CHAPTER IX
SEPTEMBER ROSES
The afternoon sunshine streamed through the dull gold curtains into the old print shop where Corinna sat in her tapestry-covered chair between the tea-table and the log fire. She was alone for the moment; and lying back in the warmth and fragrance of the room, she let her gaze rest lovingly on one of the English mezzotints over which a stray sunbeam quivered. The flames made a pleasant whispering sound over the cedar logs; her favourite wide-open creamy roses with golden hearts scented the air; and the delicate China tea in her cup was drawn to perfection. As she lay back in the big chair but one thing disturbed her serenity—and that one thing was within. She had everything that she wanted, and for the hour, at least, she was tired of it all. The mood was transient, she knew. It would pass because it was alien to the clear bracing air of her mind; but while it lasted she told herself that the present had palled on her because she had looked beneath the vivid surface of illusion to the bare structure of life. Men had ceased to interest her because she knew them too well. She knew by heart the very machinery of their existence, the secret mental springs which moved them so mechanically; and she felt to-day that if they had been watches, she could have taken them apart and put them together again without suspending for a minute the monotonous regularity of their works. Even Gideon Vetch, who might have held a surprise for her, had differed from the rest in one thing only: he had not seen that she was beautiful! And it wasn't that she was breaking. To-day because of her mood of depression, she appeared drooping and faded; but that night, a week ago, in her velvet gown and her pearls, she had looked as handsome as ever. The truth was simply that Vetch had glanced at her without seeing her, as he might have glanced at the gilded sheaves of wheat on a picture frame. He had been so profoundly absorbed in his own ideas that she had been nothing more individual than one of an audience. If he were to meet her in the street he would probably not recognize her. And this was a man who had never before seen a woman whose beauty had passed into history, a man who had risen to his place through what the Judge had described with charitable euphemism, as "unusual methods." "The odd part about Vetch," the Judge had added meditatively on the drive home, "is that he doesn't attempt to disguise the kind of thing that we of the old school would call—well, to say the least—extraordinary. He is as outspoken as Mirabeau. I can't make it out. It may be, of course, that he has a better reading of human nature than we have, and that he knows such gestures catch the eye, like long hair or a red necktie. It is very much as if he said—'Yes, I'll steal if I'm driven to it, but—confound it!—I won't lie!'"
After all, the sting to her vanity had been too slight to leave an impression. There must be another cause for the shadow that had fallen over her spirits. Even a reigning beauty of thirty years could scarcely expect to be invincible; and she had known too much homage in the past to resent what was obviously a lack of discrimination. Her disappointment went deeper than this, for it had its source in the stories she had heard of Vetch that sounded original and dramatic. She had imagined a personality that was striking, spectacular, or at least interesting; and the actual Gideon Vetch had seemed to her merely unimpressive and ordinary. Beside John Benham (as the thought of Benham returned to her, her spirit rose on wings out of the shadow), beside John Benham, in the drawing-room after dinner, Vetch had appeared at a disadvantage that was almost ridiculous; and, as Stephen Culpeper had hastened to point out, this was merely a striking illustration of the damning contrast between the Governor's chequered political career and Benham's stainless record of service.
A smile curved her lips as she gazed at the quivering sunbeams. Was that deep instinct for perfection, the romantic vision of things as they ought to be, awaking again? Did the starry flower bloom not in the dream, but in reality? The passion to create beauty, to bring happiness, which had been extinguished for years, burned afresh in her heart. Yes, as long as there was beauty, as long as there was nobility of spirit, she could fight on as one who believed in the future.
A shadow darkened the window, and a moment afterward there was a fall of the old silver knocker on her door. She thought at first—the shadow had seemed so young—that it was Stephen; but when she opened the door, she saw, with a lovely flush, that it was John Benham.
"You expected me?" he asked, raising her hand to his lips.
"Yes, I knew that you would come," she answered, and the flush died away slowly as she turned back to the fire. In the moment of recognition all the despondency had vanished so utterly that it had not left even a memory. He had brought not only peace, but youth and happiness back to her eyes.
He came in as impressively as he presented himself to an audience; and with the glow of pleasure still in her heart, she found her keen and observant mind watching him almost as if he were a stranger. This had been her misfortune always, the ardent heart joined to the critical judgment, the spectator chained eternally to the protagonist. She received a swift impression that he had prepared his words and even his gestures, the kiss on her fingers. Yet, in spite of this suggestion of the actor, or because of it, he possessed, she felt, great distinction. The straight backward sweep of his hair; the sharp clearness of his profile; the steady serenity of his gray eyes; the ease and suppleness and indolent strength of his tall thin figure—all these physical details expressed the reserves and inhibitions of generations. The only flaw that she could detect was that dryness of soul that she had noticed before, as of soil that has been too heavily drained. She knew that he excelled in all the virtues that are monumental and public, that he was an honourable opponent, a scrupulous defender of established rules and precedents. He would always reach the goal, but his race would never carry him beyond the end of the course; he would always fulfil the law, but he would never give more than the exact measure; he would always fight for the risen Christ, but he would never have followed the humble bearer of the Cross. His strength and weakness were the kind which had profoundly influenced her life. He represented in her world the conservative principle, the accepted standard, the acknowledged authority, custom, stability, reason, and moderation.