'TWIXT SEA AND SKY
Myra never forgot Jim Airth's prayer. Instinctively she knew it to be the
first time he had voiced his soul's thanksgiving or petitions in the
presence of another. Also she realised that, for the first time in her
whole life, prayer became to her a reality. As she crouched on the ledge
beside him, shaking uncontrollably, so that, but for his arm about her,
she must have lost her balance and fallen; as she heard that strong soul
expressing in simple unorthodox language its gratitude for life and
safety, mingled with earnest petition for keeping through the night and
complete deliverance in the morning; it seemed to Myra that the heavens
opened, and the felt presence of God surrounded them in their strange
isolation.
An immense peace filled her. By the time those disjointed halting
sentences were finished, Myra had ceased trembling; and when Jim Airth,
suddenly at a loss how else to wind up his prayer, commenced "Our Father,
Who art in heaven," Myra's sweet voice united with his, full of an
earnest fervour of petition.
At the final words, Jim Airth withdrew his arm, and a shy silence fell
between them. The emotion of the mind had awakened an awkwardness of
body. In that uniting "_Our_ Father," their souls had leapt on, beyond
where their bodies were quite prepared to follow.
Lady Ingleby saved the situation. She turned to Jim Airth, with that
impulsive sweetness which could never be withstood. In the rapidly
deepening twilight, he could just see the large wistful grey eyes, in the
white oval of her face.
"Do you know," she said, "I really couldn't possibly sit all night, on a
ledge the size of a Chesterfield sofa, with a person I had to call 'Mr.'
I could only sit there with an old and intimate friend, who would
naturally call me 'Myra,' and whom I might call 'Jim.' Unless I may call
you 'Jim,' I shall insist on climbing down and swimming home. And if you
address me as 'Mrs. O'Mara,' I shall certainly become hysterical, and
tumble off!"
"Why of course," said Jim Airth. "I hate titles of any kind. I come of an
old Quaker stock, and plain names with no prefixes always seem best to
me. And are we not old and trusted friends? Was not each of those minutes
on the face of the cliff, a year? While that second which elapsed between
the slipping of my knife from my right hand and the catching of it,
against my knee, by my left, may go at ten years! Ah, think if it had
dropped altogether! No, don't think. We were barely half way up. Now you
must contrive to put on your shoes and stockings." He produced them from
his pocket. "And then we must find out how to place ourselves most
comfortably and safely. We have but one enemy to fight during the next
seven hours--cramp. You must tell me immediately if you feel it
threatening anywhere, I have done a lot of scouting in my time, and know
a dodge or two. I also know what it is to lie in one position for hours,
not daring to move a muscle, the cold sweat pouring off my face, simply
from the agonies of cramp. We must guard against that."
"Jim," said Myra, "how long shall we have to sit here?"
He made a quick movement, as if the sound of his name from her lips for
the first time, meant much to him; and there was in his voice an added
depth of joyousness, as he answered:
"It would be impossible to climb from here to the top of the cliff. When
I came down, I had a sheer drop of ten feet. You see the cliff slightly
overhangs just above us. So far as the tide is concerned we might clamber
down in three hours; but there is no moon, and by then, it will be pitch
dark. We must have light for our descent, if I am to land you safe and
unshaken at the bottom. Dawn should be breaking soon after three. The sun
rises to-morrow at 3.44; but it will be quite light before then. I think
we may expect to reach the Moorhead Inn by 4 A.M. Let us hope Miss
Murgatroyd will not be looking out of her window, as we stroll up the
path."
"What are they all thinking now?" questioned Lady Ingleby.
"I don't know, and I don't care," said Jim Airth, gaily. "You're alive,
and I'm alive; and we've done a record climb! Nothing else matters."
"No, but seriously, Jim?"
"Well, seriously, it is very unlikely that I shall be missed at all. I
often dine elsewhere, and let myself in quite late; or stop out
altogether. How about you?"
"Why, curiously enough," said Myra, "before coming out I locked my
bedroom door. I have the key here. I had left some papers lying about--I
am not a very tidy person. On the only other occasion upon which I locked
my door, I omitted dinner altogether, and went to bed on returning from
my evening walk. I am supposed to be doing a 'rest-cure' here. The maid
tried my door, went away, and did not turn up again until next morning.
Most likely she has done the same to-night."
"Then I don't suppose they will send out a search-party," said Jim
Airth.
"No. We are so alone down here. We only matter to ourselves," said Myra.
"And to each other," said Jim Airth, quietly.
Myra's heart stood still.
Those four words, spoken so simply by that deep tender voice, meant more
to her than any words had ever meant. They meant so much, that they made
for themselves a silence--a vast holy temple of wonder and realisation
wherein they echoed back and forth, repeating themselves again and
again.
The two on the ledge sat listening.
The chant of mutual possession, so suddenly set going, was too beautiful
a thing to be interrupted by other words.
Even Lady Ingleby's unfailing habit of tactful speech was not allowed to
spoil the deep sweetness of this unexpected situation. Myra's heart was
waking; and when the heart is stirred, the mind sometimes forgets to be
tactful.
At length:--"Don't you remember," he said, very low, "what I told you
before we began to climb? Did I not say, that if we succeeded in reaching
the ledge safely, we should owe our lives to each other? Well, we did;
and--we do."
"Ah, no," cried Myra, impulsively. "No, Jim Airth! You--glad, and safe,
and free--were walking along the top of these cliffs. I, in my senseless
folly, lay sleeping on the sand below, while the tide rose around me. You
came down into danger to save me, risking your life in so doing. I owe
you my life, Jim Airth; you owe me nothing."
The man beside her turned and looked at her, with his quiet whimsical
smile.
"I am not accustomed to have my statements amended," he said, drily.
It was growing so dark, they could only just discern each other's faces.
Lady Ingleby laughed. She was so unused to that kind of remark, that, at
the moment she could frame no suitable reply.
Presently:--"I suppose I really owe my life to my scarlet parasol," she
said. "Had it not attracted your attention, you would not have seen me."
"Should I not?" questioned Jim Airth, his eyes on the white loveliness of
her face. "Since I saw you first, on the afternoon of your arrival, have
you ever once come within my range of vision without my seeing you, and
taking in every detail?"
"On the afternoon of my arrival?" questioned Lady Ingleby, astonished.
"Yes," replied Jim Airth, deliberately. "Seven o'clock, on the first of
June. I stood at the smoking-room window, at a loose end of all things;
sick of myself, dissatisfied with my manuscript, tired of fried
fish--don't laugh; small things, as well as great, go to make up the sum
of a man's depression. Then the gate swung back, and YOU--in golden
capitals--the sunlight in your eyes, came up the garden path. I judged
you to be a woman grown, in years perhaps not far short of my own age; I
guessed you a woman of the world, with a position to fill, and a
knowledge of men and things. Yet you looked just a lovely child, stepping
into fairy-land; the joyful surprise of unexpected holiday danced in your
radiant eyes. Since then, the beautiful side of life has always been
you--YOU, in golden capitals."
Jim Airth paused, and sat silent.
It was quite dark now.
Myra slipped her hand into his, which closed upon it with a strong
unhesitating clasp.
"Go on, Jim," she said, softly.
"I went out into the hall, and saw your name in the visitors' book. The
ink was still wet. The handwriting was that of the holiday-child--I
should like to set you copies! The name surprised me--agreeably. I had
expected to be able at once to place the woman who had walked up the
path. It was a surprise and a relief to find that my Fairy-land Princess
was not after all a fashionable beauty or a society leader, but owned
just a simple Irish name, and lived at a Lodge."
"Go on, Jim," said Lady Ingleby, rather tremulously.
"Then the name 'Shenstone' interested me, because I know the Inglebys--at
least, I knew Lord Ingleby, well; and I shall soon know Lady Ingleby. In
fact I have written to-day asking for an interview. I must see her on
business connected with notes of her husband's which, if she gives
permission, are to be embodied in my book. I suppose if you live near
Shenstone Park you know the Inglebys?"
"Yes," said Myra. "But tell me, Jim; if--if you noticed so much that
first day; if you were--interested; if you wanted to set me copies--yes,
I know I write a shocking hand;--why would you never look at me? Why were
you so stiff and unfriendly? Why were you not as nice to me as you were
to Susie, for instance?"
Jim Airth sat long in silence, staring out into the darkness. At last he
said:
"I want to tell you. Of course, I _must_ tell you. But--may I ask a few
questions first?"
Lady Ingleby also gazed unseeingly into the darkness; but she leaned a
little nearer to the broad shoulder beside her. "Ask me what you will,"
she said. "There is nothing, in my whole life, I would not tell you, Jim
Airth."
Her cheek was so close to the rough Norfolk jacket, that if it had moved
a shade nearer, she would have rested against it. But it did not move;
only, the clasp on her hand tightened.
"Were you married very young?" asked Jim Airth.
"I was not quite eighteen. It is ten years ago."
"Did you marry for love?"
There was a long silence, while both looked steadily into the darkness.
Then Myra answered, speaking very slowly. "To be quite honest, I think I
married chiefly to escape from a very unhappy home. Also I was very
young, and knew nothing--nothing of life, and nothing of love; and--how
can I explain, Jim Airth?--I have not learnt much during these ten long
years."
"Have you been unhappy?" He asked the question very low.
"Not exactly unhappy. My husband was a very good man; kind and patient,
beyond words, towards me. But I often vaguely felt I was missing the Best
in life. Now--I know I was."
"How long have you been--How long has he been dead?" The deep voice was
so tender, that the question could bring no pain.
"Seven months," replied Lady Ingleby. "My husband was killed in the
assault on Targai."
"At Targai!" exclaimed Jim Airth, surprised into betraying his
astonishment. Then at once recovering himself: "Ah, yes; of course. Seven
months. I was there, you know."
But, within himself, he was thinking rapidly, and much was becoming
clear.
Sergeant O'Mara! Was it possible? An exquisite refined woman such as
this, bearing about her the unmistakable hall-mark of high birth and
perfect breeding? The Sergeant was a fine fellow, and superior--but, good
Lord! _Her_ husband! Yet girls of eighteen do foolish things, and repent
ever after. A runaway match from an unhappy home; then cast off by her
relations, and now left friendless and alone. But--Sergeant O'Mara! Yet
no other O'Mara fell at Targai; and there _was_ some link between him and
Lord Ingleby.
Then, into his musing, came Myra's soft voice, from close beside him, in
the darkness: "My husband was always good to me; but----"
And Jim Airth laid his other hand over the one he held. "I am sure he
was," he said, gently. "But if you had been older, and had known more of
love and life you would have done differently. Don't try to explain. I
understand."
And Myra gladly left it at that. It would have been so very difficult to
explain further, without explaining Michael; and all that really mattered
was, that--with or without explanation--Jim Airth understood.
"And now--tell me," she suggested, softly.
"Ah, yes," he said, pulling himself together, with an effort. "My
experience also misses the Best, and likewise covers ten long years. But
it is a harder one than yours. I married, when a boy of twenty-one, a
woman, older than myself; supremely beautiful. I went mad over her
loveliness. Nothing seemed to count or matter, but that. I knew she was
not a good woman, but I thought she might become so; and even if she
didn't it made no difference. I wanted her. Afterwards I found she had
laughed at me, all the time. Also, there had all the time been
another--an older man than I--who had laughed with her. He had not been
in a position to marry her when I did; but two years later, he came into
money. Then--she left me."
Jim Airth paused. His voice was hard with pain. The night was very black.
In the dark silence they could hear the rhythmic thunder of the waves
pounding monotonously against the cliff below.
"I divorced her, of course; and he married her; but I went abroad, and
stayed abroad. I never could look upon her as other than my wife. She had
made a hell of my life; robbed me of every illusion; wrecked my ideals;
imbittered my youth. But I had said, before God, that I took her for my
wife, until death parted us; and, so long as we were both alive, what
power could free me from that solemn oath? It seemed to me that by
remaining in another hemisphere, I made her second marriage less sinful.
Often, at first, I was tempted to shoot myself, as a means of righting
this other wrong. But in time I outgrew that morbidness, and realised
that though Love is good, Life is the greatest gift of all. To throw it
away, voluntarily, is an unpardonable sin. The suicide's punishment
should be loss of immortality. Well, I found work to do, of all sorts, in
America, and elsewhere. And a year ago--she died. I should have come
straight home, only I was booked for that muddle on the frontier they
called 'a war.' I got fever after Targai; was invalided home; and here I
am recruiting and finishing my book. Now you can understand why
loveliness in a woman, fills me with a sort of panic, even while a part
of me still leaps up instinctively to worship it. I had often said to
myself that if I ever ventured upon matrimony again, it should be a plain
face, and a noble heart; though all the while I knew I should never bring
myself really to want the plain face. And yet, just as the burnt child
dreads the fire, I have always tried to look away from beauty. Only--my
Fairy-land Princess, may I say it?--days ago I began to feel certain that
in you--YOU in golden capitals--the loveliness and the noble heart went
together. But from the moment when, stepping out of the sunset, you
walked up the garden path, right into my heart, the fact of YOU, just
being what you are, and being here, meant so much to me, that I did not
dare let it mean more. Somehow I never connected you with widowhood; and
not until you said this evening on the shore: 'I am a soldier's widow,'
did I know that you were free.--There! Now you have heard all there is to
hear. I made a bad mistake at the beginning; but I hope I am not the sort
of chap you need mind sitting on a ledge with, and calling 'Jim'."
For answer, Myra's cheek came trustfully to rest against the sleeve of
the rough tweed coat. "Jim," she said; "Oh, Jim!"
* * * * *
Presently: "So you know the Inglebys?" remarked Jim Airth.
"Yes," said Myra.
"Is 'The Lodge' near Shenstone Park?"
"The Lodge is _in_ the park. It is not at any of the gates.--I am not a
gate-keeper, Jim!--It is a pretty little house, standing by itself, just
inside the north entrance."
"Do you rent it from them?"
Myra hesitated, but only for the fraction of a second. "No; it is my own.
Lord Ingleby gave it to me."
"_Lord_ Ingleby?" Jim Airth's voice sounded like knitted brows. "Why not
_Lady_ Ingleby?"
"It was not hers, to give. All that is hers, was his."
"I see. Which of them did you know first?"
"I have known Lady Ingleby all my life," said Myra, truthfully; "and I
have known Lord Ingleby since his marriage."
"Ah. Then he became your friend, because he married her?"
Myra laughed. "Yes," she said. "I suppose so."
"What's the joke?"
"Only that it struck me as an amusing way of putting it; but it is
undoubtedly true."
"Have they any children?"
Myra's voice shook slightly. "No, none. Why do you ask?"
"Well, in the campaign, I often shared Lord Ingleby's tent; and he used
to talk in his sleep."
"Yes?"
"There was one name he often called and repeated."
Lady Ingleby's heart stood still.
"Yes?" she said, hardly breathing.
"It was 'Peter'," continued Jim Airth. "The night before he was killed,
he kept turning in his sleep and saying: 'Peter! Hullo, little Peter!
Come here!' I thought perhaps he had a little son named Peter."
"He had no son," said Lady Ingleby, controlling her voice with effort.
"Peter was a dog of which he was very fond. Was that the only name he
spoke?"
"The only one I ever heard," replied Jim Airth.
Then suddenly Lady Ingleby clasped both hands round his arm.
"Jim," she whispered, brokenly, "Not once have you spoken my name. It was
a bargain. We were to be old and intimate friends. I seem to have been
calling you 'Jim' all my life! But you have not yet called me 'Myra,' Let
me hear it now, please."
Jim Airth laid his big hand over both of hers.
"I can't," he said. "Hush! I can't. Not up here--it means too much. Wait
until we get back to earth again. Then--Oh, I say! Can't you help?"
This kind of emotion was an unknown quantity to Lady Ingleby. So was the
wild beating of her own heart. But she knew the situation called for
tact, and was not tactful speech always her special forte?
"Jim," she said, "are you not frightfully hungry? I should be; only I had
an enormous tea before coming out. Would you like to hear what I had for
tea? No. I am afraid it would make you feel worse. I suppose dinner at
the inn was over, long ago. I wonder what variation of fried fish they
had, and whether Miss Susannah choked over a fish-bone, and had to be
requested to leave the room. Oh, do you remember that evening? You looked
so dismayed and alarmed, I quite thought you were going to the rescue! I
wonder what time it is?"
"We can soon tell that," said Jim Airth, cheerfully. He dived into his
pocket, produced a matchbox which he had long been fingering turn about
with his pipe and tobacco-pouch, struck a light, and looked at his watch.
Myra saw the lean brown face, in the weird flare of the match. She also
saw the horrid depth so close to them, which she had almost forgotten. A
sense of dizziness came over her. She longed to cling to his arm; but he
had drawn it resolutely away.
"Half past ten," said Jim Airth. "Miss Murgatroyd has donned her
night-cap. Miss Eliza has sighed: '_Good-night, summer, good-night,
good-night_,' at her open lattice; and Susie, folding her plump hands,
has said: '_Now I lay me_.'"
Myra laughed. "And they will all be listening for you to dump out your
big boots," she said. "That is always your 'Good-night' to the otherwise
silent house."
"No, really? Does it make a noise?" said Jim Airth, ruefully. "Never
again----?"
"Oh, but you must," said Myra. "I love--I mean _Susie_ loves the sound,
and listens for it. Jim, that match reminds me:--why don't you smoke?
Surely it would help the hunger, and be comfortable and cheering."
Jim Airth's pipe and pouch were out in a twinkling.
"Sure you don't mind? It doesn't make you sick, or give you a headache?"
"No, I think I like it," said Myra. "In fact, I am sure I like it. That
is, I like to sit beside it. No, I don't do it myself."
Another match flared, and again she saw the chasm, and the nearness of
the edge. She bore it until the pipe was drawing well. Then: "Oh, Jim,"
she said, "I am so sorry; but I am afraid I am becoming dizzy. I feel as
though I must fall over." She gave a half sob.
Jim Airth turned, instantly alert.
"Nonsense," he said, but the sharp word sounded tender. "Four good feet
of width are as safe as forty. Change your position a bit." He put his
arm around her, and moved her so that she leant more completely against
the cliff at their backs. "Now forget the edge," he said, "and listen. I
am going to tell you camp yarns, and tales of the Wild West."
Then as they sat on in the darkness, Jim Airth smoked and talked,
painting vivid word-pictures of life and adventure in other lands. And
Myra listened, absorbed and enchanted; every moment realising more fully,
as he unconsciously revealed it, the manly strength and honest simplicity
of his big nature, with its fun and its fire; its huge capacity for
enjoyment; its corresponding capacity for pain.
And, as she listened, her heart said: "Oh, my cosmopolitan cowboy! Thank
God you found no title in the book, to put you off. Thank God you found
no name which you could 'place,' relegating its poor possessor to the
ranks of 'society leaders' in which you would have had no share. And, oh!
most of all, I thank God for the doctor's wise injunction: 'Leave behind
you your own identity'!"