Max

by Katherine Cecil Thurston

  CHAPTER XXXIV

  It was midway between the hours of nine and ten on the morningfollowing. Max was standing in the studio; the easel, still bearing theportrait, had been pushed into a corner, its face to the wall;everywhere the warm sun fell upon a rigid severity of aspect, as thoughthe room had instinctively been bared for the enacting of some scene.

  Max himself, in a subtle manner, struck the same note. The old paintingblouse he usually wore had been discarded for the blue serge suit,severely masculine in aspect; his hair had been reduced to an usualorder, his whole appearance was rigid, active, braced for the comingmoment.

  And this moment arrived sooner even than anticipation had suggested. Theclocks of Paris had barely clashed the half hour, when his strained earscaught a step upon the landing, a sharp knock upon the door, and beforehis brain could leap to fear or joy, Blake was in the _appartement_--inthe room.

  There was no mistaking Blake's attitude as he swung into the boy'spresence; it was patent in every movement, every glance, even had hiswhite, strained face not testified to it. Coming into the studio, heaffected nothing--neither apology, greeting, nor explanation; withoutpreamble he came straight to the matter that possessed his mind.

  "You know of this?" He held out a square white envelope, bearing boldfeminine handwriting--writing over which time and thought and labor hadbeen expended in this same room ten hours earlier. "You know this?"

  "Yes." Max's tongue clicked dryly against the roof of his mouth, but hiseyes bore the fire of Blake's scrutiny.

  "You know the contents?"

  "Yes."

  "'Yes!' And you can stand there like a graven image. Do you realize it,at all? Do you grasp it?"

  "I--think I understand."

  "You think you understand?" Blake laughed in a manner that was notagreeable. "Understand, forsooth! You, who have never seen anythinghuman or divine that you rate above your own little finger! Understand!"He laughed again, then suddenly his attitude changed. "But I haven'tcome here to waste words! You know that, your sister has left Paris?"

  Max nodded, finding no words.

  "She tells me here that she has gone--gone out of my life--that I am toforget her."

  "Well?"

  "Well, that has only one meaning, when it comes from the one woman. Imust know where she is."

  Max set his lips and studiously averted his face.

  "Come! Tell me where she is! Time counts."

  "I do not know."

  "I expected that! You're lying, of course; but when you're up against aman in my frame of mind, lies are poor ammunition. I don't ask you whyshe has gone--that's between her and me, that's my affair. But I mustknow where she is."

  "I cannot tell you."

  "You cannot refuse to tell me! Look here, boy, you've always seen mysoft side, you don't believe there is a hard one. But we Irish cansurprise you."

  Max had no physical fear, but he backed involuntarily before the menacein Blake's eyes.

  "I'm not lying to you, Ned. I cannot tell you, because I do not know. Mysister Maxine has ceased to exist--for me, as much as for you."

  "Stop!" Blake stepped close to him and for an instant his hand wasraised, but it fell at once to his side, and he laughed once more,harshly and self-consciously. "Don't play with me, boy! I've had a hardknock."

  "I'm not playing. It's true! It's true!" Dark eyes, with dark linesbeneath them, stared at Blake, carrying conviction. "It's true! It'strue! I do not know."

  "God, boy!" Blake faltered in his vehemence.

  "It's true!" said Max again.

  "True that she's gone--vanished? That I can't find her? That you can'tfind her? It isn't!"

  "It is."

  The blood rushed into Blake's face. For a moment he stood rigid andspeechless, drinking in the fact; then his feelings broke bounds.

  "It's true? And you stand there, gaping! God, boy, rouse yourself!" Hecaught him by the shoulder and shook him. "Don't you know what this is?Have you never seen a man dealt a mortal blow?"

  "Love is not everything!" cried Max.

  "Not everything? Oh, you poor, damned little fool, how bitterly you'llretract that prating! Not everything? Isn't water everything in aparched desert? Isn't the sun everything to a frozen world?" He stopped,suddenly loosing the boy, casting him from him, a thing of nosignificance.

  Max, faint and pale, caught at his arm.

  "Ned! Ned! I am here. I am your friend. I love you."

  Blake, in all his whirl of passion, paused.

  "You!" he said, and no long eloquence could have accentuated the blankamazement, the searing irony of the word.

  But Max closed all his senses.

  "Ned! Ned! Look at the truth of life! There is in me everything but onething."

  "Then, by God, that one thing is everything! It's the woman and the manthat rule this world. The woman and the man--the soul and the body! Allother things are dust and chaff."

  "You feel that now. But time--time balances. We will be happy yet. Wewill relive the old days--"

  Blake turned, wrenching away his arm. "The old days? Do you imagineParis can hold me now she is gone?"

  "Ned!"

  "Do you imagine I can live in this town--climb these steps--stand onthat balcony, that breathes of her?"

  Max was leaning back against the window-frame. His brain seemed empty ofblood, his heart seemed to pulse in a strange, unfamiliar fashion, whilesomewhere within his consciousness a tiny voice commanded him urgentlyto preserve his strength--not to betray himself.

  "You will go away?" he heard himself say. "Where will you go? ToIreland?"

  "To Ireland--or hell!" Blake walked to the door.

  "Then you are leaving me?"

  "You shall know where I am."

  "And if I should need you?"

  Blake made no answer; he did not even look back.

  "If--if she should need you?"

  He turned.

  "I will come to her at any moment--from anywhere."

  The door closed. He was gone, and Max stood leaning against the window.His blood still circulated oddly, and now the inner voice with itsreiterated commands was rising, rising until it became the thunder of asea that filled his ears, annihilating all other sounds. A swift, sharpterror smote him; he sought desperately to maintain his consciousness,but, breaking across the effort an icy breath crept up from nowhere,fanning his cheek, suspending all struggle, and a palpable darkness,like the darkness of brooding wings, closed in upon him, bringingoblivion.