Katrine’s efforts to bring Bedford and Keith together seemed doomed to failure. She managed the introduction indeed, but the attempts at conversation which followed were not promising for future relationships, and for the rest of the day the two men avoided each other sedulously. It was duty, pure and simple, which made Katrine waylay Keith after dinner, and appear to take it for granted that he would give her his society for the customary half-hour’s promenade round the deck, when in reality her only longing was to escape, and enjoy a continuation of her talk with the newer friend. Keith was in a black mood also; grim, unsmiling. His haggard eyes surveyed her with a scrutiny that was the reverse of friendly.
“Still busy at your Reform Bill, I see! I had no idea you could be so persistent!”
“Don’t be nasty!”
“Nasty!” he laughed harshly. “What a bread-and-butter Miss it is, with her ‘nice’ and ‘nasty,’ and little cut-and-dried maxims and beliefs! One can just see the English village where you have lived, and the worthy Victorians who have lived around. You knew about six families in all, I presume, and lived in terror of what they would say; and they also lived in terror of you. There is no monarchy so absolute as the Mrs Grundy of a country town. And you went on Sunday to the Church—rather a low church I should say, breathing forth enmity equally against ritualism and dissent—went twice a day—”
“And Sunday School! Don’t forget Sunday School.”
“Ah! Sunday School. I’d forgotten the existence of Sunday Schools. That revives old memories. I went to one myself in prehistoric times. Seems odd, doesn’t it? Can you imagine me a small, curled darling in a Sunday School class? It was a dank, underground cellar of a place, shaped like an amphitheatre, with seats rising one above another. We infants sat bunched together in a corner, and the teacher stood before us on the flat. She was a plain soul, with three large warts on one cheek. I used to gaze at them fascinated, and ponder what could be done. The warts interested me more than her words, but I made gallant attempts at attention. We were bribed to attend,—one little card with an illuminated text for good behaviour and attention; so many cards, one small book; so many small books, a prize at Christmas. I actually won one prize. Can you imagine me gaining a Sunday School prize?”
Katrine regarded him thoughtfully with her deep blue eyes. The slighting, almost contemptuous tone in which he spoke seemed to hurt her more for his sake than for her own, as proving the invariable bitterness of his mind. She was the only soul on board who had sought his friendship, and even to her—
“Do you ever think—?” she stammered, confused and shy, yet possessed by a gallant resolve to improve the occasion. “Do you ever remember the things you heard?”
“Bible stories!” He laughed again, his harsh, unmirthful laugh. “My good girl, is it possible to forget? They are too terribly true. I’ve seen them acted before my eyes. I’ve lived through them myself. Heavens! how many of those old stories I’ve lived through! I’ve eaten of the fruit of knowledge—a liberal repast, and as a result been turned out of my Eden; I’ve wandered in far lands; I’ve defrauded my neighbour, and sold my birthright for, not gold, not silver, not even a mess of pottage—for a foaming poison which has killed body and soul! I’ve sung my penitential psalms—and, gone on sinning! I’ve sung my Song of Solomon, also, I must not forget that!”
He met Katrine’s eyes, widely questioning, and replied with a defiant flash. “You are astonished! You did not associate romance with such a death’s head of a man! Nevertheless it is true. There was a woman: one woman, only one! I worshipped her for five long years; I worship her still, but all the same I did her to death. Oh, let me explain! It was nothing actionable. I am not a prisoner fleeing from justice. There is no escape from the court before which I shall be tried. I would have killed myself a thousand times over sooner than have lifted a hand against her. She was my wife, you see, and I loved her, but I broke her heart. I believed that in the joy of her I could break loose from the devil which possessed me. I did go free for a few months, and she married me, poor child! knowing nothing. Then, He came back, mightier than before. The first time she saw me—I may live through a thousand hells, and know nothing more awful than the memory of those eyes! She told me herself, weeping in my arms the next day, that she could not love, she could not even endure, ‘that man!’ If he came back—if she saw him again.—I promised; I swore. A hundred times over I promised and a hundred times over I failed, and her love changed to fear, fear and dread, and a shrinking of flesh. She was a frail thing, and she lived in terror of ‘that man.’ In terror of him she died. When she drew her last breath he was drunk, lying helpless downstairs—”