Carfax was buried. There had been an inquest; certain tramps and wanderers had been arrested, examined and dismissed. No discovery had been made, and a verdict of Wilful "Wilful murder against some person or persons unknown" had been returned. It was generally felt that Carfax's life had not been of the most savoury and that there were, in all probability, amongst the back streets of Cambridge several persons who had owed him a grudge. He appeared, indeed, in the discoveries that were now made on every side, to be something better dead than alive. A stout and somnolent gentleman, with red cheeks and eyes half closed, was the only mourner from the outside world at the funeral. This, it appeared, was an uncle. Father dead, mother divorced and leading a pleasant existence amongst the capitals of Europe. The uncle, although maintaining a decent appearance of grief, was obviously, at heart, relieved to be rid of his nephew so easily. Poor Carfax! For so rubicund and noisy a person he left strangely little mark upon the world. Within a fortnight the college had nearly lost account of his existence. He lent to Sannet Wood a sinister air that caused numberless undergraduates to cycle out in that direction. Now and again, when conversation flagged, some one revived the subject. But it was a horse that needed much whipping to make it go. It had kicked with its violent hoof upon the soft walls of Cambridge life. For a moment it had seemed that it would force its way, but the impression had been of the slightest.
Even within the gates and courts of Saul's itself the impression that Carfax had left faded with surprising swiftness into a melodramatic memory. But nothing could have been more remarkable than the resolute determination of these young men to push grim facts away. They were not made—one could hear it so eloquently explained—for that kind of tragedy. The autumn air, the furious exercise, the hissing kettles, the decent and amiable discussions on Life reduced to the importance of a Greek Accent—these things rejected violently the absurdity of Tragic Crudity.
They were quite right, these young men. They paid their shining pounds for the capture—conscious or not as it might be—of an atmosphere, a delicate and gentle setting to the crudity of their later life. Carfax, when alive, had blundered into coarse disaster but had blundered in back streets. Now the manner of his death painted him in shrieking colours. The harmony was disturbed, therefore he must go.
Of more importance to this world of Saul's was the strange revival—as though from the dead—of Olva Dune. They had been prepared, many of them, for some odd development, but this perfectly normal, healthy interest in the affairs of the College was the last thing that his grave, romantic air could ever have led any one to expect. His football in the first place opened wide avenues of speculation. First there had been the College game, then there had been the University match against the Harlequins, and it was, admittedly, a very long time since any one had seen anything like it. He had seemed, in that game against the Harlequins, to possess every virtue that should belong to the ideal three-quarter—pace, swerve, tackle, and through them all the steady working of the brain. Nevertheless those earlier games were yet remembered against him, and it was confidently said that this brilliance, with a man of Dune's temperament, could not possibly last. But, nevertheless, the expectation of his success brought him up, with precipitation, against the personality of Cardillac, and it was this implied rivalry that agitated the College. It is only in one's second year that a matter of this kind can assume world-shaking importance. The First-year Undergraduate is too near the child, the Third-year Undergraduate too near the man. For the First-year man School, for the Third-year man the World looms too heavily. So it is from the men of the Second year that the leaders are to be selected, and at this time in Saul's Cardillac seemed to have no rival. He combined, to an admirable degree, the man of the world and the sportsman; he had an air that was beyond rubies. He was elegant without being effeminate, arrogant without being conceited, indifferent without being blase. He had learnt, at Eton, and at the knee of a rich and charming mother, that to be crude was the unforgivable sin. He worshipped the god of good manners and would have made an admirable son of the great Lord Chesterfield. Finally he was the only man in Saul's who had any "air" at all, and he had already travelled round the world and been introduced by his mother to Royalty at Marienbad.
The only man who could ever have claimed any possible rivalry was Dune, and Dune had seemed determined, until now, to avoid any-thing of the kind. Suddenly the situation leapt upon the startled eyes of the attentive world. Possibility of excitement. . . .
Olva, himself, was entirely unconcerned by this threatened rivalry. He was being driven, by impulses that he understood only too well, into the noisiest life that he could manage to find about him. The more noise the better; he had only a cold fear at his heart that, after all, it would penetrate his dreaded loneliness too little, let it be as loud a noise as he could possibly summon.
He had not now—and this was the more terrible—any consciousness of Carfax at all; there was waiting for him, lurking, beast-like, until its inevitable moment, something far more terrible.
Meanwhile he made encounters. . . . There was Bunning. The Historical Society in Saul's was held together by the Senior Tutor. This gentleman, a Mr. Gregg, was thin, cadaverous, blue-chinned, mildly insincere. It was his view of University life that undergraduates were born yesterday and would believe anything that you told them. In spite, however, of their tender years there was a lurking ferocity that must be checked by an indulgent heartiness of manner, as one might offer a nut to a monkey. His invariable manner of salutation—"Comealong, Simter—the very man I wanted to see"—lost its attraction through much repetition, and the hearty assumption on the amiable gentleman's part that "we are all boys together" froze many undergraduates into a chill and indifferent silence. He had not taken Holy Orders, but he gave, nevertheless, the effect of adopting the language of the World, the Flesh and the Devil in order that he might the better spy out the land. He attracted, finally, to himself certain timid souls who preferred insincere comfort to none at all, but he was hotly rejected by more able-bodied persons.
Nevertheless the Historical Society prospered, and Olva one evening, driven he knew not by what impulse, attended its meeting. When he entered Mr. Gregg's room some dozen men were already seated there. The walls were hung with groups in which a younger and even thinner Mr. Gregg was displayed, a curious figure in "shorts." On one side of the room two oars were hung and over the mantelpiece (littered with pipes) there were photographs of the "Mona Lisa" and Da Vinci's "Last Supper." The men in the room were embarrassed and silent. Under a strong light a minute undergraduate with enormous spectacles sat, white and trembling; it was obviously he who was to read the paper.
Mr. Gregg came forward heartily. "Why, Dune, this is quite splendid! The very man! Why, it is long since you've honoured our humble gathering. Baccy? That's right. Help yourself. Erdington's going to read to us about the Huns and stand a fire of questions afterwards, aren't you, Erdington?"
The youth in spectacles gulped.
"That'sright.That'sright. Comfortable now, Dune? Got all you want?That'sright. Now we can begin, I think. Minutes of the last meeting, Stevens."
Olva placed himself in a corner and looked round the room. He found that most of the men were freshmen whose faces he did not know, but there, moving his fat body uneasily on a chair, was Bunning, and there, to his intense surprise, was Lawrence. That football hero was lounging with half-closed eyes in a large armchair. His broad back looked as though it would burst the wooden arms, and his plain, good-natured face beamed, through a cloud of smoke, upon the company. Below his short, light grey flannel trousers were bright purple socks. He had the body of a bullock—short, thick, broad, strong, thoroughly well calculated to withstand the rushes of oncoming three-quarters. Various freshmen flung timid glances at the hero every now and again; it was to them an event that they might have, for a whole hour, closely under their observation, this king among men.
Olva wondered at his presence. He remembered that Lawrence was taking a "pass" degree in History. He knew also that Lawrence somewhere in the depths of his slow brain had a thirst for knowledge and at the same time a certain assurance that he would never acquire any. His slow voice, his slow smile, the great, heavy back, the short thick legs attracted Olva; there was something simple and primeval here that appealed to the Dune blood. Moreover, since the afternoon when Olva had played against the Harlequins and covered himself with glory, Lawrence had shown a disposition to make friends. Old Lawrence might be stupid, but, as a background, he was the most important man in the College. His slow, lumbering body as it rolled along the Court was followed by the eyes of countless freshmen. His appearance on the occasion of a College concert was the signal for an orgy of applause. Cardillac might lead the College, but he was, nevertheless, of common clay. Lawrence was of the gods!
Swift contrast the fat and shapeless Bunning! As the tremulous and almost tearful voice of little Erdington continued the solemn and dreary exposition of the Huns, Olva felt increasingly that Bunning's eye was upon him. Olva had not seen the creature since the night of the revival, and he was irritated with himself for the persistence of his interest. The man's pluck had, in the first place, struck him, but now it seemed to him that they were, in some undefinable measure, linked together. As Olva watched him, half contemptuously, half sarcastically, he tried to pin his brain down to the actual, definite connection. It seemed ultimately to hang round that dreadful evening when they had been together; it was almost—-although this was absurd—as though Bunning knew; but, in spite of the certain assurance of his ignorance Olva felt as he moved uneasily under Bunning's gaze that the man himself was making some claim upon him. It was evident that Bunning was unhappy; he looked as though he had not slept; his face was white and puffy, his eyes dark and heavy. He was paying no attention to the "Huns," but was trying, obviously, to catch Olva's eye. As the reading progressed Olva became more and more uneasy. It showed the things that must be happening to his nerves. He had now that sensation that had often come to him lately that some one was waiting for him outside the door. He imagined that the man next to him, a spotty, thin and restless freshman, would suddenly turn to him and say quite casually—"By the way, you killed Carfax, didn't you?" Above all he imagined himself suddenly rising in his place and saying—-"Yes, gentlemen, this is all very well, very interesting I'm sure, but I killed Carfax."
His tortured brain was being driven, compelled to these utterances. Behind him still he felt that pursuing cloud; one day it would catch him and, out of the heart of it, there would leap . . .
And all this because Bunning looked at him. It was becoming now a habit—so general that it was instinctive—that, almost unconsciously, he should, at a point like this, pull at his nerves. "They are watching you; they are watching you. Don't let them see you like this; pull yourself together. . . ."
He did. Little Erdington's voice ceased. Mr. Gregg was heard saying: "It has always occurred to me that the Huns . . . " and then, after many speeches: "How does this point of view strike you, Erdington?"
It didn't strike Erdington very strongly, and there was no other person present who seemed to be struck in any very especial direction. The discussion, therefore, quickly flagged. Olva escaped Bunning's pleading eyes, found his gown amongst a heap in the corner, and avoiding Mr. Gregg's pressing invitation to stay, plunged down the stairs. Behind him, then, making his heart leap into his mouth, was a slow, thick voice.
"I say, Dune, what do you say to a little drink in my room after all that muck?" Above him, in the dark shadow of the stair, loomed Lawrence's thick body.
"I shall be delighted," Olva said.
Lawrence came lumbering down. He always spoke as though words were a difficulty to him. He left out any word that was not of vital necessity.
"Muck that-awful muck. What do they want gettin' a piffler like that kid in the glasses to read his ideas? Ain't got any—not one—no more 'an I have."
They reached the Court—it swam softly in the moonlight—stars burnt, here and there, in a trembling sky.
Lawrence put his great arm through Olva's. "Rippin' game that o' yours yesterday. Rippin'." He seemed to lick his lips over it as a gourmet over a delicate dish.
Lawrence pursued his slow thoughts.
"I say, you know, you—re one of these clever ones—thinkin' an' writin' an' all that—an'yetyou play footer like an archangel—a blarsted archangel. Lucky devil!" He sighed heavily. "Every time I put on my footer boots," he pursued, "I say to myself, 'What you'd be givin', Jerry Lawrence, if you could just go and write a book! What you'd give! But it ain't likely—my spellin's somethin' shockin'."
Here there was interruption. Several men came rattling; laughing and shouting, down the staircase behind Lawrence and Olva.
"Oh, damn!" said Lawrence, slowly turning round upon them. Cardillac was there, also Bobby Galleon, Rupert Craven, and one or two more.
Cardillac shouted. "Hullo, Lawrence, old man. Is it true, as they say, that you've been sitting at the feet of our dearly beloved Gregg? How splendid for you!"
"I've been at our Historical Society hearin' about the Huns, and therefore there's compellin' necessity for a drink," Lawrence said, moving in the direction of his room.
"Oh! rot, don't go in yet. We're thinking of going round and paying Bunning a visit in another ten minutes. He's going to have a whole lot of men in for a prayer-meeting. Thompson's just brought word."
Thompson, a wretched creature in the Second Year, who had, during his first term, been of the pious persuasion and had since turned traitor, offered an eager assurance.
The news obviously tempted Lawrence. He moved his body slowly round.
"Well," he said slowly, then he turned to Olva. "You'll come?" he said.
"No, thanks," said Olva shortly. "Bunning's been ragged about enough. There's nothing the matter with the man."
Cardillac's voice was amused. "Well, Dune, I daresay we can get on without you," he said.
Lawrence said slowly, "Well, I don't know. P'raps it's mean on the man. I want a drink. I don't think I'm havin' any to-night, Cards."
Cardillac was sharper. "Oh, nonsense, Lawrence, come along. It doesn't do the man any harm."
"It frightens the fellow out of his wits," said Dune sharply. "You wouldn't like it yourself if you had a dozen fellows tumbling down upon your rooms and chucking your things out of the window."
Rupert Craven said: "Well, I'm off anyhow. Work for me." He vanished into the shadow.
Lawrence nodded. "Good-bye, Cards, old man. Go and play your old bridge or something—leave the wretched Bunnin' to his prayers."
Lawrence and Olva moved away.
The first thing that Lawrence said when they were lounging comfortably in his worn but friendly chairs hit Olva, expecting peace here at any rate, like a blow.
"Fellers have forgotten Carfax damn quick."
In that good-natured face there was no suspicion, but Olva seemed to see there a curiosity, even an excitement.
"Yes," he said, "they have."
"Fellers," said Lawrence again, "aren't clever in this College. They get their firsts in Science—little measly pups from Board Schools who don't clean their teeth—and there are one or two men who can row a bit and play footer a bit and play cricket a bit—I grant you all that—but theyaren'tclever—not what I call clever."
Olva waited for the development of Lawrence's brain.
"Now at St. Martin's they'll talk. They'll sit round a fire the whole blessed evenin' talkin'—about whether there's a God or isn't a God, about whether they're there or aren't there, about whether women are rotten or not, about jolly old Greece and jolly old Rome—Iknow. That's the sort o' stuff you could go in for—damn interestin'. I'd like to listen to a bit of it, although they'd laugh if they heard me say so, but what I'm gettin' at is that there ain't any clever fellers in this old bundle o' bricks, and Carfax's death proves it."
"How does it prove it?" asked Dune.
"Why, don't you see, they'd have made more of Carfax. Nobody said a blessed thing that any one mightn't have said."
Lawrence thought heavily for a moment or two, and then he brought out—
"Carfax was a stinker—a rotten fellow. That's granted, but there was more in it than just Carfax. Why, any one could give him a knock on the chin any day and there's no loss, but to have a feller killed in Sannet Wood where all those old Druids—-"
As the words came from him Lawrence stopped.
"Druids?" said Olva.
"Why, yes. I wish I were a clever feller an' I could say what I mean, but if I'd been a man with a bit of grey matter that's what I'd have gone in for—those old stones, those old fellers who used to slash your throat to please their God. My soul, there's stuff there.Theyknew what fightingwas—they'dhave played footer with you. Ever since I was a tiny kid they've excited me, and if I'd been a brainy feller I'd have known a lot more, but the minute I start reactin' about them I get heavy, can't keep my eyes to it. But I've walked miles—often and often—to see a stone or a hill, don't yer know, and Sannet Wood's one o' the best. So, says I, when I hear about young Carfax bein' done for right there at the very place, I says to myself, 'You may look and look—hold your old inquests—collar your likely feller—but it wasn't a man that did it, and you'll have to go further than human beings if you fix on the culprit.'"
This was, in all probability, the longest speech that Lawrence had ever made in his life. He himself seemed to think so, for he added in short jerks: "It was those old Druids—got sick—o' the sight—o' Carfax's dirty body—bangin' about in their preserves—an' they gave him a chuck under the chin," and after that there was silence.
To Olva the effect of this was uncanny. He played, it seemed, a spiritual Blind Man's Buff. On every side of him things filled the air; once and again he would touch them, sometimes he would fancy that he was alone, clear, isolated, when suddenly something again would blunder up against him. And always with him, driving him into the bustle of his fellow men, flinging him, hurling him from one noise to another noise, was the terror of silence. Let him once be alone, once waiting in suspense, and he would hear. . . . What would he hear?
He felt a sudden impulse to speak.
"Do you know, Lawrence, in a kind of way I feel with you. I mean this—that if—I had, at any time, committed a murder or were indeed burdened by any tremendous breaking of a law, I believe it would be the consciousness of the Maker of the law that would pursue me. It sounds priggish, but I don't mean man. The laws that man has made nothing—subject to any temporary civilization, mere fences put up for a moment to keep the cattle in their proper fields. But the laws that God made—if you break one . . ."
Lawrence tuned heavily in his chair.
"Then you believe in God?"
"Yes, I believe in God."
After that there was silence. Both men felt uncomfortable. Led by some sudden, ungovernable impulse, they had both gone further than their slight acquaintance justified. Olva was convinced that he had made a fool of himself, that he had talked like a prig. Lawrence was groping hopelessly amongst a forest of dark thought for some little sensible thing that he might say. He found nothing and so relapsed, with false, uncomfortable easiness, into—
"I say, old man, have a drink."
The rest of that conversation concerned football.
He was running—running for his life. Behind stretched the long white road rising like a great bloated, warning finger out of the misty trees. Heavy cushions of grey cloud blotched the sky; through the mist ridges of ploughed field rose like bars.
The dog, Bunker, was running beside him, his tongue out, body solid grey against the lighter, floating grey around. His feet pattered beside his master, but his body appeared to edge away and yet to be held by some compelling force.
Olva was running, running. But not from Carfax. There in the wood it lay, the leg doubled under the body, the head hanging limply back. . . . But that was nought, no fear, no terror in that. It could not pursue, nor in its clumsy following, had it had such power, would there have been any horror. There was no sound in the world save his running and the patter of the dog's feet. Would the lights never come, those sullen streets and at last the grateful, welcome crowds?
He could see one lamp, far ahead of him, flinging its light forward to help him. If he might only reach it before the pursuer caught him. Then, behind him, oh! so softly, so gently, with a dreadful certainty, it came. If he did but once look round, once behold that Shadow, his defeat was sure. He would sink down there upon the road, the mists would crowd upon him, and then the awful end. He began to call out, his breath came in staggering gasps, his feet faltered.
"O, mercy, mercy—have mercy." He sank trembling to his knees.
"Dune, Dune, wake up! What's the matter? You've been making the most awful shindy. Dune, Dune!"
Slowly he came to himself. As his eyes caught the old familiar objects, the little diamond-paned window, the books, the smiling tenderness of "Aegidius," the last evening blaze lighting the room with golden splendour, he pulled himself together.
He had been sitting, he remembered now, in the armchair by the fire. Craven had come to tea. They had had their meal, had talked pleasantly enough, and then Olva had felt this overpowering desire for sleep come down upon him. He knew the sensation of it well enough by now, for his nights had often been crowded with waking hours, and this drowsiness would attack him at any time—in hall, in chapel, in lecture. Sometimes he had struggled against it, but to-day it had been too strong for him. Craven's voice had grown fainter and fainter, the room had filled with mist. He had made one desperate struggle, had seen through his hall-closed eyes that Craven was looking at a magazine and blowing, lazily, clouds of smoke from his pipe . . . then he had known no more.
Now, as he struggled to himself, he saw that Craven was standing over him, shaking him by the arm.
"Hullo," he said stupidly, "I'm afraid I must have dropped off. I'm afraid you must have thought me most frightfully rude."
Craven left him and went back to his chair.
"No," he said, "that's all right—only youdidtalk in the most extraordinary way."
"Did I?" Olva looked at him gravely. "What did I say?"
"Oh—I don't know—only you shouted a lot. You're overdone, aren't you? Been working too hard I expect." Then he added, slowly, "You were crying out about Carfax."
There was a long pause. The clock ticked, the light slowly faded, leaving the room in shadow. Craven's voice was uncomfortable. He said at last—
"You must have been thinking a lot about Carfax lately."
"What did I say?" asked Olva again.
"Oh, nothing." Craven turned his eyes away to the shadowy panes. "You were dreaming about a road—and something about a wood . . . and a matchbox."
"I've been sleeping badly." Olva got up, filled his pipe and relit it. "I expect, although we don't say much about it, the Carfax business has got on all our nerves. You don't look yourself, Craven."
He didn't. His careless, happy look had left him. Increasingly, every day, Olva seemed to see in him a likeness to his mother and sister. The eyes now were darker, the tines of the mouth were harder.
Meanwhile so strong bad the dream's impression been that Olva could not yet disentangle it from his waking thoughts. He was in his room and yet the white road stretched out of it—somewhere there by the bookcase—oil through the mist into the heart of the dark wood.
He had welcomed during these last days Craven's advances towards friendship, partly because he wanted friends now, and partly, he was beginning now to recognize, there was, in the back of his mind, the lingering memory of the kind eyes of Margaret Craven. He perceived, too, that here was sign enough of change in him—that he who had, from his earliest days, held himself proudly, sternly aloof from all human companionship save that of his father, should now, so readily and eagerly, greet it. Craven had been proud of him, eager to be with him, and had shown, in his artless opinions of men and things, the simplest, most innocent of characters.
"Time to light up," said Olva. The room had grown very dark.
"I must be going."
Olva noticed at once that there was a new note in Craven's voice. The boy moved, restlessly, about the room.
"I say," he brought out at last, laughing nervously, "don't go asleep when I'm in the room again. It gives one fits."
Both men were conscious of some subtle, vague impression moving in the darkness between them.
Olva answered gravely, "I've been sticking in at an old paper I've been working on—no use to anybody, and I've been neglecting my proper work for it, but it's absorbed me. That's what's given me such bad nights, I expect."
"I shouldn't have thought," Craven answered slowly, "that anything ever upset you; I shouldn't have thought you had any nerves. And, in any case, I didn't know you had thought twice about the Carfax business."
Olva turned on the electric light. At the same moment there was a loud knock on the door.
Craven opened it, showing in the doorway a pale and flustered Bunning. Craven looked at him with a surprised stare, and then, calling out good-bye to Olva, walked off.
Bunning stood hesitating, his great spectacles shining owl-like in the light.
Dune didn't want him. He was, he reflected as he looked at him, the very last person whom he did want. And then Bunning had most irritating habits. There was that trick of his of pushing up his spectacles nervously higher on to his nose. He bad a silly shrill laugh, and he had that lack of tact that made him, when you had given him a shilling's worth of conversation and confidence, suppose that you had given him half-a-crown's worth and expect that you would very shortly give him five shillings' worth. He presumed on nothing at all, was confidential when he ought to have been silent, and gushing when he should simply have thanked you with a smile. Nothing, moreover, to look at. He had the kind of complexion that looks as though it would break into spots at the earliest opportunity. His clothes fitted him badly and were dusty at the knees; his hair was of no colour nor strength whatever, and he bit his nails. His eyes behind his spectacles were watery and restless, and his linen always looked as though it had been quite clean yesterday and would be quite filthy to-morrow.
And yet Olva, as he looked at him seated awkwardly in a chair, was surprisingly, unexpectedly touched. The creature was so obviously sincere. It was indeed poor Bunning's only possible "leg," his ardour. He would willingly go to the stake for anything. It was the actual death and sacrifice that mattered—-and Bunning's life was spent in marching, magnificently and wholeheartedly, to the sacrificial altars and then discovering that he had simply been asked to tea.
Now it was evident that he wanted something from Olva. His tremulous eyes bad, as they gazed at Dune across the room, the dumb worship of a dog adoring its master.
"I hear," he said in that husky voice that always sounded as though he were just swallowing the last crumbs of a piece of toast, "that you stopped Cardillac and the others coming round to my rooms the other night. I can't tell you how I feel about it."
"Rot," said Olva brusquely. "If you were less of an ass they wouldn't want to come round to your rooms so often."
"I know," said Bunning. "I am an awful ass." He pushed his spectacles up his nose. "Why did you stop them coming?" he asked.
"Simply," said Olva, "because it seems to me that ten men on to one is a rotten poor game."
"I don't know," said Bunning, still very husky, "If a man's a fool he gets rotted. That's natural enough. I've always been rotted all my life. I used to think it was because people didn't understand me—now I know that it really is because I am an ass."
Strangely, suddenly, some of the burden that bad been upon Olva now for so long was lifted. The atmosphere of the room that had lain upon him so heavily was lighter—and he seemed to feel the gentle withdrawing of that pursuit that now, ever, night and day, sounded in his ears.
And what, above all, had happened to him? He flung his mind back to a month ago. With what scorn then would he have glanced at Bunning's ugly body—with what impatience have listened to his pitiful confessions. Now he said gently—
"Tell me about yourself."
Bunning gulped and gripped the baggy knees of his trousers.
"I'm very unhappy," he said at last desperately—"very. And if you hadn't come with me the other night to hear Med-Tetloe—I'm sure I don't know why you did—I shouldn't have come now—-"
"Well, what's the matter?"
Bunning's mouth was full of toast. "It was that night—that service. I was very worked up and I went round afterwards to speak to him. I could see, you know, that it hadn't touched you at all. I could see that, and then when I went round to see him he hadn't got anything to say—nothing that I wanted—and—suddenly—then—at that moment—I felt it was all no good. It was you, you made me feel like that—-"
"Yes. If you hadn't gone—like that—it would have been different. But when you—the last man in College to care about it-went and gave it its chance I thought that would prove it. And then when I went to him he was so silly, Med-Tetloe I mean. Oh! I can't describe it but it was just no use and I began to feel that it was all no good. I don't believe there is a God at all—it's all been wrong—I don't know what to do. I don't know where to go. I've been wretched for days, not sleeping or anything. And then they come and rag me—and—and—the Union men want me to take Cards round for a Prayer Meeting—and—and—I wouldn't, and they said. . . . Oh! I don't know, I don't knowwhatto do—I haven't got any-thing left!"
And here, to Olva's intense dismay, the wretched creature burst into the most passionate and desperate tears, putting his great hands over his face, his whole body sobbing. It was desolation—the desolation of a human being who had clutched desperately at hope after hope, who had demanded urgently that he should be given something to live for and had had all things snatched from his hands.
Olva, knowing what his own loneliness was, and the terror of it, understood. A fortnight ago he would have hated the scene, have sent Bunning, with a cutting word, flying from the room, never to return.
"I say, Bunning, you mustn't carry on like this—you're overdone or something. Besides, I don't understand. What does it matter if youhavegrown to distrust Med-Tetloe and all that crowd. They aren't the only people in the world—that isn't the only sort of religion."
"It's all I had. I haven't got anything now. They don't want me at home. They don't want me here. I'm not clever. I can't do anything. . . . And now God's gone. . . . I think I'll drown myself."
"Nonsense. You mustn't talk like that—God's never gone."
Bunning dropped his hands, looked up, his face ridiculous with its tear-stains.
"You think there's a God?"
"I know there's a God."
"Oh!" Bunning sighed.
"But you mustn't take it from me, you know. You must think it out for yourself. Everybody has to."
"Yes—but you matter—more to me than—any one."
"Yes." Bunning looked at the floor and began to speak very fast. "You've always seemed to me wonderful—so different from every one else. You always looked—so wonderful. I've always been like that, wanted my hero, and I haven't generally been able to speak to them—my heroes I mean. I never thought, of course, that I should speak to you. And then they sent me that day to you, and you came with me—it was so wonderful—I've thought of nothing else since. I don't think God would matter if you'd only let me come to see you sometimes and talk to you—like this."
"Don't talk that sort of rot. Always glad to see you. Of course you may come in and talk if you wish."
"Oh! you're so different—from what I thought. You always looked as though you despised everybody—and now you look—Oh! I don't know—but I'm afraid of you—-"
The wretched Bunning was swiftly regaining confidence. He was now, of course, about to plunge a great deal farther than was necessary and to burden Olva with sell-revelations and the rest.
Olva hurriedly broke in—
"Well, come and see me when you want to. I've got a lot of work to do before Hall. But we'll go for a walk one day. . . ."
Bunning was at once flung back on to his timid self. He pushed his spectacles back, blushed, nearly tumbled over his chair as he got up, and backed confusedly out of the room.
He tried to say something at the door—"I can't thank you enough. . ." he stuttered and was gone.
As the door closed behind him, swiftly Olva was conscious again of the Pursuit. . . .
He turned to the empty room—"Leave me alone," he whispered. "For pity's sake leave me alone."
The silence that followed was filled with insistent, mysterious urgency.
Craven did not come that night to Hall. Galleon had asked him and Olva to breakfast-the next morning. He did not appear.
About two o'clock in the afternoon a note was sent round to Olva's rooms. "I've been rather seedy. Just out for a long walk—do you mind my taking Bunker? Send word round to my rooms if you mind.—R. C." Craven had taken Bunker out for walks before and had grown fond of the dog. There was nothing in that. But Olva, as he stood in the middle of his room with the note in his hand, was frightened.
The result of it was that about five o'clock on that afternoon Olva paid his second visit to the dark house in Rocket Road. His motives for going were confused, but he knew that at the back of them was a desire that he should find Margaret Craven, with her grave eyes, waiting for him in the musty little drawing-room, and that Mrs. Craven, that mysterious woman, should not be there. The hall, when the old servant had admitted him, once again seemed to enfold him in its darkness and heavy air with an almost active purpose. It breathed with an actual sound, almost with a melody . . . the "Valse Triste" of Sibelius, a favourite with Olva, seemed to him now to be humming its thin spiral note amongst the skins and Chinese weapons that covered the walls. The House seemed to come forward, on this second occasion, actively, personally. . . . His wish was gratified. Margaret Craven was alone in the dark, low-ceilinged drawing-room, standing, in her black dress, before the great deep fireplace, as though she had known that he would come and had been awaiting his arrival.
"I know that you will excuse my mother," she said in her grave, quiet voice. "She is not very well. She will be sorry not to have seen you." Her hand was cool and strong, and, as he held it for an instant, he was strangely conscious that she, as well as the House, had moved into more intimate relation with him since their last meeting.
They sat down and talked quietly, their voices sounding like low notes of music in the heavy room. He was conscious of rest in the repose of her figure, the pale outline of her face, the even voice, and above all the grave tenderness of her eyes. He was aware, too, that she was demanding from him something of the same kind; he divined that for her, too, life had been no easy thing since they last met and that she wanted now a little relief before she must return. He tried to give it her.
All through their conversation he was still conscious in the dim rustle that any breeze made in the room of that thin melody that Sibelius once heard. . . .
"I hope that Mrs. Craven is not seriously ill?
"No. It is one of her headaches. Her nerves are very easily upset. There was a thunder-storm last night. . . . She has never been strong since father died."
"You will tell her how sorry I am."
"Thank you. She is wonderfully brave about it. She never complains—she suffers more than we know, I think. I don't think this house is good for her. Father died here and her bedroom now is the room where he died. That is not good for her, I'm sure. Rupert and I both are agreed about it, but we cannot get her to change her mind. She can be very determined."
Yes—Olva, remembering her as she sat so sternly before the fire, knew that she could be determined.
"And I am afraid that your brother isn't very well either."
She looked at him with troubled eyes. "I am distressed about Rupert. He has taken this death of his friend so terribly to heart. I have never known him morbid about anything before. It is really strange because I don't think he was greatly attached to Mr. Carfax. There were things I know that he didn't like."
"Yes. He doesn't look the kind of fellow who would let his mind dwell on things. He looks too healthy."
"No. He came in to see us for an hour last night and sat there without a word. I played to him—he seemed not to hear it. And generally he cares for music."
"I'm afraid"—their eyes met and Olva held hers until he had finished his sentence—"I'm afraid that it must seem a little lonely and gloomy for you here—in this house—after your years abroad."
She looked away from him into the fire.
"Yes," she said, speaking with sudden intensity. "I hate it. I have hated it always—this house, Cambridge, the life we lead here. I love my mother, but since I have been abroad something has happened to change her. There is no confidence between us now. And it is lonely because she speaks so little—I am afraid she is really very ill, but she refuses to see a doctor. . . ."
Then her voice was softer again, and she leant forward a little towards him. "And I have told you this, Mr. Dune, because if you will you can help me—all of us. Do you know that she liked you immensely the other even big? I have never known her take to any one at once, so strongly. She told me afterwards that you had done her more good than fifty doctors—just your being there—so that if, sometimes, you could come and see her——"
He did not know what it was that suddenly, at her words, brought the terror back to him. He saw Mrs. Craven so upright, so motionless, looking at him across the room—with recognition, with some implied claim. Why, he had spoken scarcely ten words to her. How could he possibly have been of any use to her? And then, afraid lest his momentary pause had been noticeable, he said eagerly—-
"It is very kind of Mrs. Craven to say that. Of course I will come if she really cares about it. I am not a man of many friends or many occupations. . . ."
She broke in upon him—
"You could be if you cared. I know, because Rupert has told me. They all think you wonderful, but you don't care. Don't throw away friends, Mr. Dune—one can be so lonely without them."
Her voice shook a little and he was suddenly afraid that she was going to cry. He bent towards her.
"I think, perhaps, we are alike in that, Miss Craven. We do not make our friends easily, but they mean a great deal to us when they come. Yes, Iamlonely and Iama little tired of bearing my worries alone, in silence. Perhaps I can help you to stand this life a little better if I tell you that—mine is every bit as hard."
She turned to him eyes that were filled with gratitude. Her whole body seemed to be touched with some new glow. Into the heart of their consciousness of the situation that had arisen between them there came, sharply, the sound of a shutting door. Then steps in the hall.
"That's Rupert," she said.
They both rose as he came into the room. He stood back in the shadow for a moment as though surprised at Olva's presence. Then he came forward very gravely.
"I've found something of yours, Dune," he said. It lay, gleaming, in his hand. "Your matchbox."
Dune drew a sharp breath. Then he took it and looked at it.
"Where did you find it?"
"In Saunet Wood. Bunker and I have been for a walk there. Bunker found it."
As the three of them stood there, motionless, in the middle of the dark room, Olva caught, through the open door, the last sad fading breath of the "Valse Triste."