"The whole of me wants to escape," Nigel replied.
He looked about him. People were seeking "pleasure" in the darkness. He
saw them standing at street corners, watchfully staring lest they should
miss the form of joy. Cabs containing couples rolled by, disappeared
towards north and south, disappeared into the darkness.
"I want to get into the light."
"Well, there it is before us."
Isaacson pointed to the brilliant illumination of Piccadilly Circus.
"I want to get into the real light, the light of the sun, and I want
every one else to get into it too."
"You carry your moral enthusiasm into all the details of your life,"
exclaimed Isaacson. "Would you carry the world to Egypt?"
Nigel took his arm.
"It seems so selfish to go alone."
"Are you going alone?"
The question was forced from Isaacson. His mind had held it all the
evening, and now irresistibly expelled it into words.
Nigel's strong fingers closed more tightly on his arm.
"I don't want to go alone."
"I would far rather be alone than not have the exactly right
companion--some one who could think and feel with me, and in the sort of
way I feel. Any other companionship is destructive."
Isaacson spoke with less than his usual self-possession, and there were
traces of heat in his manner.
"Don't you agree with me?" he added, as Nigel did not speak.
"People can learn to feel alike."
"You mean that when two natures come together, the stronger eventually
dominates the weaker. I should not like to be dominated, nor should I
like to dominate. I love mutual independence combined with perfect
sympathy."
Even while he was speaking, he was struck by his own exigence, and
laughed, almost ironically.
"But where to find it!" he exclaimed. "Those are right who put up with
less. But you--I think you want more than I do, in a way."
He added that lessening clause, remembering, quite simply, how much more
brilliant he was than Nigel.
"I like to give to people who don't expect it," Nigel said. "How hateful
the Circus is!"
"Shall we take a cab to Cleveland Square?"
"Yes--I'll come in for a little."
When they were in the house, Nigel said:
"I want to thank you for your visit to Mrs. Chepstow."
He spoke abruptly, as a man does who has been for some time intending to
say a thing, and who suddenly, but not without some difficulty, obeys
his resolution.
"Why on earth should you thank me?"
"Because I asked you to go."
"Is Mrs. Chepstow still in London?"
"Yes. I saw her to-day. She talks of coming to Egypt for the winter."
"Cairo, I suppose?"
"I think she is sick of towns."
"Then no doubt she'll go up the Nile."
There was a barrier between them. Both men felt it acutely.
"If she goes--it is not quite certain--I shall look after her," said
Nigel.
Meyer Isaacson said nothing; and, after a silence that was awkward,
Nigel changed the conversation, and not long after went away. When he
was gone, Isaacson returned to his sitting-room upstairs and lit a
nargeeleh pipe. He had turned out all the electric burners except one,
and as he sat alone there in the small room, so dimly lighted, holding
the long, snake-like pipe-stem in his thin, artistic hands, he looked
like an Eastern Jew. With a fez upon his head, Europe would have dropped
from him. Even his expression seemed to have become wholly Eastern, in
its sombre, glittering intelligence, and in the patience of its craft.
"I shall look after her."
Said about a woman like Mrs. Chepstow by a man of Nigel's youth, and
strength, and temperament, that could only mean one of two things, a
liaison or a marriage. Which did it mean? Isaacson tried to infer from
Nigel's tone and manner. His friend had seemed embarrassed, had
certainly been embarrassed. But that might have been caused by something
in his, Isaacson's, look or manner. Though Nigel was enthusiastic and
determined, he was not insensitive to what was passing in the mind of
one he admired and liked. He perhaps felt Isaacson's want of sympathy,
even direct hostility. On the other hand, he might have been embarrassed
by a sense of some obscure self-betrayal. Often men talk of uplifting
others just before they fall down themselves. Was he going to embark on
a liaison with this woman whom he pitied? And was he ashamed of the deed
in advance?
A marriage would be such madness! Yet something in Isaacson at this
moment almost wished that Nigel contemplated marriage--his secret
admiration of the virtue in his friend. Such an act would be of a piece
with Nigel's character, whereas a liaison--and yet Nigel was no saint.
Isaacson thought what the world would say, and suddenly he knew the
reality of his affection for Nigel. The idea of the gossip pained,
almost shocked him; of the gossip and bitter truths. A liaison would
bring forth almost disgusted and wholly ironical laughter at the animal
passions of man, as blatantly shown by Nigel. And a marriage? Well, the
verdict on that would be, "Cracky!"
Isaacson's brain could not dispute the fact that there would be justice
in that verdict. Yet who does not secretly love the fighter for lost
causes?
"I shall look after her."
The expression fitted best the cruder, more sordid method of gaining
possession of this woman. And men seem made for falling.
The nargeeleh was finished, but still Isaacson sat there. Whatever
happened, he would never protest to Nigel. The _feu sacre_ in the man
would burn up protest. Isaacson knew that--in a way loved to know it.
Yet what tears lay behind--the tears for what is inevitable, and what
can only be sad! And he seemed to hear again the symphony which he had
heard that night with Nigel, the unyielding pulse of life, beautiful,
terrible, in its monotony; to hear its persistent throbbing, like the
beating of a sad heart--which cannot cease to beat.
Upon the window suddenly there came a gust of wild autumn rain. He got
up and went to bed.
X
Very seldom did Meyer Isaacson allow his heart to fight against the
dictates of his brain; more seldom still did he, presiding over the
battle, like some heathen god of mythology, give his conscious help to
the heart. But all men at times betray themselves, and some betrayals,
if scarcely clever, are not without nobility. Such a betrayal led him
upon the following day to send a note to Mrs. Chepstow, asking for an
appointment. "May I see you alone?" he wrote.
In the evening came an answer:
"Dear Doctor:
"I thought you had quite forgotten me. I have a pleasant
recollection of your visit in the summer. Indeed, it made me
understand for the first time that even a Bank Holiday need not be
a day of wrath and mourning. Do repeat your visit. And as I know
you are always so busy telling people how perfectly healthy they
are, come next Sunday to tea at five. I shall keep out the
clamouring crowd, so that we may discuss any high matter that
occurs to us."
Yours sincerely,
"Ruby Chepstow."
It was Wednesday when Isaacson read, and re-read, this note. He
regretted the days that must intervene before the Sunday came. For he
feared to repent his betrayal. And the note did not banish this fear.
More than once he did repent. Then he and Nigel met and again he gave
conscious help to his heart. He did not speak to Nigel of the projected
visit, and Nigel did not say anything more about Mrs. Chepstow. Isaacson
wondered at this reserve, which seemed to him unnatural in Nigel. More
than once he found himself thinking that Nigel regretted what he had
said about the possibility of Mrs. Chepstow visiting Egypt. But of this
he could not be sure. On Sunday, at a few minutes past five, he arrived
at the Savoy, and was taken to Mrs. Chepstow's room.
The autumn darkness had closed over London, and when he came into the
room, which was empty, the curtains were drawn, the light shone, a fire
was blazing on the hearth. Not far from it was placed a tea-table, close
to a big sofa which stood out at right angles from the wall.
There were quantities of white carnations in vases on the mantel-piece,
on the writing-table, and on the top of the rosewood piano. The piano
was shut, and no "Gerontius" was visible.
Meyer Isaacson stood for a moment looking round, feeling the atmosphere
of this room, or at least trying to feel it. In the summer had it not
seemed a little lonely, a little dreary, a chamber to escape from,
despite its comfort and pretty colours? Now it was bright, cosy, even
hopeful. Yes, he breathed a hopeful atmosphere.
A door clicked. Mrs. Chepstow came in.
She wore a rose-coloured dress, cut very high at the throat, with tight
sleeves that came partly over her hands, emphasizing their attractive
delicacy. The dress was very plainly made and seemed moulded to her
beautiful figure. She had no hat on, but Isaacson had never before been
so much struck by her height. As she came in, she looked immensely tall.
And there was some marked change in her appearance. For an instant he
did not know what it was. Then he saw that she had given to her cheeks
an ethereal flush of red. This altered her extraordinarily. It made her
look younger, more brilliant, but also much less refined. She smiled
gaily as she took his hand. She enveloped him at once with a definite
cheerfulness which came to him as a shock. As she held his hand, she
touched the bell. Then she drew him down on the sofa, with a sort of
coaxing cordiality.
"This shall be better than Bank Holiday," she said. "I know you pitied
me then. You wondered how I could bear it. Now I've shut out the river.
I'm glad you never came again till I could have the lights and the fire.
I love the English winters, don't you, because one has to do such
delicious things to keep all thought of them out. Now, in the hot places
abroad, that people are always raving about, all the year round one can
never have a room like this, an hour like this by a clear fire, with
thick curtains drawn--and a friend."
As she said the last three words, her voice had a really beautiful sound
in it, and a sound that was surely beautiful because of some moral
quality it contained or suggested. More than a whole essay of Emerson's
did this mere sound suggest friendship. The leaves of the book of this
woman's attractions were being turned one by one for Isaacson. And of
all her attractions her voice perhaps was the greatest.
The waiter came in with tea. When he had gone, the Doctor could speak.
But he scarcely knew what to say. Very seldom was his self-possession
disturbed. To-day he felt at a disadvantage. The depression, perhaps
chiefly physical, which had lately been brooding over him, and which had
become acute at the concert, deepened about him to-day, made him feel
morally small. Mrs. Chepstow's cheerfulness seemed like height. For a
moment in all ways she towered above him, and even her bodily height
seemed like a mental triumph, or a triumph of her will over his.
"But this is only autumn," he said.
"We can pretend it is winter."
She gave him his cup of tea, with the same gesture that had charmed
Nigel on the day when he first visited her. Then she handed him a plate
with little bits of lemon on it.
"I've found out your tastes, you see. I know you never take milk."
He was obliged to feel grateful. Yet something in him longed to refuse
the lemon, the something that never ceased from denouncing her. He
uttered the right banality:
"How good of you to bother about me!"
"But you bother about me, and on your only free day! Don't you think I
am grateful to you?"
There was no mockery in her voice. Today her irony was concealed, but,
like a carefully-covered fire, he knew it was burning still. And because
it was covered he resented it. He resented this comedy they were
playing, the insincerity into which she was smilingly leading him. She
could not imagine that she deceived him. She was far too clever for
that. Then what was the good of it all?--that she had put him, that she
kept him, at a disadvantage.
She handed him the muffins. She ministered to him as if she wanted to
pet him. Again he had to feel grateful. Even in acute dislike men must
be conscious of real charm in a woman. And Isaacson did not know how to
ignore anything that was beautiful. Had the Devil come to him--with a
grace, he must have thought, "How graceful is the Devil!" Now he was
charmed by her gesture. Nevertheless, being a man of will, and, in the
main, a man who was very sincere, he called up his hard resolutions, and
said:
"No, I don't think you are grateful. I don't think you are the woman to
be grateful without a cause."
"Or with one," he mentally added.
"But here is the cause!"
She touched his sleeve. And suddenly, with that touch, all her charm for
him vanished, and he was angry with her for daring to treat him like
those boys by whom she had been surrounded, for daring to think that she
could play upon the worst in him.
"I'm afraid you are mistaken," he said. "I am no cause for your
gratitude."
She looked more cordial and natural even than before.
"But I think you are. For you don't really like me, and yet you come to
see me. That is unselfishness."
"Only supposing what you say were true, and that you did like me."
"I do like you."
She said it quite simply, without emphasis. And even to him it sounded
true.
"Some day perhaps you will know it."
"But--I do not believe it."
He had recovered from the stroke of her greatest weapon, her voice.
"That does not matter. What is matters, not what some one thinks is, or
is not."
"Yes," he said. "What is matters. I have come here, not to pay a formal
call, or even a friendly visit, but, perhaps, to commit an
impertinence."
She smilingly moved her head, and handed him her cigarette-case.
"No, you would never do that."
He hesitated to take a cigarette--and now her bright eyes frankly mocked
him, and said, "A cigarette commits you to nothing!" Certainly she knew
how to make him feel almost like an absurd and awkward boy; or was it
his feeling of overwork, of physical depression, that was disarming him
today?
"Thank you."
He lighted a cigarette, and she lighted another, still with a happy air.
"How do you know that?" he asked.
"I feel it."
With a little laugh, she reminded him of his saying about women.
"You are wrong. I am going to do it," he said.
"But--do you really think it an impertinence?"
He was beset by his sensitive dislike to mix in other people's affairs,
but almost angrily he overcame it.
"I don't know. You may. Mrs. Chepstow, you were raving just now about
the delights of the English winter--"
"Shut out!" she interpolated.
"Then why should you avoid them?"
"And who says I am going to?"
"Are not you going to Egypt?"
She settled herself in the angle of the sofa.
"Would it be the wrong climate for me, Doctor Isaacson?"