"That is the answer of the man of society, the well-bred man of the world; the man, moreover, of sensibility and nice feeling. I quite appreciate the tone and tact of his letter. But I had already received the answer of the man himself. It was simpler, so simple as to need no supplement—'It is no use. I do not want you. My poor woman, I do not want you. It is not possible that I should ever want you. I am bitterly grieved for you; but you waste your time.'
"He has never wanted me. I have wasted my time.—That is all. And assuredly that is enough, and more than enough? I will waste no more time, Adrian. I will go where time, thought, love, and the rejection of love are not.
"The rain has come back. It drips and drips upon the veranda roof. I have burned all your letters. No one has ever seen or touched them save myself. This volume of my diary I leave to you. I shall seal it up, and direct it to you. At least read it—I am no longer ashamed. I want you to know me as I really am. Life is already over. I am already dead. So I am not afraid. I welcome the darkness of the everlasting night which is about to absorb me into itself.—I wear the white gown I wore the second time you kissed my hand.—I do not blame you, Adrian. It is just as natural that you should not love me as that I should have loved you. I understand that.
"And very soon now all my trouble will be over and passed. Soon I shall sleep in the arms of the lover who has never failed man or woman yet—in the arms of Death. JOANNA SMYRTHWAITE."
CHAPTER VIII
IN WHICH A STRONG MAN ADOPTS A VERY SIMPLE METHOD
OF CLEARING HIS OWN PATH OF THORNS
Challoner stood turning up the collar of his mackintosh. Looking back between the lines of dark, wind-agitated trees, the red mass of the house, through a dull whiteness of driving rain, showed imposing both in height and in extent. Challoner measured it with a satisfied, even triumphant, eye. Its large size suited his own large proportions capitally. This evening, though early and still light, all the blinds were drawn down. This was as it should be. He favored the observance of such outward conventional decencies. Then, as he moved away with his heavy, lunging tread, the rain and wind took him roughly on the quarter.
This rearward onslaught caused him no annoyance, however, since his thoughts were altogether self-congratulatory. Circumstance had played, and was playing, into his hands in the handsomest fashion. Well, every one gets his deserts in the long run; so he could but suppose he deserved his present good fortune! Only in this case the run had proved such an unexpectedly short and easy one. For hadn't he arrived, practically arrived, feeling every bit as fresh as when he started?—Here a turn of half-superstitious, half-cynical piety took him. The Lord helps those who have the nous to help themselves. He praised the Lord! Having offered which small tribute, or bribe, to the Judge of all the Earth who cannot do other than right, he proceeded to check off a few of his well-earned blessings.
The announcement of his engagement to Margaret Smyrthwaite had appeared, about three weeks previously, in the society columns of local and London papers. Stourmouth buzzed with the news, to a loudness which he found both humorous and flattering. In private Challoner laughed a horse-laugh more than once at thus finding how he had made his fellow-townsmen "sit up." He enjoyed the joke of his own social elevation and prospective wealth hugely. And Mrs. Gwynnie had been quite good, thank the Powers! If the rest of his acquaintance had been made to "sit up" by the news, she—to quote his own graceful manner of speech—had "taken it lying down." Really he felt very kindly toward her. She'd given no trouble. But then the world was going a lot better with Mrs. Gwyn than she'd any right to expect. Her rent and her quarterly allowance were paid with absolute regularity. Not every man would have done as much for her after the dance she'd led him! Beattie Stacey was safely married last week to her young R.M.S. second officer. And, so Challoner heard, mainly on the strength of the said young officer's excellent reputation, Gwynnie herself had taken out a new lease of social life since her installation in the white house opposite the Marychurch Borough Recreation Ground. She'd been cute enough to throw herself into that department of Anglican religio-parochial activity which busies itself with variety entertainments, rummage sales, concerts, "happy evenings," bazaars, and such-like contrivances for providing—under cover of charity—audiences for idle amateurs ambitious of publicity. Curates waxed enthusiastic over "Mrs. Spencer's splendidly unselfish helpfulness" and "wonderful organizing power."—The thought of that poor little, earnest, light-weight, impecunious baggage of an Anglo-Indian widow in the character of a church-worker tickled her ex-lover consumedly.
But now Challoner felt constrained to put a term to the slightly ribald mirth induced by this checking of his well-deserved blessings, and bestow himself within the four corners of an appropriately black-edged manner. For, as he turned out of the gates at the end of the carriage-drive, he caught sight of Col. Rentoul Haig's unmistakable figure, pompous and dapper even when clothed in an "aquascutum" and carrying a streaming umbrella, walking briskly down The Avenue. Making a pretense of deep abstraction, Challoner passed him; then, drawing up suddenly, wheeled round.