THEnext day, London awoke to a sensation. As early as ten o’clock in the morning, it was known that something astounding had happened; though the general public still lacked information as to what it was. Had Bonaparte escaped from St. Helena, and landed at Gravesend? Was his Majesty George Third dead at last? Had the Pope been proclaimed Spiritual and Temporal ruler of Great Britain? Or had another Gunpowder Plot been discovered? City men, meeting one another on their way to their shops and offices, asked each other such questions, half jocosely, half in earnest. The people on the street caught up echoes of these dialogues, and spread them about with amplifications and variations. Up till noon, only a handful of persons knew the truth: but before sunset it was familiar in the mouths of millions. The great banking house of Bendibow Brothers had failed.
Yes, after a career of almost unparalleled success and splendor, the mighty structure, founded, nearly a century ago, by grim Abraham Bendibow, had fallen with a crash, and thousands of hapless people were involved in the ruins. Financial England was shaken to its foundations by that catastrophe; on the Continent, the news created only less dismay; but in London itself the destruction wrought by it was terribly wide-spread and apparent. By order of the Government, which received early information of what had happened, a company of soldiers was sent down to guard the bank,—a wise precaution, as the threatening crowd that soon began togather in front of it proved. A very ugly and turbulent crowd it was, as London mobs are apt to be: and in this case its passions were inflamed by the presence in the midst of it of numbers of luckless depositors, who had lost all they possessed, and were shrieking for vengeance. Was such enormous robbery to be perpetrated, and the guilty not to suffer? A scape-goat was wanted, and must be had. And who was the thief? Who, but Sir Francis Bendibow? Where was Sir Francis Bendibow? Where was the man who had made himself rich and fat on the life-blood of thousands of honest men and women? Was he in the bank? The captain of the soldiers assured the questioners that he was not; that the bank contained nothing but money, and very little of that; and this, in due time, would be fairly divided among those who could show a claim to it. For the rest, he had orders to fire should any act of violence be attempted; and he was ready to obey his orders. Hereupon the mob laughed, as if the defiance pleased them; but it was evident that a few score of soldiers would not be a mouthful for such a roaring multitude, should they choose to attack. At this juncture, however, a fresh suggestion was disseminated, none knew how: but it was caught up at once. Sir Francis Bendibow owned a town mansion, only a mile or two distant. Why not look for him there? That was a more likely place to find him; and if he were gone, at all events the house and its contents would remain, and be at the mob’s disposal. Away, then, to the Bendibow mansion! There were no naked bayonets and loaded musket-barrels there; but there were valuables of all kinds to smash or to purloin, and possibly there were provisions in the larder, and wines in the cellar. So off to Sir Francis Bendibow’s!
In a surprisingly short time the vast mass of men had begun to move in the direction of their new object, sweeping everything before them, and gaining new recruitsat every street corner. Along the Strand they poured, a seething and howling torrent of lawless humanity, swollen continually by confluents streaming down the narrow streets from the north; more than half of them, no doubt, ignorant whither they were bound, or wherefore they were gathered together, but all alike ready for mischief and exulting in disorder. Meantime the warning of their approach preceded them, and shop-keepers hurriedly put up their shutters, and householders barred their doors. Westward they roared along, appalling to see and hear, and yet grotesquely fascinating, insomuch that law-abiding and respectable citizens, beholding them, were seized with a strange longing to cast themselves into that irresistible current, to imbibe its purpose and join in its achievements. Alas for Francis Bendibow, should he fall into the clutches of these his fellow-creatures!
As the front of the mob entered the street in which the Bendibow mansion stood, a hackney carriage was being driven rapidly out of it in the opposite direction. Before it could turn the corner, a stone, flung at random, struck the driver on the head, and knocked him off the box. At this mishap the mob set up a jeering howl, and a number of them rushed forward to see what game they had brought down. But hereupon the door of the carriage opened, and a man got out, wearing a heavy caped cloak; an elderly man, but stout and broad-shouldered. The collar of his cloak was turned up, and the brim of his hat drawn down over his forehead, so that little of his face was visible. This man, after casting a glance toward the crowd, mounted quickly on the vacant box, and gathering up the reins with a practiced hand, laid the whip sharply across the horse’s back. A ragged scarecrow sprang at the animal’s bit with outstretched hand, but the lash of the whip smote him across the eyes, and he staggered back with a shriek ofagony. The vehicle was now at the street corner; but before turning it, the man on the box, taking the reins in his left hand, passed his right beneath his cloak, and drew forth a long pistol. He leveled it at the thick of the crowd, which was now swarming before the doomed house, and fired. The ball passed through the neck of a gigantic ruffian, who had just smashed one of the front windows of the mansion, and buried itself in the heart of a pallid stripling a couple of yards further on, who had been swept along in the rush, against his own will, and without the least notion of what all the uproar was about. Both the stricken men fell; and the hackney carriage and its driver disappeared.
All this had passed so rapidly that few were aware it had occurred, or knew whence the shots came, or what damage they had done; and all eyes and thoughts being now centered on the house, no pursuit of the fugitive was attempted. The house, of course, had never been designed to stand a siege, nor did there seem to be any garrison to defend it: the doors and windows were speedily battered in, and the mob, meeting with no resistance and seeing no adversaries, crowded in pell-mell, and the work of sack and destruction began. It was speedily apparent, however, that the amount of the spoil was altogether out of proportion with the number of the spoilers,—so much so that at least nine-tenths of the latter must needs come off, not only empty-handed, but without even the gratification of having destroyed anything. In half an hour the lately splendid residence of the proprietor of the greatest private banking-house in London was gutted from cellar to ridge-pole, and such of its contents as could profitably be stolen had passed through the hands of hundreds of temporary possessors, one snatching from another, until everything had vanished, it was impossible to say where, and nobody—save those who had been crushed, beaten, trampled, or tornwithin an inch of their lives or less—were in the slightest degree satisfied. In this predicament, a very obvious resource presented itself. If Sir Francis Bendibow’s house could not fill the mob’s pockets, there were in London plenty of similar houses which might, in the aggregate, realize the desired end: a good beginning had been made here; why not go on and sack all Belgravia? The suggestion had only to be made to be acted upon; and in a few minutes more the whole vast crowd was in full cry toward Pall Mall. Here, however, an unexpected and chilling obstacle presented itself. The Duke of Wellington, who happened to have come over from Paris for a few days, and had received information of the disturbance, had shortly before despatched a battery of artillery in that direction: and as the mob swept round the corner of the Haymarket, they found themselves almost on the gaping muzzles of half-a-dozen big cannon, the same that had mowed down the French at Waterloo, and which seemed cordially disposed to do as much for the cockney roughs in Pall Mall. An amazing scene of confusion followed, those behind being as yet ignorant of the passionate desire of those in front to get out of the way; and the confusion was kindled into a wild panic when the tramp of horses was heard on the left, and the black plumes and glancing breastplates of a hundred heavy dragoons were seen charging at a brisk trot upon the flank of the rioters. This charge, and the accompanying arrest of many of the ringleaders, dispersed the mob even more quickly than it had been assembled; it plunged headlong wherever an opening presented itself, and its wicked old mother, London, swallowed it up; as Spenser’s monster swallowed her filthy offspring, at the attack of the Red Cross Knight. All mobs are cowardly: but the London mob is the most cowardly of all, because it is the least excitable, and is without convictions.
While these matters were in progress, the hackney-carriage had gone on its way unmolested, and having reached Oxford street, turned eastward, and rattled along swiftly toward the city. It was now nearly four o’clock, and the early London dusk had begun to settle over the dingy streets. The driver sat erect and square on the box, turning his head neither to the right nor left, but occasionally touching the horse smartly with the whip. To look at him, one would have supposed him to be absorbed in a gloomy revery: he scarcely seemed to notice where he was going. Presently, however, he turned down a street to the right; and in ten minutes more drew up in front of the office of Mr. Merton Fillmore, Solicitor, in the neighborhood of Cornhill. Throwing the reins on the tired animal’s back, he got leisurely down from his seat, and with his hat-brim still pulled down over his brows, he entered the doorway and went up stairs.
He was about to lay his hand on the handle of the office door, when it was opened from within, and Fillmore, with his hat and top coat on, stepped across the threshold, but stopped short on seeing his visitor. For a moment he stood silent and motionless: then he grasped the other by the arm and drew him into the office, where the clerks were locking up their desks, and across it into the inner room, closing the door behind them.
“Well, Bendibow, I’m glad you have escaped,” he said. “I sent after you to the bank and to your house this forenoon, but you were at neither place. Where did you spend the night?”
“At an inn in Pimlico.”
“Your house is probably in ruins by this time.”
The baronet took a pistol from beneath his cloak, and showed Fillmore that it had been discharged. “I just came from there,” he remarked. “I gave an account of two or three of ’em, first.”
“Of course you know your life is in danger?”
“I’m dangerous myself,” replied the other, with a short laugh.
“You had better lose no time in getting out of London.”
“Not I! I’m satisfied. I shall give myself up.”
“That may be the best thing you can do. Did you know this was coming on?”
“I suppose so. It had to come some time. I haven’t known much, one way or another, lately. If Tom had been alive, I should have tried to stave it off. It’s all one to me now, damn ’em! I wish I could have ruined all England.”
“You have done enough, Bendibow. What was the cause of this?”
The baronet laughed again. “The cause of it? Ask the historians of the eighteenth century. If Abraham Bendibow had never succeeded, I never should have failed. It was bound to happen, from the beginning. Have you got anything to drink, Fillmore?”
The lawyer shook his head. “And you had better let brandy alone for the present,” he said. “Your head has not been right, as it is, for the last four months.”
“My head will last my time,” said Sir Francis, carelessly. “I can bring my wits together when there’s need for it. Four months, is it? Should have thought it was four days—or a century! Tom is dead ... did you know that? You don’t know what killed him, though! Well, give me something to eat, then: I’m hungry.”
Fillmore opened the door, and ordered the clerk to bring some bread and meat from the neighboring tavern. Sir Francis sat heavily down at the table, and supported his head between his hands. He was greatly changed from the courtly and fastidious baronet of last summer. There was something coarse and reckless about him.The germ of it had always been there, perhaps; but it had been kept out of sight till now. Fillmore leaned in thought against the mantelpiece, with his arms folded. After a while the clerk came in, with the bread and meat. He put it down before Sir Francis, who roused himself, and began to eat ravenously. When he had finished, he leaned back in his chair, and fixed his eyes upon the solicitor.
“You’re a good fellow, after all, Fillmore,” he said. “I’ll tell you all about it: ’twill be known soon enough, without my telling. Ever hear of Rackett’s?”
“The gambling house in Jermyn street?”
“That’s it. Well, that was Bendibow Brothers—that was the real place. It brought me in hundreds per cent., where the bank brought me in tens. We should have gone down long ago if it hadn’t been for Rackett’s. But the devil was in it all.”
“I knew you had something of the sort going on; but you never chose to explain, and I didn’t care to make inquiries. But I never thought of Rackett’s. ’Tis the most scandalous place in London.”
“ ’Tis nothing now, but four walls and a bailiff. Scandalous, eh? Well, so it was! I’ve had there, in one night, the Prince of Wales, Brummel, Fox, Rivers, Aubrey, and Dennis O’Kelly. Dick England—do you remember him? He was a great pal of mine a score of years ago. Tippoo Smith—he was another. Egad, I had ’em all! They never knew where their money went to—except those who were in the secret: never suspected Frank Bendibow of having any connection with such scandalous doings! We had Lady Kendall of Ross there once; and we made his lordship pay one hundred thousand pounds down, to save my lady’s reputation. Dear at the price, wasn’t it?”
“Aye, you were a clever man, Bendibow, ill as your cleverness has served you in the end. And in nothingmore clever than in the way you kept your connection with this business concealed. Something was always suspected, but nothing was known.”
“No, nothing was known. Do you know the reason? ’Twas because I knew how to choose men, and how to make them work for me. Frank Bendibow was a Napoleon, in his own way; but he’s had his Waterloo! The only one who ever found me out was that jade Perdita; and she forced me to pay her ten thousand pounds for it, when I could easier have spared her as many drops of my heart’s blood. I was a fool not to have taken her into partnership ten years ago, instead of marrying her to that French imbecile. She is worth more than the best dozen men I ever came across, begad!”
“She is worth too much ever to have mixed herself up in any such thievish business,” said Fillmore sternly.
“Maybe she is: ’tis all over now,” returned the other carelessly. “I’m glad to be at the end of it. They’ve been bothering me for weeks past, curse ’em! bringing me their fears and complaints, and asking me what they should do. I bade ’em go to the devil: I had other things to think about. If Tom had been alive ... well, no matter! I believe that scoundrel, Catnip, that I took out of the street, damme, and had in my own office, and made a prosperous man of—I believe he was the one who betrayed us. You call me a swindler, Merton Fillmore; but if every man had been as square as I’ve been, I wouldn’t be here now.”
“You are what I would have been, under the same conditions,” said Fillmore. “I neither condemn nor praise any man. Had you warning of the crash, yesterday?”
“At ten o’clock last night, at Vauxhall.”
“At Vauxhall?”
“That surprises you, eh? ’Twas our trysting-place, where we met to concoct our nefarious schemes, as they say in the play: and the safest one we could have chosen.Well, I thought I was ready for anything; but when they told me that, I called out, and struck the fellow down, and I don’t know what happened for a while after that. Here’s a queer thing: I had a notion I saw that Lockhart girl—the one that married Lancaster—just before I dropped; and again, at the inn, I thought I heard her voice. At the inn I awoke this morning, and that’s all I know about it. Faces and voices sometimes come before a man that way, when he’s a bit beside himself. But what made me think of her, eh?” He arose as he spoke, and began to button up his cloak.
“Is that all you have to tell me?” asked Fillmore.
“All? No. That’s all at present. The words in which I tell you all—you, or any one else—will be the last words that Frank Bendibow speaks. What do you care? What does anybody care? Let ’em find out, if they can. I shall be there: I am not going to run away, as Grantley did.”
“You must come home and spend the night with me.”
“No: my board and lodging will be at the expense of the government from this day on. Say what you like of Rackett’s, there was virtue enough in it to secure me that, at any rate. Thank you all the same, Fillmore: you’re the last man I shall ever give thanks to. Well, I’m off. Good day to you.”
“Where are you going?”
Bendibow named the station at which he proposed to surrender himself.
“If you are resolved to go, I will drive you there,” said Fillmore. “But you had better accept my invitation, for one night at least.”
The baronet shook his head. “My liabilities are heavy enough already; I am not going to risk being the cause of your house being used as mine has been. I’m poison: but I can prevent your taking me.”
And with this jest, he led the way out of the office.
IThad been Fillmore’s intention to call on Perdita the next morning, and acquaint her with the details of what had happened. She was, theoretically at all events, nearly interested in the matter. She was Bendibow’s adopted daughter, and his credit or disgrace must more or less affect her. She might desire to take some action about the affair, and, as Bendibow was already in the hands of the authorities, and seemed inclined to be somewhat outspoken, there was no time to be lost. Whatever defense of the unfortunate baronet was to be attempted would naturally be intrusted to Fillmore; and it was necessary that he should be acquainted with the views and wishes of all concerned. Perdita, moreover, was capable not only of having desires, but of suggesting ingenious and practical methods of accomplishing them: and though Fillmore was not accustomed to ask advice from his clients, or to accept it when offered, he was ready to make an exception in Perdita’s case. She had brains, sound judgment, and quickness of wit superior to Fillmore’s own—more elastic and adaptable. Furthermore, the lawyer was in love with the lady, and was not the man to forego any opportunity of strengthening his relations with her. He had resolved never to give her up, and in order to carry out that resolve, it was indispensable, in the case of a woman like Perdita, to use every advantage at his disposal.
He had arranged to make his call as early as ten o’clock, which, after all, was not so early seventy yearsago as it is now. But fortune, who often leads men to destruction by simply improving the grade of the path they are already inclined to travel, so arranged events that Fillmore received, while he was yet at breakfast, a short note from the Marquise herself, dispatched to him from her bed-chamber by special messenger, requesting his speedy presence at her house. “You will know, without my telling you, why I want to speak to you,” she wrote: “and I send to you thus early so that you may be able to come before you go to the city. I shall be expecting you by nine o’clock. Pardon my haste and informality,mon ami: I have confidence in you.”
This communication no doubt improved the lawyer’s appetite, and imparted a more exquisite flavor to the coffee that he quaffed from the delicate cup of painted Meissen porcelain. He allowed the little note to remain open on the table beside him; he scrutinized its curious chirography, at once rounded and sharp, bold, characteristic, and yet difficult to read. A faint, very faint perfume emanated from it, reminding him of the writer; her lovely hand had rested upon this paper; her breath had touched it. The lawyer bent down, perhaps to examine it more closely.... At that moment the servant entered, to inquire when Mr. Fillmore wanted his carriage. Mr. Fillmore raised his head quickly, hemmed, pulled up his collar, and replied that fifteen minutes before nine would be time enough. The servant withdrew, and Fillmore, glancing at the mirror opposite, detected an unmistakable blush on his ordinarily pale cheeks. He bit his lip; then, catching up the letter, he kissed it and put it in his pocket.
At five minutes past nine he arrived at the Marquise’s house and was immediately ushered into a charming ante-room adjoining the lady’s chamber. In a few moments the door of the latter opened, and the Marquise appeared. She had on a flowingdressing-gown of white cachemire lined with quilted satin and bordered with flowers worked in gold thread. Her bright reddish hair was drawn up to the top of her head, revealing the beautiful line and pose of her white neck; and her slender feet, encased in bronze slippers and open-work silk stockings, peeped out beneath the embroidered hem of her petticoat. She was fresh and rosy from her bath, and had all the fragrance and loveliness of a sweet-petaled flower.
She put her warm hand in the lawyer’s cool, firm clasp, smiled upon him, and bade him be seated. “You are very good to come to me so promptly,” she said, “and to show my appreciation of your courtesy, I will proceed to business at once, and give you your liberty as soon as possible. You have not been able to see Sir Francis, I suppose? I know that he has been arrested.”
“He gave himself up voluntarily,” said Fillmore. “He had ample opportunity to escape, if he had wished it. I offered to help him off; but he refused.”
“You...? You did see him, then?”
“He came to my office in the midst of the disturbance.”
Perdita’s dark, sparkling eyes fixed themselves steadfastly upon the lawyer. “In that case,” she said slowly, “he probably told you.... Will you tell me all that passed?”
Fillmore complied, and Perdita listened to his story with close attention. After it was told, she sat for a while with her forefinger against her chin, meditating.
“I don’t know whether to be pleased or displeased,” she remarked at length. “ ’Tis rather exciting, at all events. I knew about Rackett’s, and all that: I knew more than he ever suspected. But I thought he was clever enough to secure himself. I’m not sure but I might have helped him, if he had applied to me.”
“Even if your means would have sufficed, he was past helping.”
“I should have done it for my own sake, not for his,” said Perdita, with a smile of cynical candor. “I care for what happens to him only as it may affect me. You won’t be obliged, sir, to remodel your estimate of my character on the idea that I am given to self-sacrifice. And I should certainly not begin with Sir Francis. On the contrary!”
“I understand. You think his disgrace may affect you?”
“I only fear that he may not be disgraced enough.”
“I don’t understand so well as I thought.”
“You do your understanding injustice. If Sir Francis was a villain from the beginning, I am comfortable. If that old story about him and my father should turn out to my father’s credit, then I should be the daughter of an honest man, who was wickedly abused; and that will be to my advantage. If this man who was lately murdered proves to have been really my father, all the better. The opposite alternatives would be what I should not like. Now, as Sir Francis has given himself up, ’tis likely he means to make a full confession: and meanwhile I’m in suspense. What is your opinion about him?”
“I have been on friendly terms with him for a good many years.”
“And you mean to stick by him, right or wrong?”
“As against people in general—yes.”
“Does that mean that you are going to sacrifice your conscience only in special cases?”
“I could do anything to serve you,” said Fillmore, with measured emphasis.
“And I am to consider it a compliment if you betray an old friend to please a new acquaintance? You are severe, Mr. Fillmore!”
She said this smilingly but the lawyer could not tell whether she were offended, or were only teasing him. Ifhe had needed any assurance that she was not a woman to be easily duped by flattery, he had it now. He had intended merely to indicate that he would not lightly be false to a trust, but she had contrived to make him imply nearly the reverse. His real sentiments in the matter were, in fact, honorable enough, though he was sensible of a fatal fascination about Perdita, stronger than the attractions of virtue. For a moment he hesitated, undecided whether to draw back now and finally, or to go on.
“Do you give me up?” asked Perdita, with a little laugh.
“Never!” said he, with a feeling that he was pledging himself rather for the possibilities of the future than for anything in the present. “Not that there is anything in this affair to impair the most sensitive principles,” he added, smiling. “Professional etiquette is the most I have to consider, and that is not involved in the present question. As I was saying, I have been in the way of knowing a good deal about Bendibow, and my opinion is that the more complete his confession is, the less cause you will have for anxiety. At the same time, from something he let fall, I doubt whether his confession will be entirely without reserve.”
“What will he hold back?”
“I know of nothing in particular.”
“Anything about the murder of my father, for instance?”
“Do you suspect him of knowing anything about that?” demanded Fillmore, feeling astonished.
“One cannot help seeing that if the robber had been able to rifle his victim’s pockets, and had taken away that packet among other things, it would have been convenient for Sir Francis.”
“But if the contents of the packet were compromising to any one, the thief would have demanded a ransom—”
“Which the person compromised would have paid,—if he had not already paid it in advance,” said Perdita composedly.
“I don’t think Bendibow had it in him to go such lengths,” said Fillmore, after a long pause. “Besides, the fact that his son was killed at the same time....”
“It was a dark night,” remarked Perdita. “However, I don’t really believe it, either. But I’ve made up my mind that I want that packet. Sir Francis’ confession may agree with it; or—’tis just possible—he may try to tell a different story, in which event the packet might be useful.”
“Very true. The packet is still in Mrs. Lancaster’s possession, is it not?”
“I gave it to her, for fear of my own curiosity. But ’tis another thing now. I must know what is in it. And soon!”
“Shall I get it for you?”
“If you will be so kind.... No, on the whole, I think you had better not. Under the circumstances, Mrs. Lancaster would probably prefer to have me apply to her directly. But when I’ve got it, I shall want to consult with you about it.”
“You may command me at any time, madame.”
Perdita rose, and the lawyer, though he would gladly have stayed longer, had no choice but to rise also. “Sir,” said the Marquise, after contemplating him a moment, “I wish you would be consistent!”
Fillmore bowed, somewhat apprehensively: for although Perdita had given him to know that she was not afraid of him, he was beginning to be a little afraid of her. Perceiving that he did not catch her drift, she explained herself.
“You are one of the most agreeable and sensible men I ever met, on all points but one,” she said. “Be sensible on that too!”
“You might as well ask me not to be sensible to hunger, or to fire,” he replied, drawing a deep breath and looking upon her with a sort of sullen ardor.
“I have kept a part of my promise to you,” continued the Marquise; “I have showed you something of what I really am. There is nothing to love here,”—she laid her finger on her breast—“for beauty alone is not lovable, to a man like you. And you have intellect enough: you need something besides intellect in a wife: and that something is just what I can never give.”
“You have it to give,” interrupted Fillmore, “whether you give it to me or not.”
“And what most annoys me,” she went on, “is that unless you come to your senses soon, I shall cease to like you, and therefore to be able to make use of you. So, if you really care for me, you must not love me any more.”
“It is no use,” said Fillmore, with a slow movement of his head: and, without awaiting any further argument, he took his leave.
“And now for you, master Philip!” said the Marquise to herself, when she was alone. What she intended by such an exclamation there was nothing to indicate: but she called her maid, and having disembarrassed herself of her dressing-gown, she proceeded rapidly to complete her toilet, and gave orders for her carriage to be at the door at half-past ten. A few minutes later she was being driven in the direction of the Lancasters’ house.
At this juncture, however, fortune again interposed to hasten matters, by bringing Philip to the corner of Hanover Square just as the Marquise’s carriage was entering it. He recognized the livery, and paused, raising his hat; but she had already caught sight of him, and the carriage drew up to the sidewalk. Philip appeared at the door, wearing a rather grave face. Perdita greetedhim with radiant composure. His dejection recovered a little under this tonic; and when she followed it up by inviting him to take a seat beside her, he felt better, and complied. By a flash of memory, Perdita recollected a former occasion, on which she had entreated him to do the same thing, and he had refused; although then he had been a single man, whereas now he was married: this recollection made the Marquise smile secretly. Meanwhile Philip took his seat in total unsuspiciousness of what was passing in her mind.
“Tell me where you want to go,” she said, “and I’ll drive you there.”
“I was going to call on you.”
“How charmingly attentive of you! In that case ... suppose we carry out my original intention of—driving round the Park.”
“It would give me great pleasure,” he answered: whereupon she gave the direction to the coachman.
“Have you a new poem to read to me?” she asked.
“I haven’t written a line for six weeks. I was coming about this Bendibow affair. Of course you’ve heard of it?”
“That his house was ransacked, and he arrested—yes.”
“Well: my wife ... we thought you might want those papers that you left with my wife. There’s no knowing what may happen, you know.”
“You haven’t got them with you?”
“Here they are,” he answered, producing the packet.
“They may be needed; there’s no telling, as you say. It was very kind of your wife—of you, that is, to think of it. You are all well and happy—that goes without saying?”
“Oh, yes: Marion is not very well this morning, though.”
“Indeed! What ails her?”
“A headache, I believe. I don’t know. I was away for a day or two and she has not been quite herself since I came back.”
“Surely that’s only what might be expected, after being deprived of you so long!”
“Perhaps so,” said Philip, laconically.
“We poor women, you know, are not permitted to amuse ourselves when our lords are away. We can only stay at home until they come back.”
“That’s the principle: but not always the practice,” said Philip, with a grim look.
“You have not found it out?” exclaimed the Marquise in a startled tone; and then, as if perceiving that she had committed herself, she hurriedly added, “Of course, principle and practice must always differ more or less. Human beings aren’t made by rule of thumb.”
Philip at first made no reply, but a painful expression passed over his face, leaving it gloomier than before. At length he said, “I’m not a man who lets himself be blindfolded to save trouble. You and I have known each other some time, Perdita. Will you answer me truly—will you tell me what you know? for I see you do know something.”
“I’m not likely to forget the past,” answered the beautiful Marquise: “I shall remember it at least as long as this scar lasts,”—and as she spoke she placed her hand on the upper part of her bosom. “But it is never true friendship to interfere between husband and wife. If you see anything that troubles you, give it the best interpretation possible, and forget it. Very likely—most likely—there is no harm in it. One must not expect, or wish, to know all the secrets even of the person they have married. Does Marion know all yours?”
“I thank you for your advice,” said Philip, in a tonethat intimated he did not mean to follow it. “It seems you are aware that my wife spent a night away from home. Probably you also know where, and with whom. I shall know that in time; but I would rather learn it from you than from any one else.”
“I could tell you nothing that would really enlighten you, Philip. Your best security for your wife’s conduct is the good you know of her. Be satisfied with that. It was enough to make you marry her. It should be enough to make you happy in your marriage.”
“Yes, I know all that!” said Philip, impatiently. After a short silence, he added, turning toward her, “You are a true friend, Perdita. May I come and talk to you, some time? The world is a lonely place!”
“If I can make it less lonely for you—come!” she answered.
MEANWHILEthe inscrutable Providence, whose apparent neglect of the affairs of men is only less remarkable than its seeming interference with them, had decreed that these affairs with which we are at present occupied should be dignified by the participation in them of Lady Flanders. For, at about the hour when Philip and Perdita were driving in the Park, and discussing the former’s domestic situation, Mr. Thomas Moore was calling upon the elderly aristocrat, and the conversation between them was taking a similar direction.
Precisely what passed on this occasion, it is unnecessary at this moment to inquire; but the reader may be reminded that Mr. Moore was a gentleman, and incapable of wantonly betraying any lady’s confidence; and he may further be informed that the genial poet’s acquaintance with Lady Flanders was intimate and of old standing. Her attitude toward him was, indeed, of a quasi-maternal character: and in the present instance his communications, whatever they were, were prompted in great measure by his recognition of her great social influence, and by the fact that her declared opinion, favorable or unfavorable, of any person, was apt to go a long way toward making or marring that person’s social reputation. When Mr. Moore left her ladyship’s presence, she patted him on the shoulder and called him a good boy; and he issued from her door with the light of conscious virtue glistening on his ingenuous forehead.
Next morning Lady Flanders arose early, and in thecourse of her toilet preparations she fell into chat, as her custom was, with her maid Christine, an attractive young person of German extraction, deft of hand and soothing of voice, who could design and elevate a headdress in a manner to please the most exacting elderly aristocrat imaginable. Christine was a great favorite with her mistress, and was the only human being of either sex to whom that lady was uniformly indulgent and good-humored. Christine, for her part, was much attached to Lady Flanders; but, with the perversity and short-sightedness of persons in her enviable condition of life, she had lately taken it into her head to lose her heart; and the individual who had won it was a Mr. Catnip, whose name has been once or twice mentioned in this history, as a servant of Sir Francis Bendibow. It would appear that Christine and her cavalier had met to enjoy each other’s society the evening previous; and Mr. Catnip had at that time confided to Christine a curious circumstance which had happened to come under his observation the day before at Vauxhall. After Christine had repeated to her mistress the main points of Mr. Catnip’s story, her ladyship interrupted her.
“Of course you understand, Christine,” she said, “that I am convinced to begin with that your Catnip has been telling you a pack of lies, and that there’s not a word of truth in the tale from beginning to end. ’Tis very foolish of you to have anything at all to say to such a fellow, and my advice to you is to drop him at once. Is he willing to make affidavit that ’twas really the Marquise Desmoines he saw there?”
“Oh, yiss, madame! He stand close by de box on which Madame la Marquise sit, and he recognize de ring on her finger, and her tone as she speak with her companion. They sit on de box next to Madame Lancaster.”
“Could she and Mrs. Lancaster see each other?”
“Not whiles dey sit so; but soon Madame Lancaster get up and go out in front, and den Madame la Marquise....”
“Aye, aye: a mighty pretty story! And so then Sir Francis fainted away, did he, and Mrs. Lancaster got a carriage, and Catnip followed it?... Upon my word, Christine, you ought to be ashamed of yourself to listen to such trash: much more to repeat it to me. Take care you never open your mouth about it to any one else, that’s all.”
“Oh, not in de least, madame.”
“There, that’ll do. Now go and tell Withers that I shall want the carriage immediately after breakfast. And, Christine ... put in order the bed-room and the sitting-room on the second floor: I’m expecting some one to spend the night. Don’t forget.”
“I shall take care of it, madame.”
Lady Flanders went down to breakfast, ate with a good appetite, and having put on her bonnet and cloak, she got into her carriage and was driven to the Marquise Desmoines’. The latter received her august visitor with some surprise, for Lady Flanders had not hitherto shown much disposition to cultivate intimate relations with the beautiful widow. But her ladyship was notorious for indulging in whims of which no one but herself could divine the reason: and in the present instance she was evidently laying herself out to be exceptionally polite and entertaining. After ten minutes’ desultory chat on things in general, the name of Philip Lancaster happened to fall, quite by accident, from Lady Flanders’ lips, and after a moment’s pause she said:
“By-the-by, my dear, I was quite upset yesterday. I don’t know whether to believe it or not. I’ve taken such a fancy to the young gentleman, I should be sorry to see his domestic felicity destroyed. I have alwaysdisapproved of man’s marrying beneath him ... the girl may be very attractive in some ways, but such persons lack training, and a proper realization of their social duties. Bless you, I don’t expect women to be saints—that would put an end to society in six weeks—but there is everything in savoir-faire, tact, the way a thing is managed. Let a woman do anything but make a vulgar exhibition of herself. And that is just what this unfortunate creature seems to have done—that is, if the story is to be believed: and I have it on pretty good authority. What do you think about it?”
Perdita had been on her guard from the beginning of Lady Flanders’ speech. She was startled (more perhaps, than distressed) to find that her visitor knew anything about the matter; and anxious to discover why the old lady should suppose that she had any information. For there was one reason why Perdita had need to be cautious here; and that was, lest it should transpire that she herself had been at Vauxhall. That was the weak point in her position; but for that, she had nothing to apprehend. She was quite certain that no one among those whom she had recognized there, had recognized her: as for Catnip,—well as he knew her,—she scarcely knew that such a person existed, she being, herein, at the disadvantage in which all persons of higher rank are liable to stand toward those in the lower. Lady Flanders, therefore, (she argued) could have no knowledge of her own presence at Vauxhall: and admitting that, it was impossible to suppose that her ladyship should, of her own motion, conjure up the imagination of so wildly improbable a thing. No; she must have been influenced by some other idea; and it was at this juncture that the Marquise bethought herself, with a feeling of relief, that it would be natural for Lady Flanders to infer that Philip himself had been her informant. In fact, it was Philip who had first introduced the subject. Her apprehensionsthus relieved, Perdita no longer saw in Lady Flanders anything more than an old scandal-monger greedy for the last new scrap of her favorite wares; and she consequently felt it necessary to observe no more than ordinary discretion.
“You have not yet told me,” she remarked, “what it is you refer to.”
“Dear me! sure enough!” exclaimed the other innocently. “Well, I’m glad to see it has not been more talked about. Why, you must know, my dear, that our friend Mrs. Lancaster, who seemed so precious straight-forward and artless, has been guilty of the most outrageous rashness—not to call it by a worse name! She has been....” and here Lady Flanders lowered her voice, and told the story which Perdita already knew, with much vivacity, and in a way to put Marion’s conduct in a most ungainly light. “ ’Tis impossible to be sorry for her,” she continued; “such a brazen creature puts herself outside the pale of pity; but one can’t help being sincerely concerned for that poor boy, Philip Lancaster. It will be a terrible blow for him; and knowing the friendly interest you have shown in him, I thought it likely he might have sought your advice on the subject.”
“Since you have spoken on the subject, my dear Lady Flanders,” said Perdita, gravely, “I may follow your example, though otherwise I should have kept silence. Mr. Lancaster has opened his mind to me, to some extent; and I counseled him to put the best construction possible on his wife’s conduct, and rather to secure her safety in the future than inquire too curiously into the past. She is young and inexperienced, and will no doubt reform her behavior when she realizes its true character.”
“Aye, aye, you little serpent!” said Lady Flanders to herself, “ ’tis just as I thought, you and master Philip have been feathering your own nest with what you’veplucked from my poor little Marion’s reputation. I’ll catch you yet—see if I don’t!” Aloud she added, “Indeed, my dear, your advice was most sensible, and you’re a deal more charitable than I should have been in your place. Well, and how did your advice affect him? I hope he won’t lose his head and make a disturbance!”
“He does not yet know, and I hope never may know, the name of the gentleman implicated in the affair,” said Perdita. “As you say, it could only make bad worse to have a public outbreak; and I don’t think Philip will go so far as that until he has seen me again....”
Perdita paused, doubting the prudence of this last sentence, which, in fact, had vastly delighted the cynical and Machiavellian old lady. The latter was convinced that the relations between Perdita and Philip would not bear inspection, and that they were making Marion’s predicament a pretext for prosecuting their own intrigue. She was determined to bring their nefarious doings to light, and had already partly outlined to herself a plan of operations, having that end in view. For the present, she was satisfied at having attained the object of her visit, which was simply to ascertain that Perdita and Philip were on a confidential footing upon a matter so nearly affecting the latter’s honor, and that their intimacy was such as it was expedient for them to disguise. The rest would be revealed in due time. Meanwhile she hastened to declare that it was a fortunate thing for Philip to have secured the friendly interest of a woman of the world like Perdita; and that she trusted he would show his appreciation of it.
“I was going to say,” remarked Perdita, who had her wits about her, and was by no means prone to believe in the sincerity of her visitor’s cordiality, “that the whole story, so far as I am aware, is mere hearsay, and may be untrue. It would not surprise me wereit to turn out so. So that any premature allusion to it, as your ladyship yourself suggested, might do a great deal of harm.”
“Aye, to be sure,” returned Lady Flanders, admiring the cleverness of this stroke; and for a moment she hesitated whether or not to give her authorities. She decided not to do so; turned the conversation into a review of the Bendibow affair, and soon after took her leave, charmed with the prospect of finally getting the better of the only woman in London whom she acknowledged as her equal in subtlety and intrigue.
We will now return to Philip Lancaster. He came home late after his interview with Perdita, and Marion having already gone to her room, he resolved to postpone whatever he might have to say to her until the next day. Indeed, he needed time to turn the matter over in his mind. Before speaking to Perdita, he had not regarded it in a really serious light. All he knew was that Marion had spent the greater part of a night away from home; that her mother had only accidentally discovered her absence; and that Marion had given no satisfactory account of where she had been. When he had asked her about it, she had merely laughed, in her strange, perverse way, had affected to treat it lightly, and had remarked that he would know by-and-by without her telling him. He had confined himself, at the time, to some moderate expression of displeasure; he was not prepared to believe in anything worse than an imprudent freak, especially while he was under the influence of Marion’s presence. She had presently begun to speak of Bendibow’s arrest, and had expressed a strong desire to know the details of any confession he might make: and she had suggested that Philip should take the packet and return it to Perdita without delay. He agreed to do this: and with that their conversation terminated. But when Philip was alone, his reflectionsbecame more and more uncomfortable; Marion’s refusal to explain her escapade seemed very strange; and her sudden anxiety to hear about Bendibow’s confession looked like a pretext for changing the subject. Even this errand to Perdita might be a device to get him out of the way. When, therefore, he and Perdita met, he was in a fit mood to receive the intelligence she had ready for him: he learnt from her, for the first time, where it was that Marion had gone, and what she had been seen to do there; for although Perdita neither told him that she herself had been the witness whose testimony she cited, nor mentioned Moore’s name, she made it sufficiently evident to her auditor that it was not any ordinary freak he had to deal with here, but a matter involving all that is of most vital importance to a husband. And yet, though his mind was persuaded, his heart was not so: did he not know Marion? and was it credible that she could do such wrong? It was necessary, however, that his mind and his heart should be put in accord, one way or the other; and he spent the greater part of the night in trying to summon up all his wits and energies for the interview on the morrow. The natural consequence was, that when the morrow came he was so nervous and discomposed as with difficulty to control even his voice. The interview, which took place in the breakfast-room, which Marion entered just as Philip was ready to leave it, did not last long, though its results did.
“Well,” said Marion, as she entered, “did Madame Desmoines accept the packet? And did you see what was in it?”
“She did not open it in my presence,” he answered. “We found other things to talk about.”
“Oh, no doubt,” said Marion laughingly.
“There was nothing amusing in it, as you seem to suppose,” he continued, hardly controlling his indignation.“I am going to ask you a serious question, Marion: and you must answer it.”
“Must?”
“Yes—must!”
“That depends ... upon my own pleasure, Mr. Philip!” she returned, with a nervous smile.
“You have taken your pleasure too much into your own hands already. I must know where you were the other night, and with whom.”
“La! is your curiosity awake again so early? Ask me some other time. I’m not ready to tell you just yet.”
“No other time will do. I must tell you, since you seem ignorant of it, that your reputation as an honest woman is at stake. Bah! don’t try to escape me with subterfuges, Marion. I know that you were at Vauxhall Gardens; and that your companion was a man who—”
“Has he ... has any one been so base as to tell—”
“Any one!” thundered Philip, his eyes blazing. “Who?”
Marion lifted her head high, but she trembled all over, and her face was white. She met Philip’s fiery glance with a scornful look; but beneath the scorn there were unfathomable depths of pain, humiliation, appeal. Philip saw only the scorn; he was in no mood for insight. Thus the husband and wife confronted each other for several moments, while the air still seemed to echo with Philip’s angry shout.
“Philip,” said Marion at length, in a thin voice, which sustained itself with difficulty, “I have done you no wrong; and I should have been willing, some time, to tell you all you ask. But until you go down on your knees at my feet, and crave my pardon, I will not speak to you again!”
“Then we have exchanged our last words together,” said he.
Marion bent her head as if in assent, and moved to one side, so that her husband might leave the room. He paused at the door, and said:
“I give you one more chance. Will you confess? I might forgive you, then; but if you compel me to bring home to you your ... what you have done, on any other evidence, by God, I never will forgive you!—Oh, Marion! will you?”
His voice faltered; tears of misery and entreaty were in his eyes. Marion made a half-step toward him: but, by another impulse, she drew back again, covering her eyes with one hand, while with the other she motioned him away. Neither would yield; and so they parted.
Philip went forth, not knowing whither he was going. His world was turned upside down, and his life looked like a desert. He walked along the streets with wide-open but unseeing eyes—or with eyes that saw only Marion, as she stood with her hand over her face, waving him away. Sometimes he thought it must have been a dream: but he could not awake. He went down to the river-bank, near Chelsea, and sat for several hours on a bench, looking at the muddy current as it swirled by. The sky was cloudy and the wind cold, but he did not seem aware of it. It was already late in the afternoon when he arose, and returned towards the north. But where should he go? Home? There was no such place.
For a couple of hours we leave Philip to himself, to meet with what adventures destiny may provide.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
At six o’clock in the evening we come up with him again. He is hurrying along the street with a new light in his face—of anxiety, of suspense, of hope! Hope is unmistakably there—the dawn of a belief in the possibility of better things. The infrequent lamps that dimly light the street intermittently reveal the expression of his haggard and eager features. Arrived at the door of hishouse, he paused for a moment, biting his lips and clenching his hands: then he ran up the steps and rang the bell. The door seemed never to be going to open, and in his impatience he rang again. It opened at last. He strode across the threshold.
“Mrs. Lancaster up stairs?”
“No, sir,” said the servant. “She went out this afternoon in a carriage: not your carriage, sir. She left a note she said was to be given to you, sir. ’Tis there on the ’all table, sir.”
A singular quietness came over Philip, as he opened the letter, and deliberately read its contents. He seemed to himself to have known that this was coming. He put the letter in his pocket.
“That’s all right,” he said to the servant. “I had forgotten ... I shall probably not be back to-night.” He waited an instant or two, looking down at the ground: then, without saying anything more, he descended the steps and walked away. The door closed behind him.
PERDITAhad planned to attend the opera that evening, and afterwards she meant to look in at Lord Croftus’ party, which had more or less of a political significance. Her carriage was waiting at the door, and she herself, in full raiment of festivity, was in the act of coming down stairs, with a soft silken shawl thrown round her neck and shoulders to keep out the chill, when she heard the door-bell ring sharply, and some one was admitted to the hall below. Then the sound of a voice that was familiar to her came to her ears. Hearing it, the Marquise paused on the upper landing, holding the folds of her shawl together with her left hand, and gazing expectantly downward.
“Philip, again!” she murmured. “Something must have happened. Well, let us see.”
Philip mounted the stairs slowly and heavily, with his hand on the banisters, and his head bent down. Only when he reached the landing where Perdita stood did he look up. When she saw the expression on his face, she took him by the hand without a word, and led him up to the next floor, and into her boudoir. Some wine was sparkling in a decanter on the cabinet between the windows. She poured out a glass of this, and held it to his lips. He had been glancing round the room in an apprehensive but intent way, and then into her face, as if suspecting the presence of some one or of something which did not appear. After a few moments’ pause he drank the wine, and put the glass down.
“If she is here, tell me at once,” he said.
“No one is here but ourselves. Whom do you mean?”
“You know nothing about it?”
“No. What is it?”
“Have you seen my wife lately?”
“Lately? Three or four days ago—a week.”
“Then ... she’s lost!”
“Marion—your wife? Why, Philip ... lost!”
“I thought she might have come here. No, I didn’t think it: I hoped—I couldn’t believe all at once that she was gone. One tries to dodge such things as long as possible.” He fetched a deep breath, and took off his hat, which, up to this moment, he had forgotten to remove. “I beg your pardon,” he said vaguely, drawing his brows together as if to collect his wits: “Thank you. You’re going out. I won’t detain you.”
“Sit down, Philip,” said the Marquise, guiding him to a chair as if he had been a child, or an infirm person. “I am not going out—I am going to stay here with you. See! I am dressed to receive you,” she added, throwing off her wrap and smiling. “Now, Philip, we are friends, you know, and you have confidence in me. Let me help you. At any rate, tell me!”
“I am ashamed to tell it,” said he heavily. “I have been to blame: but I never thought of this. It doesn’t seem possible in her!”
“Has your wife left you—has she run away?” asked Perdita, putting into words, with her accustomed strength of nerve, what Philip shrank from formulating even in his thought. He did not reply, save by an assenting silence, and she presently went on: “Are you sure there is no mistake? She can’t have been gone long; she may come back.”
“She will never come back: she left a letter, to say she thought it best we should not meet again, after ... some words we had this morning. But that is a pretext! I had a right to ask her to explain. She must have made up her mind before; and when she found I knew what—what you told me—”
“Did you tell her it was I?”
“No: she thought it was the fellow himself who had spoken—she betrayed herself in thinking he had betrayed her. Oh, what a miserable, pitiable thing! ’Tis as if she were another woman—she seemed so noble and so pure! And even Lady Flanders had just been telling me that it was all nonsense—my imagination.”
“Lady Flanders?”
“I met her in the street an hour ago. She said my suspicions were an outrage on the truest and purest woman alive; but that I deserved to suffer the misfortune I imagined, and that if she were Marion, she would give me my deserts. And when I told her what I knew, she laughed, and said she knew all that and much more, and that Marion was as innocent as an angel in spite of it. I didn’t know what to think: but I came home, ready to kneel down and ask her pardon, if it were true. But she had taken her opportunity, and gone.”
This story was a surprise for Perdita, and she could not understand it. It seemed entirely improbable that Lady Flanders could have been sincere in what she had said; but, then, what could have been her object in saying it? Was she secretly aiding Moore in his schemes? That was conceivable, and her ladyship was quite wicked enough: and yet it was not a characteristic kind of wickedness in her. Moreover, what help would it give the fugitive couple to make Philip believe for a few minutes that his wife was innocent? On the other hand, however, what interest could she have had in making a woman appear innocent of whose guilt she was persuaded? It was perplexing either way, and caused Perdita some uneasiness: she regretted having spoken to the old plotter even so frankly as she had done. But she would get to the bottom of that matter later: Philip engaged her attention now. The crisis of his trouble had come on much sooner than she expected, and shewas inclined to share (though with a different feeling) his amazement at his wife’s action. Perdita felt that she had undervalued Marion’s audacity and resolution, not to speak of her unscrupulousness. She had been startled to see her at Vauxhall; but this sudden culmination of the intrigue showed a spirit stronger and more thoroughgoing than that of the ordinary intriguer.
“And to think of her doing it for a dapper little tom-tit like Tom Moore!” said the Marquise to herself. “Well! ’tisn’t he I would have done it for!” Here she glanced at Philip, who sat relaxed and nerveless, his chin resting upon his broad chest, his great eyes, haggard and sad, gazing out beneath the dark level of his brows; his noble figure, revealed beneath the close-buttoned coat and small-clothes, sunk in a posture of unconscious grace; his hessians stained with the mire of the weary miles he had traversed: here was a man to whom, indeed, a woman might yield her heart, and for whose sake she might imperil her renown. But what woman in her senses—especially when they were senses so keen as Marion’s appeared to be—would abandon such a man as this for...? It roused the Marquise’s indignation.
“She has gone, then, Philip: let her go!” she said, fixing upon him her sparkling eyes. “I can forgive a woman for anything but being a fool! I am a woman, and I know—or can imagine—what it is to love. But she has thrown herself away for nothing. What you loved was something that never was in her, though you fancied otherwise. You can forget her: and you will! What is she to you?”
“I won’t forget her yet!” Philip said, lifting his face with a grim look. “I’ll find her first,” he continued, suddenly rising to his feet, and tossing back his black tangled hair, “and the man who is with her! I need occupation, and that will suit me.”
“I believe in revenge as much as anybody,” observedthe beautiful Marquise, tapping her white fingers on the arm of her chair; “but what you are thinking of is vulgar. Any poor forsaken husband can run after his wife, and risk losing his life as well as her. There are finer things to do than that, Philip. Why should you pay them the compliment of hunting them down? Let them punish each other: they’ll do it soon enough, and more cruelly than you would!”
“I want the fellow’s blood,” said Philip savagely. “I won’t fight him—I’ll kill him. I don’t want finer kinds of revenge: they wouldn’t satisfy what I feel here!” As he spoke, he put his clenched hand over his heart.
“And after the killing—what? Suicide, to prevent hanging. It mustn’t be, Philip. Feel that you are well rid of her; and let her know it!”
He shook his head. “How could that be done?”
Perdita waited until his eyes encountered hers. It would be no slight feat to make a man in Philip’s condition forget his disgrace and wretchedness by dint of the sheer potency of her personal charm. But Perdita’s spirit was equal to the attempt, and she was conscious that she had never been better equipped for success. And if she did succeed so far, she might safely leave the rest to him. It was a crisis for herself as well as for him. The craving for adventure, the defiance of laws, the passion of the heart, which she had been all her life approaching, might be realized now: if not now, then not at all. Perdita had a powerful heart, full of courage for any emergency, and with capacity for trenchant emotion both of love and hate. She had been lonely and self-poised from her girlhood; she had fenced herself with the armor of an alert and penetrating mind, and had made good her defense; but, to a woman, victories like these are little better than defeat. She had fought to gain that which she would rather lose. Shelonged to yield; to give up her sword and shield, and taste the sweetness of submission. The laws of God and man were against her; but she perceived that it was only by disregarding these laws that she could gain her desire; and she had never been taught to love the one, or to respect the other. She had wished to conquer Philip; to bring him to her feet, as she had brought other men, and then to draw back, herself uncompromised and unhurt. But now she found that no such cold triumph would content her. She was ready to take the further step that separates the thousand prudent coquettes of the social world from the few who are daring enough to surrender. All would be lost but love: but was not that worth all?
These thoughts were stirring in the depths of the look which she bent upon Philip; and the fire of them searched through the thick clouds of despondency and wrath that brooded over his mind. An answering fire began to kindle in his own eyes. For when the fierce emotions of the soul have been aroused, their sinister heat permeates the blood, and makes the impulses plastic; so that adultery goes hand-in-hand with murder.
“There is more than one woman in the world, mon ami,” said Perdita. “What you have lost by one, you might perhaps more than regain by another.”
“Ah, Perdita!” muttered Philip, in an inward tone. He drew two or three deep breaths, and sat down beside her. “Was this destined to be the end of the story?” he continued. “Why did we not know it long ago? Shall we revenge each other on those who have injured us?” He took her hand, which responded to the pressure he gave it. “So this is what was destined!” he repeated, “and I was a fool to leave you after all!”
“We were neither of us ready then, perhaps,” she said, in the same low tone in which he had spoken. Speech came slowly to both of them, there was so much to say.“You gave me a scar which I vowed to requite you for,” she added with a smile.
“The seal of blood upon our union,” he responded, smiling also. “I have bled too. How well I remember all that. It was symbolic. You challenged me to it, and handed me the swords, to make my choice. In the second pass my foot slipped, and my point touched your breast. You seemed not to try to parry.”
“If it had passed through my heart, I shouldn’t have minded, then.”
“Were you so unhappy?”
“I was weary. But new life came to me with that wound. You were very tender ... and very timid!” she said, laughing. “Was I the first woman whose heart you had endangered?”
“Well, I had my scruples. Your husband was my friend. I’m not sorry that I did so, now. I should have felt remorse. But that is all past. No remorse any more! No one can blame us, Perdita. When did you begin to ... think of me?”
“I have never asked my heart many questions, nor let myself listen when it tried to speak. Perhaps I never cared for you until this moment. But I wanted you to care for me from the first. It seems so strange, Philip, to be talking to you without a disguise. I don’t believe I have ever done that to any one. I wonder how soon I shall get used to it!”
“You will forget that it was strange, soon.”
“And shall we begin to get tired of each other then?”
“God forbid that should ever happen!” exclaimed Philip with a sombre look.
“Yes; one cannot expect to succeed in this sort of experiment more than once,” returned Perdita, with a smile. “We should have to try another fencing match then, and you would have to push your rapier a little further.” After a pause she continued, “Were you really in love with your wife, Philip?”
“We must not speak about that.”
“There must be no closed subjects between us, sir!” she said, lifting her finger playfully. “We don’t belong to society any more, remember: we have nothing but each other to comfort ourselves with. There is no intimacy like this intimacy, Philip. A husband and wife represent the world: but we—what do we represent?”
“Then let us make a new beginning here, and build a wall between us and the past. We are no longer what we have been: why should we recall the deeds and thoughts of persons who were not what we are?”
“We have only one thing to be afraid of,” said the Marquise, looking at him thoughtfully, “and that is fear! Unless you can take your courage in your hands, mon ami, the time will come when you will need it, and find it wanting. It is best to think of these things while there is yet time. If you fear Marion, or your memories of her, do not come near me! I cannot help you there. In all else I would be as true as steel to you. But you must be true to me. The worldly honor that we abandon must make our honor toward each other doubly strong.”
Again Philip rose suddenly to his feet: but instead of standing in one place he began to pace up and down the room. Perdita, after watching him keenly for a few moments, leaned back in her chair and remained quite without movement, save that the changing glitter of the necklace on her bosom showed that she breathed. Almost any other woman would have betrayed signs of nervousness or agitation under such circumstances; but there was in Perdita, notwithstanding her subtlety and superficial fickleness, a certain strong elemental simplicity of character, that enabled her, after entering upon a given course, to pursue it with as much steadiness and singleness of purpose as if no other course were possible. She was one of those who can sleep soundly onthe eve of execution, or play their last stake and lose it with a smile. And now, when, as she divined from Philip’s manner, and the changing expressions that passed across his face, all was once more in doubt between them, and the issue beyond prophecy, it was not only possible but natural for her to sit composed and silent, and await what must be to her the final good or evil of the future. She knew that there were ways in which she might influence Philip; but with that strange feminine pride that never avouches itself more strongly than at the moment when all pride seems to have been surrendered, she would not avail herself of them. Had she tried to move him at all, it would have been on the other side. At last he stopped in his walk, and halted before her. She looked up at him with a smile.
“Well, monsieur, have you thought it all out? Have you realized the folly of it? Sit down here and tell me your opinion.”
“I am going to play the most ungainly part that can fall to a man,” he said, in a husky and obstructed voice, which he did not attempt to make smooth. “Let us part, Perdita. The only thing that gives me resolution to say this, is that I find it hard to say. But I know myself too well! I am small and incomplete of nature: hitherto I have deluded myself, and perhaps others, by a play of intellect which drew attention from my real feebleness and narrowness, and made me seem to be as broad and as deep as the reach of my thoughts and imagination. It is all delusion: I can chatter and contrive, but what I do and feel is petty and cold. There have been moments when I fancied I had overcome that torpid chill of the heart, and should be single, at last, in thought and feeling; but the chill has always come back, and the horizon been blotted out again by the shadow of my own carcase. Even now it is of myself that I am talking, instead of about you!”
“That is why you interest me, my friend.”
“Yes; and I might as well stop there. I am not going to hang such a lump of emptiness as myself round your neck. Even your overflow of life would not suffice long to vivify me. A man whose wife has been forced to desert him six months after marriage—a man who, merely by being himself, could change an innocent and high-spirited girl into a miserable outcast—such a fellow as that has neither the power nor the right to claim the love of a woman like you. Perdita, I am not fit even to commit a genuine sin! May God help me to the decency of keeping henceforth to myself! What would be, at least, generosity and courage in you, would be selfish and dastardly in me. It amazes me that I can feel even the shame and self-contempt that I am trying to give utterance to. But probably I shall have forgotten that too by to-morrow!”
“All that is very extravagant and impolite,” said Perdita pleasantly. “You should know better than to abuse a gentleman whom I esteem, and ... who cannot defend himself! Seriously, Philip, if I am angry with you, it is because you are quite right. I will not compliment you on your virtue, because you don’t seem to think of that so much as to be afraid of becoming a burden on my hands. No—I perceive, underneath your disguise, a courteous desire to save me from the consequences of my own rashness. It is the act of a true gentleman, and ... I shall never forgive it! I must, like you, have some occupation, and since you will not let me love you, you shall give employment to my hate. It will be just as amusing, and a great deal morecomme il faut! And then, some day—who knows?—your lost Marion may turn up again, neither better nor worse than other men’s wives, and with her curiosity as to the world gratified. And then you will be happier than ever. Will you drink another glass of wine?”