PERPLEXING QUESTIONS
There was no chance of withdrawal for either. If Ralph had caught a
glimpse of Dorothy earlier, he would have hidden himself and let her
pass; but there was no possibility of that now. He could only stand
still and wait. Would she recognise him, or would she cut him dead? It
was an interesting moment--from his point of view, almost tragic.
Wildly as his heart was beating, he could not help noticing that she
looked thin and pale, as though she had recovered from a recent illness.
She came straight on, not hesitating for a moment, and his heart seemed
to beat all the more tumultuously with every step she took.
If in the long months that had elapsed since he saw her last he had
grown for a moment indifferent, his passion flamed up again to a white
heat at the first glimpse of her face. For him there was no other woman
on earth. Her beauty had increased with the passing of the years; her
character, strengthened and ennobled by suffering, showed itself in
every line of her finely expressive face.
It was a trying moment for both, and perhaps more trying for Dorothy
than for Ralph. For good or ill she knew that this young man had
affected her whole life. He had crossed her path in the most critical
moments of her existence. He had spoken words almost at haphazard which
had changed the whole current of her thoughts. He had dared even to tell
her that he loved her, when influence was being brought to bear on her
to bestow her affection in another direction.
There were moments when she felt half angry that she was unable to
forget him. He was out of her circle, and it seemed madness to let his
image remain in her heart for a single moment, and yet the fascination
of his personality haunted her. He was like no other man she had ever
met. His very masterfulness touched her fancy as nothing had ever done
before. If only he had been of her own set she would have made a hero of
him.
When she left him in the Park after that passionate outburst of his, she
made up her mind that she must forget him--utterly and absolutely. The
situation had become dangerous; her heart was throbbing so wildly that
she could scarcely bear it; the tense glow and passion of his words rang
through her brain like the clashing of bells; her nerves were tingling
to her finger-tips.
"Oh, what madness all this is," she said to herself--"what utter
madness!" And yet all the while her heart seemed to be leaping
exultantly. This clever, daring, handsome democrat loved her--loved her.
She lingered over the words unconsciously.
Lord Probus had said he loved her, and had tempted her with a thousand
brilliant toys; Archie Temple--with whom she had walked in the Park more
than once--had professed unbounded and undying devotion; but her heart
had never leaped for a moment in response to their words. The only man
who moved her against her will, and sent the blood rushing through her
veins like nectar, was this son of the people, this man who hated her
class and tried his best to hate her.
Nevertheless, her resolve was fixed and definite. She must forget him.
Unless she put him out of her thoughts he would spoil her whole life.
Socially, they belonged to different hemispheres. The fact that her
father was hard pressed for money, and was living abroad in order to
economise, did not alter their relative positions. A Hamblyn was still a
Hamblyn, though he lived in an almshouse.
It was easier, however, to make good resolves than to carry them into
effect. Events would not allow her to forget. As the companion and
private secretary of the Dowager Duchess of Flint, she had to read the
papers every day, and not only the political articles, but the
commercial and financial. The success of the Great St. Goram Mine was
talked of far and wide, and the new discoveries of Ralph Penlogan, the
brilliant young chemist and mineralogist, were the theme of numberless
newspaper articles. Dorothy found herself searching all the papers that
came her way for some mention of his name, and her heart seemed to leap
into her mouth every time she saw it in print.
The dowager often dabbled in stocks and shares for want of something
better to do. She liked to have what she called a "flutter" now and
then, and she managed to pick up a few Great St. Goram shares at eighty
per cent. premium.
It came out one day in conversation that Dorothy knew the exact locality
of Great St. Goram Mine, knew the young man who had made the discovery,
knew all about the place and all about the people, in fact. The
dowager's interest grew. She began to make inquiries, and finally
decided to rent Hamblyn Manor for a year. Dorothy was in a transport of
excitement. To go back again to the dear old home would be like heaven,
even though her father and Geoffrey were not there.
But that was not all. She would see Ralph Penlogan again--that would be
inevitable. It seemed as though the Fates had determined to throw them
together. The battle was not ended yet, it was only beginning.
The second day after their arrival at Hamblyn Manor she went for a long
walk through the plantation. It was a lovely afternoon. The summer glory
lay upon land and sea. She stood still for several moments when she came
to the spot where she had found Ralph Penlogan lying senseless. How
vividly every circumstance came up before her, how well she remembered
his half-conscious talk. She did not see Ralph leaning against the stile
when she pushed open the gate, and yet she half expected he would be
there. It was the place where they first met, and Fate, or Destiny, or
Providence, had a curious way of bringing them together, and she would
have to face the inevitable, whatever it might be.
She was not in the least surprised when she caught sight of him, nor did
she feel any inclination to turn back. Life was being shaped for her.
She was in the grasp of a power stronger than her own will.
She looked at him steadily, and her face paled a little. He had altered
considerably. He looked older by several years. He was no longer a
youth, he was a man with the burden of life pressing upon him. Time had
sobered him, softened him, mellowed him, greatened him.
Ought she to recognise him? For recognition would mean condoning his
daring, and if she condoned him once, he might dare again, and he looked
strong enough and resolute enough to dare anything.
She never quite decided in her mind what she ought to do. She remembered
distinctly enough what she did. She smiled at him in her most gracious
and winning manner and passed on. She half expected to hear footsteps
behind her, but he did not follow. He watched her till she had turned
the brow of the hill toward St. Goram, then he retraced his steps in the
direction of his home.
He too had a feeling that it was of no use fighting against Fate. Events
would have to take their course. She was not lost to him yet, and her
smile gave him fresh hope.
He found the house empty when he got home, save for the housemaid. Ruth
was out with William somewhere.
Ralph threw himself into an easy-chair and closed his eyes. His heart
was beating strangely fast, his hands shook in spite of himself. The
sight of Dorothy was like a match to stubble. He wondered if her beauty
appealed to other people as it did to him.
Then a new question suggested itself to him, or an old question came up
in a new form. To tell Dorothy Hamblyn that he loved her was one thing,
to make love to her was another. Should he dare the second? He had dared
the first, not with any hope of winning her, but rather to demonstrate
to himself the folly of any such suggestion. But circumstances alter
cases, and circumstances had changed with him. He was no longer poor. He
could give her all the comforts she had ever known. As for the rest, her
name, her family pride, her patrician blood, her aristocratic
connections, they did not count with him. To ask a woman reared in
comfort and luxury to share poverty and hardship and want was what he
would never do. But the question of ways and means being disposed of,
nothing else mattered. He was a man and an Englishman. He had lived
honestly, and had kept his conscience clean.
He believed in an aristocracy, as most people do, but the aristocracy he
believed in was the aristocracy of character and brains. He did not
despise money, but he despised the people who made it their god, and who
were prepared to sell their souls for its possession. To have a noble
ancestry was a great thing; there was something in blood, but a man was
not necessarily great because his father was a lord. The lower orders
did not all live in hovels, some of them lived in mansions. All fools
did not wear fustian, some of them wore fur-lined coats and drove
motor-cars; the things that mattered were heart and intellect. A man
might drop his "h's" and be a gentleman. The test of worth and manhood
was not the size of a man's bank balance, but the manner of his life.
Sir John Hamblyn boasted of his pedigree and was proud of his title, and
yet, to put it in its mildest form, he had played the fool for twenty
years.
Ralph got up from his seat at length and walked out into the garden. He
had not felt so restless and excited for a year. The affairs of Great
St. Goram Mine passed completely out of his mind. He could think only of
one thing at a time, and just then Dorothy Hamblyn seemed of more
importance than anything else on earth.
Up and down the garden paths he walked with bare head and his hands in
his pockets. Now and then his brows contracted, and now and then his
lips broke into a smile. The situation had its humorous as well as its
serious side.
"If she had been the daughter of anybody else!" he said to himself again
and again.
But outweighing everything else was the fact that he loved her. He could
not help it that she was the daughter of the man who had been his
greatest enemy. He could not help it that she belonged to a social
circle that had little or no dealings with his own. Love laughs at bolts
and bars. He was a man with the rights of a man and the hopes of a man.
Before Ruth returned he had made up his mind what to do.
Meanwhile, Dorothy was sauntering slowly homeward in a brown study. She
felt anything but sure of herself. She hoped she had done the right
thing in recognising Ralph Penlogan, but her heart and her head were not
in exact agreement. The conventions of society were very strict. The
Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans.
"If only Ralph Penlogan had been in her circle," and her heart leaped
suddenly at the thought. How handsome he was, how resolute, how clever!
Unconsciously she compared him with her brother Geoffrey, with Archie
Temple, and with a number of other young men she had met in the
drawing-rooms of London society.
The duchess had urged her to be friendly with Archie Temple. He was such
a nice young man. He was well connected, was, in fact, the nephew of an
earl, and was in receipt of a handsome salary which a generous
Government paid him for doing nothing. He was a type of a great many
others, impecunious descendants, many of them, of younger
sons--drawling, effeminate, shallow-pated nobodies. Socially, of course,
they belonged to what is called society printed with a capital S, but
that was the highest testimonial that could be given them.
Dorothy found herself unconsciously revolting against the conventional
view of life and the ethics of the social Ten Commandments. Were the
mere accidents of birth the only things to be considered? Was a man less
noble because he was born in a stable and cradled in a manger? Did
greatness consist in possessing an estate and a title? Was worth to be
measured by the depth of a man's pocket?
Measured by any true standard, she felt instinctively that Ralph
Penlogan overtopped every other man she had met. How bravely he had
fought, how patiently he had endured, how gloriously he had triumphed.
If achievement counted for anything, if to live purely and do something
worthy were the hall-marks of a gentleman, then he belonged to the
world's true aristocracy, he was worth all the Archie Temples of London
rolled into one.
Before she reached Hamblyn Manor another question was hammering at her
brain--
"Did Ralph Penlogan still love her?"
She looked apprehensively right and left, and was half afraid lest her
thoughts should take shape and reveal themselves to other people.
What would people think if they knew she had put such a question to
herself? Had she forgotten that she was the daughter of Sir John
Hamblyn?
No, she had not forgotten; but she was learning the truth that true
worth is not in title, or name, or fortune; that neither coronet nor
crown can make men; that fools clad in sables are fools still, and
rogues in mansions are still rogues.
The love of a man like Ralph Penlogan was not a thing to resent. It was
something to be proud of and to be grateful for.
She retired to rest that night with a strange feeling of wonder in her
heart. She was still uncertain of herself.
"Suppose Ralph Penlogan still loved her, and suppose----" She hid her
face in the bedclothes and blushed in spite of herself.
He was fearless, she knew, and unconventional, and had no respect for
names, or titles, or pedigrees as such. Moreover, he was not the man to
be discouraged by small obstacles or turned aside by feeble excuses, and
if he chose to cross her path she could not very well avoid him. The
place was comparatively small, the walks were few, and during this
glorious weather she could not dream of remaining indoors.
She had encouraged him that afternoon by recognising him. She had smiled
at him in her most gracious way; and so, of course, he would know that
she had forgiven him for speaking to her as he had done when last they
met. And if he should seek her out; if, in his impetuous way, he should
tell her he loved her still; if he should ask for an answer, and for an
immediate answer. If--if----
She was still wondering when she fell asleep.