by Maud Diver
E-text prepared by Al Haines
THE GREAT AMULET
by
MAUD DIVER
"Love is the greatest Amulet that makes this world a garden: and 'Hopecomes to all' outwears the accidents of life; and reaches withtremulous hands beyond the grave and Death."
--R. L. S.
"Four things come not back to man or woman: the sped arrow; the spokenword; the past life; and the neglected opportunity."
--Omar El Khuttub.
THE GREAT AMULET
by
MAUD DIVER
Author of "Captain Desmond, V.C."
Shilling Edition
William Blackwood and SonsEdinburgh and LondonMCMXVAll rights reserved
_THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO_
_TRIX FLEMING_
_IN MEMORY OF DALHOUSIE DAYS._
Let thy heart see that still the same Burns early friendship's sacred flame, The affinities have strongest part In youth, to draw men heart to heart: As life draws on, and finds no rest, The individual in each breast Is tyrannous to sunder them.
--Rossetti.
CONTENTS.
PROLOGUE
BOOK I.
AFTER FIVE YEARS
BOOK II.
JUST IMPEDIMENT
BOOK III.
THE TENTS OF ISHMAEL
BOOK IV.
THE VALLEY OF DECISION
THE GREAT AMULET.
PROLOGUE.
I.
"The little more, and how much it is! The little less, and what worlds away." --Browning.
No one in Zermatt dreamed that a wedding had been solemnised in theEnglish church on that September afternoon of the early eighties.Tourists and townsfolk alike had been cheated of a legitimate thrill ofinterest and speculation. Nor would even the most percipient haverecognised as bride and bridegroom the tall dark Englishman, in a roughshooting suit, and the girl, in simple white travelling gear, who stoodtogether, an hour later, on the outskirts of the little town, and tookleave of their solitary wedding guest:--an artist _cap-a-pie_;velveteen coat, loosely knotted tie, and soft felt hat complete.
In this Bohemian garb Michael Maurice,--as the bride's brother,--hadled his sister up the aisle, and duly surrendered her to Captain Lenox,R.A., serenely unaware, the while, of censorious side-glances bestowedupon him by the ascetic-featured chaplain, who had an air ofofficiating under protest, of silently asserting his own aloofness fromthis hole-and-corner method of procedure. But his attitude waspowerless to affect the exalted emotion of that strange half-hour,wherein, by the repetition of a few simple, forcible words, a man andwoman take upon themselves the hardest task on earth with a valiantassurance which is at once pathetic and sublime.
To Quita Maurice, impressionable at all times, the absence of ceremony,of those trivialities which obscure and belittle the one supreme fact,gave an added solemnity to the unadorned service: forced upon her ahalf-disturbing realisation that she was passing from an independence,dearer to her than life, into the keeping of a man:--a man of whom sheknew little beyond the fact that he loved her with a strength andsingleness of heart which is the heritage of those who reach life'ssummit without indulging in emotional excursions by the way.
And now all needful preliminaries were over; even to the weddingbreakfast, a cheerful, casual meal of cold chicken, iced cake, and abottle of champagne, served in Maurice's unpretentious rooms, on thepastry-cook's second floor.
The scene of their brief courtship lay behind them, dozing in thegolden stillness of late September: before them a footpath climbedthrough a forest of pine and fir to the Eiffel Alp Hotel; and on allsides multitudinous mountains flung heroic contours outward and upward,to a galaxy of peaks, that glittered diamond-bright upon a turquoisesky. A mule, ready-saddled, champed his bit at a respectful distancefrom the trio: for Lenox, an indefatigable mountaineer, had insisted ontaking the footpath up to the Eiffel; where they would spend ten days,before crossing into Italy, and so on to Brindisi, _en route_ for hisstation in India.
The expiration of his leave, and his determination to take QuitaMaurice back with him, were responsible for the brevity of theirengagement, and for the absence, in both, of that brand-new aspectwhich proclaims a bride and bridegroom to an eternally interested world.
For this last Eldred Lenox was abundantly grateful. All the Scot inhim asserted itself in a fierce reticence, an inbred sense of privacywhere a man's deepest feelings were concerned: and now, as he stoodbattling with his impatience to be gone, he was suffering acutediscomfiture from the demonstrative leave-taking in progress betweenMaurice and his sister. For their sakes, at least, he would fain haveeffaced himself: while they, as a matter of fact, were momentarilyoblivious of his existence.
Artists both, of no mean quality, they had lived and worked togetherfor five years, since the day when Michael had rented his first modeststudio in the King's Road, Chelsea: and, setting aside Art, his feelingfor Quita was the one serious element in a nature light and variable asa summer cloud. From his French mother he derived an elastic spiritthat yielded itself to the emotion of the passing moment; and Lenox,watching him, marvelled at the sharp dividing-lines drawn between thedifferent races of earth.
He half resented such facility of self-expression. Possibly he enviedit: though no doubt he would have denied the impeachment with an oath.
Eventually it occurred to Maurice that he could not well stand in theroadway till sunset, taking leave of the sister he was so loth to lose,and, with a sigh of exasperation, he pushed her gently towards herhusband.
"_Voila, cherie_, . . . enough of my endless adieux, or _ce bon_ Lenoxmay be tempted to break the sixth commandment on my account, inaddition to the eighth."
Lenox smiled tolerantly down from six feet of height upon his slim,fair brother-in-law.
"That temptation should be your own prerogative, my dear fellow, sinceI am taking her from you for good."
Maurice laughed.
"_Mon Dieu_, yes. You have certainly given me a fair excuse to hateyou. And I have wondered more than once, in the last three months, whyone could not manage it."
"Too fatiguing for a man of your calibre!" the other answered withgood-humoured bluntness. "You could never be bothered to keep it up."
"Ah, _mon ami_, you men who speak little speak to the point! You arealtogether too discerning. But for Quita's sake, at least, we couldnever be otherwise than firm friends. With all my heart I wish goodfortune to you both, and count the days to your return."
The two men shook hands cordially: and Lenox, beckoning the muleteer,lifted his wife into the saddle; thus averting a final demonstration.She waved her hand to a blurred vision of her brother, smilingresolutely, till his back was turned: and he departed townward;--alonely brown figure, to which a slight stoop of the shoulders lent anadded air of pathos.
Quita sat looking after him, her stillness belying the clash ofemotions at her heart.
That vanishing figure on the sunlit road stood for all that she knewand loved best in the world: for Art, independence, good comradeship:for the happy, irresponsible, hand-to-mouth life of Bohemia: for thePast, dear and familiar, as a well-loved voice: while the quiet man ather side,--whose mere presence suggested latent force, and gave her asense of protection wholly new to her,--stood for the Future; theundiscovered country, peopled with possibilities, dark and bright. AndQuita Lenox, being blest, or curst, with the insight and detachedspirit of the artist, saw clearly that the Great Experiment held, forher, a large element of hazard; that she had staked her all upon a turnof the wheel, with what resulting Time alone could show.
Her husband's hand on her arm brought reflection abruptly to an end.
"He is almost out of sight now," Lenox said quietly.
"And I think it'stime we made a start. Will you come?"
She turned to him at once, with a smile whose April quality heightenedits charm.
"Of course I will; and gladly. Don't think me horrid, Eldred. I havealways been frank with you, haven't I? And . . . it _is_ a wrenchleaving Michael to live and work alone."
"I quite understand that: and I value your devotion to him for selfishreasons. It proves what you may be capable of feeling . . . for me,one of these days."
The mingled dignity and humility of his tone so moved her that her onlyanswer was an impulsive pressure of the hand resting on her arm: andthey went forward for a long while without further speech, the muleteerhaving set off for the summit by a series of short cuts known to hiskind.
Before long massed pines were above and below them; their jagged stemsand branches sharply imprinted on stretches of sunlit glacier, and onthe pathway in mottled patches of shadow.
Eldred Lenox walked close to his wife, one hand resting on the crupperbehind her. The man's intensity of feeling did not rise readily to thesurface; and a certain proud sensitiveness, the cardinal weakness ofbig natures, withheld him from the full expression of an emotion towhich she could not adequately respond. He was content to wait, andhope; and in the meanwhile, he walked at her side wrapt in the mere joyof possession; one of the strongest, yet least recognised passions of aman's heart. From time to time he glanced at her attentively; and eachglance strengthened his faith in that which had come upon him, suddenas an earthquake, and no less subversive of ancient landmarks, ofconfirmed prejudices and convictions in regard to the woman element inman's life.
For Quita Lenox, though far from beautiful, in the accepted sense, wasundeniably good to look at. Coils of soft hair, golden in the sun,brown in the shade; eyes neither grey nor green, intensified byunusually large pupils, and by brows and lashes almost black; astraight nose, low at the root; a mouth too long, too mobile forbeauty, its emotional quality safeguarded by an uncompromising chin,completed a face whose charm lay in no particular excellence ofdetails; but in the vivid spirit,--quick to see, to feel, tounderstand,--that informed and harmonised a somewhat contradictorywhole. An abiding sense of humour, hovering about her lips and in hereyes, kept the world sane and sweet for her, and leavened her wholeoutlook on life. A minor quality completed her charm. By virtue ofthe French blood in her veins, she imparted, even to the simplestgarments, an air of distinction, of exquisite finish, to which anEnglishwoman rarely attains.
At three-and-twenty Quita Lenox was very artist, though not, as yet,very woman. The complex Ego, which is the keystone of Art, had notbeen tested and dominated by the great simple forces, which are thekeystone of life.
But her husband was in no mood to analyse her appearance, or her charm.He wanted beyond all things to know what was passing in her mind, andbecause his own thoughts were too passionate for utterance, he waitedfor her to speak. But for the first time in his knowledge of her, hewaited in vain. Protracted silence on her part was a phenomenon sounusual, that at length he turned to her definitely, a shadow ofmisgiving in his clear Northern eyes.
"Are you thinking over it all very seriously . . . now that it is donepast undoing?"
He smiled in speaking, and she met his look with her accustomedfrankness.
"And if I am . . . ? Surely that service gives one food forreflection. I had not so much as looked at it since early days whencuriosity impelled me to read it through; and weddings have never beenin my line. As a matter of fact, I was thinking just then whatunaccountable creatures we men and women are! How we ponder, anddebate, and fuss over trifles, and then plunge headlong past the bigturning-points of life, without a thought of the consequences lurkinground the corner. Which doesn't mean that you and I need spell ourconsequences with a capital C, or label them tragic in advance," sheadded with a laugh. "For honestly, it seems to me that a risingartist, and a rising explorer, both devout worshippers of the eternalhills, may reasonably expect to possess many ideas and interests incommon: and those are the bricks out of which two people build theirHouse of Happiness, _n'est-ce pas, mon ami_?"
"Yes; if you choose to leave mutual trust, and mutual devotion, out onthe doorstep."
"I don't choose: only, they are not the bricks, Eldred. One is thefoundation-stone; and the other,--the other is a great mysteriousSomething, that transforms the House into an enchanted palace. But wemust be content to begin with the House,--do you see?"
"Yes--I see. I am abundantly content to begin on any terms."
Something in the man's tone impelled her to lean outward a little, sothat her shoulder rested lightly against the arm passed behind her.
"You are much too good to me, dear," she said softly. "I don't thinkone could possibly live with you and fail to love you. That is why Ihave dared to take the risk."
He did not answer in words, nor did he give her the kiss she halfexpected; but his hand deserted the crupper, and the mule pricked avelvet ear at the check in his progress. Then Quita straightenedherself, as if reasserting her cherished independence.
"After all, it is more interesting, in some ways, not to haveeverything cut and dried from the start," she went on, striking off ata tangent, with an innate perversity incomprehensible to a mere man."It prevents a headlong fall into the commonplace: and there is acertain excitement in looking on, so to speak, at one's own personaldrama, without feeling quite sure of its developments."
Lenox knitted his brows. He could not always keep pace with her morefantastic moods.
"Quita, are you talking nonsense?" he asked with a touch of irritation.
"No."
"Well, I wish you were. I don't like that sort of attitude towardsserious things; and I don't understand what you mean about looking onat one's own life. It sounds brutally detached, not to sayegotistical."
"That is because you only climb mountains and handle men, _mon cher_,instead of trying to paint them, or translate them into verse. You arespared the artist's complication of a dual personality; of two soulsimprisoned in one body; the one who enjoys, and loves, and suffers; andthe one who looks on, and picks every emotion to pieces. I am afraidthe one you disapprove of has had the upper hand in me so far. Perhapsit is your mission to develop the other into a healthier state ofactivity."
"I hope to Heaven it may be," her husband answered fervently. "Thepresent state of things strikes me as a trifle inhuman."
"But indeed I am not inhuman! Only . . . we have still a good deal tolearn about one another, Eldred, although we are man and wife. Youconfess to an amazing ignorance of women; while my own variedexperience of men has lain chiefly among 'the sayers of words'; and onecan hardly class you under that heading!"
"Good Lord, no! I should hope not."
Quita threw up her head and laughed outright.
"Really, Eldred, you are delightful!"
"Glad to hear it," Lenox replied, a shade of sarcasm in his tone."It's the first time I have been accused of such a thing."
He quickened his pace; and she, divining a slight jar in theatmosphere, said no more. The supreme art in human intercourse is theart of punctuation, and in the long pause that ensued, silenceaccomplished her perfect work.
Higher up they emerged on an open space of roadway, where the pinescame abruptly to an end; and the path shelved sheer from its brokenrailing to the Visp Valley below. Instinctively Quita drew rein anddrank in every detail of the vision before her with the wordlesssatisfaction that is the hall-mark of the true Nature-worshipper.Lenox stood quietly at her side, his gaze riveted on her face. He hadseen many mountains, giants among their kind; but never till now had hebeheld the glory of them reflected in a woman's eyes. At that momentthey seemed the only sentient things in a world of rock, and snow, andsunshine. It was as if the round earth, and the pillars thereof, hadbeen made for them, and them alone.
Above the road a weather-beaten hut struck an isolated note of life,and across the valley Matterhorn towered,--solitary, superb,--hisrugged
head and shoulders thrust heavenward through a diaphanous scarfof cloud. Suddenly Quita Lenox fronted her husband, and his facesoftened to a smile that hovered in the eyes an appreciable time beforeit reached his lips.
"_A la bonheur_!" she said, smiling back at him. "We will break ourjourney here. You can tether 'Modestina' to that stump. I must do arough sketch of this, and put in notes for colouring, while you sitbeside me and smoke, and talk. When it's complete, I'll present it toyou as a memento of to-day. Will that suit you?"
"Rather!"
He lifted her from the saddle, in defiance of her laughing protest,and, holding her at arm's length, looked long and steadily into hereyes, as though he would reach and capture, by force of will, theelusive spirit that lived in their depths.
It was in these rare moments of revelation that Quita was troubled by adisconcerting sense of exchanging false coin for gold. She tried tofree herself from his grasp; and the colour deepened in her cheeks.
"Eldred,--let me go!" she said, with something less than her wontedassurance. "It frightens me when you look right into me like that."
"Frightens you? Dearest, . . . what nonsense!" But for once hedisregarded her behest.
"It's not nonsense. It makes me see too clearly the chained-up forceshidden under that surface quietness of yours. I think you might berather terrible if they ever broke loose."
He laughed abruptly, and let her go.
"I keep them chained up, I promise you: and they are never likely to doyou any harm. Now, begin upon your picture, and don't alarm yourselfabout nothing."
She watched him thoughtfully as he led "Modestina" away, and tetheredher to a pine stump. It needed small discernment to perceive that theequitable poise of his character rested upon the noiseless convictionthat he was a man, and a gentleman: and it seemed to her that she didwell to feel proud of her husband.
With which satisfying conviction she settled herself upon a slab of arock, whipped out the sketch-book, that hung permanently in a flatleather bag at her waist, and plunged headlong into her picture. Forin her case, impression and expression were almost simultaneous: themost distinctive quality of her work being the rapidity and certaintywith which she produced her effects.
Lenox, returning, extended his firmly-knit length of figure on thesloping ground near by, and flung aside his cap; thus revealing moreclearly the rugged contour of his head, and the black hair whoseobstinate ripple no amount of brushing could subdue. With leisurelydeliberation he filled his pipe, and surrendered himself to theenchantment of the hour, before it slipped from him into the region ofaccomplished things. And it is this very evanescence, this rainbowquality of our hill-top moments, that adds such poignant intensity totheir charm.
Much of their brief courtship had been spent in such wordlesscompanionship: the man smoking beside her, with, or without, a book,while she worked; and he never wearied of watching that abidingmiracle, a picture springing to life under an artist's fingers.
"You're not likely to give up this sort of thing, I suppose?" he askedsuddenly; and she turned upon him with blank astonishment in her eyes.
"Give it up? . . . You might as well ask if I shall ever give upseeing, or hearing, or feeling. It is a part of me. You don't want meto give it up, do you?"
"Far from it. I was merely thinking that it seems suicidal for anartist of your quality to bury herself alive in a little Frontierstation, on the edge of a desert, more than a hundred miles fromanywhere."
"Rubbish! It simply means a new range of subjects for my brush. Tellme a little about it, please. I like to try and picture things inadvance; and I am lamentably ignorant about this remarkable FrontierForce, to which I now have the honour to belong. Are we all on thewrong side of the Indus, always?"
"Yes, for ever and ever; except when we get away on leave."
"And then we go camping and climbing in the far hills beyond Kashmir,don't we?"
"Yes, invariably! For the rest of the time we keep 'cave' along sixhundred miles of heart-breaking Border country."
"In other words, you are watch-dogs guarding the gates of an Empire?"
"That sounds far more imposing; and it's no less true. We are alsoactively engaged in helping the Indian Government to cultivate friendlyrelations with the tribes at the point of the bayonet!"
"And don't the tribes respond?"
"Yes, vigorously, to the tune of bullets and cold steel; so that wemanage to keep things pretty lively between us! Since we annexed theFrontier, nearly forty years ago, the Piffers have taken part in morethan thirty Border expeditions, all told, to say nothing of the AfghanWar."
Quita's attention had been diverted from her picture to her husband'sface.
"You get your fill of fighting at that rate," she said, "And I thinkyou must be rather magnificent when you are fighting, Eldred."
Lenox shrugged his shoulders, and laughed.
"I'm a keen soldier, if that's what you're driving at: and I believethe world holds no finer school for character than constant activeservice."
"I confess I never thought of looking at war in that light! But I canwell believe it, if its horrors and hardships turn out many men . . .like you."
Words and tone set the man's pulses in commotion. But he clenched histeeth upon his pipe-stem, and ignored the personal allusion.
"Well, you can see for yourself, when you get there. Taking 'em allround, I think you'll find the Piffers as fine a set of fellows as youcould wish to meet anywhere; and it's hard work, and hard conditions oflife, that thrash them into shape."
"And the stations, where I am to be 'buried alive' in such goodcompany?"
"I'm afraid the stations are the least satisfactory part of theprogramme. There are five of them along our north-west strip ofdesert; all more or less hopeless to get at. We play general postamong them every two or three years, to avoid stagnation and keep themen fit. Just now my battery's quartered at Dera Ghazee Khan, aGod-forsaken place, right down by Scindh. I don't know how I have thecheek to think of taking you there."
"But if I refuse to be left behind . . . ?"
"Well, of course . . . in that case . . ." His eyes, looking up intohers, completed the sentence.
"I'm not a 'society woman,' remember; and setting aside yourcompanionship, I should prefer a 'God-forsaken place' on the IndianFrontier to St. John's Wood or Upper Tooting, any day! I am preparedto find it all very interesting."
"So you may, at the start. But the interest is likely to wear thinafter the first few years of it."
"Well, perhaps by that time we shall have arrived at the enchantedpalace, and then nothing else will matter at all!--There now; I've doneall I can to my sketch for the present. Shall we go on?"
Lenox roused himself, not without reluctance, and they went onaccordingly.
Towards the summit, trees grew rare: and they found the solitary hotelperched aloft, upon an open space; a hive of restless shifting humanlife, set in the midst of the changeless hills.
After a short interview with the manager's wife, they found themselvesalone again, in the private sitting-room engaged by Lenox. A wood fireburned merrily in the open hearth, for September evenings are chilly atthat altitude; and the windows, looking westward, gave generousadmittance to a flood of afternoon sunlight.
Eldred, standing on the hearth-rug, surveyed all things in an access ofsilent satisfaction; while Quita moved lightly to and fro, franklyinterested in details.
"Oh, how I love the cleanness and emptiness of these Swiss rooms!" sheexclaimed at last. "They make one feel so unspeakably wholesome andgood. And we are actually going to have dinner here, you and I? Justour two selves! How strange!"
On a sudden impulse she came close to him, and standing before him,took the lapels of his coat, one in each hand.
"Eldred, . . . I don't seem able to take it in at all! Other brideshave so much of external paraphernalia to emphasise the fact they haveclosed one chapter of life, and begun another. But except for thatdreamlike ha
lf-hour in church, you and I seem merely to have come awaytogether for an everyday outing; and there is nothing anywhere, . . .except this,"--she lifted the third finger of her left hand,--"to makeme realise that we are actually . . . married."
She spoke the last word under her breath; and almost before it was out,he had caught her to himself, and kissed her fervently, again and again.
"Does that help you to realise it a little better, . . . my wife?" hewhispered; and for answer she drew in a long breath that was almost asob. He released her at once; and as she faced him, flushed andbreathless, he saw that tears stood in her eyes.
"Why, . . . why did you never . . . kiss me . . . like that before?"she asked very low.
"God knows I have wanted to, a hundred times," he answered. "But Ithink I was afraid you might . . . hate it. Why do you ask, though?Would it have made any difference between us if I had?"
"I can't tell; . . . oh, I can't tell! Only . . . you have been sorestrained, so unlike an . . . ordinary lover, that I never dreamed itcould mean as much to you . . . as all that . . ." She pulled herselftogether with an effort. "Now I am going to take off my things," shesaid. "Don't come, please. I want to get away by myself."
A moment later he stood alone, between the sunlight and the firelight,gazing blankly at the door that hid her from view; and wonderingwhether he had advanced or retarded matters by his unpremeditated flashof self-revelation.
