The Gateless Barrier

by Lucas Malet

  XIX

  The disposition of Montagu Rivers's property proved--as Mr. Wormald hadalready advised Laurence it would prove--of a simple and straightforwarddescription. All the servants connected with the house and stables wouldreceive a couple of years' wages. Lowndes, the valet, would in additiondraw a substantial pension. Outside these provisions, Laurence inheritedwholly and solely. A single clause in the brief will revealed somewhatof the eccentric character of its maker. Mr. Rivers directed that withinforty-eight hours of his reported death a London surgeon of acknowledgedeminence should use means to ascertain, beyond all possibility of doubt,that death had veritably and indeed taken place. He further directedthat Armstrong, the agent, and a local practitioner who had attended himat intervals during his illness, should be present at this ratherghastly demonstration. It was added that the corpse should receiveChristian burial not less than twenty-four hours after the autopsy hadbeen carried out. The clause concluded with the following words:--

  "I desire these measures to be taken--childish and superstitious thoughthey may appear--as a precaution against that happening, in my own case,which would appear to have happened in the case of a former inhabitantof Stoke Rivers."

  The eminent surgeon in question, hastily summoned from amid a press ofwork, could spare but one evening for his visit. He proved to be acourtly and agreeable person, an amateur of the fine arts, with a turnfor copper-plate engravings, a weakness for Italian ivories, and anenthusiasm for antique and renaissance gems. His work in thedeath-chamber accomplished, he readily turned his attention to morepleasing investigations; and during the hour after dinner, before thecoming of the carriage to take him to catch the up-express at StokeRivers Road, he examined the contents of certain glass cases in thelibrary, and looked at the engravings hanging in the lower corridor.

  "I little imagined, when I left town this afternoon," he said,addressing Laurence with a peculiarly charming smile, "that suchdelectable entertainment was in store for me. I am proud of myprofession--no man more so; but I am not sorry to put it aside for atime and forget injury and disease, and even successful dealing withthem, in favour of art. This collection of your uncle's, though notlarge, is remarkable. It reflects great credit upon his judgment andtaste. It contains absolutely no rubbish, hardly, indeed, a singleobject which it would be just to qualify as second-rate.--Ah! here isanother admirable thing, though less in my line than those delightfulgems."

  The two men had reached the end of the corridor, and the doctor pausedin front of the tapestry curtain.

  "This is a very fine example," he continued, "though I could not, offhand, be sure of the date. How broad and yet how harmonious incolouring! Just a trifle broad in subject, too, perhaps; but ourforefathers were blessed or cursed--I am often at a loss to decidewhich--with a more robust taste in sentiment than ourselves. A wittymodern writer has spoken of 'the saving grace of coarseness.' Therehave been times when I have been tempted to endorse his phrase."

  As he spoke, he laid hold of the edge of the curtain.

  "Dear me, how singularly weighty!" He looked at his host quickly,inquiringly, and with heightened interest. "Singularly weighty," herepeated. "This house enjoys a reputation for a certain originality, Iunderstand. Would it be indiscreet to inquire to what this splendid_portiere_ either gives, or denies, access?"

  Just for a moment Laurence hesitated, staring his guest very full in theface. So far this new acquaintance had interested him greatly. Hisconversation had been refreshingly varied; moreover, Laurence, inlistening to it, had become increasingly and pleasingly impressed withthe value and distinction of his lately acquired possessions. Herecognised a steadiness and sanity in the great surgeon's outlook; anappreciation of things rare and beautiful, combined with a wisdom bornof wide practical experience; a large compassion, too, for the foibles,and sufferings, and sins of poor human nature, unembittered by anyflavour of contempt. And so it happened that, during that moment ofhesitation, Laurence was sorely disposed to lay bare to this man--whomhe would in all probability never meet again--the abnormal situation inwhich he, at the present time, found himself. If any one could graspthat situation, and deal with it at once justly and sympathetically, hethought this man could do so; since he appeared to have passed thelimits of denial and scepticism, and reached that composure and poise ofmind wherein revolt ceases and the capacity of acceptance and beliefbecomes almost unlimited. But--perhaps unfortunately--Laurence put theinclination towards free speech from him as a temptation. Was he notbound by his promise to the dead? He was bound still more, perhaps, bypersonal pride. It appeared to him free speech would be a yielding, aweakness; so he answered suavely, yet with a sufficient loftiness toleave no room for further question--

  "Behind the curtain is that which, indirectly, has procured me the greatpleasure of receiving you here to-day."

  As he spoke he turned, and led the way in the direction of the hallagain.

  "I'm uncommonly glad," he added, "that you have such a high opinion ofmy uncle's little collection. Perhaps it may induce you to come downhere again sometime, from Saturday to Monday, and overhaul the contentsof these cases at your leisure. I am afraid I'm a bit of a barbarian,and don't reckon with them as reverently as I ought. I am a good dealbetter up in the points of polo ponies than in those of Popes' rings, Iknow."

  "That is no matter for regret," the doctor replied, in his most courtlymanner. "My esteem for the barbarian increases rather than diminishes asI grow older. And I never forget that these delicacies of art are, afterall, the refuge of those who have outlived or injured their digestionof, and appetite for, simpler and more wholesome diet. Such dyspepticsare to be commiserated rather than commended. As long as the romance ofsport and travel holds you, as long as you still 'love the bright eyesof danger,' you can very well afford to leave the consolations offeredby gems, and ivories, and such like sweepings from the ruins of departedcivilisations, to the physically and emotionally decrepit."

  He shrugged his shoulders.

  "Ah, youth," he said, "immortal youth, and the rather savage joys ofit!--I congratulate you far more profoundly upon the possession ofthese, and upon the magnificent health which I cannot but perceive to beyours, than upon your extremely interesting house and both its seen"--hepaused, looking rather hard at Laurence and smiling--"and unseentreasures.--A cigar? Yes, thanks, I think I will permit myself thatindulgence on my way down to the station.--But to return to mycontention. Remember we only take to sweet-sop when our teeth are nolonger sound enough for ship's biscuit. Eat ship's biscuit and relish itjust as long as a merciful Providence permits you to do so, my dearyoung gentleman. The days of sweet-sop, of the armchair, of what we arepleased to call 'the judicial attitude of mind,' but which is reallynothing save the natural consequence of a sluggish and defectivecirculation, will come all too soon in any case. Adieu to you--"

  A flash of carriage lamps at the open hall door, the twomen-servants--restored to their habitual correctness of bearing--armedwith rugs, greatcoat, and narrow leather bag of slightly sinisteraspect--the snort of a horse in the night air, fresh from thecomfortable warmth of the stable--and, after further farewells, Laurencewent back into the hot, bright, silent house.

  "No one need sit up, Renshaw," he said to the waiting butler. "I shallwatch in Mr. Rivers's room alone to-night."

  For this was to be a night of abstinence, so the young man had decided,from the dear sight of his fairy-lady and the delight of hermiraculously recovered speech. He had a duty to perform to the dead man,lying solitary upstairs--though hardly more solitary now, than duringthe long years past in which he had repudiated all solace of humanaffection. To Laurence himself life had become almost terribly wellworth living since he had set foot in Stoke Rivers little more than aweek ago; and it was to this man, of cold and narrow nature, that, afterall, he owed this notable enlargement of interests and opportunity--notto mention those material advantages of houses, lands, and costlyfurnishings which had come to him. Gratitude was very much in place; andit seemed
to him that a silent vigil in that stately bed-chamber wouldbe only fitting, both as an act of piety, and as testimony to thegratitude now no longer permitted expression either in spoken word orkindly act. Nor could Laurence help hoping that during those solemnhours he might arrive at a clear determination regarding thefuture--ceasing merely to drift passive and acquiescent to the push ofcircumstance, as a rudderless boat to the push of the tide. He woulddirect his own course, be master of his own action, prepared totake--for good or ill--all the consequences that action might involve.For, all the while--and it was worse than useless to shirk remembranceof that--all the while, across the Atlantic, under the bright Americanskies, bright as they, immediate and modern as the civilisation on whichthey look down, was the vivacious, young, society beauty, whom he hadbelieved he loved, whom he very certainly had married, and to whom--inthe opinion of both her world and his own--his honour and his wholefuture stood pledged. The question of Virginia--for the whole situationresolved itself fundamentally into that--the question of Virginia mustbe reckoned with, and the results of such reckoning accepted once andfor all.

  He had not visited that upstairs room since the night of his uncle'sdeath. The impression then received of the furnace-like fire, and theapparent life and motion of those figures of enslaved and half-bestialwomanhood supporting the bed, were still present to his recollection.But now, as he passed into the room, he found the change worked therevery arresting. All trace of that which had gone forward, earlier in theevening, under the hands of the eminent surgeon, had been obliterated.The room was orderly, stately as ever; but it was very cold. The hearthwas swept and empty. One casement stood wide open, and by it entered acontinuous breathing of bleak wind. A single electric burner was turnedon, and, in the low steady light shed by it, the carven figures of theebony bed offered no illusion of life or motion; they showed rigid asthe long, narrow body they guarded, the angular outline of which wasperceptible beneath the fine linen sheet--upon the surface of whichsprigs of rosemary and box lay scattered.

  Laurence moved across, intending to turn back the upper part of thesheet and look on the face of the dead; but as he did so a bent formrose silently from the armchair, set at right angles to the firelesshearth, and took up its position on the far side of the bed opposite tohim. Though by no means addicted to nervous alarms, Laurence felt achill run through him, right up to the roots of his hair. Was itconceivable that he beheld the Umbra or Corporeal Soul, of which Ovidspeaks, and that this phantom would keep watch with him over its ownunburied corpse during the coming hours? His sweet fairy-lady was onething, and this quite another, in the line of disembodied spirits. StokeRivers, apparently, was not a comfortable place to die in. Laurenceregistered a hasty vow that he, for one, would take precious good careto arrange to die somewhere else! But as he gazed, somewhat fearfully,at the intruder, it declared itself pathetically and pitifullyhuman--nothing more recondite, indeed, than Lowndes, the wiry,long-armed, grey-faced valet.

  "I thought it proper to wait till you should come, sir," he said, underhis breath. "Though Mr. Rivers has no need of my services now, I haveattended on him too constantly to feel it fitting I should be out ofcall."--His voice quavered, and he cleared his throat.--"He was agentleman that rarely praised, sir. Some might have thought him harsh;but that was because his mind was so engaged with study. In all theforty years I waited on him, he never gave me an uncivil word; and it isnot many gentlemen of whom you can say that."

  He lent across, carefully removed some sprigs of box lying high on thesheet, then folded it down quickly and skilfully across the chest.Laurence was aware of a jealous devotion in his attitude. No hands savehis own should again touch his dead master. But the sheet once arrangedto his satisfaction, he stepped back, a pace or two, into the shadow ofthe damask curtains.

  Then the young man looked long and silently upon the dead.Notwithstanding its extreme emaciation, the face was gentler than inlife. This was not merely owing to the closing of the brilliant eyes. Animmense calm rested on it. The hunger of the intellect was stayed atlast; and the face was majestic in its composure--the face of one whohas passed, for ever, beyond the tyranny of desire. Looking on it,Laurence bowed himself reverently in spirit, while the conviction rooteditself in him, that of all virtues the most fertile, the most admirable,is courage. For the weak, the dismayed, for skulkers, liars, anddastards, in whatever department of action or of thought, there is smallhope--so he told himself--either here or hereafter. The battle is to thestrong; and, therefore, to be strong is the one and only thing whichreally signifies.

  And then it came to him, with a sense of sudden satisfaction, that thismost desirable thing, strength, was altogether part of his owninheritance, did he choose to claim it. For the first time heappreciated the value of that strain of fanaticism resident in hisblood. He had feared it a little, and apologised to himself for itsexistence heretofore. He had made a prodigious mistake; for now thatstrain of fanaticism revealed itself as among the most excellent thingsof his birthright. He remained motionless, gazing, no longer at thecarven bed and its rigid burden, but away to the open casement--in atwhich came the breathing of the bleak night-wind--his head held high,and a singular compression about the corners of his mouth.Virginia?--Just now Virginia, and all and any obligation he might havecontracted towards her, went for very little. He stood apart, completein himself, regardless of custom, regardless even of so-called morality,should these interfere between him and his purpose. His sense of humourin regard to himself--humour, eternal enemy of all exaggerations andfixed ideas--was in abeyance. He knew that, knew it was dangerous. Butthen, as the courtly surgeon had so lately reminded him, what soadorable, after all, as those same "bright eyes of danger"--let dangercome, how and when it may?--Conventionalities? He bade them pack, allthe sort of them. Their day was over. The day of scruples was overlikewise. His position was unexampled. He took the risks, along with thejoys, of it. As his forefathers had been, so would he be. He felt anextraordinary exaltation and freedom of spirit. And feeling this helaughed a little, just as he had laughed when rallying his men amid theroar of cannon and scream of the grinding ships, in the famous sea-fightoff the southern Spanish coast at Trafalgar.

  But the old valet, hearing that most unexpected, and to him unseemly,sound, emerged from the discreet shadow of the damask curtains andstretched his long arms to draw the sheet again up over the face of thecorpse.

  "You have done, sir?" he asked in accents of severity.

  "No," Laurence answered, the excitement of his thoughts still strongupon him--"I have only just begun; but, thank God, or devil, or what youwill, I have begun at last."