скачать книгу бесплатно
PASSIONATE PITY
A tear fell upon the envelope in her hand, and one fell upon the red carpet under her feet. She must try and not cry, crying made one ugly. She must go to her room as quickly as she could.
Then came noiselessly out from the curtained door at Gwen's right hand the figure of Dr. Middleton. He was already dressed for dinner, his face composed and dignified as usual, but preoccupied as if the business of the day was not over. There were these letters waiting for him on the table. He came on, and Gwen, blinded by a big tear in each eye, vaguely knew that he stooped and swept up the letters in his hand. Then he turned his face towards her in his slow, deliberate way and looked. She closed her eyes, and the two tears squeezed between the lids, ran down her cheeks leaving the delicate rosy skin wet and shining under the electric light.
Tears had rarely been seen by the Warden: never – in fact – until lately! He was startled by them and disconcerted.
"Has anything happened?" he asked. "Anything serious?" It would need to be something very serious for tears!
The gentleness of his voice only made the desolation in Gwen's heart the more poignant. In a week's time she would have to leave this beautiful kindly little home, this house of refuge. The fear she had had before of the Warden vanished at his sudden tenderness of tone; he seemed now something to cling to, something solid and protective that belonged to the world of ease and comfort, of good things; things to be desired above all else, and from which she was going to be cruelly banished – to Stow. She made a convulsive noise somewhere in her young throat, but was inarticulate.
There came sounds of approaching steps. The Warden hesitated but only for a moment. He moved to the door of the library.
"Come in here," he said, a little peremptorily, and he turned and opened it for Gwen.
Gwen slid within and moving blindly, knocked herself against the protruding wing of his book-shelves. That made the Warden vexed with somebody, the somebody who had made the child cry so much that she couldn't see where she was going. He closed the door behind her.
"You have bad news in that letter?" he asked. "Your mother is not ill?"
Gwen shook her head and stared upon the floor, her lips twitching.
"Anything you can talk over with Lady Dashwood?" he asked.
"No," was the stifled answer with a shake of the dark head.
"Can you tell me about it? I might be able to advise, help you?"
"No!" This time the sound was long drawn out with a shrill sob.
What was to be done?
"Try not to cry!" he said gently. "Tell me what it is all about. If you need help – perhaps I can help you!"
So much protecting sympathy given to her, after that letter, made Gwen feel the joy of utter weakness in the presence of strength, of saving support.
"Shall I read that letter?" he asked, putting out his hand.
Gwen clutched it tighter. No, no, that would be fatal! He laid his hand upon hers. Gwen began to tremble. She shook from head to foot, even her teeth chattered. She held tight on to that letter – but she leaned nearer to him.
"Then," said the Warden, without removing his hand, "tell me what is troubling you? It is something in that letter?"
Gwen moved her lips and made a great effort to speak.
"It's – it's nothing!" she said.
"Nothing!" repeated the Warden, just a little sternly.
This was too much for Gwen, the tears rose again swiftly into her eyes and began to drop down her cheeks. "It's only – " she began.
"Yes, tell me," said the Warden, coaxingly, for those tears hurt him, "tell me, child, never mind what it is."
"It's only – ," she began again, and now her teeth chattered, "only – that nobody cares what happens to me – I've got no home!"
That this pretty, inoffensive, solitary child had no home, was no news to the Warden. His sister had hinted at it on the day that Gwen was left behind by her mother. But he had dismissed the matter, as not concerning the college or the reconstruction of National Education. Since then whenever it cropped up again, he again dismissed it, because – well, because his mind was not clear. Now, suddenly, he seemed to be more certain, his thoughts clearer. Each tear that Gwen dropped seemed to drop some responsibility upon him. His face must have betrayed this – perhaps his hands also. How it happened the Warden did not quite know, but he was conscious that the girl made a movement towards him, and then he found himself holding her in his arms. She was weeping convulsively into his shirt-front – weeping out the griefs of her childhood and girlhood and staining his shirt front with responsibility for them all, soaking him with petty cares, futile recollections, mean subterfuges, silly triumphs, sordid disappointments, all the small squalid moral muddle that Belinda Scotts call "life."
All this smothered the Warden's shirt-front and trickled sideways into the softer part of that article of his dress.
For the first few moments his power of thinking failed him. He was conscious only of his hands on her waist and shoulder, of the warmth of her dark hair against his face. He could feel her heart thumping, thumping in her slender body against his.
A knock came at the door.
The Warden came to himself. He released the weeping girl gently and walked to the door.
He opened it, holding it in his hand. "What is it, Robinson?" he asked, for he had for the moment forgotten that it was dinner time, and that a guest was expected.
"Mr. Boreham is in the drawing-room, sir," said the old servant very meekly, for he met the narrow eyes fixed coldly upon him.
"Very well," said the Warden, and he closed the door again.
Then he turned round and looked at Gwendolen Scott. She was standing exactly where he had left her, standing with her hands clutching at a little pocket-handkerchief and her letter. She was waiting. Her wet eyelashes almost rested on her flushed cheeks. Her lips were slightly swollen. She was not crying, she was still and silent. She was waiting – her conceit for the moment gone – she was waiting to know from him what was going to become of her. Her whole drooping attitude was profoundly humble. The humility of it gave Middleton a strange pang of pain and pleasure.
The way in which the desire for power expresses itself in a man or woman is the supreme test of character. The weak fritter away on nothings the driving force of this priceless instinct; this instinct that has raised us from primeval slime to the mastery of the world. The weak waste it, it seems to slip through their fingers and vanish. Only the strong can bend this spiritual energy to the service of an important issue, and the strongest of all do this unconsciously, so that He, who is supreme Master of the souls of men, could say, "Why callest thou Me good?"
The Warden in his small sphere of academic life showed himself to be one of the strong sort. His mind was analytical rather than constructive, but among all the crowded teaching staff of Oxford only one other man – and he, too, now the head of a famous college – had given as much of himself to his pupils. Indeed, so much had the Warden given, that he had left little for himself. His time and his extraordinarily wide knowledge, materials that he had gathered for his own use, all were at the service of younger men who appealed to him for guidance. He grasped at opportunities for them, found gaps that they could fill, he criticised, suggested, pushed; and so the years went on, and his own books remained unwritten. Only now, when a new world seemed to him to be in the making – he sat down deliberately to give his own thoughts expression.
Men like Middleton are rare in any University; a man unselfish enough and able enough to spend himself, sacrifice himself in "making men." And even this outstanding usefulness, this masterly hold he had of the best men who passed through King's would not have forced his colleagues to elect him as Warden. They made him Warden because they couldn't help themselves, because he was in all ways the dominating personality of the college, and even the book weary, the dull, the frankly cynical among the Fellows could not escape from the conviction that King's would be safe in Middleton's hands, so there was no reason to seek further afield.
But women and sentiment had played a very small part in the Warden's life. His acquaintance with women had been superficial. He did not profess to understand them. Gwendolen Scott had for several days sat at his table, looking like a flower. That her emotions were shallow and her mind vacant did not occur to the Warden. She was like a flower – that was all! His business had been with men – young men. And just now, as one by one, these young men, once the interest and pride of his college, were stricken down as they stood upon the very threshold of life, the Warden's heart had become empty and aching.
And now, on this autumn evening, this sobbing girl seemed, somehow, all part of the awful tragedy that was being enacted, only in her case – he had the power to help. He need not let her wander alone into the wilderness of life.
For the first time in his life, his sense of power betrayed him. It was in his own hands to mould the future of this helpless girl – so he imagined!
He experienced two or three delicious moments as he walked towards her, knowing that she would melt into his arms and give up all her sorrows into his keeping. She was waiting on his will! But was this love?
The Warden was well aware that it was not love, such as a man of his temperament conceived love to be.
But his youth was passed. The time had gone when he could fall in love and marry a common mortal under the impression that she was an angel. Was it likely that now, in middle life, he would find a woman who would rouse the deepest of his emotions or satisfy the needs of his life?
Why should he expect to find at forty, what few men meet in the prime of youth? All that he could expect now – hope for – was standing there waiting for him. Waiting with blushes, timid, dawning hope; full of trust and so pathetically humble!
He took her into his arms and spoke, and his voice was steady but very low and a little husky.
"There is no time to talk now. But you shall not go out into the wilderness of life, if you are afraid."
She pressed her face closer to him – in answer.
"If you want to, if you care to – come to me, I shall not refuse you a home. You understand?"
She did fully understand. Her mother's letter had made it clearer than ever to her that marriage with somebody sufficiently well off is a haven of refuge for a woman, a port to be steered for with all available strength.
Suddenly and unexpectedly Gwen had found herself in harbour, and the stormy sea passed.
"Run up to your room now," he said, "and bathe your face and come down to the drawing-room as if nothing had happened."
He did not kiss her. A thought, such as only disturbs a man of scrupulous honour, came to him. He was so much older than she was that she must have time to think – she must come to him and ask for what he could give her – not, as she was just now – convulsed with grief; she must come quietly and confidently and with her mind made up. There must be no working upon her emotions, no urgency of his own will over a weaker will; no compulsion such as a strong man can exercise over a weak woman.
He pushed her gently away, and she raised her head, smiling through her tears and murmuring something: what was it? Was it "Thanks;" but she did not look him in the face, she dare not meet those narrow blue eyes that were bent upon her.
He stood watching her as she moved lightly to the door. There she turned back, and even then she did not raise her eyes to his face, but she smiled a strange bewildered smile into the air and fled.
It was really she who had conquered, and with such feeble weapons.
She had gone. The door was closed. The Warden was alone.
He looked round the room, at the book-lined walls, at his desk strewn with papers, and then the whole magnitude and meaning of what he had done – came to him!
He took out his watch. It was twenty past eight – all but a minute. In less than twenty minutes he had disposed of and finally settled one of the most important affairs of life. Was this the action of a sane man?
During the last few days he had gradually been drifting towards this, just drifting. He had been dreaming of it all the time, dreaming in that part of his brain where the mind works out its problems underground, waiting until the higher world of consciousness calls for them, and they are flung out into the open daylight – solved. A solution found without real solid premeditation.
Was the solution to his life's problem a good one, or a bad one? Was it true to his past life, or was it false? Can a man successfully live out a plan that he has only dimly outlined in a dream and swiftly finished in a passion of pity?
It was Middleton's duty as host to go into the drawing-room. He must go at once and think afterwards. And yet he lingered. She might not claim him. She too might have been moved only by a momentary emotion! But what right had he to be speculating on the chance of release? It was a bad beginning!
On the floor lay a letter. The Warden had not noticed it before. He picked it up. It was the letter that she had held in her trembling hands.
He stood holding it, and then suddenly he opened the flap and pulled the sheet from its cover. He unfolded it and looked at the signature. Yes, it was from her mother. He folded the paper again and put it back in the envelope.
Then as he stood for a moment, with the letter in his hand, he perceived that his shirt-front was stained – with her tears.
He left the library and went towards his bedroom behind the curtained door. He had the letter in his hand. He caught sight of Louise, Lady Dashwood's maid, near the drawing-room door. The Warden held the letter out to her.
"Please put this letter in Miss Scott's room," he said. "I found it lying on the floor;" and he went back into his room.
Louise had gone to the drawing-room with a handkerchief forgotten by Lady Dashwood. She took the letter and went upstairs to her mistress's room, gazing at the letter as she walked. Now Louise was not a French woman for nothing. A letter – even an open letter – passing between a male and a female, must relate to an affair of the heart. This was interesting – exciting! Louise felt the necessity of thinking the matter out. Here was a pretty young lady, Miss Scott, and here was the Warden, not indeed very young, but très très bien, très distingué! Very well, if the young lady was married, then well, naturally something would happen! But she was "Miss," and that was quite other thing. Young unmarried girls must be protected – it is so in la belle France. Louise pulled the envelope apart and drew out the contents. She opened the letter, and searched for the missive between its folds which was destined for the hands of "Miss." There was none. Louise spread out the letter. Her knowledge of English as a spoken language was limited, and as a written language it was an unending puzzle.
She could, however, read the beginning and the end.
"Dear Gwen" … and "Mother." Hein!
The reason why the letter had been put into her hands was just because she could not read it.
What cunning! Without doubt, there were some additions added by the Warden here and there to the maternal messages, which would have their significance to "Miss." Again, what cunning!
And the Warden, so dignified and so just as he ought to be! Ah, my God, but one never knows!
Louise folded up the letter and replaced it in its envelope.
Doubtless my Lady Dashwood was in the dark. Oh, completely! That goes without saying. Louise had already tidied the room. There was nothing more for her to do. She had been on the point of going down to the servants' quarters. Should she take the letter as directed to the room occupied by "Miss"? That was the momentous question. Now Louise was bound hand and foot to the service of Lady Dashwood. Only for the sake of that lady would Louise have endured the miseries of Oxford and the taciturnity of Robinson, and the impertinence of Robinson's grandson, Robinson aged fifteen, and the stupid solemnity of Mrs. Robinson, the daughter-in-law of Robinson and the widowed mother of the young Robinson.
Louise loved Lady Dashwood. Lady Dashwood was munificent and always amiable, things very rare. Also Louise was a widow and had two children in whom Lady Dashwood took an interest.
That Monsieur, the head of the College, should secretly communicate with a "Miss" was a real scandal. Propos d'amour are not for young ladies who are unmarried. The Warden ought to have known better than that – Ah, poor Lady Dashwood!
Torn between the desire to participate in an interesting affair and her duty not to assist scandals in the family of my Lady Dashwood, Louise stood for some time plunged in painful argument with herself. At last her sense of duty prevailed! She would not deliver the letter. No, not if her life depended on it. The question was – Ah, this would be what she would do. A brilliant idea had struck her. Louise went to the dressing-table. It was covered with Lady Dashwood's toilet things, all neatly arranged. On the top of the jewel drawers at one side lay two envelopes, letters that had come by the last post and had been put aside hurriedly by Lady Dashwood. Louise lifted these two letters and underneath them placed the letter addressed to Miss Gwendolen Scott.
"Good!" exclaimed Louise to the empty room. "The letter is now in the disposition of the Good God! And the Warden! All that there is of the most as it ought to be! Ah, but it is incredible!"
Louise went to the door and put out the lights. Then she closed the door softly behind her and went downstairs.
CHAPTER IV
THE UNFORESEEN HAPPENS
Before his maternal aunt had left him Chartcote, the Honourable Bernard Boreham's income had been just sufficient to enable him to live without making himself useful. The Boreham estate in Ireland was burdened with obligations to female relatives who lived in various depressing watering-places in England. Bernard, the second son, had not been sent to a public school or University. He had struggled up as best he might, and like all the members of his family, he had left his beloved country as soon as he possibly could, and had picked up some extra shillings in London by writing light articles of an inflammatory nature for papers that required them. Boreham had had no real practical acquaintance with the world. He had never been responsible for any one but himself. He was a floating cloudlet. Ideas came to him easily – all the more easily because he was scantily acquainted with the mental history of the past. He did not know what had been already thought out and dismissed, nor what had been tried and had failed. The world was new to him – new – and full of errors.
From the moment that Chartcote became his and he was his own master, it occurred to him that he might write a really great book. A book that would make the world conscious of its follies. He felt that it was time that some one – like himself – who could shed the superstitions and the conventions of the past and step out a new man with new ideas, uncorrupted by kings or priests (or Oxford traditions), and give a lead to the world.
It was, of course, an unfortunate circumstance that Oxford was now so military, so smitten by the war and shorn of her pomp, so empty of academic life. But after the war Boreham meant among other things to study Oxford, and if perfectly frank criticism could help her to a better understanding of her faults in view of the world's requirements – well, it should have that criticism. Boreham had considerable leisure, for apart from his big Book which he began to sketch, he found nothing to do. Every sort of work that others were doing for the war he considered radically faulty, and he had no scheme of his own – at the moment. Besides, he felt that England was not all she ought to be. He did not love England – he only liked living in England.
Boreham had arrived punctually for dinner on that October evening; in fact, he had arrived too early; but he told Lady Dashwood that his watch was fast.
"All the clocks in Oxford are wrong," he said to her, as he stood on the hearthrug in the drawing-room, "and mine is wrong!"
Boreham was tall and fair and wore a fair pointed beard. His features were not easy to describe in detail, they gave one the impression that they had been cut with insufficient premeditation by the hand of his Creator, from some pale fawn-coloured material. He wore a single eyeglass which he stuck into a pale blue eye, mainly as an aid to conversation. With Boreham conversation meant an exposition of his own "ideas." He was disappointed at finding only Lady Dashwood in the drawing-room; but she had been really good natured in asking him to come and meet May Dashwood, so he was "conversing" freely with her when the door opened and Gwendolen Scott came in. Boreham started and put his eyeglass in the same eye again, instead of exercising the other eye. He was agitated. When he saw that it was not May Dashwood who had come in, but a youthful female unknown to him and probably of no conversational significance, he dropped his glass on to his shirt-front, where it made a dull thud. Gwen's face was flushed, and her lips still a little swollen; but there was nothing that betrayed tears to strangers, though Lady Dashwood saw at once that she had been crying. As soon as the introduction was over Gwen sank into a large easy-chair where her slight figure was almost obliterated.
She had got back her self-control. It had not, after all, been so difficult to get it back – for the glow of a new excitement possessed her. For the first time in her life she had succeeded. Until to-day she had had no luck. At a cheap school for the "Education of Daughters of Officers" Gwen had not learnt more than she could possibly help. Her first appearance in the world, this last summer, had been, considering her pretty face, on the whole a disappointment. But now she was successful. Gwen tingled with the comfortable warmth of self-esteem. She looked giddily round the spacious room – was it possible that all this might be hers? It was amazing that luck should have just dropped into her lap.
Boreham had turned again to Lady Dashwood as soon as he had been introduced and had executed the reverential bow that he considered proper, however contemptuously he might feel towards the female he saluted.
"As we were saying," he went on, "Middleton – except to-day – has always been punctual to the minute, by that I mean punctual to the fastest Oxford time. He is the sort of man who is born punctual. Punctually he came into the world. Punctually he will go out of it. He has never been what I call a really free man. In other words, he is a slave to what's called 'Duty.'"
Here the door opened again, and again Boreham was unable to conceal his vivid curiosity as he turned to see who it was coming in. This time it was the Warden – the Warden in a blameless shirt-front. He had changed in five minutes. He walked in composed as usual. There was not a trace in his face that in the library only a few minutes ago he had been disposing of his future with amazing swiftness.
"Go on, Boreham," said the Warden, giving his guest, along with the glance that serves in Oxford as sufficient greeting to frequenters of Common Room, a slight grasp of the hand because he was not a member of Common Room. The Warden had not heard Boreham's remarks, he merely knew that he had interrupted some exposition of "ideas."
In a flash the Warden saw, without looking at her, that Gwen was there, half hidden in a chair; and Gwen, on her side, felt her heart thump, and was proudly and yet fearfully conscious of every movement of the Warden as he walked across the room and stood on the other side of the hearthrug. "Does he – does that important person belong to me?" she thought. The conviction was overpowering that if that important person did belong to her, and it appeared that he did, she also must be important.
Boreham's appearance did not gain in attractiveness by the proximity of his host. He began again in his rapid rather high voice.
"You see for yourself," he said, turning back to Lady Dashwood: "here he is – the very picture of what is conventionally correct, his features, his manner, before which younger men who are not so correct actually quail. I'm afraid that now he is Warden he has lost the chance of becoming a free man. I had hopes of one day seeing him carried off his feet by some impulse which fools call 'folly.' If he could have been even once divinely drunk, he might have realised his true self, I am afraid now he is hopeless."
"My dear man, your philosophy of freedom is only suitable for the 'idle rich.' You would be the first person to object to your cook becoming divinely drunk instead of soberly preparing your dinner."
Boreham always ignored an argument that told against him, so he merely continued —
"As it is, Middleton, who might have been magnificent, is bound hand and foot to the service of mere propriety, and will end by saddling himself with some dull wife."
