Susie quickly told the doctor the few facts they knew. He was as surprised, as distressed, as they.
‘But what is the explanation of it all?’ he asked.
Arthur shrugged his shoulders wearily.
‘She cared for Haddo more than she cared for me, I suppose. It is natural enough that she should go away in this fashion rather than offer explanations. I suppose she wanted to save herself a scene she thought might be rather painful.’
‘When did you see her last?’
‘We spent yesterday evening together.’
‘And did she not show in any way that she contemplated such a step?’
Arthur shook his head.
‘You had no quarrel?’
‘We’ve never quarrelled. She was in the best of spirits. I’ve never seen her more gay. She talked the whole time of our house in London, and of the places we must visit when we were married.’
Another contraction of pain passed over his face as he remembered that she had been more affectionate than she had ever been before. The fire of her kisses still burnt upon his lips. He had spent a night of almost sleepless ecstasy because he had been certain for the first time that the passion which consumed him burnt in her heart too. Words were dragged out of him against his will.
‘Oh, I’m sure she loved me.’
Meanwhile Susie’s eyes were fixed on Haddo’s cruel telegram. She seemed to hear his mocking laughter.
‘Margaret loathed Oliver Haddo with a hatred that was almost unnatural. It was a physical repulsion like that which people sometimes have for certain animals. What can have happened to change it into so great a love that it has made her capable of such villainous acts?’
‘We mustn’t be unfair to him,’ said Arthur. ‘He put our backs up, and we were probably unjust. He has done some very remarkable things in his day, and he’s no fool. It’s possible that some people wouldn’t mind the eccentricities which irritated us. He’s certainly of very good family and he’s rich. In many ways it’s an excellent match for Margaret.’
He was trying with all his might to find excuses for her. It would not make her treachery so intolerable if he could persuade himself that Haddo had qualities which might explain her infatuation. But as his enemy stood before his fancy, monstrously obese, vulgar, and overbearing, a shudder passed through him. The thought of Margaret in that man’s arms tortured him as though his flesh were torn with iron hooks.
‘Perhaps it’s not true. Perhaps she’ll return,’ he cried.
‘Would you take her back if she came to you?’ asked Susie.
‘Do you think anything she can do has the power to make me love her less? There must be reasons of which we know nothing that caused her to do all she has done. I daresay it was inevitable from the beginning.’
Dr Porhoët got up and walked across the room.
‘If a woman had done me such an injury that I wanted to take some horrible vengeance, I think I could devise nothing more subtly cruel than to let her be married to Oliver Haddo.’
‘Ah, poor thing, poor thing!’ said Arthur. ‘If I could only suppose she would be happy! The future terrifies me.’
‘I wonder if she knew that Haddo had sent that telegram,’ said Susie.
‘What can it matter?’
She turned to Arthur gravely.
‘Do you remember that day, in this studio, when he kicked Margaret’s dog, and you thrashed him? Well, afterwards, when he thought no one saw him, I happened to catch sight of his face. I never saw in my life such malignant hatred. It was the face of a fiend of wickedness. And when he tried to excuse himself, there was a cruel gleam in his eyes which terrified me. I warned you; I told you that he had made up his mind to revenge himself, but you laughed at me. And then he seemed to go out of our lives and I thought no more about it. I wonder why he sent Dr Porhoët here today. He must have known that the doctor would hear of his humiliation, and he may have wished that he should be present at his triumph. I think that very moment he made up his mind to be even with you, and he devised this odious scheme.’
‘How could he know that it was possible to carry out such a horrible thing?’ said Arthur.
‘I wonder if Miss Boyd is right,’ murmured the doctor. ‘After all, if you come to think of it, he must have thought that he couldn’t hurt you more. The whole thing is fiendish. He took away from you all your happiness. He must have known that you wanted nothing in the world more than to make Margaret your wife, and he has not only prevented that, but he has married her himself. And he can only have done it by poisoning her mind, by warping her very character. Her soul must be horribly besmirched; he must have entirely changed her personality.’
‘Ah, I feel that,’ cried Arthur. ‘If Margaret has broken her word to me, if she’s gone to him so callously, it’s because it’s not the Margaret I know. Some devil must have taken possession of her body.’
‘You use a figure of speech. I wonder if it can possibly be a reality.’
Arthur and Dr Porhoët looked at Susie with astonishment.
‘I can’t believe that Margaret could have done such a thing,’ she went on. ‘The more I think of it, the more incredible it seems. I’ve known Margaret for years, and she was incapable of deceit. She was very kind-hearted. She was honest and truthful. In the first moment of horror, I was only indignant, but I don’t want to think too badly of her. There is only one way to excuse her, and that is by supposing she acted under some strange compulsion.’
Arthur clenched his hands.
‘I’m not sure if that doesn’t make it more awful than before. If he’s married her, not because he cares, but in order to hurt me, what life will she lead with him? We know how heartless he is, how vindictive, how horribly cruel.’
‘Dr Porhoët knows more about these things than we do,’ said Susie. ‘Is it possible that Haddo can have cast some spell upon her that would make her unable to resist his will? Is it possible that he can have got such an influence over her that her whole character was changed?’
‘How can I tell?’ cried the doctor helplessly. ‘I have heard that such things may happen. I have read of them, but I have no proof. In these matters all is obscurity. The adepts in magic make strange claims. Arthur is a man of science, and he knows what the limits of hypnotism are.’
‘We know that Haddo had powers that other men have not,’ answered Susie. ‘Perhaps there was enough truth in his extravagant pretensions to enable him to do something that we can hardly imagine.’
Arthur passed his hands wearily over his face.
‘I’m so broken, so confused, that I cannot think sanely. At this moment everything seems possible. My faith in all the truths that have supported me is tottering.’
For a while they remained silent. Arthur’s eyes rested on the chair in which Margaret had so often sat. An unfinished canvas still stood upon the easel. It was Dr Porhoët who spoke at last.
‘But even if there were some truth in Miss Boyd’s suppositions, I don’t see how it can help you. You cannot do anything. You have no remedy, legal or otherwise. Margaret is apparently a free agent, and she has married this man. It is plain that many people will think she has done much better in marrying a country gentleman than in marrying a young surgeon. Her letter is perfectly lucid. There is no trace of compulsion. To all intents and purposes she has married him of her own free-will, and there is nothing to show that she desires to be released from him or from the passion which we may suppose enslaves her.’
What he said was obviously true, and no reply was possible.
‘The only thing is to grin and bear it,’ said Arthur, rising.
‘Where are you going?’ said Susie.
‘I think I want to get away from Paris. Here everything will remind me of what I have lost. I must get back to my work.’
He had regained command over himself, and except for the hopeless woe of his face, which he could not prevent from being visible, he was as calm as ever. He held out his hand to Susie.
‘I
can only hope that you’ll forget,’ she said.
‘I don’t wish to forget,’ he answered, shaking his head. ‘It’s possible that you will hear from Margaret. She’ll want the things that she has left here, and I daresay will write to you. I should like you to tell her that I bear her no ill-will for anything she has done, and I will never venture to reproach her. I don’t know if I shall be able to do anything for her, but I wish her to know that in any case and always I will do everything that she wants.’
‘If she writes to me, I will see that she is told,’ answered Susie gravely.
‘And now goodbye.’
‘You can’t go to London till tomorrow. Shan’t I see you in the morning?’
‘I think if you don’t mind, I won’t come here again. The sight of all this rather disturbs me.’
Again a contraction of pain passed across his eyes, and Susie saw that he was using a superhuman effort to preserve the appearance of composure. She hesitated a moment.
‘Shall I never see you again?’ she said. ‘I should be sorry to lose sight of you entirely.’
‘I should be sorry, too,’ he answered. ‘I have learned how good and kind you are, and I shall never forget that you are Margaret’s friend. When you come to London, I hope that you will let me know.’
He went out. Dr Porhoët, his hands behind his back, began to walk up and down the room. At last he turned to Susie.
‘There is one thing that puzzles me,’ he said. ‘Why did he marry her?’
‘You heard what Arthur said,’ answered Susie bitterly. ‘Whatever happened, he would have taken her back. The other man knew that he could only bind her to him securely by going through the ceremonies of marriage.’
Dr Porhoët shrugged his shoulders, and presently he left her. When Susie was alone she began to weep broken-heartedly, not for herself, but because Arthur suffered an agony that was hardly endurable.
XI
ARTHUR WENT BACK to London next day.
Susie felt it impossible any longer to stay in the deserted studio, and accepted a friend’s invitation to spend the winter in Italy. The good Dr Porhoët remained in Paris with his books and his occult studies.
Susie travelled slowly through Tuscany and Umbria. Margaret had not written to her, and Susie, on leaving Paris, had sent her friend’s belongings to an address from which she knew they would eventually be forwarded. She could not bring herself to write. In answer to a note announcing her change of plans, Arthur wrote briefly that he had much work to do and was delivering a new course of lectures at St. Luke’s; he had lately been appointed visiting surgeon to another hospital, and his private practice was increasing. He did not mention Margaret. His letter was abrupt, formal, and constrained. Susie, reading it for the tenth time, could make little of it. She saw that he wrote only from civility, without interest; and there was nothing to indicate his state of mind. Susie and her companion had made up their minds to pass some weeks in Rome; and here, to her astonishment, Susie had news of Haddo and his wife. It appeared that they had spent some time there, and the little English circle was talking still of their eccentricities. They travelled in some state, with a courier and a suite of servants; they had taken a carriage and were in the habit of driving every afternoon on the Pincio. Haddo had excited attention by the extravagance of his costume, and Margaret by her beauty; she was to be seen in her box at the opera every night, and her diamonds were the envy of all beholders. Though people had laughed a good deal at Haddo’s pretentiousness, and been exasperated by his arrogance, they could not fail to be impressed by his obvious wealth. But finally the pair had disappeared suddenly without saying a word to anybody. A good many bills remained unpaid, but these, Susie learnt, had been settled later. It was reported that they were now in Monte Carlo.
‘Did they seem happy?’ Susie asked the gossiping friend who gave her this scanty information.
‘I think so. After all, Mrs Haddo has almost everything that a woman can want, riches, beauty, nice clothes, jewels. She would be very unreasonable not to be happy.’
Susie had meant to pass the later spring on the Riviera, but when she heard that the Haddos were there, she hesitated. She did not want to run the risk of seeing them, and yet she had a keen desire to find out exactly how things were going. Curiosity and distaste struggled in her mind, but curiosity won; and she persuaded her friend to go to Monte Carlo instead of to Beaulieu. At first Susie did not see the Haddos; but rumour was already much occupied with them, and she had only to keep her ears open. In that strange place, where all that is extravagant and evil, all that is morbid, insane, and fantastic, is gathered together, the Haddos were in fit company. They were notorious for their assiduity at the tables and for their luck, for the dinners and suppers they gave at places frequented by the very opulent, and for their eccentric appearance. It was a complex picture that Susie put together from the scraps of information she collected. After two or three days she saw them at the tables, but they were so absorbed in their game that she felt quite safe from discovery. Margaret was playing, but Haddo stood behind her and directed her movements. Their faces were extraordinarily intent. Susie fixed her attention on Margaret, for in what she had heard of her she had been quite unable to recognize the girl who had been her friend. And what struck her most now was that there was in Margaret’s expression a singular likeness to Haddo’s. Notwithstanding her exquisite beauty, she had a curiously vicious look, which suggested that somehow she saw literally with Oliver’s eyes. They had won great sums that evening, and many persons watched them. It appeared that they played always in this fashion, Margaret putting on the stakes and Haddo telling her what to do and when to stop. Susie heard two Frenchmen talking of them. She listened with all her ears. She flushed as she heard one of them make an observation about Margaret which was more than coarse. The other laughed.
‘It is incredible,’ he said.
‘I assure you it’s true. They have been married six months, and she is still only his wife in name. The superstitious through all the ages have believed in the power of virginity, and the Church has made use of the idea for its own ends. The man uses her simply as a mascot.’
The men laughed, and their conversation proceeded so grossly that Susie’s cheeks burned. But what she had heard made her look at Margaret more closely still. She was radiant. Susie could not deny that something had come to her that gave a new, enigmatic savour to her beauty. She was dressed more gorgeously than Susie’s fastidious taste would have permitted; and her diamonds, splendid in themselves, were too magnificent for the occasion. At last, sweeping up the money, Haddo touched her on the shoulder, and she rose. Behind her was standing a painted woman of notorious disreputability. Susie was astonished to see Margaret smile and nod as she passed her.
Susie learnt that the Haddos had a suite of rooms at the most expensive of the hotels. They lived in a whirl of gaiety. They knew few English except those whose reputations were damaged, but seemed to prefer the society of those foreigners whose wealth and eccentricities made them the cynosure of that little world. Afterwards, she often saw them, in company of Russian Grand-Dukes and their mistresses, of South American women with prodigious diamonds, of noble gamblers and great ladies of doubtful fame, of strange men overdressed and scented. Rumour was increasingly busy with them. Margaret moved among all those queer people with a cold mysteriousness that excited the curiosity of the sated idlers. The suggestion which Susie overheard was repeated more circumstantially. But to this was joined presently the report of orgies that were enacted in the darkened sitting-room of the hotel, when all that was noble and vicious in Monte Carlo was present. Oliver’s eccentric imagination invented whimsical festivities. He had a passion for disguise, and he gave a fancy-dress party of which fabulous stories were told. He sought to revive the mystical ceremonies of old religions, and it was reported that horrible rites had been performed in the garden of the villa, under the shining moon, in imitation of those he had seen in Eastern places. It was said that Haddo
had magical powers of extraordinary character, and the tired imagination of those pleasure-seekers was tickled by his talk of black art. Some even asserted that the blasphemous ceremonies of the Black Mass had been celebrated in the house of a Polish Prince. People babbled of satanism and of necromancy. Haddo was thought to be immersed in occult studies for the performance of a magical operation; and some said that he was occupied with the Magnum Opus, the greatest and most fantastic of alchemical experiments. Gradually these stories were narrowed down to the monstrous assertion that he was attempting to create living beings. He had explained at length to somebody that magical receipts existed for the manufacture of homunculi.
Haddo was known generally by the name he was pleased to give himself. The Brother of the Shadow; but most people used it in derision, for it contrasted absurdly with his astonishing bulk. They were amused or outraged by his vanity, but they could not help talking about him, and Susie knew well enough by now that nothing pleased him more. His exploits as a lion-hunter were well known, and it was reported that human blood was on his hands. It was soon discovered that he had a queer power over animals, so that in his presence they were seized with unaccountable terror. He succeeded in surrounding himself with an atmosphere of the fabulous, and nothing that was told of him was too extravagant for belief. But unpleasant stories were circulated also, and someone related that he had been turned out of a club in Vienna for cheating at cards. He played many games, but here, as at Oxford, it was found that he was an unscrupulous opponent. And those old rumours followed him that he took strange drugs. He was supposed to have odious vices, and people whispered to one another of scandals that had been with difficulty suppressed. No one quite understood on what terms he was with his wife, and it was vaguely asserted that he was at times brutally cruel to her. Susie’s heart sank when she heard this; but on the few occasions upon which she caught sight of Margaret, she seemed in the highest spirits. One story inexpressibly shocked her. After lunching at some restaurant, Haddo gave a bad louis among the money with which he paid the bill, and there was a disgraceful altercation with the waiter. He refused to change the coin till a policeman was brought in. His guests were furious, and several took the first opportunity to cut him dead. One of those present narrated the scene to Susie, and she was told that Margaret laughed unconcernedly with her neighbour while the sordid quarrel was proceeding. The man’s blood was as good as his fortune was substantial, but it seemed to please him to behave like an adventurer. The incident was soon common property, and gradually the Haddos found themselves cold-shouldered. The persons with whom they mostly consorted had reputations too delicate to stand the glare of publicity which shone upon all who were connected with him, and the suggestion of police had thrown a shudder down many a spine. What had happened in Rome happened here again: they suddenly disappeared.
The Great Exotic Novels and Short Stories of Somerset Maugham Page 55
