Part 8

"This is a cruel trick that Fate has played us," he said. "Believe me, if I had known what had happened I should not be here this evening. I suppose Mr. Westlake has explained to you how the misunderstanding came about. And I think I know now why you did not get my letter. I had placed it with others on the hall table two days before. It was the day I lost my home. You see, I have been in great money difficulties, due principally to the extravagance of the woman who is my wife. One of my creditors stripped my house of everything, and left me nothing but the bare walls. I am not complaining. I had fair warning, and the money was honestly due to the man. Doubtless, in the confusion of the moment, my letters were lost sight of. But perhaps you will think that I ought not to stay any longer. I daresay I can find some accommodation in the village till the morning."

"Indeed, you cannot," Mrs. Rent exclaimed, all her hospitable instincts on fire. "There is no house of entertainment within some miles of this and the few cottages around are impossible. I appreciate the delicacy of your feelings, but you will have to remain till the morning. And the thing is no fault of yours."

"My wife's friends will tell you otherwise," Charlock said, with a bitter smile. "They will tell you that she is a sweet, saintly creature who put up with my cruel indifference till human nature could bear the strain no longer. Indeed, your son was good enough to tell me so. As a friend of my wife's, he ventured to expostulate with me, a comparative stranger, on the way I treated her."

All the blood came flaming to Mrs. Rent's face.

"He didn't," she said hoarsely. "He never went so far as that. It is incredible. What did you say?"

"I said nothing. I never say anything. The heart knoweth its own bitterness. There is no man on earth who has learnt the wisdom of that saying more than myself. And why should I try to put the world right? In the eyes of most people I am a boor and a brute. I had no business to tie a beautiful woman to a personality like mine. Why should I waste my time in proving to the world that the world is wrong? Why should I proclaim from the housetops that I am a broken and disappointed man, with nothing but my work to fall back upon?"

Charlock appeared to have forgotten himself. The words burst in a stream from his lips as he paced up and down the room. Never before had he shown his heart like this to a stranger. Yet there was something like sorrowful sympathy in the eyes of his hostess that seemed to draw confidences from him.

"I think I understand," Mrs. Rent said gently. "Is your wife, then, so wonderfully prepossessing?"

"I think she is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen," Charlock said, in the same tense tones. "She is outwardly the embodiment of womanly innocence and purity, and I gave her all the heart that a lonely and self-contained man possesses. How she has repaid me I leave you to find out for yourself. And yet, if she were to come back to me now and place her hands upon my shoulders and ask me to forgive her, I should be as wax in her hands. Wait till you see the woman called Kate Charlock before you judge your son too harshly. But, then, you are a woman, and do not know how we men feel when we come in contact with temptation. Mind you, I am not defending myself. I am going to make no defence. When your son came to me and spoke as he did I saw that heart and soul he was the slave of my wife. He did not know it. He did not realise it at the moment, but I let him chide me where ninety-nine men out of a hundred would have kicked him out of the house. But I was patient. I asked him to come four-and-twenty hours later, when I would show him what I was going to do. At the end of that time I knew that my home would be no more than a name. And then I forgot all about my scheme of revenge. And when the time came and my home was no more, I stood within the bare walls and made my wife an offer. There was to be an end of all her shameful extravagance. I was going into a cottage, where we should live without a servant till my debts were paid. My wife refused to go, and in a fit of sullen indifference I turned away and left her in the empty house.... It was then that your son came along.... I can say no more. I leave the rest for you to imagine. And now, if you will permit me, I will seek some lodging for the night."

Gently but firmly Mrs. Rent refused to listen to the suggestion. Till the morning, at any rate, she would not hear of Charlock seeking quarters elsewhere. It would be a dull and dreary evening, but that was inevitable in any case. It was a quiet and somewhat strained meal from which they all rose presently with feelings of undisguised thankfulness. It was barely dark, and the sea shimmered in the afterglow of the sunset. Charlock crossed over towards the French windows and stepped out upon the lawn, followed by Ethel.

"This is a lovely spot," he said. "Isn't there a wonderful walk here through the rose gardens leading to the sea? Would you mind showing it to me? I may never have another chance of seeing it. Won't you come?"

"We will all go," Mrs. Rent suggested. "Anything is better than sitting brooding in the house. Ethel, will you run upstairs and get a wrap for me?"

They started off presently, Ethel and Charlock a little in front of the rest. For a time they were silent, till, at length, the perfect beauty of the scene fell like a charm upon Charlock and he began to talk. It was a new thing for him to have a companion in sympathy with himself. But the responsive look in Ethel's deep eyes seemed to draw him to her. It was not so much what he said as what he implied that led Ethel to believe that he was both a miserable and a misunderstood man. The church clock was striking the hour of ten before they turned and made their way again towards the house.

"I believe I have been talking for a good hour," Charlock said. "I never remember doing such a thing before in all my life. I hope you will not run away with the idea that I am a loquacious man."

Westlake and Mrs. Rent drew up to the rest, and they all stood enjoying the fragrance of the night. Mrs. Rent turned at last with a suggestion that it was getting chilly, and that it would be more prudent to go indoors.

"A few minutes longer," Charlock pleaded. "To an artist such a scene is exceedingly attractive. One could forget all one's troubles in a place like this."

Before Mrs. Rent could make any reply a servant came across the lawn and spoke to her mistress. She seemed to be excited, and her eyes danced with pleasure.

"What is it, Mary?" Mrs. Rent asked.

"Mr. Arnold has come back unexpectedly, madam," the maid replied. "He would like to see you in the library, please. I forgot to say that there is a lady with him."

"Say I will come," Mrs. Rent said faintly.

Now that the crisis had arrived, the unhappy mother felt like shirking it altogether. She had not forgotten what Charlock had said. She was prepared to make every allowance for her son. But, even then, she would have to do violence to her feelings. She only wanted to be just, to do that which was right and proper. And, after all, she only had John Charlock's word as to the way in which he had been treated. And she was bound to confess that he did not look in the least like a man capable of making a woman happy. Perhaps his wife was the injured saint she took herself to be, and her son might be acting from the highest and purest motives. Such things had happened over and over again, despite the fact that the world was cold and critical. But the matter had to be faced, and the sooner the better.

In a dreamy sort of way Mrs. Rent saw her son's smiling face. She noticed the heightened colour on his cheeks. Then she saw the most beautiful woman her eyes had ever fallen upon. Oh, it was impossible to believe that this was a cold, scheming creature playing for her own hand. No one could look upon that face and think her anything but innocent. And Mrs. Rent thought she could vouch for her son.

As she stood there she saw the smile on Kate Charlock's face soften wonderfully. The woman advanced towards her with an obvious intention shining in her eyes.

She stepped back instinctively.

"No, no," she cried. "The time is not ripe for that. I cannot allow you to kiss me--yet."

*CHAPTER XX*

*ACROSS THE THRESHOLD*

Kate was in the house at last--in the long drawing-room, where the servants had lighted the lamps. Though pale and agitated, she could not resist the temptation to glance furtively about her. She had not lived under the same roof with a great artist for five years without learning something of the value of beautiful things. She was not slow to appraise the works of art. In her eyes the place was a trifle old-fashioned and out of date. Already she could see her way to make an imposing salon of the room. Then, as she saw Rent looking eagerly towards her, she lowered her eyelids and sighed deeply.

"I ought not to have come in with you," she murmured. "I see that it was a mistake. I ought to have waited outside till you had seen your mother and prepared her for my coming. It would have been so much more----"

The speaker's voice trailed off into a murmur. She was going to say "dramatic," but she stopped just in time. At the same moment there were sounds of voices outside, and the outline of dim figures could be seen advancing across the misty lawn. Instinctively Kate Charlock drew closer to Rent's side.

"My dearest, there is nothing to be frightened of," he said soothingly. "That was my mother's voice you heard. See, she is coming this way. I can't make out who the others are, but one of them looks to me like our solicitor, Mr. Westlake. If so, it is rather fortunate. Westlake always takes such a common-sense view of matters. He is sure to be on our side."

There was nothing more to be said, nothing to do but wait for the coming of Mrs. Rent. And she seemed in no hurry to detach herself from her companions. Why did she not come? Arnold wondered. Usually she was so eager to see him. In the selfishness of the moment it had not occurred to Rent that the ordeal his mother was about to go through would be more distressful than his own. And the cruel shock of finding that he was here in defiance of her telegram was not calculated to make the mother's heart any the less sore and angry. Mrs. Rent stood outside, her hands tightly clasped, looking first from one to the other for support.

"Oh, this is downright cruel," Ethel burst out. "He ought never to have come like this. If he came at all, it should have been alone. My dear aunt, sit down and collect yourself. I know you will be brave and steadfast when it comes to the point, or perhaps you would like Mr. Westlake----"

"No, I must go through with it myself," Mrs. Rent said. "This is a burden that no one can share with me."

"I am afraid the fault is mine," Charlock said. "I ought to have gone away when I found out whose house I had come into. I should not have hesitated. It is a cruel stroke of fortune, and no one regrets it more than myself."

"It is no fault of yours," Mrs. Rent murmured. "Will you mind talking to Miss Hargrave while Mr. Westlake and I go into the house? I should like him to be near me, though I do not wish him to be present at the interview."

Ethel and Charlock stood alone together, silent and anxious. They watched the others as they went slowly towards the house, then Charlock touched his companion's arm.

"We had better not stay here," he suggested. "We can see and hear too much. Do you know, I feel as if, in a measure, I have thrust this black humiliation and disgrace upon you. I feel hot and cold all over that I should even be discussing the thing with one so young and innocent as yourself."

"And why?" Ethel said. "I am not a child. I have heard of these things before, though I never dreamt that I should live to see the like of this at Alton Lee."

"It is like a romance," Charlock laughed bitterly. "What puppets we are in the hands of Fate! And I thought once that I was a strong man capable of defying the world and shaping my own destiny. I daresay you will say that it is my own fault, and perhaps you will be right. I don't know why I should be talking to you like this. But the peacefulness of the night and the look of sympathy in your eyes invite my confidence. But I will swear to you that if I could have foreseen that this honourable old family would be disgraced in this fashion, I would never have let my home go. I would have worked all the harder to gratify my wife's extravagance. I would have made it worth her while to stay. Perhaps I was too candid, too brutal. Do you suppose she would have left me as she did if she had come back the other night and found the homestead intact? Oh, dear, no. With all her air of purity and sweetness, my wife always had a shrewd sense of business and self-interest."

"Yet you loved her once," Ethel murmured.

"My dear young lady, I love her now. She has only to say one word and the whole past is forgotten. It may seem strange to you, brought up as you have been, that a man should love a woman for whom he has the deepest contempt. But there are many such cases in the world. Call it madness, call it fascination--anything you like. It is possible for a man to love a woman devotedly and yet not to speak to her, though she is under the same roof as himself. That has been my case during the last four years. I have despised myself for my weakness--I, who in other matters can be so strong. I am a self-contained man, and five years ago I thought I had found paradise. Then it began slowly to dawn upon me that I had made a mistake. There was sweetness and melancholy and fascination in my wife's smiling face, but no atom of sympathy behind it. She had no feeling for me. She had no kind of pride in my work. Even when she began to hang the millstone of debt about my neck she had no concern, though on more than one occasion I was on the verge of a breakdown. But I don't ask you to take all these things for granted. I don't even ask you to believe me. You will know my wife later, and it is probable that she will convince you that I am a brute and a boor and not fit to mix with decent people."

Ethel made no reply. There was something in this man's grim tones that moved her strongly. Someone was coming from the house. She could hear footsteps on the gravel. Then the light from the drawing-room windows fell upon the face of a woman who was slowly crossing the lawn. Her features were serene and beautiful. Her eyes glistened with heavy tears. It was only for a moment that Ethel saw the vision before it vanished in the shadows. The girl felt Charlock's hand tighten on her arm.

"My wife," he said hoarsely. "She has come out to leave her lover and his mother alone. Did you see her face?"

"Indeed I did," Ethel murmured. "The beauty of it! And such an air and expression of sweetness and resignation I never saw before. It seems impossible to believe----"

"I see you pause," Charlock said grimly. "I know exactly what you are going to say. It does seem impossible. Before God, it seems to me sometimes that it is impossible and that I am only dreaming. It would go hard with me if we both stood before a jury of our countrymen and she told her tale after I had finished mine. But I won't say more. I will leave you to judge for yourself. You have seen us both, and you must rely upon your own instincts. I won't ask you to give any verdict, because I feel sure it will be against me."

"I am very, very sorry," Ethel murmured.

"Of course you are. But the point is, whom are you sorry for? There is no halfway in the business."

Ethel hesitated for a moment. She hardly seemed to know what to say. A bitter smile crossed Charlock's lips.

"Let me put it plainly to you," he said. "And yet I don't know why I should worry you with this business. I have never spoken to a living soul like this before. At any rate, I am going to be candid now. Let us assume that my wife has a genuine grievance against me. Say that I am too great a bully and savage for any decent woman to live with. I am prepared to admit that I did turn her out of doors in a brutal fashion. It is possible she can justify her conduct in her own eyes and that she is here with the purest and most disinterested of motives. Mind, in her way, she is a good woman--that is, she is highly virtuous. She would never forget herself. She would never step over the border, not even for the sake of Arnold Rent and all the fortune he is to inherit. No doubt she has persuaded herself that she has been right in coming here, that she has a moral claim upon Mrs. Rent's protection. She would argue it all out in her own mind. She would wait for me to commit some blazing indiscretion, and then invoke the aid of the law to release her from such a creature as myself. She would think that the proper thing to do. And after that she would be in a position to marry Arnold Rent and settle here as a county lady. Whether she would keep it up or not is another matter. And now, after I have told you this, let me repeat my question. You said you were sorry just now. Is your sympathy for her or for me?"

Ethel hesitated for a moment, and Charlock watched her with an anxiety which surprised himself.

"I think," she said in a voice little above a whisper, "that I am the more sorry for--you."

*CHAPTER XXI*

*THE HONOUR OF THE FAMILY*

Meanwhile, an entirely different scene was being enacted in the drawing-room. All her life Mrs. Rent had lived most placidly. She had never been confronted with a crisis like this. Indeed, the mere suggestion that such a cataclysm could have happened in the family would have moved her to gentle scorn. And now, on the spur of the moment, and almost solely upon her own initiative, she had to decide between her duty and her beloved son. It had cost her an effort to speak as she had done to Kate Charlock, and when she saw the half-wounded expression on the woman's face her heart smote her, and she became, for the time being, almost infirm of purpose.

Still, the situation had to be faced. She had a stern and rigid duty both to her conscience and to the family whose name she bore. There was a curious vein of Puritanism in her blood which came to her aid now. And it was very difficult, indeed, to stand looking at these two, to see her son advance with outstretched hands, and yet to hold back. He would have taken her in his arms and kissed her, but something warned him that the occasion was not opportune.

Under her long lashes, Kate Charlock watched him demurely. Why was he hesitating? It was necessary the fortress should be taken by storm. And Arnold Rent stood there shyly, his face downcast like that of a child detected in some fault.

"Mother," he murmured, "have you nothing to say to me? Have you no kind of welcome to offer to-night?"

The words were pleading and almost passionate, but seemingly they did not move Mrs. Rent at all.

"I am at a loss to understand why you are here," she said.

"Why I am here?" Arnold echoed. "Where else could I go? When you have heard all the circumstances of the case----"

"I have heard them already. Mr. Westlake came down on purpose to tell me. Come and stand here where I can see you--where the light shines full upon your face."

Arnold Rent came obediently a step or two forward.

"Strange," the mother murmured. "You have not altered. To all outward appearances you are still the man of honour and integrity you used to be. And yet you can commit this crime and come here to boast of it without the shadow of remorse, even without a word of apology. It seems incredible."

"But what apology should I make?" Arnold demanded. "What have I done that you should speak to me like this?"

"You ask me what you have done! Are you so blind as not to see the results of your indiscretion?"

Kate Charlock raised her head suddenly.

"May I not be allowed to speak?" she pleaded. "Is it not possible that when you come to hear my story----"

Mrs. Rent raised her hand imperiously.

"Tell her to be silent," she commanded her son. "Oh, I do not know what to do or what to say in such a crisis. Is it not bad enough without bringing your partner in folly under this roof? To think that I should have lived to see a scene like this at Alton Lee! To think that I should be the instrument chosen by Providence for the punishment of my own son! For that is what it comes to, Arnold. I was stunned at first. I was unable to believe the evidence of my senses. But I begin to see my way clearly. The path of duty lies plainly before me."

There was something cold and chilling in the words. They filled Kate Charlock with dismay. All the world seemed to be slipping from under her feet. If the opportunity were lost, the chance would never come again. She darted forward and threw herself in an _abandon_ of grief on her knees before the mistress of the house. The ready tears were streaming from her eyes. Her beautiful features were almost irresistible in their entreaty.

"Oh, won't you listen to me?" she said. "You are a kind, good woman; your face tells me that. And yet, though you would be good and generous towards the world, you decline to listen to one poor woman's story. Can't you understand how one may suffer year by year until the strain becomes too great, and, in a moment of passing madness, sacrifice everything that a woman holds dear? That is my case exactly. Oh, it is all very well for you, whose married life has been the path of happiness, to judge humanity from your own standpoint. But there are others----"

The woman's voice snapped suddenly like the breaking of a harp-string. She covered her face with her hands, her whole frame shaking with convulsive sobs.

Nor was it all acting. For the time, Kate Charlock was convinced that she was the unhappy, abandoned wife of a man who had driven her almost to madness in one moment of divine despair. She thrilled with self-pity. She saw her airy castles crumbling to the ground. Unless this old woman could be moved, there would be no rest for the sole of her foot at Alton Lee. The face that she raised once more to Mrs. Rent's dark eyes was stained with tears and broken with emotion. Fighting for self-control as she was, Helen Rent was moved now as she had seldom been moved before.

"Get up," she said, almost gently. "It is unseemly that you should be kneeling here. If you have a story to tell, I may be disposed to listen to it presently."

Slowly Kate Charlock rose to her feet and felt her way across the room to a chair. She had made an impression. On that point she felt certain. If she could only remain here a week, or even a day, she had no fear of the result. Alton Lee was growing nearer. She began to see herself installed. She could hear the swish of the cards on the green-topped tables. She could imagine the rooms gay with the laughter of friends. But not yet, she told herself, not quite yet.

"I will say no more," she murmured. "Indeed, when I came here I had no intention of speaking at all. I see now how wrong it was to come. But in the moment of my madness and despair----"