Chapter Twenty Six.
Pamela was alone and waiting for Dare when he presented himself at the house on the following morning. She turned slowly when the door of the room opened, and advanced to meet him with a look of inquiry and of welcome in her eyes.
She looked better, he observed, than when he had last seen her; the anxiety that had sharpened her features and shadowed her face with an expression of dread had yielded to a new calm, which suggested a mind braced and prepared to meet and accept whatever offered. Her composure helped him enormously in quieting his nervousness, which before, and at the moment of, his entry had been excessive. He took her extended hand and held it.
“You bring me bad news?” she said, observing his grave face with a watchful scrutiny, and speaking in that quiet, level voice that one uses sometimes in discussing things too serious and strange for ordinary emotion. “I felt it must be bad news when your telegram arrived... You’ve seen him?”
“No,” he answered.
He led her to the sofa near the French window on which he had sat with her before when they had had their last interview. The memory of that former occasion was present in his mind. It was possibly present in Pamela’s mind also; but the recollection caused no sense of embarrassment. Her love for, and confidence in, him had swept all feeling of constraint away. He seated himself beside her.
“I wrote to you,” he said; “but I decided not to send the letter. I felt it was best to come down and explain. Mr Arnott is in Pretoria. I went there for the purpose of seeing him; but he is ill, and unable to see any one. I had an interview with the doctor who is attending his case. I thought you would wish to know exactly how matters are with him.”
He paused. Pamela was gazing at him with wide serious eyes. She showed less surprise than he had expected. She appeared somehow prepared, and extraordinarily calm. It made the telling easier. It was as though she had passed the final stage of emotionalism, had come through all the stresses of anguished uncertainty, of distressed and tormented doubt and wounded love, and emerged calm-eyed and efficient, amazingly controlled, and clear as to her judgment. She listened attentively without interrupting him. When he paused, she said:
“You are not preparing me to hear that he is dead?”
“No,” he answered. His feelings got the better of him, and he added bluntly,—“I would to God I were! Life—all that is left of it for him—isn’t worth the having. And anyway, living or dead, he isn’t worthy of one thought of your compassion.”
“Then he did go away with Blanche?” she said quietly.
“He followed her. He meant to marry her—means to marry her still, if her statement is to be believed. I saw her in Bloemfontein. It was she who told me of his illness.”
“What is the matter with him?” she asked, her earnest eyes holding his, questioning his, refusing, it occurred to him, to allow what he was telling her to bias her ultimate judgment. She had accustomed herself to ugly truths; she was not shocked or dismayed any longer, only anxious to have her worst fears confirmed or disproved. She desired to hear the whole truth, whatever it held of pain or humiliation. At least it could hold no disillusion for her.
“He has had a stroke of paralysis, they tell me,” Dare answered, avoiding her eyes.
He was conscious of a sudden movement on her part, of a quick, inaudible exclamation which was followed by a sharp indrawing of her breath. He did not look at her; he felt, without seeing them, that there were tears of pity and of horror shining in her eyes. He counted for something to her still. She was sorry for the man. Dare felt unreasonably incensed.
“There is hope of a partial recovery,” he continued dully, trying to keep under the sudden sharp jealousy that gripped him as nothing he had experienced in all their former talks had gripped and hurt. “He’ll get about again, they think... walk a little. His brain is affected—slightly. That will never be quite clear again...”
He broke off abruptly, and turned to her in protesting surprise. She was weeping. The tears were welling in her eyes and coursing down her cheeks. Arnott ill—broken—touched the deepest springs of her compassion. All the bitterness in her heart against the man who had so cruelly wronged her melted into sorrow for him in his terrible affliction. She no longer experienced any anger against him, only a great pity,—pity for the miserable wreckage of his health, which stood, it seemed to her, as a symbol of the wreckage of their love,—all the promise and the strength and the beauty gone for evermore,—only the dead ashes remaining in the furnace of life.
“Your tears are a big return for his cruelty to you,” he said, trying with ill success to hide the twinge of jealousy which caused him to wince at sight of her grief. “Some people might consider his condition a perfectly just retribution. You owe him nothing—not even pity.”
“One doesn’t only render what is due,” she said, wiping her eyes slowly. “That would make life too hard. Could you expect me to hear unmoved what you have just told me? I thought I had schooled myself to bear anything; but this is too awful. I would rather have heard that he was well and happy—with her.”
“She is going to him,” he said, bluntly.
“Going to him? ... Now?” Pamela’s tone expressed wonder. “You mean, she loves him sufficiently to marry him—ill—like that?”
“I mean,” he returned, watching her narrowly, “that she loves herself sufficiently to put up with his condition on account of his wealth. She admitted that almost in as many words. It’s as much as he has any right to expect.”
“Oh! no,” she said quickly. “He is giving her more than that.”
She was silent for a moment, looking thoughtfully beyond him towards the garden which showed through the aperture of the long window, a fair and peaceful background, in striking contrast to the tension within the room and the unquiet of her mind. Dare’s gaze never left her face. He was watching her continually, trying to gauge her intention from his study of her expression. The slow tears still fell at intervals; but they became fewer, and she wiped them mechanically with a small drenched handkerchief, making no effort at concealment from him. It seemed as if in her preoccupation she was scarcely conscious of his presence.
“It’s a sordid story,” he said. “I am sorry to have to distress you with it; but you had to know... It closes everything, you see,—puts a finish to your part in his life. He has flung aside his responsibilities deliberately. A man like that, devoid of all moral sense, cannot be influenced. I doubt you would accomplish anything, if you went to him.”
“At least, I must make the effort,” she said slowly. She turned to him, a look of sad entreaty in her eyes, as though she would appeal to him to help, instead of making things more difficult for her. “Don’t try to dissuade me,” she pleaded earnestly. “Don’t fail me. I am relying so much on your help.”
“But,” he urged gently, “don’t you realise how impossible this thing has become? Think, even if you succeeded in persuading him to return—which I doubt strongly you could succeed in doing—what would your life be like with him,—half-imbecile, helpless, an invalid always? ... It’s too horrible to contemplate.”
She shuddered at the picture of Arnott which he drew, and hid her white face in her hands and said nothing.
“It’s not as though you owe him anything,” he insisted. “It’s not as though you love him any longer, or can even give him what he wants—that girl, however little she brings him, can give him more than you. You are for defeating happiness all round, you see. It’s not worth it. I understand your reason for wishing to do this, but I can’t feel it justifies it in any sense.”
He put an arm about her and drew her to him and held her close.
“Cut it, Pamela,” he said. “I’ll take you home to England. We’ll be married quietly over there—or in Europe somewhere. It will be better for the children in the long run, dear, believe me. I can’t get reconciled anyhow to the idea of giving you up. You belong to me. I’ve a right to you. I have loved you always, from the day I saw you first at that tournament so many years ago. Arnott robbed me of you then. I can’t let him step in a second time and take you from me... Believe me, Pamela, I wouldn’t try to stand between you and what you consider to be a duty if I saw any possible chance of happiness in it for you at all,—if even I could feel that the result might justify the sacrifice. It won’t. It will be just death in life for you both. And it’s going to be pretty hard on me too. I could put up with that, if it spelt happiness for you; but it doesn’t. Pamela, is it worth it? cheating ourselves for a principle that isn’t going to work any solid good for any one?”
He drew her head to his shoulder, and gathered her closer in his arms and kissed her, keeping his face pressed to the tear-wet cheek, feeling the trembling of her body lying passive in his arms, and the little choking sobs which escaped her as she wept in his embrace. Would she yield, he wondered? Had she not in surrendering to his caresses partly yielded already?
“It is asking too much of human nature to expect us to give up everything,” he said. “I want you. I am lonely without you. It isn’t a case of making love,—a phase of feverish emotions. I love you honestly, earnestly. I want you day after day. I want your companionship. I want you to fill my life, as I shall hope to fill yours. I want you at my side—always. Pamela, my dearest, you are not going to snatch my hope away from me for no more solid reason than the fulfilment of an imaginary duty which is going to benefit no one? Life—without you—is empty for me.”
“Oh! my dear!” she sobbed. She lifted her face to his and kissed his lips. “I want to do as you wish. I want to take the easy course; but the other is the right course. It isn’t just happiness that is at stake. It is neither love for him, nor any sense of obligation to him, that makes me desire to marry the father of my children... It’s just the knowledge of what is due to them. They count first. They have to be considered. Do you think I don’t realise,” she added passionately, withdrawing herself from his arms, “that I shall hate my life with him,—that—God forgive me I—I shall possibly hate him? ... hate him more every year, until even pity for him dies beneath the strain of constant weariness, daily resentment. What you offer tempts me sorely. It’s just dragging me to pieces to refuse you. Life with you would be a good and happy thing. I want it, and I can’t have it. But it is denying you which hurts more than denying myself. My dear!—my dear! I wish you didn’t care so much. What can I do? ... What can I say?”
“You can do,” he answered, looking at her steadily, “what I ask you to do, and leave the future of the children more safely in my hands than in their father’s. His example can be no possible guide for them. His influence in the home will tend neither towards their happiness nor their good. At most, you can give them his name—they have a right to that, as it is. Think, Pamela... Isn’t your idea of what is right for them merely a morbid fancy? Let the man go. You’ve lost your hold on him. Leave him to finish the muddle he has made of his life in his own way. He has proved himself incapable of faithfulness. It isn’t decent that you should continue to live with him. I show you a way out,—take it. Put yourself unreservedly in my hands.”
“That’s shirking,” she said. “I’ve always shirked.”
“What else is there for you to do?” he asked. “You can’t straighten a muddle which is none of your making. There’s a duty you owe to yourself,—you’re overlooking that Shake yourself free of this life which is hurtful to you in every sense, and give me the right to protect you, to act and think for you. I can’t countenance what you think of doing. I’m going to use my utmost effort to dissuade you. See here,” he said. He took a note-book from his pocket, and wrote the address of the Pretoria Home upon a page which he tore out and handed to her. “Write to the doctor there, and ask him to give you all particulars of Arnott’s case. He will possibly tell you more than he told me.”
“His condition makes no difference,” she answered, reading the address he handed to her before putting the paper away. “Ill or well, it doesn’t affect the main point.”
“I know,” he said. “But you ought to ascertain what you can before taking any decisive step. Then, if you wish to see him, I will take you there.”
At this suggestion, which she had not before considered, she glanced at him in quick dismay.
“I don’t think—I could go to him,” she said, hesitating nervously. “I... He must come home.”
“That, of course,” Dare answered, infinitely relieved, “is as you wish.”
The possibility of Arnott consenting to return occurred to him as very unlikely.
“You’ve got to face the chance of his refusal,” he added abruptly. He leaned towards her. “If he refuses, Pamela?—He may, you know.”
She turned to him and laid a hand impulsively upon his arm.
“Don’t tempt me to hope he will do that,” she said. “Be strong for both of us... I want you to be strong.”
He took her face in his hands and held it for a moment looking deeply into her eyes.
“Aren’t you demanding rather much of me,” he asked, “to insist that I should aid you in my own defeat? I’m only human, Pamela.”
She answered nothing, but placing her hands on his wrists, she pulled his hands from her face and carried them to her lips. At this unexpected act on her part Dare coloured awkwardly. The next moment he had seized her in his arms and covered her face with kisses. As abruptly as he had seized her, he released her and stood up. He pulled himself together with an effort, and walked as far as the window, where he paused for a second or so, and then turned and came slowly bade, and stood above her, looking down into the sweet, upturned face.
“When I came to you this morning,” he said, “I had only one purpose,—to win you,—to make you see that the only thing that really matters is our love for one another. I feel that still. It’s the only thing that counts with me. But I’m not going to worry you any more. You’ve got to follow your conscience in this. I think you’re wrong... time may prove you wrong. If it does, or if you fail in this, I count on you to let me know. I shall always be at hand—waiting. You’ll summon me, Pamela, when the time comes?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
She gazed into the strong face above her, sad now, and rather stern; and the thought of all that she was losing in sending him out of her life gripped her heart like icy fingers closing about the happiness of life. And while she sat there, and he stood over her, gravely silent, the gay sound of childish laughter broke upon the stillness, followed by the quick patter of little feet along the stoep. Dare looked round.
“Well, at any rate,” he said, “you’ve got them.”
The bitterness in his voice did not escape her. She understood what he was feeling, and, rising, she went to him and placed a hand gently on his arm.
“The best thing that life has given me is your love,” she said. “There is no sting of bitterness in that at all.”