Comin' Thro' the Rye (Mathers)/Summer/Chapter 12
CHAPTER XII.
"Where fair is not, praise cannot mend the brow."
Out in the garden I am pacing up and down, up and down through the silver bars and the dark shadows, backwards and forwards as for a wager, trying to trample out the aching pain in my heart, as many a man and woman has tried before me and will try after me, in vain. And only a week ago at this hour I was so happy, so happy! And by this day twelve months I shall, perhaps, have got rid of this ugly ache, and be moderately happy again, but, oh! I never knew the prospect of a cheerful to-morrow bring any comfort to a chilly to-day; it is the present hour that we hold fast between our hands that is our care. It is a pleasant thing, is it not, to find that your heart has slipped away out of your safe keeping, and knocked at the wrong door, and that your affections have set in a broad, liberal stream towards a man who wants none of them, who has even been at the pains to tell you he is in love with somebody else? My cheeks burn, my foot presses deep into the grass, as I wither under the shameful thought; taking all due blame to myself, has he not been somewhat in fault, did he not mislead me by his looks and words? Bah! it was all my own wretched vanity; could not a man be kind and friendly with me, but I must suppose he had lost his head, and fall in love with him myself, a little fool! as though I had never had a lover, or heard a love word in my life, and was ready to leap at the ghostliest shadow of a man's light fancy!
I stand still to think, suddenly, of how thoroughly George is avenged, of how I have come to suffer all the pains that I laid on him; I can feel for him now, my poor fellow! as I never felt before; truly pity is sometimes a selfish thing. I think that, considering our youth and the few opportunities that we have had of gambling, George and I show as clean a sheet of bankruptcy in our heart affairs as could be seen anywhere. We shall be able to mingle our sighs and groans in a pleasing duet by the river side, for I know now very certainly that, difficult as I have always found it to look upon George as my future husband, when nothing more than a girl's idle fancy stood between, we are now as utterly separated as though either or both of us lay in our coffins.
His instinct warned him truly, when he stood before me and entreated me not to come on this visit! had I not in truth done better to stay at Silverbridge? Might I not have come to love my yellow-haired laddie, and never had my heart wakened by the Prince Charming who came too late? My heart is sore as I think of the words I shall have to speak to him, sweet, pleasant-sounding words, bright with truth; "I have fallen in love with somebody, George, who is in love with somebody else." That is plain enough at all events. I think I must have loved that other ever since the old Charteris days without knowing it. Was it his memory, I wonder, that made my eyes so fastidious when they rested on George? Was I ever unconsciously comparing my fair-browed lover with the dark strong face that I had seen soften and pale under the lips of the woman he loved, and who loved him? Were George's Bunny blue eyes but handsome, commom-place bits of colour beside those splendid dark ones, that flash and burn and subjugate and sway my heart with their masterful will as none ever did or could?
We shall be a lovelorn assembly at Silverbridge: the thought of how everybody will be in love with everybody else provokes an unwilling smile from me. George is in love with me, I am in love with Paul, Paul is in love with somebody else: now if she would only come to Silverbridge and fall in love with George, we should be the most amusing partie carrée of lovers that the world ever saw, and our united sighs would form a high wind wherever we went. In time of drought we might go out in a body and water the land, and at all the funerals in the neighbourhood our looks would be far more grief-inspiring than any amount of well-fed, sober-faced mutes. I wonder if I shall always be able to see my misfortunes in a ludicrous light, no matter how painfully I smart under them?
Will Paul expect me to listen to the tale of his lady-love's perfections? I am puzzled to know why he should have told me of her at all, for clearly he has told no one else here. Probably he has favoured me with his notice because he has all along had me in his eye as a nice comfortable sort of person to whom he can maunder on by the hour about his charmer's perfections. I told him when I came here that I would be gooseberry to him; has he taken me at my word, and is going to make a listening one of me? I have always been afraid that he would come under Silvia's influence again, but he has not.
Paul Vasher is neither a weak nor a forgiving man. I like these strong, deep natures: the impulsive, pleasant-mannered, facile folk may be twice as lovable, but they are like sand, and that which they receive quickly is as quickly effaced; while the favour of the proud, reserved man or woman is precious and rare, since it is vouchsafed to but few. I should like to know what Silvia would say if she knew? For all her indifference, I have caught some strange glances shot at Paul's unconscious face, and several times lately perceived her watching me with a keen intentness that tells a different story to her idle, listless ways, and nonchalant, careless speech.
How the men are laughing in the dining-room! What guffaws and explosions and exhausted roars peal forth! Something vulgar is on the tapis, I am certain, for I have long since learned that anything broad appeals irresistibly to man, whether he be prince or potman, prelate or parson, learned sage or simple squire; men's hearts warm to each other over a good joke, and Shakespeare might as well have written, "A touch of vulgarity makes the whole world kin," as "nature." In the drawing-room the married ladies are holding up their hands, and relating to each other stories tending to the discredit of their men and maids in waiting, who are, strange to say, addicted to much the same vices and weaknesses as their masters and mistresses (such presumption!), only, poor souls! they are not delicate over them; and romance without an "h" to bless itself with does not appeal to the imagination as the more aristocratic failings of their betters do.
You, Sarah Ann, who have been discovered with Jeames's arm pressing your too adaptive form, are a bold-faced, abandoned hussey, and out you must pack without a character, and with a scanty wage; and you, Jeames, are a shameless varlet, who ought to be above such lowness, but as you are not, there is not much difficulty in prophesying your end. You neither of you seem to be aware that only rich people, high people, good people (so called from a polite fiction, for is not the best society the worst?) can be immoral with impunity, and embrace other men's wives and daughters when they please; to be wicked with safety you must roll in a carriage, and keep your unlawful assignations with a coachman and footman to vouch for your respectability. Sarah Ann is married and her husband has left her, and Jeames is married and his wife has left him, but as neither of them are rich enough to procure a divorce, and since (as I have said before) they are not in that state of life where their flirtations would be pleasantly winked at, I fear the poor woman will go down, down, down!
Birkhead was drunk the other night, could anything be more disgusting? All his life he has seen gentlemen with hard heads drinking a great deal more than is good for them; he has a weak one, but is indecent enough to wish to be convivial "below stairs" too, and, of course, came to grief. Now drunkenness, sitting hiccoughing at the head of its table, and able to offer its guests the choicest wines is one thing, and drunkenness in low life, without a cellar to bless itself with, is another. Faugh! send him away, and let him not come 'twixt the air and our nobility; that man will die in a workhouse.
Silvia comes stepping across the grass all in white; is she restless, I wonder, like me? Bad as my thoughts are I would rather have them than her company, so I move away towards the terrace; but she calls to me—
"Helen Adair! Helen Adair!"
She has that most excellent thing in woman, a low, sweet voice.
"I wonder what she wants with me?" I say to myself, as I go slowly towards the seat she has taken. Our conversation has always been of the baldest; if, indeed, she can ever be said to converse with any woman.
"Did you call me?"
"Yes; sit down here for a few minutes, it is miserable out here alone. How long have you had a fancy for moonlight walks?" she asks, leaning her shapely head against the wooden seat; "for my part I always hated the moon, a great empty, bare splendour that chills one."
She shivers and draws her shawl closely about her—and, indeed, these September nights are growing treacherous. Looking down at her feet I see that she has adopted the sensible precaution of thick boots, as I have done.
"How those men are laughing," she says, "at some racy story, no doubt. Paul Vasher's lungs seem to be in a satisfactory state. Have you and he been quarrelling?" she says, turning her head till her eyes rest on my face.
"I did not know it."
"Sir George and I have both remarked it. Until a week ago you were inseparable, now you are conspicuous by your distance from each other."
Some slight intangible insolence in her tone gives flavour to her words, and warns me that she means mischief; and, indeed, I might have known her better than to suppose that she would take the trouble to come out here to talk commonplaces; but since she has thrown the gauntlet down, I will not fear to take it up.
"You do me too much honour," I say, quietly," and him. We should never have taken the trouble to watch the affairs of you and Sir George Vestris so closely."
And as I meet her eyes full under the moonlight, I smile scornfully, securely. How heavy my heart is she shall not know, and of her pity I shall have none, therefore rally to my side coolness, disdain, indifference. As I look into her face with a fuller knowledge of the truth than she possesses, I can see clearly enough that she believes me to be her rival, that she is jealous; I see that the love Paul believed to be long dead lives as fiercely and hotly in her as ever, and at this moment we read each other's hearts, see each other as we really are . . . henceforth no shams or subterfuges will rise up between Silvia Fleming and me! She looks away.
"May I then be allowed to congratulate you on your felicity?"
With the intonation she gives these words, they sound more like a menace than a politeness.
"When you will condescend to explain yourself, I may possibly be able to answer you, Miss Fleming." (How I must have disliked this girl all my life, to flare up so heartily at a moment's notice!)
"You are rather slow of comprehension to-night! I allude, of course, to your engagement with Paul Vasher."
A smile parts my lips as I listen to her. How sweet those words sound, spoken even by an enemy's tongue! For a moment I forget the woman by my side, and that she waits my answer; I am looking at a happy, far-away picture, that makes my eyes ache with longing; only in dreamland does it exist, in reality it never will. . . .
"And it is so," says a low, breathless voice by my side. "You sit there smiling; you dare to mock me with your gladness. . . ."
Her words come hurrying out as though past her control. For the second time in her life, Silvia drops the mask before me; for the second time in my life I see her as she is.
"Let me tell you this, Helen Adair, that you will never be Paul Vasher's wife, never!"
"I have not aspired to that honour," I answer, quietly; "have you? I should not, were I you!"
"You have such faith in your powers of keeping him?" she asks, scoffingly.
"I have much faith in the power of the woman he loves. Pray, do not put yourself out!" I say, looking away from her pale face to the pearly sea beyond; we need not quarrel over Paul Vasher, since he is neither yours nor mine."
"Not yours?" she repeats, staring at me, while a swift surprise dashes all the triumphant scorn out of her face, "whose is he then?"
"Some stranger's."
"And her name?"
"I do not know it."
"And so he was amusing himself with you all that time?" she says.
"You can call it that, if it so pleases you."
"And he told you this himself?" she says.
But I do not answer, and she goes on like one who is thinking hard and deep.
"I do not believe it. It is you whom he loves. . . . . I have watched him———"
I turn my head away, that she may not see the pallor that has crept over my face. Others were deceived by his manner to me, then; I have not been the only mistaken one.
"It is all the same," she says, indifferently. "I told you that you should never be Paul's wife, and you never shall, but neither shall any other woman."
"Are you mad?" I ask contemptuously, for the shameless, godless selfishness of the creature angers me deeply. Does she give one thought to him? She would trample his life beneath her feet rather than see another woman take the place she once filled; that which she calls love is one corrupt, foul adoration of self.
"I am glad you love him," she says, with a malicious cruelty of look and word that sets ill upon her fair, innocent-looking beauty. (No wonder Paul thought he had found his spotless white flower at last when he beheld her; no angel could boast a more perfectly fair face!) "Glad that there is some one who will suffer as I have suffered, endure what I have endured, weary for him as I have wearied."
"Hush!" I say, rising and lifting my hand; "do not dare to link my name with yours, or call your wicked passion for Paul Vasher love! You, who would sacrifice his whole life to grasp your own paltry, pitiful wish—you dare to call that loving him? No wonder you never kept him? Thank God, I can love him better than that! I wish I had been lovely, for his sake. . . . I should have liked to be good, for his sake . . . . He might have loved me then, but even as it is, and though he never loved me, while he loved you once (you should never forget that), my love for him has only taught me sweet and tender and sorrowful things; it has not set a flood of wild, impious passion ravening through my heart, as it has done through yours. If I could have my empty heart back again, I would not, for if he has brought me pain he has also given me an exquisite happiness. And since you never truly loved him, or as he ought to be loved, I tell you now that, however low you stoop, you will never win him back; though Satan were your bondsman, and delivered Paul Vasher's body over to you, you could not touch his soul, his mind, or his heart, they are dead to you now and always. And now go your way, fight your fight, do your worst—win him if you can, Silvia; but if the memory of the girl he loves do not protect him from your unwomanly pursuit, believe me when I say that in his integrity you have an enemy that will never yield to you. By fair means you will not win him; from foul ones may God protect him."
And I move away and leave her with that faint, wintry, strange smile on her face that I have so often tried to read and cannot. How cool and peaceful the sleeping garden looks! how fair the silver-braided sky! how hot and angry is my passionate, indignant, outraged heart! It was hard enough to bear my shame of lovelessness in my own eyes; it is something harder to have that sneering, evil woman speak openly of it. For she is wicked; I know it now, and that the intangible dislike and distrust I have always had for her is a well-grounded one, and that she means mischief to the man she professes to love. Does she love him, though? There was more of hate than tenderness in her voice just now. How can she reach or do him harm? A woman is so bound by the trammels of society, she cannot watch and baulk him in life as a man might do; perhaps after all it is mere empty talk and babble; and, granted that she has the wish to cross him, she is not likely to have the power. She seemed in earnest, but she was jealous; I saw it in her eyes, and that threw her off her guard and made her talk wildly.
We must have looked very nice just now—two women quarrelling over one man! There is an intense vulgarity in the situation, whether the actors be clad in silk and velvet, or homespun and duffle-grey; perhaps, though, the fact of his being not in the least in love with either of us somewhat lessens the disgrace. And all through my night dreams, ringing now near, now far away, sometimes in my ears, sometimes seeming to call faintly across the long years, comes a bitter, silvern voice, saying, "You will never be Paul Vasher's wife—never."