C. D.
Kent took some time to read this. The letters swam a little before his eyes. Then he laid his head upon his arms and thought, in dumb agony. Clytie's letter, sisterly and trustful, soothed and goaded him at once. “The part that passion plays in the tragedy of things!” God! Had a fleeting thought never struck her what a part it might play in their lives' tragedy? How could he answer that letter, addressed to a friend, received by a lover in the hot flush of newly awakened realisation? How could he meet her bright, frank look with this burning demon within him? It was base, horrible. His mind wandered to a German print he had seen somewhere, a goat-footed satyr kneeling and leering at Psyche. He shuddered.
It is given but to few men to know this terror of love: only to those who, like Kent, have hitherto expended vast animal and moral energies in non-sexual enthusiasms, and have rebelled with almost passionate repulsion against the assertion of the sexual principle. To some men love dawns like a sweet, fair star—the storm comes later on. To such as Kent it comes in terrific forked lightnings and crash of thunder, overwhelming the soul with terror. To Kent's excited fancy it seemed that the Beast, such as Wither had spoken of, had entered into him. He had betrayed the compact of friendship, her sisterly trust in him. Fool that he had been! Why had he not recognised it before? Now all was over between them. The future seemed nothing but black, rolling darkness.
The solitary gas-jet that he had lit on entering flared high and strident over the mantelpiece above the blackening fire, and Kent lay with his hands on his arms, his morbid brain at death-grapple with love, he himself heedful of nothing external—not even of a gay whistle and a quick, springing tread on the uncarpeted stairs. The door burst suddenly open.
“Come out, you fusty old hermit——”
Then Wither stopped. Kent raised a drawn, rather ghastly face and stared at him stupidly.
“My dear old chap, in the name of Heaven, what's the matter?” cried Wither, putting down his hat and stick and coming towards him.
“Oh, nothing!” said Kent, who pulled himself together with an effort, rose, and broke into a forced laugh.
Wither looked at him steadily while he slowly drew off his gloves.
“That's nonsense!” he said quietly.
Then his sharp glance fell on the little crumpled handkerchief that lay beside the open letter on the table. His quick sense, aided by certain opinions he had formed long since, grasped the main feature of the situation.
He went over to where Kent was standing by the fireplace, and laid his hand on his shoulder.
“Never mind, dear old man, it will all come right.”
“It will never come right,” groaned Kent absently.
“It must. She must care for you in time.”
“How do you know what I am thinking of?” Kent burst out rather fiercely.
“I guessed. Besides—the handkerchief. It is not your own. Yours are a little more businesslike.”
“Oh, well!” said Kent a little huskily, and throwing his head back with a gesture of impatience, “I can't hide it. What would be the good? I have found out that she is a friend no longer, that what you were saying the other night is true—and I feel a brute! My God, what a brute I feel!”
Wither's mental balance was for a moment upset. He righted it after a moment with considerations of his friend's character. In many fragile, nervous bodies there is a delicacy of perception which often remains all the keener when protected by a shell of cynicism.
“You want to be reasoned with gently, friend John,” he said. “You must not feel a brute when you love a woman as a man like you can love. It's the best and holiest thing on God's earth, believe me.”
“But, Teddy, she is so frank, so trustful, so proud of our friendship—it can never be the same again—if I should tell her, she would hate me——”
“You can bet your life she wouldn't!” murmured Wither.
“She would go out of my life in indignation, and she would be right,” Kent went on. “She would scorn me for the feelings that I know now I have had all along for 'her. No; it is all over, all over. I can't meet her again. I think I shall go mad! I shall throw up everything and go away.”
“You dear, foolish old chap,” said Wither, “can't you see that very little would make her in love with you, if she is not so already? Why should you two not get married?”
“I marry!” gasped Kent, as if struck by a new idea. “I ask Clytie Davenant, with her beauty and intellect and genius, to come and share—this! Clytie Davenant marry me! Why, the idea is ludicrous—preposterous!”
“If I were she, I should not think so,” said Wither affectionately.
Kent shook his head gloomily, and kicked the smouldering coal into a fitful blaze.
“No. Until she shows me unmistakably—which can be never—that she cares for me in that way, I would sooner bite my tongue out than tell her.”
“Until she asks you to marry her, in fact! John Kent, you are two years older than I am, and three times as big. But verily you are a little child! And if you weren't,” he added impulsively, with a soft glitter in his elfin eyes, “you would not be the lovable old chap that you are! Good-bye!”
“Oh, stay a little, Teddy!” cried Kent. “I'm not much company, but I——”
“Come round with me and have some dinner, then,” interrupted Wither. “It will occupy your body—if not your mind. And it will be better for you than the bottled beer and sardines which you usually feast upon. I shall be quite alone and you can do some work for me.”
“All right!” replied Kent dejectedly. “It does not matter what I do.”
Wither turned his face to the fire, while Kent prepared to go out. When he turned round Kent was holding the cash-box in his hand. The handkerchief and letter were gone from the table, and Wither smiled inwardly. He had himself disposed of many such trifles in a similar way. Men are very much alike in several matters.