III
At half-past eleven Wantley heard that which he had feared to hear, the sound of steps coming down the marble staircase. He got up from his chair, very slowly, very reluctantly. There came the murmur of low voices, and the listener's ear caught Cecily's low, even tones answering Penelope's eager, whispering voice.
'What a relief,' the voice was saying—'what a relief to get away from upstairs—from Motey next door! Here we shall be quite alone——' Then, with surprise, but no annoyance: 'Why, there's a light in Ludovic's smoking-room! But he's very discreet. He would never intrude on a dressing-gown conference.'
And the voices swept on, past the door ajar, on into the short passage which led to the studio.
Wantley sat down again with a very altered feeling. He was ashamed of his former fears, and at that moment begged his cousin's pardon for suspicions which he trusted she would never know he had entertained.
Cecily asleep, dreaming sad dreams, had suddenly wakened to see Penelope standing by the side of her bed.
The tall, ghostlike figure, clad in a long pale-grey dressing-gown, held a small lamp in her hand; and, as the girl opened her eyes, bent down and whispered, 'I could not sleep, and so I thought we might have one last talk. Not here—for we might wake Cousin Theresa; not in my room—for there Motey can hear every word—but downstairs in the studio, if you are not afraid of the cold.'
And so they had made their way through the unlighted house, Cecily's smaller figure wrapped in pale blue and white, her fair hair spread over her shoulders, looking, so her companion in tender mood assured her, like one of Fra Angelico's heavenly visitants.
When in the studio, Penelope put the lamp down on her painting-table and drew the girl over to the broad couch where Cecily had sat down and waited for her, just a month ago, on the afternoon of her first day at Monk's Eype. The knowledge of how happy she had then been, of how beautiful she had thought this room, now full of dim, mysterious sadness, came back to the girl with a pang of pain. She looked round with troubled eyes, but Mrs. Robinson, an elbow on her knee, her chin resting in her left hand, caught nothing of this look, for she was staring out through the dark uncurtained window, absorbed in her own thoughts.
At last she slowly turned her head.
'Cecily,' she said, and her voice sounded curiously strained, 'you must have thought me odd of late, and even sometimes not kind. And yet, my dear, I love you very well.'
'I know,' said Cecily, speaking with difficulty; 'I have understood.'
'You have understood?' Mrs. Robinson looked at her with quick suspicion, and her face hardened. 'Do you mean that my affairs have been discussed? What have you heard? What have you understood?'
'Your feeling as to Lord Wantley—and myself.' Cecily's voice sank, but she spoke very steadily, a little coldly. Surely Penelope might have spared her this utterance.
But the other had heard the slow, reluctant words with a feeling of remorse and relief.
'Why, Cecily!' she cried, and as she spoke she put her arm round the girl's shoulders, 'did you think—did you believe, that I could feel anything but glad? Why, when I first saw how things were going, I could hardly believe in Ludovic's good fortune.' She added, half to herself, 'in his good taste! You are a thousand times too good for him; but he knows that well enough. Of course, I knew he had spoken to you; but as you did not tell me——' There was a note of reproach in Penelope's voice. 'How strange, how amazing, that you should have understood me so little! For the last few days,' she sighed a sharp, short sigh, 'my only really happy, comfortable moments have been spent in thinking of you and of Ludovic.'
She stopped speaking abruptly, but kept her arm round the girl's shoulder. Cecily had time to wonder why she herself felt so far from content; surely the kind words just uttered should have filled her with joy and peace?
'Tell me,' she said, and as she spoke she fixed her eyes imploringly on her companion's face, taking unconscious note of Penelope's rigid mouth and stern, contracted brows—'do tell me why you are so unhappy! I would not ask you if I did not care for you so much.'
'Am I unhappy? Do I seem unhappy?' Mrs. Robinson looked fixedly at the questioner as if really seeking an answer. She got up suddenly, walked to the end of the long room and back, then came and stood before Cecily.
'Well, Cecily, I will tell you, for you deserve to know the truth. I am unhappy, if indeed I am so, because I am about to do a thing of which almost everyone who knows me—in fact, I might say everyone who knows me—will disapprove. Also, it is a thing which will separate me from all those I love and esteem, both in a material sense—for I am going very far away—and in a spiritual sense.'
Penelope sank down on her knees, and placed her hands so that they clasped and covered those of Cecily Wake. 'In your heaven, my dear, there may be found a place for me—after a long stay, I imagine, in purgatory; but there will be no room in mamma's heaven, especially not in that where she believes my father to be. David Winfrith also will consign me to outer darkness, and that of a very horrible kind. Still I would give up willingly all hope of future heaven, Cecily, if only I could conciliate them here—if only they would sympathize with what I am about to do.'
Cecily looked down on the lovely face turned up to hers with a feeling of pity and terror. 'What do you mean?' she said. 'I am sure you would never do anything which would make your mother love you less.'
'I believe there are people'—Penelope was speaking quietly, as if to herself—'to whom what I am going to do would appear to be perfectly right, and, indeed, commendable. But then, you see, I do not know those people, so the thought of them brings no comfort.'
She waited a moment, rose from her knees, and again sat down on the couch. She felt ashamed of her emotion, and forced herself into calmness, her voice into measured tones: 'I am going away with Sir George Downing, back with him to Persia, to Teheran. We hope to be always together, never apart till death takes one of us. I have even promised him that I will not return to England, excepting, of course, with him.'
'But I thought, I understood——' Cecily looked anxiously at her friend.
'You think rightly, you have understood the truth. Sir George Downing has a wife. They have been married many years, and separated almost as many.'
'But if he is married,' said Cecily slowly, 'how can you go away with him like that?'
Mrs. Robinson thought Cecily strangely dull of understanding. 'Surely you have heard of such occurrences?' she said impatiently.
'Oh, yes,' answered the girl, and her eyes filled with tears, which ran down her cheeks unheeded. 'You mean St. Mary Magdalen, Penelope? And others, later——'
Mrs. Robinson again got up. 'Surely,' she cried, 'you can understand how it is with me? You love Ludovic—supposing that you suddenly heard, now, that he was married—what would you do?—how would you feel?'
But Cecily, looking at her in dumb, agonized distress, made no answer.
'You are too kind to say so, but I know quite well what you would do. You would go away, and never see him again. It might kill you, but you would never do what you believed to be wrong.'
'Wrong for him, too,' the girl said, with difficulty.
'Well, I am not good, like you. If I had hesitated—and Cecily, believe me, I never did so, not for a moment—it would have been owing to mean, worldly considerations——'
'Do you, then, love him so very much?'
'Ah, my dear! Listen, Cecily, and I will tell you of our first meeting. It was in the Gare de Lyon, when we—Motey and I—were on our way to Pol les Thermes. I lost my purse, and he came forward, offered to lend me what I needed. Should I'—Penelope's voice altered, became curiously introspective, questioning—'should I have taken money from a stranger?' And then as Cecily looked at her, amazed, 'I tell you that from the moment our eyes met we knew one another in a more real sense than many lovers do after years of communion. My unhappiness the last few days has come from his absence, from the knowledge, too, that we are both to be tormented, as I am now being tormented—by you.' And, as Cecily made a gesture of protest, 'Yes, my dear, by you! Why, he has also been attacked by old Mr. Gumberg, of all people in the world!'
Penelope laughed nervously. She took the girl by the arm, and silently they retraced their footsteps through the quiet house—the silence broken at intervals by Cecily's long sighing sobs.
Some moments later, Wantley, going up to bed with uneasy mind, for he had heard the sound of Cecily's distress, met his cousin face to face. A white cloak concealed her figure, and a black silk hood her resplendent hair.
They looked at one another for a moment. Then very deliberately he spread out his arms, barring the way. 'You cannot, shall not go down to the Beach Room!' he whispered.
'I must, and shall!' she said. 'You do not understand, I must see him—you can come and wait for me if you like.'
But Wantley was merciless. He looked at her till her eyes fell before his—till she turned and slowly went up before him, back into her room.