Chapter 10

Nevertheless such men as he have ideas of marriage, both romantic and austere. They are inclined to claim what they give--a clean sheet, and the first-fruits of body and soul. In Rachel's case the first-fruits had been wasted on a marriage, of which the ugly and inevitable incidents haunted Ellesborough's imagination. One moment he shrank from the thought of them; the next he could not restrain the protesting rush of passion--the vow that his love should put her back on that pinnacle of honour and respect from which fate should never have allowed her to fall.

Well, she had promised to tell him her story in full. He awaited it. As to his own people, they were dear, good women, his mother and sisters--saints, but not Pharisees.

It was a dark and lowering evening, with tempest gusts of wind. But from far away, after he had passed Ipscombe, a light from one of the windows of the farm shone out, as though beckoning him to her. Suddenly from the mouth of the farm, he saw a bicycle approaching. The rider was Janet Leighton. She passed him with a wave and a smile.

"Going to a Food meeting! But Rachel's at home."

What a nice woman! Looking back over the couple of months since he had known the inmates of the farm, he realized how much he had come to like Janet Leighton. So unselfish, so full of thought for others, so modest for herself! There couldn't be a better friend for Rachel; her friendship itself was a testimonial; he reassured himself by the mere thought of her.

When he drew up at the farm, Hastings with a lantern in his hand was just disappearing towards the hill, and the two girls, Betty and Jenny, passed him, each with a young man, two members, in fact, of his own Corps, John Dempsey and another. They explained that they were off to a Red Cross Concert in the village hall. Ellesborough's pulse beat quicker as he parted from them, for he realized that he would find Rachel alone in the farm.

Yes, there she was at the open door, greeting him with a quiet face--a smile even. She led the way into the sitting-room, where she had just drawn down the blinds and closed the curtains of the window looking on the farm-yard. But his arrival had interrupted her before she could do the same for the window looking on the Down. Neither of them thought of it. Each was absorbed in the mere presence of the other.

Rachel was in her black Sunday dress of some silky stuff. Her throat was uncovered, and her shapely arms showed through the thin sleeves. The black and white softened and refined something overblown and sensuous in her beauty. Her manner, too, had lost its confident, provocative note. Ellesborough had never seen her so adorable, so desirable. But her self-command dictated his. He took the seat to which she pointed him; while she herself brought a chair to the other side of the fire, putting on another log with a steady hand, and a remark about the wind that was whistling outside. Then, one foot crossed over the other, her cheek reddened by the fire, propped on her hand, and her eyes on the fresh flame that was beginning to dance out of the wood, she asked him,--"You'd like to hear it all?"

He made a sign of assent.

So in a quiet, even voice, she began with an account of her family and early surroundings, more detailed than anything she had yet given him. She described her father (the striking apostolic head of the old man hung on the wall behind her) and his missionary journeys through the prairie settlements in the early days of Alberta; how, when he was old and weary, he would sometimes take her, his latest child, a small girl of ten or twelve, on his pastoral rounds, for company, perched up beside him in his buggy; and how her mother was killed by the mere hardships of the prairie life, sinking into fretful invalidism for two years before her death.

"I nursed her for years. I never did anything else--I couldn't. I never had any amusements like other girls. There was no money and no time. She died when I was twenty-four. And three months after, my father died. He didn't leave a penny. Then my brother asked me to go and live with him and his wife. I was to have my board and a dress allowance, if I would help her in the house. My brother's an awfully good sort--but I couldn't get on with his wife. I just couldn't! I expect it was my fault, just as much as hers. It was something we couldn't help. Very soon I hated the sight of her, and she never missed a chance of making me feel a worm--a useless, greedy creature, living on other people's work. If only there had been some children, I dare say I could have borne it. But she and I could never get away from each other. There were no distractions. Our nerves got simply raw--at least mine did."

There was a pause. She lifted her brown eyes, and looked at Ellesborough intently.

"I suppose my mother would have borne it. But girls nowadays can't. Not girls like me, anyway. Mother was a Christian. I don't suppose I am. I don't know what I am. I just _had_ to live my own life. I couldn't exist without a bit of pleasure--and being admired--and seeing men--and all that!"

Her cheeks had flushed. Her eyes were very bright and defiant.

Ellesborough came nearer to her, put out a strong hand and enclosed hers in it.

"Well then--this man Delane--came to live near you?"

He spoke with the utmost gentleness, trying to help her out.

She nodded, drawing her hand away.

"I met him at a dance in Winnipeg first--the day after I'd had a horrid row with my sister-in-law. He'd just taken a large farm, with a decent house on it--not a shack--and everybody said his people were rich and were backing him. And he was very good-looking--and a Cambridge man--and all that. We danced together almost all the evening. Then he found out where I lived, and used to be always coming to see me. My brother never liked him. He said to me often, 'Why do you encourage that unprincipled cad? I'm certain there's a screw loose about him!' And I wasn't in love with Roger--not really--for one moment. But I _think_ he was in love with me--yes, I'm sure he was--at first. And he excited and interested me. I was proud, too, of taking him away from other girls, who were always running after him. And my sister-in-law was just mad to get rid of me! Don't you understand?"

"Of course I do!"

Her eyelids wavered a little under the emotion of his tone.

"Well, then, we got married. My brother tried to get out of him what his money-affairs were. But he always evaded everything. He talked a great deal about this rich sister, and she did send him a wedding present. But he never showed me her letter, and that was the last we ever heard of her while I knew him...."

Her voice dropped. She sat looking at the fire--a grey, pale woman, from whom light and youth had momentarily gone out.

"Well, it's a hateful story--and as common!--as common as dirt. We began to quarrel almost immediately. He was jealous and tyrannical, and I always had a quick temper. I found that he drank, that he told me all sorts of lies about his past life, that he presently only cared about me as--well, as his mistress!"--and again she faced Ellesborough with hard, insistent eyes--"that he was hopelessly in debt--a gambler--and everything else. When the baby came, I could only get the wife of a neighbouring settler to come and look after me. And Roger behaved so abominably to her that she went home when the baby was a week old--and I was left to manage for myself. Then when baby was three months old, she caught whooping-cough, and had bronchitis on the top. I had a few pounds of my own, and I gave them to Roger to go in to Winnipeg and bring out a doctor and medicines. He drank all the money on the way--that I found out afterwards--he was a week away instead of two days--and the baby died. When he came back he told me a lie about having been ill. But I never lived with him--as a wife--after that. Then, of course, he hated me, and one night he nearly killed me. Next morning he apologized--said that he loved me passionately--and that kind of stuff--that I was cruel to him--and what could he do to make up? So then I suggested that he should go away for a month--and we should both think things over. He was rather frightened, because--well--he'd knocked me about a good deal in the horrible scene between us--and he thought I should bring my brother down on him. So he agreed to go, and I said I would have a girl friend to stay with me. But, of course, as soon as he was gone, I just left the house and departed. I had got evidence enough by then to set me free--about the Italian girl. I met my brother in Winnipeg. We went to his lawyers together, and I began proceedings--"

She stopped abruptly. "The rest I told you.--_No!_--I've told you the horrible things--now I'll say something of the things which--have made life worth living again. Till the divorce was settled I went back to my brother in Toronto. I dropped my married name then and called myself Henderson. And then I came home--because my mother's brother, who was a manufacturer in Bradford, wrote to ask me. But when I arrived he was dead, and he had left me three thousand pounds. Then I went to Swanley and got trained for farm-work. And I found Janet Leighton, and we made friends. And I love farm-work--and I love Janet--and the whole world looks so different to me! Why, of course, I didn't want to be reminded of that old horrible life! I didn't want people to say, 'Mrs. Delane? Who and where is her husband? Is he dead?' 'No--she's divorced.' 'Why?' There's!--don't you see?--all the old vile business over again! So I cut it all!"

She paused--resuming in another voice--hesitating and uncertain,--

"And yet--it seems--you can't do a simple thing like that without--hurting somebody--injuring somebody. I can't help it! I didn't mean to deceive _you_. But I had a right to get free from the old life if I could!"

She threw back her head proudly. Her eyes were full of tears. Then she rose impetuously.

"There!--I've told you. I suppose you don't want to be friends with me any more. It was rotten of me, I know, for, of course--I saw--you seemed to be getting to care for me. I told Janet when we set up work together that I wasn't a bad woman. And I'm not. But I'm weak. You'd better not trust me. And besides--I fell into the mud--and I expect it sticks to me still!"

She spoke with passionate animation--almost fierceness. While through her inner mind there ran the thought, "I've told him!--I've told him! If he doesn't understand, it's not my fault. I can always say, 'I _did_ tell you--about Roger--_and the rest_!--as much as I was bound to tell you.' Why should I make him miserable--and destroy my own chances with him for _nothing_?"

They stood fronting each other. Over the fine bronzed face of the forester there ran a ripple of profound emotion--nostril and lip--and eye. Then she found herself in his arms--with no power to resist or free herself. Two or three deep, involuntary sobs--sobs of excitement--shook her, as she felt his kisses on her cheek.

"Darling!--I'll try and make up to you--for all you've suffered. Poor child!--poor little Rachel!"

She clung to him, a great wave of passion sweeping through her also. She thought, "Now I shall be happy!--and I shall make him happy, too. Of course I shall!--I'm doing quite right."

Presently he put her back in her chair, and sat beside her on the low fender stool, in front of the fire. His aspect was completely transformed. The triumphant joy which filled him had swept away the slightly stiff and reserved manner which was on the whole natural to him. And it had swept away at the same time all the doubts and hesitations of his inner mind. She had told her story, it seemed to him, with complete frankness, and a humility which appealed to all that was chivalrous and generous in a strong man. He was ready now to make more excuses for her, in the matter of his own misleading, than she seemed to wish to make for herself. How natural that she should act as she had acted! The thought of her suffering, of her ill-treatment was intolerable to him--and of the brute who had inflicted it.

"Do you know where that man is now?" he said to her presently. She had fallen back in her chair--pale and shaken, but dressed, for his eyes, in a loveliness, a pathos, that was every moment strengthening her hold upon him.

"Roger? No, I have no idea. I always suppose he's in Canada still. He never appeared when the case was tried. But the summons had to be served on him, and my lawyers succeeded in tracking him to a lodging in Calgary, where he was living--with the Italian girl. But after that we never heard any more of him--except that I had a little pencil note--unsigned, undated, delivered by hand--just before the trial came on. It said I should repent casting him off--that I had treated him shamefully--that I was a vile woman--and though I had got the better of him for the time, he would have his revenge before long."

Ellesborough shrugged his shoulders contemptuously.

"Threats are cheap! I hope you soon put that out of your mind?"

She made a little restless movement.

"Yes, I--I suppose so. But I did tell you once, didn't I, that--I often had fears--about nothing?"

"Yes, you did tell me," he said, smiling. "Don't have any more fears, darling! I'll see to that."

He took her hands again, and raised them to his lips and kissed them. It astonished him to feel them so cold, and see her again so excited and pale. Was she really afraid of the villain she had escaped from? The dear, foolish woman! The man in his self-confident strength loved her the more for the vague terrors he felt himself so well able to soothe.

For half an hour more they sat together, in that first intimacy of love, which transfigures men and women, so that when they pass back from it into ordinary life they scarcely recognize life or themselves again. They talked much less of the past than of the future--and that in the light of the glorious war news coming in day by day. Austria was on the point of surrender--the German landslide might come at any moment--then _peace_!--incredible word. Ellesborough would hardly now get to France. They might be able to marry soon--within a few weeks. As to the farm, he asked her, laughing, whether she would take him in as a junior partner for a time, till they could settle their plans. "I've got a bit of money of my own. But first you must let me go back, as soon as there are ships to go in--to see after my own humble business. We could launch out--get some fine stock--try experiments. It's a going concern, and I've got a good share in it. Why shouldn't you go, too?"

He saw her shrink.

"To Canada? Oh, no!"

He scourged himself mentally for having taken her thoughts back to the old unhappy times. But she soon recovered herself. Then it was time for him to go, and he stood up.

"I should like to have seen Janet!" he said joyously. "She'll have to get used to Christian names. How soon will you tell her? Directly she comes in?"

"Certainly not. I shall wait--till to-morrow morning."

He laughed, whispering into her ear, as her soft, curly head lay against his breast.

"You won't wait ten minutes--you couldn't! Well, I must be going, or they'll shut me out of the camp."

"Why do you hurry so?"

"Hurry? Why, I shall be an hour late, anyway. I shall have to give myself C.B. to-morrow."

She laughed--a sound of pure content. Then she suddenly drew herself away, frowning at him.

"You do love me--you do--you will always!--whatever people may say?"

He was surprised at the note almost of violence in her voice. He answered it by a passionate caress, which she bore with trembling. Then she resolutely moved away.

"Do go!" she said to him, imploringly. "I'd like to be a few minutes--alone--before they come back."

He saw her settle herself by the fire, her hands stretched out to the blaze. Seeing that the fire was low, and remembering the chill of her hands in his, he looked around for the wood-basket which was generally kept in a corner behind the piano.

His movement was suddenly arrested. He was looking towards the uncurtained window. The night had grown pitch dark outside, and there were splashes of rain against the glass. But he distinctly saw as he turned a man's face pressed against the glass--a strained, sallow, face, framed in straggling black hair, a face with regular features, and eyes deeply set in blackened orbits. It was a face of hatred; the lips tightly drawn over the teeth, seemed to have a curse on them.

The vision lasted only a moment. Ellesborough's trained instinct, the wary instinct of the man who had parsed days and nights with nature in her wilder and lonelier places, checked the exclamation on his lips. And before he could move again, the face had disappeared. The old holly bush growing against the farm wall, from which the apparition seemed to have sprung, was still there, some of its glossy leaves visible in the bright light of the paraffin lamp which stood on the table near the window. And there was nothing else.

Ellesborough quietly walked to the window, drew down the blind, and pulled the curtains together. Rachel looked around at the sound.

"Didn't I do that?" she said, half dreamily.

"We forgot!" He smiled at her. "Now it's all cosy. Ah, there they are! Perhaps I'll get Janet to come as far as the road with me." For voices were approaching--Janet talking to the girls. Rachel looked up, assenting. The colour had rushed back to her face. Ellesborough took in the picture of her, sitting unconscious by the fire, while his own pulse was thumping under the excitement of what he had seen.

With a last word to her, he closed the sitting-room door behind him, and went out to meet Janet Leighton in the dark.

IX

It was a foggy October evening, and Berkeley Square, from which the daylight had not yet departed, made a peculiarly dismal impression on the passers-by, under the mingled illumination of its half-blinded lamps, and of a sunset which in the country was clear and golden, and here in west London could only give a lurid coppery tinge to the fog, to the eastern house-fronts, and to the great plane-trees holding the Square garden, like giants encamped. Landsowne House, in its lordly seclusion from the rest of the Square, seemed specially to have gathered the fog to itself, and was almost lost from sight. Not a ray of light escaped the closely-shuttered windows. The events of the _mensis mirabilis_ were rushing on. Bulgaria, Austria, Turkey, had laid down their arms--the German cry for an armistice had rung through Europe. But still London lay dark and muffled. Her peril was not yet over.

In the drawing-room of one of the houses on the eastern side, belonging to a Warwickshire baronet and M.P.--Sir Richard Winton by name--a lady was standing in front of a thrifty fire, which in view of the coal restrictions of the moment, she had been very unwilling to light at all. The restrictions irritated her; so did the inevitable cold of the room; and most of all was she annoyed and harassed by the thought of a visitor who might appear at any moment. She was tall, well-made, and plain. One might have guessed her age at about thirty-five. She had been out in the earlier afternoon, attending a war meeting on behalf of some charities in which she was interested, and she had not yet removed a high and stately hat with two outstanding wings and much jet ornament, which she had worn at the meeting, to the huge indignation of her neighbours. The black of her silk dress was lightened by a rope of pearls, and various diamond trinkets. Her dress fitted her to perfection. Competence and will were written in her small, shrewd eyes and in the play of a decided mouth.

There was a knock at the door. At Lady Winton's "Come in!" a stout, elderly maid appeared. She came up to her mistress, and said in a lowered voice,--

"You'll see Mr. Roger here?"

"Why, I told you so, Nannie!" was the impatient answer. "Is everybody out of the way?"

The maid explained that all was ready. Jones the butler had been sent with a note to the City, and the housemaid was sitting with the kitchen-maid, who was recovering from the flu.

"I told them I'd answer the bell. And I'll keep an eye that no one comes down before he's gone. There he is!"

For the bell had rung, and the maid hastened to the hall door to answer it.

A tall man entered--coughing.

"Beastly night, Nannie!" he said, as soon as the cough would let him. "Don't suit my style. Well?--how are you? Had the flu, like everybody else?"

"Not yet, Mr. Roger--though it's been going through the house. Shall I take your coat?"

"You'd better not. I'm too shabby underneath."

"Sir Richard's in the country, Mr. Roger."

"Oh, so her ladyship's alone? Well, that's how I generally find her, isn't it?"

But Nannie--with her eye on the stairs--was not going to allow him any lingering in the hall. She led him quickly to the drawing-room, opened it, and closed it behind him. Then she herself retreated into a small smoking-den at the farther end of the hall, and sat there, without a light, with the door open--watching.

Roger Delane instinctively straightened himself to his full height as he entered his sister's drawing-room. His overcoat, though much worn, was of an expensive make and cut; he carried the Malacca cane which had been his companion in the Brookshire roads; and the eyeglass that he adjusted as he caught sight of his sister completed the general effect of shabby fashion. His manner was jaunty and defiant.

"Well, Marianne," he said, pausing some yards from her. "You don't seem particularly glad to see me. Hullo!--has Dick been buying some more china?"

And before his sister could say anything, he had walked over to a table covered with various bric-a-brac, where, taking up a fine Nankin vase, he looked closely at the marks on its base.

Lady Winton flushed with anger.

"I think you had better leave the china alone, Roger. I have only got a very few minutes. What do you want? Money, I suppose--as usual! And yet I warned you in my last letter that you would do this kind of thing once too often, and that we were _not_ going to put up with it!" She struck the table beside her with her glove.

Delane put down the china and surveyed her.

"The vase is Ming all right--better stuff than Dick generally buys. I congratulate him. Well, I'm sorry for you, my dear Marianne--but you _are_ my sister--and you can't help yourself!"

He looked at her, half-smiling, with a quiet bravado which enraged her.

"Don't talk like that, Roger! Tell me directly what it is you want. You seem to think you can force me to see you at any time, whatever I may be doing. But--"

"Your last letter was 'a bit thick'--you see--it provoked me," said Delane calmly. "Of course you can get the police to chuck me out if you like. You would be quite in your rights. But I imagine the effect on the aristocratic nerves of Berkeley Square would be amusing. However--"

He looked round him--

"As Carlyle said to the old Queen, 'I'm getting old, madam, and with your leave I'll take a chair--'"

He pushed an arm-chair forward.

"And let me make up the fire. It's beginning to freeze outside."

Lady Winton moved quickly to the fireplace, holding out a prohibiting hand.

"There is quite enough fire, thank you. I am going out presently."

Delane sat down, and extended a pair of still shapely feet to the slender flame in the grate.

"Dick's boots!" he said, tapping them with his cane, and looking round at his sister. "What a lot of wear I've got out of them since he threw them away! His overcoat, too. And now that it's the thing to be shabby, Dick's clothes are really a godsend. I defraud Jones. But I have no doubt that Jones gets a good deal more than is good for him."