A SPOKE IN THE WHEEL
THE assurance that Hero loved him was not conveyed to Alistair in
words. It stole in upon him like faint scents rising from the earth
after a shower, and thrilled him almost unawares.
The note of passion was overlaid by higher and more intricate
harmonies. In Hero’s thoughts of Alistair there was a protecting
tenderness, like a mother’s for a child that has suffered some hurt;
and in Alistair’s thoughts of her there was a reverence and spiritual
yearning that made it seem profane to offer her the common coin of love.
When he sat beside her on some lonely stretch of sand or grass-clad
promontory, and saw the sea reflected in her eyes, like the star in the
wine-cup of Hafiz, he shrank instinctively from the thoughts that other
women had roused in him. For the first time he saw into the mind of the
ascetic, and shared its rebellion against Nature--Nature that roots
the flower of life in earth. A silence often fell on him in Hero’s
presence. He dreaded certain stages on the way in front of them, and
wished that they could have fallen asleep together, and waked up man
and wife.
The marriage of true minds, so rare and so desirable, made formal
marriage vulgar. There was something impossible in that astounding
ceremony by which society revealed its strain of primitive savagery.
How could a man and woman, sensitive to beautiful things, their hearts
vibrating with the awful music of creation, prank themselves out like
negroes at a fair, and march into a public building to advertise
mankind of what they were about to do? The marriage of true minds did
not admit impediments like these.
The thorns of life pressed less roughly against his spirit as he talked
with Hero. He opened his heart to her, and the bitterness within seemed
to be changed and softened under the tender light of sympathy. A
process of reconciliation went on without his understanding whither he
was being led.
And Hero found in Alistair that which her life had lacked hitherto--a
motive and an aim. For in the view of life in which she had been
trained there was, as Alistair told himself, no window; and Hero had
missed the window. She had sought it at St. Jermyn’s, and found only
the pale altar-lights of a past age guttering in their sockets. For
a brave, truthful heart like hers that was not enough. In Alistair’s
discontent, in his revolt against the social order that had condemned
him, she discerned his latent faith in a more beautiful order, of which
this triumphant one was the enemy.
Her woman’s instinct told her that every man’s life depends for
one-half of its happiness or its misery on the women he meets with.
The man who has met the right woman for him cannot be utterly cast
down. And so, as Alistair’s mother had foreseen, Hero’s love was
strengthened by the idea of devotion. She had the power to help this
wounded soldier, perhaps to nurse him back to strength again, and such
a mission was the best thing that life had yet offered her.
All this became part of their mutual consciousness as the days
stretched into weeks of happy summer, and Alistair still lingered, in
wayward mood, unwilling to exchange delicious expectation for dull
security. For the poet waking life has nothing that can quite match the
exquisite texture of his dream. And when at last he spoke he did so
rather sorrowfully, like one who says farewell.
Without having made any compact with each other, the lovers kept their
secret for a time.
Even Alistair’s mother, though she was watching and praying for the
end, could not feel sure that it had been reached. But there is one eye
keener than a mother’s, and that is a rival’s. The Home Secretary had
read with angry jealousy the letters in which the Duchess described the
growing intimacy between Alistair and Hero, and innocently indulged
her hopeful anticipations. He sought and obtained the Prime Minister’s
permission, and on the day that Parliament was prorogued he left
England for France.
Alistair went across to St. Malo to meet the English boat, and the
moment he saw him the Duke guessed the truth. The brothers had not been
really cordial for many years, though for their mother’s sake both
tried to keep up a conventional friendliness. But on this occasion
Alistair greeted his brother with an unaffected kindliness which sprang
from the new happiness in his heart. He was at peace with the world;
he wished to be at peace with Trent as well. He wanted to forget past
grudges, and to view his brother’s character and conduct towards him in
the most favourable light.
“I am so glad you have come, Trent,” he said heartily. “This place is
fairyland itself, without the ogres.”
“What about Sir Bernard Vanbrugh?”
“He is quite well. Do you mean, is he an ogre?”
Trent nodded. He knew something about the scientist.
“I have not found him very formidable so far,” Alistair said cheerfully.
His brother’s hint had made an impression on him nevertheless. He had
suspected for some time that it would not be all plain sailing with
Sir Bernard Vanbrugh, and this confirmation of his fears from another
quarter depressed him considerably.
Trent was satisfied. He saw that his brother had not yet spoken to
Hero’s father, although he might have spoken to Hero.
The Duchess was waiting at the villa to welcome her eldest son. Almost
the first thing she said to him was:
“I have asked the Vanbrughs to dine here to-night. I thought you would
like to see your old friend Hero.”
“Yes, I should like to see her,” the Home Secretary replied impassively.
The suspicious glance which Alistair darted at him was met and repelled
by the Minister’s reserve.
“I shouldn’t wonder if you liked Sir Bernard too,” the Duchess added.
“He is an extraordinary man. He seems to know almost all about
everything.”
“I have met him,” Trent said, with the same cold indifference. “He
impressed me as an extremely able man--a man of strong character.”
The Duchess waited till she and Trent were alone to broach the topic
that was engrossing her thoughts.
“I think all is going well,” she said. “They seem quite wrapped up in
each other. But I am still a little anxious about Alistair. The poor
boy seems to be so much ashamed of his disgrace; he has told me that he
does not think he is good enough for a girl like Hero Vanbrugh.”
“The question is what she thinks, isn’t it?”
“Yes; that is what I want you to tell him. You can put it better than I
can. A little encouragement from you just now might turn the scale. We
can save him--and you will help me, dear?”
“You haven’t said anything to her father, I suppose?”
“No.” The Duchess looked a little troubled. “He is not a man I should
find it easy to be confidential with. I think I am a little afraid of
him.”
“I think you are right,” pronounced the rejected suitor.
All the old bitterness had welled up again as his mother spoke. He, the
eldest son, the credit to the family, was welcomed by his mother simply
as an ally in the salvation of the young prodigal who had brought
disgrace upon their house. He was to encourage this ne’er-do-weel, who
at last showed some slight sense of his own worthlessness--to pat him
on the back, and bid him go forward and win the bride whom he, Trent,
had been refused.
“I wish you would sound Sir Bernard,” said the innocent Duchess.
Trent started. The suggestion chimed in so exactly with certain
dark suggestions of his own secret mind that he nearly betrayed his
exultation.
“I will do so if you wish,” he said, measuring out his words carefully,
so as to give his conscience no possible excuse thereafter for
reproaching him with treachery to his brother.
The Vanbrughs had not been in the house five minutes that night before
the Duke saw more than anyone else had seen. Every look that passed
across the table between Alistair and Hero told him that they had
nothing more to tell each other. He saw also that the physician had as
little suspicion of what had happened as if he had been a thousand
miles off all the time.
After dinner was over the lovers wandered down the garden paths and
the Duchess retired to her drawing-room. The Duke and Vanbrugh were
left sitting on the verandah over the coffee and cigars, of which only
Trent partook. The physician dealt as severely with himself as with his
patients, and the abstemious habits so long enforced by poverty had not
been departed from in prosperity.
The Home Secretary considered how he could make his attack most
crushing. An ingenious idea suggested itself.
“Do you think you have treated me quite fairly, Sir Bernard?” he asked
in an accent of mild reproach.
The physician turned and stared at him.
“In what way do you mean, Duke?”
“Am I not correct in saying that you declined me for a son-in-law
principally on the ground that I had the misfortune to be the brother
of Lord Alistair Stuart?”
“That was one of my strongest reasons, certainly--perhaps the
strongest. Well?”
“Well!”
The Duke waved his hand in the direction in which the lovers had
disappeared.
“I never said anything implying that I should object to make a friend
of your brother,” protested Sir Bernard hastily, trying to ward off the
unwelcome suggestion.
The Minister treated this evasion with contempt.
“My brother has been wiser than I, it appears. He has made sure of Miss
Vanbrugh’s consent before asking for yours.”
“I hope you are mistaken!” cried the father, now seriously alarmed. “I
am sure you must be. I know every thought in my daughter’s mind.”
“Is it possible that you, a wise man, can believe that?”
“I am certain that she has never had a secret from me before.”
“Then it is serious indeed.”
The justice of the remark silenced Vanbrugh. He struggled in vain to
resist the conviction that the Duke of Trent was right. A hundred
trifling indications of the understanding between the lovers returned
upon his mind, like water pouring in through a leak.
“Damn the young blackguard!” he growled. “He is just the sort that
attracts good women. They think that they can ‘save’ him. I ought to
have remembered that.”
Trent listened, anxious for some assurance that his warning would not
be thrown away.
“If I have made a mistake in speaking to you----” He spoke slowly, to
let the other interrupt him.
“You could not have done me a greater service, Duke. Even if you are
mistaken in thinking there is anything in it, I shan’t be the less
obliged to you for the warning.”
“I should not like Miss Vanbrugh or my brother to know that I had
interfered.”
“No one shall know. It is a matter entirely between ourselves.” The
Home Secretary breathed easily again. “After all, it was a mere
accident. You naturally thought I had seen as much as you.”
“I am afraid I spoke under the influence of jealousy,” Trent said,
determined to do the handsome thing by his conscience, now that all was
safe. “My mother had actually asked me to sound you as to the match.”
The word stung Sir Bernard.
“There will be no match,” he said decisively. “I will see to that.”
And Trent was satisfied.
When the Vanbrughs were leaving, an hour later, Sir Bernard declined,
a little curtly, Lord Alistair’s offer to walk round with them. He
watched the parting between Hero and Alistair, and made up his mind
that he must interfere at once.
In order to give greater weight to his action he formally told his
daughter before going to bed that he desired to speak to her before she
went out the next morning. Hero’s start and blush at the request showed
that she guessed its meaning.
The boast which the scientist had made, that he knew every thought
in his daughter’s mind, might have been made with more truth by Hero
about her father. She had never deluded herself about the view which
he would take of such a suitor as Lord Alistair Stuart. Now she spent
a restless night revolving in her mind how best to defend the man she
loved.
Sir Bernard passed a restless night also. The task of a father whose
daughter is motherless is a responsible and delicate one; and though
the physician had accustomed himself to speak more plainly to Hero than
most fathers speak to their daughters, he would have given a great deal
to have had a woman’s aid at this crisis.
Their conversation took place the next morning in the drawing-room of
the villa. The scientist missed his study, but the French seaside house
is built on the principle of parsimony in living-rooms and extravagance
in bedrooms. The villa contained sleeping accommodation for upwards of
twenty persons and a dining-room comfortably seating six.
“We have seen a great deal lately of Lord Alistair,” the father began
gravely, “and I am afraid I have been to blame in not noticing how much
you and he were together. I will not ask you whether you have seen his
evident admiration for you, but I hope it is not too late to caution
you against any serious inclination for him.”
“Who has been speaking to you about us?” demanded Hero, with a bright
spot on her cheeks.
Sir Bernard had not allowed for womanly intuition when he promised to
keep the Duke’s interference a secret.
He shook his head gravely as he answered:
“I see no good in discussing that. It is for you to tell me how matters
stand.”
“It was the Duke, of course,” Hero returned. “Paragons are always mean.
There was a time when I might have accepted him if he had asked me to.
But he is like the dog in the manger: he would not ask me himself, and
yet he grudges me to his brother.”
The scientist was weak enough to accept the gambit offered by his
adversary.
“You are doing the Duke an injustice,” he said. “As a matter of fact he
called on me some time ago in London, and asked me for your hand.”
Hero opened her eyes. It was a shock, and it could not be a
disagreeable one, to know that she had had such a suitor. In the light
of this revelation the tale-bearer was less harshly judged.
“What did you say to him? Why didn’t you tell me?” she exclaimed.
“I declined his proposal on medical grounds,” her father answered. “The
family stock is unsound.”
Hero began to see what she had to face, and her heart sank.
“I think you might have told me,” she said reproachfully.
“He came to ask my consent, not yours, and I told him I would not give
it. There was no reason that I could see for telling you.”
Hero looked her father in the face.
“Suppose he had come to me first, and I had accepted him?” she said.
The physician answered gravely:
“I should have had to ask you to choose between him and me.”
The clash of these two strong wills had come at last, and both were
silent for a time.
Vanbrugh was the first to resume.
“Every objection I had against the Duke of Trent, of course, applies
with ten-fold force to his brother. The Duke is physically sound;
he has personally escaped the taint of his family stock, and it is
possible that it may disappear in his descendants. But Lord Alistair
has inherited his father’s vices. He is an idler, a profligate, and I
might say a drunkard.”
“He has ceased to drink,” Hero protested. “I do not believe the life he
has been leading is his natural one. I am sure that if he were to marry
a woman who understood him he would become a changed man.”
“I do not believe in changed men,” her father answered. “But that is
not the point. I am not condemning Lord Alistair for the life he has
led up to the present. On the contrary, from my point of view of an
enlightened sociology, the sooner such a man exhausts his vital energy
the better.”
“You would have him commit suicide!” Hero exclaimed, with flashing eyes.
“I would have him commit suicide rather than marry, yes,” the scientist
responded firmly.
“I have promised to marry him.” Hero said the words with a calmness
which alarmed her father.
“Even if such a man could reform his conduct, he could not reform his
physical constitution,” the physician said, turning his eyes away from
his daughter’s face. “His children would be doomed, before their birth,
to disease and insanity. To bring such beings into the world is a crime
worse than murder, and will be dealt with as such as soon as society
has escaped from the thraldom of the priests.”
It was not the first time that Hero had heard her father express
similar sentiments. It was the personal application that was new--and
terrifying.
“If I do not marry Alistair I shall never marry anyone else,” she said,
after a tragic pause.
Sir Bernard glanced at her face, and saw it pale with resolution. He
became afraid.
“That would be a crime on your part. It is the duty of the sound to
marry, as much as it is the duty of the unsound to refrain.”
“Duty to whom?” asked Hero.
The question opened Vanbrugh’s eyes to the gulf that had come into
existence during the past few weeks between him and his daughter.
Hitherto Hero had been his child, and had looked at the world through
his eyes. Now she loved another better than him, and had learned to
look at the world through the eyes of the man she loved.
His answer was given without confidence.
“To society. To the order of Nature of which you are a part.”
“Society!” Hero’s tone breathed some of that scorn which she had caught
from Alistair in their intimate communion with one another. “Society!
that is the man in the street, isn’t it? Or is it the public?--the
British public expects every man to do his duty!” Some of the bitter
expressions that she had heard Alistair use came back to her with
unexpected force, and half unconsciously she defended him in his own
language. “The whole duty of man is to be one of a horde of drudges
toiling to make a millionaire. That is civilization, isn’t it?--the
social order to which we are all expected to conform. And the new
religion is that we are to marry and have healthy children, that this
great organized stupidity may go on for ever.”
Sir Bernard Vanbrugh recognized Lord Alistair’s voice, and bowed his
head in despair. “My daughter is lost to me,” he told himself. “I have
lost my daughter.”
Aloud he said:
“And your father? I have tried to be a good father to you, my dear.”
Hero was smitten to the heart. She went over to where her father sat,
and put an arm round his neck.
“I love you just the same,” was all she found it in her heart to say.
“I love you just the same.”