CHAPTER XXIV
THE MAN'S POINT OF VIEW
A deep peace reigned in the library at Gleneesh. Garth and Deryck sattogether and smoked in complete fellowship, enjoying that sense of calmcontent which follows an excellent dinner and a day spent in moorlandair.
Jane, sitting upstairs in her self-imposed darkness, with nothing to dobut listen, fancied she could hear the low hum of quiet voices in theroom beneath, carrying on a more or less continuous conversation.
It was a pity she could not see them as they sat together, each lookinghis very best,--Garth in the dinner jacket which suited his slightupright figure so well; the doctor in immaculate evening clothes of thelatest cut and fashion, which he had taken the trouble to bring,knowing Jane expected the men of her acquaintance to be punctilious inthe matter of evening dress, and little dreaming she would have,literally, no eyes for him.
And indeed the doctor himself was fastidious to a degree where clotheswere concerned, and always well groomed and unquestionably correct incut and fashion, excepting in the case of his favourite old Norfolkjacket. This he kept for occasions when he intended to be what hecalled "happy and glorious," though Lady Brand made gentle butpersistent attempts to dispose of it.
The old Norfolk jacket had walked the moors that morning with Jane. Shehad recognised the feel of it as he drew her hand within his arm, andthey had laughed over its many associations. But now Simpson wasfolding it and putting it away, and a very correctly clad doctor sat inan arm-chair in front of the library fire, his long legs crossed theone over the other, his broad shoulders buried in the depths of thechair.
Garth sat where he could feel the warm flame of the fire, pleasant inthe chill evening which succeeded the bright spring day. His chair wasplaced sideways, so that he could, with his hand, shield his face fromhis visitor should he wish to do so.
"Yes," Dr. Brand was saying thoughtfully, "I can easily see that allthings which reach you in that darkness assume a different proportionand possess a greatly enhanced value. But I think you will find, astime goes on, and you come in contact with more people, there will be agreat readjustment, and you will become less consciously sensitive tosound and touch from others. At present your whole nervous system ishighly strung, and responds with an exaggerated vibration to everyimpression made upon it. A highly strung nervous system usuallyexaggerates. And the medium of sight having been taken away, the othermeans of communication with the outer world, hearing and touch, draw tothemselves an overplus of nervous force, and have become painfullysensitive. Eventually things will right themselves, and they will onlybe usefully keen and acute. What was it you were going to tell me aboutNurse Rosemary not shaking hands?"
"Ah, yes," said Garth. "But first I want to ask, Is it a rule of herorder, or guild, or institution, or whatever it is to which shebelongs, that the nurses should never shake hands with their patients?"
"Not that I have ever heard," replied the doctor.
"Well, then, it must have been Miss Gray's own perfect intuition as towhat I want, and what I don't want. For from the very first she hasnever shaken hands, nor in any way touched me. Even in passing acrossletters, and handing me things, as she does scores of times daily,never once have I felt her fingers against mine."
"And this pleases you?" inquired the doctor, blowing smoke rings intothe air, and watching the blind face intently.
"Ah, I am so grateful for it," said Garth earnestly. "Do you know,Brand, when you suggested sending me a lady nurse and secretary, I feltI could not possibly stand having a woman touch me."
"So you said," commented the doctor quietly.
"No! Did I? What a bear you must have thought me."
"By no means," said the doctor, "but a distinctly unusual patient. As arule, men--"
"Ah, I dare say," Garth interposed half impatiently. "There was a timewhen I should have liked a soft little hand about me. And I dare say bynow I should often enough have caught it and held it, perhaps kissedit--who knows? I used to do such things, lightly enough. But, Brand,when a man has known the touch of THE Woman, and when that touch hasbecome nothing but a memory; when one is dashed into darkness, and thatmemory becomes one of the few things which remain, and, remaining,brings untold comfort, can you wonder if one fears another touch whichmight in any way dim that memory, supersede it, or take away from itsutter sacredness?"
"I understand," said the doctor slowly. "It does not come within my ownexperience, but I understand. Only--my dear boy, may I say it?--if theOne Woman exists--and it is excusable in your case to doubt it, becausethere were so many--surely her place should be here; her actual touch,one of the things which remain."
"Ah, say it," answered Garth, lighting another cigarette. "I like tohear it said, although as a matter of fact you might as well say thatif the view from the terrace exists, I ought to be able to see it. Theview is there, right enough, but my own deficiency keeps me from seeingit."
"In other words," said the doctor, leaning forward and picking up thematch which, not being thrown so straight as usual, had just missed thefire; "in other words, though She was the One Woman, you were not theOne Man?"
"Yes," said Garth bitterly, but almost beneath his breath. "I was 'amere boy.'"
"Or you thought you were not," continued the doctor, seeming not tohave heard the last remark. "As a matter of fact, you are always theOne Man to the One Woman, unless another is before you in the field.Only it may take time and patience to prove it to her."
Garth sat up and turned a face of blank surprise towards the doctor."What an extraordinary statement!" he said. "Do you really mean it?"
"Absolutely," replied the doctor in a tone of quiet conviction. "If youeliminate all other considerations, such as money, lands, titles,wishes of friends, attraction of exteriors--that is to say, admirationof mere physical beauty in one another, which is after all just aquestion of comparative anatomy; if, freed of all this social andhabitual environment, you could place the man and the woman in a mentalGarden of Eden, and let them face one another, stripped of all shamsand conventionalities, soul viewing soul, naked and unashamed; if underthose circumstances she is so truly his mate, that all the noblest ofthe man cries out: 'This is the One Woman!' then I say, so truly is heher mate, that he cannot fail to be the One Man; only he must have theconfidence required to prove it to her. On him it bursts, as arevelation; on her it dawns slowly, as the breaking of the day."
"Oh, my God," murmured Garth brokenly, "it was just that! The Garden ofEden, soul to soul, with no reservations, nothing to fear, nothing tohide. I realised her my WIFE, and called her so. And the next morningshe called ME 'a mere boy,' whom she could not for a moment think ofmarrying. So what becomes of your fool theory, Brand?"
"Confirmed," replied the doctor quietly. "Eve, afraid of the immensityof her bliss, doubtful of herself, fearful of coming short of themarvel of his ideal of her, fleeing from Adam, to hide among the treesof the garden. Don't talk about fool theories, my boy. The fool-factwas Adam, if he did not start in prompt pursuit."
Garth sat forward, his hands clutching the arms of his chair. Thatquiet, level voice was awakening doubts as to his view of thesituation, the first he had had since the moment of turning and walkingdown the Shenstone village church three years ago. His face was livid,and as the firelight played upon it the doctor saw beads ofperspiration gleam on his forehead.
"Oh, Brand," he said, "I am blind. Be merciful. Things mean so terriblymuch in the dark."
The doctor considered. Could his nurses and students have seen the lookon his face at that moment, they would have said that he was performinga most critical and delicate operation, in which a slip of the scalpelmight mean death to the patient. They would have been right; for thewhole future of two people hung in the balance; depending, in thiscrisis, upon the doctor's firmness and yet delicacy of touch. Thisstrained white face in the firelight, with its beads of mental agonyand its appealing "I am blind," had not entered into the doctor'scalculations. It was a view of "the other man" upon
which he could notlook unmoved. But the thought of that patient figure with bandaged eyessitting upstairs in suspense, stretching dear helpless hands to him,steadied the doctor's nerve. He looked into the fire.
"You may be blind, Dalmain, but I do not want you to be a fool," saidthe doctor quietly.
"Am I--was I--a fool?" asked Garth.
"How can I judge?" replied the doctor. "Give me a clear account of thecircumstances from your point of view, and I will give you my opinionof the case."
His tone was so completely dispassionate and matter-of-fact, that ithad a calming effect on Garth, giving him also a sense of security. Thedoctor might have been speaking of a sore throat, or a tendency tosciatica.
Garth leaned back in his chair, slipped his hand into the breast-pocketof his jacket, and touched a letter lying there. Dare he risk it? Couldhe, for once take for himself the comfort of speaking of his trouble toa man he could completely trust, and yet avoid the danger of betrayingher identity to one who knew her so intimately?
Garth weighed this, after the manner of a chess-player looking severalmoves ahead. Could the conversation become more explicit, sufficientlyso to be of use, and yet no clue be given which would reveal Jane asthe One Woman?
Had the doctor uttered a word of pressure or suggestion, Garth wouldhave decided for silence. But the doctor did not speak. He leanedforward and reached the poker, mending the fire with extreme care andmethod. He placed a fragrant pine log upon the springing flame, and ashe did so he whistled softly the closing bars of Veni, Creator Spiritus.
Garth, occupied with his own mental struggle, was, for once, obliviousto sounds from without, and did not realise why, at this criticalmoment, these words should have come with gentle insistence into hismind:
"Keep far our foes; give peace at home; Where Thou art Guide, no ill can come."
He took them as an omen. They turned the scale.
"Brand," he said, "if, as you are so kind as to suggest, I give myselfthe extreme relief of confiding in you, will you promise me never toattempt to guess at the identity of the One Woman?"
The doctor smiled; and the smile in his voice as he answered, added toGarth's sense of security.
"My dear fellow," he said, "I never guess at other people's secrets. Itis a form of mental recreation which does not appeal to me, and which Ishould find neither entertaining nor remunerative. If I know themalready, I do not require to guess them. If I do not know them, andtheir possessors wish me to remain in ignorance, I would as soon thinkof stealing their purse as of filching their secret."
"Ah, thanks," said Garth. "Personally, I do not mind what you know. ButI owe it to her, that her name should not appear."
"Undoubtedly," said the doctor. "Except in so far as she herself,chooses to reveal it, the One Woman's identity should always remain asecret. Get on with your tale, old chap. I will not interrupt."
"I will state it as simply and as shortly as I can," began Garth. "Andyou will understand that there are details of which no fellow couldspeak.--I had known her several years in a friendly way, just stayingat the same houses, and meeting at Lord's and Henley and all the placeswhere those in the same set do meet. I always liked her, and alwaysfelt at my best with her, and thought no end of her opinion, and soforth. She was a friend and a real chum to me, and to lots of otherfellows. But one never thought of love-making in connection with her.All the silly things one says to ordinary women she would have laughedat. If one had sent her flowers to wear, she would have put them in avase and wondered for whom they had really been intended. She dancedwell, and rode straight; but the man she danced with had to be awfullygood at it, or he found himself being guided through the giddy maze;and the man who wanted to be in the same field with her, must beprepared for any fence or any wall. Not that I ever saw her in thehunting-field; her love of life and of fair play would have kept herout of that. But I use it as a descriptive illustration. One was alwaysglad to meet her in a house party, though one could not have explainedwhy. It is quite impossible to describe her. She was just--well, just--"
The doctor saw "just Jane" trembling on Garth's lips, and knew howinadequate was every adjective to express this name. He did not wantthe flood of Garth's confidences checked, so he supplied the neededwords.
"Just a good sort. Yes, I quite understand. Well?"
"I had had my infatuations, plenty of them," went on the eager youngvoice. "The one thing I thought of in women was their exteriors. Beautyof all kinds--of any kind--crazed me for the moment. I never wanted tomarry them, but I always wanted to paint them. Their mothers, andaunts, and other old dowagers in the house parties used to think Imeant marriage, but the girls themselves knew better. I don't believe agirl now walks this earth who would accuse me of flirting. I admiredtheir beauty, and they knew it, and they knew that was all myadmiration meant. It was a pleasant experience at the time, and, inseveral instances, helped forward good marriages later on. PaulineLister was apportioned to me for two whole seasons, but she eventuallymarried the man on whose jolly old staircase I painted her. Why didn'tI come a cropper over any of them? Because there were too many, Isuppose. Also, the attraction was skin-deep. I don't mind telling youquite frankly: the only one whose beauty used to cause me a real pangwas Lady Brand. But when I had painted it and shown it to the world inits perfection, I was content. I asked no more of any woman than topaint her, and find her paintable. I could not explain this to thehusbands and mothers and chaperons, but the women themselves understoodit well enough; and as I sit here in my darkness not a memory rises upto reproach me."
"Good boy," said Deryck Brand, laughing. "You were vastlymisunderstood, but I believe you."
"You see," resumed Garth, "that sort of thing being merely skin-deep, Iwent no deeper. The only women I really knew were my mother, who diedwhen I was nineteen, and Margery Graem, whom I always hugged at meetingand parting, and always shall hug until I kiss the old face in itscoffin, or she straightens me in mine. Those ties of one's infancy andboyhood are among the closest and most sacred life can show. Well, sothings were until a certain evening in June several years ago. She--theOne Woman--and I were in the same house party at a lovely old place inthe country. One afternoon we had been talking intimately, but quitecasually and frankly. I had no more thought of wanting to marry herthan of proposing to old Margery. Then--something happened,--I must nottell you what; it would give too clear a clue to her identity. But itrevealed to me, in a few marvellous moments, the woman in her; thewife, the mother; the strength, the tenderness; the exquisiteperfection of her true, pure soul. In five minutes there awakened in mea hunger for her which nothing could still, which nothing ever willstill, until I stand beside her in the Golden City, where they shallhunger no more, neither thirst any more; and there shall be no moredarkness, or depending upon sun, moon, or candle, for the glory of Godshall lighten it; and there shall be no more sorrow, neither shallthere be any more pain, for former things shall have passed away."
The blind face shone in the firelight. Garth's retrospection wasbringing him visions of things to come.
The doctor sat quite still and watched the vision fade. Then he said:"Well?"
"Well," continued the young voice in the shadow, with a sound in it ofhaving dropped back to earth and finding it a mournful place; "I neverhad a moment's doubt as to what had happened to me. I knew I loved her;I knew I wanted her; I knew her presence made my day and her absencemeant chill night; and every day was radiant, for she was there."
Garth paused for breath and to enjoy a moment of silent retrospection.
The doctor's voice broke in with a question, clear, incisive. "Was shea pretty woman; handsome, beautiful?"
"A pretty woman?" repeated Garth, amazed: "Good heavens, no! Handsome?Beautiful? Well you have me there, for, 'pon my honour, I don't know."
"I mean, would you have wished to paint her?"
"I HAVE painted her," said Garth very low, a moving tenderness in hisvoice; "and my two paintings of her, though done in sadness and don
efrom memory, are the most beautiful work I ever produced. No eye but myown has ever seen them, and now none ever will see them, exceptingthose of one whom I must perforce trust to find them for me, and bringthem to me for destruction."
"And that will be--?" queried the doctor.
"Nurse Rosemary Gray," said Garth.
The doctor kicked the pine log, and the flames darted up merrily. "Youhave chosen well," he said, and had to make a conscious effort to keepthe mirth in his face from passing into his voice. "Nurse Rosemary willbe discreet. Very good. Then we may take it the One Woman wasbeautiful?"
But Garth looked perplexed. "I do not know," he answered slowly. "Icannot see her through the eyes of others. My vision of her, in thatilluminating moment, followed the inspired order of things,--spirit,soul, and body. Her spirit was so pure and perfect, her soul sobeautiful, noble, and womanly, that the body which clothed soul andspirit partook of their perfection and became unutterably dear."
"I see," said the doctor, very gently. "Yes, you dear fellow, I see."(Oh, Jane, Jane! You were blind, without a bandage, in those days!)
"Several glorious days went by," continued Garth. "I realise now that Iwas living in the glow of my own certainty that she was the One Woman.It was so clear and sweet and wonderful to me, that I never dreamed ofit not being equally clear to her. We did a lot of music together forpure enjoyment; we talked of other people for the fun of it; we enjoyedand appreciated each other's views and opinions; but we did not talk ofourselves, because we KNEW, at least _I_ knew, and, before God, Ithought she did. Every time I saw her she seemed more grand andperfect. I held the golden key to trifling matters not understoodbefore. We young fellows, who all admired her, used nevertheless tojoke a bit about her wearing collars and stocks, top boots and shortskirts; whacking her leg with a riding-whip, and stirring the fire withher toe. But after that evening, I understood all this to be a sort offence behind which she hid her exquisite womanliness, because it was ofa deeper quality than any man looking upon the mere surface of her hadever fathomed or understood. And when she came trailing down in theevening, in something rich and clinging and black, with lots of softold lace covering her bosom and moving with the beating of her greattender heart; ah, then my soul rejoiced and my eyes took their fill ofdelight! I saw her, as all day long I had known her to be,--perfect inher proud, sweet womanliness."
"Is he really unconscious," thought the doctor, "of how unmistakable aword-picture of Jane he is painting?"
"Very soon," continued Garth, "we had three days apart, and then metagain at another house, in a weekend party. One of the season'sbeauties was there, with whom my name was being freely coupled, andsomething she said on that subject, combined with the fearful blanknessof those three interminable days, made me resolve to speak withoutdelay. I asked her to come out on to the terrace that evening. We werealone. It was a moonlight night."
A long silence. The doctor did not break it. He knew his friend wasgoing over in his mind all those things of which a man does not speakto another man.
At last Garth said simply, "I told her."
No comment from the doctor, who was vividly reminded of Jane's"Then--it happened," when SHE had reached this point in the story.After a few moments of further silence, steeped in the silver moonlightof reminiscence for Garth; occupied by the doctor in a rapid piecing inof Jane's version; the sad young voice continued:
"I thought she understood completely. Afterwards I knew she had notunderstood at all. Her actions led me to believe I was accepted, takeninto her great love, even as she was wrapped around by mine. Notthrough fault of hers,--ah, no; she was blameless throughout; butbecause she did not, could not, understand what any touch of hers mustmean to me. In her dear life, there had never been another man; thatmuch I knew by unerring instinct and by her own admission. I havesometimes thought that she may have had an ideal in her girlish days,against whom, in after years, she measured others, and, finding themcome short, held them at arm's length. But, if I am right in thissurmise, he must have been a blind fool, unconscious of the pricelesslove which might have been his, had he tried to win it. For I amcertain that, until that night, no man's love had ever flamed abouther; she had never felt herself enveloped in a cry which was all onepassionate, in-articulate, inexplicable, boundless need of herself.While I thought she understood and responded,--Heaven knows I DID thinkit,--she did not in the least understand, and was only trying to besympathetic and kind."
The doctor stirred in his chair, slowly crossed one leg over the other,and looked searchingly into the blind face. He was finding theseconfidences of the "other man" more trying than he had expected.
"Are you sure of that?" he asked rather huskily.
"Quite sure," said Garth. "Listen. I called her--what she was to mejust then, what I wanted her to be always, what she is forever, so faras my part goes, and will be till death and beyond. That one word,--no,there were two,--those two words made her understand. I see that now.She rose at once and put me from her. She said I must give her twelvehours for quiet thought, and she would come to me in the village churchnext morning with her answer. Brand, you may think me a fool; youcannot think me a more egregious ass than I now think myself; but I wasabsolutely certain she was mine; so sure that, when she came, and wewere alone together in the house of God, instead of going to her withthe anxious haste of suppliant and lover, I called her to me at thechancel step as if I were indeed her husband and had the right to bidher come. She came, and, just as a sweet formality before taking her tome, I asked for her answer. It was this: 'I cannot marry a mere boy.'"
Garth's voice choked in his throat on the last word. His head was bowedin his hands. He had reached the point where most things stopped forhim; where all things had ceased forever to be as they were before.
The room seemed strangely silent. The eager voice had poured out intoit such a flow of love and hope and longing; such a revealing of a soulin which the true love of beauty had created perpetual youth; of aheart held free by high ideals from all playing with lesser loves, butrising to volcanic force and height when the true love was found atlast.
The doctor shivered at that anticlimax, as if the chill of an emptychurch were in his bones. He knew how far worse it had been than Garthhad told. He knew of the cruel, humiliating question: "How old areyou?" Jane had confessed to it. He knew how the outward glow of adoringlove had faded as the mind was suddenly turned inward toself-contemplation. He had known it all as abstract fact. Now he saw itactually before him. He saw Jane's stricken lover, bowed beside him inhis blindness, living again through those sights and sounds which nomerciful curtain of oblivion could ever hide or veil.
The doctor had his faults, but they were not Peter's. He never, underany circumstances, spoke BECAUSE he wist not what to say.
He leaned forward and laid a hand very tenderly on Garth's shoulder."Poor chap," he said. "Ah, poor old chap."
And for a long while they sat thus in silence.
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