“Oh, it is a complication — weak heart, over-worked brain, gouty tendency, and other complications. You know how strong he looks, what a solid block of a man. Well, he is like a citadel that has been long undermined, which may fall at any time, perhaps without warning, or may crumble slowly, inch by inch. The doctors told me much that I could not understand, but the main fact is only too clear. He is doomed.”
“Does he know? Have they told him?”
“Not half what they told me. He is not to be alarmed. Most of the evil has arisen from over-work — the strain and fever of the race for wealth — and while he has been wasting his life in the effort to make money, I have been spending it, oh, how recklessly! I am full of remorse when I think that I have been spending, not money, but my husband’s life.”
“My dear Edith, it is his metier, his one amusement and desire to make money, and as for your extravagance, it has been after his own heart. A less costly wife would not have suited him.”
“Yes, that is quite true. He has always encouraged me to spend money. But it is sad, all the same. He did not know that money meant his heart’s blood. It has been going drop by drop.”
“We spend our lives as we live them, Edith,” Gerard answered gloomily. “All strong passion means so much loss. We cannot live intensely and yet live long. You know Balzac’s story, ‘La Peau de Chagrin.’”
“Yes, yes; a terribly sad story.”
“Only an allegory, Edith. We are all living as Raphael de Valentine lived, although we have no talisman to mark the waste of our years. Good-bye. You will come and help me to choose my house, in a few days, will you not?”
“Yes, in a few days. When I have recovered from the shock of this morning.”
Ile went out into the broad bright sunshine, agitated, but by no means unhappy.
It was a relief to see the end of that dubious and not altogether delightful road along which he had been travelling, that primrose path of dalliance which had seemed to lead no whither. He had pledged himself for life, as surely as if he had vowed the marriage vow before the altar, or allowed himself to be booked and docketted in a registrar’s office. For a man of honour there could be no retreat from such a vow. Nothing but shame or death could cancel the promise he had given. But he had no regret for having so promised. He had no foreshadowing of future evil. He had only confirmed by a vow the bondage into which he had entered years ago, when all life lay new and untried before him. This woman was still to him the dearest of all women, and he was willing to be bound to her.
CHAPTER VIII. A SHADOW ACROSS THE PATH.
THE house-agents had been more truthful than their kind are wont to be, and the house which Mr. Hillersdon had been invited to inspect more nearly realised their description than houses generally do. Of course it was not all that he wanted; but it possessed capabilities; and it stood in grounds which are becoming daily more difficult to find on the south side of Hyde Park. It was an old house, and somewhat dismal of aspect, the garden being shut in by high walls, and overshadowed by timber; but Gerard was pleased with that air of seclusion which would have repelled many people, and he saw ample scope for improvement in both house and grounds. He closed with the owner of the lease on the following day; and ho had Roger Larose at work upon plan and specification without an hour’s delay. The house belonged to the period when all façades of important houses were Italian, and Gerard insisted upon the Italian idea being strictly earned out in the improved front and added wings. —
“Let there be no mixture of styles,” he said, “that is anathema maranatha in my mind. Above all, be neither Flemish nor Jacobean — the school has been overdone. Let your portico be light and graceful, yet severe; and give me a spacious loggia upon the first floor, between your new wings, which will consist each of a single room — billiard-room on one side and music-room on the other.
The delighted Larose assured his client that the Italian school was his passion, and that he, too, was weary of the oriels and bays, the turrets and angles, cupolas and quaintness of the flamboyant Flemish, miscalled Queen Anne. He took his designs to Mr Hillersdon within twenty-four hours after their inspection of the premises, and the new front and wings looked charming upon paper. There was no question of competition, which would involve delay. Gerard begged that the designs might be given to the best builder in London, and carried out with the utmost rapidity compatible with good work.
“I must have everything finished before November,” he said. Roger Larose urged that it was hardly possible that two large rooms, and a new façade, with portico, loggia, and classic pediment, to say nothing of various minor improvements, could be completed in so short a time.
“Nothing is impossible to a man of energy, with ample funds at his disposal,” answered Gerard. “If your plans cannot be carried out in four months, my dear Larose, they are useless, and I will occupy the house as it now stands.”
The commission was too good to be lost, and Larose promised to achieve the impossible.
“I don’t believe such a thing was ever done before, except for Aladdin,” he said.
“Consider me Aladdin, if you like; but do what I want.”
The garden was Gerard’s own peculiar care. The landscape gardener whom he called in wanted to cut down at least half the trees — limes and chestnuts of more than a century’s growth — upon the pretence that they darkened the house, and that a smooth lawn and geometrical flower beds were to be preferred to spreading branches under which no turf could live. Gerard would not sacrifice a tree.
“You will lay down fresh turf early in April every year,” he said, “and with care we must make it last till the end of July.”
The nurseryman booked the order, and felt that this was a customer who deserved his best consideration.
“And you will supply me with palms and orange trees, standard rhododendrons, and other ornamental plants every season. It will be your business to see that they do well while the season lasts.”
“Exactly, sir, I perfectly understand your views. The lawn is considerably contracted by that belt of timber, but we can make a fine show of oranges in tubs, standard rhododendrons, and hardy palms in the portico and on the lawn, and you will retain your lime grove, which is, no doubt, an enjoyable feature of the grounds, a remarkable feature in grounds so near London.”
For the furnishing of his house Mr. Hillersdon consulted the man who had dictated her taste to Mrs. Champion. The source of a lady’s taste and knowledge becomes forgotten after a year or two, and she takes credit to herself for having evolved her surroundings for her inner consciousness. But on being asked about her views as to furniture, Mrs. Champion suggested the employment of Mr. Callander, a gentleman who made it his business to create homes of taste for those who could afford to carry out his ideal.
“One has ideas of one’s own, of course,” said Edith Champion. “I was full of original ideas for my drawing-rooms and morning-room, but I found it very difficult to get them carried out. Tradespeople are so stupid. Mr. Callander helped me immensely with drawings and suggestions. In your case I should certainly go to him.”
Gerard took her advice, and went to Mr. Callander, of whom Larose declared that he was the only man in London who had any taste in furniture.
To this gentleman the millionaire explained his desires very briefly.
“My house is to be severely Italian,” he said, “and I want you to furnish it as if it were a villa between Florence and Fiesole, and as if I were Leonardo di Medici.”
“And is expense to be no more considered than if you were one of the Medici?”
“You can spend as much as you like, but you must not make any display of wealth. I have come unexpectedly into a fortune, and I don’t want people to point to me as a nouveau riche.”
“Your house shall be furnished with a subdued splendour which shall make people think that your surroundings have descended to you from a Florentine ancestor. There shall be nothing to suggest newness, or the display of unaccustomed weal
th.”
“You are evidently an artist, Mr. Callander. Try to realise the artistic ideal in all its purity. But remember, if you please, there are two rooms on the first floor, to the left of the staircase, which I mean to furnish myself, and for which you need not provide anything.”
It was now the third week in July, and London was beginning to put on its deserted aspect. Three weeks ago it had been a work of difficulty to cross from one side of Bond Street to the other; but now crossing the most fashionable thoroughfares was as easy and leisurely a matter as a stroll in daisied meads. Everybody was leaving town or talking of leaving, and dinners and balls were becoming a memory of the past, except such small dinners as may be given to the chosen few during a period of transition. Goodwood was over, and after Goodwood the tocsin of retreat is sounded.
Gerard dined in a party of four in Hertford Street. Mrs. Gresham had returned for a final glimpse of London, after a fortnight’s severe duties in her husband’s parish. He was Vicar of a curious old settlement in Suffolk, a little town which had been a seaport, but from which the sea had long since retired, perhaps disgusted with the dulness of the place.
She was delighted to see Mr. Hillersdon again, and he could but note the increased fervour of her manner since his improved fortunes.
“I hope you have forgiven me for my premature application about the chancel,” she said, plumping herself down upon the causeuse where he had seated himself after talking for a few minutes with his host. “It was dreadfully premature, I know; but if you could see our dear, quaint, old church, with its long narrow nave and lofty roof, I’m sure you would be interested. Do you know anything about church architecture in Suffolk?”
“I blush to say it is one of the numerous branches of my education which have been neglected.”
“What a pity! Our East Anglian churches are so truly interesting. Perhaps you will come down and see us at Sandyholme some day?”
“Is Sandyholme Mr. Gresham’s parish?”
“Yes; we have the dearest old Vicarage, with only one objection — there are a good many earwigs in summer. But then our earwigs arc more than counterbalanced by our roses. We are on a clay soil, don’t you know? I do hope you will come some Saturday and spend Sunday with us. You would like Alec’s sermon, I know; and for a little Suffolk town our choir is not so very bad. I give up two evenings a week to practice with them. You will think about it, now, Mr. Hillersdon, won’t you?”
“Yes, certainly I will think about it,” answered Gerard, meaning never to do more.
He had not been very attentive to the lady’s discourse, for his thoughts had been engrossed by Mr. Champion, who was standing on the hearthrug, with his back to an arrangement of orchids which filled the fireplace, and which for a man of chilly temperament poorly replaced the cheery fire. He was indeed what his wife had called him — a solid block of a man, short, sturdy, with massive shoulders and broad chest, large head and bull-neck, sandy-haired, thick-featured, with the indications of vulgar lineage in every detail. A man who had made his own career, evidently, and who had sacrificed length of years in the endeavour to push his way ahead of his fellow-men; a resolute, self-sufficient, self-contained man, proud of his success, confident of his own merits, not easily jealous but, it might be, a terrible man if betrayed; — not a man to shut his eyes to a wife’s treachery, once suspected.
Of ill-health the tokens were of the slightest. A livid tinge under the eyes and about the coarsely moulded mouth, a flaccidity of the muscles of the face, and a dulness in the tarnished eyeballs, were all the marks of that slow and subtle change which had been creeping over the doomed victim during the last few years, unnoted by himself or those about him.
At dinner the talk was chiefly of the approaching departure. Mr and Mrs. Champion were going to Mont Oriol.
“You’ll look us up there, I suppose, Hillersdon,” said Champion; “my wife could hardly get on without you; you are almost as necessary to her as her dachshunds.”
“Yes, I dare say I shall find my way to Mont Oriol. I am by nature irresolute. You and Mrs. Champion have often saved me the trouble of deciding on holiday haunts.”
“And now that you are rich I suppose you will be idler than ever,” suggested Champion.
“Upon my word, no. My case seemed too hopeless for improvement while I was poor, and the stern necessity to earn money benumbed any small capacity I may have had for writing a readable story.”
“You wrote one that delighted everybody,” interposed Mrs. Gresham, who but dimly remembered the subject of his book, and was hardly sure of the title.
“But now that I need no longer write for bread my fancy may have a new birth. At any rate, it need not dance in fetters.”
Mr. Champion went off to his whist club after dinner. He played whist at the same club every evening during the London season, unless peremptorily called upon to accompany his wife to some festive gathering. He was a very silent man, and had never been fond of society, though he liked to have a fine house and a handsome wile, and to give dinners which very respectable, and even smart people, considered it a privilege to eat. His greatest pleasure was found in the city, his chief relaxation at the whist table.
“Don’t be late, James,” his wife said to him kindly, as he muttered something about stepping round to the club. “Your doctor makes such a strong point of your getting a long night’s rest.”
“If my doctor could give me the capacity to sleep, I should set a higher value on his advice,” said Champion, “but you need not be afraid, I shall be home at eleven.”
When Mr. Champion was gone Mrs. Gresham was sent to the piano in the inner drawing-room, and Edith and Gerard were practically tête-à-tête. Cousin Rosa was very fond of music, and still fonder of her own playing.
She at once attacked Mendelssohn’s Capriccio, while the other two drew nearer to the verandah, and the perfume of the flowers, and the cool, starlit street, and began to talk.
“I have been thinking a great deal about you lately,” said Edith, and there was the sound of anxiety in her voice.
“It is very good of you to keep me in your thoughts.”
“Good of me! I cannot help myself. If I did not care for you more than I care for any one else in the world, the strangeness of our position would make me think about you. I have been full of such curious thoughts: but perhaps that is only because I have been reading ‘La Peau de Chagrin’ again, after having almost forgotten the story. It is a horrid story.”
“No, no, Edith, a magnificent story, full of the profoundest philosophy.”
“No, it is only full of gloom. Why is that young man to die, simply because he has inherited a fortune? The story is dreadful, like a haunting, horrible dream. I can see that unhappy young man — so gifted, so handsome — sitting face to face with that hideous talisman, which diminishes with his every wish, and marks how his young life is wasting away. I have not been able to get the story out of my mind.”
“You are too impressionable, my dear Edith; but I own the story has a gloomy fascination which makes it difficult to forget. It was the book which established Honoré de Balzac’s fame, and it seems to me that the hero is only a highly coloured image of the author, who wasted life and genius as feverishly as Raphael de Valentin — living with the same eager intensity, working with the same fervid concentration, and dying in the zenith of his power, though by no means in the bloom of his youth.”
“Was not Alfred de Musset of the same type?”
“Undoubtedly. The type was common to the epoch. Byron set the example, and it was the fashion for men of genius to court untimely death. Musset, the greatest poet France has ever had, son of the morning, elegant, aristocratic, born to love and to be loved, after a youth of surpassing brilliance, wasted the ripest years of manhood in the wine shops of the Quartier Latin, and was forgotten like a light blown out, long before the end of his life. Our geniuses of to-day know better how to husband their resources. They are as careful of their brain-power as an eld
erly spinster of her Sunday gown.”
“How much better for them and for posterity,” said Mrs. Champion. “Please go on, Rosa,” as Mrs. Gresham made a show of rising from the piano. “Grieg is always delightful.”
“So he is; but I have been playing Rubinstein,” replied Rosa, severely.
“Then do play that sweet prelude of Chopin’s in A flat major.”
“Why, I played it ten minutes ago,” answered the lady at the piano.
“How sweet of you! You know how I worship Chopin,” answered Edith, unabashed, and immediately went on talking.
“I dare say it is only the effect of that horrible story,” she said, “but I have been feeling absurdly morbid of late, and I can’t help tormenting myself about your health.”
“A most futile torment, since I am perfectly well,” Gerald answered irritably.
“No doubt, no doubt; but my husband seemed perfectly well last year, and yet there was all manner of organic mischief. I know you are not strong, and since you came into your fortune you have been looking dreadfully ill.”
“So my mother told me. Gold has evidently a bad effect upon the complexion, and yet the seventeenth century physicians considered it a fine tonic, boiled in broth.”
“I want you to do me a favour, Gerard.”
“Command my devotion in all things, great and small.”
“Oh, it is not a great thing. You will come to Mont Oriol, of course?”
“Yes. If that is all you were going to ask—”
“It is something more than that. Before you leave London I want you to consult the cleverest physician you can find. The man who knows most about brain, and heart, and lungs.”
“A wide field for scientific exploration. I suppose you really mean the man who has contrived to make himself the fashion — the man to whom it is the right thing to go.”
“No, no. I am not the slave of fashion. Go to some one who will understand you — who will be able to advise you how to enjoy your life, without wasting it as Balzac and Musset did.”
Delphi Works of M. E. Braddon Page 900
