The Patrician

Standing there, gripping the wall, it seemed to Harbinger that there were no words left in the world. Not even his worst enemy could have called this young man romantic; yet that figure beside him, the gleam of her neck and her pale cheek in the dark, gave him perhaps the most poignant glimpse of mystery that he had ever had. His mind, essentially that of a man of affairs, by nature and by habit at home amongst the material aspects of things, was but gropingly conscious that here, in this dark night, and the dark sea, and the pale figure of this girl whose heart was dark to him and secret, there was perhaps something – yes, something – which surpassed the confines of his philosophy, something beckoning him on out of his snug compound into the desert of divinity. If so, it was soon gone in the aching of his senses at the scent of her hair, and the longing to escape from this weird silence.

“Babs,” he said; “have you forgiven me?”

Her answer came, without turn of head, natural, indifferent:

“Yes – I told you so.”

“Is that all you have to say to a fellow?”

“What shall we talk about – the running of Casetta?”

Deep down within him Harbinger uttered a noiseless oath. Something sinister was making her behave like this to him! It was that fellow – that fellow! And suddenly he said:

“Tell me this – ” then speech seemed to stick in his throat. No! If there were anything in that, he preferred not to hear it. There was a limit!

Down below, a pair of lovers passed, very silent, their arms round each other’s waists.

Barbara turned and walked away towards the house.

CHAPTER XI

The days when Miltoun was first allowed out of bed were a time of mingled joy and sorrow to her who had nursed him. To see him sitting up, amazed at his own weakness, was happiness, yet to think that he would be no more wholly dependent, no more that sacred thing, a helpless creature, brought her the sadness of a mother whose child no longer needs her. With every hour he would now get farther from her, back into the fastnesses of his own spirit. With every hour she would be less his nurse and comforter, more the woman he loved. And though that thought shone out in the obscure future like a glamorous flower, it brought too much wistful uncertainty to the present. She was very tired, too, now that all excitement was over – so tired that she hardly knew what she did or where she moved. But a smile had become so faithful to her eyes that it clung there above the shadows of fatigue, and kept taking her lips prisoner.

Between the two bronze busts she had placed a bowl of lilies of the valley; and every free niche in that room of books had a little vase of roses to welcome Miltoun’s return.

He was lying back in his big leather chair, wrapped in a Turkish gown of Lord Valleys’ – on which Barbara had laid hands, having failed to find anything resembling a dressing-gown amongst her brother’s austere clothing. The perfume of lilies had overcome the scent of books, and a bee, dusky, adventurer, filled the room with his pleasant humming.

They did not speak, but smiled faintly, looking at one another. In this still moment, before passion had returned to claim its own, their spirits passed through the sleepy air, and became entwined, so that neither could withdraw that soft, slow, encountering glance. In mutual contentment, each to each, close as music to the strings of a violin, their spirits clung – so lost, the one in the other, that neither for that brief time seemed to know which was self.

In fulfilment of her resolution, Lady Valleys, who had returned to Town by a morning train, started with Barbara for the Temple about three in the after noon, and stopped at the doctor’s on the way. The whole thing would be much simpler if Eustace were fit to be moved at once to Valleys House; and with much relief she found that the doctor saw no danger in this course. The recovery had been remarkable – touch and go for bad brain fever just avoided! Lord Miltoun’s constitution was extremely sound. Yes, he would certainly favour a removal. His rooms were too confined in this weather. Well nursed – (decidedly) Oh; yes! Quite! And the doctor’s eyes became perhaps a trifle more intense. Not a professional, he understood. It might be as well to have another nurse, if they were making the change. They would have this lady knocking up. Just so! Yes, he would see to that. An ambulance carriage he thought advisable. That could all be arranged for this afternoon – at once – he himself would look to it. They might take Lord Miltoun off just as he was; the men would know what to do. And when they had him at Valleys House, the moment he showed interest in his food, down to the sea-down to the sea! At this time of year nothing like it! Then with regard to nourishment, he would be inclined already to shove in a leetle stimulant, a thimbleful perhaps four times a day with food – not without – mixed with an egg, with arrowroot, with custard. A week would see him on his legs, a fortnight at the sea make him as good a man as ever. Overwork – burning the candle – a leetlemore would have seen a very different state of things! Quite so! quite so! Would come round himself before dinner, and make sure. His patient might feel it just at first! He bowed Lady Valleys out; and when she had gone, sat down at his telephone with a smile flickering on his clean-cut lips.

Greatly fortified by this interview, Lady Valleys rejoined her daughter in the ear; but while it slid on amongst the multitudinous traffic, signs of unwonted nervousness began to start out through the placidity of her face.

“I wish, my dear,” she said suddenly, “that someone else had to do this. Suppose Eustace refuses!”

“He won’t,” Barbara answered; “she looks so tired, poor dear. Besides – ”

Lady Valleys gazed with curiosity at that young face, which had flushed pink. Yes, this daughter of hers was a woman already, with all a woman’s intuitions. She said gravely:

“It was a rash stroke of yours, Babs; let’s hope it won’t lead to disaster.”

Barbara bit her lips.

“If you’d seen him as I saw him! And, what disaster? Mayn’t they love each other, if they want?”

Lady Valleys swallowed a grimace. It was so exactly her own point of view. And yet – !

“That’s only the beginning,” she said; “you forget the sort of boy Eustace is.”

“Why can’t the poor thing be let out of her cage?” cried Barbara. “What good does it do to anyone? Mother, if ever, when I am married, I want to get free, I will!”

The tone of her voice was so quivering, and unlike the happy voice of Barbara, that Lady Valleys involuntarily caught hold of her hand and squeezed it hard.

“My dear sweet,” she said, “don’t let’s talk of such gloomy things.”

“I mean it. Nothing shall stop me.”

But Lady Valleys’ face had suddenly become rather grim.

“So we think, child; it’s not so simple.”

“It can’t be worse, anyway,” muttered Barbara, “than being buried alive as that wretched woman is.”

For answer Lady Valleys only murmured:

“The doctor promised that ambulance carriage at four o’clock. What am I going to say?”

“She’ll understand when you look at her. She’s that sort.”

The door was opened to them by Mrs. Noel herself.

It was the first time Lady Valleys had seen her in a house, and there was real curiosity mixed with the assurance which masked her nervousness. A pretty creature, even lovely! But the quite genuine sympathy in her words: “I am truly grateful. You must be quite worn out,” did not prevent her adding hastily: “The doctor says he must be got home out of these hot rooms. We’ll wait here while you tell him.”

And then she saw that it was true; this woman was the sort who understood.

Left in the dark passage, she peered round at Barbara.

The girl was standing against the wall with her head thrown back. Lady Valleys could not see her face; but she felt all of a sudden exceedingly uncomfortable, and whispered:

“Two murders and a theft, Babs; wasn’t it ‘Our Mutual Friend’?”

“Mother!”

“What?”

“Her face! When you’re going to throw away a flower, it looks at you!”

“My dear!” murmured Lady Valleys, thoroughly distressed, “what things you’re saying to-day!”

This lurking in a dark passage, this whispering girl – it was all queer, unlike an experience in proper life.

And then through the reopened door she saw Miltoun, stretched out in a chair, very pale, but still with that look about his eyes and lips, which of all things in the world had a chastening effect on Lady Valleys, making her feel somehow incurably mundane.

She said rather timidly:

“I’m so glad you’re better, dear. What a time you must have had! It’s too bad that I knew nothing till yesterday!”

But Miltoun’s answer was, as usual, thoroughly disconcerting.

“Thanks, yes! I have had a perfect time – and have now to pay for it, I suppose.”

Held back by his smile from bending to kiss him, poor Lady Valleys fidgeted from head to foot. A sudden impulse of sheer womanliness caused a tear to fall on his hand.

When Miltoun perceived that moisture, he said:

“It’s all right, mother. I’m quite willing to come.”

Still wounded by his voice, Lady Valleys hardened instantly. And while preparing for departure she watched the two furtively. They hardly looked at one another, and when they did, their eyes baffled her. The expression was outside her experience, belonging as it were to a different world, with its faintly smiling, almost shining, gravity.

Vastly relieved when Miltoun, covered with a fur, had been taken down to the carriage, she lingered to speak to Mrs. Noel.

“We owe you a great debt. It might have been so much worse. You mustn’t be disconsolate. Go to bed and have a good long rest.” And from the door, she murmured again: “He will come and thank you, when he’s well.”

Descending the stone stairs, she thought: “‘Anonyma’ – ‘Anonyma’ – yes, it was quite the name.” And suddenly she saw Barbara come running up again.

“What is it, Babs?”

Barbara answered:

“Eustace would like some of those lilies.” And, passing Lady Valleys, she went on up to Miltoun’s chambers.

Mrs. Noel was not in the sitting-room, and going to the bedroom door, the girl looked in.

She was standing by the bed, drawing her hand over and over the white surface of the pillow. Stealing noiselessly back, Barbara caught up the bunch of lilies, and fled.

CHAPTER XII

Miltoun, whose constitution, had the steel-like quality of Lady Casterley’s, had a very rapid convalescence. And, having begun to take an interest in his food, he was allowed to travel on the seventh day to Sea House in charge of Barbara.

The two spent their time in a little summer-house close to the sea; lying out on the beach under the groynes; and, as Miltoun grew stronger, motoring and walking on the Downs.

To Barbara, keeping a close watch, he seemed tranquilly enough drinking in from Nature what was necessary to restore balance after the struggle, and breakdown of the past weeks. Yet she could never get rid of a queer feeling that he was not really there at all; to look at him was like watching an uninhabited house that was waiting for someone to enter.

During a whole fortnight he did not make a single allusion to Mrs. Noel, till, on the very last morning, as they were watching the sea, he said with his queer smile:

“It almost makes one believe her theory, that the old gods are not dead. Do you ever see them, Babs; or are you, like me, obtuse?”

Certainly about those lithe invasions of the sea-nymph waves, with ashy, streaming hair, flinging themselves into the arms of the land, there was the old pagan rapture, an inexhaustible delight, a passionate soft acceptance of eternal fate, a wonderful acquiescence in the untiring mystery of life.

But Barbara, ever disconcerted by that tone in his voice, and by this quick dive into the waters of unaccustomed thought, failed to find an answer.

Miltoun went on:

“She says, too, we can hear Apollo singing. Shall we try.”

But all that came was the sigh of the sea, and of the wind in the tamarisk.

“No,” muttered Miltoun at last, “she alone can hear it.”

And Barbara saw, once more on his face that look, neither sad nor impatient, but as of one uninhabited and waiting.

She left Sea House next day to rejoin her mother, who, having been to Cowes, and to the Duchess of Gloucester’s, was back in Town waiting for Parliament to rise, before going off to Scotland. And that same afternoon the girl made her way to Mrs. Noel’s flat. In paying this visit she was moved not so much by compassion, as by uneasiness, and a strange curiosity. Now that Miltoun was well again, she was seriously disturbed in mind. Had she made a mistake in summoning Mrs. Noel to nurse him?

When she went into the little drawing-room Audrey was sitting in the deep-cushioned window-seat with a book on her knee; and by the fact that it was open at the index, Barbara judged that she had not been reading too attentively. She showed no signs of agitation at the sight of her visitor, nor any eagerness to hear news of Miltoun. But the girl had not been five minutes in the room before the thought came to her: “Why! She has the same look as Eustace!” She, too, was like an empty tenement; without impatience, discontent, or grief – waiting! Barbara had scarcely realized this with a curious sense of discomposure, when Courtier was announced. Whether there was in this an absolute coincidence or just that amount of calculation which might follow on his part from receipt of a note written from Sea House – saying that Miltoun was well again, that she was coming up and meant to go and thank Mrs. Noel – was not clear, nor were her own sensations; and she drew over her face that armoured look which she perhaps knew Courtier could not bear to see. His face, at all events, was very red when he shook hands. He had come, he told Mrs. Noel, to say good-bye. He was definitely off next week. Fighting had broken out; the revolutionaries were greatly outnumbered. Indeed he ought to have been there long before!

Barbara had gone over to the window; she turned suddenly, and said:

“You were preaching peace two months ago!”

Courtier bowed.

“We are not all perfectly consistent, Lady Barbara. These poor devils have a holy cause.”

Barbara held out her hand to Mrs. Noel.

“You only think their cause holy because they happen to be weak. Good-bye, Mrs. Noel; the world is meant for the strong, isn’t it!”

She intended that to hurt him; and from the tone of his voice, she knew it had.

“Don’t, Lady Barbara; from your mother, yes; not from you!”

“It’s what I believe. Good-bye!” And she went out.

She had told him that she did not want him to go – not yet; and he was going!

But no sooner had she got outside, after that strange outburst, than she bit her lips to keep back an angry, miserable feeling. He had been rude to her, she had been rude to him; that was the way they had said good-bye! Then, as she emerged into the sunlight, she thought: “Oh! well; he doesn’t care, and I’m sure I don’t!”

She heard a voice behind her.

“May I get you a cab?” and at once the sore feeling began to die away; but she did not look round, only smiled, and shook her head, and made a little room for him on the pavement.

But though they walked, they did not at first talk. There was rising within Barbara a tantalizing devil of desire to know the feelings that really lay behind that deferential gravity, to make him show her how much he really cared. She kept her eyes demurely lowered, but she let the glimmer of a smile flicker about her lips; she knew too that her cheeks were glowing, and for that she was not sorry. Was she not to have any – any – was he calmly to go away – without – And she thought: “He shall say something! He shall show me, without that horrible irony of his!”

She said suddenly:

“Those two are just waiting – something will happen!”

“It is probable,” was his grave answer.

She looked at him then – it pleased her to see him quiver as if that glance had gone right into him; and she said softly:

“And I think they will be quite right.”

She knew those were reckless words, nor cared very much what they meant; but she knew the revolt in them would move him. She saw from his face that it had; and after a little pause, said:

“Happiness is the great thing,” and with soft, wicked slowness: “Isn’t it, Mr. Courtier?”

But all the cheeriness had gone out of his face, which had grown almost pale. He lifted his hand, and let it drop. Then she felt sorry. It was just as if he had asked her to spare him.

“As to that,” he said: “The rough, unfortunately, has to be taken with the smooth. But life’s frightfully jolly sometimes.”

“As now?”

He looked at her with firm gravity, and answered

“As now.”

A sense of utter mortification seized on Barbara. He was too strong for her – he was quixotic – he was hateful! And, determined not to show a sign, to be at least as strong as he, she said calmly:

“Now I think I’ll have that cab!”

When she was in the cab, and he was standing with his hat lifted, she looked at him in the way that women can, so that he did not realize that she had looked.

CHAPTER XIII

When Miltoun came to thank her, Audrey Noel was waiting in the middle of the room, dressed in white, her lips smiling, her dark eyes smiling, still as a flower on a windless day.

In that first look passing between them, they forgot everything but happiness. Swallows, on the first day of summer, in their discovery of the bland air, can neither remember that cold winds blow, nor imagine the death of sunlight on their feathers, and, flitting hour after hour over the golden fields, seem no longer birds, but just the breathing of a new season – swallows were no more forgetful of misfortune than were those two. His gaze was as still as her very self; her look at him had in at the quietude of all emotion.

When they’ sat down to talk it was as if they had gone back to those days at Monkland, when he had come to her so often to discuss everything in heaven and earth. And yet, over that tranquil eager drinking – in of each other’s presence, hovered a sort of awe. It was the mood of morning before the sun has soared. The dew-grey cobwebs enwrapped the flowers of their hearts – yet every prisoned flower could be seen. And he and she seemed looking through that web at the colour and the deep-down forms enshrouded so jealously; each feared too much to unveil the other’s heart. They were like lovers who, rambling in a shy wood, never dare stay their babbling talk of the trees and birds and lost bluebells, lest in the deep waters of a kiss their star of all that is to come should fall and be drowned. To each hour its familiar – and the spirit of that hour was the spirit of the white flowers in the bowl on the window-sill above her head.

They spoke of Monk-land, and Miltoun’s illness; of his first speech, his impressions of the House of Commons; of music, Barbara, Courtier, the river. He told her of his health, and described his days down by the sea. She, as ever, spoke little of herself, persuaded that it could not interest even him; but she described a visit to the opera; and how she had found a picture in the National Gallery which reminded her of him. To all these trivial things and countless others, the tone of their voices – soft, almost murmuring, with a sort of delighted gentleness – gave a high, sweet importance, a halo that neither for the world would have dislodged from where it hovered.

It was past six when he got up to go, and there had not been a moment to break the calm of that sacred feeling in both their hearts. They parted with another tranquil look, which seemed to say: ‘It is well with us – we have drunk of happiness.’

And in this same amazing calm Miltoun remained after he had gone away, till about half-past nine in the evening, he started forth, to walk down to the House. It was now that sort of warm, clear night, which in the country has firefly magic, and even over the Town spreads a dark glamour. And for Miltoun, in the delight of his new health and well-being, with every sense alive and clean, to walk through the warmth and beauty of this night was sheer pleasure. He passed by way of St. James’s Park, treading down the purple shadows of plane-tree leaves into the pools of lamplight, almost with remorse – so beautiful, and as if alive, were they. There were moths abroad, and gnats, born on the water, and scent of new-mown grass drifted up from the lawns. His heart felt light as a swallow he had seen that morning; swooping at a grey feather, carrying it along, letting it flutter away, then diving to seize it again. Such was his elation, this beautiful night! Nearing the House of Commons, he thought he would walk a little longer, and turned westward to the river: On that warm evening the water, without movement at turn of tide, was like the black, snake-smooth hair of Nature streaming out on her couch of Earth, waiting for the caress of a divine hand. Far away on the further; bank throbbed some huge machine, not stilled as yet. A few stars were out in the dark sky, but no moon to invest with pallor the gleam of the lamps. Scarcely anyone passed. Miltoun strolled along the river wall, then crossed, and came back in front of the Mansions where she lived. By the railing he stood still. In the sitting-room of her little flat there was no light, but the casement window was wide open, and the crown of white flowers in the bowl on the window-sill still gleamed out in the darkness like a crescent moon lying on its face. Suddenly, he saw two pale hands rise – one on either side of that bowl, lift it, and draw it in. And he quivered, as though they had touched him. Again those two hands came floating up; they were parted now by darkness; the moon of flowers was gone, in its place had been set handfuls of purple or crimson blossoms. And a puff of warm air rising quickly out of the night drifted their scent of cloves into his face, so that he held his breath for fear of calling out her name.

Again the hands had vanished – through the open window there was nothing to be seen but darkness; and such a rush of longing seized on Miltoun as stole from him all power of movement. He could hear her playing, now. The murmurous current of that melody was like the night itself, sighing, throbbing, languorously soft. It seemed that in this music she was calling him, telling him that she, too, was longing; her heart, too, empty. It died away; and at the window her white figure appeared. From that vision he could not, nor did he try to shrink, but moved out into the lamplight. And he saw her suddenly stretch out her hands to him, and withdraw them to her breast. Then all save the madness of his longing deserted Miltoun. He ran down the little garden, across the hall, up the stairs.

The door was open. He passed through. There, in the sitting-room, where the red flowers in the window scented all the air, it was dark, and he could not at first see her, till against the piano he caught the glimmer of her white dress. She was sitting with hands resting on the pale notes. And falling on his knees, he buried his face against her. Then, without looking up, he raised his hands. Her tears fell on them covering her heart, that throbbed as if the passionate night itself were breathing in there, and all but the night and her love had stolen forth.

CHAPTER XIV

On a spur of the Sussex Downs, inland from Nettle-Cold, there stands a beech-grove. The traveller who enters it out of the heat and brightness, takes off the shoes of his spirit before its, sanctity; and, reaching the centre, across the clean beech-mat, he sits refreshing his brow with air, and silence. For the flowers of sunlight on the ground under those branches are pale and rare, no insects hum, the birds are almost mute. And close to the border trees are the quiet, milk-white sheep, in congregation, escaping from noon heat. Here, above fields and dwellings, above the ceaseless network of men’s doings, and the vapour of their talk, the traveller feels solemnity. All seems conveying divinity – the great white clouds moving their wings above him, the faint longing murmur of the boughs, and in far distance, the sea… And for a space his restlessness and fear know the peace of God.

So it was with Miltoun when he reached this temple, three days after that passionate night, having walked for hours, alone and full of conflict. During those three days he had been borne forward on the flood tide; and now, tearing himself out of London, where to think was impossible, he had come to the solitude of the Downs to walk, and face his new position.