The Shadow of the Past

by F. E. Mills Young

But Matheson, though he had no doubt of Brenda’s love, was not so confident of winning her as her mother believed. In all the weeks of their renewed friendship he had not uttered one word of love to her, had attempted none of those affectionate familiarities he had practised during the early days of their acquaintance. The kiss she had given him in the road at their first parting was the only kiss he had received from her. Something in the girl’s manner silenced him.—It may have been that the mere knowledge that she loved him, acted as a restraint; possibly too the lukewarm quality of his own desires caused him to hesitate ere taking the irrevocable step he contemplated. He was sure of the girl’s love, but he could not feel positive as to her answer. Nor was he satisfied that perfect happiness would result from an alliance based on such inequalities of affection. She had set this doubt working in his mind, and he was powerless to determine it, or to put it aside. The matter occasioned him endless thought and worry.

At times he felt like taking the plunge and leaving the doubts to resolve themselves; and then her quiet face, with the earnest eyes lit with love for him, gave him pause, and he decided to wait and allow the friendship to develop. Already it had grown deep enough to make him conscious of his need of her. The idea of letting her drop out of his life again was altogether unthinkable. She was necessary to him. He did not understand it, but he realised it perfectly. Out of the odd confection of human emotions that swayed him, his dependence on Brenda, even the inconsistent urgency of his requirement of her love, stood out and dominated the rest. He wanted her; he had no longer any doubt about that.

And yet when he was alone, and at night-time, it was seldom of Brenda he thought Even when he was with her the memory of Honor thrust between them, a beautiful, intangible obstruction keeping them apart.

The time came when he felt the necessity to talk to her about Honor. He did not stop to consider whether it was wise to do so; something impelled him to speak of this matter which alone formed a bar to their complete understanding. He could not, he found, ask Brenda to marry him without confiding to her something of that part of his life the influences of which intervened between them.

It was on a Sunday afternoon that Matheson chose to unburden himself. He took Brenda to see the Rhodes’ Memorial—the fine unfinished work of Watts, emblematic of Rhodes’ unfinished work—for that matter, emblematic of the unfinished work of any human span.

It was a day of brilliant sunshine and cool winds, such as one gets during the Cape winter, and which one can only compare with spring weather in England, or an early autumn day before the leaves fall. They went out by tram, and walked through the wonderful grounds of Groot Schuur, that magnificent home of a wealthy, ambitious, brilliant man, who dreamed of Empire expansion, and who realised a part, though never the entire dream.

Silent and a little weary, they followed the broad gravelled drive to the temple where the eight bronze lions guard the steps which lead up to the lonely enshrined bust of a strong man who, for all his greatness, despite wealth and success and numberless friends, stands out a lonely figure in the history of his time.

They walked up the broad stone steps and stood before the fine thoughtful face, lifelike in its quiet abstraction, gazing towards the north, as Watts’ equestrian statue of Energy gazes, through eternal sunlit spaces, across rich plains of unsurpassed beauty, towards the mountains and the remote distances of that hinterland which lies beyond them, and in which Rhodes’ hopes and thoughts were centred.

It was the first time that Matheson had visited the place. Its influence upon him in the quiet grandeur, the spirit-invaded atmosphere of this spot where Rhodes in his lifetime spent so many thoughtful hours, where even now in bronze he mounted guard over this chosen place, was tremendous. It did not surprise him, on looking towards her after a pregnant silence, to see the tears standing in Brenda’s eyes. There was a greatness in the quality and the inspiration of this monument to greatness which touched the secret springs of emotion and stirred the imagination.

“Let us go and sit on the seat below there, under the trees, where he used to sit,” he said.