Then, out of the wind and rain, came Mr. Zanti.
Three days after Peter's visit to Brockett's he was finishing a letter before dressing for dinner. He and Clare were going on to a party later in the evening but were dining quietly alone together first. The storms that had fallen upon London three days before were still pommelling and buffeting the city, the trees outside the window groaned and creaked with a mysterious importance as though they were trying to tell one another secrets, and little branches tapped at the dripping panes. He was writing in the little drawing-room—warm and comfortable—and the Maria Theresa, so small a person in so much glory, looked down on him from her silver frame and gave him company.
Then Sarah—a minute servant, who always entered a room as though swept into it by a cyclone—breathlessly announced that there was a gentleman to see Mr. Westcott.
“'E's drippin' in the 'all,” she gasped and handed Peter a very dirty bit of paper.
Peter read:—“Dear Boy, Being about to leave this country on an expedition of the utmost importance I feel that I must shake you by the hand before I go. Emilio Zanti.”
Mr. Zanti, enormous, smiling from ear to ear, engulfed in a great coat from which his huge head, buffeted by wind and rain—his red cheeks, his rosy nose, his sparkling eyes—stood out like some strange and cheerful flower—filled the doorway.
He enfolded Peter in his arms, pressed him against very wet garments, kissed him on both cheeks and burst into a torrent of explanation. He was only in London for a very few days—he must see his dearest Peter—so often before he had wanted to see his Peter but he had thought that it would be better to leave him—and then he had heard that his Peter was married—well, he must see his lady—it was entirely necessary that he should kiss her hand and wish her well and congratulate her on having secured his “own, own Peter,” for a life partner. Yes, he had found his address from that Pension where Peter used to live; they had told him and he had come at once because at once, this very night, he was away to Spain where there was a secret expedition—ah, very secret—and soon—in a month, two months—he would return, a rich, rich man. This was the adventure of Mr. Zanti's life and when he was in England again he, Mr. Zanti, would see much of Peter and of his beautiful wife—of course she was beautiful—and of the dear children that were to come—
Here Peter interrupted him. He had listened to the torrent of words in an odd confusion. The last time that he had seen Mr. Zanti he had left him, sitting with his head in his hands sobbing in the little bookshop. Since then everything had happened. He, Peter, had had success, love, position, comfort—the Gods had poured everything into his hands—and now, to his amazement as he sat there, in the little room opposite his huge fantastic friend he was almost regretting all those glorious things that had come to him and was wishing himself back in the dark little bookshop—dark, but lighted with the fire of Mr. Zanti's amazing adventures.
But there was more than this in his thoughts. As he looked at Mr. Zanti, at his wild black locks, his flaming cheeks, his rolling eyes, his large red hands, he was aware suddenly that Clare would not appreciate him. It was the first time since his marriage that there had been any question of Clare's criticism, but now he knew, with absolute certainty, that Mr. Zanti was entirely outside Clare's range of possible persons. For the first time, almost with a secret start of apprehension, he knew that there were things that she did not understand.
“I'm afraid,” he said, “that my wife is dressing. But when you come back you shall meet of course—that will be delightful.” And then he went on—“But I simply can't tell you how splendid it is to look at you again. Lots of things have happened to me since I saw you, of course, but I'm just the same—”
Whilst he was speaking his voice had become eager, his eyes bright—he began to pace the room excitedly—
“Oh, Zanti! ... the days we used to have. I suppose the times I've been having lately had put it all out of my head, but now, with you here, it's all as though it happened yesterday. The day we left Cornwall, you and I—the fog when we got to London ... everything.” He drew a great breath and stood in the middle of the room listening to the rain racing down the pipes beyond the dark windows.
Mr. Zanti, getting up ponderously, placed his hands on Peter's shoulders.
“Still the same Peter,” he said. “Now I know zat I go 'appy. Zat is all I came for—I said I must zee my Peter because Stephen—”
“Stephen—” broke in Peter sharply.
“Yes, our Stephen. He goes with me now to Spain. He is now, until to-night, in London but he will not come to you because 'e's afraid—”
“Afraid?”
“Yes 'e says you are married now and 'ave a lovely 'ouse and 'e says you 'ave not written for a ver' long time, and 'e just asked me to give you 'is love and say that when 'e comes back from Spain, per'aps—”
“Stephen!” Peter's voice was sharp with distress. “Zanti, where is he now? I must go and see him at once.”
“No, 'e 'as gone already to the boat. I follow 'im.” Then Mr. Zanti added in a softer voice—“So when he tell me that you 'ave not written I say 'Ah! Mr. Peter forgets his old friends,' and I was zorry but I say that I will go and make sure. And now I am glad, ver' glad, and Stephen will be glad too. All is well—”
“Oh! I am ashamed. I don't know what has come over me all this time. But wait—I will write a note that you shall take to him and then—when he comes back from Spain—”
He went to his table and began to write eagerly. Mr. Zanti, meanwhile, went round the room on tip-toe, examining everything, sometimes shaking his huge head in disapproval, sometimes nodding his appreciation.
Peter wrote:
Dear, Dear Stephen,—I am furious, I hate myself. What can I have been doing all this time? I have thought of you often, but my marriage and all the new life have made me selfish, and always I put off writing to you because I thought the quiet hour would come to me—and it has never come. But I have no excuse—except that in the real part of myself I love you, just the same as ever—and it will be always the same. I have been bewildered, I think, by all the things that have happened to me during this last year—but I will never be bewildered again. Write to me from Spain and then as soon as you come back I will make amends for my wickedness. I am now and always, Your loving Peter.
Mr. Zanti took the letter.
“How is he?” asked Peter.
“I found 'im—down in Treliss. He wasn't 'appy. 'E was thinking of that woman. And then 'e was all alone. 'E got some work at a farm out at Pendragon and 'e was just goin' there when I came along and made 'im come to Spain. 'E was thinkin' of you a lot, Peter.”
Mr. Zanti cast one more look round the room. “Pretty,” he said. “Pretty. But not my sort of place. Too many walls—all too close in.”
In the hall he said once more—a little plaintively:—
“Ishouldlike to see your lady, Peter,” and then he went on hurriedly, “But don't you go and disturb her—not for anything—Iunderstand....”
And, with his finger on his lip, wrapt in the deepest mystery, he departed into the rain.
As the door closed behind him, Peter felt a wave of chill, unhappy loneliness. He turned back into the cheerful little hall and heard Clare singing upstairs. He knew that they were going to have a delightful little dinner, that, afterwards, they would be at a party where every one would be pleased to see them—he knew that the evening in front of him should be wholly charming ... and yet he was uneasy. He felt now as though he ought to resign his evening, climb to his little room and work at “The Stone House.” And yet what connection could that possibly have with Mr. Zanti?
His uneasiness had begun, he thought, after his visit to Brockett's. It seemed to him as he went upstairs to dress that the world was too full of too many things and that his outlook on it all was confused.
Throughout dinner this uneasiness remained with him. Had he been less occupied with his own thoughts he would have noticed that Clare was not herself; at first she talked excitedly without waiting for his answers—there were her usual enthusiasms and excitements. Everything in the day's history had been “enchanting” or “horrible,” as a rule she waited for him to act up to her ecstasies and abhorrencies; to-night she talked as though she had no audience but were determined to fill up time. Then suddenly she was silent; her eyes looked tired and into them there crept a strange secret little shudder as though she were afraid of some thought or mysterious knowledge. She looked now like a little girl who knew, that to-morrow—the inevitable to-morrow—she must go to the dentist's to be tortured.
The last part of the meal was passed in silence. Afterwards she came into his study and sat curled upon the floor at his feet watching him smoke.
She thought as she looked up at him, that something had happened to make him younger. She had never seen him as young as he was to-night—and then because his thoughts were far away and because her own troubled her she made a diversion. She said:—
“Whowasthat extraordinary man you were talking to this evening?”
He came back, with a jerk, from Stephen.
“What man?”
“Why the man with all the black hair and a funny squash hat. I saw Sarah let him in.”
“Ah, that,” said Peter, looking down at her tenderly, “that was a great friend of mine.”
She moved her head away.
“Don't touch my hair, Peter—it's all been arranged for the party. A friend of yours? What! That horrible looking man? Oh! I suppose he was one of those dreadful people you knew in the slums or in Cornwall.”
Peter saw Mr. Zanti's dear friendly face, like a moon, staring at him, and heard his warm husky voice: “Peter, my boy....”
He moved a little impatiently.
“Look here, old girl, you mustn't call him that. He's one of the very best friends I've ever had—and I've been rather pulled up lately—ever since that night you sent me to Brockett's. I've felt ashamed of myself. All my happiness and—you—and everything have made me forget my old friends and that won't do.”
She laughed. “And now I suppose you're going to neglect me for them—for horrid people like that man who came to-night.”
Her voice was shaking a little—he saw that her hands were clenched on her lap. He looked down at her in astonishment.
“My dear Clare, what do you mean? How could you say a thing like that even in jest? You know—”
She broke in upon him almost fiercely—“It wasn't jest. I meant what I said. I hate all these earlier people you used to know—and now, after our being so happy all this time, you're going to take them up again and make the place impossible—”
“Look here, Clare, you mustn't speak of them like that—they're my friends and they've got to be treated as such.” His voice was suddenly stern. “And by the way as we are talking about it I don't think it was very kind of you to tell me nothing at all about poor Norah's being so ill. She asked you to tell me and you never said a word. That wasn't very kind of you.”
“I did speak to you about it but you forgot—”
“I don't think you did—I am quite sure that I should not have forgotten—”
“Oh, of course you contradict me. Anyhow there's no reason to drag Norah Monogue into this. The matter is perfectly clear. I will not have dirty old men like that coming into the house.”
“Clare, you shall not speak of my friends—”
“Oh, shan't I? When I married you I didn't marry all your old horrid friends—”
“Drop it, Clare—or I shall be angry—”
She sprang to her feet, faced him. He had never in his life seen such fury. She stood with her little body drawn to its full height, her hands clenched, her breast heaving under her white evening dress, her eyes glaring—
“You shan't! You shan't! I won't have any of them here. I hate Cornwall and all its nasty people and I hate Brockett's and all those people you knew there. When you married me you gave them all up—all of them. And if you have them here I won't stay in the house—I'll leave you. All that part of your life is nothing to do with me.Nothing—and I simply won't have it. You can do what you like but you choose between them and me—you can go back to your old life if you like but you go without me!”
She burst from the room, banging the door behind her. She had behaved exactly like a small child in the nursery. As he looked at the door he was bewildered—whence suddenly had this figure sprung? It was some one whom he did not know. He could not reconcile it with the dignified Clare, proud as a queen, crossing a ball-room or the dear beloved Clare nestling into a corner of his arm-chair, her face against his, or the gentle friendly Clare listening to some story of distress.
The fury, the tempest of it! It was as though everything in the room had been broken. And he, with his glorious, tragical youth felt that the end of the world had come. This was the conclusion of life—no more cause for living, no more friendship or comfort or help anywhere. Clare had said those things to him. He stood, for ten minutes there, in the middle of the room, without moving—his face white, his eyes full of pain.
Sarah came to tell him that the hansom was there. He moved into the hall with the intention of sending it away; no party for him to-night—when, to his amazement he saw Clare coming slowly down the stairs, her cloak on, buttoning her gloves.
She passed him without a word and got into the hansom. He took his hat and coat, gave the driver the address, and climbed in beside her.
Once as they drove he put out his hand, touched her dress and said—“Clare dear—”
She made no reply, but sat looking, with her eyes large and black in her little white face, steadfastly in front of her.
Lady Luncon was a rich, good-natured woman who had recently published a novel and was anxious to hear it praised, therefore she gave a party. Originally a manufacturer's daughter, she had conquered a penniless baronet—spent twenty years in the besieging of certain drawing-rooms and now, tired of more mundane worlds, fixed her attention upon the Arts. She was a completely stupid woman, her novel had been exceedingly vulgar, but her good heart and a habit of speaking vaguely in capital letters secured her attention.
When Clare and Peter arrived people were filling her drawing-rooms, overflowing on to the stairs and pouring into the supper room. Some one, very far away, was singing “Mon coeur s'ouvre a ta voix,” a babel of voices rose about Clare and Peter on every side, every one was flung against every one; heat and scent, the crackle and rustle of clothes, the soft voices of the men and sharp strident voices of the women gave one the sensation of imminent suffocation; people with hot red faces, unable to move at all, flung agonised glances at the door as though the entrance of one more person must mean death and disaster.
There were, Peter soon discovered, three topics of conversation: one was their hostess' novel and this was only discussed when Lady Luncon was herself somewhere at hand—the second topic concerned the books of somebody who had, most unjustly it appeared, been banned by the libraries for impropriety, and here opinions were divided as to whether the author would gain by the advertisement or lose by loss of library circulation. Thirdly, there was a new young man who had written a novel about the love affairs of a crocus and a violet—it was amazingly improper, full of poetry—“right back,” as somebody said “to Nature.” Moreover there was much talk about Form. “Here is the new thing in fiction that we are looking for ...” also “Quite a young man—oh yes, only about eighteen and so modest. You would never think....”
His name was Rondel and Peter saw him, for a moment, as the crowds parted, standing, with a tall, grim, elderly woman, apparently his mother, beside him. He was looking frightened and embarrassed and stood up straight against the wall as though afraid lest some one should come and snatch him away.
But Peter saw the world in a dream. He walked about, with Clare beside him, and talked to many people; then she was stopped by some one whom she knew and he went on alone. Now there had come back to him the old terror. If he went back, after this was over, and Clare was still angry with him, he did not know what he would do. He was afraid....
He smiled, talked, laughed and, in his chest, there was a sharp acute pain like a knife. He had still with him that feeling that nothing in life now was worth while and there followed on that a wild impulse to let go, to fling off the restraints that he had retained now for so long and with such bitter determination.
He wanted to cast aside this absurd party, to hurry home alone with Clare, to sit alone with her in the little house and to reach the divine moment when reconciliation came and they were closer to one another than ever before—and then there was the horrible suggestion that there would be no reconciliation, that Clare would make of this absurd quarrel an eternal breach, that things would never be right again.
He looked back and saw Clare smiling gaily, happily, at some friend. He saw her as she had faced him, furiously, an hour earlier ... oh God! If she should never care for him again!
He recognised many friends. There were the two young Galleons, Millicent and Percival, looking as important and mysterious as possible, taxing their brains for something clever to say....
“Ah, that's Life!” Peter heard Percival say to some one. Young fools, he thought to himself, let them have my trouble and then they may talk. But they were nice to him when he came up to them. The author of “Reuben Hallard,” even though he did look like a sailor on leave, was worth respecting—moreover, father liked him and believed in him—nevertheless he was just a tiny bit “last year's sensation.” “Have you read,” said Percival eagerly, “'The Violet's Redemption'? It really is the most tremendous thing—all about a violet. There's the fellow who wrote it over there—young chap standing with his back to the wall....”
There was also with them young Tony Gale who was a friend of Alice Galleon. He was nice-looking, eager and enthusiastic. Rather too enthusiastic, Peter, who did not like him, considered. Full of the joy of life; everything was “topping” and “ripping.” “I can't understand,” he would say, “why people find life dull. I never find it dull. It's the most wonderful glorious thing—”
“Ah, but then you're so young,” he always expected his companions to say; and the thing that pleased him most of all was to hear some one declare—“Tony Gale's such a puzzle—sometimes he seems only eighteen and then suddenly he's fifty.”
It was rumoured that he had once been in love with Alice Galleon when she had been Alice du Cane—and that they had nearly made a match of it; but he was certainly now married to a charming girl whom he had seen in Cornwall and the two young things were considered delightful by the whole of Chelsea.
Tony Gale had with him a man called James Maradick whom Peter had met before and liked. Maradick was forty-two or three, large, rather heavy in build and expression and very taciturn. He was in business in the city, but had been drawn, Peter knew not how, into the literary world of London. He was often to be found at dinner parties and evening “squashes” silent, observant and generally alone. Many people thought him dull, but Peter liked him partly because of his reserve and partly because of his enthusiasm for Cornwall. Cornwall seemed to be the only subject that could stir Maradick into excitement, and when Cornwall was under discussion the whole man woke into sudden stir and emotion.
To-night, with his almost cynical observance of the emotions and excitement that surged about him, he seemed to Peter the one man possible in the whole gathering.
“Look here, Maradick, let's get somewhere out of this crush and have a cigarette.”
People were all pouring into supper now and Peter saw his wife in the distance, on Bobby Galleon's arm. They found a little conservatory deserted now and strangely quiet after the din of the other rooms: here they sat down.
Maradick was capable of sitting, quite happily for hours, without saying anything at all. For some time they were both silent.
At last Peter said: “By jove, Maradick, yours is a fortunate sort of life—just going into the city every day, coming back to your wife in the evening—no stupid troubles that come from imagining things that aren't there—”
“How do you know I don't?” answered Maradick quietly. “Imagination hasn't anything to do with one's profession. I expect there's as much imagination amongst the Stock Exchange men as there is with you literary people—only it's expressed differently.”
“What do you do,” said Peter, “if it ever gets too much for you?”
“Do? How do you mean?”
“Well suppose you're feeling all the time that one little thing more, one little word or some one coming in or a window breaking—anything will upset the equilibrium of everything? Supposing you're out with all your might to keep things sane and to prevent your life from swinging back into all the storm and uncertainty that it was in once before, and supposing you feel that there are a whole lot of things trying to get you to swing back, what's the best thing to do?”
“Why, hold on, hold on—”
“How do you mean?”
“Fortitude—Courage. Clinging on with your nails, setting your teeth.”
Peter was surprised at the man's earnestness. The two of them sitting there in that lonely deserted little conservatory were instantly aware of some common experience.
Maradick put his hand on Peter's knee.
“Westcott, you're young, but I know the kind of thing you mean. Believe me that it's no silly nonsense to talk of the Devil—the Devil is as real and personal as you and I, and he's got his agents in every sort and kind of place. If he once gets his net out for you then you'll want all your courage. I know,” he went on sinking his voice, “there was a time I had once in Cornwall when I was brought pretty close to things of that sort—it doesn't leave you the same afterwards. There's a place down in Cornwall called Treliss....”
“Treliss!” Peter almost shouted. “Why that's where I come from. I was born there—that's my town—”
Before Maradick could reply Bobby Galleon burst into the conservatory. “Oh, there you are—I've been looking for you everywhere. How are you, Maradick? Look here, Peter, you've got to come down to supper with us. We've got a table—Alice, Clare, Millicent, Percival, Tony Gale and his wife and you and I—and—one other—an old friend of yours, Peter.”
“An old friend?” said Peter, getting up from his chair and trying to look as though he were not furious with Bobby for the interruption.
“Yes—you'll never guess, if I give you a hundred guesses—it's most exciting—come along—”
Peter was led away. As he moved through the dazzling, noisy rooms he was conscious that there, in the quiet, dark little conservatory, Maradick was sitting, motionless, seeing Treliss.
On his way down to the supper room he was filled with annoyance at the thought of his interrupted conversation. He might never have his opportunity again. Maradick was so reserved a fellow and took so few into his confidence—also he would, in all probability, be ashamed to-morrow of having spoken at all.
But to Peter at that moment the world about him was fantastic and unreal. It seemed to him that at certain periods in his life he was suddenly confronted with a fellow creature who perceived life as he perceived it. There were certain persons who could not leave life alone—they must always be seeing it as a key to something wider, bigger altogether. This was nothing to do with Christianity or any creed whatever, because Creeds implied Certainty and Definition of Knowledge, whereas Peter and the others like him did not know for what they were searching. Again, they were not Mystics because Mysticism needed a definite removal from this world before any other world were possible. No, they were simply Explorers and one traced a member of the order on the instant. There had been already in Peter's life, Frosted Moses, Stephen, Mr. Zanti, Noah Monogue, and now suddenly there was Maradick. These were people who would not laugh at his terror of Scaw House, at his odd belief that his father was always trying to draw him back to Treliss....
As he entered the supper-room and saw Clare sitting at a distant table, he knew that his wife would never be an Explorer. For her Fires and Walls, for her no questions, no untidiness moral or physical—the Explorer travelled ever with his life in his hands—Clare believed in the Stay-at-homes.
The great dining-room was filled with Stay-at-homes. One saw it in their eyes, in the flutter of useless and tired words that rose and fell; all the souls in that room were cushioned and were happy that it was so. The Rider on the Lion was beyond the Electric Lights—on the dark hill, over the darker river, under the stars. Somebody pulled a cracker and put on a paper cap. He was a stout man with a bald head and the back of his neck rippled with fat. He had tiny eyes.
“Look at Mr. Horset,” cried the woman next to him—“Isn't he absurd?”
Peter found at the table in the corner Alice, Clare, Millicent and Percival Galleon, Tony Gale and his wife, waiting. There was also a man standing by Alice's chair and he watched Peter with amused eyes.
He held out his hand and smiled. “How do you do, Westcott?” he said. Then, with the sound of his voice, the soft almost caressing tilt of it, Peter knew who it was. His mind flew back to a day, years ago, when he had flung himself on the ground and cried his soul out because some one had gone away....
“Cards!” he cried. “Of all wonderful things!”
Cards of Dawson's—Cards, the magnetic, the brilliant, Cards with his World and his Society and now slim and dark and romantic as ever, making every one else in the room shabby beside him, so that Bobby's white waistcoat was instantly seen to be hanging loosely above his shirt and Peter's trousers were short, and even the elegant Percival had scarcely covered with perfect equality the ends of his white tie.
Instantly as though the intervening years had never been, Bobby took his second place beside Cards' glory—even Percival's intention of securing the wonderful Mr. Rondel, author of “The Violet's Redemption,” for their table, failed of its effect.
They were enough. They didn't want anybody else—Room for Mr. Cardillac!
And he seized it. Just as he would have seized it years ago at school so he seized it now. Their table was caught into the most dazzling series of adventures. Cards had been everywhere, seen everybody and everything—seen it all, moreover, with the right kind of gaiety, with an appreciation that was intelligent and also humorous. There was humour one moment and pathos the next—deep feeling and the wittiest cynicism.
They were all swung about Europe and with Cards at their head pranced through the cities of the world. Meanwhile Peter fancied that once or twice Clare flung him a little glance of appeal to ask for forgiveness—and once they looked up and smiled at one another. A tiny smile but it meant everything.
“Oh! won't we have a reconciliation afterwards? How could I have said those things? Don't we just love one another?”
When they went upstairs again Peter and Cards exchanged a word:
“You'll come and see us?”
“My dear old man, I should just think so. This is the first time I've been properly in London for years and now I'm going to stay. Fancy you married and successful and here am I still the rolling-stone!”
“You! Why you can do anything!”
“Can't write 'Reuben Hallard,' old boy....” and so, with a laugh, they parted.
In the cab, afterwards, Clare's head was buried in Peter's coat, and she sobbed her heart out. “How Icouldhave been such a beast, Peter, Peter!”
“Darling, it was nothing.”
“Oh, but it was! It shall never, never happen again...but I was frightened—”
“Frightened!”
“Yes, I always think some one's going to take you away. I don't understand all those other people. They frighten me—I want you to myself, just you and I—always.”
“But nobody can take me away—nobody—”
The cab jolted along—her hand was on his knee—and every now and again a lamp lighted her face for him and then dropped it back into darkness.
By the sharp pressure of her hand he knew that she was moved by an intensity of feeling, swayed now by one of those moods that came to her so strangely that it seemed that they belonged to another personality.
“Look... Peter. I'm seeing clearly as I think I never have before. I'm afraid—not because of you—but because of myself. If you knew—” here his hand came down and found hers—“if you knew how I despise myself, my real self. I've been spoilt always, always, always. I've always known it. My real self is ashamed of it. But there's another side of me that comes down suddenly and hides all that—and then—when that happens—I just want to get what I want and not to be hurt and ...” she pressed closer against him and went on in a whisper.
“Peter, I shall always care for you more than any one—always whatever happens. But think, a time will come—I know it—when you'll have to watch me, to keep me by you, and even let your work go—everything, just for a time until I'm safe. I suppose that moment comes to most women in their married lives. But to me, when it happens, it will be worse than for most women because I've always had my way. Youmustn'tlet me have my way then—simply clutch me, be cruel, brutal, anything only don't let me go. Then, if you keep me through that, you'll always keep me.”
To Peter it was almost as though she were talking in her sleep, something, there in the old, lumbering cab that was given to her by some one else to say something to which she herself would not give credit.
“That's all right, you darling, you darling, you darling.” He covered her face, her eyes with kisses. “I'll never let you go—never.” He felt her quiver a little under his arms.
“Don't mind, Peter, my horrible, beastly character. Just keep me for a little, train me—and then later I'll be such a wife to you,sucha wife!”
Then she drew his head down. His lips touched her body just above her dress, where her cloak parted.
She whispered:
“There's something else.”
She raised her face from his coat and looked up at him. Her cheeks were stained with crying and her eyes, large and dark, held him furiously as though he were the one place of safety.
He caught her very close.
“What is it?...”
That night, long after he, triumphant with the glory of her secret, had fallen asleep, she lay, staring into the dark, with frightened eyes.
Peter's child was born on a night of frost when the stars were hard and fierce and a full moon, dull gold, flung high shadows upon the town.
During the afternoon the fear that had been in Clare's eyes for many weeks suddenly flamed into terror—the doctor was sent for and Peter was banished from the room.
Peter looked ludicrously, pitifully young as he sat, through the evening, in his room at the top of the house, staring in front of him, his face grey with anxiety, his broad shoulders set back as though ready for a blow; his strong fingers clutched the things on his writing-table, held them, dropped them, just like the hands of a blind man about the shining surface, tapping the wood.
He saw her always as he had seen her last night when she had caught his arm crying—“If I die, Peter.... Oh, Peter, if I die!”... and he had comforted and stroked her hair, warming her cold fingers.
How young she was, how tiny for this suffering—and it was he, he who had brought it upon her! Now, she was lying in her bed, as he had once seen his mother lie, with her hair spread about the pillow, her hands gripping the sheets, her eyes wide and black—the vast, hard bed-room closing her in, shutting her down—
She who loved comfort, who feared any pain, who would have Life safe and easy, that she should be forced—
The house was very still about him—no sound came up to him; it seemed to him that the hush was deliberate. The top branches of the trees in the little orchard touched his window and tapped ever and again; a fire burnt brightly, he had drawn his curtains and beyond the windows the great sheet of stars, the black houses, the white light of the moon.
And there, before him—what mockery! the neat pages of “The Stone House” now almost completed.
He stared into the wall and saw her face, her red-gold hair upon the pillow, her dark staring eyes—
Once the nurse came to him—Yes, she was suffering, but all went well ... it would be about midnight, perhaps. There was no cause for alarm....
He thought that the nurse looked at him with compassion. He turned fiercely upon Life that it should have brought this to them when they were both so young.
At last, about ten o'clock, able no longer to endure the silence of the house—so ominous—and the gentle tap-tap of the branches upon the pane and the whispering crackle of the fire, he went out....
A cold hard unreal world received him. Down Sloane Street the lines of yellow lamps, bending at last until they met in sharp blue distance, were soft and misty against the outline of the street, the houses were unreal in the moonlight, a few people passed quickly, their footsteps sharp in the frosty air—all the little painted doors of Sloane Street were blind and secret.
He passed through Knightsbridge, into the Park. As the black trees closed him in the fear of London came, tumbling upon him. He remembered that day when he had sat, shivering, on a seat on the Embankment, and had heard that note, sinister, threatening, through the noise and clattering traffic. He heard it again now. It came from the heart of the black trees that lined the moonlit road, a whisper, a thread of sound that accompanied him, pervaded him, threatened him. The scaly beast knew that another victim was about to be born—another woman was to undergo torture, so that when the day came and the scaly beast rose from its sleep then there would be one more to be devoured.
He, Peter, was to have a child. He had longed for a child ever since he could remember. He had always loved children—other people's children—but to have one of his own!... To have something that was his and Clare's and theirs alone, to have its love, to feel that it depended Upon them both, to watch it, to tend it—Life could have no gift like that.
But now the child was hidden from him. He thought of nothing but Clare, of her suffering and terror, of her waiting there so helplessly for the dreadful moment of supreme pain. The love that he had now for Clare was something more tender, more devoted, than he had ever felt for any human being. His mind flew back fiercely to that night of his first quarrel when she had told him. Now he was to be punished for his heartlessness and cruelty ... by her loss.
His agony and terror grew as he paced beneath the dark and bending trees. He sat down on a seat, at the other end of which was a little man with a bowler hat, spectacles and his coat collar turned up. He was a shabby little man and his thin bony hands beat restlessly upon his knees.
The little man said, “Good evening, sir.”
“Good evening,” said Peter, staring desperately in front of him.
“It's all this blasted government—”
“I beg your pardon—”
“This blasted government—This income tax and all—”
“It's more than that,” said Peter, wishing that the man would cease beating his knees with his hands—
“It's them blasted stars—it's Gawd. That's what it is. Curse Gawd—that's what I say—Curse Gawd!”
“What's He done?” said Peter.
“I've just broken in my wife's 'ead with a poker. Killed 'er I expect—I dunno—going back to see in a minute—”
“Why did you do it?”
“'Ad to—always nagging—that's what she was—always nagging. Wanted things—all sorts o' things—and there were always children coming—So we 'ad a blasted argyment this evening and I broke 'er 'ead open—Gawd did it—that's what I say—”
Peter said nothing.
“You can call a bloomin' copper if you want to,” the little man said.
“It's no business of mine,” said Peter and he got up and left him. All shadows—only the sinister noise that London makes is real, that and Clare's suffering.
He left the Park turned into Knightsbridge and came upon a toyshop. The shutters had not been put up and the lights of a lamp shone full upon its windows. Against the iron railings opposite and the high white road these toys stood with sharp, distinct outline behind the slanting light of the glass. There were dolls—a fine wedding doll, orange blossom, lace and white silk, and from behind it all, the sharp pinched features and black beady eyes stared out.... There was a Swiss doll with bright red cheeks, red and green clothing and shoes with shining buckles. Then there were the more ordinary dolls—and gradually down the length of the window, their clothing was taken from them until at last some wooden creatures with flaring cheeks and brazen eyes kicked their limbs and defied the proprieties.
He would be a Boy ... he would not care about dolls....
There were soldiers—rows and rows of gleaming soldiers. They came from a misty distance at the top of the shop window, came marching from the gates of some dark, mediæval castle. Their swords caught the lamplight, shining in a line of silver and the precision with which they marched, the certainty with which they trod the little bridge ... ah, these were the fellows! He would be a Boy ... soldiers would enchant him! He should have boxes, boxes, boxes!
There were many other things in the window; teddy bears and animals with soft woolly stomachs and fat comfortable legs—and there were ugly, modern Horrors with fat bulging faces and black hair erect like wire; there were little devils with red tails, there were rabbits that rode bicycles and monkeys that climbed trees. There were drums—big drums and little drums—trumpets with crimson tassels, and in one corner a pyramid of balls, balls of every colour, and at the top of the pyramid a tiny ball of peacock blue, hanging, balancing, daintily, supremely right in pose and gesture.
It had gesture. It caught Peter's eye—Peter stood with his nose against the pane, his heart hammering—“Oh! she is suffering—My God, how she is suffering!”—and there the little blue ball caught him, held him, encouraged him.
“I will belong to your boy one day” it seemed to say.
“It shall be the first thing I will buy for him—” thought Peter.
He turned now amongst the light and crowds of Piccadilly. He walked on without seeing and hearing—always with that thought in his heart—“She is in terrible pain. How can God be so cruel? And she was so happy—before I came she was so happy—now—what have I done to her?”
Never, before to-night, had he felt so sharply, so irretrievably his sense of responsibility. Here now, before him, at this birth of his child, everything that he had done, thought, said—everything that he had been—confronted him. He was only twenty-seven but his shoulders were heavy with the confusion of his past. Looking back upon it, he saw a helpless medley of indecisions, of sudden impulses, sudden refusals; into the skeins of it, too, there seemed to be dragged the people that had made up his life—they faced him, surrounded him, bewildered him!
What right had he, thus encompassed, to hand these things on to another? His father, his grandfather ... he saw always that dark strain of hatred, of madness, of evil working in their blood. Suppose that as his boy grew he should see this in the young eyes? Suppose, most horrible of all, that he should feel this hatred for his son that his grandfather had felt for his father, that his father had felt for him.
What had he done?... He stopped, staring confusedly about him. The people jostled him on every side. The old devils were at him—“Eat and drink for to-morrow we die.... Give it up ... We're too strong for you and we'll be too strong for your son. Who are you to defy us? Come down—give it up—”
His white face caught attention. “Move along, guv'nor,” some one shouted. A man took him by the arm and led up a dark side street. He turned his eyes and saw that the man was Maradick.
The elder man felt that the boy was trembling from head to foot.
“What's the matter, Westcott? Anything I can do for you?”
Peter seemed to take him in slowly, and then, with a great effort, to pull himself together.
“What, you—Maradick? Where was I? I'm afraid I've been making a fool of myself....” A church clock struck somewhere in the distance. “Hullo, I say, what's that? That's eleven. I must get back, I ought to be at home—”
“I'll come with you—”
Maradick hailed a hansom and helped Peter into it.
For a moment there was silence—then Maradick said—
“I hope everything's all right, Westcott? Your wife?”
Peter spoke as though he were in a dream. “I've been waiting there all the afternoon—she's been suffering—My God!... It got on my nerves.... She's so young—they oughtn't to hurt her like that.” He covered his face with his hands.
“I know. I felt like that when my first child came. It's terrible, awful. And then it's over—all the pain—and it's magnificent, glorious—and then—later—it's so commonplace that you cannot believe that it was ever either awful or magnificent. Fix your mind on the glorious part of it, Westcott. Think of this time to-morrow when your wife will be so proud, so happy—you'll both be so proud, so happy, that you'll never know anything in life like it.”
“Yes, yes, I know—of course it's sure to be all right—but I suppose this waiting's got on my nerves. There was a fellow in the Park just broken his wife's head in—and then everything was so quiet. I could almost hear her crying, right away in her room.”
He stopped a moment and then went on. “It's what I've always wanted—always to have a boy. And, by Jove, he'll be wonderful! I tell you he shall be—We'll be such pals!” He broke off suddenly—“You haven't a boy?”
“No, mine are both girls. Getting on now—they'll soon be coming out. I should like to have had a boy—” Maradick sighed.
“Are they an awful lot to you?”
“No—I don't suppose they are. I should have understood a boy better,—but they're good girls. I'm proud of them in a way—but I'm out so much, you see.”
Peter faced the contrast. Here this middle-aged man, with his two girls—and here too he, Peter, with his agonising, flaming trial—to slip, so soon, into dull commonplace?
“But didn't you—if you can look so far—didn't you, when the first child came, funk it? Your responsibility I mean. All the things one's—one's ancestors—it's frightening enough for oneself but to hand it on—”
“It's nothing to do with oneself—one's used, that's all. The child will be on its own legs, thrusting you away before you know where you are. Itwillwant to claim its responsibilities—ancestors and all—”
Peter said nothing—Maradick went on:
“You know we were talking one night and were interrupted—you're in danger of letting the things you imagine beat the things you know. Stick to the thing you can grasp, touch—I know the dangers of the others—I told you that once in Cornwall, I—the most unlikely person in the world—was caught up by it. I've never laughed at morbidity, or nerves, or insanity since. There's such a jolly thin wall between the sanest, most level-headed beef-eating Squire in the country and the maddest poet in Bedlam.Iknow—I've been both in the same day. It's better to be both, I believe, if you can keep one under the other, but youmustkeep it under—”
Maradick talked on. He saw that the boy's nerves were jumping, that he was holding himself in with the greatest difficulty.
Peter said: “You don't know, Maradick. I've had to fight all my life—my father, grandfather, all of them have given in at last—and now this child ... perhaps I shall see it growing, see him gradually learning to hate me, see myself hating him ... at last, my God, see him go under—drink, deviltry—I've fought it—I'm always fighting it—but to-night—”
“Good heavens, man—you're not going to tell me that your father, your grandfather—the rest of them—are stronger than you. What about your soul, your own blessed soul that can't be touched by any living thing or dead thing either if you stick to it? Why, every man's got power enough in himself to ride heaven and earth and all eternity if he only believed he'd got it! Ride your scruples, man—ride 'em, drive 'em—send 'em scuttling. Believe in yourself and stick to it—Courage!...”
Maradick pulled himself in. They were driving now, down the King's Road. The people were pouring in a thick, buzzing crowd, out of the Chelsea Palace. Middle-aged stockbrokers in hansom cabs—talking like the third act of a problem play!—but Maradick had done his work. As they drove round the corner, past the mad lady's painted house, he saw that Peter was calmer. He had regained his self-control. The little house where Peter lived was very still—the trees in the orchard were stiff and dark beneath the stars.
Peter spoke in a whisper—“Good-night, Maradick, you've done me a lot of good—I shan't forget it.”
“Good luck to you,” Maradick whispered back. Peter stole into the house.
The little drawing-room looked very cosy; the fire was burning, the lamp lighted, the thick curtains drawn. Maria Theresa smiled, with all her finery, from the wall.
Peter sat down in front of the fire. Maradick was right. One must have one's hand on the bridle—the Rider on the Lion again. It's better that the beast under you should be a Lion rather than a Donkey, but let it once fling you off its back and you're done for. And Maradick had said these things! Maradick whom once Peter had considered the dullest of his acquaintances. Well, one never knew about people—most of the Stay-at-homes were Explorers and vice versa, if one only understood them.
How still the house was! What was happening upstairs? He could not go and see—he could not move. He was held by the stillness. The doctor would come and tell him....
He thought of the toyshop—that blue ball—it would be the first thing that he would buy for the boy—and then soldiers—soldiers that wouldn't hurt him, that he couldn't lick the paint from—
Now the little silver clock ticked! He was so terribly tired—he had never been tired like this before....
The stillness pressed upon the house. Every sound—the distant rattling of some cab, the faint murmur of trams—was stifled, extinguished. The orchard seemed to press in upon the house, darker and darker grew the forest about it—The stars were shut out, the moon... the world was dead.
Then into this sealed and hidden silence, a voice crying from an upper room, suddenly fell—a woman in the abandonment of utter pain, pain beyond all control, was screaming. Somewhere, above that dark forest that pressed in upon the house, a bird of prey hovered. It hung for a moment; it descended—its talons were fixed upon her flesh... then again it ascended. Shriek after shriek, bursting the silence, chasing the shadows, flooding the secrecy with horrible light, beat like blows upon the walls of the house—rose, fell, rose again. Peter was standing, his back against the wall, his hands spread out, his face grey.
“My God, my God... Oh! my God!”
The sweat poured from his forehead. Once more there was silence but now it was ominous, awful....
The little silver clock ticked—Peter's body stood stretched against the wall—he faced the door.
Hours, hours passed. He did not move. The screaming had, many years ago, ceased. The doctor—a cheerful man with blue eyes and a little bristling moustache—came in.
“A fine boy, Mr. Westcott—I congratulate you. You might see your wife for a moment if you cared—stood it remarkably well—”
Slowly the forest, dark and terrible, moved away from the house. Very faintly again could be heard the distant rattling of some cab, the murmur of trams.