CHAPTER VI
CLEARING AWAY THE RUBBISH
All the night following the momentous meeting of the Marut Diamond Company Mrs. Cary had kept to her room, the door locked against her daughter, and had sobbed and wailed in a manner befitting the victim of a hard and undeserved fate.
But in reality hers was the rage of a clumsy workman who has cut himself with his own tools. Her own child, her partner and co-worker, had upset the erection of years. She saw themselves cast out of Marut; she saw the desolate wandering over the earth's surface, this time without the consolation and protection of wealth. For she knew that Beatrice's confession was to go further. Beatrice had made the announcement of her plans quietly but firmly as they had driven home from the club-house.
"To-morrow everybody shall know everything there is to know," she had said, and had remained obdurate to all her mother's commands and pleadings. "I do consider you. I consider you even now. I mean to save you and myself. But this time it must be in another way. Your scheming has only brought us into deeper trouble. We must start afresh."
"But how? But how?" her mother had said, wringing her hands in uncontrolled despair. "Where are we to start? How are we ever going to make people believe in us, now we have no money?"
"It does not matter what people believe," Beatrice had replied. "With our money and our lies we have been building mud-hovels, and now we are going to build palaces. That's all that matters."
Mrs. Cary had not understood. She thought Beatrice had gone mad, and knowing that with madness, reasoning is in vain, she shut herself up in her room, pulled down the blinds, and believed by this ostrich-like proceeding that she could keep off the inevitable moment when they would have to be pulled up again and the cold, pitiless reality faced.
But Beatrice went her way undeterred. From Stafford's bungalow she drove to the Travers'. The place was little more than an ill-cared-for shanty, the garden overgrown with weeds, the rooms damp, ill-aired and badly furnished, its reputation for misfortune phenomenal. Travers had taken it as the only bungalow to be had for such a short period as he intended to stay in Marut, and Lois had made no objection. Her energy and determined striving after everything that was graceful and beautiful was systematically crushed out of sight. She never protested, never laid any difficulties in Travers' path. She seemed to shrink into herself and live an invisible life of her own, leaving him to go his way. She could not help him. She could build up nothing on a character whose foundations were of shifting sand.
And never had she been more fully convinced of her own powerlessness and of his absolute independence than after their brief and stormy interview before Stafford's entry. She had felt how for a moment their two diametrically opposed natures had faced each other. She had felt a brief joyful satisfaction in at last coming to a hand-to-hand struggle with him; but then, as usual, with a smile and an easy word he had eluded her. So it had always been—so it would always be. Too late she realized that she had thrown away her life upon a man who had no need of her devotion. Too late she realized that all sacrifices are wasted unless the ennobling of the sacrificer's character be considered. For true happiness, true content and goodness can not be given. They must be self-won, or they are no more than hothouse plants which shrivel together in the cold blast of an east wind. Lois had sacrificed herself to bring true happiness and content and goodness into Travers' life, and had failed. She had failed all the more signally because she had never loved him. She had loved Stafford—extraordinary and terrible as it seemed to her, she still loved him. She could not root him out of her life, and though his image was overshadowed by a greater and more noble figure he retained his place.
The glance they had exchanged had pierced down to the very center of her being, and if it had revealed nothing to her it had also revealed everything. For she knew now that the strange bond which had linked them together from the beginning united them still. Some reckless and unscrupulous hand had sundered them outwardly, and her instinct, guided by a hundred significant incidents, told her whose hand it had been. She fled to her little gloomy sitting-room, with its worn-out, tasteless furniture and drab walls, and fought her sorrow and despair single-handed and in her own way. She had a man's dislike for tears—though, being a woman, they came all too easily to her—and she fought against them now with all the strength at her command, with all the pluck which in happier days had made her so splendid a partner in a "losing game." She had made a disastrous mistake in her life, but it was not too late.
The cathedral should go on in its unseen growth, and every conquered tear, every brave smile was a fresh stone bringing it nearer to perfection. God be thanked for the fetishes with which the less fortunate of us are still allowed to adorn the barren walls of our life! The cathedral, the imaginary "sheltering-place for others," was Lois' fetish, and the thought of it and of the strong-faced man with whom she worked in spiritual partnership was a deep, inspiring consolation. It stood at her right hand and helped partly to overthrow the weight of dread and evil presentiment which had borne down upon her all too sensitive and superstitious temperament as she had left her husband and Stafford alone.
Thus it was that, when the curtains of her room were suddenly parted and Beatrice stood on the threshold, she could face the new-comer with a calm if grave demeanor. She remembered her husband's last injunctions, but it was too late; and moreover, there was an expression on Beatrice's face which told her that the visit was no ordinary one. A woman's instinct is her spiritual hand feeling through the darkness to another's soul. Beatrice and Lois watched each other without smile or greeting. They forgot the outward formalities of life in the suddenly aroused interest which they found in each other, in the consciousness that in this, their first meeting alone, they were to become closely united.
They were indeed striking contrasts. At no time had they seemed more so than now, as they stood there silently facing each other—Beatrice, tall, fair with the wonderful Madonna beauty; Lois, small and dark, the quick and fiery temperament flashing to meet the other's dignity and apparent calm. And yet at no time had the barrier between them been so insignificant, so slight. Beatrice advanced slowly from the door, where she had first hesitated.
"May I speak with you, Mrs. Travers?" she asked.
Lois nodded, mechanically holding out her hand. Her eyes were riveted on the other's grave face, drinking in with a real admiration a loveliness from which the old marring lines of mockery and cynicism had been swept away.
"Won't you sit down?" she said gently. "You look tired and pale."
Beatrice seemed not to hear. She took the outstretched hand between both her own. Her head was a little bent, and as she looked full into Lois' face her expression softened and saddened.
"You, too, are unhappy!" she said.
Lois made no answer. She was overwhelmed by the directness of the statement, but still more by the change in Beatrice's voice. It sounded low and unsteady, as though a storm of feeling lay close beneath the surface. "Do you wonder how I know?" Beatrice went on, after an instant's pause.
"I don't know," Lois answered, "and for the moment we won't talk about such things. I can't bear to see you look so—so ill. You must sit there and let me get you something to drink. Have you walked?"
Beatrice yielded this time to the kindly persuasion. She sank down in the proffered chair, but she retained Lois' hand.
"No, I drove. But I am tired. It was not easy work getting through the crowd. They did not seem to want to let me pass. Once or twice I thought they were going to attack me."
Lois laughed.
"They are only pilgrims. They come every year, and are quite harmless. Hark at them now! There must be a band of them going past. Would you like to watch from the verandah? It is really amusing—"
"No, no; this is not the time for amusement. I have something else to do. Mrs. Travers, you are very kind to me. You have the right to hate me."
"I—hate you? Why should I, Beatrice?"
"You call me Beatrice. But we have never been friends."
"Not till now."
"Do you think we are going to be?"
Lois drew up a stool and seated herself at Beatrice's side. Something in the other's firm, gentle hold and in the low voice made her heart ache.
"I don't know. I feel as though we were already."
"Don't feel that, because it is not possible. Mrs. Travers, do you know who it was who came between you and John Stafford?" Lois' head sank. "I see that you do. Yes, I did my best. I wanted his position—and money. Are you still my friend?"
Lois met the grave, questioning eyes with a sudden energy.
"Yes. That is all over and past. I like you now. I liked you the moment you entered the room. You seemed different."
Beatrice smiled faintly.
"And you, too, are different from any one I have ever known. Another woman would not have been able to forgive as you have done. I have spoiled your life. I can see that."
Lois pressed her hand.
"Hush! You must not say so. I am married—"
"Lois, I have spoiled your life. I have come here to tell you the truth, and you also must be truthful. For pity's sake, let us put lies and humbug on one side. I am sick of them!" For a moment she seemed to fight desperately with herself, and then she went on more quietly: "I have spoiled your life. I have spoiled the life of a man who trusted me. I have spoiled my own. That is what I have done in the twenty-five years given me to work in. I have lied and cheated my way through. And this is the end—miserable bankruptcy."
"Yes," Lois said, nodding. "I heard about it."
"About what? Has your husband told you?"
"The Marut Company has failed."
Beatrice sat silent a moment. Her free hand supported the firmly moulded chin, her eyes were fixed thoughtfully in front of her.
"I did not mean that sort of bankruptcy," she said at last. "That doesn't count, Lois. I used to think it meant the worst sort of misfortune, but it doesn't. The inner bankruptcy is worse. The loss of self-respect, of honor, of the trust of those one—cares for—" Again the low voice trembled dangerously, but she went on: "Don't commiserate with me, kind-hearted little woman. I don't need your pity—now. Bankruptcy isn't so bad. It is better than living on false credit. When the crash is over, one picks oneself up again. Hope is eternal, and on the ruins—"
"One can build cathedrals," Lois interposed dreamily.
"Yes, or palaces. But first the old rubbish must be cleared away. One must pay one's debts. I have very many to pay. First to you, Lois—"
"Don't! I have told you that that is all over."
"—and then to Captain Stafford. Lois, I did want to take him away from you, but I never succeeded. It was something else that did it—something which I have never understood."
"But which my husband knows?"
Beatrice nodded. She was not there to spare Lois or herself. She was there to tell the truth.
"Yes, he knows. But it is a mystery which we shall never penetrate. At any rate, I have set Captain Stafford free."
Lois said nothing. Her thoughts were busy trying to piece together the secret. With every moment distrust and suspicion were taking stronger hold upon her.
"Lois," Beatrice went on, "that is the least of it all. The worst of all is that I can not pay my debts alone. I must go on ruining others. I must ruin you."
Lois stiffened. She sat upright, as though preparing herself for a shock which she dimly anticipated.
"Tell me what you mean," she said.
"You remember it was I who tempted Rajah Nehal Singh into forming the
Marut Company—"
"That is not what you want to say. It was my husband's scheme."
"Very well, it was our scheme, if you like. At any rate, the whole responsibility rests—or should rest—upon our shoulders. We have ruined him, and we have ruined hundreds of others. It is only fair that we should bear our share of the calamity."
"And haven't we done so? You have lost all your money. That is punishment enough. And Archie, too—" She paused, a fierce note of defiance ringing out with her last words. Beatrice made no answer, and the two women looked at each other in significant silence. "You don't mean that—that it was—dishonest?"
"I have no doubt Mr. Travers believed the mine was going to be a success. But it has failed, and the whole burden of the failure rests upon others, not upon him."
"My husband is ruined, too. All his money is gone."
"Yours remains."
"Yes, but—" She stammered and broke off helplessly.
Beatrice said nothing more. She saw the process of rapid thought on her companion's working face. She knew there was no need to explain further the careful precautions which Travers had made for his own safety. She knew that for his wife there was only one action possible. Lois rose to her feet.
"You must forgive me," she said, a new and dangerous light in her dark eyes. "I am very slow and stupid about business matters, but I understand what you have been trying to say to me. You have pointed out a duty to me which otherwise, in my ignorance, I might have overlooked. My husband has incurred responsibilities which must be met—if not by him, at any rate by me. No third person shall take his share of the burden—certainly not the Rajah, who was no more than the tool which my husband used. I would be glad if you would let every one know that of course my money will go toward refunding those whom the failure of the mine has injured."
Beatrice rose also. She put her two hands on Lois' shoulders.
"You needn't do it," she said. "The money is yours. It is a thing that is done every day. The world won't say much if you stick to what is yours."
"It is not mine. My husband's responsibilities are my responsibilities." She paused, and then went on quietly: "Thank you for explaining to me. I should never have understood myself, and Archie—no doubt dreads having to tell me that of course my money must go, too." She looked Beatrice full in the face, and they understood each other. There are some lies which a loyal woman must carry with her to the grave. Beatrice bent and kissed the cold face.
"You do right," she said. "I knew you would. That is why I came to you. I have helped to bring down all this misfortune on Marut. I have helped to lower us all in the eyes of those—those who used and ought to look up to us. Now you are going to lift us out of the mire—Lois, what was that?"
The two women clung to each other. Hitherto there had been no sound in the adjoining room save the regular rise and fall of two voices. Now the startled listeners heard the report of a revolver, followed by a sudden, absolute silence. Lois shook herself free from Beatrice's instinctive clutch.
"It is in my husband's room!" she said hoarsely. "Stay here! I will go—"
She hurried across the room and, thrusting open a curtained door, disappeared. The next instant Beatrice heard a cry which overcame every hesitation. Horror and despair called her in that sound, and the next moment she followed Lois' footsteps. She did not know what she expected to see. Afterward she believed that at the back of her mind there had been some thought of suicide. But it was not Travers' head that she saw pillowed against Lois' knee. Travers stood on the verandah, the smoking pistol still in his hand, his face livid and damp with fear. At his feet his wife was bending over the body of a man whom Beatrice recognized with a shock of pain.
"What has happened?" she asked breathlessly. "What has happened?"
Travers turned and stared at her. His eyes were glazed, and for the moment he did not seem to know who she was.
"Captain Stafford has—been murdered!" he stammered. "He was going down the steps when a native attacked him. I—fired, but it was too late. Oh, thank God! Here is Colonel Carmichael!"
True enough, it was the Colonel himself who sprang up the verandah steps. From beyond the ill-kept garden they heard the tramp of men and a low, continuous sound, like the threatening moan of the wind. On the verandah reigned a complete and awestruck silence. Colonel Carmichael bent over the unconscious man.
"This is the beginning," he said somberly. "How did it happen?"
"A native must have been lying in wait for him," Travers answered. "He struck at him with this." He held out a three-inch blade in a hand which shook like a child's. "I tried to save him, but I couldn't. The man escaped, though I think I hit him."
The Colonel knelt down by Lois' side, and drawing out his brandy-flask tried to force a few drops between the purple lips.
"We were expecting him every minute," he said, "but we couldn't wait.
The danger was too pressing. Here, man—it's all right. Look up."
Captain Stafford's heavy eyelids had wavered. The Colonel shifted him into a higher position, his head still resting against Lois' knee. When the dying eyes opened they fell straight on the sweet dark face bent over him in loving pity.
"Lois!" he whispered faintly. "Lois—my—kiss me!"
Lois looked up at her husband. He nodded without meeting her eyes. Her lips rested on the chilly forehead.
"Dear John!"
"Lois—you—tell the Rajah——" He struggled fiercely for breath and his raised hand pointed piteously at Travers. "Tell him—not—his own"—The words died into a choked silence.
"Brandy—here! He's trying to say something. What is it, man?"
Stafford turned with a last effort, his lips parted. A second time he pointed with a desperate insistency at Travers—then with a sudden quick-drawn sigh he sank back, his face against Lois' shoulder. Colonel Carmichael, who knew death too well, rose heavily to his feet.
"It's all over," he said. "We can do nothing more for him, and we must leave him. Come, Lois."
His stern command roused her from her stupor of half-incredulous sorrow. Gently she laid the lifeless head upon the cushions which Beatrice had brought, and crossed the hands over the quiet breast. This time she fought in vain against the blinding tears. They fell on the face of the dead man, and, moved by an irresistible impulse, she bent once more and kissed him.
"God bless you, John!" Then she rose and faced her husband. "I can not help it," she said. "He is dead."
Travers said nothing. He was clinging to the verandah, and his face was grey. Outside the noise and confusion had increased. They could hear yells and imprecations, and a stone whizzed through the trees, falling a few feet short of where the little party stood. Colonel Carmichael shook Travers by the arm.
"Don't stand there like that!" he said, his voice rough with contempt. "It can't be helped, and I dare say we shan't any of us be much better off by to-morrow. I have a patrol outside waiting to take the ladies over to my bungalow. Mrs. Cary and Mrs. Berry are already there. There isn't a moment to be lost. Rouse yourself and look to Lois. I will escort Miss Cary." He turned to Beatrice with a stiff bow. "The enemy must at least find us united."
"The enemy!" exclaimed Beatrice sharply.
"The Rajah is our enemy," was the bitter answer. "You and Travers best know why."
The two women exchanged one brief glance. Lois crossed the intervening space and took her husband's arm.
"Archibald," she said, slowly and emphatically, "if this trouble has anything to do with the mine, it would be well to let the Rajah know that we also take our share. There must be no suspicion that—that we have not acted honorably or have shirked our responsibilities."
He stared at her with dull, listless eyes.
"What do you mean, Lois? He knows I haven't a brass cent."
"But I have. And of course my money must go to refund those whom you have unintentionally ruined."
That roused him. He flung her on one side, with a desperate, goaded curse.
"Your money! How dare you! It's not your money. Half of it is mine. I settled it on you."
"If it is yours, I will give it back to you. You will use it as I say.
If not, I shall use it for you."
Colonel Carmichael had reached the garden. He turned now, and there was a gleam of satisfaction in his eyes.
"That's spoken like an honorable woman, Lois!" he said. "God bless you for it. But it's too late. Nicholson has already gone to Nehal Singh. If he fails, there won't be any time to explain. Come on, or we shall have to fight our way through."
He hurried on through the garden, Beatrice at his side. Husband and wife stood an instant alone, the body of poor Stafford between them. Lois' face was grave and contemptuous.
"I do not know what you have done," she said—"I do not understand what part you played in John's life or in mine, nor how far you are innocent or guilty of bringing about all this misfortune—but I know this much—we shall take our share of trouble."
"Lois, you are my wife! You have no right to go against me."
"I have the right where my honor—where your honor—is concerned. I have the right to refuse to commit an act of gross injustice." She glanced down once more at the quiet face of the man who had held so persistently upon her life and heart, and her firmly compressed lips trembled. "Oh, Archie, was it worth while—just for a little bit of gain? Was it worth while? We might all have been so happy!"
He said nothing. His rage had sunk into a sullen, dogged defiance. The roar of voices beyond the compound suddenly subsided. They heard the Colonel's voice issuing a sharp command and the thud of grounded rifles.
"We must go," she said.
He followed her down the steps, his face painfully averted from the figure that lay motionless upon the ground. The world is but a reflection of ourselves. The sunshine is sad or joyful according to our moods. We read threats and promises in the smiles of others as our own heart is hopeful or distrusting. And for Travers, with the bloodstained hand, the poor lifeless body of his enemy had become the towering shadow of an approaching Nemesis.