Part 23

Never had I seen her looking so well. You may say what you please, but an American woman who knows how to dress, in touch with a French dressmaker who is rather artist than dressmaker, is the supreme combination for æsthetic beauty. Mrs. Kirkwood, of the ivory skin and the coal-black hair, was a thrilling sight to see in her white dress and big black hat, with that background of fresh spring foliage and late afternoon light. Her eyes and her smile, I noted for the first time, had somewhat the same quality as Frascatoni’s--the weary eyes, the slow sweet smile.

“Mr. Loring!” she cried, rising and extending her hand impulsively. “I thought I was never to see you again.”

I hid my emotion and greeted her, then Beechman, in my habitual manner which, they tell me, is the reverse of effusive. I suppose, when I am deeply moved, its lack of cordiality becomes even more pronounced. After a few minutes of the talk necessary among acquaintances who have not met in a long time Beechman rose.

“You and Beechman will dine with me, I hope?” I said. “Mrs. Armstrong says she will go if you can.”

It was arranged and, as the day was warm, d’Armenonville was fixed upon as the place. “Until half-past eight,” said Beechman as he left. Mary and I sat silent watching him walk away. A superb figure of young manhood, supremely fortunate in that his body was an adequate expression of a strong and simple nature.

As he passed from view at the turn of the walk I transferred my gaze to her. Her eyes slowly lowered, and a faint flush came into her cheeks. Said I:

“You saw the news--about me?”

“Hartley and I were talking of it as you appeared.”

“You were not surprised?”

“Yes--and no,” replied she, with constraint and some confusion. “A year or so ago I--people thought--you and she had--had drifted apart. Then it looked as though you had come together again. It seemed the natural thing. She is beautiful and has so much charm.”

“She was unhappy in America. She wished to be free.”

Mary looked at me reflectively. “You are not--inconsolable, I see,” said she with a smile of faint raillery. “My brother has often told me about you--how indifferent you are to women. Perhaps that is why you are attractive to them.”

“Am I?” said I. “I did not know it.”

“You are terribly impersonal,” she went on laughingly. “Last summer I--well, I was not--that is, not exactly--trying to flirt with you. But your absolute unconsciousness of me as a woman was often very--baffling.”

I laughed. “You thought that?”

“How could I help seeing it? Why, you treated me precisely as if I were another man. Not that I didn’t like it, on the whole. A woman gets tired of being always on guard.” She smiled at herself. “That sounds horribly conceited. But you know what I mean. The men never lose a chance to practice. Then, too--well, if a woman has the reputation of being rich she need not flatter herself that it is her charms that do all the drawing.”

“That’s the supreme curse of money--it all but cuts one off from love and friendship. Fortunately it, to a great extent, takes the place of them.”

“I don’t like to hear you say that,” said she.

“How many poor people get love and friendship?” replied I. “Isn’t it the truth that there is little--very, very little--real love or friendship in the world? All I meant was that money, and the independence and comfort and the counterfeit of affection it brings, are better than nothing at all.”

“Oh, I see,” said she. “You are so sensible--and you don’t cant. That was why I liked to talk with you. At first I thought you cynical and hard. That’s the first impression plain good sense makes. We are used to hearing only shallow sentimentality.”

“The unending flapdoodle,” said I.

“Flapdoodle,” agreed she. “Then--I began to discover that you were anything but hard--that you looked at people as they are, and liked them for themselves, not for what they pretended to be. I was beginning to trust you--to venture timidly in the direction of being my natural self--when you left.”

“Well--here I am again,” said I. “And we start in afresh.”

She smiled with embarrassment. “Yes,” she said hesitatingly. “But the circumstances have changed somewhat.”

I know full well now what I should have said. I should have replied, “Yes--we are both almost free--but soon will be altogether free--I in six months, you as soon as you break your engagement.” That would have been bold and intelligent--for it is always intelligent to make the issue clear at the earliest possible moment. But I did not speak. I remained silent. Why? Because as I was talking with her I was realizing that I had been deceiving myself in a curious fashion. I had been so concentratedly in love with her-- Gentle reader, I see the mocking smile on your shallowly sentimental face. You are ridiculing a love that could have such restraint as mine--that could bear with Edna, could wait, could refrain from any of the familiar much-admired impetuosities and follies. You cannot understand. In this day when men no longer regard or feel their responsibilities in taking a more or less helpless woman to wife, your sense of the decencies is utterly corrupted. But let me say that no matter how ardently and romantically a man may conduct himself, a woman would do well to take care how she trusts him if he has a bad or even a doubtful record as to his way of meeting his responsibilities of whatever sort. That kind of love may “listen good,” but it does not “live good.” However--as I was about to say when your smile interrupted me, my all-absorbing love for Mary Kirkwood had misled me into assuming, with no reason whatsoever, that she understood all, that she knew I was eager to come to her, and would come as soon as I could. You will say this was absurd. Granted. But is not a man in love always absurd? You will say it was egotistical. Granted. But is not a man in love always egotistical? It is not the realities but the delusions that keep us going; and in those long months of waiting, of hoping often against hope, I had to have a delusion to keep me going. But now, her friendly, simply friendly, way of talking to me made me see that I had her yet to win, that I could not speak out directly as I had planned. You, who probably know women well, may say that this was a mistake. Perhaps. Nevertheless _I_ could not have done otherwise.

You will say that women do not know their own minds, but have to be told. I admit it. You will say my silence was timidity. I admit it. I could not talk of love to a woman until I was sure she wished to hear. I had the timidity of the man to whom woman and love are serious matters; the timidity unknown to the man who makes love to every passable female at whom he has a chance; the timidity which all women profess to approve, but which, I more than suspect, appeals only to the jaded palate of the woman who has long made love and passion her profession.

As Beechman was busy with a novel I had everything my own way without strategy during those following days. There are a thousand attractive places to go in and near Paris, and I was resourceful in contriving excursions for the days when there was no chance of seeing only her. Almost every day the London papers or the Paris _Herald_ printed something about Edna and the brilliant season she was having in London; often not far away from her name in a list of guests was the name of Prince Frascatoni. My own activities, more Bohemian as was my taste and the taste of my friends--and I may say the taste of civilized and intelligent Paris--my activities were not recorded in the papers. I fancied they were unobserved. I was soon to be undeceived.

I wonder who the people are that write anonymous letters--and give anonymous “tips” to society journals? Every once in a while by mischance--often by my having made a remark that was misinterpreted into something malicious or low, utterly foreign to my real meaning--I have had some fellow-being suddenly unveil a noisome corner in his or her soul for confidently awaited sympathy; and I have almost literally shrunk back in my horror at the cesspool of coarseness, or at the vicious envy. Have you had that experience? No doubt scattered among us ordinary folk, neither particularly good nor particularly bad, well rather than ill-disposed and amiable, if not too severely tried or tempted--no doubt, scattered among us there are not a few of these swine souls or snake souls, hid beneath a pleasant smile and fine raiment. And these are they who give off the foulness of the anonymous letters and the anonymous tip.

In one of the minor London society papers appeared this paragraph which I am sure I quote word for word:

“American Paris is much amused these beautifully fine spring days with the ardent love-making of a recently divorced railway ‘baron.’ The lady is herself a divorcee of several years standing and is supposed to be engaged to a famous young literary man who is all unaware of what is going on.”

I know of five copies of this journal that were mailed with the paragraph marked. The five were received by Edna, Margot, myself, Mary Kirkwood, and Hartley Beechman. I have often mentally gone through the list of my acquaintances in search of the person who was responsible for this thing. I have some extremely unpleasant characters in that list. But I have never been able to suspect who did it. Not improbably the guilty person is some one in other respects not a bad sort--for almost any given cut from that vast universal, human nature, contains something of everything.

I had an engagement with Mary Kirkwood to walk in the Bois and have tea the afternoon of the day this paragraph reached me. When I arrived at her apartment she came down ready to go. Her costume was so lovely and I so delighted in her that I did not immediately note the heavy circles round her eyes nor the drawn expression of her mouth. I did not dream that she knew of the paragraph. I had read it and had dismissed it from my mind. The anonymous letter and the anonymous newspaper attack were old familiar stories to me, as they are to every man who attains distinction in active life. But as we drove toward the Bois I happened to catch a glimpse of her by way of the mirror in the frame of the taxi. I saw the evidence of suffering--and the wistful, weary look in her beautiful eyes.

“What is it?” said I. “You have had bad news?”

“Yes,” replied she.

“Can I help?”

“Don’t let’s talk of it now,” said she. “Wait until we are in the woods.”

Soon after we passed the entrance gates we descended and rambled away over the not too even ground, along the indistinct paths under the fascinating little trees. It was a gorgeous, perfumed May day. You know the Bois--how lovely it is, how artfully it mingles the wild and the civilized, suggesting nature as a laughing nymph with tresses half bound, half free, with graceful young form half clad, half nude. We rambled on and on, and after half an hour seated ourselves where there were leaves and the slim graceful trunks on every side and the sound of falling water like the musical voice of the sunbeams.

Mary drew a long sigh. “I feel better,” she said.

I looked at her. “You _are_ better. You have shaken it off.”

She met my gaze. “This is the last time,” she said. She looked away, repeated softly, thoughtfully, “the last time.”

“The last time?”

“We are not going to see each other any more. It is being misunderstood.”

I glanced quickly at her, and I knew she had read the paragraph. “That miserable scandal sheet!” said I. “No one sees it--and if they did why should we notice anything so ridiculous?”

She did not answer immediately. After a while she said: “Perhaps I ought not to say it, but--Hartley is sensitive. A copy of the paper got to him.”

“One to me. One to you. One to him.”

“No matter,” said she. “The mischief is done.”

“You do not give up a friend lightly,” rejoined I. The time to speak was at hand; I welcomed it.

“_He_ has asked me to give you up,” said she simply. “And I shall do it.”

“But he has no right to ask such a thing,” protested I.

“Yes--he has. He and I are engaged--you knew that?”

“I imagined there was some sort of an engagement,” said I, still waiting for the right opening.

“There is only one sort of engagement possible with me,” replied she, with a certain gentle reproach.

“I know that,” said I. “But I remember the talk we had on the yacht.”

A flush overspread her paleness for a moment. Then she rose from the little rustic iron chair. “We must go,” said she.

“Wait,” said I. And I made a tactless, a stupid beginning: “You can’t deny that you do not love him.”

She turned coldly away and walked on, I following. “I think I’ll not stop for tea,” she said. “Will you hail the first taxi we meet?”

“You are offended--Mary?” I said. What a blundering fool love does make of a man!--unless he makes a fool of it.

She shook her head. “No--not offended. But when a subject comes up about which we may not talk there is nothing to do but drop it.”

In my desperation I reached for the right chord and struck it. “Do you know,” said I, “why I left the yacht abruptly?”

She halted, gave me a swift, frightened glance. The color flooded her face, then fled.

“Yes--that was why,” said I. “And--I’ve come as soon as I could.”

“Oh, why, why didn’t you _tell_ me?” cried she. Then, before I could answer, “I don’t mean that. I understand.” Then, with a wild look around, “_What_ am I saying?”

“I’ve come for you, Mary,” I went on. “And you are not going to rush into folly a second time--a greater folly. For--you do not love him--and you will care for me. You are right, we can’t discuss him--you and him. But we can, and must, discuss you and me.”

“I shall not see you again,” said she, looking at me with tranquil eyes that would have daunted me had I not known her so well, understood her so well--which is only another way of saying, had I not loved her so well.

“Why have you been seeing me day after day, when you knew that I loved you----”

“I did not know it,” replied she. “I did not think I could move you in the least--beyond a friendly liking.”

An inflection in her voice made me suddenly realize. “You came because it made you happy to come!” I cried triumphantly. I caught her hand. “You do care, Mary!”

She drew her hand away resolutely. “I shall keep my promise,” she said coldly. “I wish to hear no more.”

“You will not keep your promise. If necessary I’ll go to him and tell him--and he’ll release you.”

She gave me a look that withered. “You--do a cowardly thing like that!”

“No,” said I. “But _you_ will ask him to release you. You have no right to marry him. And I--I love you--and must live my life with you, or--I can think of nothing more futile and empty than life without you. And your life--would it not be futile and empty, Mary, if you tried to live it without me, when we might have been together? Together!--you and I! Mary, my love!”

“Why do you say those things, Godfrey?” she cried passionately. “To make me wretched? To make it harder for me to do what I must?”

“To make it impossible for you to do what you must not. Marry a man you don’t love--marry him when you love another! You’d be doing him the worst possible injury. No matter how much he loves you, he can recover from the blow of losing you. But the day to day horror of such a loveless marriage would destroy you both. He is a sensitive man. He would feel it, in spite of all your efforts to pretend. You--pretend! You could not do it.”

“After what has passed between him and me--the promises we’ve exchanged--the plans we’ve made--there is no going back! I don’t wish to go back. I----”

“Mary--I love you!” I cried. “I love you--and you love me. That’s the wall between you and any other man, between me and any other woman.”

She had waved to a passing taxi. It swept into the edge of the drive. She opened the door. “You are not coming with me,” she said. “And I shall not see you again.”

I laid my hand on her arm and forced her to meet my gaze. “You are hysterical now,” I said. “But you will be calm, and----”

She gave me a cold smile--it would have deceived those who do not understand the temperaments that can conceal themselves. “I am perfectly calm, I assure you,” said she.

“As you were the first time we ever met,” said I. “You’ve no right to marry any man but me, Mary. If you did you’d be wronging yourself--me--him most of all. That is the truth, and you will see it.”

She dragged her arm away, burst into violent sobs, sank upon the seat of the cab. I hesitated--obeyed a right instinct, closed the door, gave her address to the ignoring chauffeur, stood watching the cab whisk away. I was shaking from head to foot. But I had no fear for the outcome. I knew that I had won--that _we_ had won.

XI

Rossiter--I believe I have mentioned the name of my new secretary--was lying in wait for me at the hotel entrance. He read me a telegram from Margot: Edna was ill, was not expected to live, begged me to come at once.

I wrote to Mary Kirkwood--a brief repetition of what I had said to her--“of what I know both your intelligence and your heart are saying to you, dear.” I told her that Edna was desperately ill and had sent for me, and that I should be back as soon as I could get away. I went on to say many things such as a man deeply in love always says. No doubt it was a commonplace letter, as sincere love letters are apt to be; but because it was from my heart I felt that, for all the shortcomings, it would go to her heart. I admit I am not a facile love-maker. I have had little practice. And I suspect, those who are facile at love-making have got their facility by making love speeches so often when they were not in earnest that they cannot but have lost all capacity to be in earnest.

Toward noon the next day Rossiter and I and my valet were set down at the little station of Kesson Wells, half an hour out from London in Surrey. We were in the midst of about as beautiful a country us I have seen. I am a narrow enough patriot not to take the most favorable view of things foreign. But I must admit that no other countryside can give one the sense of sheer loveliness that one gets in certain parts of England. I am glad we have nothing like it at home; for to have it means rainy weather most of the time, and serf labor, and landlord selfishly indifferent to the misery of the poor human creatures he works and robs. Still, I try to forget the way it came in the joy of the thing itself--as you, gentle reader, forget the suffering and death of the animals that make the artistic and delicious course dinners you eat.

We were received with much ceremony at the station. My money was being exercised by those who knew how to do it. After a drive between perfumed and blossoming hedgerows and over a road as smooth and clean as a floor we came to Garton Hall, the place my son-in-law had leased until his new house should be ready. It was a modern house, as I noted with relief when we were still afar off, and while not large, was a most satisfactory embodiment of that often misused and often misunderstood word comfort. To live in the luxurious yet comfortable comfort obtainable in England only--indoors, in its steam-heated or Americanized portions--one must have English servants. I am glad we do not breed English servants in America; I am glad that when they are imported they soon cease to be the models of menial perfection they are at home. But when I am in England I revel in the English servant. To find him at his best you must see him serving in the establishment of a great noble. And my son-in-law was that; and the establishment over which Margot presided, but with which she was not permitted to interfere in the smallest detail because of her utter ignorance of all the “vulgarities” of life, as became a true lady of our quaint American brand--the establishment was a combination of the best of the city with the best of the country, a skillful mingling of the most attractive features of home, club, and hotel.

My first question at the station had, of course, been as to Mrs. Loring. I was assured that her ladyship’s mother was somewhat better, but still awaiting the dangerous crisis of the fever. Margot, not a whit less girlish for her maternity, met me in the doorway, and had the nurse there with the boy--the Earl of Gorse. They said he looked like me--and he did, though I do not believe they thought so. Why should they say it? I was still a young man and might marry again. I fancy the same prudent instinct prompted them to give him Godfrey as one of his four or five names. Why do I think they did not believe he looked like me? Because all of them were ashamed of everything American. In the frequent quarrels between Margot and Hugh, he never failed to use the shaft that would surely pierce the heart of her vanity and rankle there--her low American birth, in such ghastly and grotesque contrast to the illustrious descent of her husband. She had an acid tongue when it came to quarreling; she could hurl taunts about his shifts to keep up appearances before he met her that made ugly and painful marks on his hide. She had discovered, probably by gossiping with some traitor servant, that he had been flouted by a rich English girl for a chauffeur--and you may be sure she put it to good use. But nothing she could say made him quiver as she quivered when he opened out on the subject of those “filthy bounders in the States.”

Do not imagine, gentle reader, that my daughter was unhappily married. She would not have exchanged places with anyone but the wife of a duke; and Hugh--well, he needed the money. Nor should you think that they lived unhappily together. They saw little of each other alone; and in public they were as smiling and amiable with each other as--perhaps as you and your husband.

A fine baby was the Earl of Gorse--one who in a decent environment would have grown up a sensible, useful person. But hardly, I feared, when he was already living in his own separate apartment, with his name--“The Earl of Gorse”--on a card beside the door, and with all the servants, including his mother, treating him as if he were of superior clay. This when he barely had his sight. They say a baby learns the utility of bawling at about three days old; I should say the germ of snobbishness would get to work very soon thereafter.