in all those low papers!" and Oliver had shrugged
his shoulders, not knowing what to answer, but comfortably sure, in a
brotherly way, that Fanny would have been quite willing to see her own
fair features reproduced in similar fashion, had it occurred to any of
the editors of these same enterprising papers to ask for the loan of her
photograph.
As a matter of fact, he had remembered, even while she was speaking, a
monstrously ugly photograph of Fanny,--Fanny surrounded by her dogs and
children,--which had appeared in a well-known lady's paper. Why, she had
actually sent the paper to him, marked! But Oliver magnanimously
refrained from reminding her of this,--the more so, that Fanny had
hurried on from the trifling question of Bella's portrait to the more
serious and unpleasant one of her brother's moderate income.
But, as Germaine now told himself complacently, he had been very short
with her. In fact he had administered a good brotherly snub to
inquisitive Fanny. She had no business to ask him a lot of questions
concerning the way he and Bella chose to spend their income; it was no
business of hers how the money was spent. Unfortunately Fanny did
consider it her business, simply owing to the fact that she was Oliver's
only sister, and very fond of him,--that went without saying,--and that
unluckily her husband was Oliver's trustee. So it was that she had shown
extraordinary curiosity as to how her brother and his wife managed to
live in the way they did, on the income she knew they had.
"Do you know," she had said gravely, "exactly what your income is?"
Oliver had nodded impatiently. Of course he knew, roughly speaking, that
he and Bella had a little over two thousand a year----
"Two thousand and sixty-one pounds, eighteen shillings," she had gone on
impressively. "At least that was what it was last year, for I asked
Dick." Now Dick was Fanny's husband, and a most excellent fellow, but
hopelessly under Fanny's thumb.
Oliver Germaine had not always been so well off. In fact, when he first
met Bella--something like six years ago--he had been a subaltern, with a
very small private income, in a Line regiment. And it was on that small
income that the loveliest girl in Southsea--now the most beautiful woman
in London--had married him. Then had come an immense, unlooked-for piece
of good fortune!
A distant Scotch cousin, a crusty old chap, of whom all the Germaines
were afraid, and who had constantly declared it to be his intention to
leave his money outside his own family, had chosen to make Oliver his
heir, and had appointed Fanny's husband, the steady-going, rather dull
Shropshire squire, as trustee.
Of course Oliver, and even more Bella, knew now that the fortune which
had seemed then to make them rich beyond their wildest dreams, was not
so very much after all. But still, at first, it had been plenty--plenty
for everything they could reasonably require.
But when Bella had become a famous beauty, they had of course to spend
rather more, and about a year ago they had gone through rather a
disagreeable moment. The little house in West Chapel Street which had
seemed so cheap had proved more expensive than they had expected.
However, Dick, as trustee, had stretched a point in his brother-in-law's
favour, and the slight shrinkage which had resulted in the Germaines'
income mattered not at all from the practical point of view, for the
simple reason that they went on spending as much as, in fact rather more
than, they had done before--but it was tiresome having to pay, as they
now had to do, an insurance premium.
Still, it was too bad of Fanny to have spoken as she had done, for Bella
was wonderfully economical. Take one simple matter; all their friends,
or at any rate the majority of them, had motors as a matter of course,
but Bella, when she was not driving, as she generally did, in a car lent
her by some kind acquaintance, contented herself with jobbing an
old-fashioned brougham.
This restraint was the more commendable inasmuch that a friend had
lately pointed out to her a way in which one could run a motor brougham
in town on almost nothing at all. One bought a second-hand car for about
seventy-five pounds; it was kept for one at a garage for fifteen
shillings a week, and one looked out for a gentleman chauffeur who loved
motoring for its own sake, and who had some little means of his own.
With care the whole thing need not cost more than a hundred and fifty
pounds the first year, and less the second. They could not afford to do
this just yet, though Bella was convinced it would be true economy, but
Oliver hoped to start something of the kind the following winter.
Of course Oliver was never exactly easy about money. Everything always
cost just a little more than he expected. It sounded absurd, and he
would not have said so to anyone but himself, but they had to live up to
Bella's reputation--that is, they had to go everywhere, and do
everything. Yet neither of them lacked proper pride. They differed from
some people they knew--that is, they did not (more than they could help)
live on their rich friends. Their only real extravagance last year had
been sharing a house during Goodwood week. That had let them in for a
great deal more than they had expected--in fact, not to put too fine a
point on it, they had been rooked, regularly rooked, and by people whom
they had thought their intimate friends!
Germaine sighed impatiently. This little uneasiness about money was the
one spot on a very bright sun. But he had no wish to confide this fact
to Fanny! Fanny would be certain to blame Bella. He remembered very
well, though she had apparently forgotten it, the way Fanny had behaved
at the time of his marriage.
The fact that the girl he wished so ardently to make his wife was lovely
(no one could have denied that even then), and quite sufficiently well
connected, had not counterbalanced, from the prudent sister's point of
view, Bella Arabin's lack of fortune and her having been brought up in
such a "mixed" place (whatever that might mean) as Southsea.
But Bella had never borne malice; and far from being spoilt or rendered
"uppish" by her sudden intoxicating success, Bella was, if anything,
nicer than before. She and Oliver were still devoted, still happier
together than apart; their quarrels, so far, had been only lovers'
quarrels....
Germaine grew restless--restless and tired. He had not had such a
thinking bout for a long time. Just as he reached Grosvenor Gate for the
fifth or sixth time, it struck a quarter-past one. In a sense there was
plenty of time, for they lunched at a quarter to two; he would give
Fanny ten more minutes and then go off home without her.
The young man looked round. Every bench was full, but there were plenty
of empty chairs. He dragged one of them forward, and placed it with its
back to a large tree. From there he could see everyone who came in and
out of the gate, and so he and Fanny would not lose a moment looking for
one another. But, though many went out, very few came in; the Park was
beginning to empty.
Suddenly two middle-aged women, the one very stout, the other very thin,
walked slowly through the gate. They struck across Germaine's line of
vision, and for a moment his dark eyes rested on them indifferently.
Then his gaze changed into something like attention, for he had a vague
impression of having seen the elder of these two women before. What was
more, he felt certain he had seen her in some vaguely unpleasant
connection.
For a moment he believed her to be one of the cook-housekeepers with
whom he and Bella had grappled during the earlier days of their married
life. But no, this short stout woman with the shrewd, powerful face
Germaine seemed to know, did not look like a servant. Even he could see
that her black clothes were handsome and costly, if rather too warm for
a fine July day. Her thin, nervous-looking companion was also dressed
with some pretension and research, but she lacked the other's look of
stout prosperity.
They were typical Londoners, of the kind to be seen on the route of
every Royal procession, and standing among the crowd outside the church
door at every fashionable marriage--women who, if they had lived in the
London of the Georges, would have walked a good many miles to see a
fellow-creature swing. But to Oliver Germaine they were simply a couple
of unattractive-looking women, one of whom he thought he had seen
before, and whose proximity was faintly disagreeable.
Germaine's mind had dwelt on them longer than it would otherwise have
done because, when just in front of him, they stopped short and
hesitated; then, looking round them much as Germaine himself had looked
round a few minutes before, and, the elder woman taking the lead, each
dragged a chair forward, and sat down a yard or so to the young man's
right, the trunk of the tree stretching its gnarled grey girth between.
Seven minutes of the ten Oliver meant to allow Fanny had now gone by,
and he felt inclined to cut the other three minutes short, and go
straight home. After all, it was too bad of her to be so unpunctual!
And then, striking on his ear, shreds of the conversation which was
taking place between the two women sitting near him began to penetrate
Oliver Germaine's brain. Names fell on his ear--Christian names,
surnames, with which he was familiar, evoking the personalities of men
and women with whom he was on terms of acquaintance, in some cases of
close friendship.
Unconsciously his clasped hands tightened on the knob of his stick, and
he caught himself listening--listening with a queer mixture of morbid
interest and growing disgust.
It was the elder woman who spoke the most, and she was a good speaker,
with that trick,--self-taught, instinctive,--of making the people of
whom she was speaking leap up before the listener. Now and again she was
interrupted by little shrieks of astonishment and horror--her
companion's way of paying tribute to the interesting nature of the
conversation.
How on earth--so Oliver Germaine asked himself with heating cheek--had
the woman obtained her peculiarly intimate knowledge of those of whom
she was speaking? The people, these men and women, especially women,
whose lives, the inner cores of whose existences, were being probed and
ruthlessly exposed, almost all belonged to the Germaines' own particular
set,--if indeed such a prosperous and popular couple as were Oliver and
Bella, could be said to have a particular set in that delightful world
into which they had only comparatively lately effected an entrance, and
of which the strands all intermingle the one with the other.
Germaine was too young, he had been too happy, he was too instinctively
kindly, to concern himself with other people's private affairs, save in
a wholly impersonal fashion. He had always avoided the hidden, unspoken
side of life; when certain secrets were confided to him they dropped
quickly out of his mind; ugly gossip passed him by.
Yet now he found himself listening to very ugly gossip; some feeling
outside himself, some instinct which for the moment mastered him, made
him stay on there, eavesdropping.