Chapter Twenty Two.
Once More, No.
Tired as he was with his quick journey and with the hurrying emotions of the past night, Jack was too restless to stay in the house. He called Cartouche, and the dog, after a little hesitation, went with him, though without any of his usual excitement. He kept close at Ibbetson’s heels, from which nothing drew him, and walked along with his tail depressed, and his whole appearance spiritless. Jack’s own heart was very heavy. The kind, gentle woman had been like a mother to him, and a hundred remembrances of her unselfishness came thronging. He was vexed with himself for having left her, for having neglected to write as often as she liked—for many things of which he knew very well she had kept no record, nor so much as blamed him in her heart. Those tender cancellings are the sharpest reproaches of all, when Death has laid his finger on the page.
Then, as he walked on, his mind wandered off to the speculations from which who can be free, when one who has been near to them passes away from their reach? Could she still see him? What was the actual separation between them? What infinite mysteries had already been made known to her? Jack had no fixed aim, but he thought he would go on to the English cemetery and choose the place where she was so soon to lie. He did not know the exact way, and found himself by San Gregorio: the bell was tolling, and he went up the broad steps. There is a little chapel connected with it, one of a group of three, in which he remembered having long ago seen a quire of angels painted by Guido, which had haunted him. He found the sacristan, and went with him across a little untidy picturesque garden, sweet with violets, and gay with great irises, purple and white. The chapel is very bare and like a barn, but at one end is the beautiful fresco; the white wings seem to clash, the blissful faces glow down upon you—over what might be the battlements of heaven—with a purity and grace which are rare in Guido. Jack paid the sacristan to let him stay there by himself for a little while; he was glad he had come, thankful to have had this quiet and peaceful hour with the praising angels above and the sweet scent of spring violets stealing through the door. Then, as he came out and stood on the steps of San Gregorio, the full glory of the sun was shining on that stately and beautiful view which stretches before the church. Feathery clouds dappled the blue of the sky, tender and yet deep: golden and ruddy lights fell on the convent which crowns the ridge of the Palatine, the convent whose nuns pray patiently on the spot where emperors held their revels; up against the buildings two palms stood proudly; the great arches of Nero and Severus were black with shadows; here and there an almond blossomed, rosy red, and all the light cloud of trees below was touched with the mysterious and indescribable promise of the spring.
Jack walked slowly back, and Cartouche followed sadly behind him. There was something in the dog’s mute sympathy very grateful to the man, piteous though it was to see the wistful questioning of his eyes. They went home through little back streets, to avoid the crowded thoroughfares where all Rome was making her carnival holiday. It does not penetrate much into those crooked and picturesque byeways, and, indeed the day was as yet too early for great attempts at gaiety. All about the Forum was quite undisturbed, the beautiful pillars stood in quiet beauty, while the sun played in golden lights upon their stone, and the Capitol looked down upon them from its prouder height.
When he reached the Via della Croce he found, as he might have expected without allowing it to cause him a sharp disappointment, that Phillis had left it, and had gone back to the hotel. It was not possible for him to follow her until quite late in the day. Miss Preston, who, it might have been imagined, would have liked to have kept matters in her own hands, was so subdued and full of grief, as to be quite helpless and unable even to offer a suggestion. She had been rather disposed to blame Miss Cartwright for not throwing off her invalid habits when first she came to Rome, and now reproached herself bitterly. Indeed it seemed as if the sweetness of that death had touched and softened all; Winter went quietly about on tip-toe, with oddly gentle movements. As for Cartouche, who could tell what was passing in his mind? How much did he know? This much they all noticed, that having watched patiently for so many hours in the anteroom, he would not now go near it. He buried himself in a corner of the kitchen, and only came out or took food when Jack went there and coaxed him.
Necessarily, every arrangement fell on Ibbetson, and it was necessary they should be made with a promptitude which at such a time seems almost inhuman. They occupied him all the day, so that, as has been said, it was quite late before he was able to follow Phillis to the hotel.
She was alone when he was shown up, sitting, in the dusk, near the wood fire. He had longed all day for this moment, and came in quickly, with a sudden delight at finding her there by herself. Something in her manner checked him instantly. It was nothing upon which he could seize, and it was perfectly gentle, but he felt that, in some way or other, it recalled to him the change in their position, which in his eagerness he had seemed to forget. And it vexed him the more because the night before certain vague thoughts had almost taken the form of hope. She was sitting with her back to the fading light; he could not see the expression of her eyes, nor much more than a pale face, the outline of a slender figure, the hands clasped on her lap. Every now and then as she gave him the details of his aunt’s illness, or repeated some tender message, her voice faltered, but she carefully avoided the least allusion to her own feelings, and he was certain that she intended him to feel that the barrier between them remained unmoved. A chill restraint crept over them both. Once, when his words took a somewhat warmer and more personal form as he thanked her for all she had done, she interrupted him, although still quite gently:
“Do you know,” she said, “that I have been very glad to have had this talk with you without the others being here? There are many things one can’t talk of before friends, however kind they are. But they may come back at any moment now, and I have a great many things to say. So don’t let us waste our time.” Jack muttered something about the others. She did not seem to hear him, but went on hurriedly:
“You ought to know how things are going on with the Masters. I’m afraid it is not very satisfactory. Has anyone told you that Mr Trent is still here?”
“Still? Well, certainly I did think that circumstances would have ousted him by this time.”
She gave him a quick, inquiring glance.
“I thought your letter would have been strong enough to do it. But—please excuse me—did you speak plainly enough? I couldn’t help having a feeling that you were making the best of his conduct, and—and it almost seems a pity,” said Phillis, provoked at her own lame ending. She had thought she knew exactly what to say.
“Didn’t I speak out?”
“Well, it is certain that man can twist everything to suit his purpose, even his own misdeeds.”
“Yes,” assented Jack quietly. “He has a wonderful strength of plausibility.”
“And he has managed to persuade Bice—I don’t know what he hasn’t persuaded them all—that it was a mistake about the fifty pounds, and that though now he no longer doubts that Clive paid it, the man never repaid it to him. Somehow or other he has made her believe that he has acted straightforwardly, and has suffered for it. And, myself, I can’t help fearing that there are some other complications, and that he has that foolish Mrs Masters in his power. But now that you are here, things will be put straight, I hope.”
“Yes. I suppose there will have to be a blow up,” said Jack, not very cheerfully.
There was a curious thrill—was it pity or reluctance?—in her voice when she went on rapidly:
“I blame myself for something. I ought to have told you before you went away that Bice was engaged to Mr Trent. I believe I thought something would be sure to happen to put an end to it.”
“I heard it from Trent himself. And it still goes on?”
“Yes. The marriage is to be at Easter—or was.” If there had been a clearer light in the room, Jack might have read something in Phillis’s face, some hidden pain, some struggle with herself which might have disarmed him. As it was, he was hurt by her persistent belief in his caring for Bice. He said in a hard and strained voice, which she interpreted as pain from her own point of view—
“Here is a budget of news, indeed! It seems one should be a villain if one desires to succeed successfully.”
Phillis only thought of the pain in his voice. She leant forward and said with eagerness—
“But of course you will not allow her to be sacrificed?”
“I? Why not? I suppose she knows what she is about—most women do,” he said with gloom. But the next moment he turned towards her. “Really, I can’t tell what she wishes, but I’ll tell you what I’ll do. She shall hear the precise facts as fairly as I can put them, without exaggeration. After that she must judge for herself. A woman ought to have some sort of notion what the man is like whom she intends to marry, unless, indeed, she cares for him so much that she is content to be blind. In that case—”
He stopped. Phillis repeated quickly:
“In that case—”
“Hadn’t she better remain undeceived?”
She sighed. It seemed to her that he made her task very difficult.
“Well, at any rate, let her judge fairly,” she said. “Yes, that’s due to her.” He leant his arms on the table, and began pulling some cyclamen out of a great bunch. “Viole pazze,” he went on; “Rome seems to have as many flowers as Florence. By the way, do you remember hearing me speak of a young Moroni who used to be a good deal at the villa? He came in my train yesterday from Florence.”
“Did he?” said Phillis absently. The constraint between them seemed to increase; they might have been strangers. Her effort had been greater than she knew, and she felt more sad and weary than before Jack came in, while something told her that the hardest part was to come. Jack himself went on playing with the poor cyclamen, no less uncomfortable than she. He wanted to say something about Hetherton, and did not know how to begin. Phillis relieved him of the difficulty. “Tell me something about Aunt Harriet, please,” she said. “It is an age since she wrote. Of course you saw her while you were in England?”
“Yes. I went to Hetherton at once, and to my amazement found that fellow Trent spending his Christmas there. Did you know he was so thick with them?”
“I? No. They hardly write to me,” said she, with a forlorn sense of loneliness. “But they were well, weren’t they?”
“My uncle was horribly cut up by—by your determination, Phillis.”
“I was afraid he might be sorry.”
She knew that what she dreaded was coming, and her heart beat wildly; but she said the words quite calmly, and as if they related to someone else. Jack crushed a flower in his hand, and leant forward.
“She was sorry, too,” he said in a low voice. “Can’t you think differently? I know I was the one to blame, but can’t you let me—”
She interrupted him with a hasty gesture.
“That subject is at an end between us; pray do not return to it.”
But that it was so unlike her, he could have sworn he detected a slight accent of scorn in her voice.
“Well, Phillis,” he said, getting up, “I daren’t do it, if you forbid me. I don’t suppose I’ve gone the way to work to make you believe what I want to say. Perhaps I’d better have held my tongue, as I intended. It was the seeing you with her, I suppose, and thinking that perhaps—however, if it is as you say, and the subject must be at an end, will you give me a kiss, Phillis, before we part?”
She covered her face with her hands, and drew back quickly and without a word to soften the gesture.
“Not?” said Jack, in the same slow tone. “Well, don’t fear. Whatever I am, I won’t be a bore. I understand fully all that you mean—all. It was you, remember, who promised we should always be friends—There, don’t be afraid, I am going. Good-bye. God bless you, Phillis.”
But long after he had gone she kept her face covered—perhaps because she was trying to shut out even the remembrance of what had past, perhaps because she feared her own impulses. For as the door shut, she had felt as if her very senses went out in a wild cry to him to come back. Not? If he had but known how hard that moment was, how it was against herself that she shrank with the movement which had wounded him, how she had fought with the longing that his request called up! If she had kissed him she could have fought no longer, she must have flung down her arms. Why not? Why not? For the first time this persistent question seemed to have gained strength, and she set herself to answer it reasonably. Why not?
She went back to the early days of their engagement. Its romance had come to her very quietly, and untroubled by fears or doubts. Jack had always been her hero from the time when he had embodied one by one all that her storybooks offered in that line. She used to listen triumphantly to the school exploits which he poured into her fascinated ears. She could have no greater delight than to go with him to feed the rabbits, or the wild-fowl on the lake. He filled a far more important part in her life than she did in his, and so, though the gladness was great, she felt neither surprise nor misgivings when he asked her to marry him. Her inexperience was even greater than her youthfulness; she loved him, and it was both natural and sweet that he should love her.
But when, little by little, she understood that his feeling was of a very different nature from hers, an uneasy shame that she should have been so lightly won added a sting to her sorrow.
Jack had not been mistaken in fancying that there was a touch of scorn in her voice when he made that last appeal. The scorn, however, was directed rather against herself than him. She knew so well why he had made it. She had been expecting it all the time. She had always had a presentiment that Miss Cartwright, who loved her very dearly, would say something to her nephew which would bear this sort of fruit, and his speaking only assured her that her dread was well founded. If Jack had but known it, he had chosen the worst possible moment for his appeal. Did he think that she was going to make another mistake? And Mr Thornton too—as he had almost admitted—had probably spoken very strongly, and had no doubt weighted his words with threats about the future of Hetherton. Phillis started up and walked to the window, locking her hands together as she walked, but there was not the slightest hesitation hidden behind the movement. Though she loved Jack so well that she thought it would almost break her heart to see him shut out from Hetherton, she would never suffer herself to become its price.
For Jack did not love her, of that she felt sure. He pitied her, perhaps; liked her, possibly; reproached himself, she did not doubt; but these were only shadows with which she would never again content herself.
Somebody else loved her, or so she had begun to fear, and it was curious that her clear judgment failed as she thought of Mr Penington. For she was wondering whether she should ever marry him. He was very good, and kind, and clever, and—
“In the dark, my poor Phillis?” said a cheerful voice. “And all alone? I am afraid it was very inhuman of us to leave you. Come, confess, haven’t you been thinking so? At any rate, somebody else was almost rude to me about it. I felt quite horrid.”
“I’ve not been alone,” said Phillis, thinking as she spoke that her own voice sounded curiously odd and unsteady. “Mr Ibbetson only went away a few minutes ago. I almost wonder you did not meet him.”
“I thought I caught sight of a coat like his. I will say for him that his coats are well cut. However, his companionship can hardly have been cheerful.”
“We had a good deal to talk about,” said Phillis, gravely.
“Of course, my poor dear. But I think it is very hard so much has fallen on you. And do tell me, for I am dying to know—”
“What?”
“Did he ask a great many questions about the Masters? Has he seen any of them yet?”
“No.”
“No? Are you sure? Well, I suppose he could hardly hurry there at once, but I’m much mistaken if he waits long, and then what will be the next act in the play? Will poor Mr Trent receive his dismissal? Now, Phillis, it’s too dark to see you, but I know exactly how you’re looking. I can’t help it; I shall always say that Mr Ibbetson has behaved abominably. There was no one to call him out, for Harry could never have been brought to comprehend that was part of his duty. But I must speak.”
“Don’t blame him to-day, at any rate,” said Phillis in a low voice that was full of pain.
“Is he so much cut up? Well, poor fellow, I really am sorry for him, though I pity Cartouche more. And you, too, my dear. You have had a terrible time of it while we have all been going on in a most shamefully selfish way. Not Mr Penington. I must do him the justice to say that I don’t think you’ve been out of his thoughts for a minute. And how nice he is! Oh, dear, there’s the table-d’hôte bell! You’ll not go down, of course? No, I told Giuseppe so as I passed. But you won’t mind Mr Penington coming up afterwards? He wanted to so very much that I hadn’t the heart to refuse him. Besides, he is very understanding and won’t tease you; you needn’t even try to talk, for he has a whole heap of Etruscan tomby things from Corneto, and wants Harry to take us all there. I shan’t go. I know exactly what it’s like, one of those horrid dirty little places where one can only eat the middles of things.”
She lit the candles and went away, leaving Phillis just where she had found her, so that the girl’s thoughts, which this conversation had hardly broken in upon, rapidly shaped themselves again in the same form. She would have told herself that Miss Cartwright made the centre, and perhaps she did, but round that centre, with its tender and gentle recollections, how many other fancies grouped themselves.
And somehow or other that evening the question, which she had not yet answered to her own satisfaction, became more persistent. Mr Penington, whom she had not seen for a day or two, was radiant with the delight of being near her again, and his pleasure sent a sort of answering glow into her own heart. It was impossible for her to remain untouched by the kind thoughtfulness with which he contrived to shield and leave her in peace, or by the swiftness with which he seemed to anticipate her wishes. Gradually he drew her out of her silence into an interest in the curious things he had got together, and to promise to go to the Etruscan Museum, in the Vatican to see the collection of cottage tombs, the curious little vessels like miniature hats which were dug out of an ancient burying place in the Campagna.
“You shall go when you like,” he said eagerly.
Mrs Leyton, who was very warmly on Mr Penington’s side, looked at her husband and smiled. She had noticed something different in Phillis’s manner that night, a more passive acquiescence, perhaps, from which she augured well. Really liking her, she would have been glad that the Roman winter should end in this satisfactory fashion, and was prepared even to go through the catacombs, if Mr Penington proposed it, though she hated anything underground. Mr Penington had learnt exactly the things which Phillis liked.
“I have come round to your thinking about Titian’s picture in the Borghese,” he said to her in a low voice, when the others were talking; “I think it is the best thing in all the gallery.”
“In all Rome, I think,” said Phillis brightening. “I care for it so much that it quite hints me to hear people abuse it.”
“Are you talking of the Sacred and Profane Love?” asked Mrs Leyton, chiming in. “Mr Ibbetson could not make out which was which, don’t you remember? I can’t say it spoke very well for his artistic feeling.”
Somehow or other this little speech had a different effect from what was intended: it hurt Phillis, and though Mr Penington did not know much about Jack’s position with her, he was watching her and saw that she was vexed. He said quietly—
“That is not a very uncommon mistake at first sight, indeed, you may find it immortalised in print. But at every fresh visit the marvellous beauty comes out. Very likely the name is altogether imaginary. Vanity and Modesty would do as well for it as for Da Vinci’s picture in the Sciarra. You must come and see that one day, soon, Miss Grey; I can get an order.”
“You can get everything, I believe,” said Phillis with a smile.
He said quickly, so that only she could hear—
“I like you to say so—I shall take it as an omen;” and he then turned away, and talked for the rest of the evening to Mrs Leyton. Phillis leaned back in a kind of dream, thinking that friendship was pleasant and soothing, and wishing that others would be content with it. But they would not. And if—if only she could make up her mind to marry him, not only could she save him—this was what she thought—from the pangs of disappointment, but her own unrest might perhaps be hushed into—contentment.
And yet she would not marry Jack without an equal love. Certainly Phillis could lay no claim to be what is called a consistent character.