The Island Pharisees

In writing this, I recollect that I myself once had the chance of passing all my life in this enviable safety, and as you may suppose, dear Madame, I curse myself that I should ever have had the courage to step beyond the boundaries of this fine tranquil state. Yet, too, there have been times when I have asked myself: “Do we really differ from the wealthy – we others, birds of the fields, who have our own philosophy, grown from the pains of needing bread – we who see that the human heart is not always an affair of figures, or of those good maxims that one finds in copy-books – do we really differ?” It is with shame that I confess to have asked myself a question so heretical. But now, when for these four weeks I have had the fortune of this rest beneath your roof, I see how wrong I was to entertain such doubts. It is a great happiness to have decided once for all this point, for it is not in my character to pass through life uncertain – mistaken, perhaps – on psychological matters such as these. No, Madame; rest happily assured that there is a great difference, which in the future will be sacred for me. For, believe me, Madame, it would be calamity for high Society if by chance there should arise amongst them any understanding of all that side of life which – vast as the plains and bitter as the sea, black as the ashes of a corpse, and yet more free than any wings of birds who fly away – is so justly beyond the grasp of their philosophy. Yes, believe me, dear Madame, there is no danger in the world so much to be avoided by all the members of that circle, most illustrious, most respectable, called high Society.

From what I have said you may imagine how hard it is for me to take my flight. I shall always keep for you the most distinguished sentiments. With the expression of my full regard for you and your good family, and of a gratitude as sincere as it is badly worded,

Believe me, dear Madame,

Your devoted

LOUIS FERRAND.

Shelton’s first impulse was to tear the letter up, but this he reflected he had no right to do. Remembering, too, that Mrs. Dennant’s French was orthodox, he felt sure she would never understand the young foreigner’s subtle innuendoes. He closed the envelope and went to bed, haunted still by Ferrand’s parting look.

It was with no small feeling of embarrassment, however, that, having sent the letter to its destination by an early footman, he made his appearance at the breakfast-table. Behind the Austrian coffee-urn, filled with French coffee, Mrs. Dennant, who had placed four eggs in a German egg-boiler, said “Good-morning,” with a kindly smile.

“Dick, an egg?” she asked him, holding up a fifth.

“No, thank you,” replied Shelton, greeting the table and fitting down.

He was a little late; the buzz of conversation rose hilariously around.

“My dear,” continued Mr. Dennant, who was talking to his youngest daughter, “you’ll have no chance whatever – not the least little bit of chance.”

“Father, what nonsense! You know we shall beat your heads off!”

“Before it ‘s too late, then, I will eat a muffin. Shelton, pass the muffins!” But in making this request, Mr. Dennant avoided looking in his face.

Antonia, too, seemed to keep her eyes away from him. She was talking to a Connoisseur on Art of supernatural appearances, and seemed in the highest spirits. Shelton rose, and, going to the sideboard, helped himself to grouse.

“Who was the young man I saw yesterday on the lawn?” he heard the Connoisseur remark. “Struck me as having an – er – quite intelligent physiog.”

His own intelligent physiog, raised at a slight slant so that he might look the better through his nose-nippers, was the very pattern of approval. “It’s curious how one’s always meeting with intelligence;” it seemed to say. Mrs. Dennant paused in the act of adding cream, and Shelton scrutinised her face; it was hare-like, and superior as ever. Thank goodness she had smelt no rat! He felt strangely disappointed.

“You mean Monsieur Ferrand, teachin’ Toddles French? Dobson, the Professor’s cup.”

“I hope I shall see him again,” cooed the Connoisseur; “he was quite interesting on the subject of young German working men. It seems they tramp from place to place to learn their trades. What nationality was he, may I ask?”

Mr. Dennant, of whom he asked this question, lifted his brows, and said,

“Ask Shelton.”

“Half Dutch, half French.”

“Very interesting breed; I hope I shall see him again.”

“Well, you won’t,” said Thea suddenly; “he’s gone.”

Shelton saw that their good breeding alone prevented all from adding, “And thank goodness, too!”

“Gone? Dear me, it’s very – ”

“Yes,” said Mr. Dennant, “very sudden.”

“Now, Algie,” murmured Mrs. Dennant, “it ‘s quite a charmin’ letter. Must have taken the poor young man an hour to write.”

“Oh, mother!” cried Antonia.

And Shelton felt his face go crimson. He had suddenly remembered that her French was better than her mother’s.

“He seems to have had a singular experience,” said the Connoisseur.

“Yes,” echoed Mr. Dennant; “he ‘s had some singular experience. If you want to know the details, ask friend Shelton; it’s quite romantic. In the meantime, my dear; another cup?”

The Connoisseur, never quite devoid of absent-minded malice, spurred his curiosity to a further effort; and, turning his well-defended eyes on Shelton, murmured,

“Well, Mr. Shelton, you are the historian, it seems.”

“There is no history,” said Shelton, without looking up.

“Ah, that’s very dull,” remarked the Connoisseur.

“My dear Dick,” said Mrs. Dennant, “that was really a most touchin’ story about his goin’ without food in Paris.”

Shelton shot another look at Antonia; her face was frigid. “I hate your d – d superiority!” he thought, staring at the Connoisseur.

“There’s nothing,” said that gentleman, “more enthralling than starvation. Come, Mr Shelton.”

“I can’t tell stories,” said Shelton; “never could.”

He cared not a straw for Ferrand, his coming, going, or his history; for, looking at Antonia, his heart was heavy.

CHAPTER XXX

THE LADY FROM BEYOND

The morning was sultry, brooding, steamy. Antonia was at her music, and from the room where Shelton tried to fix attention on a book he could hear her practising her scales with a cold fury that cast an added gloom upon his spirit. He did not see her until lunch, and then she again sat next the Connoisseur. Her cheeks were pale, but there was something feverish in her chatter to her neighbour; she still refused to look at Shelton. He felt very miserable. After lunch, when most of them had left the table, the rest fell to discussing country neighbours.

“Of course,” said Mrs. Dennant, “there are the Foliots; but nobody calls on them.”

“Ah!” said the Connoisseur, “the Foliots – the Foliots – the people – er – who – quite so!”

“It’s really distressin’. she looks so sweet ridin’ about. Many people with worse stories get called on,” continued Mrs. Dennant, with that large frankness of intrusion upon doubtful subjects which may be made by certain people in a certain way, “but, after all, one couldn’t ask them to meet anybody.”

“No,” the Connoisseur assented. “I used to know Foliot. Thousand pities. They say she was a very pretty woman.”

“Oh, not pretty!” said Mrs. Dennant! “more interestin than pretty, I should say.”

Shelton, who knew the lady slightly, noticed that they spoke of her as in the past. He did not look towards Antonia; for, though a little troubled at her presence while such a subject was discussed, he hated his conviction that her face, was as unruffled as though the Foliots had been a separate species. There was, in fact, a curiosity about her eyes, a faint impatience on her lips; she was rolling little crumbs of bread. Suddenly yawning, she muttered some remark, and rose. Shelton stopped her at the door.

“Where are you going?”

“For a walk.”

“May n’t I come?”.

She shook her head.

“I ‘m going to take Toddles.”

Shelton held the door open, and went back to the table.

“Yes,” the Connoisseur said, sipping at his sherry, “I ‘m afraid it’s all over with young Foliot.”

“Such a pity!” murmured Mrs. Dennant, and her kindly face looked quite disturbed. “I’ve known him ever since he was a boy. Of course, I think he made a great mistake to bring her down here. Not even bein’ able to get married makes it doubly awkward. Oh, I think he made a great mistake!”

“Ah!” said the Connoisseur, “but d’ you suppose that makes much difference? Even if What ‘s – his-name gave her a divorce, I don’t think, don’t you know, that – ”

“Oh, it does! So many people would be inclined to look over it in time. But as it is it’s hopeless, quite. So very awkward for people, too, meetin’ them about. The Telfords and the Butterwicks – by the way, they’re comin’ here to dine to-night – live near them, don’t you know.”

“Did you ever meet her before-er-before the flood?” the Connoisseur inquired; and his lips parting and unexpectedly revealing teeth gave him a shadowy resemblance to a goat.

“Yes; I did meet her once at the Branksomes’. I thought her quite a charmin’ person.”

“Poor fellow!” said the Connoisseur; “they tell me he was going to take the hounds.”

“And there are his delightful coverts, too. Algie often used to shoot there, and now they say he just has his brother down to shoot with him. It’s really quite too melancholy! Did you know him, Dick?”

“Foliot?” replied Shelton absently. “No; I never met him: I’ve seen her once or twice at Ascot.”

Through the window he could see Antonia in her scarlet Tam-o’-shanter, swinging her stick, and he got up feigning unconcern. Just then Toddles came bounding up against his sister. They went off arm in arm. She had seen him at the window, yet she gave no friendly glance; Shelton felt more miserable than ever. He stepped out upon the drive. There was a lurid, gloomy canopy above; the elm-trees drooped their heavy blackish green, the wonted rustle of the aspen-tree was gone, even the rooks were silent. A store of force lay heavy on the heart of nature. He started pacing slowly up and down, his pride forbidding him to follow her, and presently sat down on an old stone seat that faced the road. He stayed a long time staring at the elms, asking himself what he had done and what he ought to do. And somehow he was frightened. A sense of loneliness was on him, so real, so painful, that he shivered in the sweltering heat. He was there, perhaps, an hour, alone, and saw nobody pass along the road. Then came the sound of horse’s hoofs, and at the same time he heard a motor-car approaching from the opposite direction. The rider made appearance first, riding a grey horse with an Arab’s high set head and tail. She was holding him with difficulty, for the whirr of the approaching car grew every moment louder. Shelton rose; the car flashed by. He saw the horse stagger in the gate-way, crushing its rider up against the gatepost.

He ran, but before he reached the gate the lady was on foot, holding the plunging horse’s bridle.

“Are you hurt?” cried Shelton breathlessly, and he, too, grabbed the bridle. “Those beastly cars!”

“I don’t know,” she said. “Please don’t; he won’t let strangers touch him.”

Shelton let go, and watched her coax the horse. She was rather tall, dressed in a grey habit, with a grey Russian cap upon her head, and he suddenly recognised the Mrs. Foliot whom they had been talking of at lunch.

“He ‘ll be quiet now,” she said, “if you would n’t mind holding him a minute.”

She gave the reins to him, and leaned against the gate. She was very pale.

“I do hope he has n’t hurt you,” Shelton said. He was quite close to her, well able to see her face – a curious face with high cheek-bones and a flatfish moulding, enigmatic, yet strangely passionate for all its listless pallor. Her smiling, tightened lips were pallid; pallid, too, her grey and deep-set eyes with greenish tints; above all, pale the ashy mass of hair coiled under her grey cap.

“Th-thanks!” she said; “I shall be all right directly. I’m sorry to have made a fuss.”

She bit her lips and smiled.

“I ‘m sure you’re hurt; do let me go for – ” stammered Shelton. “I can easily get help.”

“Help!” she said, with a stony little laugh; “oh, no, thanks!”

She left the gate, and crossed the road to where he held the horse. Shelton, to conceal embarrassment, looked at the horse’s legs, and noticed that the grey was resting one of them. He ran his hand down.

“I ‘m afraid,” he said, “your horse has knocked his off knee; it’s swelling.”

She smiled again.

“Then we’re both cripples.”

“He’ll be lame when he gets cold. Would n’t you like to put him in the stable here? I ‘m sure you ought to drive home.”

“No, thanks; if I ‘m able to ride him he can carry me. Give me a hand up.”

Her voice sounded as though something had offended her. Rising from inspection of the horse’s leg, Shelton saw Antonia and Toddles standing by. They had come through a wicketgate leading from the fields.

The latter ran up to him at once.

“We saw it,” he whispered – “jolly smash-up. Can’t I help?”

“Hold his bridle,” answered Shelton, and he looked from one lady to the other.

There are moments when the expression of a face fixes itself with painful clearness; to Shelton this was such a moment. Those two faces close together, under their coverings of scarlet and of grey, showed a contrast almost cruelly vivid. Antonia was flushed, her eyes had grown deep blue; her look of startled doubt had passed and left a question in her face.

“Would you like to come in and wait? We could send you home, in the brougham,” she said.

The lady called Mrs. Foliot stood, one arm across the crupper of her saddle, biting her lips and smiling still her enigmatic smile, and it was her face that stayed most vividly on Shelton’s mind, its ashy hail, its pallor, and fixed, scornful eyes.

“Oh, no, thanks! You’re very kind.”

Out of Antonia’s face the timid, doubting friendliness had fled, and was replaced by enmity. With a long, cold look at both of them she turned away. Mrs. Foliot gave a little laugh, and raised her foot for Shelton’s help. He heard a hiss of pain as he swung her up, but when he looked at her she smiled.

“Anyway,” he said impatiently, “let me come and see you don’t break down.”

She shook her head. “It ‘s only two miles. I’m not made of sugar.”

“Then I shall simply have to follow.”

She shrugged her shoulders, fixing her resolute eyes on him.

“Would that boy like to come?” she asked.

Toddles left the horse’s head.

“By Jove!” he cried. “Would n’t I just!”

“Then,” she said, “I think that will be best. You ‘ve been so kind.”

She bowed, smiled inscrutably once more, touched the Arab with her whip, and started, Toddles trotting at her side.

Shelton was left with Antonia underneath the elms. A sudden puff of tepid air blew in their faces, like a warning message from the heavy, purple heat clouds; low rumbling thunder travelled slowly from afar.

“We’re going to have a storm,” he said.

Antonia nodded. She was pale now, and her face still wore its cold look of offence.

“I ‘ve got a headache,” she said, “I shall go in and lie down.”

Shelton tried to speak, but something kept him silent – submission to what was coming, like the mute submission of the fields and birds to the menace of the storm.

He watched her go, and went back to his seat. And the silence seemed to grow; the flowers ceased to exude their fragrance, numbed by the weighty air. All the long house behind him seemed asleep, deserted. No noise came forth, no laughter, the echo of no music, the ringing of no bell; the heat had wrapped it round with drowsiness. And the silence added to the solitude within him. What an unlucky chance, that woman’s accident! Designed by Providence to put Antonia further from him than before! Why was not the world composed of the immaculate alone? He started pacing up and down, tortured by a dreadful heartache.

“I must get rid of this,” he thought. “I ‘ll go for a good tramp, and chance the storm.”

Leaving the drive he ran on Toddles, returning in the highest spirits.

“I saw her home,” he crowed. “I say, what a ripper, isn’t she? She ‘ll be as lame as a tree to-morrow; so will the gee. Jolly hot!”

This meeting showed Shelton that he had been an hour on the stone seat; he had thought it some ten minutes, and the discovery alarmed him. It seemed to bring the import of his miserable fear right home to him. He started with a swinging stride, keeping his eyes fixed on the road, the perspiration streaming down his face.

CHAPTER XXXI

THE STORM

It was seven and more when Shelton returned, from his walk; a few heat drops had splashed the leaves, but the storm had not yet broken. In brooding silence the world seemed pent beneath the purple firmament.

By rapid walking in the heat Shelton had got rid of his despondency. He felt like one who is to see his mistress after long estrangement. He, bathed, and, straightening his tie-ends, stood smiling at the glass. His fear, unhappiness, and doubts seemed like an evil dream; how much worse off would he not have been, had it all been true?

It was dinner-party night, and when he reached the drawing-room the guests were there already, chattering of the coming storm. Antonia was not yet down, and Shelton stood by the piano waiting for her entry. Red faces, spotless shirt-fronts, white arms; and freshly-twisted hair were all around him. Some one handed him a clove carnation, and, as he held it to his nose, Antonia came in, breathless, as though she had rushed down-stairs, Her cheeks were pale no longer; her hand kept stealing to her throat. The flames of the coming storm seemed to have caught fire within her, to be scorching her in her white frock; she passed him close, and her fragrance whipped his senses.

She had never seemed to him so lovely.

Never again will Shelton breathe the perfume of melons and pineapples without a strange emotion. From where he sat at dinner he could not see Antonia, but amidst the chattering of voices, the clink of glass and silver, the sights and sounds and scents of feasting, he thought how he would go to her and say that nothing mattered but her love. He drank the frosted, pale-gold liquid of champagne as if it had been water.

The windows stood wide open in the heat; the garden lay in thick, soft shadow, where the pitchy shapes of trees could be discerned. There was not a breath of air to fan the candle-flames above the flowers; but two large moths, fearful of the heavy dark, flew in and wheeled between the lights over the diners’ heads. One fell scorched into a dish of fruit, and was removed; the other, eluding all the swish of napkins and the efforts of the footmen, continued to make soft, fluttering rushes till Shelton rose and caught it in his hand. He took it to the window and threw it out into the darkness, and he noticed that the air was thick and tepid to his face. At a sign from Mr. Dennant the muslin curtains were then drawn across the windows, and in gratitude, perhaps, for this protection, this filmy barrier between them and the muffled threats of Nature, everyone broke out in talk. It was such a night as comes in summer after perfect weather, frightening in its heat, and silence, which was broken by the distant thunder travelling low along the ground like the muttering of all dark places on the earth – such a night as seems, by very breathlessness, to smother life, and with its fateful threats to justify man’s cowardice.

The ladies rose at last. The circle of the rosewood dining-table, which had no cloth, strewn with flowers and silver gilt, had a likeness to some autumn pool whose brown depths of oily water gleam under the sunset with red and yellow leaves; above it the smoke of cigarettes was clinging, like a mist to water when the sun goes down. Shelton became involved in argument with his neighbour on the English character.

“In England we’ve mislaid the recipe of life,” he said. “Pleasure’s a lost art. We don’t get drunk, we’re ashamed of love, and as to beauty, we’ve lost the eye for’ it. In exchange we have got money, but what ‘s the good of money when we don’t know how to spend it?” Excited by his neighbour’s smile, he added: “As to thought, we think so much of what our neighbours think that we never think at all… Have you ever watched a foreigner when he’s listening to an Englishman? We ‘re in the habit of despising foreigners; the scorn we have for them is nothing to the scorn they have for us. And they are right! Look at our taste! What is the good of owning riches if we don’t know how to use them?”

“That’s rather new to me,” his neighbour said. “There may be something in it… Did you see that case in the papers the other day of old Hornblower, who left the 1820 port that fetched a guinea a bottle? When the purchaser – poor feller! – came to drink it he found eleven bottles out of twelve completely ullaged – ha! ha! Well, there’s nothing wrong with this”; and he drained his glass.

“No,” answered Shelton.

When they rose to join the ladies, he slipped out on the lawn.

At once he was enveloped in a bath of heat. A heavy odour, sensual, sinister, was in the air, as from a sudden flowering of amorous shrubs. He stood and drank it in with greedy nostrils. Putting his hand down, he felt the grass; it was dry, and charged with electricity. Then he saw, pale and candescent in the blackness, three or four great lilies, the authors of that perfume. The blossoms seemed to be rising at him through the darkness; as though putting up their faces to be kissed. He straightened himself abruptly and went in.

The guests were leaving when Shelton, who was watching; saw Antonia slip through the drawing-room window. He could follow the white glimmer of her frock across the lawn, but lost it in the shadow of the trees; casting a hasty look to see that he was not observed, he too slipped out. The blackness and the heat were stifling he took great breaths of it as if it were the purest mountain air, and, treading softly on the grass, stole on towards the holm oak. His lips were dry, his heart beat painfully. The mutter of the distant thunder had quite ceased; waves of hot air came wheeling in his face, and in their midst a sudden rush of cold. He thought, “The storm is coming now!” and stole on towards the tree. She was lying in the hammock, her figure a white blur in, the heart of the tree’s shadow, rocking gently to a little creaking of the branch. Shelton held his breath; she had not heard him. He crept up close behind the trunk till he stood in touch of her. “I mustn’t startle her,” he thought. “Antonia!”

There was a faint stir in the hammock, but no answer. He stood over her, but even then he could not see her face; he only, had a sense of something breathing and alive within a yard of him – of something warm and soft. He whispered again, “Antonia!” but again there came no answer, and a sort of fear and frenzy seized on him. He could no longer hear her breathe; the creaking of the branch had ceased. What was passing in that silent, living creature there so close? And then he heard again the sound of breathing, quick and scared, like the fluttering of a bird; in a moment he was staring in the dark at an empty hammock.

He stayed beside the empty hammock till he could bear uncertainty no longer. But as he crossed the lawn the sky was rent from end to end by jagged lightning, rain spattered him from head to foot, and with a deafening crack the thunder broke.

He sought the smoking-room, but, recoiling at the door, went to his own room, and threw himself down on the bed. The thunder groaned and sputtered in long volleys; the lightning showed him the shapes of things within the room, with a weird distinctness that rent from them all likeness to the purpose they were made for, bereaved them of utility, of their matter-of-factness, presented them as skeletons, abstractions, with indecency in their appearance, like the naked nerves and sinews of a leg preserved in, spirit. The sound of the rain against the house stunned his power of thinking, he rose to shut his windows; then, returning to his bed, threw himself down again. He stayed there till the storm was over, in a kind of stupor; but when the boom of the retreating thunder grew every minute less distinct, he rose. Then for the first time he saw something white close by the door.