As she went up the stairs in the house in Tite Street, Brigit recalled
the occasion of her other visit there and shuddered. Poor Carron. Could
it have been partly her fault?
And that was her only tribute to his memory. Essentially selfish though
the girl was, she was no hypocrite, and it did not occur to her now to
make excuses for the man simply because he was dead.
But it had been just here at the turning of the dusty stairs that he had
waylaid her on her way down after her first love scene with Joyselle,
and she could not pass without recalling it.
Then she had been gloriously happy, feeling, because she and Victor
loved each other, that the world was theirs; now she came a
broken-willed, frightened woman, to plead with the man who had put her
out of his life, to take her back. She would tell him that no matter
what happened, she would never marry Théo, and--then, when he realised
that she meant this, she would beg him to take her back.
And remembering the last days she trembled.
She knocked at his door, and a short, familiar bark answered the sound.
Papillon. But-ter-fly.
Joyselle opened the door, which had been locked, and when he saw her,
his face, already sombre, darkened ominously.
"Brigitte--what do you want?" he asked, not offering to let her in.
Behind him, on a table, she saw his violin-case--unopened, and her heart
gave a glad hope. He had not been working. He had been, she hoped,
unable to work.
"May I come in, Victor?" she asked.
Still he did not move. "Why?" he asked uncompromisingly.
"Because I have things to tell you. Don't be afraid. I am not going to
make a scene----"
He drew aside, and she went in and closed the door. Papillon sprang at
her with delight, and she laughed sadly.
"_He_ is glad to see me," she said; "aren't you, Yellow Dog?"
Joyselle shrugged his shoulders and sitting down on the sofa lit a
cigarette. "Well?" he asked after a pause.
Brigit sat down by him and took off her gloves.
"Victor--why have things--been as they have been of late?"
"You know why."
"Because the father in you is stronger than the lover?"
"I have never been your lover," he retorted harshly, hurling the words
at her as if they had been an accusation.
She winced. "I am speaking English. Well--was it your loyalty to Théo
that--that changed you?"
"I have been loyal, have I not? _Juste ciel!_" Rising, he walked about
the great room, his hands clasped behind him. "My conduct was
magnificent, was it not? Don't quibble with words, Brigit. In plain
language, I was a scoundrel, a beast, and now I am trying to behave--not
like a gentleman, but like a decent man. And why you won't let me, I
don't know."
He was suffering, she saw with a sigh of relief.
"Then you still love me?" she asked coolly.
"Yes. Does a man change in a week? You are a child. Now tell me what you
have come for--if you have any object other than your usual one of
seeing how much I can endure, and then--go. I am strong, and you cannot
make me change my mind, and I--I despise you for trying to make of
me--the--_thing_ I was at one time. But I am not made of stone, and you
hurt me--almost too much."
His voice was very even and low-pitched, but she shrank back in her
corner and hastened to answer.
"You wrong me. I have not come to tempt you. I have come--to tell you
that nothing in the world nor out of it can induce me to marry Théo."
"You will not----"
"No, I will not marry him."
Papillon, who had unearthed a long-cherished bone in a dark corner under
a Dutch cabinet, dragged his treasure across the floor and laid it at
his master's feet with a pleased growl.
"You will not marry Théo?"
"No."
She had risen, and the two faced each other defiantly, while the little
dog between them wagged his tail with joy.
"Why?" asked Joyselle sharply.
"Because--I cannot. I have dawdled and dallied, and refused to face
things long enough. Now I see that the worst crime I could commit
against him would be to marry him. I love you. Whether you love me or
not, I love you, and I always shall. And I ask you as a great favour to
tell Théo for me that I cannot marry him."
"But what are you going to do?"
His voice trembled and he spoke very slowly.
"I am--going away. I don't know where. To Italy, probably, with the
Lenskys. And I shall, I daresay, marry in the course of time."
"Whom are you going to marry?" he cried furiously, forgetting that she
had just said that she loved him, and mad with jealousy.
She laughed. "_Qui sait?_ I don't. Possibly Lord Pontefract--he has just
come back from the Andes--possibly someone whom--you do not know."
"Then," returned Joyselle very quietly, "I will kill him."
And she could have laughed aloud.
"You will tell Théo?" she asked, picking up her gloves.
"No, I will not. I cannot. And you shall not go. Or, yes--Brigit--you
shall go--with me. If you will not marry him, then there is nothing
between us. I have fought, I have done my best, but I can bear no more.
We will go, you and I----"
Catching her in his arms he held her close, whispering incoherent,
broken words in her ear, while the little yellow dog, thinking it was a
game, snapped playfully at her trailing skirts.
"You will go with me, my woman? You and I alone, all alone? For ever and
ever and ever?"
And putting her arms round his neck she answered, "Yes, I will go with
you. For ever."