CHAPTER VIII
THE DOVE AND THE SERPENT
Rachel was bereft of speech; and yet a certain sense of relief underlaythe natural embarrassment caused by a proposal so premature and soabrupt. Nor was the deeper emotion very difficult to analyze. Here atlast was a logical explanation of the whole behavior of this man; it wasthe first that had occurred to her, and, after all, it was the onlypossible one.
"I want you to be my wife," repeated Mr. Steel, with enough of respectin his tone, yet none the less with the air of a man who is accustomedto obtain what he wants.
And Rachel, looking at the wiry, well-knit, upright figure, and at thefresh, elderly, but virile face, with its sombre eyes and its snowyhair, thought once again of the ancient saw which she had quoted toherself the night before, only to dismiss it finally from her mind. Thisman was no fool, nor was he old. He might be eccentric, but he waseminently sane; he might be elderly, in the arbitrary matter of mereyears; but an old man he was not, and never would be with those eyes.
She tried to tell him it was absurd, but before the word could come shesaw that it was the last one to apply; he was so confident, so quiet, sosure of himself, if not of Rachel. At last she told him she could notthink of it, he had seen nothing of her, and could not possibly care forher, even supposing that she cared for him.
"By 'caring,'" said he, "do you mean being 'in love,' as they say, andall that?"
"Naturally," said Rachel, with great ease and irony, but with a newmisgiving every moment.
"And have I said I was in love with you?" inquired Mr. Steel, with asmile as indulgent as his tone. "It might, perhaps, be no more than thetruth; but have I had the insolence to tell you so?"
"It is a greater insult if you are not," returned Rachel, speaking hotlyand quickly, but with lowered eyes.
"What! To offer to marry a person whom one does not--as yet--pretend tolove?"
Rachel vouchsafed no reply.
"Whom one only--but tremendously--admires?"
Rachel felt bound to answer him, for at least there was no insult inhis tone. She raised her candid eyes, a sweet brown blush upon her face.
"Yes," she said, "I think there is absolutely no excuse for a proposalof marriage, if it is not founded upon love and nothing else!"
"Or its pretence and nothing else," amended Steel, with a bow and asmile of some severity. "That is a hard saying," he went on, resuminghis chair, and wheeling it even nearer to Rachel's than it had beenbefore; "moreover," he added, "since I have already insulted you, let metell you that it is an exceedingly commonplace saying, into the bargain.It depends, you must admit, upon the commonplace conception of marriage;and before we go any further I should like to give you my ownconception, not of the institution, but of the particular marriage whichI have in view."
So he had it in view! It was not an inspiration, but already quite aprospect! Rachel made an acid little note of this; but there was noacidity in her permission to him to proceed; her turn was coming last.
"The marriage that I propose to you," continued Steel, "is simply themost convenient form of friendship of which I can think. I want to beyour friend; indeed, that much I mean to be, if necessary, in spite ofyou. I was interested in your case, so I came up to hear your trial. Iwas more interested in your trial, but most interested of all inyourself. There, indeed, the word is too weak; but I will not vex yourspirit with a stronger. My attraction you know; my determination youknow; even the low wiles to which your pride reduced me, even my dodgingand dogging, have been quite openly admitted to you on the firstreasonable opportunity. All this business of the shipwrecked daughterwas of course a crude device enough; but I had very little time tothink, and my first care was that you should not be recognized here orelsewhere in my society. That was essential, if there was the slightestchance of your even listening to my proposition, as indeed you are doingnow. Last night I told you nothing, because that's always easier thantelling only a little; moreover, you were so distraught that you wouldpossibly have gone right away without benefiting even to the slightextent of the comfortable night's rest you so badly needed; but thismorning I am prepared to put it to the touch. And let me begin bysaying, that if circumstances would permit me to continue the paternalimposture, that would be quite enough for me; unluckily, I am known inmy own country as an old bachelor; so that I cannot suddenly produce awidowed daughter, without considerable unpleasantness for us both. WhatI can do, however," and Steel bent further forward, with eyes that heldRachel's in their spell; "what I can do, and will, is to go back with alady who shall be my wife in name, my daughter in effect. We should, Itrust, be the best of friends; but I will give you my word, and not onlymy word but my bond, that we never need be anything more."
He had spoken rapidly; the pause that followed lasted longer than thislengthy speech. And through it all they sat with eyes still locked,until he spoke again.
"You believe, at least, in the bona fides of my offer?"
And Rachel, still looking in his eyes, murmured that she did.
"You will bear in mind how essentially it differs from the ordinaryoffer of the kind; also, that I have never for a moment pretended to bein love with you?"
"I will."
Steel had risen as if to go; the keen scrutiny was withdrawn, a distinctspell as distinctly broken; and yet he lingered, with a smile.
"That," said he, "was a poor compliment to pay twice over! But it ishuman to err, and in my anxiety not to do so on the side of sentiment Iown myself in danger of flying to the other extreme. Well, you knowwhich is the common extreme in such cases; and at all events we shallavoid the usual pitfall. I am going to give you a few minutes to thinkit over; then, if you care to go into it further, I shall be most happy;if not, the matter is at an end."
A few minutes! Rachel felt very angry, without knowing that she was mostangry with herself for not feeling angrier still. She had heard quiteenough; it were weakness to listen to another word; and yet--and yet--
"Don't go," said Rachel, with some petulance; "that is quiteunnecessary. Anything more extraordinary--but I owe you too much alreadyto be your critic. Still, I do think I am entitled to go a littlefurther into the matter, as you said, without committing myself."
"To be sure you are."
But this time he remained standing; and for once he kept those mesmericeyes to himself. Obviously, Rachel was to have a chance.
"You spoke of your own country," she began. "Do you live abroad?"
There was the least suspicion of eagerness in the question. Rachelherself was unaware of it; not so Mr. Steel, and he sighed.
"A mere figure," he said; "what I meant was my own country-side."
"And where is that?"
"In the north," he replied vaguely. "Did you look twice at my card?Well, here is another, if you will do me that honor now. The initialsJ. B. stand for no very interesting names--John Buchanan. A certaininterest in the Buchanan, perhaps; it comes out in the flesh, I fancy,though not on the tongue. As for the address, Normanthorpe House is therather historic old seat of the family of that name; but they have somany vastly superior and more modern places, and the last fifty yearshave so ruined the surroundings, that I was able to induce the Duke totake a price for it a year or two ago. He had hardly slept a night therein his life, and I got it lock-stock-and-barrel for a song. TheNorthborough which, you will observe, it is 'near'--a good four miles,as a matter of fact--is the well-known centre of the Delvertoniron-trade. But you may very well have spent a year in this countrywithout having heard of it; they would be shocked at Northborough, butnowhere else."
Rachel had dropped the card into her lap; she was looking straight atMr. John Buchanan Steel himself.
"You are very rich," she said gravely.
"I am nothing of the kind," he protested. "The Duke is rich, if youlike, but I had to scrape together to pay him what would replenish hisracing-stud, or stand him in a new yacht."
But Rachel was not deceived.
"I might have known you were very r
ich," she murmured, as much toherself as to him; and there was a strange finality in her tone, asthough all was over between them; a still more strange regret,involuntary, unconscious, and yet distinct.
"Granting your hypothesis, for the sake of argument," he went on, withhis simplest smile; "is it as difficult as ever for the poor rich man toget to heaven?"
Rachel spent some moments in serious thought. He was wonderfully honestwith her; of his central motive alone was she uncertain, unconvinced. Inall else she felt instinctively that he was telling her the truth,telling her even more than he need. His generous candor was a challengeto her own.
"It may be very small of me," she said at length, "but--somehow--if youhad been comparatively poor--I should have been less--ashamed!"
And candor begot candor, as it generally will.
"Upon my word," he cried, "you make me sigh for the suburbs and sixhundred a year! But you shall know the worst. I meant you to know itwhen I came in; then I changed my mind; but in for a penny, in for thelot!"
He caught up the magazine which he had brought in with the sheaf ofnewspapers, and he handed it to Rachel, open at an article quiteexcellently illustrated for an English magazine.
"There," he cried, "there's a long screed about the wretched place,before it came into my hands. But it's no use pretending it isn't quitethe place it was. I took over the whole thing--every stick outside andin--and I've put in new drainage and the electric light."
His tone of regret was intentionally ludicrous. Had Rachel beenlistening, she would once more have suspected a pose. But already shewas deep in the article in the two-year-old magazine, or rather in itsnot inartistic illustrations.
"The House from the Tennis Lawn," "In the Kitchen Garden," "TheDrawing-room Door," "A Drawing-room Chimney-piece," "A Corner of theChinese Room," "A Portion of the Grand Staircase"--of such were thetitles underneath the process pictures. And (in all but theirproduction) each of these was more beautiful than the last.
"That," observed Steel, "happens to be the very article from which Ifirst got wind of the place, when I was looking about for one. Andnow," he added, "I suppose I have cut my own throat! Like the devil, Ihave taken you up to a high place--"
It was no word from Rachel that cut him short, but his own taste, withwhich she at least had very little fault to find. And Rachel wascritical enough; but her experience was still unripe, and she liked hisview of his possessions, without perceiving how it disarmed her own.
Presently she looked up.
"Now I see how much I should have to gain. But what would you gain?"
The question was no sooner asked than Rachel foresaw the pretty speechwhich was its obvious answer. Mr. Steel, however, refrained from makingit.
"I am an oldish man," he said, "and--yes, there is no use in denyingthat I am comfortably off. I want a wife; or rather, my neighbors seembent upon finding me one; and, if the worst has to come to the worst, Iprefer to choose for myself. Matrimony, however, is about the very laststate of life that I desire, and I take it to be the same with you.Therefore--to put the cart before the horse--you would suit me ideally.One's own life would be unaltered, but the Delverton mothers would ceasefrom troubling, and at the head of my establishment there would be alady of whom I should be most justly proud. And even in my own life Ishould, I hope, be the more than occasional gainer by her society; may Ialso add, by her sympathy, by her advice? Mrs. Minchin," cried Steel,with sudden feeling, "the conditions shall be very rigid; my lawyershall see to that; nor shall I allow myself a loophole for any weaknessor nonsense whatsoever in the future. Old fellows like myself have madefools of themselves before to-day, but you shall be safeguarded from thebeginning. Let there be no talk or thought of love between us from firstto last! But as for admiration, I don't mind telling you that I admireyou as I never admired any woman in the world before; and I hope, inspite of that, we shall be friends."
Still the indicative mood, still not for a moment the conditional!Rachel did not fail to make another note; but now there was nothingbitter even in her thoughts. She believed in this man, and in hispromises; moreover, she began to focus the one thing about him in whichshe disbelieved. It was his feeling towards her--nothing more andnothing else. There he was insincere; but it was a pardonableinsincerity, after all.
Of his admiration she was convinced; it had been open and honest allalong; but there was something deeper than admiration. He could say whathe liked. The woman knew. And what could it be but love?
The woman knew; and though the tragedy of her life was so close behindher; nay, though mystery and suspicion encompassed her still, as theymight until her death, the woman thrilled.
It was a thrill of excitement chiefly, but excitement was not the onlyelement. There was the personal factor, too; there was the fascinationwhich this man had for her, which he could exert at will, and which hewas undoubtedly exerting now.
To escape from his eyes, to think but once more for herself, and byherself, Rachel rose at last, and looked from the window which lit thisrecess.
It was the usual November day in London; no sun; a mist, but not a fog;cabmen in capes, horses sliding on the muddy street, well-dressed womenpicking their way home from church--shabby women hurrying inshawls--hurrying as Rachel herself had done the night before--as shemight again to-night. And whither? And whither, in all the world?
Rachel turned from the window with a shudder; she caught up the firstnewspaper of the sheaf upon the writing-table. Steel had moved into thebody of the room; she could not even see him through the alcove. So muchthe better; she would discover for herself what they said.
Leading articles are easily found, and in a Sunday paper they are seldomlong. Rachel was soon through the first, her blood boiling; the secondshe could not finish for her tears; the third dried her eyes with thefires of fierce resentment. It was not so much what they said; it waswhat they were obviously afraid to say. It was their circumlocution,their innuendo, their mild surprise, their perfunctory congratulations,their assumption of chivalry and their lack of its essence, that woundedand stung the subject of these effusions. As she raised her flushed facefrom the last of them, Mr. Steel stood before her once more, theincarnation of all grave sympathy and consideration.
"You must not think," said he, "that my proposal admits of noalternative but the miserable one of making your own way in a suspiciousand uncharitable world. On the contrary, if I am not to be your nominaland legal husband, I still intend to be your actual friend. On the firstpoint you are to be consulted, but on the second not even you shallstand in my way. Nor in that event would I attempt to rob you of theindependence which you value so highly; on the other hand, I wouldpoint the way to an independence worth having. I am glad you have seenthose papers, though to-morrow they may be worse. Well, you may beshocked, but, if you won't have me, the worse the better, say I! Yourcase was most iniquitously commented upon before ever it came for trial;there is sure to be a fresh crop of iniquities now; but I shall be muchmistaken if you cannot mulct the more flagrant offenders in heavydamages for libel."
Rachel shivered at the thought. She was done with her case for ever andfor ever. People could think her guilty if they liked, but that the caseshould breed other cases, and thus drag on and on, and, above all, thatshe should make money out of all that past horror, what an unbearableidea!
On second thoughts, Mr. Steel agreed.
"Then you must let me send you back to Australia." No, no, no; she couldnever show her face there again, or anywhere else where she was known.She must begin life afresh, that was evident.
"It was evident to me," said Steel, quietly, "though not more so thanthe injustice of it, from the very beginning. Hence the plans andproposals that I have put before you."
Rachel regarded him wildly; the Sunday papers had driven her todesperation, as, perhaps, it was intended that they should.
"Are you sure," she cried, "that they would not know me--up north?"
"Not from Eve," he answered airily. "I should see to that;
and, besides,we should first travel, say until the summer."
"If only I _could_ begin my life again!" said Rachel to herself, butaloud, in a way that made no secret of her last, most desperateinclination.
"That is exactly what I wish you to do," Steel rejoined quietly, evengently, his hand lying lightly but kindly upon her quivering shoulder.How strong his touch, how firm, how reassuring! It was her first contactwith his hand.
"I wish it so much," he went on, "that I would have your past lifeutterly buried, even between ourselves; nay, if it were possible, evenin your own mind also! I, for my part, would undertake never to ask youone solitary question about that life--on one small and only faircondition. Supposing we make a compact now?"
"Anything to bury my own past," owned Rachel; "yes, I would doanything--anything!"
"Then you must help me to bury mine, too," he said. "I was nevermarried, but a past I have."
"I would do my best," said Rachel, "if I married you."
"You will do your best," added Steel, correcting her; "and there is mycompact cut and dried. I ask you nothing; you ask me nothing; and thereis to be no question of love between us, first or last. But we help eachother to forget--from this day forth!"
Rachel could not speak; his eyes were upon her, black, inscrutable,arrestive of her very faculties, to say nothing of her will. She couldonly answer him when he had turned away and was moving towards the door.
"Where are you going?" she cried.
"To send to my solicitor," replied Steel, "as I warned him that I might.It has all to be drawn up; and there is the question of a settlement;and other questions, perhaps, which you may like to put to him yourselfwithout delay."
The Shadow of the Rope Page 8
