Chapter 15

UTTER EXHAUSTION.

Claire rose and slipped quietly to her own bed. All the aching pain of her proposed future came over her with its dirty sordidness. She could never stand it, she thought, and clenched her teeth. Well, it was not necessary. When Lawrence was gone, there was the lake. That would be her way out of it all. No one need ever know. The thought of death seemed very sweet to her.

Philip came in, saw Lawrence asleep, and stole across the room to peep in at her. She met his glance.

"I beg your pardon," he murmured.

"Never mind," she answered dully. "Come in if you like."

He hesitated, then stepped through, and let the curtain fall behind him.

"May I sit here?" he asked, sitting on the edge of the bed.

"Why not?" Her voice was colorless. "Only please speak softly. Don't wake Lawrence."

"He'll feel better after his sleep, I think."

"I hope so."

He sat looking down into her dark, clouded eyes. There was something so tragic, so sad, and so submissive in them that he was filled with utter tenderness.

"Claire," he whispered, "what is the matter?"

"Nothing. I'm quite well."

"You look absolutely desolate."

"I don't especially feel so."

"Are you happy?"

"I don't know."

He stooped over her, studying her face. She did not move, only her deep, dark eyes looked up coldly into his. He took the hand which she did not draw away, and whispered: "Claire, let me make you happy."

She did not answer. He bent nearer. Her eyes did not shift from his, she saw that he was going to kiss her, but she did not move. If the whole world had come crashing down upon her, she could not have made the slightest effort to escape.

He pressed his lips against hers. She did not return his kiss, but she did not protest. He slipped his arm around her waist and drew her up. Still she made no objection. He held her more closely, kissing her again and again. She remained impassive, unable to summon sufficient willpower to resist. Besides, had she not decided to be this man's wife?

He was pouring into her ears short, whispered words of endearment, giving his love free rein.

"Claire--Claire," he whispered passionately, "you do love me! Say you love me!"

"Oh, must I say that?" she asked languidly.

He laid her head back on the pillow tenderly.

"Why shouldn't you?" he demanded. "You do, or you wouldn't let me act this way. Oh, Claire, isn't that true?"

"Doesn't your own heart tell you, Philip?" She could not lie easily.

"Yes, of course. I just wanted to hear you say it, dear."

"Why?"

"Because--because it means so much to me."

"How does it mean any more than my unresisting lips?" She wanted to be fair to Philip. Would he want a wife without love?

He looked at her, puzzled by her calm question.

"Because, dear, it would mean that you put your seal on our divine betrothal."

"I gave you my lips, you held me in your arms, doesn't that mean love to you?"

"Claire, why do you talk that way?"

"Why shouldn't I? Isn't it true?"

"Yes, but you--you seem so unlike the woman you are."

"Oh, I see. But you haven't told me fully why you wanted me to say I loved you."

He stood up nervously and moved a few paces away, but the patient, self-reproachful gaze in Claire's eyes brought him back again.

"Why talk of that at all, dearest?" he whispered. "We have each other. Isn't that enough?"

"Perhaps not. You asked me to say it, you know."

"Yes, but I don't care. I won't plague you. I know you do love, me." He kissed her again and then looked at her. Her lips had been cold.

"What is the matter, Claire? Don't you love me? Is that why you wouldn't give me your word?"

It was coming at last. How could she make Philip see, and yet be fair to him, too?

"I don't know what you mean by love." Her voice was carefully toneless.

Philip's eyes lighted. "Don't you want me here beside you? Don't you warm to my kisses? Isn't there an awakened tenderness in you at my touch? Isn't there, dearest?"

Claire's hands moved nervously up and down the edge of the comforter. "If I should stay here with you, that would be the highest proof that I loved you, wouldn't it?"

"What else?" He looked at her, hope giving his face a renewed glow.

Was that all that love meant to him? "Is that what your years of thought have taught you?" she said aloud.

"Why, yes, Claire, the return of passion for passion, of warmth for warmth, of tenderness for tenderness, must be the last test, mustn't it?"

Despite her resolution her eyes narrowed ironically.

Philip started, and stared at her.

"Would you ever be jealous of my husband?" she asked, slowly.

His head dropped. "No--and yes. Of course, I wish he hadn't been your husband, but we can't help what fate has decreed." He raised his eyes, and then suddenly he smiled. "Claire, is it because of him that you are unwilling to tell me you love me?" he asked softly. "I think I can understand. You'll have to be freed from him in some way, and we must be married, of course."

"I am free from him. To him, I am dead. Isn't that enough?"

"Yes," he answered judiciously, "if your own conscience is satisfied."

She smiled a little, her eyebrows lifting in amusement. "Oh, my own conscience dictates my every act, Philip."

"I know it does," he agreed, earnestly. "But your lips were cold to my kiss." He bent over to test the truth of his remark.

"Do you forget Lawrence so easily?" Claire raised a hand over her face. "Certainly I cannot."

"I beg your pardon," Philip said, rising hastily. "Of course he is to be remembered. We will wait until we are alone to talk of our future."

"Yes," she said. "I should prefer that greatly."

He touched his lips to her forehead tenderly, then stepped silently into the room beyond.

She heard him as he moved quietly to replenish the fire, and it seemed to her that he made enough noise to echo from the mountains across the lake. She must think her situation through. She was studying the look she had read on Philip's face, and was angry with herself, yet she could not help thinking of it and its meaning. Suddenly she remembered the same expression on her husband's face, and she shuddered. She had thought it beautiful then, why not now? And why should she be so contemptuous when probably the same look had been in her own eyes when she had raged at Lawrence because he had not taken her in his arms. Philip was sitting out there beyond the curtain dreaming ecstatically of the days when they would be alone in the cabin, and she smiled ironically. After all, there was but one way out. He would find little comfort in her ghost, and her drowned body would scarcely fire him to passion.

She rose and slipped out into the room. Lawrence was still asleep. She did not even glance toward Philip because she foresaw his look of proprietorship. She went straight to Lawrence, and bending over him as if to arrange something about his blanket, she whispered softly: "Beloved, when I am alone with him, I shall be more with you."

Philip came and stood beside her, his hand resting lightly on her shoulder.

"It looks like a serious fever," he said softly.

Claire listened to Lawrence's breathing and felt his temperature. She stood up, gray with anxiety. "I'm afraid for him," she said, and there was that in her voice which Philip did not understand.

They ate their supper in silence. Claire glanced at Philip occasionally and found in his eyes the anticipated look of tender ownership. She let him slip out of her mind while she thought again of the afternoon when Lawrence had declared his creative principle. How dearly she would love to help him, to have him model his statue of her. He had said that she was savage and elemental underneath her polish. He had known, then, all the time. What a man he was! If only she knew how to find his love, to reawaken it. But no, he would never forget. Well, he would not have been able to care for her, anyway, she was so utterly sensual despite all her training in culture. He would want a more spiritual woman to fire his imagination to do great work. She tried to imagine what sort of woman would be best for his wife.

Lawrence stirred restlessly. She rose and went quickly to the bed. He was still asleep and she stood looking down at him. In her heart was a great tenderness and a great fear. What if he should die? Memories of their days in the woods swept over her in waves of love.

Abruptly she turned to Philip and said quietly: "Philip, until I am your wife you must not touch me again."

He looked up, startled, then smiled. "I understand, my dear," he said, "I will not."

She sat down at the table to wait for Lawrence's waking. It was late when he did, and immediately they realized that he was worse. Claire gave him some hot soup made from dried meal and helped Philip get him undressed and into bed.

"I'll put some blankets here and sleep on the floor beside him," Philip whispered. "I don't in the least mind, and I can help him if he wants help during the night."

"Thank you," Claire said gratefully. She felt indebted to this man for every kindness shown Lawrence.

Long before morning she was aroused by the sound of movements out there in the room.

"What is it?" she called softly.

"I am looking for something in which to heat water," came Philip's voice.

She scrambled out of bed, drew on a few clothes, and went out. Lawrence was tossing on his bed and breathing heavily. She set to work heating the water herself, and sent Philip back to his blankets. There was a pleasure in doing this nursing for Lawrence. She felt glad that hers was the chance to care for him.

"You're to have the best nursing a sick man ever got, Lawrence," she said, stooping over him tenderly.

He smiled faintly and whispered: "Good, Claire."

"You'll be well so quick you won't remember being ill."

"I know," he murmured huskily.

"What do you know?" she asked eagerly.

"I know, it's natural for you, this kindness."

"Is that all you know, Lawrence?"

"About all, Claire. About all, yet."

"Why do you say 'yet'?"

"I haven't thought it out yet."

"What, Lawrence?"

"My platform, my work-bench for the future."

She laughed, a little sadly. "You would better stop thinking about that for a day or so, wouldn't you?"

"Perhaps. I can't, though."

She drew up a chair and sat beside him. "I'm going to become a regular guard, and if you don't sleep and let thinking wait, I'll scold dreadfully."

He tossed uneasily and turned toward her, his cheeks brilliant with fever.

"I like to hear you scold, Claire," he said. "I shall go my limit."

She rubbed her cool hand across his forehead for answer.

When he at last slept, she continued to watch by his side, rocking slowly in her chair. It was peace for her to sit there and dream. There was rest from her ceaseless questionings, and it was welcome rest.