Chapter Eleven.
Dare, as he sat at the Arnotts’ dinner-table that evening, making the extra man, the odd number, as he had done on a former occasion, was conscious of two discrepant facts; namely, that he had not decided a moment too soon to quit the danger zone of Pamela’s seductive influence, and that he was sincerely sorry he was leaving on the morrow. The regret was, perhaps, the keener sensation of the two; it balanced his sense of moral satisfaction to a nicety. The dinner was the funeral feast of his only real love affair. He intended, when he parted from Pamela that night, never to see her again.
“I was a fool to come,” he told himself. “No one can handle fire and expect to escape unhurt. And I knew it was fire I was playing with.”
Yet he would gladly have continued to act foolishly. The strongest inducement towards wisdom was the fear that Pamela herself might get singed; fire which spreads ends in a conflagration.
One thing he noticed after the women had withdrawn, and it was not the first time he had observed the same thing, was that Arnott drank more than was good for him. This possibly accounted for the coarsening so evident in the man’s general deportment. It disgusted him; though probably had he not been in love with the man’s wife it would not have struck him so unpleasantly. It was revolting to think of a sweet, refined woman contaminated by close association with a man of intemperate habits. Arnott was inclined to be offensive when he had been drinking; it was on these occasions that he displayed discourtesy towards his wife. It enraged Dare to see how readily she recognised these symptoms, and how tactful she was in her avoidance of friction. It was as much as he could do at times to be civil to his host. Arnott’s self-indulgence was, he supposed, the cause of the cloud which had disturbed the domestic peace. If the man persistently made a beast of himself, it was not surprising that his wife should lose her affection for him.
He was thankful to escape from the dining-room and join Pamela and Mrs Carruthers on the stoep.
Mrs Carruthers, doubtless as a sign of her approval of the decision he had arrived at, acted that evening with a considerate kindness of which he was keenly sensible and gratefully appreciative: she contrived with admirable skill to engage her host and her husband in a political discussion which bored her exceedingly, and which roused Arnott to a heated denunciation of the Hertzog faction. Like many men sufficiently indifferent to public affairs to take no active part in them, Arnott was a fiery critic of anti-imperialism, indeed of any opinions which failed to accord with his own way of thinking. Mrs Carruthers threw in the necessary challenge at intervals in order to keep the talk from flagging, and, to her own amazement, found herself defending some of the backveld ideals.
“I am a staunch believer in race preservation,” she announced. “I admire the Dutch for defending their principles, and insisting on the recognition of their language.”
“Language!” Arnott sneered.
“Oh! it’s a language of sorts, though we may not consider it exactly important. But it’s a kind of instinct with them, like the Family Bible, and a contempt for the natives. I don’t see why they shouldn’t uphold these things.”
Dare, talking a little apart with Pamela, gazed thoughtfully at the quiet darkness of the garden and proposed walking in it. She hesitated for the fraction of a second, and then complied. He noted the slight hesitation, and felt glad that she conquered her reluctance. To have refused his request would have seemed to suggest a want of confidence in him. Nevertheless, some impulse, prompted by the recollection of that slight hesitation, impelled him to turn before they got beyond view of the others on the lighted stoep, and confine their walking to the limit of the path in front of the house. He had not intended this at the start; he longed for darkness and solitude. The murmur of voices, the little disjointed scraps of conversation overheard as they passed and repassed, disturbed him irritatingly; Arnott’s frequently raised, assertive tones sounded intrusive, broke upon the quiet of the garden discordantly, reminding the two who walked in it of his presence with a needlessly aggressive insistence.
Dare tried to ignore these things, but they jarred his nerves none the less. He had not suspected until recently that he possessed any nerves; but they had made many disquieting manifestations of their actuality of late.
“I can’t grow accustomed to the thought that you are leaving to-morrow,” Pamela said to him presently. Her voice was low, and betrayed unmistakable regret. The back of her hand brushed his lightly as they paced the gravel slowly side by side. The contact gave him immense satisfaction; he was grateful to her for not increasing the space between them and thus denying him this small pleasure. “Of course I knew you were only down for a short while; but your departure is a little unexpected, isn’t it?”
“I came for a week,” he answered with a brief laugh. “It’s been a long one as days are reckoned, but time skips along when one is enjoying oneself... It was sweet of you to say that, to allow me to think that you will miss me a little. We have had some pleasant times together. The worst of these things is there always has to be an end. I shall miss you more than you will miss me.”
“I wonder!” said Pamela.
He turned his head suddenly and looked her squarely in the eyes. The light from the stoep shone on her face and showed it very fair and pale and pure. She turned aside as though unwilling to bear his earnest scrutiny.
“One grows used to people,” she said. “Somehow, I have always felt at home with you. When you go away I have a feeling that you won’t come back. I had that feeling last time.”
“Yet here I am,” he said in a lighter tone.
“Yes,” she said. “I know. It’s stupid of me. I hate losing sight of friends. I have so few.”
“Few!” he echoed. “I expect if I had half the number I should reckon myself rich.”
“You don’t use the word in the sense I do,” she returned. “I meant the friends one can depend upon... who wouldn’t fail one under any circumstances.”
“I understand,” he said, and added quietly: “I am glad you place me in that category.”
“You head the list,” she answered with a faint smile. “I’m not quite sure your name doesn’t stand alone.”
While she was speaking the belief was suddenly confirmed in her that this man was entirely sincere in his protestations of friendship, that even if he heard the shameful story of her life with Arnott, he would not withdraw his friendship. She felt that she could rely on him, trust him implicitly. She also knew that if she needed help at any time he was the one person in the world she would ask for it. He was so sympathetic that she believed he would understand, as no one else without a similar experience could understand, her position. He, at least, would recognise that she had not acted solely from base motives.
“I shouldn’t like to believe that,” he said gently; “but I am proud to top the list. I have a feeling to-night,” he added slowly, unconsciously watching Arnott as the latter leaned forward in excited argument with Mrs Carruthers, “that we shall yet prove our belief in one another’s sincerity. Don’t think I am suggesting all manner of unnameable tragedies in your life,—the proof of loyal friendship is to be helpful also in little things. It’s rather a rotten idea—isn’t it?—that a man can’t be pals with a married woman.”
“I think so,” Pamela answered. “Besides, you’ve disproved that in your friendship with Connie.”
Dare was silent for a moment. There was, he knew, a very substantial difference in the quality of his friendship with Mrs Carruthers and his friendship with Pamela; sentiment was entirely absent in his feeling for the one; in the latter case the whole fabric of his regard was built upon it. He had a fairly strong conviction that he would throw, over Connie, throw over the whole world if need be, for this other woman. But he also realised with an equal certainty that the one thing he would not do was to allow her fair name to be sullied through his indiscretion. If it were necessary to the maintenance of a platonic friendship to remain at a distance, he would avoid any future possibility of their paths crossing. That much he could do for her. It was the strongest proof of his regard.
“Men and women disprove that theory continually,” he returned. “But we only hear of the failures, and that brings discredit on the idea. One might as reasonably argue that the divorce court brings discredit on the married state. The whole thing is absurd.”
“I wonder why you never married,” Pamela said suddenly. “Somehow, I can’t think of you as a married man; and yet you must surely have contemplated marriage. Most men do at some time or another.”
“I suppose,” he said, “that you, like Connie, regard me as an old fogey and past such things?”
“No,” she answered simply. “My husband was older than you when I—when—”
She floundered helplessly, and paused in swift confusion. It was impossible, she found, to refer to her marriage; the word stuck in her throat. Always, it seemed to her in her distress, this galling knowledge that she was not legally married was being forced upon her realisation to her further humiliation. Unable to complete the sentence, she added lamely:
“A man is never too old.”
He laughed.
“You think I might find some one to take pity on me even now?”
“I think,” she returned warmly, “that the woman who wins you will be very fortunate. And you are only quizzing me in respect of age; you are quite young yet.”
“Only recently,” he explained, “I have been called middle-aged, and it hurt my vanity. Age, like most things, is relative. When one is in one’s teens forty appears senility; when one approaches forty it wears quite another aspect,—a comfortably matured, youthful aspect compared with which the teens are puerile. The heart defies wrinkles. I resent being described as middle-aged: it tempts me to the committal of youthful follies.”
They had reached the end of the path and were beyond the circle of light from the stoep. Dare brought up abruptly, and instead of turning, halted, and faced her in the gloom of the overhanging trees. His eyes scrutinised her face in the dimness with tender intensity.
“This is the last lap,” he said. “I’m going to take you back now, and you’ll sing for me. ‘Mon coeur s’ouvre à ta voix.’ ... Don’t you love the words? They express better than any words in our language could just exactly how the dear particular voice affects one... Oh! little friend, I wish that fate did not decree that our paths in life must diverge just here, and so seldom cross.”
“That bears out what I have felt,” said Pamela slowly, gazing steadily bade at him. “You won’t come again.”
“Who can say?” he returned. “I feel—and I think you do too, though you are too wise and sweet to say so—that it is better I should stay away. I want you to bear me always kindly in your thoughts. And when I am near you I am never quite confident that I shall not say something which may lower me in your esteem. I shouldn’t like to do that. Man is but human, and humanity has some of the brute instincts, though we flatter ourselves we are only a little lower than the angels,—that little makes all the difference. Shall we turn back?”
Pamela acquiesced in silence, and walked in silence to the house. She was conscious that Dare talked, but she scarcely heard what he said in her troubled preoccupation. What he had said beyond there in the shadow of the trees was repeating itself over and over in her mind. She could not misunderstand the purport of his words; and she felt sorry. She liked him so well. She wanted to keep and enjoy his friendship,—wanted him to be in her life, not forced by a recognition of the weakness he hinted at to stand always outside. Why could they not have remained friends in the real sense of the word, as he had first suggested? His admission made it impossible. She felt angry with him. She wanted his friendship so urgently.
“You are not offended with me?” he asked presently, struck by her unheeding silence which insensibly conveyed a hurt resentment. He put the question twice before she answered him.
“No,” she replied. “But—”
“But?” he prompted gently.
“I want your friendship,” she said quickly, with a little nervous catch of her breath. “I thought I had it... And you are making it impossible.”
“Oh! no,” he answered. “I am making it very possible. It is because I feel I may perhaps be useful as a friend that I have been so honest with you. Don’t make any mistake about that.”
She made no response. They were approaching within hearing of the others, and Mrs Carruthers was leaning on the rail of the stoep, watching their slow advance, observing them, it occurred to Pamela, from the concentrated earnestness of her look, with an unaccountable interest. She leaned towards them as they came up.
“I’m on the verge of quarrelling with every one,” she said with remarkable cheerfulness. “You’ve only arrived in time to prevent bloodshed. If you have tired of doing the romantic, come in and let us have some music.”
“Sing to us, Mrs Arnott,” pleaded Carruthers,—“something soothing. My wife has been most extraordinarily aggravating.”
Pamela made some laughing response, and joined him. Mrs Carruthers turned towards Dare, who remained standing alone at the top of the steps.
“I have saved the situation for you this evening,” she said, “and lost my own temper. But I am thankful for three things.”
“And they are?” he inquired.
“That there is no moon,—that you turned back when you did,—and that to-morrow is not many hours off.”
“I never believed before,” he returned drily, “that it was in your nature to be unpleasant.”
She smiled encouragingly.
“You are only beginning,” she said, “to gauge my possibilities.”