For Farquharson it was different. Those who have fame cannot reasonably expect love; life is as best a compromise. Farquharson's career was wide and high. The fate of nations lay in his hand; nations, like individuals, move mechanically to a set tune. The average man deals in small issues; his view is bounded by his neighbour's fences. But Farquharson's boundaries were limitless; they stretched from empire to empire.
"I send you these enclosures," she wrote at last, "they explain themselves. I trust to your honour to keep them back for two and a half days from your receipt of this letter. You have borne so much already; you will bear this for me. This alters everything, of course. You won't need me now. Had I been able to atone in the smallest degree for your shame and betrayal, you know that I would have given myself gladly, without a moment's hesitation. But your career is opening out again before you. You are not mine really, you see; you never were mine in the biggest sense. Men like you are too big to be bound down by a woman's love; you will reach your goal the quicker because you haven't me beside you. Everything is settled; my husband's escape and my own. It will tell in his favour if I too seem involved in the inevitable scandal. We shall have to stand or fall together in this. Such help as I can give him by identifying myself with his interests must be his—is, in fact, his due, considering that in my heart I violated every law of God's that bound us.
"Don't try to find me; I have to take my courage in both hands as it is. There are some things beyond expression.
"Good-bye. That's a cold word to say. I doubt if it ever has been said with a more profound sense of farewell. We shall never meet again in the future; we have met too often in the past. Yet how sweet it has been, some of it—worth every pang, every wound. How sweet it might have been, you and I know.... But we cannot stand against God's will.
"I could write on for ever—what's the use? We know the truth. We belong to each other, now and always. The two lives which stand between us now are shadows, which once in eternity will disappear."
She folded the two letters, addressed them, and went down-stairs to post them herself. There was a letter with a foreign postmark in the box; she recognized the handwriting as Hare's, although so weak and tremulous. She held it for a moment in her hand, wondering what it contained; Hare was an infrequent correspondent. She decided to post her letters first, and read his message afterwards. There was so much still to be done that night. She had still to arrange her own plans of escape. To Marseilles she must inevitably go—but afterwards? That lay on the knees of the gods. When once she had seen Brand, she would take the next train out to the unknown.
CHAPTER III
"They kill me, they cut my flesh ... what then? ... In matter of death carry thyself scornfully ... either the gods can do nothing for us, or they can allay the distemper of thy mind. If they can do nothing, why dost thou pray?"—MARCUS AURELIUS.
To overwrought nerves there is occasionally something soothing in the movement of a train. Evelyn, on her way to Marseilles, looked back to the rush of events of the last few days with amazement and wonder. By the same post as Hare's letters there had come one from his solicitor; a brief announcement of the fact that he had received instructions from his client authorizing him to communicate with Mrs. Brand immediately upon his death. The solicitor wished to see Mrs. Brand, if possible, within the next twenty-four hours, as she, amongst others, benefited by the will. Would she telephone to 8431, Central, at once to fix a meeting?
She had met him then and there, in view of her sudden departure abroad. It was necessary to make a fresh will; having disposed of Hare's legacy in charity, the solicitor obeyed her instructions regarding her husband, without restriction. An hour later found Evelyn ready to leave England, to start a new life under new conditions. Through the train windows she watched village after village flit by, as though she was looking at the shifting scenes of a biograph. Only dimly aware of beauty, she whirled through the kaleidoscope of colour, of full and fragrant orchards, of fields of daffodils, by vineyards and woods, until at last she reached the coast, and before her the view of the Mediterranean stretched, in its eternal blue. She had gone through the hours of travel oblivious and stupefied, hardly conscious even of the occasional stoppages of the train.