Miss Palliser looked at her searchingly.
“ — But — it has made me very happy to believe that you consider me — acceptable.”
“Dearest child, it is evident that we are the unacceptable ones—”
“Please don’t say that — or think it. It is absurd — in one sense.... Are we to be friends in town? Is that what you mean?”
“Indeed we are, if you will.”
Miss Cardross nodded and withdrew her hands as Virginia and Malcourt came into view across the lawn.
Constance, following her glance, saw, and signalled silent invitation; Malcourt sauntered up, paid his respects airily, and joined Hamil and Wayward; Virginia spoke in a low voice to Constance, then, leaning on the back of her chair, looked at Shiela as inoffensively as she knew how. She said:
“I am very sorry for my rudeness to you. Can you forgive me, Miss Cardross?”
“Yes.... Won’t you have some tea?”
Her direct simplicity left Virginia rather taken aback. Perhaps she expected some lack of composure in the girl, perhaps a more prolix acceptance of honourable amends; but this terse and serene amiability almost suggested indifference; and Virginia seated herself, not quite knowing how she liked it.
Afterward she said to Miss Palliser:
“Did you ever see such self-possession, my dear? You know I might pardon my maid in exactly the same tone and manner.”
“But you wouldn’t ask your maid to tea, would you?” said Constance, gently amused.
“I might, if I could afford to,” she nodded listlessly. “I believe that girl could do it without disturbing her Own self-respect or losing caste below stairs or above. As for the Van Dieman — just common cat, Constance.”
Miss Palliser laughed. “Shiela Cardross refused the Van Dieman son and heir — if you think that might be an explanation of the cattishness.”
“Really?” asked Virginia, without interest. “Where did you hear that gossip?”
“From our vixenish tabby herself. The thin and vindictive are usually without a real sense of humour. I rather suspected young Jan Van Dieman’s discomfiture. He left, you know, just after Garret arrived,” she added demurely.
Virginia raised her eyes at the complacent inference; but even curiosity seemed to have died out in her, and she only said, languidly:
“You think she cares for Garret? And you approve?”
“I think I’d approve if she did. Does that astonish you?”
“Not very much.”
Virginia seemed to have lost all spirit. She laughed rarely, nowadays. She was paler, too, than usual — paler than was ornamental; and pallor suited her rather fragile features, too. Also she had become curiously considerate of other people’s feelings — rather subdued; less ready in her criticisms; gentler in judgments. All of which symptoms Constance had already noted with incredulity and alarm.
“Where did you and Louis Malcourt go this afternoon?” she asked, unpegging her hair.
“Out to the beach. There was nothing there except sky and water, and a filthy eagle dining on a dead fish.”
Miss Palliser waited, sitting before her dresser; but as Virginia offered no further information she shook out the splendid masses of her chestnut hair and, leaning forward, examined her features in the mirror with minute attention.
“It’s strange,” she murmured, half to herself, “how ill Jim Wayward has been looking recently. I can’t account for it.”
“I can, dear,” said Virginia gently.
Constance turned in surprise.
“How?”
“Mr. Malcourt says that he is practising self-denial. It hurts, you know.”
“What!” exclaimed Constance, flushing up.
“I said that it hurts.”
“Such a slur as that harms Louis Malcourt — not Mr. Wayward!” returned Constance hotly.
Virginia repeated: “It hurts — to kill desire. It hurts even before habit is acquired ... they say. Louis Malcourt says so. And if that is true — can you wonder that poor Mr. Wayward looks like death? I speak in all sympathy and kindness — as did Mr. Malcourt.”
So that was it! Constance stared at her own fair face in the mirror, and deep into the pained brown eyes reflected there. The eyes suddenly dimmed and the parted mouth quivered.
So that was the dreadful trouble! — the explanation of the recent change in him — the deep lines of pain from the wing of the pinched nostril — the haunted gaze, the long, restless silences, the forced humour and its bitter flavour tainting voice and word!
And she had believed — feared with a certainty almost hopeless — that it was his old vice, slowly, inexorably transforming what was left of the man she had known so long and cared for so loyally through all these strange, confusing years.
From the mirror the oval of her own fresh unravaged face, framed in the burnished brown of her hair, confronted her like a wraith of the past; and, dreaming there, wide-eyed, expressionless, she seemed to see again the old-time parlour set with rosewood; and the faded roses in the carpet; and, through the half-drawn curtains, spring sunlight falling on a boy and a little girl.
Virginia, partly dressed for dinner, rose and went to the window, frail restless hands clasped behind her back, and stood there gazing out at the fading daylight. Perhaps the close of day made her melancholy; for there were traces of tears on her lashes; perhaps it suggested the approaching end of a dream so bright and strange that, at times, a dull pang of dread stilled her heart — checking for a moment its heavy beating.
Light died in the room; the panes turned silvery, then darker as the swift Southern night fell over sea, lagoon, and forest.
Far away in the wastes of dune and jungle the sweet flute-like tremolo of an owl broke out, prolonged infinitely. From the dark garden below, a widow-bird called breathlessly, its ghostly cry, now a far whisper in the night, now close at hand, husky, hurried, startling amid the shadows. And, whir! whir-r-r! thud! came the great soft night-moths against the window screens where sprays of silvery jasmine clung, perfuming all the night.
Still Constance sat before the mirror which was now invisible in the dusk, bare elbows on the dresser’s edge, face framed in her hands over which the thick hair rippled. And, in the darkness, her brown eyes closed — perhaps that they might behold more clearly the phantoms of the past together there in an old-time parlour, where the golden radiance of suns long dead still lingered, warming the faded roses on the floor.
And after a long while her maid came with a card; and she straightened up in her chair, gathered the filmy robe of lace, and, rising, pressed the electric switch. But Virginia had returned to her own room to bathe her eyelids and pace the floor until she cared to face the outer world once more and, for another hour or two, deceive it.
CHAPTER XV
UNDER FIRE
Meanwhile Constance dressed hastily, abetted by the clever maid; for Wayward was below, invited to dine with them. Malcourt also was due for dinner, and, as usual, late.
In fact, he was at that moment leisurely tying his white neckwear in his bed-chamber at Villa Cardross. And sometimes he whistled, tentatively, as though absorbed in mentally following an elusive air; sometimes he resumed a lighted cigarette which lay across the gilded stomach of a Chinese joss, sending a thin, high thread of smoke to the ceiling. He had begun his collection with one small idol; there were now nineteen, and all hideous.
“The deuce! the deuce!” he murmured, rejecting the tie and trying another one; “and all the things I’ve got to do this blessed night!... Console the afflicted — three of them; dine with one, get to “The Breakers” and spoon with another — get to the Club and sup with another! — the deuce! the deuce! the—”
He hummed a bar or two of a new waltz, took a puff at his cigarette, winked affably at the idol, put on his coat, and without a second glance at the glass went out whistling a lively tune.
Hamil, dressed for dinner, but looking rather worn and fatigued, passed him in the hall.
<
br /> “You’ve evidently had a hard day,” said Malcourt; “you resemble the last run of sea-weed. Is everybody dining at this hour?”
“I dined early with Mrs. Cardross. Mrs. Carrick has taken Shiela and Cecile to that dinner dance at the O’Haras’. It’s the last of the season. I thought you might be going later.”
“Are you?”
“No; I’m rather tired.”
“I’m tired, too. Hang it! I’m always tired — but only of Bibi. Quand même! Good night.... I’ll probably reappear with the dicky-birds. Leave your key under that yellow rose-bush, will you? I can’t stop to hunt up mine. And tell them not to bar and chain the door; that’s a good fellow.”
Hamil nodded and resumed his journey to his bedroom. There he transferred a disorderly heap of letters, plans, contracts, and blue-prints from his bed to a table, threw a travelling rug over the bed, lay down on it, and lighted a cigar, closing his eyes for a moment. Then he opened them wearily.
He did not intend to sleep; there was work waiting for him; that was why he left the electric bulbs burning as safeguard against slumber.
For a while he smoked, flat on his back; his cigar went out twice and he relighted it. The third time he was deciding whether or not to set fire to it again — he remembered that — and remembered nothing more, except the haunted dreams in which he followed her, through sad and endless forests, gray in deepening twilight, where he could neither see her face nor reach her side, nor utter the cry which strained in his throat.... On, on, endlessly struggling onward in the thickening darkness, year after year, the sky a lowering horror, the forest, no longer silent, a twisting, stupefying confusion of sound, growing, increasing, breaking into a hellish clamour! —
Upright on his bed he realised that somebody was knocking; and he slid to the floor, still stupid and scarcely convinced.
“Mrs. Carrick’s compliments, and is Mr. Hamil quite well bein’ as the lights is burnin’ an’ past two o’clock, sir?” said the maid at the door.
“Past two! O Lord! Please thank Mrs. Carrick, and say that I am going to do a little work, and that I am perfectly well.”
He closed the door and looked around him in despair: “All that stuff to verify and O.K.! What an infernal ass I am! By the nineteen little josses in Malcourt’s bedroom I’m so many kinds of a fool that I hate to count up beyond the dozen!”
Stretching and yawning alternately he eyed the mass of papers with increasing repugnance; but later a cold sponge across his eyes revived him sufficiently to sit down and inspect the first document. Then he opened the ink-well, picked up a pen, and began.
For half an hour he sat there, now refreshed and keenly absorbed in his work. Once the stairs outside creaked, and he raised his head, listening absently, then returned to the task before him with a sigh.
All his windows were open; the warm night air was saturated with the odour of Bermuda lilies. Once or twice he laid down his pen and stared out into the darkness as a subtler perfume grew on the breeze — the far fragrance of china-berry in bloom; Calypso’s breath!
Then, in the silence, the heavy throb of his heart unnerved his hand, rendering his pen unsteady as he signed each rendered bill: “O.K. for $ —— ,” and affixed his signature, “John Garret Hamil, Architect.”
The aroma of the lilies hung heavy in the room, penetrating as the scent of Malcourt’s spiced Chinese gums afire and bubbling. And he thought again of Malcourt’s nineteen little josses which he lugged about with him everywhere from some occult whim, and in whose gilt-bronze laps he sometimes burned cigarettes, sometimes a tiny globule of aromatic gum, pretending it propitiated the malice-brooding gods.
And, thinking of Malcourt, suddenly he remembered the door-key. Malcourt could not get in without it. And the doors were barred and chained.
Slipping the key into his pocket he opened his door, and, treading quietly through the silent house, descended to the great hall. With infinite precaution he fumbled for the chains; they were dangling loose. Somebody, too, had drawn the heavy bars, but the door itself was locked.
So he cautiously unlocked it, and holding the key in his hand, let himself out on the terrace.
And at the same moment a shadowy figure turned in the starlight to confront him.
“Shiela!”
“Is that you, Mr. Hamil?”
“Yes. What on earth are you—”
“Hush! What are you doing down here?”
“Louis Malcourt is out. I forgot to leave a key for him under the yellow rose—”
“Under the rose — and yellow at that! The mysteries of the Rosicrucians pale into insignificance beside the lurid rites of Mr. Malcourt and Mr. Hamil — under the yellow rose! Proceed, my fearsome adept, and perform the occult deed!”
Hamil descended the terrace to the new garden, hung the key to a brier under the fragrant mass of flowers, and glanced up at Shiela, who, arms on the balustrade above him, was looking down at the proceedings.
“Is the dread deed done?” she whispered.
“If you don’t believe it come down and see.”
“I? Come down? At two in the morning?”
“It’s half-past two.”
“Oh,” she said, “if it’s half-past two I might think of coming down for a moment — to look at my roses.... Thank you, Mr. Hamil, I can see my way very clearly. I can usually see my own way clearly — without the aid of your too readily offered hand.... Did you ever dream of such an exquisitely hot night! That means rain, doesn’t it? — with so many fragrances mingling? The odour of lilies predominates, and I think some jasmine is in the inland wind, but my roses are very sweet if you only bend down to them. A rose is always worth stooping for.”
She leaned over the yellow blossoms, slender, spirit-white in the starlight, and brushed her fresh young face with the silken petals.
“So sweet,” she said; “lean down and worship my young roses, you unappreciative man!”
For a few minutes she strolled along the paths of the new garden he had built, bending capriciously here and there to savour some perfect blossom. The night was growing warmer; the sea breeze had died out, and a hot wind blew languidly from the west.
“You know,” she said, looking back at him over her shoulder, “I don’t want to go to bed.”
“Neither do I, and I’m not going.”
“But I’m going.... I wonder why I don’t want to? Listen! Once — after I was a protoplasm and a micro-organism, and a mollusc, and other things, I probably was a predatory animal — nice and sleek with velvet feet and shining incandescent eyes — and very, very predatory.... That’s doubtless why I often feel so deliciously awake at night — with a tameless longing to prowl under the moon.... And I think I’d better go in, now.”
“Nonsense,” he said, “I’m not going to bed yet.”
“Oh! And what difference might that make to me? You are horridly conceited; do you know it?”
“Please stay, Calypso. It’s too hot to sleep.”
“No; star-prowling is contrary to civilized custom.”
“But every soul in the house is sound asleep—”
“I should hope so! And you and I have no business to be out here.”
“Do little observances of that sort count with you and me?”
“They don’t,” she said, shaking her head, “but they ought to. I want to stay. There is no real reason why I shouldn’t — except the absurd fear of being caught unawares. Perhaps, perhaps I might stay for ten more minutes.... Oh, the divine beauty of it all! How hot it is! — the splash of the fountains seems to cool things a little — and those jagged, silvery reflections of the stars, deep, deep in the pool there.... Did you see that fish swirl to the surface? Hark! What was that queer sound?”
“Some night bird crying in the marshes. It will rain to-morrow; the wind is blowing from the hammock; that’s why it’s hot to-night; can you detect the odour of wild sweet-bay?”
“Yes — at moments. And I can just hear the surf — calling, calling
‘Calypso!’ as you called me once.... I must go, now.”
“To the sea or the house?” he asked, laughing.
She walked a few paces toward the house, halted, and looked back audaciously.
“I’d go to the sea — only I’m afraid I’d be found out.... Isn’t it all too stupid! Where convention is needless and one’s wish is so harmless why should a girl turn coward at the fear of somebody discovering how innocently happy she is trying to be with a man!... It makes me very impatient at times.” ... She turned, hesitated, stepped nearer and looked him in the face, daringly perverse.
“I want to go with you!... Have we not passed through enough together to deserve this little unconventional happiness?” She was breathing more quickly. “I will go with you if you wish.”
“To the sea?”
“Yes. It is only a half mile by the hammock path. The servants are awake at six. Really, the night is too superb to waste — alone. But we must get back in time, if I go with you.”
“Have you a key?”
“Yes, here in my gloves” — stripping them from her bare arms. “Can you put them into your pocket with the key?... And I’ll pin up my skirt to get it out of the way.... What? Do you think it’s a pretty gown? I did not think you noticed it. I’ve danced it to rags.... And will you take this fan, please? No, I’ll wear the wrap — it’s only cobweb weight.”
She had now pinned up her gown to walking-skirt length; her slim feet were sheathed in silken dancing gear; and she bent over to survey them, then glanced doubtfully at Hamil, who shook his head.
“Never mind,” she said resolutely; “only we can’t walk far on the beach; I could never keep them on in the dune sands. Are you ready, O my tempter?”
Like a pair of guilty ghosts they crossed the shadowy garden, skirted the dark orange groves, and instead of entering the broad palm-lined way that led straight east for two miles to the sea, they turned into the sinuous hammock path which, curving south, cut off nearly a mile and a half.
Works of Robert W Chambers Page 386
