Part 31

"By heaven, a veritable new Venus and reluctant Adonis!" I cried deliriously--"A poet should be here to immortalize so touching a scene! Go--go!"--and I motioned her away with a furious gesture--"Go, if you do not want me to murder you! Go, with the proud consciousness that you have worked all the mischief and ruin that is most dear to the heart of a woman,--you have spoilt a life and dishonoured a name,--you can do no more,--your feminine triumph is complete! Go!--would to God I might never see your face again!--would to God I had been spared the misery of having married you!"

She paid no attention whatever to my words, but kept her eyes fixed on Lucio. Retreating slowly, she seemed to feel rather than see her way to the winding stair, and there, turning, she began to ascend. Half way up she paused--looked back and fully confronted us once more,--with a wild wicked rapture on her face she kissed her hands to Lucio, smiling like a spectral woman in a dream,--then she went onward and upward step by step, till the last white fold of her robe had vanished,--and we two,--my friend and I,--were alone. Facing one another we stood, silently,--I met his sombre eyes and thought I read an infinite compassion in them!--then,--while I yet looked upon him, something seemed to clutch my throat and stop my breathing,--his dark and beautiful countenance appeared to me to grow suddenly lurid as with fire,--a coronal of flame seemed to tremble above his brows,--the moonlight glistened blood-red!--a noise was in my ears of mingled thunder and music as though the silent organ at the end of the gallery were played by hands invisible;--struggling against these delusive sensations, I involuntarily stretched out my hands ...

"Lucio! ..." I gasped--"Lucio ... my friend! I think, ... I am, ... dying! My heart is broken!"

As I spoke, a great blackness closed over me,--and I fell senseless.

XXXII

Oh, the blessedness of absolute unconsciousness! It is enough to make one wish that death were indeed annihilation! Utter oblivion,--complete destruction,--surely this would be a greater mercy to the erring soul of man than the terrible God's-gift of Immortality,--the dazzling impress of that divine 'Image' of the Creator in which we are all made, and which we can never obliterate from our beings. I, who have realized to the full the unalterable truth of eternal life,--eternal regeneration for each individual spirit in each individual human creature,--look upon the endless futures through which I am compelled to take my part with something more like horror than gratitude. For I have wasted my time and thrown away priceless opportunities,--and though repentance may retrieve these, the work of retrieval is long and bitter. It is easier to lose a glory than to win it; and if I could have died the death that positivists hope for at the very moment when I learned the full measure of my heart's desolation, surely it would have been well! But my temporary swoon was only too brief,--and when I recovered I found myself in Lucio's own apartment, one of the largest and most sumptuously furnished of all the guest-chambers at Willowsmere,--the windows were wide open, and the floor was flooded with moonlight. As I shuddered coldly back to life and consciousness, I heard a tinkling sound of tune, and opening my eyes wearily I saw Lucio himself seated in the full radiance of the moon with a mandoline on his knee from which he was softly striking delicate impromptu melodies. I was amazed at this,--astounded that while I personally was overwhelmed with a weight of woe, _he_ should still be capable of amusing himself. It is a common idea with us all that when we ourselves are put out, no one else should dare to be merry,--in fact we expect Nature itself to wear a miserable face if our own beloved Ego is disturbed by any trouble,--such is the extent of our ridiculous self-consciousness. I moved in my chair and half rose from it,--when Lucio, still thrumming the strings of his instrument _piano pianissimo_, said--

"Keep still, Geoffrey! You'll be all right in a few minutes. Don't worry yourself."

"Worry myself!" I echoed bitterly--"Why not say don't kill yourself!"

"Because I see no necessity to offer you that advice at present--" he responded coolly--"and if there were necessity, I doubt if I should give it,--because I consider it better to kill one's self than worry one's self. However opinions differ. I want you to take this matter lightly."

"Lightly!--take my own dishonour and disgrace lightly!" I exclaimed, almost leaping from my chair--"You ask too much!"

"My good fellow, I ask no more than is asked and expected of a hundred 'society' husbands to-day. Consider!--your wife has been led away from her soberer judgment and reasoning by an exalted and hysterical passion for me on account of my looks,--not for myself at all--because she really does not know _Me_,--she only sees me as I appear to be. The love of handsome exterior personalities is a common delusion of the fair sex--and passes in time like other women's diseases. No actual dishonour or disgrace attaches to her or to you,--nothing has been seen, heard, or done, _in public_. This being so, I can't understand what you are making a fuss about. The great object of social life, you know, is to hide all savage passions and domestic differences from the gaze of the vulgar crowd. You can be as bad as you like in private--only God sees--and that does not matter!"

His eyes had a mocking lustre in them,--twanging his mandoline, he sang under his breath,

"If she be not fair for me What care I how fair she be!"

"That is the true spirit, Geoffrey,"--he went on--"It sounds flippant to you no doubt in your present tragic frame of mind,--but it is the only way to treat women, in marriage or out of it. Before the world and society, your wife is like Cæsar's, above suspicion. Only you and I (we will leave God out) have been the witnesses of her attack of hysteria ..."

"Hysteria, you call it! She loves you!" I said hotly--"And she has always loved you. She confessed it,--and you admitted that you always knew it!"

"I always knew she was hysterical--yes--if that is what you mean;"--he answered--"The majority of women have no real feelings, no serious emotions--except one--vanity. They do not know what a great love means,--their chief desire is for conquest,--and failing in this, they run up the gamut of baffled passion to the pitch of frenetic hysteria, which with some becomes chronic. Lady Sibyl suffers in this way. Now listen to me. I will go off to Paris or Moscow or Berlin at once,--after what has happened, of course I cannot stay here,--and I give you my word I will not intrude myself into your domestic circle again. In a few days you will tide over this rupture, and learn the wisdom of supporting the differences that occur in matrimony, with composure----"

"Impossible! I will not part with you!" I said vehemently--"Nor will I live with her! Better the companionship of a true friend than that of a false wife!"

He raised his eyebrows with a puzzled half humorous expression--then shrugged his shoulders, as one who gives up a difficult argument. Rising, he put aside his mandoline and came over to me, his tall imposing figure casting a gigantic shadow in the brilliant moonbeams.

"Upon my word, you put me in a very awkward position Geoffrey,--what is to be done? You can get a judicial separation if you like, but I think it would be an unwise course of procedure after barely four months of marriage. The world would be set talking at once. Really it is better to do anything than give the gossips a chance for floating scandal. Look here--don't decide anything hastily,--come up to town with me for a day, and leave your wife alone to meditate upon her foolishness and its possible consequences,--then you will be better able to judge as to your future movements. Go to your room, and sleep till morning."

"Sleep!" I repeated with a shudder--"In that room where she----" I broke off with a cry and looked at him imploringly--"Am I going mad, I wonder! My brain seems on fire! If I could forget! ... if I could forget! Lucio--if you, my loyal friend, had been false to me I should have died,--your truth, your honour have saved me!"

He smiled--an odd, cynical little smile.

"Tut----I make no boast of virtue"--he rejoined--"If the lady's beauty had been any temptation to me I might have yielded to her charms,--in so doing I should have been no more than man, as she herself suggested. But perhaps I _am_ more than man!--at anyrate bodily beauty in woman makes no sort of effect on me, unless it is accompanied by beauty of soul,--then it does make an effect, and a very extraordinary one. It provokes me to try how deep the beauty goes--whether it is impervious or vulnerable. As I find it, so I leave it!"

I stared wearily at the moonlight patterns on the floor.

"What am I to do?" I asked--"What would you advise?"

"Come up to town with me,"--he replied--"You can leave a note for your wife, explaining your absence,--and at one of the clubs we will talk over the matter quietly, and decide how best to avoid a social scandal. Meanwhile, go to bed. If you won't go back to your own room, sleep in the spare one next to mine."

I rose mechanically and prepared to obey him. He watched me furtively.

"Will you take a composing draught if I mix it for you?" he said--"It is harmless, and will give you a few hours' sleep."

"I would take poison from your hand!" I answered recklessly--"Why don't you mix _that_ for me?--and then, ... then I should sleep indeed,--and forget this horrible night!"

"No,--unfortunately you would not forget!" he said, going to his dressing-case and taking out a small white powder which he dissolved gradually in a glass of water--"That is the worst of what people call dying. I must instruct you in a little science by-and-by, to distract your thoughts. The scientific part of death,--the business that goes on behind the scenes you know--will interest you very much--it is highly instructive, particularly that section of it which I am entitled to call the regeneration of atoms. The brain-cells are atoms, and within these, are other atoms called memories, curiously vital and marvellously prolific! Drink this,"--and he handed me the mixture he had prepared--"For temporary purposes it is much better than death--because it does numb and paralyse the conscious atoms for a little while, whereas death only liberates them to a larger and more obstinate vitality."

I was too self-absorbed to heed or understand his words, but I drank what he gave me submissively and returned the glass,--he still watched me closely for about a minute. Then he opened the door of the apartment which adjoined his own.

"Throw yourself on that bed and close your eyes,"--he continued in somewhat peremptory accents--"Till morning breaks I give you a respite,--" and he smiled strangely--"both from dreams and memories! Plunge into Oblivion, my friend!--brief as it is and as it must ever be, it is sweet!--even to a millionaire!"

The ironical tone of his voice vexed me,--I looked at him half reproachfully, and saw his proud beautiful face, pale as marble, clear-cut as a cameo, soften as I met his eyes,--I felt he was sorry for me despite his love of satire,--and grasping his hand I pressed it fervently without offering any other reply. Then, going into the next room as he bade me, I lay down, and falling asleep almost instantly, I remembered no more.

XXXIII

With the morning came full consciousness; I realized bitterly all that had happened, but I was no longer inclined to bemoan my fate. My senses were stricken, as it seemed, too numb and rigid for any further outbreak of passion. A hard callousness took the place of outraged feeling; and though despair was in my heart, my mind was made up to one stern resolve,--I would look upon Sibyl no more. Never again should that fair face, the deceitful mask of a false nature, tempt my sight and move me to pity or forgiveness,--that I determined. Leaving the room in which I had passed the night, I went to my study and wrote the following letter;--

Sibyl.

After the degrading and disgraceful scene of last night you must be aware that any further intercourse between us is impossible. Prince Rimânez and I are leaving for London; we shall not return. You can continue to reside at Willowsmere,--the house is yours,--and the half of my fortune unconditionally settled upon you on our marriage-day will enable you to keep up the fashions of your 'set,' and live with that luxury and extravagance you deem necessary to an 'aristocratic' position. I have decided to travel,--and I intend to make such arrangements as may prevent, if possible, our ever meeting again,--though I shall of course do my best for my own sake, to avoid any scandal. To reproach you for your conduct would be useless; you are lost to all sense of shame. You have abased yourself in the humiliation of a guilty passion before a man who despises you,--who, in his own loyal and noble nature, hates you for your infidelity and hypocrisy,--and I can find no pardon for the wrong you have thus done to me, and the injury you have brought upon my name. I leave you to the judgment of your own conscience,--if you have one,--which is doubtful. Such women as you, are seldom troubled with remorse. It is not likely you will ever see me or the man to whom you have offered your undesired love again,--make of your life what you can or will, I am indifferent to your movements, and for my own part, shall endeavour as much as may be, to forget that you exist.

Your husband, Geoffrey Tempest.

This letter, folded and sealed, I sent to my wife in her own apartments by her maid,--the girl came back and said she had delivered it, but that there was no answer. Her ladyship had a severe headache and meant to keep her room that morning. I expressed just as much civil regret as a confidential maid would naturally expect from the newly-wedded husband of her mistress,--and then, giving instructions to my man Morris to pack my portmanteau, I partook of a hurried breakfast with Lucio in more or less silence and constraint, for the servants were in attendance, and I did not wish them to suspect that anything was wrong. For their benefit, I gave out that my friend and I were called suddenly to town on urgent business,--that we might be absent a couple of days, perhaps longer,--and that any special message or telegram could be sent on to me at Arthur's Club. I was thankful when we at last got away,--when the tall, picturesque red gables of Willowsmere vanished from my sight,--and when finally, seated in a railway smoking-carriage reserved for our two selves, we were able to watch the miles of distance gradually extending between us and the beautiful autumnal woods of poet-haunted Warwickshire. For a long time we kept silence, turning over and pretending to read the morning's papers,--till presently flinging down the dull and wearisome 'Times' sheet, I sighed heavily, and leaning back, closed my eyes.

"I am truly very much distressed about all this;" said Lucio then, with extreme gentleness and suavity--"It seems to me that _I_ am the adverse element in the affair. If Lady Sibyl had never seen _me_,----"

"Why, then I should never have seen _her_!" I responded bitterly--"It was through you I met her first."

"True!" and he eyed me thoughtfully--"I am very unfortunately placed!--it is almost as if I were to blame, though no-one could be more innocent or well-intentioned than myself!" He smiled,--then went on very gravely--"I really should avoid scandalous gossip if I were you,--I do not speak of my own involuntary share in the disaster,--what people say of me is quite immaterial; but for the lady's sake----"

"For my own sake I shall try to avoid it;" I said brusquely, whereat his eyes glittered strangely--"It is myself I have to consider most of all. I shall, as I hinted to you this morning, travel for a few years."

"Yes,--go on a tiger-hunting expedition in India,"--he suggested--"Or kill elephants in Africa. It is what a great many men do when their wives forget themselves. Several well-known husbands are abroad just now!"

Again the brilliant enigmatical smile flashed over his face,--but I could not smile in answer. I stared moodily out of the window at the bare autumnal fields, past which the train flew,--bare of harvest,--stripped of foliage--like my own miserable life.

"Come and winter with me in Egypt,"--he continued--"Come in my yacht 'The Flame,'--we will take her to Alexandria,--and then do the Nile in a dahabeah, and forget that such frivolous dolls as women exist except to be played with by us 'superior' creatures and thrown aside."

"Egypt----the Nile!" I murmured,--somehow the idea pleased me--"Yes,----why not?"

"Why not indeed!" he echoed--"The proposal is agreeable to you I am sure. Come and see the land of the old gods,--the land where my princess used to live and torture the souls of men!--perhaps we may discover the remains of her last victim,----who knows!"

I avoided his gaze;--the recollection of the horrible winged thing he persisted in imagining to be the transmigrated soul of an evil woman, was repugnant to me. Almost I felt as if there were some subtle connection between that hateful creature and my wife Sibyl. I was glad when the train reached London, and we, taking a hansom, were plunged into the very vortex of human life. The perpetual noise of traffic, the motley crowds of people, the shouting of news-boys and omnibus-conductors,--all this hubbub was grateful to my ears, and for a time at least, distracted my thoughts. We lunched at the Savoy, and amused ourselves with noting the town noodles of fashion,--the inane young man in the stocks of the stiff high collar, and wearing the manacles of equally stiff and exaggerated cuffs, a veritable prisoner in the dock of silly custom,--the frivolous fool of a woman, painted and powdered, with false hair and dyed eyebrows, trying to look as much like a paid courtezan as possible,--the elderly matron, skipping forward on high heels, and attempting by the assumption of juvenile airs and graces to cover up and conceal the obtrusive facts of a too obvious paunch and overlapping bosom,--the would-be dandy and 'beau' of seventy, strangely possessed by youthful desires, and manifesting the same by goat-like caperings at the heels of young married women;--these and such-like contemptible units of a contemptible social swarm, passed before us like puppets at a country fair, and aroused us in turn to laughter or disdain. While we yet lingered over our wine, a man came in alone, and sat down at the table next to ours;--he had with him a book, which, after giving his orders for luncheon, he at once opened at a marked place and began to read with absorbed attention,--I recognised the cover of the volume and knew it to be Mavis Clare's "Differences." A haze floated before my sight,--a sensation of rising tears was in my throat,--I saw the fair face, earnest eyes, and sweet smile of Mavis,--that woman-wearer of the laurel-crown,--that keeper of the lilies of purity and peace. Alas, those lilies!--they were for me

"des fleurs étranges,[3] Avec leurs airs de sceptres d'anges; De thyrses lumineux pour doigts de séraphins,-- Leurs parfums sont trop forts, tout ensemble, et trop fins!"

I shaded my eyes with one hand,--yet under that shade I felt that Lucio watched me closely. Presently he spoke softly, just as if he had read my thoughts.

"Considering the effect a perfectly innocent woman has on the mind of even an evil man, it's strange, isn't it that there are so few of them!"

I did not answer.

"In the present day," he went on--"there are a number of females clamouring like unnatural hens in a barn-yard about their 'rights' and 'wrongs.' Their greatest right, their highest privilege, is to guide and guard the souls of men. This, they for the most part, throw away as worthless. Aristocratic women, royal women even, hand over the care of their children to hired attendants and inferiors, and then are surprised and injured if those children turn out to be either fools or blackguards. If I were controller of the State, I would make it a law that every mother should be bound to nurse and guard her children herself as nature intended, unless prevented by ill-health, in which case she would have to get a couple of doctor's certificates to certify the fact. Otherwise, any woman refusing to comply with the law should be sentenced to imprisonment with hard labour. This would bring them to their senses. The idleness, wickedness, extravagance and selfishness of women, make men the boors and egotists they are."

I looked up.

"The devil is in the whole business;"--I said bitterly--"If women were good, men would have nothing to do with them. Look round you at what is called 'society'! How many men there are who deliberately choose tainted women for their wives, and leave the innocent uncared for! Take Mavis Clare----"

"Oh, you were thinking of Mavis Clare, were you?" he rejoined, with a quick glance at me--"But she would be a difficult prize for any man to win. She does not seek to be married,--and she is not uncared for, since the whole world cares for her."

"That is a sort of impersonal love;"--I answered--"It does not give her the protection such a woman needs, and ought to obtain."

"Do you want to become her lover?" he asked with a slight smile--"I'm afraid you've no chance!"

"I! Her lover! Good God!" I exclaimed, the blood rushing hotly to my face at the mere suggestion--"What a profane idea!"

"You are right,--it _is_ profane;"--he agreed, still smiling--"It is as though I should propose your stealing the sacramental cup from a church, with just this difference,--you might succeed in running off with the cup because it is only the church's property, but you would never succeed in winning Mavis Clare, inasmuch as she belongs to God. You know what Milton says:

'So dear to Heaven is saintly chastity That when a soul is found sincerely so, A thousand liveried angels lacquey her, Driving far off each thing of sin and guilt, And in clear dream and solemn vision Tell her of things which no gross ear can hear, Till oft converse with heavenly habitants Begin to cast a beam on th'outward shape The unpolluted temple of the mind, And turns it by degrees to the soul's essence Till all be made immortal!'

He quoted the lines softly and with an exquisite gravity.

"That is what you see in Mavis Clare,"--he continued--"that 'beam on the outward shape' which 'turns it by degrees to the soul's essence,'--and which makes her beautiful, without what is called beauty by lustful men."

I moved impatiently, and looked out from the window near which we were seated, at the yellow width of the flowing Thames below.

"Beauty, according to man's ordinary standard," pursued Lucio, "means simply good flesh,--nothing more. Flesh, arranged prettily and roundly on the always ugly skeleton beneath,--flesh, daintily coloured and soft to the touch, without scar or blemish. Plenty of it too, disposed in the proper places. It is the most perishable sort of commodity,--an illness spoils it,--a trying climate ruins it,--age wrinkles it,--death destroys it,--but it is all the majority of men look for in their bargains with the fair sex. The most utter _roué_ of sixty that ever trotted jauntily down Piccadilly pretending to be thirty, expects like Shylock his 'pound' or several pounds of youthful flesh. The desire is neither refined nor intellectual, but there it is,--and it is solely on this account that the 'ladies' of the music-hall become the tainted members and future mothers of the aristocracy."