XLIVAlthough she had eaten nothing since breakfast that morning, a few biscuits and the remainder of Mrs. Bell's brandy sufficed Maggy."Now I'll go," she said, getting up. "I was in a fearful state about you, but now that everything has turned out so splendidly I feel quite all right again. Bless your sweet face, Lexie. I'd like to kiss you only I'm such a bad creature." Her lips trembled."Nonsense! Then I'll kiss you." Alexandra did so. "You're not going to-night, Maggy. You've got to stay here with me. We'll tuck in together. Here's a nightie.""Tuck in—with you!" Maggy repeated. "But, Lexie—I'm not—like you.""Nothing that's happened can make any difference between us, Maggy. Try and forget you ever left me. Get undressed, dear."Very soon they were lying together in the little bed in the darkness. Alexandra did not talk. She wanted Maggy to get to sleep. It was so evident that she needed it. Half-an-hour passed in silence. A whisper from Maggy broke it."Asleep, Lexie?""No, dear.""Have you enough room?""Heaps.""May I have your hand to hold, Lexie? I feel so lonely.""You poor pet!" Alexandra's hand sought hers."Lexie ... may I tell you things?""Yes, if it helps.""I don't think anything ever will help. I'm done for, Lexie.""You won't always feel like that," was the consoling rejoinder.Maggy sat up in bed."I tried to kill myself to-day," she said abruptly. "But the stuff only made me sick. That's why I wasn't at the theater. I should be dead by now if it had worked properly.""Maggy!""Yes, I did. How could I go on living? It's not worth it. Alone again: a room like this without even you to make it bearable ... or men. I won't do that. I went to the bad for love. I won't do it out of habit.""Don't be so despondent. You won't have to live alone, dear. You shall leave the stage and be with me.""Is it likely?" asked Maggy, with a touch of her old independence. "I wouldn't tell anybody but you, but I gave Fred more than he gave me. It's the meanness of it all that hurts so. There was the flat, I know, and the car; but they were only mine so long as he wanted me. And I paid for the meals I had in the place out of my salary. He gave me money for dresses because he liked me showy, but I went to sales and bought bargains, and what I saved that way I spent on him. And all the time I gave love, love, love! Oceans of it! Let me go on. Then, just before you went on tour I knew I was going to have a baby. Lexie, I longed for it! I think I'm the sort of woman that's meant to have babies without much pain or trouble, just for the sheer joy of mothering them and kissing their dear, pink, crumply palms. But Fred was annoyed about it. I told him he could put me in a laborer's cottage in the country and I'd live on ten shillings a week if only he would let me be a mother. Mrs. Lambert knew. I told her.... I had to go to a dreadful place in Bayswater until—until it was over.... Fred arranged everything. He seemed to know all about it. And I wasn't even a mother, Lexie. I nearly died. I wish I had. And when I was back again with Fred, instead of hating him it somehow made me feel more than ever bound up with him in my heart, because of having gone through so much for him. He was quite kind to me afterwards, almost tender for him. He used to bring me flowers. I wonder why. He couldn't have loved me.... But now it's all over...."Alexandra put her arms round the shaking girl."Lie still," she said.She held Maggy to her as she would have held a child, and kissed her and cried over her in sheer pity, so stirred was she by the heartrending story. Presently Maggy lay very still, breathing evenly, asleep in Alexandra's arms. But Alexandra lay awake for a long time, trying to find a reason for the discrepancies of life. Why, for her, should there be provided a haven of safety, and for Maggy nothing but a desolate sea with breakers ahead?Mutely, she prayed to the Providence that had tided her over so many storms to safeguard Maggy until she, too, made harbor in calm and peaceful waters. Praying, she feel asleep and did not stir when, some hours later, Maggy awoke and gently disengaged herself from the encircling arm.Maggy sat up. By the light of the street lamps she could just make out Alexandra's peaceful face. She looked so happy and innocent. Maggy watched her for a long time very fondly. It was the only way in which she could bid her farewell, a long and final one. For Maggy intended making no mistake this time. She had dreamt of what she meant to do. The dream had been inspired by the noises in the street, and it still obsessed her. The thunder of heavy wheels resounded in her ears.... She was going to employ a monster crushing power to blot herself out.Very quietly and silently she got out of bed and groped for her clothes. Dressed, she hovered for a moment over Alexandra's sleeping form, bent and touched her forehead with her lips ... and crept out in search of her Juggernaut car.XLVMaggy intended making for Covent Garden. She had once seen it in the early hours after a fancy-dress ball to which Woolf had taken her, and she had marked the leviathan motor-lorries, freighted with perishable produce, converging on it. She meant to end her troubles under the wheels of one of these. The drug had failed her because of her ignorance of the fatal dose. This would be a sure and decisive way. In her dream it had seemed so feasible.There would be something fitting in such an end. The very monstrousness of the ponderous vehicle was symbolical of the violence of the feeling that she had had for Woolf, the strength of passion that had drawn her to him. Her spirit had succumbed to strength and violence: strength and violence should annihilate her body.The deserted streets were very silent. Maggy wandered along them, insensibly diverging from her route. She was thinking dully of a scene that long ago had made a dreadful impression on her mind. It had been a disconnected incident at the time: now its significance was almost personal. She had once seen a number of dogs pursuing a small mongrel, typical of the ownerless cur that gets its living in the streets. It was looking over its shoulder, heedless of the traffic. A motor-lorry came along at top speed. The mongrel made an unexpected dart across its track. There was an agonizing yelp, suddenly cut short; and though Maggy had quickly averted her eyes she had not been able to avoid witnessing the canine tragedy.A shudder went through her at the recollection of it, a shudder of pity for the dog, not of apprehension for herself. She was too wretched to feel fear; but she was very weary and to some extent stupefied. When, therefore, she found herself in Portland Place instead of Covent Garden she was indifferent at having wandered in the wrong direction. She hardly met a soul. It was too late for night-prowlers and still too early for those who steal a march upon the day's work. An occasional policeman was all she came across. One flashed his lantern in her face, but satisfied by the serious look on it and her appearance generally, took no further notice of her.It seemed to her that she had been walking interminably before the silence of the streets was broken by any sound of traffic. She had crossed the top of Regent Street, gone on due west by Cavendish Square and Wigmore Street, and was now in one of the turnings that give on Great Cumberland Place. At the corner a lighted doorway and an awning over the pavement told of a dance in progress. One or two carriages and a motor car were drawn up before the house. She did not look up as she passed it, but she slackened her pace when it was behind her, for she had heard the sound of a heavy vehicle. A slowly-moving van drawn by horses lumbered across the top of the turning. There surely she would find hercoup de grâce!She stood in Great Cumberland Place, listening. The faint rumble of the morning traffic coming along Edgware and Bayswater Roads was audible now. Presently it was silenced by a nearer sound, the reverberation of machinery. It was coming at last. She kept on the edge of the pavement waiting and listening, trying to discern the advancing monster. The clank and rattle of it filled the wide street with stridulous echoes. She moved into the roadway, telling herself that she must make no mistake, give it no chance of avoiding her. She stood still, nerving herself for the moment of impact. It was very close now; its noise deafened her; a breath of hot metal filled her nostrils....Now!She stood poised, her body bent forward ready for the spring; and at that moment a heavy hand fell on her, jerked her roughly back and held her while the motor-lorry thundered by."Let me go!" she muttered thickly, pulling ineffectually against a uniformed arm."No, that I shan't," was the firm rejoinder. "Trying to do for yourself, eh?""I was crossing the road," she gasped, maddened by this second defeat.The stars in their courses seemed to be fighting against her. Why should they prevent her taking her worthless life? And now, to add to her inflictions, she was in the grip of a policeman. She would be charged, cautioned, watched, so that another attempt would be well-nigh impossible. Besides, she wanted to make it now, while the madness was upon her."Crossing the road," she repeated. "Here comes a gentleman. He must have seen me. He'll believe me, if you won't."She said it to gain time, in the hope that the policeman would relax his hold, so that she might run away. But though he took her suggestion, he gave her no chance of escaping."Beg pardon, sir, did you witness this young lady step off the pavement sudden-like in front of that there lorry?" he inquired.The pedestrian, thus addressed, came to a stop. Maggy stared at him. The street lamp at the corner was behind him. But while she stared a motor car slipped past, the beam of its headlights full on his face, and she caught her breath as their eyes met—hers and Chalfont's. He was clearly too astonished to speak."He—the constable—thinks I was going to commit suicide, I believe," said Maggy, conjuring up a laugh that made Chalfont shiver. "It's fortunate you came along, Lord Chalfont. Please assure him I'm much too level-headed to do anything like that. I—I'm on my way home."No part of her statement convinced him, but he took care that neither she nor the policeman should see that."So am I," he said in the most ordinary tone. "This lady is a friend of mine, constable. Here's my card. You've erred a little on the side of discretion, but that's excusable considering how dark it is. I'll see her home myself. Good morning."The policeman looked at the card and then touched his hat."Very well, m'lord. I apologize to the young lady for the mistake. At this hour of the night if we're not very careful—""That's all right," said Chalfont.He took Maggy's arm, holding it almost as tightly as the policeman had done, and walked her on in the direction of the Marble Arch."Thank you," she said in a subdued tone when they had gone a dozen paces. "Now I can manage to—to go on by myself.""I don't think so," he rejoined sternly. "What are you doing, wandering about at this time of night?""I—I might as well ask you the same question.""I can answer it. I have just left a friend's house—a late affair—fortunately for you.""Why fortunately for me?" she asked, trying to assume an air of innocent resentment. "You're making too much fuss about a mistake in crossing the street."He stopped, still holding her, compelling her to look at him."Maggy, are you going to tell me lies?""No," she choked, lowering her head."Then—" Chalfont did not proceed with what he was about to say. A taxi was passing and he hailed it. "I'll take you to your flat," he said."No, not there! I'm never going there again!" she cried, drawing back.That she had some potent reason for that decision was evident to him. He did not ask her what it was. He guessed it."In that case," he said, "you must come to my house. I'm not going to leave you."His determined tone put a stop to her spirit of rebelliousness. Passively she got into the cab and sat silent in its obscurity. When it stopped Chalfont opened his door with a latchkey. His servants had gone to bed, but in the room where Maggy had breakfasted with him there were sandwiches and consommé. He helped her to some of this, and she, beyond resistance now, took it. Then she shrank into the depths of the big chair which he had drawn up to the fire for her. She was unconscious of the tears of weakness that were welling from her eyes. Her hair had come down and was tumbled over her shoulders. Emotion had played havoc with her face.Chalfont, watching her, was stirred by feelings that had their birth in pity. If they were gathering force, changing into others more personal, more tender, there was nothing of disloyalty to the memory of the dead woman on whom he had once lavished great affection."Maggy," he said quietly, "he has left you."She lifted heavy eyes."How—how did you know?""I thought it would come."A dry sob broke from her. Then she said: "He really was on his honeymoon.... Did you know?""No. But a few days ago I heard something.... I knew he was very thick with Cantire. I saw it coming.""Why didn't you tell me?""How could I?""No; I see.... I had to find out for myself.... Well, it's finished now." She stared blankly in front of her."Do you care so terribly?" he asked, after a pause.She shook her head. "That's dead, I think. Everything's dead except myself, and I want to be. I can't stand it: the hardness—and the loneliness.""I thought you were brave.""Not when I don't want to be.""I'm lonely too," he said; "but I haven't turned my back on life, partly because your advice helped me when I was feeling very down. Don't you think suicide is rather a craven thing?""Perhaps.... I shall have to go on living now, I suppose," she admitted dully. "Oh, damn that policeman! I should have been pulp by this time! That's the second failure. I took laudanum this afternoon, and was only sick."Chalfont went over to her chair, sat on its arm-rest and took one of her hands."Don't you think we have something in common?" he said, and waited for a reply that should warrant him speaking more definitely.She rested her head against his shoulder like one who is spent."You make me feel peaceful," she murmured. "I wish you would give me some poison and let me die while you held me.""You tragic person!" He tried to speak lightly. "You'll laugh at yourself, later on.... I want you to live.""I'll live," she consented. "It's only a matter of breathing.""You must promise me that—and something else.""All right. What's the else?" Her voice was unutterably tired."Everything, in effect. I'm not good at explaining, but, first of all, I want you to understand that I honor you."Maggy sat bolt upright. Two fierce spots of color came into her cheeks."Also," he continued, "that from the beginning, ever since I first met you, even when you made that admission about—him, I always thought of you apart from him, as Maggy—the nice girl.""Maggy—the nice girl!" she echoed in wonder."When you came down to Purton Towers I seemed to see you as belonging there. Even after you had gone I felt that.""But—how could I belong to Purton Towers?" she asked in a wondering voice."By marrying me," he said very deliberately.She looked at him blankly for a few seconds."Marry you!" she faltered. "Me—marry you?""Suppose," he went on, "suppose I said I needed you? I do say it. I believe that we can bring something into each other's lives that at present is missing, and perhaps always has been. We should, at any rate, be very perfect friends. That would be something."All her face lit up. Her lips quivered."What an idea! Me and you! At breakfast, at dinner—always.... Purton Towers, and me—your wife! Oh, you dear, I do believe you mean it! As if I could! But I tell you what: let me live in a little cottage in the grounds and sell eggs!""Oh, Maggy, you child!" he said tenderly.Her eyes brimmed over. She took his hand and kissed it."Thank you so much," she said. "But it's—it's not in the picture. What sort of a wife should I make? No, it wouldn't do.... And there are other reasons.""Ada Lambert?" he asked gently. "Is that one of them? I loved her as a young man loves the first good woman who comes into his life. I don't think I do her any disloyalty.""No, it's not that. What difference could that make? If I could I would make you happy because you lost her. It's me. I don't come from a good man. I wouldn't let any one say that except myself. I loathe what he's done to me and the way he's treated me. But I've loved him. There's something I gave him I can never get back. It's strange: though I never want to hear of him or see him again, I don't want anything bad to happen to him. I should be sorry.""I understand," nodded Chalfont. "But it need not stand between you and me, Maggy. We should start fair."The ghost of a smile flickered on her lips."Think of the racket there would be in the papers about us! You would be ashamed. And I'm not worth it, really. 'Another peer weds actress. Romance of the stage. The third this season. Below we append other instances of brilliant marriages of stage beauties.' Think of it!""I fancy we could keep it out of the papers," he said. "We would be married in the country—in church.""In church!" Her eyes grew misty. "You would—go to church with me? Oh, my dear, that would be more of my dream coming true, like the cedar trees and the cows!""It's going to come true," declared Chalfont.She held him away from her."Don't tempt me. It's not the title. That's only—funny. Me, my lady! What tempts me is the thought of being with you in that place where my heart is.""My home?"She nodded, appeared to be considering."There is this," she said. "If I married you I would do my best to try and be a lady—not vulgar. I think, after a little, it would come easy.... You said we should be perfect friends; but suppose—suppose I couldn't help loving you?""I was asking myself if that would come about—hoping it. In my case it is an eventuality not very remote."His very quietness impressed her. She knew he was not demonstrative, yet behind every word he spoke the intensity of his feelings was manifest to her. She had to fight hard to keep in check the ferment of emotion he had stirred in her. She picked up her hat from the chair where she had been sitting on it."It might have been more crushed," she said quaintly, but with a meaning that had a hint of tragedy averted in it. She went to a mirror and began arranging her tumbled hair. "I must go back to Lexie. I stole out while she was asleep. Perhaps I shall get there before she wakes up.""I'll take you," he said. "Only—aren't you going to give me an answer first, Maggy?"She made a last desperate and unsuccessful effort at calmness."Yes—but I'm not worth having," she sobbed and collapsed in a crumpled heap at his feet. "Don't stop me!" she gasped, waving him away. "Let me—burst!"And Chalfont stood where he was, waiting while her pent-up feelings exhausted themselves in a flood of choking tears, until she should be ready for him. Presently her sobs ceased. She struggled to her knees; her hands were clasped; her face, with a faint presage of happiness upon it, was turned to the window where the dawn of a new morning glimmered. Her lips moved. She was murmuring something beneath her breath. "What are you saying, dear?" he asked gently. "I—I think I'm saying my prayers," she answered huskily.There, on her knees, with her hair still hanging in disorder, the tears drying on her face, thanksgiving and humility in her heart, she repeated the words of her rhymed creed, with a reverence that surely gave it the consecration of a prayer."All's well with the world, my friend,And there isn't an ache that lasts;All troubles will have an end,And the rain and the bitter blasts.There is sleep when the evil is done,There's substance beneath the foam;And the bully old yellow sun will shineTill the cows come home!"She held out her arms to Chalfont."Lift me up," she whispered.*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOKTHE HONEY-POT***
XLIV
Although she had eaten nothing since breakfast that morning, a few biscuits and the remainder of Mrs. Bell's brandy sufficed Maggy.
"Now I'll go," she said, getting up. "I was in a fearful state about you, but now that everything has turned out so splendidly I feel quite all right again. Bless your sweet face, Lexie. I'd like to kiss you only I'm such a bad creature." Her lips trembled.
"Nonsense! Then I'll kiss you." Alexandra did so. "You're not going to-night, Maggy. You've got to stay here with me. We'll tuck in together. Here's a nightie."
"Tuck in—with you!" Maggy repeated. "But, Lexie—I'm not—like you."
"Nothing that's happened can make any difference between us, Maggy. Try and forget you ever left me. Get undressed, dear."
Very soon they were lying together in the little bed in the darkness. Alexandra did not talk. She wanted Maggy to get to sleep. It was so evident that she needed it. Half-an-hour passed in silence. A whisper from Maggy broke it.
"Asleep, Lexie?"
"No, dear."
"Have you enough room?"
"Heaps."
"May I have your hand to hold, Lexie? I feel so lonely."
"You poor pet!" Alexandra's hand sought hers.
"Lexie ... may I tell you things?"
"Yes, if it helps."
"I don't think anything ever will help. I'm done for, Lexie."
"You won't always feel like that," was the consoling rejoinder.
Maggy sat up in bed.
"I tried to kill myself to-day," she said abruptly. "But the stuff only made me sick. That's why I wasn't at the theater. I should be dead by now if it had worked properly."
"Maggy!"
"Yes, I did. How could I go on living? It's not worth it. Alone again: a room like this without even you to make it bearable ... or men. I won't do that. I went to the bad for love. I won't do it out of habit."
"Don't be so despondent. You won't have to live alone, dear. You shall leave the stage and be with me."
"Is it likely?" asked Maggy, with a touch of her old independence. "I wouldn't tell anybody but you, but I gave Fred more than he gave me. It's the meanness of it all that hurts so. There was the flat, I know, and the car; but they were only mine so long as he wanted me. And I paid for the meals I had in the place out of my salary. He gave me money for dresses because he liked me showy, but I went to sales and bought bargains, and what I saved that way I spent on him. And all the time I gave love, love, love! Oceans of it! Let me go on. Then, just before you went on tour I knew I was going to have a baby. Lexie, I longed for it! I think I'm the sort of woman that's meant to have babies without much pain or trouble, just for the sheer joy of mothering them and kissing their dear, pink, crumply palms. But Fred was annoyed about it. I told him he could put me in a laborer's cottage in the country and I'd live on ten shillings a week if only he would let me be a mother. Mrs. Lambert knew. I told her.... I had to go to a dreadful place in Bayswater until—until it was over.... Fred arranged everything. He seemed to know all about it. And I wasn't even a mother, Lexie. I nearly died. I wish I had. And when I was back again with Fred, instead of hating him it somehow made me feel more than ever bound up with him in my heart, because of having gone through so much for him. He was quite kind to me afterwards, almost tender for him. He used to bring me flowers. I wonder why. He couldn't have loved me.... But now it's all over...."
Alexandra put her arms round the shaking girl.
"Lie still," she said.
She held Maggy to her as she would have held a child, and kissed her and cried over her in sheer pity, so stirred was she by the heartrending story. Presently Maggy lay very still, breathing evenly, asleep in Alexandra's arms. But Alexandra lay awake for a long time, trying to find a reason for the discrepancies of life. Why, for her, should there be provided a haven of safety, and for Maggy nothing but a desolate sea with breakers ahead?
Mutely, she prayed to the Providence that had tided her over so many storms to safeguard Maggy until she, too, made harbor in calm and peaceful waters. Praying, she feel asleep and did not stir when, some hours later, Maggy awoke and gently disengaged herself from the encircling arm.
Maggy sat up. By the light of the street lamps she could just make out Alexandra's peaceful face. She looked so happy and innocent. Maggy watched her for a long time very fondly. It was the only way in which she could bid her farewell, a long and final one. For Maggy intended making no mistake this time. She had dreamt of what she meant to do. The dream had been inspired by the noises in the street, and it still obsessed her. The thunder of heavy wheels resounded in her ears.... She was going to employ a monster crushing power to blot herself out.
Very quietly and silently she got out of bed and groped for her clothes. Dressed, she hovered for a moment over Alexandra's sleeping form, bent and touched her forehead with her lips ... and crept out in search of her Juggernaut car.
XLV
Maggy intended making for Covent Garden. She had once seen it in the early hours after a fancy-dress ball to which Woolf had taken her, and she had marked the leviathan motor-lorries, freighted with perishable produce, converging on it. She meant to end her troubles under the wheels of one of these. The drug had failed her because of her ignorance of the fatal dose. This would be a sure and decisive way. In her dream it had seemed so feasible.
There would be something fitting in such an end. The very monstrousness of the ponderous vehicle was symbolical of the violence of the feeling that she had had for Woolf, the strength of passion that had drawn her to him. Her spirit had succumbed to strength and violence: strength and violence should annihilate her body.
The deserted streets were very silent. Maggy wandered along them, insensibly diverging from her route. She was thinking dully of a scene that long ago had made a dreadful impression on her mind. It had been a disconnected incident at the time: now its significance was almost personal. She had once seen a number of dogs pursuing a small mongrel, typical of the ownerless cur that gets its living in the streets. It was looking over its shoulder, heedless of the traffic. A motor-lorry came along at top speed. The mongrel made an unexpected dart across its track. There was an agonizing yelp, suddenly cut short; and though Maggy had quickly averted her eyes she had not been able to avoid witnessing the canine tragedy.
A shudder went through her at the recollection of it, a shudder of pity for the dog, not of apprehension for herself. She was too wretched to feel fear; but she was very weary and to some extent stupefied. When, therefore, she found herself in Portland Place instead of Covent Garden she was indifferent at having wandered in the wrong direction. She hardly met a soul. It was too late for night-prowlers and still too early for those who steal a march upon the day's work. An occasional policeman was all she came across. One flashed his lantern in her face, but satisfied by the serious look on it and her appearance generally, took no further notice of her.
It seemed to her that she had been walking interminably before the silence of the streets was broken by any sound of traffic. She had crossed the top of Regent Street, gone on due west by Cavendish Square and Wigmore Street, and was now in one of the turnings that give on Great Cumberland Place. At the corner a lighted doorway and an awning over the pavement told of a dance in progress. One or two carriages and a motor car were drawn up before the house. She did not look up as she passed it, but she slackened her pace when it was behind her, for she had heard the sound of a heavy vehicle. A slowly-moving van drawn by horses lumbered across the top of the turning. There surely she would find hercoup de grâce!
She stood in Great Cumberland Place, listening. The faint rumble of the morning traffic coming along Edgware and Bayswater Roads was audible now. Presently it was silenced by a nearer sound, the reverberation of machinery. It was coming at last. She kept on the edge of the pavement waiting and listening, trying to discern the advancing monster. The clank and rattle of it filled the wide street with stridulous echoes. She moved into the roadway, telling herself that she must make no mistake, give it no chance of avoiding her. She stood still, nerving herself for the moment of impact. It was very close now; its noise deafened her; a breath of hot metal filled her nostrils....
Now!
She stood poised, her body bent forward ready for the spring; and at that moment a heavy hand fell on her, jerked her roughly back and held her while the motor-lorry thundered by.
"Let me go!" she muttered thickly, pulling ineffectually against a uniformed arm.
"No, that I shan't," was the firm rejoinder. "Trying to do for yourself, eh?"
"I was crossing the road," she gasped, maddened by this second defeat.
The stars in their courses seemed to be fighting against her. Why should they prevent her taking her worthless life? And now, to add to her inflictions, she was in the grip of a policeman. She would be charged, cautioned, watched, so that another attempt would be well-nigh impossible. Besides, she wanted to make it now, while the madness was upon her.
"Crossing the road," she repeated. "Here comes a gentleman. He must have seen me. He'll believe me, if you won't."
She said it to gain time, in the hope that the policeman would relax his hold, so that she might run away. But though he took her suggestion, he gave her no chance of escaping.
"Beg pardon, sir, did you witness this young lady step off the pavement sudden-like in front of that there lorry?" he inquired.
The pedestrian, thus addressed, came to a stop. Maggy stared at him. The street lamp at the corner was behind him. But while she stared a motor car slipped past, the beam of its headlights full on his face, and she caught her breath as their eyes met—hers and Chalfont's. He was clearly too astonished to speak.
"He—the constable—thinks I was going to commit suicide, I believe," said Maggy, conjuring up a laugh that made Chalfont shiver. "It's fortunate you came along, Lord Chalfont. Please assure him I'm much too level-headed to do anything like that. I—I'm on my way home."
No part of her statement convinced him, but he took care that neither she nor the policeman should see that.
"So am I," he said in the most ordinary tone. "This lady is a friend of mine, constable. Here's my card. You've erred a little on the side of discretion, but that's excusable considering how dark it is. I'll see her home myself. Good morning."
The policeman looked at the card and then touched his hat.
"Very well, m'lord. I apologize to the young lady for the mistake. At this hour of the night if we're not very careful—"
"That's all right," said Chalfont.
He took Maggy's arm, holding it almost as tightly as the policeman had done, and walked her on in the direction of the Marble Arch.
"Thank you," she said in a subdued tone when they had gone a dozen paces. "Now I can manage to—to go on by myself."
"I don't think so," he rejoined sternly. "What are you doing, wandering about at this time of night?"
"I—I might as well ask you the same question."
"I can answer it. I have just left a friend's house—a late affair—fortunately for you."
"Why fortunately for me?" she asked, trying to assume an air of innocent resentment. "You're making too much fuss about a mistake in crossing the street."
He stopped, still holding her, compelling her to look at him.
"Maggy, are you going to tell me lies?"
"No," she choked, lowering her head.
"Then—" Chalfont did not proceed with what he was about to say. A taxi was passing and he hailed it. "I'll take you to your flat," he said.
"No, not there! I'm never going there again!" she cried, drawing back.
That she had some potent reason for that decision was evident to him. He did not ask her what it was. He guessed it.
"In that case," he said, "you must come to my house. I'm not going to leave you."
His determined tone put a stop to her spirit of rebelliousness. Passively she got into the cab and sat silent in its obscurity. When it stopped Chalfont opened his door with a latchkey. His servants had gone to bed, but in the room where Maggy had breakfasted with him there were sandwiches and consommé. He helped her to some of this, and she, beyond resistance now, took it. Then she shrank into the depths of the big chair which he had drawn up to the fire for her. She was unconscious of the tears of weakness that were welling from her eyes. Her hair had come down and was tumbled over her shoulders. Emotion had played havoc with her face.
Chalfont, watching her, was stirred by feelings that had their birth in pity. If they were gathering force, changing into others more personal, more tender, there was nothing of disloyalty to the memory of the dead woman on whom he had once lavished great affection.
"Maggy," he said quietly, "he has left you."
She lifted heavy eyes.
"How—how did you know?"
"I thought it would come."
A dry sob broke from her. Then she said: "He really was on his honeymoon.... Did you know?"
"No. But a few days ago I heard something.... I knew he was very thick with Cantire. I saw it coming."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"How could I?"
"No; I see.... I had to find out for myself.... Well, it's finished now." She stared blankly in front of her.
"Do you care so terribly?" he asked, after a pause.
She shook her head. "That's dead, I think. Everything's dead except myself, and I want to be. I can't stand it: the hardness—and the loneliness."
"I thought you were brave."
"Not when I don't want to be."
"I'm lonely too," he said; "but I haven't turned my back on life, partly because your advice helped me when I was feeling very down. Don't you think suicide is rather a craven thing?"
"Perhaps.... I shall have to go on living now, I suppose," she admitted dully. "Oh, damn that policeman! I should have been pulp by this time! That's the second failure. I took laudanum this afternoon, and was only sick."
Chalfont went over to her chair, sat on its arm-rest and took one of her hands.
"Don't you think we have something in common?" he said, and waited for a reply that should warrant him speaking more definitely.
She rested her head against his shoulder like one who is spent.
"You make me feel peaceful," she murmured. "I wish you would give me some poison and let me die while you held me."
"You tragic person!" He tried to speak lightly. "You'll laugh at yourself, later on.... I want you to live."
"I'll live," she consented. "It's only a matter of breathing."
"You must promise me that—and something else."
"All right. What's the else?" Her voice was unutterably tired.
"Everything, in effect. I'm not good at explaining, but, first of all, I want you to understand that I honor you."
Maggy sat bolt upright. Two fierce spots of color came into her cheeks.
"Also," he continued, "that from the beginning, ever since I first met you, even when you made that admission about—him, I always thought of you apart from him, as Maggy—the nice girl."
"Maggy—the nice girl!" she echoed in wonder.
"When you came down to Purton Towers I seemed to see you as belonging there. Even after you had gone I felt that."
"But—how could I belong to Purton Towers?" she asked in a wondering voice.
"By marrying me," he said very deliberately.
She looked at him blankly for a few seconds.
"Marry you!" she faltered. "Me—marry you?"
"Suppose," he went on, "suppose I said I needed you? I do say it. I believe that we can bring something into each other's lives that at present is missing, and perhaps always has been. We should, at any rate, be very perfect friends. That would be something."
All her face lit up. Her lips quivered.
"What an idea! Me and you! At breakfast, at dinner—always.... Purton Towers, and me—your wife! Oh, you dear, I do believe you mean it! As if I could! But I tell you what: let me live in a little cottage in the grounds and sell eggs!"
"Oh, Maggy, you child!" he said tenderly.
Her eyes brimmed over. She took his hand and kissed it.
"Thank you so much," she said. "But it's—it's not in the picture. What sort of a wife should I make? No, it wouldn't do.... And there are other reasons."
"Ada Lambert?" he asked gently. "Is that one of them? I loved her as a young man loves the first good woman who comes into his life. I don't think I do her any disloyalty."
"No, it's not that. What difference could that make? If I could I would make you happy because you lost her. It's me. I don't come from a good man. I wouldn't let any one say that except myself. I loathe what he's done to me and the way he's treated me. But I've loved him. There's something I gave him I can never get back. It's strange: though I never want to hear of him or see him again, I don't want anything bad to happen to him. I should be sorry."
"I understand," nodded Chalfont. "But it need not stand between you and me, Maggy. We should start fair."
The ghost of a smile flickered on her lips.
"Think of the racket there would be in the papers about us! You would be ashamed. And I'm not worth it, really. 'Another peer weds actress. Romance of the stage. The third this season. Below we append other instances of brilliant marriages of stage beauties.' Think of it!"
"I fancy we could keep it out of the papers," he said. "We would be married in the country—in church."
"In church!" Her eyes grew misty. "You would—go to church with me? Oh, my dear, that would be more of my dream coming true, like the cedar trees and the cows!"
"It's going to come true," declared Chalfont.
She held him away from her.
"Don't tempt me. It's not the title. That's only—funny. Me, my lady! What tempts me is the thought of being with you in that place where my heart is."
"My home?"
She nodded, appeared to be considering.
"There is this," she said. "If I married you I would do my best to try and be a lady—not vulgar. I think, after a little, it would come easy.... You said we should be perfect friends; but suppose—suppose I couldn't help loving you?"
"I was asking myself if that would come about—hoping it. In my case it is an eventuality not very remote."
His very quietness impressed her. She knew he was not demonstrative, yet behind every word he spoke the intensity of his feelings was manifest to her. She had to fight hard to keep in check the ferment of emotion he had stirred in her. She picked up her hat from the chair where she had been sitting on it.
"It might have been more crushed," she said quaintly, but with a meaning that had a hint of tragedy averted in it. She went to a mirror and began arranging her tumbled hair. "I must go back to Lexie. I stole out while she was asleep. Perhaps I shall get there before she wakes up."
"I'll take you," he said. "Only—aren't you going to give me an answer first, Maggy?"
She made a last desperate and unsuccessful effort at calmness.
"Yes—but I'm not worth having," she sobbed and collapsed in a crumpled heap at his feet. "Don't stop me!" she gasped, waving him away. "Let me—burst!"
And Chalfont stood where he was, waiting while her pent-up feelings exhausted themselves in a flood of choking tears, until she should be ready for him. Presently her sobs ceased. She struggled to her knees; her hands were clasped; her face, with a faint presage of happiness upon it, was turned to the window where the dawn of a new morning glimmered. Her lips moved. She was murmuring something beneath her breath. "What are you saying, dear?" he asked gently. "I—I think I'm saying my prayers," she answered huskily.
There, on her knees, with her hair still hanging in disorder, the tears drying on her face, thanksgiving and humility in her heart, she repeated the words of her rhymed creed, with a reverence that surely gave it the consecration of a prayer.
"All's well with the world, my friend,And there isn't an ache that lasts;All troubles will have an end,And the rain and the bitter blasts.There is sleep when the evil is done,There's substance beneath the foam;And the bully old yellow sun will shineTill the cows come home!"
"All's well with the world, my friend,And there isn't an ache that lasts;All troubles will have an end,And the rain and the bitter blasts.There is sleep when the evil is done,There's substance beneath the foam;And the bully old yellow sun will shineTill the cows come home!"
"All's well with the world, my friend,
And there isn't an ache that lasts;
And there isn't an ache that lasts;
All troubles will have an end,
And the rain and the bitter blasts.
And the rain and the bitter blasts.
There is sleep when the evil is done,
There's substance beneath the foam;
There's substance beneath the foam;
And the bully old yellow sun will shine
Till the cows come home!"
Till the cows come home!"
She held out her arms to Chalfont.
"Lift me up," she whispered.
*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOKTHE HONEY-POT***