This Side of Innocence

by Caldwell, Taylor;

  It was a long time before she became aware that it was quite dark in the room. Lifting her swollen eyes, she looked at the windows. They were rectangles of ashen shadow. Suddenly that shadow was torn by fiery lightning which blazed into the room like the flash of an explosion. As if indeed it had been the blaze of an explosive charge, it was followed by the most stunning crash, which caused a curious subdued rattling all over the house. The floor trembled under Amalie’s feet; boards creaked; there was a faint but terrible groaning in the assaulted air after the last reverberation had died away in hollow echoes on the hills.

  Instinctively terrified, Amalie started to her feet, leaning against the piano. She could see little but vague forms of furniture in the room. And now she heard the sudden screaming of the awakened gale, tearing and pounding at the windows, the moaning of the trees, the prolonged rustling of grass. With it, after a moment or two, came the rain, like a wall of glistening water illuminated, at intervals, by fresh explosive flashes, fresh and stupefying cannonading. All the world had been swallowed up in fire and fury. The strong old house shivered. A tree nearby was struck, and immediately the air was permeated with a smell of brimstone.

  Amalie was overwhelmed by sheer primitive fright. She was alone in the house. If it were struck, thrown down about her, there was no one to help. She sank upon the piano stool, cowered upon it, covering her ears with her hands, closing her eyes. Then, in a moment’s comparative quiet, broken only by the wind and the rushing rain, she heard a sound, even through her hands.

  It was a sound as if a door had opened and closed hastily. She started up, and her voice was wild with hope as she called out. But no one replied. It was only the banging of a shutter, she thought.

  The fire and the fury were resumed, with more intensity. She could not stay alone in this vast room. In her own room, in her bed, there was at least a spurious protection. She could draw the curtains; she could cover her ears with the pillows.

  She ran towards the doorway, wincing away from the lightning, her heart beating with pure terror, her gown streaming behind her, her hands thrown before her as if she were blind and seeking.

  It was not until she reached the doorway that she saw that Jerome stood there, watching her.

  She stopped in the very midst of her headlong flight, her arms flung out instinctively to balance herself, her face gleaming frantically in the semi-darkness. And then she was motionless, her breathing loud and irregular in the room, during the momentary pause in the storm.

  He held out his arms to her and came slowly towards her. She watched him come. Her own arms dropped. She waited numbly. He reached her, and took her in his arms and held her to him gently.

  And then she was clinging to him, sobbing wildly, clutching the wet cloth of his sleeves, pressing her face into his neck, crying out the most incoherent, the most heart-breaking words, as if her last control were gone. She felt his lips on hers, his tender and soothing reassurance, the pressure of his arms, the devouring and leaping hunger in her heart, and, finally, a terrible and soaring joy that seemed part of the lightning and the thunder.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  The storm raged almost without pause until sunset. By that time the last of the thunder bounded off the hills in one final sullen echo, the lightning retreated to the east where it occasionally lit up some dark hilltop with pale fire. But the rain continued to fall in sheets of glimmering steel even though the wind had lessened.

  By nightfall, the rain began to slacken, and at eight o’clock it stopped. A dim lavender light ran over the valley and the hills; a fugitive pink glow shone through the trunks of the evergreens on the slope. Trees dripped audibly in the exhausted silence; the earth sent up a strong sweet fragrance as of crushed grass and flowers and pine. Finally, the birds faintly discussed the storm with last tired chirpings, and went to sleep under a darkening heliotrope sky.

  Wheels grated only slightly on the wet gravel. Dorothea sat in her carriage, stiff with anxiety, and looked up at the silent, unlighted house. She tried to reassure herself that Amalie was a strong and dauntless woman, but she remembered, with some misgivings, her father’s remarks about Amalie’s failing health. At that time, Dorothea had cried: “Nonsense!” But she recalled, very clearly now, that Amalie had apparently been going into a “decline” since Mr. Lindsey’s illness, and her conscience assaulted her sharply. The storm had been fierce enough, indeed, to intimidate anyone. Dorothea had seen quite a number of stricken trees on the way home, and one smoldering barn. She had no particular nervousness about storms herself, but this one had quite frightened her.

  Amalie’s window was unlighted, and this increased Dorothea’s anxiety. But just as the carriage rolled under Jerome’s window, she saw the golden bloom of a lamp suddenly lit. He had not drawn the curtains. Dorothea heaved a sigh of relief. Amalie, then, had perhaps not been alone in the storm.

  Dorothea alighted from the carriage and it went on to the stables. She glanced up again at Jerome’s window. And then she became rigid. The parasol fell from her hand, clattered to her feet. Her face, in the last wandering light of the evening, turned a frightful color.

  Quite distinctly she saw that Jerome was not alone, and she saw that the one with him was Amalie. She could see little of them, only their shoulders and their heads, and they were held together in an embrace which even Dorothea instinctively recognized as passionate. She saw their faces merge; she saw the gleam of Amalie’s arms about Jerome’s neck.

  Dorothea never recalled moving a single step consciously, but she next remembered that she had reached the wall of the house under the window, and that she had flattened herself against it, as if seeking shelter. She heard a raucous and uneven sound in the quiet evening, and it was some dazed moments before she identified it as her own shocked breathing. Flashes and flecks of light soared and danced before her distended eyes; she was shaking to her very bones, and had to spread her arms on both sides of her body against the stones of the house in order to keep from falling. She had no conscious thought at all; she was aware only that she felt most frightfully ill, and that she might collapse on the wet earth at her feet.

  All at once she longed, with a piteous hunger, for her room, for her bed. She mumbled to herself: “It is getting cold. I must go in.” And then she began to whimper. She put her hand over her mouth, but from behind it the whimpering sounds came muffled and feebly frantic.

  She never knew how long she stood there, but her next awareness was that it was dark and that a delicate crescent hung in the purple sky of night, and that she was thoroughly chilled. Her whole body appeared to be numb and bruised. She had heard no footsteps, but, as she pulled herself heavily away from the side of the house, she saw that the third floor was lighting up, room by room. The servants had returned.

  The front door was unlocked. She crept up the stairs in darkness. Someone had lit the fire in the hall, and it was like a crimson heart pulsing in the dusky gloom. She reached her room, having approached it slow step by step, as if she had turned old in an hour. Once behind her closed door, she dropped parasol, reticule, bonnet and shawl upon a chair and went to her bed. Very dimly, she recalled that she had seen a glimmer of light under the door of Amalie’s room, but the very sight of it had sickened her, made her avert her head.

  She lay on her pillows, her arms flung out on each side of her, her face stony in the dimness. There was a deep weak sensation in the region of her heart; the slightest movement of her body set up a wild trembling in her flesh. She held herself quiet, unthinking, for even a thought threw her into a disordered frenzy.

  Perhaps she had slept, or perhaps fallen into some unconsciousness, for she was next aware that a wavering light was shining in her face. A servant was entering with a lighted candle. The girl recoiled at the sight of Dorothea’s black gaunt figure on the white bed.

  “Oh, Miss Dorothea!” she exclaimed. “I did not know you were here! Mr. Jerome said you were probably staying the night in the village, but I thought I would turn d
own your bed in case—”

  Dorothea raised herself slowly on her elbow; it appeared to her that this small movement took all her strength. She pushed back her hair. She heard her own voice, calm and neutral: “I just returned, Nancy, and I am feeling very tired.”

  The girl set down her candle, nodded her head sympathetically, and lit the lamp on the table near the window. “It was a right bad storm, wasn’t it, Miss? We thought we’d never get home.”

  Dorothea sat up; she tried to conceal the trembling of her body. She coughed and sighed. “May I have a cup of tea, and some of that fruitcake, Nancy? Here, in my room?” She must get rid of the girl at once, before she saw—

  “Oh, yes, ma’am! At once!” The girl threw her a curious glance, then went out hastily.

  Dorothea pushed herself to her feet. She said, aloud: “I must control myself. I must think. I must not give way.”

  She refused to think just now. She put away her parasol, reticule, bonnet and shawl. She washed her hands, threw cold water on her face. She smoothed her hair. Her muscles were quieter now, though at intervals they trembled violently and briefly. She sat down before her unlighted hearth and shivered. She knew that the shivering was the result of shock, for the temperature was mild from the stored heat within the house.

  Nancy found her sitting quietly there, her hands in her black silk lap. Dorothea thanked her, glanced with concealed loathing at the steaming tea and the cake.

  But she finally forced herself to drink a hot and revivifying cup and to eat a little of the cake. One must never give way. Only fools did that. They invited chaos. One’s mind must be clear and calm, or one might make an irreparable mistake, inviting the most terrible disasters. She drank a second cup. When Nancy returned for the tray, she found her mistress quite composed. Dorothea requested a small fire. The girl drew the draperies, knelt at the hearth, and soon had a fire sparking and crackling in its grate. Dorothea watched her. She could even inquire whether the girl had had a pleasant day in the village. She listened to Nancy’s demure account with an air of kind if distant interest. They discussed the storm briefly, and then the girl departed with a cheerful “good night, ma’am.”

  But just as Nancy reached the door, Dorothea halted her with a word. “Are there any others home, Nancy?”

  “Oh, yes, ma’am, I took a tray to Mr. Jerome, and to Mrs. Lindsey, in their rooms, about an hour ago. Mr. Jerome returned just before we did.”

  “I see.” Dorothea’s harsh voice was almost pleasant. Then no one knew or suspected but herself. She dismissed the girl again.

  And now she could think, think without fury or horror, but only with detestation and hatred, both as cold as winter snow, and as relentless. She could think with one part of her mind, and that part was detached, unhurried, quite calm, and almost completely unemotional.

  What was she to do? She asked herself this question without hysteria, or the slightest grief, or even outrage. Should she go to Jerome, and say: “I know what there is to know?” Should she go to Amalie, and denounce her? Should she inform Alfred, upon his return?

  She knew, or thought she knew, Jerome. He was a blackguard and a villain, without conscience or scruple. It was quite possible that he would laugh in her face, defy her, lie to her. It was quite possible for him to say: “Then, my position here is untenable. I will leave at once.” If he left (and here Dorothea drew a deep breath such as one might inhale at the sight of a dark door opening upon peace), what then, after his leaving? Would the wrong done to a good and just man be rectified?

  Would the crime committed against him be obliterated? No. Moreover, it was even possible that Jerome might, knowing he had been discovered, decide to tell Alfred himself, or run away with Amalie, though Dorothea had her doubts about this. Jerome was a reckless man, but he was not a coward, and his sister coldly considered this. What of the honor of the family? What of Mr. Lindsey, who loved the drab? Would his health survive the shock of a shameful disclosure? Dorothea shivered again, involuntarily, and it took all the stern admonition of her inexorable mind to regain her control. Jerome, she told herself, burning with the acrid fire of bitterness, was his father’s darling, after all. She had rediscovered this painful fact in the past few months.

  No, she could not tell Jerome that she knew of his crime.

  Could she denounce Amalie? What if Amalie went at once to Jerome, and informed him of the denunciation? The same results would accrue as if Jerome, and not his partner in adultery, had been told.

  For a few moments Dorothea partially lost control of herself, and all her emotions of fierce hatred and shamed loathing and repulsion smote like battering fists on the door of reason. Oh, the hideous and shameless creatures, the criminals, the traitors, the defilers! How could they have done this thing, this baseness, to such as Alfred, who loved and trusted his wife and had no evil thought against anyone? How could they have done it to such a noble man of integrity and decency and kindness? He had given that strumpet his whole heart and all his life, and she had flung them aside with derision, careless of his suffering. He had extended friendship to his cousin, and had received a mortal wound in return. They had sought out a proper opportunity for their baseness, for the dishonoring of this house, and the deceiving of a gentle husband. Dorothea was certain that she saw it all clearly: the occasion had been plotted, carefully planned. Jerome had deliberately gone to the village alone, so that he could return alone. Amalie had refused to accompany Dorothea, had waited for the return of her lover. How they must have laughed together, in their vileness!

  Dorothea, for the first time in her austere life, felt the urge to kill, to crush, to stamp down, and the urge was so compelling that she actually sprang to her feet, hands clenched, eyes flaming. Her thought raced like a thread of consuming fire to those two, smug in their rooms, confident that their foulness was undiscovered. She ran to the door, intent only on confronting them, on screaming out against them so that the whole house, the whole world, might know of what they had done.

  She was actually out in the corridor, gasping aloud, before she came to her senses, and when she did so her trembling had returned so violently that she had to grope her way back to her chair, and she was again whimpering deep in her throat. She collapsed in her chair, covered her face with her hands, rocking back and forth in a fit of anguish.

  What had she almost done? She had almost destroyed Alfred. She had most certainly almost destroyed her father. She had been on the verge of bringing even greater calamity to this house, this house where she had been born. Shame that is known only to one, and held fast and still in the heart of that one, does no harm, exposes no innocents to the contemptuous pity or hateful laughter of the hostile world. She knew Alfred well; she knew there would be no forgiveness in him for his betrayers. He might even kill them; certainly, he would drive the woman away, and Jerome also. But the hurt that had been dealt him would be mortal; he would never again recover his prestige among his friends, his associates. He would be a poor thing, whose wife had incontinently betrayed him behind his back for a lesser man. His pride could not endure such a thing. He would be utterly destroyed. Her father, too, would suffer enormously. It was possible that he would even die under the blow.

  She stopped rocking in her chair and stared before her with parched eyes which strained in their sockets. Were the guilty to be free, never to be reproached, and always seeking an opportunity to repeat their crime? It seemed so. There was no solution. There was no solution but one of silence. The guilty escaped, in order that their victims might be saved.

  But how could she, Dorothea, endure the endless days when she must see them frequently, look upon their false faces? Would they not guess, merely by glancing at her, that she knew? If she refrained from speaking to them, or could not control the loathing in her eyes, they would know. Then the final calamity would fall upon this house. It was not something they dared share with her. They would be precipitated into committing even greater enormities.

  She must be an actre
ss, then. She must remember how she had spoken to Amalie yesterday, and to Jerome. She must guard every inflection of her voice. She must veil any flash of her eyes. She must curb any shrinking. She must play the bland, deceived fool, the old spinster sister who would never suspect anything. She must do this terrible, this revolting, thing, for the sake of her father, and for Alfred. How was it possible for human flesh to exercise such restraint, such awful self-control?

  It never occurred to her that perhaps Jerome and Amalie had plans of their own. She was completely certain that they intended to retain the status quo of their lives and would only seek opportunities for fresh betrayals of Alfred. Amalie would not relinquish what she had gained, and neither would Jerome. The thought never even came to Dorothea that perhaps there was something more than derisive contempt for Alfred, or mere foul passion, between Amalie and Jerome.

  She said aloud, in a harsh, strange voice: “I have only to watch them, to guard them, and prevent them from doing this again. I will watch her, and him, during the day. When Alfred returns, he will be adequate for the night. In the meantime, what shall I do about the nights?”

  Dorothea rose and went to her mirror and studied her blanched face intently. Yes, she looked extremely ill. She would take to her bed; she would confess weaknesses and night terrors. She would implore Amalie to sleep with her, declaring that she dared not be alone. Amalie could not refuse.

  But at the very thought of sharing her virgin bed with that vile creature Dorothea turned violently sick. This was the most dreadful part of all.

  But Dorothea did not have iron in her soul for nothing. It took her only five minutes of desperate struggle with herself to master her sickness. It was for Alfred, she told herself, with cold despair. It was for her father. Alfred would be home in two weeks. Two weeks of horror would be little enough to endure for the sake of the peace of this house.