The nature of Una's conversation with Jerry during that morning of fishing and in the days that followed must always remain a secret to me. I know that when they returned Jerry was in a cheerful mood and put through an afternoon of tennis with Jack, while Una and her mother knitted in the shade. She was wholesome, that girl, and no one could be with her long without feeling the impress of her personality. But I was not happy. Marcia hung like a millstone around my neck. I knew that it was at the risk of a considerable sacrifice of pride that Una had decided to come with her mother and make this visit. The world and her own frequent contact with women of the baser sort had sharpened her wits and instincts amazingly. I am sure that she was just as well aware of the nature of Jerry's infatuation as though Jerry had told it himself. If Una cared for him as deeply as I had had the temerity to suppose, then her position was difficult—painful and thankless. But whatever her own wish to help him, I am sure that the nature of the desire was unselfish. After events prove that. All that Una saw in the situation of Jerry and Marcia was a friend who needed helping, who was worth helping from the snare of an utterly worldly and heartless woman. I am sure that her knowledge of the world must have made her task seem hopeless and it must have taken some courage to pit her own charm in the lists against one of Marcia's known quality. But if she was unhappy, no sign of it reached my eyes. Only her mother, who sometimes raised her eyes and calmly regarded her daughter, had an inkling of what was in Una's heart.
Jerry went no more to the telephone. I kept an eye on it and I know. And when his car went out, Una or Jack went with him. Three days passed with no telephone calls from Briar Hills. When Jerry's guests were with him, the duties of hospitality seemed sacred to him and he left nothing undone for their comfort or entertainment. At night Una sang to us, and Jerry was himself, but during most of the day he moved mechanically, only speaking to Jack or me when directly addressed.
"Acts like a sleepwalker," said Jack to me. "It's hypnotic, sheer moon-madness!"
Only Una had the power to draw him out of himself. He always had a smile for her and a friendly word, but I knew that she knew that she had failed. Jerry was possessed of a devil, a she-devil, that none of the familiar friendly gods could cast out.
The end came soon and with a startling suddenness. We were out driving in Jack's motor one morning before lunch, Jack at the wheel, with Una beside him, Jerry and I in the rear seat, when in passing along a quiet road not far from Briar Hills, we saw at some distance ahead of us and going our way, a red runabout, containing a man and a girl. Jack was running the car very slowly, as the road was none too good, and we ran close up behind the pair before they were aware of us. I saw Jerry lean forward in his seat, peering with the strange set look I had recently seen so often in his eyes. I followed his gaze and, as I looked, the man in the red car put his arm around the girl's neck and she raised her chin and they kissed. All of us saw it. Jack chuckled and blew his horn violently. The pair drew apart suddenly and the man tried quickly to get away, but Jack with a laugh had already put on the power and we passed them before they could get up speed. The girl hid her face but the man was Channing Lloyd.
Jerry had recognized them. I saw him start up in his seat, turning around, but I caught at his wrist and held him. He was deathly pale, ugly, dangerous. But he made no further move. During the ride home he sat as though frozen fast into his seat with no word for me or for our companions, who had not turned or spoken to us. I think that Jack suspected and Una knew and feared to look at Jerry's face. By the time we reached the house Jerry had managed to control himself. The dangerous look upon his face was succeeded by a glacial calm, which lasted through luncheon, of which he ate nothing. Jack did his best to bring an atmosphere of unconcern but failed and we got up from the table aware of impending trouble. Then Jerry disappeared.
CHAPTER XXIV
FEET OF CLAY
It is with some reluctance that I begin these chapters dealing with the most terrible event in Jerry's life, and for that matter the most terrible experience in my own, for as the reader of this history must now be aware, Jerry's life was mine. I had made him, molded him for good or ill according to my own definite plan, by the results of which I had professed myself willing to stand whatever came. Had I known what these results were to be, it would have been better if I had cast myself into the sea than have come to Horsham Manor as Jerry's preceptor, the sponsor for old Benham's theory. But human wisdom is fallible, true virtue a dream. Dust we are and to dust return, groveling meanwhile as best we may, amid the wreck of our illusions. It costs me something to admit the failure of the Great Experiment, its horrible and tragic failure! To lose a hand, an eye, a limb, to be withered by disease, one can replace, repair, renew; but an ideal, a system of philosophy, ingrained into one's very life! It is this that scars and withers the soul.