"Mrs. Portal knows most things about Irish and every other kind of men, I fancy. The wonder is that she can continue to be charming to us in spite of it. She's the most delightful woman in the world."
Bramham gave him a shrewd glance. He would have given half he possessed to say at that moment:
"What about a lovely girl who is drudging away in England to support your child?" But it was not an ordinary promise that same girl had wrung out of him, never to reveal by word or look that he knew her secret. She had bound him by every oath she could think of that had any sanctity for a man.
Something of scorn presently mingled with the shrewdness of the look he cast at Carson. He searched the dark face that had so much in it that was fine and lovable, and yet was marked with sins. But whatever Carson's sins were they did not give him peace. He did not grow sleek on them. He had the weary mouth and haggard eyes of the man with the dual nature, a finer self perpetually at war with a baser, sometimes winning, sometimes losing—but always striving. Scorn left Bramham's look and affectionate loyalty came back.
"You can't hate a fellow like that," he thought.
He presently found a further thing to say in which he was far from imagining himself disloyal to Rosalind Chard, or even prompted by curiosity.
"Carson ... since we've tumbled on to the subject of women, I'd like to know what you think about something I've rather advanced opinions upon ... girls ... girls who've gone over the hard-and-fast line ... not the ordinary demi-semi-quaver, of course ... nor the kind that are bound to slip off the rails even with gold fastenings ... I mean the sort of girl one would be glad and proud to marry, but who, given 'the time, the place, and the loved one altogether,' as some poet fellow says, cuts loose the painter for dear love and sheer love. What do you think of a girl like that, Karri?"
Carson had a distant visionary expression in his eyes. Bramham's words appeared to have driven his thoughts far afield. He might have been a man trying to remember a sweet air that evaded his memory, or to lay hold of something that had no substance.
"It is odd that you should ask me that, Bram," he spoke slowly ... "and you are the only man in the world I would say it to ... but, that was the kind of girl I was speaking of when I said the wife ... the only kind of girl I should ever care about marrying ... I suppose I am alone among Irishmen in holding such an opinion ... for all their wildness they're a conventional lot at bottom, especially on this subject ... and, of course, that's as it should be. But I've lived too long in lonely places, and I'm more woodsman than Irishman now!... I didn't think this way always, either.... But once I had a vision, a dream, something ... about such a girl. The odd part of it is that I was crazy about another woman at the time—had been for years—and it cured me of that.... But, oh, Lord!" (he gave a sort of groan) "there's been plenty of water under the bridge since then ... and it was only a dream, anyway. There may be such girls in the world somewhere ... but not for me, Bram. Some woman will trap me with an antenuptial-contract, some day." He got up, laughing mirthlessly. "Great Tophet! it's two o'clock! I shall never get through with my work to-morrow."
They gripped hands and parted for the night.