He interrupted her.
"You would go to him."
"No."
He rose up and began to pace the room, glancing furtively at his wife, who never moved. Suddenly, seizing her arm, and speaking in a loud, trembling voice, he exclaimed: "Mark is dead—you understand that? Say it; say it!"
"Mark is dead," she repeated sombrely.
CHAPTER XXXVI
FENELLA
Mark went abroad immediately after the events narrated in the last chapter, and remained abroad for many months, trying to drown recollection of Betty in printer's ink. By a tremendous effort of will and unremitting grind he nearly succeeded, but at times he could see nothing save her face, hear nothing save her voice, feel nothing save the touch of her lips upon his. After these visitations he was beset by a Comus' crew of spectres: the innumerable disappointments of his life: toute l'amertume et tout le déboire de mille événements fâcheux.
However, Compensation ordained that his Songs of the Angels should please a certain section of the American public, and a substantial cheque crossed the Atlantic in a letter from Cyrus Otway, who asked for another novel. Mark had learned to use his pen (as Conquest once put it); but recognition—the acclaim of the multitude—seemed indefinitely remote. A Soul Errant appeared, and was pronounced by reviewers an admirable piece of work, but its sales were limited to a few thousand copies.
From George Samphire, Mark learned that Archibald and Betty had entertained royalty upon the occasion when the first service was held in the Basilica. Tommy Greatorex wrote: "Your big brother is booming Vauxhall's new neighbourhood, and no mistake!" From Betty herself came no word whatever. Archibald, so Mark told himself, had forgiven her, determined to preserve appearances, to keep the wife with wealth and beauty, to guard her zealously from the man who had tried to deprive him of so valuable a possession. Once again, hatred of Archibald consumed him. In his heart he knew that Betty was pining for one line—the generous "I forgive you. I understand." But these words he could not write. He believed that she had failed him, that she had lacked courage, and lacking it, had grasped the first excuse pat to lip and hand. It seemed incredible that a sermon should stand between a woman and the man she loved. Curiously enough, he could not recall a line of this sermon thrown off, as it had been, in a brief fever of excitement and enthusiasm. Again and again, he repeated to himself the beatitude, and wondered what he had found to say about it.