Chambers Robert William
The Business of Life
CHAPTER XV
Une nuit blanche – and the young seem less able to withstand its corroding alchemy than the old. It had left its terrible and pallid mark on Desboro; and on Jacqueline it had set its phantom sign. That youthfully flushed and bright-eyed loveliness which always characterised the girl had whitened to ashes over night.
And now, as she entered the sunny breakfast room in her delicate Chinese morning robes, the change in her was startlingly apparent; for the dead-gold lustre of her hair accented the pallor of a new and strange and transparent beauty; the eyes, tinted by the deeper shadows under them, looked larger and more violet; and she seemed smaller and more slender; and there was a snowy quality to the skin that made the vivid lips appear painted.
Desboro came forward from the recess of the window; and whether in his haggard and altered features she read of his long night's vigil, or whether in his eyes she learned again how she herself had changed, was not plain to either of them; but her eyes suddenly filled and she turned sharply and stood with the back of one slender hand across her eyes.
Neither had spoken; neither spoke for a full minute. Then she walked to the window and looked out. The mating sparrows were very noisy.
Not a tear fell; she touched her eyes with a bit of lace, drew a long, deep, steady breath and turned toward him.
"It is all over – forgive me, Jim. I did not mean to greet you this way. I won't do it again – "
She offered her hand with a faint smile, and he lifted it and touched it to his lips.
"It's all over, all ended," she repeated. "Such a curious phenomenon happened to me at sunrise this morning."
"What?"
"I was born," she said, laughing. "Isn't it odd to be born at my age? So as soon as I realised what had happened, I went and looked out of the window; and there was the world, Jim – a big, round, wonderful planet, all over hills and trees and valleys and brooks! I don't know how I recognised it, having just been born into it, but somehow I did. And I knew the sun, too, the minute I saw it shining on my window and felt it on my face and throat. Isn't that a wonderful way to begin life?"
There was not a tremor in her voice, nothing tremulous in the sweet humour of the lips; and, to his surprise, in her eyes little demons of gaiety seemed to be dancing all at once till they sparkled almost mockingly.
"Dear," he said, under his breath, "I wondered whether you would ever speak to me again."
"Speak to you! You silly boy, I expect to do little else for the rest of my life! I intend to converse and argue and importune and insist and nag and nag. Oh, Jim! Please ring for breakfast. I had no luncheon yesterday and less dinner."
A slight colour glowed under the white skin of her cheeks as Farris entered with the fruit; she lifted a translucent cluster of grapes from the dish, snipped it in half with the silver scissors, glanced at her husband and laughed.
"That's how hungry I am, Jim. I warned you. Of what are you thinking – with that slight and rather fascinating smile crinkling your eyes?"
She bit into grape after grape, watching him across the table.
"Share with me whatever amuses you, please!" she insisted. "Never with my consent shall you ever again laugh alone."
"You haven't seen last evening's and this morning's papers," he said, amused.
"Have they arrived? Oh, Jim! I wish to see them, please!"
He went into his room and brought out a sheaf of clippings.
"Isn't this all of the papers that you cared to see, Jacqueline?"
"Of course! What do they say about us? Are they brief or redundant, laconic or diffuse? And are they nice to us?"
She was already immersed in a quarter column account of "A Romantic Wedding" at "old St. George's"; and she read with dilated eyes all about the "wealthy, fashionable, and well-known clubman," which she understood must mean her youthful husband, and all about Silverwood and the celebrated collections, and about his lineage and his social activities. And by and by she read about herself, and her charm and beauty and personal accomplishments, and was amazed to learn that she, too, was not only wealthy and fashionable, but that she was a descendant of an ancient and noble family in France, entirely extinguished by the guillotine during the Revolution, except for her immediate progenitors.
Clipping after clipping she read to the end; then the simple notices under "Weddings." Then she looked at Desboro.
"I – I didn't realise what a very grand young man I had married," she said, with a shy smile. "But I am very willing to admit it. Why do they say such foolish and untrue things about me?"
"They meant to honour you by lying about you when the truth about you is far more noble and more wonderful," he said.
"Do you think so?"
"Do you doubt it?"
She remained silent, turning over the clippings in her hand; then, glancing up, found him smiling again.
"Please share with me – because I know your thoughts are pleasant."
"It was seeing you in these pretty Chinese robes," he smiled, "which made me think of that evening in the armoury."
"Oh – when I sat under the dragon, with my lute, and said for your guests some legends of old Cathay?"
"Yes. Seeing you here – in your Chinese robes – made me think of their astonishment when you first dawned on their mental and social horizon. They are worthy people," he added, with a shrug.
"They are as God made them," she said, demurely.
"Only they have always forgotten, as I have, that God merely begins us – and we are expected to do the rest. For, once made, He merely winds us up, sets our hearts ticking, and places us on top of the world. Where we walk to, and how, is our own funeral henceforward. Is that your idea of divine responsibility?"
"I think He continues to protect us after we start to toddle; and after that, too, if we ask Him," she answered, in a low voice.
"Do you believe in prayer, dear?"
"Yes – in unselfish prayer. Not in the acquisitive variety. Such petitions seem ignoble to me."
"I understand."
She said, gravely: "To pray – not for one's self – except that one cause no sorrow – that seems to me a logical petition. But I don't know. And after all, what one does, not what one talks about, counts."
She was occupied with her grapes, glancing up at him from moment to moment with sweet, sincere eyes, sometimes curious, sometimes shy, but always intent on this tall, boyish young fellow who, she vainly tried to realise, belonged to her.
In his morning jacket, somehow, he had become entirely another person; his thick, closely brushed hair, the occult air of freshness from ablutions that left a faint fragrance about him, accented their new intimacy, the strangeness of which threatened at moments to silence her. Nor could she realise that she belonged there at all – there, in her frail morning draperies, at breakfast with him in a house which belonged to him.
Yet, one thing she was becoming vaguely aware of; this tall, young fellow, in his man's intimate attire, was quietly and unvaryingly considerate of her; had entirely changed from the man she seemed to have known; had suddenly changed yesterday at midnight. And now she was aware that he still remained what he had been when he took the white blossom from her hand the night before, and left in her trembling palm, untouched, the symbol of authority which now was his forever.
Even in the fatigue of body and the deadlier mental weariness – in the confused chaos of her very soul, that moment was clearly imprinted on her mind – must remain forever recorded while life lasted.
She divided another grape; there were no seeds; the skin melted in her mouth.
"Men," she said absently, "are good." When he laughed, she came to herself and looked at him with shy, humourous eyes. "They are good, Jim. Even the Chinese knew it thousands of years ago. Have you never heard me recite the three-word-classic of San Tzu Ching? Then listen, white man!
"Jen chih ch'u
Hsing pen shan
Hsing hsiang chin
Hsi hsiang yuan
Kou pu chiao
Hsing nai ch'ien
Chiao chih tao
Kuei i chuan – "
She sat swaying slightly to the rhythm, like a smiling child who recites a rhyme of the nursery, accenting the termination of every line by softly striking her palms together; and the silken Chinese sleeves slipped back, revealing her white arms to the shoulder.
Softly she smote her smooth little palms together, gracefully she swayed; her silks rustled like the sound of slender reeds in a summer wind, and her cadenced voice was softer. Never had he seen her so exquisite.
She stopped capriciously.
"All that is Chinese to me," he said. "You make me feel solitary and ignorant."
And she laughed and tossed the lustrous hair from her cheeks.
"This is all it means, dear:
"Men at their birth
Are naturally good.
Their natures are much the same;
Their habits become widely different.
If they are not taught,
Their natures will deteriorate.
The right way in teaching
Is to attach the utmost importance to thoroughness —
"And so forth, and so forth," she ended gaily.
"Where on earth did you learn Chinese?" he remonstrated. "You know enough without that to scare me to death! Slowly but surely you are overwhelming me, Jacqueline, and some day I shall leave the house, dig a woodchuck hole out on the hill, and crawl into it permanently."
"Then I'll have to crawl in, too, won't I? But, alas, Jim! The three-word-classic is my limit. When father took me to Shanghai, I learned it – three hundred and fifty-six lines of it! But it's all the Chinese I know – except a stray phrase or two. Cheer up, dear; we won't have to look for our shadows on that hill."
Breakfast was soon accomplished; she looked shyly across at him; he nodded, and they rose.
"The question is," she said, "when am I going to find time to read the remainder of the morning paper, and keep myself properly informed from day to day, if you make breakfast so agreeable for me?"
"Have I done that?"
"You know you have," she said lightly. "Suppose you read the paper aloud to me, while I stroll about for the sake of my figure."
They laughed; he picked up the paper and began to read the headlines, and she walked about the room, her hands bracketed on her hips, listening sometimes, sometimes absorbed in her own reflections, now and then glancing out of the window or pausing to rearrange a bowl of flowers.
Little by little, however, her leisurely progress from one point of interest to another became more haphazard, and she moved restlessly, with a tendency to drift in his direction.
Perhaps she realised that, for she halted suddenly.
"Jim, I have enough of politics, thank you. And it's almost time to put on more conventional apparel, isn't it? I have a long and hard day before me at the office."
"As hard as yesterday?" he asked, unthinkingly; then reddened.
She had moved to the window as she spoke; but he had seen the quick, unconscious gesture of pain as her hand flew to her breast; and her smiling courage when she turned toward him did not deceive him.
"That was a hard day, Jim. But I think the worst is over. And you may read your paper if you wish until I am ready. You have only to put on your business coat, haven't you?"
So he tried to fix his mind on the paper, and, failing, laid it aside and went to his room to make ready.
When he was prepared, he returned to their sitting room. She was not there, and the door of her bedroom was open and the window-curtains fluttering.
So he descended to the library, where he found her playing with his assortment of animals, a cat tucked under either arm and a yellow pup on her knees.
"They all came to say good-morning," she explained, "and how could I think of my clothing? Would you ask Farris to fetch a whisk-broom?"
Desboro rang: "A whisk-broom for – for Mrs. Desboro," he said.
Mrs. Desboro!
She had looked up startled; it was the first time she had heard it from his lips, and even the reiteration of her maid had not accustomed her to hear herself so named.
Both had blushed before Farris, both had thrilled as the words had fallen from Desboro's unaccustomed lips; but both attempted to appear perfectly tranquil and undisturbed by what had shocked them as no bomb explosion possibly could. And the old man came back with the whisk-broom, and Desboro dusted the cat fur and puppy hairs from Jacqueline's brand-new gown.
They were going to town by train, not having time to spare.
"It will be full of commuters," he said, teasingly. "You don't know what a godsend a bride is to commuters. I pity you."
"I shall point my nose particularly high, monsieur. Do you suppose I'll know anybody aboard?"
"What if you don't! They'll know who you are! And they'll all read their papers and stare at you from time to time, comparing you with what the papers say about you – "
"Jim! Stop tormenting me. Do I look sallow and horrid? I believe I'll run up to my room and do a little friction on my cheeks – "
"With nail polish?"
"How do you know? Please, Jim, it isn't nice to know so much about the makeshifts indulged in by my sex."
She stood pinching her cheeks and the tiny lobes of her close-set ears, regarding him with beautiful but hostile eyes.
"You know too much, young man. You don't wish to make me afraid of you, do you? Anyway, you are no expert! Once you thought my hair was painted, and my lips, too. If I'd known what you were thinking I'd have made short work of you that rainy afternoon – "
"You did."
She laughed: "You can say nice things, too. Did you really begin to – to care for me that actual afternoon?"
"That actual afternoon."
"A – about what time – if you happen to remember," she asked carelessly.
"About the same second that I first set eyes on you."
"Oh, Jim, you couldn't!"
"Couldn't what?"
"Care for me the actual second you first set eyes on me. Could you?"
"I did."
"Was it that very second?"
"Absolutely."
"You didn't show it."
"Well, you know I couldn't very well kneel down and make you a declaration before I knew your name, could I, dear?"
"You did it altogether too soon as it was. Jim, what did you think of me?"
"You ought to know by this time."
"I don't. I suppose you took one look at me and decided that I was all ready to fall into your arms. Didn't you?"
"You haven't done it yet," he said lightly.
There was a pause; the colour came into her face, and his own reddened. But she pretended to be pleasantly unconscious of the significance, and only interested in reminiscence.
"Do you know what I thought of you, Jim, when you first came in?"
"Not much, I fancy," he conceded.
"Will it spoil you if I tell you?"
"Have you spoiled me very much, Jacqueline?"
"Of course I have," she said hastily. "Listen, and I'll tell you what I thought of you when you first came in. I looked up, and of course I knew at a glance that you were nice; and I was very much impressed – "
"The deuce you were!" he laughed, unbelievingly.
"I was!"
"You didn't show it."
"Only an idiot of a girl would. But I was – very – greatly – impressed," she continued, with a delightfully pompous emphasis on every word, "very – greatly – impressed by the tall and fashionable and elegant and agreeably symmetrical Mr. Desboro, owner of the celebrated collection of arms and armour – "
"I knew it!"
"Knew what?"
"You never even took the trouble to look at me until you found out that the armour belonged to me – "
"That is what ought to have been true. But it wasn't."
"Did you actually – "
"Yes, I did. Not the very second I laid eyes on you – " she added, blushing slightly, "but – when you went away – and afterward – that evening when I was trying to read Grenville on Armour."
"You thought of me, Jacqueline?"
"Yes – and tried not to. But it was no use; I seemed to see you laughing at me under every helmet in Grenville's plates. It was rather odd, wasn't it, Jim? And to think – to think that now – "
Her smile grew vaguer; she dropped her head thoughtfully and rested one hand on the library table, where once her catalogue notes had been piled up – where once Elena's letter to her husband had fallen from Clydesdale's heavy hand.
Then, gradually into her remote gaze came something else, something Desboro had learned to dread; and she raised her head abruptly and gazed straight at him with steady, questioning eyes in which there was a hint of trouble of some kind – perhaps unbelief.
"I suppose you are going to your office," she said.
"After I have taken you to yours, dear."
"You will be at leisure before I am, won't you?"
"Unless you knock off work at four o'clock. Can you?"
"I can not. What will you do until five, Jim?"
"There will be nothing for me to do except wait for you."
"Where will you wait?"
He shrugged: "At the club, I suppose."
The car rolled up past the library windows.
"I suppose," she said carelessly, "that it would be too stupid for you to wait chez moi."
"In your office? No, indeed – "
"I meant in my apartment. You could smoke and read – but perhaps you wouldn't care to."
They went out into the hall, where her maid held her ulster for her and Farris put Desboro into his coat.
Then they entered the car which swung around the oval and glided away toward Silverwood station.
"To tell you the truth, dear," he said, "it would be rather slow for me to sit in an empty room until you were ready to join me."
"Of course. You'd find it more amusing at your club."
"I'd rather be with you at your office."
"Thank you. But some of my clients stipulate that no third person shall be present when their business is discussed."
"All right," he said, shortly.
The faint warmth of their morning's rapprochement seemed somehow to have turned colder, now that they were about to separate for the day. Both felt it; neither understood it. But the constraint which perhaps they thought too indefinite to analyse persisted. She did not fully understand it, except that, in the aftermath of the storm which had nigh devastated her young heart, her physical nearness to him seemed to help the tiny seed of faith which she had replanted in agony and tears the night before.
To see him, hear his voice, somehow aided her; and the charm of his personality for a while had reawakened and encouraged in her the courage to love him. The winning smile in his eyes had, for the time, laid the phantoms of doubt; memory had become less sensitive; the demon of distrust which she had fought off so gallantly lay somewhere inert and almost forgotten in the dim chamber of her mind.
But not dead – no; for somewhere in obscurity she had been conscious for an instant that her enemy was stirring.
Must this always be so? Was faith in this man really dead? Was it only the image of faith which her loyalty and courage had set up once more for an altar amid the ruins of her young heart?
And always, always, even when she seemed unaware, even when she had unconsciously deceived herself, her consciousness of the other woman remained alive, like a spark, whitened at moments by its own ashes, yet burning terribly when touched.
Slowly she began to understand that her supposed new belief in this man would endure only while he was within her sight; that the morning's warmth had slowly chilled as the hour of their separation approached; that her mind was becoming troubled and confused, and her heart uncertain and apprehensive.
And as she thought of the future – years and years of it – there seemed no rest for her, only endless effort and strife, only the external exercise of mental and spiritual courage to fight back the creeping shadow which must always threaten her – the shadow that Doubt casts, and which men call Fear.
"Shall we go to town in the car?" he said, looking at his watch. "We have time; the train won't be in for twenty minutes."
"If you like."
He picked up the speaking tube and gave his orders, then lay back again to watch the familiar landscape with worried eyes that saw other things than hills and trees and wintry fields and the meaningless abodes of men.
So this was what Fate had done to him —this! And every unconsidered act of his had been slyly, blandly, maliciously leading him into this valley of humiliation.
He had sometimes thought of marrying, never very definitely, except that, if love were to be the motive, he would have ample time, after that happened, to reform before his wedding day. Also, he had expected to remain in a laudable and permanent state of regeneration, marital treachery not happening to suit his fastidious taste.
That was what he had intended in the improbable event of marriage. And now, suddenly, from a clear sky, the bolt had found him; love, courtship, marriage, had followed with a rapidity he could scarcely realise; and had left him stranded on the shores of yesterday, discredited, distrusted, deeply, wretchedly in love; not only unable to meet on equal terms the young girl who had become his wife, but the involuntary executioner of her tender faith in him!
To this condition the laws of compensation consigned him. The man-made laws which made his complaisance possible could not help him now; the unwritten social law which acknowledges a double standard of purity for man and woman he must invoke in vain. Before the tribunal of her clear, sweet eyes, and before the chastity of her heart and mind, the ignoble beliefs, the lying precedents, the false standards must fall.
There had been no shelter there for him, and he had known it. Reticence, repentance, humble vows for the future – these had been left to him, he supposed.
But the long, dim road to yesterday was thronged with ghosts, and his destiny came swiftly upon him. Tortured, humiliated, helpless, he saw the lash that cut him fall also upon her.
Sooner or later, all that is secret of good or of evil shall be made manifest, here or elsewhere; and the suffering may not be abated. And he began to understand that reticence can not forever hide what has been; that no silence can screen it; no secrecy conceal it; that reaction invariably succeeds action; and not a finger is ever lifted that the universe does not experience the effect.
How he or fate might have spared her, he did not know. What she had learned about him he could not surmise. As far as Elena was concerned, he had been no worse than a fastidious fool dangling about a weaker and less fastidious one. If gossip of that nature had brought this grief upon her, it was damnable.
All he could do was to deny it. He had denied it. But denial, alas, was limited to that particular episode. He could not make it more sweeping; he was not on equal ground with her; he was at a disadvantage. Only spiritual equality dare face its peer, fearless, serene, and of its secrets unafraid.
Yet – she had surmised what he had been; she had known. And, insensibly, he began to feel a vague resentment toward her, almost a bitterness. Because she had accepted him without any illusion concerning him. That had been understood between them. She knew he loved her; she loved him. Already better things had been in sight for him, loftier aspirations, the stirring of ambition. And suddenly, almost at the altar itself, this thing had happened – whatever it was! And all her confidence in him, all her acquiescence in what had been, all her brave words and promises – all except the mere naked love in her breast had crashed earthward under its occult impact, leaving their altar on their wedding night shattered, fireless, and desolate.
He set his teeth and the muscles in his cheeks hardened.
"By God!" he thought. "I'll find out what this thing is, and who has done it. She knew what I was. There is a limit to humiliation. Either she shall again accept me and believe in me, or – or – "
But there seemed to present itself no alternative which he could tolerate; and the thread of thought snapped short.
They were entering the city limits now, and he began to realise that neither had spoken for nearly an hour.
He ventured to glance sideways at her. The exquisitely sad profile against the window thrilled him painfully, almost to the verge of anger. Unwedded, she had been nearer to him. Even in his arms, shy and utterly unresponsive, she had been closer, a more vital thing, than ever she had been since the law had made her his wife.
For a moment the brutality in him stirred, and he felt the heat of blood in his face, and his heart grew restless and beat faster. All that is latent in man of impatience with pain, of intolerance, of passion, of violence, throbbed in every vein.
Then she turned and looked at him. And it was ended as suddenly as it began. Only his sense of helplessness and his resentment remained – resentment against fate, against the unknown people who had done this thing to him and to her; against himself and his folly; even subtly, yet illogically, against her.
"I was thinking," she said, "that we might at least lunch together – if you would care to."
"Would you?" he asked coldly.
"If you would."
His lip began to tremble and he caught it between his teeth; then his anger flared, and before he meant to he had said:
"A jolly luncheon it would be, wouldn't it?"
"What?"
"I said it would be a jolly affair – considering the situation."
"What is the situation, Jim?" she asked, very pale.
"Oh, what I've made of it, I suppose – a failure!"
"I – I thought we were trying to remake it into a success."
"Can we?"
"We must, Jim."
"How?"
She was silent.
"I'll tell you how we can not make a success out of it," he said hotly, "and that's by doing what we have been doing."
"We have – have had scarcely time yet to do anything very much."
"We've done enough to widen the breach between us – however we've managed to accomplish it. That's all I know, Jacqueline."
"I thought the breach was closing."
"I thought so, too, this morning."
"Wounds can not heal over night," she said, in a low voice.
"Wounds can not heal at all if continually irritated."
"I know it. Give me a little time, Jim. It is all so new to me, and there is no precedent to follow – and I haven't very much wisdom. I am only trying to find myself so I shall know how best to serve you – "
"I don't want to be served, Jacqueline! I want you to love me – "
"I do."
"You do in a hurt, reproachful, frightened, don't-touch-me sort of way – "
"Jim!"
"I'm sorry; I don't know what I'm saying. There isn't anything for me to say, I suppose. But I don't seem to have the spirit of endurance in me – humble submission isn't my line; delay makes me impatient. I want things to be settled, no matter what the cost. When I repent, I repent like the devil – just as hard and as fast as I can. Then it's over and done with. But nobody else seems to notice my regeneration."
For a moment her face was a study in mixed emotions, then a troubled smile curved her lips, but her eyes were unconvinced.
"You are only a boy, aren't you?" she said gently. "I know it, somehow, but there is still a little awe of you left in me, and I can't quite understand. Won't you be patient with me, Jim?"
He bent over and caught her hand.
"Only love me, Jacqueline – "
"Oh, I do! I do! And I don't know what to do about it! All my thoughts are concentrated on it, how best to make it strong, enduring, noble! How best to shelter it, bind up its wounds, guard it, defend it. I – I know in my heart that I've got to defend it – "
"What do you mean, my darling?"
"I don't know – I don't know, Jim. Only – if I knew – if I could always know – "
She turned her head swiftly and stared out of the window. On the glass, vaguely, Elena's shadowy features seemed to smile at her.
Was that what tortured her? Was that what she wished to know when she and this man separated for the day —where the woman was? Had her confidence in him been so utterly, so shamefully destroyed that it had lowered her to an ignoble level – hurled down her dignity and self-respect to grovel amid unworthy and contemptible emotions? Was it the vulgar vice of jealousy that was beginning to fasten itself upon her?
Sickened, she closed her eyes a moment; but on the lids was still imprinted the face of the woman; and her words began to ring in her brain. And thought began to gallop again, uncurbed, frantic, stampeding. How could he have done it? How could he have carried on this terrible affair after he had met her, after he had known her, loved her, won her? How could he have received that woman as a guest under the same roof that sheltered her? How could he have made a secret rendezvous with the woman scarcely an hour after he had asked her to marry him?
Even if anybody had come to her and told her of these things she could have found it in her heart to find excuses, to forgive him; she could have believed that he had received Elena and arranged a secret meeting with her merely to tell her that their intrigue was at an end.
She could have accustomed herself to endure the knowledge of this concrete instance. And, whatever else he might have done in the past she could endure; because, to her, it was something too abstract, too vague and foreign to her to seem real.
But the attitude and words of Elena Clydesdale – the unmistakable impression she coolly conveyed that this thing was not yet ended, had poisoned the very spring of her faith in him. And the welling waters were still as bitter as death to her.
What did faith matter to her in the world if she could not trust this man? Of what use was it other than to believe in him? And now she could not. She had tried, and she could not. Only when he was near her – only when she might see him, hear him, could she ever again feel sure of him. And now they were to separate for the day. And – where was he going? And where was the other woman?
And her heart almost stopped in her breast as she thought of the days and days and years and years to come in which she must continue to ask herself these questions.
Yet, in the same quick, agonised breath, she knew she was going to fight for him – do battle in behalf of that broken and fireless altar where love lay wounded.
There were many ways of doing battle, but only one right way. And she had thought of many – confused, frightened, unknowing, praying for unselfishness and for light to guide her.
