Sekhet
by Irene Miller · English · Gutenberg #47744 · 658,607 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Sekhet
Author: Irene Miller
Release date: December 22, 2014 [eBook #47744]
Most recently updated: October 24, 2024
Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEKHET ***
SEKHET
SEKHET
BY IRENE MILLER
[Illustration]
LONDON JOHN LANE THE BODLEY HEAD
NEW YORK JOHN LANE COMPANY MCMXII
THE ANCHOR PRESS, LTD., TIPTREE, ESSEX.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. BORN TO BEAUTY 1
II. A FRIEND IN NEED 6
III. A RICH CASKET FOR A RARE JEWEL 12
IV. THE WAY OF A MAN WITH A MAID 18
V. THE WILES OF THE FOWLER 28
VI. A SOUL'S BATTLE 37
VII. ROSES AND RAPTURES 45
VIII. LUCINDA BELMONT 50
IX. HOW EGYPT WAS RUINED FOR EVARNE 53
X. THE SHRINE OF SEKHET 60
XI. A LOSING STRIFE 66
XII. SEKHET, CRUSHER OF HEARTS 73
XIII. OUT OF THE GILDED CAGE 88
XIV. HELPING HANDS 96
XV. THE PROBLEM OF EXISTENCE 1O4
XVI. EVARNE'S FIRST ENGAGEMENT 117
XVII. A STRANGE INTRODUCTION TO THE PROFESSION 124
XVIII. NEW TRIALS AND TROUBLES 131
XIX. NEW FRIENDS 138
XX. REHEARSALS 146
XXI. The CAREER OF "CALEDONIA'S BARD" 153
XXII. POVERTY MAKES ONE ACQUAINTED WITH
STRANGE BEDFELLOWS 163
XXIII. A FRESH TURNING 168
XXIV. "STITCH, STITCH, STITCH!" 173
XXV. HARD LUCK 180
XXVI. EVARNE'S VOCATION 188
XXVII. IN ARTIST-LAND 199
XXVIII. GEOFFREY DANVERS 207
XXIX. SEKHET SMILES 218
XXX. A GREAT RESOLVE 226
XXXI. JOURNEYS END IN LOVERS' MEETINGS 234
XXXII. FRANK'S BRILLIANT IDEA 249
XXXIII. THE SHADOW OF COMING EVENTS 256
XXXIV. SEKHET WHETS HER TEETH 264
XXXV. THE STROKE OF SEKHET 278
XXXVI. A FRESH VOW 286
XXXVII. EVARNE FIGHTS FOR MORE THAN LIFE 297
XXXVIII. CONFIDENCES 318
XXXIX. EVIL, THAT GOOD MAY COME 326
XL. A FRESH COMPLICATION 338
XLI. HOW "LA BELLE DAME" LED JACK ASTRAY 347
XLII. THE COUP DE GRÂCE 357
SEKHET
DRAMATIS PERSONÆ
SEKHET: _The Goddess of Ancient Egypt, who
presided over Love and its Cruelty._
HER TOOLS AND HER VICTIMS.
Morris Kenyon.
Leopold Stornway (_his college friend_).
Evarne (_Stornway's daughter_).
Tony Belmont.
Lucinda "Belmont."
Geoffrey Danvers (_a young artist_).
Jack Hardy }
Frank Pallister } (_Geoff's studio friends_).
Philadelphia Harbert (_an artist's model_).
Maudie Meridith and her Auntie.
Alexander Punter (_manager of the "Scotia's Bard" Touring Co_.)
Mrs. Punter (_authoress of the play_).
John Montgomery (_a printer_). }
Joe Harold (_a commercial traveller_). }
Archie (_a horsey youth_). } (_Members of the_
Harry Douglas (_an ex-prize fighter_). } _"Scotia's Bard"_
Charles Stuart (_a scene-painter_). } _Co._)
Jessie Kennedy (_a little pianist_). }
Madame Cheape (an "actress"). }
Mr. Heathmore (a real actor). }
Mrs. Burling }
Mrs. Sargeant } (_Landladies_).
Miss Brodie }
Mrs. Shiells }
Jean Brodie (_a seamstress_).
_Many minor characters_.
SCENES.
The depth of the country, London, Italy, Paris, Egypt.
SEKHET
CHAPTER I
BORN TO BEAUTY
Evarne Stornway hurried across the fields towards Heatherington at a
speed that deprived her gait of much of that graceful yet somewhat
insolent sway that caused it to be alike the butt and the envy of the
other youthful females of the neighbourhood. Not an hour since she had
first heard beyond a doubt the gentle rustling of the wings of the Angel
of Death within the sick-room of her father, and, goaded by cruel
anxiety, she was--even against the invalid's will--seeking medical aid.
The rapid walk brought brightness to eyes and cheeks, thereby doing much
to restore that subtle air of perfect health and happiness that usually
added so much to the girl's beauty. But always was Evarne fair to
behold; her dark eyes, so large and limpid, were expressive and intense;
her lips, alluring in curves and colour, spoke to the "seeing eye" of
both kindliness and individuality. Yet she could have dispensed with all
the charm given by mental grace, and still riveted attention, for she
possessed loveliness of that type, supreme above all others, that is
independent of expression--the beauty of grace, symmetry of form, and
faultless feature. And for this she had been taught to thank--not
chance, not merely heredity, but the determination of her father.
Leopold Stornway had a passionate adoration for physical beauty,
regarding it as almost the first of virtues. And more, he was proud of
the vast importance he placed on bodily perfection, for was it not a
reverence characteristic of classic Greece? There it was--in the records
of the never-to-be-forgotten days of antiquity--that Leo found all his
chief interests. Egypt, Mesopotamia, Rome, and, above all, Greece--each
in turn had been the lands of his adoption. Pericles and Cæsar, Cyrus
and Rameses, Shalmanesur and Hiram, were the gods of his idolatry. He
knew and cared more concerning the triumphant fortunes of Semiramis; the
proceedings of Antigone or of Theseus; the adventures of Agamemnon or
Achilles, of Hector or the pious Æneas at the Siege of Troy, than he did
of the doings of those who sat in the seats of the mighty in his own
century.
The happiest time of his life had been his three years at Oxford. Almost
immediately on leaving college he married--simply because she was
beautiful as any Greek statue--a young woman considerably beneath him in
station, and possessed of an unconquerably violent temper. He knew right
well, even during the period of his deepest infatuation, that he had
found no mate for his soul. He was sadly conscious that that part of his
mind--of his spirit--that he cared for most deeply, never would--never
could--unveil itself to the scrutiny of his chosen life-long companion.
To feed his intellectual affections, he relied on the continuance of his
college friendship with the brilliant and vivacious Morris Kenyon. But
herein he was doomed to disappointment. After a brief spell of vain
struggling for literary recognition in London, Leo settled down,
contentedly enough, to obscurity in the depth of the country. There he
spent peaceful days occupied in highly intellectual yet miserably paid
writings. Each year he became more of a recluse--more out of touch with
the times. Morris Kenyon likewise altered. Plunged into the vortex of
town life, seeing and doing everything, going everywhere, courted and
flattered and popular, not only on account of his great wealth but for
his more personal attractions--every year he drifted farther from being
the Morris of yore. The change in both men was but gradual, and through
varying stages of disillusion and disappointment, their ardent
friendship was long in dying. But the time came when all ended--even
correspondence ceased.
Leo's marriage was more successful. His wife made strenuous efforts to
rise to his heights, while his admiration of her stately loveliness
never waned. Their first child was a boy, who died in infancy, but ere
long little Evarne came as consoler. Leo had wished for a daughter, and
had always spoken of the expected baby by the Greek name he had already
chosen for her--Evarne.
He had strong theories on pre-natal influence, and put them into
practice. He read and discussed with his wife poetry and the noblest
prose works. Everywhere she turned her eyes in her home she beheld
representations of female beauty--magnificent or placid. On the wall of
her bed-chamber was a barbaric, richly-hued painting of a Babylonian
slave-market. It showed a group of women decking themselves before
entering the Market Square, which could be seen through an opening of
the tent. They were of many nationalities, but each in her own way
represented physically perfect womanhood.
Near to this hung a contrasting picture--a delicate symphony in blue and
gold and snowy white. It was the Catholic's Madonna, with placid lips
and large uplifted eyes that told of thoughts beyond this world--chaste,
calm and pure.
In the corner of the room by the window stood a large cast of a famous
antique nude statue of Venus. So perfect was it--the glorious muscles of
the body dimpling so gently, so graciously--that even Leo's
unimaginative wife could find and feel something of what is soothing and
peace-giving in such beauty. Sometimes of an early morning a narrow beam
of light would creep into the darkened room between the drawn curtains
and illuminate just this statue. Then the young wife, lying wakeful,
would fix her eyes on the form of the Goddess of Beauty, drinking in its
divine influence, remembering her husband's assurance that its
contemplation would go far towards making the little daughter that was
to come likewise strong and beautiful.
And Leo's words proved not untrue--a more lovely baby never saw the
light. But Evarne's birth cost the mother her life, and after five years
of happy marriage, Leo was once again lonely.
Since the child's upbringing was thus left to her father, with his fads
and fancies, it was naturally of a unique nature. Mrs. Jarman--the
worthy matron whom he engaged to act as nurse to his child, and
cook-housekeeper to himself--was wont to declare, both to her gentleman
in person and to the village in general, that she was sure Providence
had seen fit to appoint a special angel to guard that blessed motherless
mite; otherwise no mortal woman could possibly have succeeded in rearing
it.
Mr. Stornway _would_ interfere in what Mrs. Jarman held to be no concern
of any man--not even of a father. First of all he had been divided in
opinion as to whether the infant should be wrapped in swaddling-clothes
in true classical style, or should remain in equally classical nudity.
The baby had arrived in the summer-time, so the latter idea prevailed,
and to Mrs. Jarman's dismay the little one passed the first few months
of its existence clad in very little more than its own silky skin. All
the experienced dame's traditional ideas of long robes, binders,
shortening-clothes, teething-rings, etc., were swept aside as _modern_.
Thus they were unworthy of a Greek reincarnation, named after the
fairest of the Nereides, and destined to show an altogether degenerate
world what beauty had been in the glorious days of old. With the
approaching chill of winter even Mr. Stornway agreed to the little form
being warmly clad, but his aversion to modern fashions never could be
uprooted.
Thus, though Evarne, as she now hastened to summon the doctor to her
father's dying bed, was nigh seventeen, she had never owned a pair of
corsets, or worn a dress more tight-fitting than could be managed by
shaping the material into the waist by gauging or smocking. Indoors, she
invariably cast aside her shoes and stockings. She could carry burdens
on her head, could run, jump, and swim with the ease and lightness of a
young Amazon. She slept soundly on a bed hard as wood, and had never
been indulged to the extent of a pillow in her life. Of her own accord
she would never have chosen such a harsh _régime_. But at sixteen she
knew but this one mode of existence, and habit rendered it congenial
enough.
CHAPTER II
A FRIEND IN NEED
Dr. Crossways was at home, and at once set out with the girl for "The
Retreat." He was a surly old man, and, moreover, he had a particularly
annoying habit--of which no amount of gentle correction could break
him--of pronouncing Evarne's name without the final "e," thus
compressing it into two syllables instead of three, as it is in the
musical tongue of ancient Greece, whence the name was taken. As a rule,
the doctor was morose and silent, but on this occasion he had at least
one piece of gossip to enlarge upon.
On the previous day he had indulged himself in a holiday on the
strength of an invitation from the noble lord who had rented the
shooting on a big estate some twenty miles distant. Evidently it had
been a proud and happy occasion for the little doctor, and it was with
ill-concealed gratification that he rattled off the list of those who
had likewise been at this illustrious shooting-party. In it was one
name very familiar to Evarne--Morris Kenyon. She had never seen her
father's early friend, but Leo often dwelt lovingly upon his college
life, and Morris Kenyon had been, apparently, the central figure of
those never-to-be-forgotten days.
Dr. Crossways took his departure from "The Retreat" in a state of high
dudgeon. Accustomed as he was to being called in to cope with every
trivial ailment of the local gentry, his professional pride was outraged
by Mr. Stornway's presuming to approach so very near to Death's portals
without his steps having been carefully guided down the path thereto by
the controlling hand of a disciple of Æsculapius. It was absolutely
insulting--it really bordered on Christian Science!
After parting from the irate doctor, Evarne returned to her father's
room. He raised his weary eyelids as she entered, and looked at her with
a troubled, almost remorseful, expression. He had realised vaguely for
some time past that he was soon to seek the society of his dearly
beloved heroes of antiquity; but not until this solemn medical
visitation had he seriously considered the practical earthly results of
his soul winging its flight to the fields of Asphodel.
When once he should be fairly off upon this interesting journey, his
young daughter would be left quite alone in this world of sin and woe.
What was to become of her? He was singularly devoid of relations. A few
distant cousins and a poverty-stricken and decrepit uncle comprised his
entire stock in that line of goods, while he knew nothing of his wife's
common family beyond the fact that she had a number of half-brothers and
sisters somewhere in Australia. He had but little money to leave his
daughter, and the girl had no training in any means of earning a
livelihood. He sighed despondently, as too late he recognised this
neglected duty.
Evarne sat down by his side, and tenderly stroked his hand. Ere long out
came her little bit of interesting news--Mr. Morris Kenyon was within
twenty miles of Heatherington.
At the mention of this familiar name a sudden light flashed into poor
Leo's worried eyes. Surely for "auld lang syne" this once dear friend
would look after his young daughter until she was able to support
herself? Morris was married to a charming wife--unfortunately now a
confirmed invalid. Leo had met the young lady at the time of her
wedding, and been favourably impressed. Surely she would feel for the
desolate situation of the young orphan. Filled with this idea, he bade
Evarne write, telling of her father's condition, and begging that Morris
would spare time to come over to visit him.
The letter was duly posted that night; the answer arrived by return, the
day after, Morris himself appeared upon the scene. Leo wished to see his
friend alone, so on his arrival he was ushered by Mrs. Jarman direct to
the sick-room.
With engaging readiness Morris undertook to watch over the welfare of
the dying man's daughter when the time came, and lightly brushed aside
the broken thanks. But Leo's gratitude was insistent and touching to
witness. He dwelt much upon the otherwise lonely situation of the girl.
"It is such a weight off my mind," he murmured again and again. "I never
before realised how I have neglected my duty to the child." And he
sighed a deep breath of relief.
"Now, you must see her," he went on, as with a trembling hand he rang a
bell that stood by his side. In almost immediate answer to the summons
Evarne appeared in the doorway.
Leo had made no mention of his daughter's striking personal beauty.
Dutiful, unselfish, intelligent--these, and other eminently desirable
mental and moral attributes had he ascribed to her as recommendations in
Morris's eyes; but upon the subject of that physical quality that counts
for so much more than all the virtues under the sun, the unworldly Leo
had been silent. Kenyon had somehow expected to see a stolid, robust,
and, to him, altogether uninteresting country damsel, and he with
difficulty hid his surprise on beholding the fair vision that answered
the summons.
Evarne's manner was touched with timidity, but she was not at all shy.
She now stood silent and motionless for a moment, surveying her father's
friend with a grave and interested gaze. Then, without waiting for any
introduction, she advanced towards him with outstretched hand and a
little smile of welcome upon her lips. Kenyon rose, and as he clasped
her hand and looked with the eye of a connoisseur more closely into
those charming features, he was half-ashamed at the consciousness of a
distinct sense of satisfaction in the prospect of playing guardian angel
to such a singularly lovely creature.
He left "The Retreat" that evening feeling thoroughly recompensed for
the loss of his half-day's shooting, and that just occasionally the
fulfilling of the duties demanded by friendship might bring their own
reward.
Leo Stornway lingered for more weeks than either he or the doctor had
anticipated, but one morning, just at the beginning of the New Year, he
was found lying calm, pallid, pulseless. His race was run. Silently and
in loneliness the end had come to a silent lonely life.
His desire had been to dispose of his earthly frame in as classical a
manner as possible. The notion he would have really revelled in would
have been a funeral pyre on the common, with the villagers solemnly
running races and engaging in wrestling bouts in honour of his Manes, in
true Greek style. This being obviously out of the question, he had set
his heart upon the nearest thing possible--ordinary cremation. This
urgent desire was found solemnly written on the back of a used envelope.
Hereupon arose trouble for Evarne. The local undertaker, who
respectfully yet promptly put in an appearance, was aghast at her
intention of arranging for the burning of her father's body. He had no
sympathy whatsoever with innovations in his staid and respectable
business.
"It's the last thing you will ever be able to do for your dear, dead
parent, Miss Evarne," said the dour-looking man. "Give him a solid
coffin--it needn't even be oak, we have good lines in elm and ash--but
_do_ give him a decent coffin, and have him put under the earth like he
ought to be!"
Mrs. Jarman was of opinion that such a departure from conventionality
would be absolutely indecent. She also waxed eloquent in another
direction.
"I allus thought you loved your poor dead Pa. I could 'ave sworn you
wouldn't 'ave 'urt a 'air of his 'ead!" she repeated again and again, as
if Evarne's resolve now disposed of that supposition once and for all.
Dr. Crossways was so sure that had he only been consulted in reasonable
time neither cremation nor burial would now be under discussion at all,
that he declined to offer the least suggestion of any sort. As to the
vicar and the curate, they called together on a visit of combined
sympathy and expostulation. Both seemed convinced that a case of
cremation must prove a serious inconvenience to the Almighty on the
Judgment Day--even if it did not place Him in an absolute dilemma.
Into this general confusion and misery, Morris Kenyon--summoned by Mrs.
Jarman--descended with all the _eclat_ of the God in the Machine. He
arrived at the very moment when the two rival dressmakers of
Heatherington, having appeared simultaneously armed with yard measures
and black patterns, were quarrelling in stage whispers in the porch.
This weighty matter settled, he proceeded to take all the arrangements
into his capable hands. Finally, he sat down to a quiet conversation
with the grateful Evarne, the more beautiful for the pallor and
distress, concerning her future.
He learnt that her great ambition was to become an artist. She possessed
decided talent, combined with an ardent appreciation of the beautiful,
but she was absolutely without training, and had evidently no idea of
the long years of steady labour--to say nothing of the "filthy
lucre"--that must be offered at the shrine of Art by would-be disciples.
Looking at Morris, her big eyes filled with a wistful anxiety, she
inquired if the little money her father had left could, by the strictest
economy, be made to last out until she was able to thus keep herself. If
not--and she had evidently come to this conference with her ideas fully
formed--could she not learn shorthand and typewriting? Even then she
hoped that, by rising early and working at her painting after office
hours and on Sundays, she might ultimately earn her living by Art.
Kenyon smiled inwardly at the life she thus proposed for herself. If he
knew aught of the world, the sons of Adam would see to it soon enough
that this particular daughter of Eve did not spend her days simply and
solely divided between banging the keys of a typewriter and daubing
sticky colours on a canvas. It was merely his luck that he happened to
be first in the field.
To Evarne he appeared kindliness itself. Certainly she could and she
should study Art; and this brought him round to a suggestion that he
hoped would give her pleasure. He possessed a delightful villa in balmy
Naples, where Mrs. Kenyon was now staying to escape the rigours of the
English winter. Evarne must come out and stop awhile with his wife. On
the journey through Italy, she should behold all its Art treasures. That
alone, he assured her, would form a splendid foundation for her later
artistic training.
Despite her sorrows, Evarne's face lit up with a sudden brilliant light
of happiness at this altogether delightful prospect, both for the near
and distant future. Her brightened expression thanked her guardian more
ardently than did her softly-spoken words, and so it was settled.
CHAPTER III
A RICH CASKET FOR A RARE JEWEL
Despite the heavy heart with which Evarne bade farewell to her home, the
weeks occupied by the protracted journey to Naples became a period in
which the light-heartedness of youth gradually conquered sorrow. It was
so crowded with interest, novelty, fresh sights and experiences, that
every week seemed as a month, and her former monotonous existence faded
rapidly into the background. She seemed a different being, living in a
strange, new world. It was a world in which Leo had never had a place,
so that its progress was in no ways affected by his absence. Evarne
mourned her father sincerely; shed many tears for him in the silence of
the night; and sometimes felt pangs of compunction that novelty and
interest should have such powers of overcoming grief. But despite her
reluctance to accept their aid, these great forces continued their
healing work.
Amid its other charms and novelties, this new life was one totally
devoid of the necessity of considering ways and means. The girl's
natural tastes were far from simple, and the luxury in which Morris
lived and travelled soon seemed not only congenial, but proper and
customary.
At Paris, where they stayed some time, she first discovered the subtle
delight that lies in the possession of dainty clothes. Her guardian gave
her _carte blanche_ at both costumiers and milliners, but, through
diffidence, she took little advantage of this generosity. Realising
this, he visited one of the leading _ateliers_, and gave orders direct
to madame herself to lavishly stock Evarne's wardrobe.
Thus the girl found herself clad in garments totally different to any
she had ever seen--let alone possessed. She reluctantly consented to try
to endure corsets, but very soon gave up the attempt in despair. But
madame, far from discouraged, exerted her ingenuity to array the girl's
lithe yet well-developed young form to the best advantage without any
such fictitious aid, and she succeeded even beyond her expectations.
Never before had Evarne realised the latent possibilities of her own
figure. She took unconcealed delight in beholding her reflection in the
mirror, and positively revelled in her silk linings, silk petticoats,
silk stockings, and other hitherto undreamed-of silken luxuries.
Venice was visited, then Ravenna, Florence, Pisa and Rome. Day after day
Morris was untiring in the thought and care he took for his new toy.
Evarne, apparently, looked upon his utmost and constant attention as
merely part of the accepted routine of the journey, and noted it with
the quiet indifference of a spoilt beauty. Yet there was no suggestion
of coquetry or affectation about the girl. Her mind, as well as her
person, was developing on calm, stately and dignified lines.
She was, in her turn, almost as quietly affectionate and attentive to
him as she would have been to her father, but the vainest of men could
not have persuaded himself that she made the least effort--open or
covert--to at all unduly ingratiate herself into his regard. "Kindness
in women, not their beauteous looks, shall win my love," sings the wise
poet, but Morris had been taught so early and so often how many women
are over-eager to be "kind" to a wealthy man, that Evarne's simple ways
were attractive by reason of their very novelty. It served as a _sauce
piquante_, and before Naples was reached he felt more genuine love for
this sweet child than he had deemed that well-worn article--his
heart--would ever again have the good luck to experience.
It was not until they were actually in the train bound for Naples that
he broke to her the information that the looked-for introduction to Mrs.
Kenyon must be postponed for the present.
"A letter from my wife reached me just before we left Rome," he
explained. "She is very nervous, and fears Vesuvius is working up for
another eruption. She often thinks that--pure fancy, of course! Anyway
she has gone on to Taormina, in Sicily. She will return to Naples when
she can muster courage."
"How much she travels about," remarked the unsuspecting Evarne.
"Doesn't she!" agreed Morris with a grim little smile, thinking of the
invalid to whom the daily journey from bedroom to boudoir was an arduous
undertaking.
Then, noting a troubled expression on Evarne's face as she gazed out of
the window at the fast-flying landscape, he asked, with a tiny hint of
sadness in his voice--
"Am I such dull company for a bright little girl that you look thus
solemn at the prospect of a few more _tête-à-tête_ meals?"
He took her hand as he spoke. Evarne had long ago got to the point of
finding it pleasant to feel her slender fingers enclosed in his strong
magnetic clasp. She smiled a little and shook her head slightly in
response to his question, but the fingers he held moved restlessly, as
if they half-sought to free themselves.
Evarne's mental upbringing and education had been as unusual and
unconventional--to say the least of it--as had been her physical
training. She learnt the Greek and English alphabets almost
simultaneously, and while other damsels of her years were skimming
through novelettes, she had been poring over the eternal and inspiring
works of the writers of antiquity. Which form of exclusive mental diet
created, on the whole, the most impracticable, the most false, the most
mischievous ideas when considered in reference to the stern realities of
modern life, it is difficult to say. Infinitely more than the average
girl of her age did Evarne know of the possible sins of humanity, of the
grim tragedies of history; infinitely less of that perhaps more useful
field of knowledge--the restrictions, petty malignity, wickedness, and
cruelly quick suspicions of modern society.
Nevertheless, an instinct told her that there was a vast difference
between travelling under the escort of her guardian to join his wife,
and in staying with him at his villa without that lady.
"Do you not think Mrs. Kenyon expects us to go on to her at Sicily?" she
suggested in a hesitating voice, divided between her fear of appearing
to presume and dictate, and her instinctive shrinking from this new
programme.
Morris read the trouble in the girl's mind, and promptly answered in the
one and only manner that was calculated to set her thoroughly at ease
again.
"When you are comfortably fixed up at Naples I will go on to Taormina
and bring back the truant. As to you, my dear, forgive my plain
speaking, but it is time you seriously started to study for your future
profession. There are excellent Art masters at Naples, and you can draw
in the museum there, but in Sicily there is nothing of all this."
As he had foreseen, this business-like view of the proceeding reconciled
her to it as nothing else would have done, and it was with a light heart
and a smiling face that she first set foot over the threshold of "Mon
Bijou."
Morris himself conducted his little guest to the rooms that had been
prepared for her occupation. The villa was situated on the heights
overlooking the bay, and Evarne, stepping out on to the verandah, stood
enthralled by the beauty around. She gazed over the broad expanse of
purple sea sparsely dotted with small sails, white and brown--at the
island of Capri, haunted by the memory of dark mysteries--at the far
distant dome of the Italian heavens that crowned all. Then she let her
delighted eyes wander over the picturesque roof-tops of the town to the
soft yet never-failing canopy of smoke that mingled itself with billowy
white clouds overshadowing the crater of Vesuvius the volcano.
Then she looked at the gardens of the villa itself. There she saw paths
made of smooth-coloured pebbles arranged in mosaic designs, winding amid
strange and luxurious trees and shrubs and blossoms; saw snowy statues
gleaming amid the green growth; saw arbours, set near the scent of
orange-blossom or mimosa; while a white marble fountain--an art treasure
in itself--gaily tossed upwards a sparkling jet of water, which fell
with a gentle splash into a deep, carved basin encircled by thick clumps
of flowers.
Overwhelmed by beauty so universal, so lavish, so abundant, she stood
rapt until Morris's patience was exhausted. When at length she could be
persuaded to pay attention to her apartments she found them, in their
way, to be equally enchanting--equally appealing.
The chief room was very large, and decorated with an almost florid
luxuriance. Everywhere the eye turned were pictures, statuettes, carved
ivories, bowls and vases and bronzes--each the embodiment of some
artistic dream. Everything was profuse--there were many books, many
mirrors, much gilding, carving, tapestry and embroidery, while masses of
vivid flowers scented the air.
The characteristic feature, however, was the mad riot and mingling of
every glaring hue, blended together into a bewildering yet exquisite
harmony. There was mauve and deepest violet, gold, blue, and a touch of
emerald green. The walls were rich crimson, with creamy white introduced
into the deep frieze, whereon dancing maidens were moulded in relief.
The whole scheme of colour was daring, brilliant, defiant; it suggested
life, youth, vitality, pleasure without remorse.
The little bedroom opened out from this. It was daintily small, all
white and pale green, the one striking splash of colour being given by a
bowl of pink roses. Simple, demure, unassuming, it formed a strange
contrast to the tropical violence of its neighbour.
As soon as Evarne was quite alone she placed herself in the centre of
the brilliant red room, and pivoting round slowly, surveyed every
wall--every corner--anew. It was scarcely three months since she had
left the austerity of "The Retreat"--three months in which she had
learnt, seen, done and heard more than in all the previous years of her
life. In the dazzling luxury of this room the culminating point of the
extraordinary difference between the past and the present seemed to be
attained. Its mad superabundance of wealth and colour, appealing so
forcefully to the emotions, bewildered the child. Everything about it
appeared indefinably wrong--almost unnatural--and for a moment the
instinctive fear of the unknown gripped her heart.
Suddenly she became apprehensive, afraid of life, of the hidden future
and what it held. She felt very young, very ignorant, very helpless--a
stranger not only in a far land, but in a strange world. If only Mrs.
Kenyon had been here to welcome her! Apparently no one about the place
could speak a word of English save Morris himself--and, of course, his
valet. Even with the bright little maid who was to attend on her, she
had found she could only converse by signs. She walked timidly over the
thick, yielding carpet and leant against the open window, breathing
deeply of the fresh, pure air. But a little while and her natural
courage rallied, the shadow of depression was tossed aside; she turned
back into the room, glanced round it once again with sparkling eyes lit
up by admiration, and all unconsciously broke into a snatch of joyous
song.
CHAPTER IV
THE WAY OF A MAN WITH A MAID
No trace of the uneasiness of the afternoon remained, as Evarne--clad in
a Parisian triumph, a loosely-falling dinner-gown of fragile black
chiffon and lace--took her seat that evening opposite Morris in the cosy
little anteroom in which he had ordered meals to be served in preference
to the ordinary dining-room. She was bright and smiling and
appreciative, as throughout that first evening beneath his own roof he
exerted himself particularly to please and entertain her.
Not that this called for much additional effort. Evarne invariably found
her guardian's society to be more inspiring and exhilarating than his
own champagne. Even in his ordinary converse with this unusual young
girl, the whole of his knowledge of men and matters, his wide
experience, his original ideas, all his natural wit and brightness ever
flowed forth readily and unrestricted. True, this implied not only the
teachings of some doctrines more or less heretical, but a certain
element of looseness of speech and the recounting of anecdotes and
incidents not usually deemed appropriate to the ears of sweet seventeen.
So, albeit the previous delicacy of her every thought unavoidably gave
place to something less ethereal, her character developed and matured by
leaps and bounds.
"Reading maketh a full man, conversation a ready man."
The girl's nature--rendered, perhaps, somewhat over-serious by solitude
and much deep reading--only needed the mental stimulant of a brilliant
and clever man's society, to grow rapidly bright and alert. She learnt
to find interest in many a subject hitherto sealed. From dress to
politics--from hard facts to vague fancies--from logical deducing to
limitless speculating, her mind was daily led over fresh fields and
pastures new, and rejoiced in this wandering.
Morris and Evarne sat up later that night than they had ever yet done
together. Within these walls Morris alone held sway, and both felt the
subtle influence of this state of affairs, so opposed to the constant,
comparative surveillance of life in hotels. At length the musical notes
of the clock chimed the hour past midnight, and Evarne sprang from her
low chair, startled by the flight of time.
Morris went upstairs with her. Standing on the threshold of her room she
touched the knob of the electric burners, then held out both hands with
her usual frankness to bid him good-night.
He held them for a few seconds with that firm and affectionate clasp in
which she so delighted. But then, suddenly transferring both her hands
into one of his, he put the first two fingers of his free hand to his
own lips and immediately pressed them gently upon Evarne's rosy mouth.
It was at most a mere suggestion of a kiss, yet with a startled glance
she jerked her hands away, stepped back quickly, instinctively slamming
the door, and Morris, standing outside with a little grimace of
amusement on his countenance, heard the key turn in the lock.
It was apparently a decided rebuke, yet he went downstairs well pleased
by the very violence of her reception of this experimental advance.
Easily enough had he conquered any temptation to kiss the girl as long
as there remained the fear that she might accept his kisses dutifully,
as mere fatherly salutes. But the light that had darted into her
eloquent eyes at the simple pressure of his fingers upon those fresh,
unsullied lips of hers, satisfied him that such an idea--had it ever
existed--had been got rid of forever.
Evarne flung herself amid the purple cushions of a big chair and shut
her eyes. Ere long one idea evolved itself from the tangle of confused
thought, and placed itself--clearly and shamelessly--before the bar of
her reason, to be relentlessly judged. Did she indeed owe all that Mr.
Kenyon was doing for her--was giving her--simply to the fact that she
was Leo Stornway's daughter, or were her own youth--her beauty--her
sex--the real forces that prompted his generous actions?
Scarcely one second for calm deliberation was granted her. The very
process of actually formulating such a question, brought into conscious
existence a knowledge that was both crushing and exalting--terrifying
and delightful. Doubtless it had been forming itself in her heart and
brain for many a long day, but its appearance as a fully-fledged
fact--something that had to be acknowledged and reckoned with--came with
the dazzling sharpness of lightning athwart a summer sky.
Whatever might be the nature of her guardian's feelings, this one fact
she knew all too well. Come what might _she_ loved _him_--loved him
devotedly--passionately--with all the ardour of youth and a nature
formed for loving. She realised that if in his eyes she was not the
fairest amid women, she might as well be possessed of no beauty; if he
did not seek and enjoy her society before that of any other creature
alive, she was worthless in her own sight; if all this divine emotion
that had come to her could touch no answering chord within his breast,
life would be as a weed, worthless, without colour, perfume or
sweetness.
To realise so much during a single tick of the clock was overwhelming!
Instinctively concealing her face in the cushions Evarne found her
breathing oppressed, while as to her heart--it stood quite still for one
brief moment, apparently daunted by the magnitude of the additional task
suddenly imposed upon it. Then loyally rising to the occasion, it
continued to beat, but with altogether unusual violence and rapidity, as
wishing defiantly to show that it could bear up with a good grace even
under this double duty.
Ere long Evarne sat erect again, while then and there her soul soared
aloft into vaporous and shining realms of happiness. Yet no white angel
would have veiled its face before this sweet maiden's thoughts and
ideals in her first love. Not for some time did she so much as remember
that Morris was married, and even then she was in no mood to actively
regret Mrs. Kenyon's existence.
That lady's rights were so unquestioned; Evarne would have shrunk with
horror at the mere notion that she should ever come to resent the wife
as either a rival or a hindrance.
The fact that she believed Morris was a kind, affectionate and faithful
husband, was quite consistent with his returning her love--at all
events, love as she conceived it and desired it in return.
Notwithstanding her classical reading, the girl failed to realise that
her passion--youthful, virginal and absolutely spiritual, yet ardent and
enthralling--was an emotion absolutely unknown to any male mind.
Long she sat, enchanted by the fair landscapes of this unexplored
country across whose borders her feet had newly strayed. When at length
she nestled down into her soft, scented bed, still the same soft visions
gladdened her mind.
Next morning, after finishing her coffee and roll, she lay back lazily
and reflected with the clearer, more rational, thoughts of the early
hours of the day, upon the one topic that now appeared of paramount
importance.
After a while Bianca, her little maid, entered, and with painstaking
effort repeated in English a short message that she had evidently just
learnt. "Master wishes come pay his respects to signorina."
Evarne renounced day-dreams and meditations and arose immediately.
Blissfully independent of hair-curlers or any other such artificial
accessories, her toilette could be completed with marvellous rapidity.
Now, in considerably less than half an hour, she issued from her room
fresh and blooming as a spring flower, and all unconsciously greeted
Morris with the richest smile she had ever flashed upon him.
He looked bright and _debonnairé_ that morning, and it was difficult to
realise that he was in fact the contemporary of the girl's father. He
seemed so glad to behold her again after the few hours' separation,
asked with such evident interest and concern if she had slept well, held
her hand for so long and finished by pressing it so warmly between his
own, that Evarne blushed slightly for very happiness, as with unerring
instinct her heart answered its own question, "He does care--he does--he
does!"
In her previous notions concerning both men and women who had attained
to the mature and dignified age of five-and-forty, she had unconsciously
taken it for granted that Cupid always observed a due respect for such
elderly hearts. True, she was well-informed respecting poor Hera's
troubles. Zeus had surely been old--quite old and grey-bearded--yet
apparently he could not ever look down from high Olympus, even on
business, without his eye falling on some fair damsel who promptly
became entitled to a place amid the crowd of rival fair ones who packed
that miraculously capacious heart. Nevertheless, despite this seemingly
instructive knowledge, it was only as she grew to know Morris that her
ideas became revolutionised on the subject of middle-aged men who were
not divinities, but merely modern and mortal. Now, her guardian's years,
viewed with the eyes of affection, appeared simply as an additional
fascination.
After a while he proceeded to consult her regarding their plans for the
day. Would she like to go sight-seeing that morning, or rest after the
fatigues of yesterday's journey?
Evarne was still amused at this novel notion, evidently entertained by
Morris, that she was a fragile blossom requiring to be carefully tended
and cherished. The idea flashed across her: "How different life will be
in a year or two when I am all alone in cheap little rooms in London,
earning a precarious living by Art."
This led her to recall what her guardian had told her last night
concerning the two most celebrated Art masters in Naples.
"They are very different one from another, both in their style of work
and their method of teaching," he had said. "I will take you to visit
both studios, and you can see if one appeals to you more than the
other."
Now she reminded him of this promise.
"I want to oversee the unpacking of my boxes," she said, "and then, if
you please, I should like to visit the studios you spoke of. I want to
start working in all seriousness almost at once."
"Oh, no hurry; postpone that!" was the lazy advice. But she shook her
head with righteous emphasis.
"I don't mean to delay and delay like the foolish virgins in the Bible.
You remember that story?"
"I can't say I remember those particular damsels," rejoined Morris, with
a twinkle in his eye; "but candidly I maintain that _all_ virgins are
foolish."
"That's a very debatable point!" retorted Evarne, smiling, yet slightly
biting her under-lip. "Seriously, I want to start work at once. Now, let
me go and put on my hat, and we will place business before pleasure,
like good people."
This time Morris wisely checked the response that rose to his lips.
The rival studios both got visited that day, and the one wherein Evarne
was to experience the pangs and delights of the aspiring Art student was
duly settled upon. It was really somewhat absurd that a mere beginner,
totally untrained in the very rudiments of drawing, should be introduced
into such an advanced coterie as that of Florelli's.
As Evarne gazed with admiring yet somewhat saddened eyes at the work of
the other students, she felt this herself. To her they all seemed
finished artists already! She could certainly get herself up in a loose
overall plentifully besmeared with paint and charcoal, she could allow a
curl of hair to escape from its confining bonds, and thus--as far as
appearance went--be on an artistic equality with those of her new
companions who were of the feminine persuasion. But would she ever be
able to work as beautifully as did these young men and women? She
doubted it, and yet, appalling realisation! these superior young people
were not winning fame and fortune. Alack and alas, they were still
studying--still knew their work imperfect--were still striving to
attain!
The momentary wave of despair was followed by a somewhat frantic
impatience to make an immediate start along this far-stretching road
that lay before her. She wanted to return at once to "Mon Bijou," to set
up a pot or vase and endeavour to make a drawing of it in which the two
sides should at least decently resemble one another. It was all very
nice and amusing to sketch pretty little faces with huge eyes, tiny
mouths and masses of very curly hair; to cover sheets of notepaper with
angels whose big, feathery wings and vapoury bodies conveniently
vanished into nothing. But one day in Paris she had tried to make a
correct drawing of a dull, unimaginative vase, and her effort had been
brought to an abrupt and highly unsatisfactory conclusion by the
much-employed indiarubber working a hole in the paper.
That evening, as she and Morris walked in the garden star-gazing, she
honestly confided to him her fear that the attaining of artistic
excellence would be a longer task than she had at all realised. He did
not appear to sink under the shock, but, on the contrary, inquired
calmly enough "what that mattered." Hesitatingly, Evarne broached the
subject of expense. It was a matter that pressed rather heavily upon her
mind.
His answer was unexpected. Half opening his lips as if to speak, he
closed them again firmly, looked frowningly into her tremulous, upturned
countenance, then suddenly slipping his arm round her waist, drew her
closely to him. Her instantaneous impulse was to free herself--not
because she wanted to, far from it--but because she knew well enough
that such were dull duty's dictates. Still, she hesitated a moment, and
thereby lost the strength of mind necessary to maintain strict propriety
upon its lofty pedestal. On the contrary, she rested quite impassive,
and Morris felt her soft uncorseted waist heave slightly with the deep,
quivering breath she drew. Somewhat fiercely clasping her yet closer, in
a second his other arm was also around her, and he was straining the
flexible young form to his breast with all the abandon of a man who,
having reluctantly practised self-control for long, lets himself go at
last.
But his very ardour and heedless violence frightened Evarne immediately.
Using the whole of her considerable strength she endeavoured to break
away from his clasp. "Don't, don't!" she cried in unmistakable
earnestness, and besides genuine alarm there was a touch of decided
anger in her voice.
As soon as she had freed herself she stood irresolute--motionless and
fascinated--yet obviously prepared at any second to dart away. Indeed,
unconsciously, prompted by her athletic instincts, she rested, poised
with her heels already slightly raised off the earth.
She looked more Greek than ever at that moment; fitted indeed to form
part of some legend--
"Of deities or mortals, or of both;
In Temple, or the dales of Arcady."
Morris gazing at her with eager, ardent appreciation, yet read a warning
that he must venture no farther that night! Trusting and confiding
though Evarne might be, she was too serious, too thoughtful, to accept
such overtures with childish carelessness.
Her expression gradually clouded, for the unknown Mrs. Kenyon rose in
indignant might before her mind's eye! Morris, guessing the nature of
some of her thoughts, knew that in dealing with a young woman possessed
of such painfully lofty principles, discretion was indeed the better
part of valour. Moreover, he was far too genuinely attached to her to
wish to cause her undue distress, and, however strong she might be
physically, he knew well that where her feelings were concerned, Evarne
was in deed a "fragile flower," to be guarded well and treated tenderly.
So he just smiled calmly and reassuringly, and into his eyes came that
kindly, indulgent look that always stirred the girl's very heart.
"Come, pretty one," he said, "hold my hand quietly, and go on telling me
the troubles about the drawing."
Such a sudden change of manner and topic was quite bewildering; Evarne
could not accommodate herself to it all with equal rapidity. There was a
considerable pause, while he stood waiting with his hand outstretched.
The imprint of very varying emotions passed over the girl's gentle
countenance. By the brilliant light of the moon every fleeting
expression could be seen, and the look with which she at length laid her
hand in his could not have been displeasing even to the chaste goddess
whose clear rays rendered it visible.
Somewhat hastily Evarne proceeded to chatter about the studio, but her
nerves were overwrought, and her voice sounded strange to her own ears.
"Let us go in," she urged ere long; "I'm cold."
"Cold now, perhaps," murmured Morris softly, "but, if I mistake not,
magnificently capable of burning with the most divine of all fires."
She made no answer. He could not be sure that she had heard, or if she
had, that she understood. Neither was he at all sure that the time had
even yet come when it was really desirable that she should hear and
understand.
CHAPTER V
THE WILES OF THE FOWLER
Within a week of taking up her residence at "Mon Bijou," Evarne started
her career at Florelli's. She proved very painstaking, and earnest--so
much so as to cause considerable surprise to the other students, who had
judged, from the luxury of her attire and appointments, that she was a
mere _dilettante_.
She was far and away the most elementary pupil in the studio, and truth
to tell did not find it particularly interesting to sit alone hour after
hour in a corner, covering reams of Michallet, and using up boxes of
charcoal in repeated struggles to depict gigantic plaster replicas of
detached features from Michael Angelo's "David," or innumerable casts of
torsos, of arms and legs, hands and feet, in all sizes and
attitudes--painfully suggestive of amputations.
For stimulus and encouragement she would peep into the two rooms where
the more advanced students were working from life, in one room from the
costume model, in the other from the nude. The mental atmosphere of
these rooms was so full of energy and enthusiasm that she would return
with fresh ardour to her limbs and features.
Not that she was able to devote all her time to the services of the
exigent Muses, nor, alas! could this pursuit arouse the keenest, most
engrossing thoughts and energies of which her nature was capable.
Interest in this, as in everything else in the wide universe, showed
pallid and feeble before the overwhelming and concentrated interest of
her love for Morris Kenyon. There was something almost tragic in such a
domination. Barely seventeen, her heart and mind should have been still
too youthful, too immature, to conceive and sustain such force of
emotion.
Morris had many friends in Naples, and both visited and entertained
considerably. Evarne, both by reason of her studies and her recent loss,
could be prevailed upon to take very little part in any fêtes. Still,
she started to learn Italian, and was soon able to express her will to
Bianca in all simple matters, and to amuse Morris by her courageous,
laughable efforts.
She fancied herself a perfect little diplomatist, and was blissfully
unaware that her affection for him was very soon betrayed to his
experienced eye by her every look--every word--every action. Under the
circumstances, silence on the momentous topic so uppermost in both minds
was naturally not maintained for long.
One night as she sat on a footstool at his feet, spoiling her eyesight
by delicate fancy work, not speaking much, but at intervals contentedly
humming a little song, a sudden impatience at further waste of time took
possession of him.
"Evarne," he said abruptly, and as the girl in all unconsciousness
stayed her needle and looked up inquiringly, he bent forward, and
without any warning pressed his lips to hers. Then, shaken from his
habitual calm, he placed his hands heavily upon her shoulders and gazed
intently into her eyes, his expression telling yet more than his
actions.
She remained motionless as if hypnotised, her face still uplifted.
"Evarne, sweetest little Evarne!" he murmured after a pause, in accents
tender and caressing. At the sound of his voice she dropped her head
slowly lower and yet lower, until it finally rested upon his knee. Still
she spoke nothing.
Slipping his arms around her, he forcibly drew her up until her head was
pillowed upon his breast. Then he kissed her again and again, kissed her
brow, her hair, her cheeks, her mouth.
"Darling, are you happy?" he breathed at length into her ear.
Upon this the girl released herself from his hold, and kneeling erect by
his side, looked with wide-open, excited, somewhat horrified eyes
straight into his. It was no highly-wrought sentiment either of love or
indignation that fell from her lips. Simply, yet emphatically, she
cried--
"Oh, we mustn't! we mustn't! We were both forgetting your wife!"
Morris was rather proud of his versatility, and cultivated the art of
being all things to all women. The last lady on whom he had temporarily
bestowed his affections had, like Evarne, been tactless and
inconsiderate enough to invoke the memory of the happily absent one at a
critical moment. To Evarne's predecessor he had lightly remarked, "Oh!
hang my wife, Birdie. She doesn't count." Birdie had giggled, called him
a "naughty man," and there had been an end to that topic.
To have addressed any such flippant answer to Evarne and her clamouring
conscience would have meant the end of all things. Morris unhesitatingly
took the one and only course that would serve his turn now. He adopted
the plan of apparent perfect frankness, not only regarding the legal
partner of his joys and woes, but concerning much else that he had
hitherto kept hidden.
With many a sign of great mental struggle, now flashing forth eloquent
glances, now veiling his eyes from her clear, searching gaze, he made
confession of his deception concerning Mrs. Kenyon's promised presence
at "Mon Bijou." He waxed alternately ardent and pathetic as he
discoursed upon the love he bore Evarne and all that it meant to him,
vowing that it was the intensity of his affection alone that had
prompted him to his falsehood. He abused himself so unsparingly, that
half-unconsciously she was moved to utter a pleading little cry of pity
and expostulation.
Thereupon he went on to explain in touching terms that he was but a
lonely, desolate man, rapidly becoming weary of life, embittered and
miserable, until her charm, her sweet goodness, aroused him, awoke
affection and brought fresh zest into his existence--and so on, and so
on.
"My wife, well, she was a nicely-brought-up, rather silly girl, pretty
enough once and good-natured too, but now soured and aged by permanent,
incurable illness. There is no bond of any kind between us. We have not
a thought in common. There are no children; she can never be either
companion or wife to me. Frail though she is, she has a marvellous
vitality, a wondrous clinging to life. Such unhappy existences--a curse
to themselves and others,--are always prolonged. Think of it, dearest,
think what it means to a man to be practically tied to a corpse, cut off
from all the joy of living."
Then he soared to lofty heights of moralising, told her--or at least
implied--that all his hopes of heaven rested upon her gentle influence
and affection. "I may seem to others but a hard, somewhat cynical man of
the world, yet I have got here"--and in true dramatic style he struck
his breast over the supposed region of a presumably panting heart--"I
have got here a longing for a true woman's disinterested, faithful
affection, such as many a sentimental stringer together of rhymes has
never experienced. Evarne, care for me a little; love me, darling. Let
me love you. It means everything to me."
All this sentiment quite overcame his sweet-natured listener. Morris had
made a studied though carefully veiled appeal, either by his looks or
his words, direct to her most generous instincts. If much of it was mere
acting--exaggerated and artificial--his passionate desire to gain her
love was real enough. It was no reproach to frank, unsuspicious,
inexperienced Evarne--already blinded by affection--that she could see
only the evident sincerity that inspired all this bombast.
A flood of tender pity and sympathy swelled in her breast; all
resentment at his deception, all hesitation and restraint, were swept
away. If the assurance of her deep love, her utter trust, did in very
truth mean happiness to him, it should be his. Rising to her feet
impulsively, she pressed his head with almost fierce force against her
bosom, murmuring, "I do love you, my dear one. Indeed, I do love you."
Then she bent over, and almost reverently pressed a long kiss upon his
brow.
So far, so good, and in mutual love confessed Evarne's ideal was
attained! It was rather incomprehensible that she could for one minute
have supposed that "finis" would be written in Morris's masculine
conception of the old, old story, at a similar point to where it
appeared in the poetical version that had been evolved from out her
imagination. Yet when, in the course of a very short time, the
inevitable discovery was made that he had never entertained the notion
of loving her as an "inspiration to a noble life," nor as a "kindred
soul," nor as his "good angel," but merely as a man always loves a
woman, and that he sought a return of affection in kind, it came as a
stunning revelation.
At first Morris had not been at all sure but that she would endeavour to
shake the dust of "Mon Bijou" from her feet without delay. In fact, he
always declared that, probably inspired by the vicinity of Capri, she
had given him to understand that he was on a moral level with the
defunct Tiberius. But for her own part her first recollections that were
at all clear and distinct were very different.
In all moments of mental disturbance her first desire was for solitude,
and in this crisis, bidding Morris not to follow her, she sped wildly
out into the dark garden. There, leaning for support against the pillar
of a statue, and gazing up at the serene masses of white clouds and the
tinted halo encircling the moon, breathing in the perfume of the earth
and its green growth, while a gentle breath of sea-breezes played with
her heavy hair, she gradually regained calmness.
Her Greek studies had taught her much--so much that she had believed
there was but little left for her to learn. Yet to us all is life an
untold tale--strange, unique, unguessed. What wisdom of sage, what
sensual raptures of pagan poet, had ever prompted her to anticipate the
exaltation, the triumph, that awoke at the realisation that she too had
her share in the resistless power of womanhood? She felt plunged into
full harmony with nature--felt herself knit to the great heart of woman
all the world over by the sentient cords of sex-sympathy.
Carried out of herself she flung back her head and gave utterance to
emotion by lifting up her voice in song--just full rich notes that
rolled forth unconsidered, all unhampered by words--a spontaneous
outpouring of glorification and the joy of victory. Pressing both hands
hard upon her bosom she felt the force with which it rose and fell
beneath her deep breathing, and strangely delighted, the girl laughed
triumphantly with the notes of her song.
A sudden step near by startled her into abrupt shamefaced silence:
Morris stood by her side. He had been seeking her in the garden and had
traced her by this wild song that broke the stillness of the night.
Unrestricted displays of feeling were entirely new to Evarne, her
previous uneventful routine having given scant cause for much excitement
of any sort. Now she felt keen abashment at her extraordinary show of
emotion, and was almost humiliated to realise that she was not alone.
"I told you not to follow me. I don't want you," she said quickly and
decidedly.
For a moment Morris was startled; then he understood the change that was
beginning to take place in her mind. No longer was she a simple child
addressing her guardian and benefactor, but a woman growing conscious of
her own power. Of course she would be whimsical, capricious, alternately
authoritative and submissive, wilful and yielding, like the rest of the
darlings.
"I meant to obey," he answered with ready meekness, "but can you blame
the impotence of mortal man's resolution when the siren calls?"
Sudden anger flashed over Evarne at this vague suggestion that she had
fled from him only to draw him to her side again by her voice.
"I'm not a siren, and I don't say one thing and mean another, though I
know you find it difficult to believe that of any woman," she replied
curtly, and with head erect walked back through the French window into
the brightly-lit room. Once safely out of sight, she darted rapidly
upstairs to the safety of her own room.
In a minute or two she heard her name called softly through the door,
then the pleading whisper--
"Evarne, I can have no rest unless I know you are not angry with me."
She was silent for a moment, but the delay was brief. No resentment
could endure before the music of that dear voice. She guessed right well
that a locked door between them was all-sufficient for Morris to endure,
so answered him generously, as her heart prompted--
"Rest, then; rest happily now and ever."
Within the peaceful sanctuary of her delicate green and white bedroom,
the chief amid her more normal thoughts and feelings resumed their sway.
Foremost came that imperative demand for self-approbation--that pride in
self--that made her ever the slave of what she held to be honourable.
The spirit of righteousness sprang up alert, quick to wage war against
the mere suggestion that under any provocation--any excuse of
overwhelming stress of love--she should permit herself to be stained by
dishonour.
Strong and self-confident, the girl at last sank to sleep. But her
slumber was light, and early next morning she was awake and thoughtful.
She acknowledged being glad to have experienced the sensations of last
night--glad to have been granted that period of exaltation, and to have
revelled in it to the full. It had made all life seem more
understandable and interesting--yet it had brought about no wondrous
change of personality! Evarne still remained herself; still good and
conscientious and new to the ways of love; a young philosopher, and
therefore indulgent to the natural frailties of mankind. She esteemed
Morris not one whit the less for having shown himself but human;
yet--realising that he could not make her his wife--her conscience and
her wishes united in the resolution that love 'twixt him and herself
must ever remain a thing ethereal--a poem--a fair dream--a sweet
sentiment blossoming only in the soul.
She went to Florelli's as usual, but her studies occupied a very
secondary place in her thoughts. All she meant to say to Morris--all he
might perhaps answer--all the beautiful sentiments she had to express
and which she was sure must appeal so irresistibly to him--all the lofty
ideals of her soul that she was going to impart to his--obtruded
themselves between her mind and her drawing.
As she dressed for dinner that evening an unexpected shyness crept over
her, and it was with quite an effort that she went downstairs. But all
imagined difficulties and embarrassments faded like snow before the
sunlight of his eyes. Her own danced for joy at being in his presence
again, yet there was a touch of stiffness and formality in her demeanour
that was new.
Morris listened more or less patiently to her dear little sermons, and
with difficulty resisted stopping her pretty lips with kisses. But she
was very much on her dignity that night, so assuring her that she was
nothing more than a sweet, refreshing baby, he merely delivered a sermon
on his own account, with a very different text.
That night the influence of the day's high meditation rendered her proof
against his sophistries, but as time passed their steady reiteration
began to make headway. Morris unswervingly bent all his powers to gain
control of the situation. The sport amused him. He had nothing to
distract his attention, and the prize was so well worth the winning that
time and trouble were as nothing. He attempted no sudden decisive
_coup_, feeling greater confidence in the weapons of gentle argument and
persuasion, patience and a discreet mingling of ardour and forbearance.
CHAPTER VI
A SOUL'S BATTLE
Evarne grew steadily more troubled--more unhappy--more shaken in her
once firm convictions. Up to the present, save in a few unconsidered
trifles, she had always obeyed the dictates of her conscience. Now this
prop failed her; indeed, she seemed to have two opposing consciences,
each struggling for supremacy.
While one inward voice would desperately recall the existence of Mrs.
Kenyon, the other would reply by scornfully declaring that it was but
selfishness, cowardice, calculating prudence and cold lack of trust,
that clutched hold of the vision of the distant invalid whose finger
bore the only wedding ring that Morris could give, and that these
contemptible qualities used the wife but as a moral shield behind which
to conceal their own mean, hideous forms. There was no breaking up of a
previously happy home involved, no ruthless destroying of another
woman's peace of mind; while beyond a doubt she was depriving the man
she professed to love--and to whom she owed everything--of the only
return she could make for all his kindness and devoted affection.
Obviously this spiritual civil war could not forever consist of
drawn battles between the rival forces. Ere long even her own
self-respect--the chief bulwark of the defending army--trembling beneath
resistless attacks, was on the verge of capitulation. True, she might
have fled from "Mon Bijou," but convinced of Morris's engrossing love,
she could not do this without likening herself to the snake of the
fable, who, warmed back to life in its rescuer's bosom, then turned and
stung him.
But unless she thus left Morris desolate, and cast herself helpless and
penniless upon the world, she was forced to continue to accept
everything--mere food and raiment, let alone luxury--at his hands, and
above all to receive daily and hourly that care and devotion that can
only be repaid in coin of the same nature. He so obviously delighted in
giving; was she, for her part, empty of all sense of gratitude, of all
generosity?
Almost she began to deem herself something to be despised, and
self-reproaches bordering upon remorse caused the bread of charity to
taste bitter in her mouth. At times every sentiment that is most
ennobling seemed ranged amongst the forces that bade her let love pay
its debt. This veering of the tide of battle was not very visible, even
to the man's watchful and experienced eye. His patience was getting
exhausted. He had been fully prepared to wait, but with the passing of
time, the light in which Warren Hastings regarded the questionable
acquirement of his much-discussed Indian fortune became applicable to
Morris Kenyon's state of mind concerning his dealings with Evarne. He
began to feel "surprised at his own moderation."
Therefore, on coming up quietly behind her one afternoon as she sat
sketching in the garden, he overheard with some satisfaction the words
she was softly singing as she worked. It was the beginning of Emerson's
little poem--
"Give all to love;
Obey thy heart;
Friends, kindred, days,
Estate, good-fame,
Plans, credit, and the Muse,
Nothing refuse."
When a fair maiden beguiles her solitude by dwelling tunefully upon such
sentiments, it may reasonably be supposed that they are not altogether
uncongenial to her mind.
He announced his presence by covering her eyes with his hands, and
lightly dropping a kiss on the top of her head. When she had laughingly
shaken herself free he lay down on the grass at her feet, and, plucking
a flower, commenced to pull it to pieces.
"You need not have sung that song to the birds," he declared, after a
protracted survey of her fair face. "They need no such promptings,
sweetest. They do obey their hearts."
"I suppose it is only meant for selfish human beings, then," she
answered somewhat plaintively. Then, moved to a sudden impatience at her
burden of doubts, she threw her drawing-book on the ground, crying, "But
how very futile to speak of birds. There is no comparison. What concern
have they with 'good-fame,' or with any other splendid responsibilities?
We human beings have got souls--or--or something of that sort, that we
must consider, haven't we?"
"You think so!" and the man's tone was mocking.
"And so do you," came the quick retort. "You remember that picture we
looked at the other day? You yourself said it had no soul in it."
"That's altogether different. The sort of soul I meant is the gift of
the Muses. Come, my Greek girl, have you forgotten what you yourself
told me about your precious Socrates and his views on the necessity of
'divine madness' in creative work? Now I, in my turn, assure you that
the brightest amid the Nine never bestows souls on those who refuse
submission to Venus. Those who will not bend the knee at that shrine
remain forever sane--but uninspired! You see, I know more of the
classics than you give me credit for."
"Don't you believe that I love you, that you tell me this? Oh, Morris,
Morris dear, do understand!"
"Little darling, it is you who do not understand. Your love for me is
but that of a sweet child; you know nothing yet of that irresistible
force that dominates the life of the world. The soul, as you like to
call it, that you already possess, is sleeping. It has slept long
enough, Evarne; you must not be afraid of its awakening."
The girl shook her head.
"How little you know me, it seems. I could never care for you more than
I do already. I'm sure--oh, you can't tell--but I'm sure I bear already
the very fullest extent of love that my nature is capable of ever
producing."
"Your believing that only proves the finite capacities of the powers of
imagination! You see, you cannot even realise that there may be--and I
assure you there are--possibilities of emotion lying dormant within your
mind more powerful than you can even conceive of at present. Only those
who can, and who will, shake themselves free from all hampering
limitations ever become truly great in any direction. It is quite
useless to hope that the 'divine madness' of the Muses may be given to
you, unless you are already possessed of courage to seize on true
freedom, for that is the only soil in which anything worth having can
ever take root, thrive and grow."
"I don't quite understand," she murmured nervously, reluctant to
believe.
"In refusing to accept the full companionship of the man who loves you,
Evarne, and whom you love in return, you are simply enslaving your
emotions, enchaining them, and hopelessly preventing their perfect
development. The technique of your chosen Art you will doubtless gain by
time and perseverance, but you are scornfully neglecting to bring to
fruition a far more subtle source of power--the rich ripeness of soul
that alone can appeal to humanity's soul--the flame that can set blazing
the fire that lies at the heart of the race of man."
Evarne again parted her lips as if to speak, but without hesitation
Morris went on with his homily.
"Whether you set forth to create pictures or books or music, you cannot
possibly give more to the children of your brain than is to be found
within your own innermost self. Only by having known the most intense,
the loftiest, the deepest, in the whole range of emotional experience
will you be enabled to put knowledge into your work, and without that,
what worth has any work of Art? Believe me, ignorance cannot possibly
ring true--truth alone can live and enthral.
"Now, believe me or not, as you like, Evarne, but I assure you that
because of all this, love is the one and only teacher that can really
evolve a great artist. Forgive me for thus assailing you on all sides,
my sweet iceberg, but your happiness and success are very dear to me. I
simply cannot bear to see you thus blindly and ignorantly opposing the
unfolding of the bright flower of your genius. As I started by saying,
your soul is still sleeping, and it will slumber on until you can become
reconciled to letting love awaken it."
A protracted silence followed these last words. Evarne continued to gaze
at Morris with the rapt expression she always wore when he was pouring
fresh thoughts into her mind. This suggestion of a triple alliance
between illicit love, the possession of a soul, and success in Art,
possessed all the charms and the startling qualities of novelty.
"You are trying to make me think selfishly," she murmured at last, "but
you must never believe that my own progress is of more consequence to me
than----" She looked at him in silence again, and her eyes and her
thoughts grew full of tenderness. Clasping her hands together, she went
on, "And oh! if it were, I'm sure, oh! so sure, that the love I feel for
you already is--is----"
"It is not of the sort that counts."
"But Socrates says that pure love----"
Morris interrupted her. He felt that this troublesome antique
philosopher must be resolutely suppressed once and for all.
"I cannot claim as intimate an acquaintance with the opinions of that
gentleman as you possess, little sage; nevertheless, I'll be bound that
he supports my opinion. I can't definitely remember, mark you; I am only
sure on general principles that no one who taught your pretty,
sentimental rubbish--forgive me, sweetheart--could have contrived to get
himself accepted for so long. You look--or rather we will seek
together--and I'll warrant that I find and show you confirmation of my
words."
* * * * *
That night Evarne retired considerably earlier than usual, but unable to
sleep, and soon utterly weary of the darkness and her own tangled
thoughts, she resolved to follow Morris's advice of the afternoon. She
would delve once more into that master-mind that they had both invoked
as upholding their contrary ideals.
Flashing on the light, she went into the red room, and returned with her
arms filled with the six big volumes of Plato. Tumbling them all on the
table by her side she slipped into bed again, and reclining comfortably
amid her soft, faintly-perfumed pillows, drew a volume at random from
the pile, then hesitated a moment before opening it.
She had perfect confidence that in these works of Plato no sentiments
would be found of the nature that Morris sought.
"My dear one is unwise, after holding up fame and success as a bribe, to
send me to read this--which is my Bible--and which teaches that
happiness lies only in the pursuit of wisdom, of virtue, of all that is
good," was her thought, as she lazily laid open the pages. Little did
she deem that her bewildering doubts and difficulties were at length to
be definitely solved.
It is hard to avoid the terrible belief that there exists a malign
omnipotent Spirit at enmity with the race of man; an evil Power
untiringly concentrated on watching for and contriving opportunities to
work dire mischief--to create miseries of all kinds--to impose agony of
mind and body upon all that has life. Not without some show of reason
have there ever been secret sects of devil-worshippers, who recognise
the existence of, and seek to propitiate, this force so hostile to
humanity, this merciless Something that works with superhuman ingenuity
to aid and bring to fruition that which is of itself--evil--to conquer,
to destroy, to render impotent all that which is of a contrary nature;
or more terrible still, to bend such to its own purposes, employing all
that is best and noblest and sweetest in life and human nature as tools
wherewith to work destruction.
Within a few minutes of opening the Oracle, Evarne was sitting erect,
all her sleepy indifference and listlessness gone. Throughout all the
time of her mental stress she had not appealed to these familiar works.
What more could a further study of Socrates do than intensify her desire
to remain his faithful disciple? She had deemed it quite useless to look
for special guidance as to which of the two opposing courses open to her
really led to the acquisition of true wisdom, virtue, and spiritual
beauty. That she should now open directly at one of those strangely rare
definite statements concerning right and wrong, was a coincidence so
extraordinary that it is difficult to believe that a controlling
intelligence had not arranged this apparent chance.
She re-read the sentence upon which her eye had fallen, vaguely
wondering how she could ever have forgotten its doctrine. It was a
portion of the "Phædrus," and referred to that eternal topic, love, or
rather to a certain imitation of the glorious reality. This semblance
was characterised as "being mingled with mortal prudence, and dispensing
mortal and niggardly gifts," and its dire result was "to generate in the
soul an illiberality which is praised by the multitude as virtue, but
which will cause it to be tossed about the earth and beneath the earth
for nine thousand years, devoid of intelligence."
Naturally, it was not a belief in the threatened aftermath of harbouring
this "illiberality" that appalled her. It was the sudden revelation that
the inspired Socrates--far from upholding and approving her present
discreet line of conduct--would have condemned her for "illiberality
praised by the multitude as virtue," as unhesitatingly as she was now
willing to confess that she herself held it in contempt! After the first
moment's shock she found comfort in the reflection that the opinion at
which she had arrived independently, albeit slowly and reluctantly,
found confirmation in the words of this great teacher.
Something outside herself now seemed to take possession of her body, and
to control her deeds. Immediate action became imperative. Instinctively,
almost mechanically, she sprang out of bed, flung her white silk
dressing-gown around her, and sped barefooted along the corridor and up
the little flight of stairs that led to Morris's rooms.
There was still a light showing under the door; quite steadfastly and
without hesitation she turned the handle, and when it refused to yield
she rattled it violently. Hearing a quick step inside she felt the blood
surge to her head, but no suggestion of faltering or regret came to
trouble her finally settled conviction. This seemingly wild
impulse--being in reality the climax of long reflection--was far from
being a transient ebullition of feeling. It was rooted in her will; and
Evarne's will, once fairly turned in any direction, was impervious to
conflicting influences.
In the unnaturally exalted state to which her highly-strung nervous
system had now lifted her, it would have seemed a mere nothing to
have walked into an arena of wild beasts for the sake of the man
she loved--easy to have flung herself upon swords to give him
happiness--yea, she would unhesitatingly have followed him to hell
itself had he beckoned. Are those amid mankind who never knew the
"madness" of Eros to be pitied or envied?
CHAPTER VII
ROSES AND RAPTURES
In a time of fair summer, amid varied scenes of beauty, the next phase
of Evarne's life glided past--vivid, brilliantly happy--as devoid of
apprehension or sense of finality as is the dream of a lotus-eater. As
the spring advanced, and Naples became over-sultry for those reared in
northern climes, Morris took her to cooler regions. Together they
wandered through Switzerland and the Austrian Tyrol, and only with the
approach of the winter season were they again in residence at "Mon
Bijou."
With the ensuing spring, Morris's restless spirit once more asserted
itself, and the summer saw them in London. There he held a social
position which led him into circles where no man can introduce a woman
who occupies the position Evarne now held. But he saw that plenty of
diversions and gaieties of one kind and another came her way. She was
still interested in her Art, and, happy in love given and returned, she
wasted no sighs over those society gatherings from which she was forever
strictly tabooed.
Morris studied appearances to the extent of paying an occasional brief
visit to Mrs. Kenyon at their country home; in the autumn, too, he
sometimes left Evarne to her own devices in the flat wherein she was
mistress, while he joined shooting parties at various country houses.
But at the first breath of winter he was quite ready to be coaxed back
to the girl's little Paradise on earth, "Mon Bijou."
On their settling down once more at Naples, she was again seen at
Florelli's, bent on making up for lost time. Her artistic studies had
been of necessity but intermittent. In Morris she beheld her paramount
duty; he had been as ardent and jealous as any young lover, lamenting
and grudging every minute that Art took her from his service. He laughed
at the persistence with which she continued to snatch stray hours for
drawing. Her future was his care now, he insisted. He hated to think of
those soft, brown eyes squandering their beams upon inanimate objects.
Why did she want to waste any of the precious hours of her glorious
youth shut up in a crowded, overheated studio, that stank of paint and
turpentine and microbes and humanity?
But Evarne had not entirely abandoned the study of Philosophy for that
of Love. She told him, with fascinating seriousness, that in order to
maintain the mental balance that was described as "Happiness," it was
necessary to both cultivate and provide an outlet for the intellectual
faculties, as well as for those impulses that were revelling with such
joyous abandon amid "the roses and raptures of vice."
Thus she was sadly disappointed when, within a fortnight of settling
down once more seriously to work, Morris announced that he was going to
Paris for a week or two, and of course expected her to accompany him.
She had just arrived at one of those stages, so delightful to pass
through in any study, when a distinct advance in power is felt. The
close of each day's efforts left her with the exhilarating feeling of
having surpassed herself--of having successfully overstepped her
previous highest limit. To abandon her work at this crisis was the last
thing she desired.
"Morris, dearest," she pouted in sudden protest, "why do we wander about
so very much? It is so delightful here."
"But I must go to Paris now. I have business."
"I thought you never had to do anything you didn't want to? Anyway,
dearie, couldn't you live without me for a fortnight? I know how it will
be! If you have got me with you we shall end up by roaming all through
the winter, but if I am here at 'Mon Bijou,' waiting for you--why, then,
you will return quickly."
Morris protested, but in the end Evarne for once took her own way. It
was quite unusual for her not immediately and unhesitatingly to set
aside her own wishes should they chance to conflict with those of her
lover; on the other hand, Morris always duly consulted her respecting
the plans and arrangements of their mutual life, and had never realised
how entirely it was his will alone that controlled their movements. Now
his vanity was wounded--not so much that she should question his
arrangements, as that the form the opposition took should actually imply
her willingness to bear a separation. It was something fresh and strange
in his wide experience, and--to his way of thinking--far from
flattering! What he always expected was the necessity of soothing
jealous fears and apprehensions arising from periods of absence of his
own making.
Thus he went off with a feeling of displeasure against Evarne that was
new. He did not comprehend that it was the very knowledge of the
strength of her own affection that enabled her to see him leave the arc
of her personal magnetism and influence without feeling any anxiety. In
London she had been forced to spend days alone while he was in the
company of others--women, high-born, beautiful, no doubt--yet she had
never feared for his loyalty. Sweet, blind trust!
* * * * *
Shortly after his return from Paris, Morris showed that he had no
intention of spending the whole of the winter and spring at Naples, as
he had done during the two previous years.
"I've got a bright idea," he announced one evening. "Let us spend the
winter in Egypt, voyaging up the Nile with a party of our gayest,
jolliest pals. What say you, Evarne? I know of a dahabeah, built for
private use, that has lost its income, I suppose, for now it's willing
to let itself out on hire. I wrote concerning it, and here's the answer,
together with any number of photographs, both of its personal appearance
and its internal regions."
He passed over a pile of papers, which the girl studied with keen
interest. Morris, Naples and the studio was a triple combination that it
had seemed impossible to improve upon; nevertheless, Morris, Egypt and a
gay, bright party formed a decidedly alluring prospect if an alternate
programme for the winter months was not to be avoided.
"Now, whom would you like to invite? We must resign ourselves beforehand
to the idea that it will probably be the grand finale of our
acquaintance with all whom we honour by our choice. The best of friends
invariably quarrel on long voyages."
"You and I will set them such an example that concord and harmony will
reign supreme, won't we? _Absit omen._"
"I really think we may defy Fate on that point, little sweetheart. Now,
to business! We can have eight besides our charming selves. Let's ask
the Varesios--see what they gain by being able to speak English. Then
there are those rowdy Philmers from London--that's four. Then
Giuseppe--he'll keep us lively too; he's like a jolly English boy, isn't
he? Not too overwhelmingly polite. Then there's Tom Talling--we must
have some more women, mustn't we?"
"I think equal numbers are best."
"Oh, wise young judge! Well, look here, we can transport Talling to
heaven as well as Egypt if we like to give him permission to invite that
little French girl he's so mad over--Justine Feronnier, she's called.
She's a quiet, demure little minx, with curious, flaxen hair. She looks
down the side of her nose all the time, as if she had just come out of a
convent school. I'm sure you can't dislike her, and I should be glad to
do Tom a good turn. Do you mind?"
"Not a bit. Who else?"
"Um-m-m, who? Good gracious, I was forgetting Tony Belmont."
"The man you were with so much in Paris last month?"
"That's it. He must come, and we will tell him to bring Lucinda."
"Is Lucinda another little minx, like Tom's friend?"
"Well, she chooses to describe herself as Mrs. Belmont, and it wouldn't
be kind to show undue curiosity concerning the date and place of the
wedding ceremony. We've settled upon one too many, haven't we? But
Guiseppe is well accustomed to being tucked in as a sort of makeweight,
so I declare this parliament prorogued."
"Tell me, what is the dahabeah called?"
"'The Waterfowl' at present, but that's only fit for a houseboat on the
Thames. I shall rechristen her 'Evarne the Beautiful,'" and Morris
smiled indulgently.
But the girl shook her head, declaring with a touch of coquettish
self-confidence that she could not consent to such a name being chosen.
One Evarne the Beautiful was quite enough to occupy all his thoughts.
"Then, Lady Vanity, you must exercise your own ingenuity," he answered,
and after a moment's solemn hesitation over the rival merits of "The
River Queen" and "The Radiant Isis," Evarne decided on the latter name
as more appropriate to a craft destined to breast the waters of Old
Nile.
Each desired guest accepted the invitation with flattering alacrity, and
ere long "The Radiant Isis" was fairly off upon her voyage up the great
river of the land of the Pharaohs.
CHAPTER VIII
LUCINDA BELMONT
All the guests were quite well known to their young hostess with the
exception of Mdlle. Feronnier and Tony and Lucinda Belmont. As Morris
had said, there was little, so far as the average observer could
discern, either to like or to dislike in the quiet, flaxen-haired,
little French girl. Lucinda Belmont, on the contrary, possessed a
distinct and striking personality. Erect in carriage, and bearing
herself with an air of unassailable self-confidence--with a full bust,
and a waist so disproportionately tiny that Evarne surveyed it with
mingled scorn and wonder--she was unmistakably what is popularly meant
by "a fine woman." Her big eyes, fringed by long, black lashes, were the
tiniest bit protruding, whereby they were enabled to roll up and down
and round about in wondrous glances, languishing or flashing, according
to the requirements of the occasion. Her features were ordinary, yet her
vivacity, her animation, together with her carefully chosen costumes,
her elaborate coiffure, and the brilliance given by a most discreet and
effective use of paint and powder, transformed her into a woman who
excited appreciative attention from most men.
Despite her now considerable store of worldly wisdom, Evarne had not
got rid of a somewhat unwise confidence in humanity. Tennyson tells
how Vivian was able to see evil of one sort or another in the most
noble of characters through the simple method of "imputing her own
vileness" to the thoughts, the deeds, the motives of others. In the
same manner did Evarne instinctively credit everyone with her own
loyalty and honour. Assuredly Justine Feronnier and Lucinda were both
unusually striking representatives of the female sex as far as
appearance went. But the French girl was understood to belong to Tom
Talling, and Lucinda--politely described as Mrs. Belmont--had the
legitimate owner of that surname in attendance upon her, so Evarne
experienced no unpleasant anxiety in beholding the attractive flaxen
demureness of the one, or the flashing brunette brilliance of the other.
* * * * *
The long days devoted to the uneventful journey of "The Radiant Isis"
through the flat reaches of the lower Nile were relieved from monotony
by the spirit of mirth that possessed all aboard. Morris had indeed
chosen his companions with discrimination, if frivolity and constant
laughter were what he sought.
Of course each individual was provided with that hallmark of the
traveller in the East, a hand-camera, and the results of the snap-shots
of these amateur photographers caused many a shriek of laughter. Morris,
Guiseppe and Signor Varesio had all brought their foils. But neither
Italian had much chance against Morris, who was quite a champion in this
art, to which he owed much of that slim, youthful-looking figure that
was his pride. Then there were games, dances, visits from Arab
entertainers, fantasias by the crew--all serving to make time pass
delightfully.
Yet, slowly but surely, unhappiness crept in. The whole trouble had root
in the resolute transference of Tony Belmont's ardent attentions from
Lucinda to the altogether unappreciative Evarne. She found him always by
her side, even when it must have been obvious to the meanest
intelligence that she and Morris were more than contented alone. At
first she bore his society with outward patience, but soon there came an
irritated dislike to this destroyer of so many pleasant _tête-à-têtes_
between herself and the man who still ruled her entire heart.
Besides, there was the deserted, disconsolate, sulky Lucinda to worry
about, and since neither Evarne's snubs nor hints, or even actual
commands, could drive Tony back to his neglected privileges, it became
obviously Morris's duty as host to do his best to prevent the forsaken
one from feeling too overwhelmingly lonely. So it came gradually to
pass, to Evarne's dismay, that Morris spent most of his time by Mrs.
Belmont.
The girl felt herself so helpless; in the privacy of their cabin Morris
always answered her loving complaints so gently and affectionately,
deploring the fact but insisting on its necessity and its temporary
nature, that she sought at first to be trustful and comforted. But the
time came when she could no longer refuse to see that her lover was, in
sooth, fully satisfied with the present state of affairs, and desired no
other.
Then the days grew full of anguish to the girl. Justine alone noticed
aught amiss, and showed a desire to advise as how best to cope with the
situation. But Evarne could not bring herself to actually acknowledge
that here she was suddenly plunged into a vulgar struggle with another
woman--and one so coarse, ignorant and inferior to herself--for the
possession of a man.
Instead, all that her youthful wisdom prompted was to strive to arouse
jealous doubts and fears in Morris's breast. So, for a weary, dreary day
or two she was bewilderingly responsive to Tony's dull talk and banal
and often over-bold compliments. But all she gained, as her laugh rang
out gay and bright enough to rivet attention, was an indulgent smile
from Morris, and the irritating remark from Lucinda--
"How splendidly you two do get on together! And I'll warrant all your
little jokes are secret, so that Mr. Kenyon and I must be resigned to be
left out in the cold."
CHAPTER IX
HOW EGYPT WAS RUINED FOR EVARNE
At length the dahabeah drew up by the wharf of Luxor. From the beginning
of the cruise the arrival at this world-famed spot had been eagerly
anticipated, and on the very first morning the travellers gaily mounted
donkeys and set forth on the short journey to the ruined Temples of
Karnak. The spirited animals that they rode--so very different from the
poor little European drudges that go by the same name--covered the
ground with celerity, the dusky donkey-boys running hard behind, keeping
up with difficulty, yet shouting and flourishing their sticks, to urge
on any of the fiery mounts that showed signs of a failing lack of
ambition to be foremost in the race.
On arriving at Karnak, loud was the expression of amazement at the
extent of country over which was spread the ruins of this vast
collection of temples, with their halls, their courts, their huge
entrances, their obelisks, columns and statues.
"I believe really it would be quite possible that one should lose one's
self hopelessly amid all these ruins," declared little Justine, her pale
face still flushed from the fun of the amusing gallop.
The only dismal countenance in the party was that of Hassan, their
dragoman. This gorgeous and most self-satisfied personage was always
rather inclined to sulk when expeditions were in progress. He then
looked upon his lot as that of a much injured individual. Morris knew
Egypt well, and his interesting talks on the topic had made the old
history and religion intensely attractive to Evarne before and during
the voyage. He now very rightly considered himself a far more
interesting cicerone than the verbosely ignorant Arab. He therefore
restricted Hassan to the mere business details, while he himself
undertook the task of conducting his guests, of enlightening their
ignorance and training their taste.
As time passed and the day grew in heat, luncheon became the next item
on the programme, and at this point Hassan, coming into a portion of his
kingdom again, brightened perceptibly. He carefully spread out the
dainty meal in the shadow cast by a great wall, whereon sculptured
pictorial records of the war-triumphs of a Pharaoh dead for thousands of
years still preserved his royal memory green to posterity. Then, seating
the company, the dragoman waited upon them with satisfied importance.
After all had recruited their strength for the afternoon's further
exploration, Morris suggested that they should mount the sandy slope and
stone steps that led to the summit of the pylon--the great gate that
formed the entrance to the whole of the ruins. The view thus obtained
was wonderful, he assured them; the sun was not too hot to defy the
shelter provided by veils and parasols, while any cool breezes that
might chance to be wandering around would be more easily found at a
height. Thus encouraged, everyone started with such energy up the long,
severe slope, that within a very few minutes a halt had to be called,
while all stood and panted breathlessly.
"More haste, less speed," declared Morris. "Now, Mrs. Belmont, you and I
will play tortoise to their hare, and we will just see who gets to the
top first." And, proffering his arm as a support to Lucinda, he
encouraged her to persevere.
Tony, who had been sitting cross-legged on the sand, sprang to his feet,
and with a sweeping bow offered Evarne a similar attention. She accepted
it with a smile, and in due course the summit was attained.
Certainly it was worth the trouble. In the background, against
the vividly blue sweep of lofty skies, appeared the sharp and
clearly-defined outline of the arid, rose-tinted hills, concealed amid
whose rocky recesses lay the tombs of the Pharaohs of bygone days. In
the mid-distance the wide Nile--here dignified and placid, untroubled by
dams, reservoirs or cataracts--flowed calmly and gently, cool even to
behold.
Between the water and the temple the eye roved over pastures, carefully
cultivated, often of a most vivid emerald, broken by clusters of lofty,
feathery palm-trees. In the fields and on the pale dusty roads were
Arabs, their many-hued garments adding to the rich brightness of the
scene, yet without rendering it at all _voyante_. Over all was the
glamour of a dancing haze of golden sunlight.
Near to the pylon, the Old and the New appeared in close conjunction. To
the left lay a temple, ruinous yet still massive, and another pylon, far
older than the Christian religion, but still almost uninjured by its
vast weight of years. Nearer still stretched a wide avenue bordered on
either hand by rows of huge ram-headed sphinxes.
To the right of these great works of times long past, lay a tiny
poverty-stricken Arab village. It stood in the midst of a thin grove of
palms, and was then encircled by an irregular wall of mud bricks. The
small houses, also of dried mud, had, for the most part, been erected by
their provident builders around the trunks of palm-trees, which helped
support the huts, and gave some degree of shelter from the fiery rays of
the broiling summer sun. The flat roofs were covered with piles of
sugar-cane, amid which played naked brown babies and small ragged
children. The terrifying half-savage dogs that defended the village and
all its belongings during the hours of night, now basked peacefully in
the mid-day warmth, or strolled around the top of the encircling wall.
The summit of the pylon itself, though fairly wide, was rough and steep.
Its height was great, and the extensive view accentuated the feeling of
loftiness. But Evarne's few years of "softness" and luxury had not
sufficed to entirely undo the effects of her early training. The
sensation of height had small effect upon her well-trained nerves, and
when she wished to gaze particularly into one special little courtyard
within the village, she walked boldly to the farther end and edge of the
pylon.
As the party had neared the top their ears had been greeted by the sound
of numerous voices uplifted in unison; on gaining this point of vantage
the source of these cries could be seen.
Evidently death had visited the village that day, for the courtyard of
one of the largest of the small houses was filled with women wailing and
lamenting, while little knots of females were approaching with all speed
from the entire countryside. Clad in their shapeless and voluminous
black robes, with trailing ends leaving clouds of dust in their wake,
their heads veiled, their faces hidden in the yashmak, they formed a
strange, weird spectacle as they advanced, all uttering concerted cries
of mourning that grew louder as they neared the village in which the
dead man lay. The European witnesses of this phase of native life were
convinced that only the departure to another world of one of the male
half of humanity would have sufficed to create such a stir in the
surrounding district.
A band of mourners reached their goal. Their arrival was the signal for
the already assembled women of the village to wax yet more demonstrative
in their display of anguish. The long shuddering moans, the shrill
piercing cries, grew louder and more insistent, while dozens of lean
brown arms were raised in despairing appeal to heaven, then descended
with force upon head or face, and others of the mourners tore
frantically at the garments over their breasts.
"It's just as it is drawn on the ancient monuments, the very same; they
haven't changed a bit in all these thousands of years," cried Evarne.
She was far more thrilled by this illustration of the realism of
Egyptian art and of this justification for that romantic term--The
Unchanging East--than moved to sorrow by the conventional mourning of
the many wailers.
Evidently the news had spread widely. From all directions black figures
bore down upon the village, sometimes in groups of six or eight,
sometimes in bodies of thirty or more. Each one on her arrival passed
into the low hut wherein the corpse lay, then came out after a minute or
so to add her quota to the increasing lamentation for the dead. This
business of mourning was clearly still the prerogative of the female
sex. No men took any share in it--indeed, the only two existing in the
whole place, as far as could be seen, were squatting calmly in a
neighbouring yard, unconcernedly holding and milking a buffalo.
Evarne looked round for Morris. He stood just at the top of the slope,
Lucinda still clinging to his arm.
"Come along to where I am, Morris," the girl called out to him. "You can
see everything much better from here."
He made a movement as if to follow her suggestion, but Lucinda said
something in a low voice, whereupon he replied--
"Mrs. Belmont feels too giddy either to walk or to be left alone; but
don't you bother about us, my dear. We can really witness all the fun of
the fair quite nicely."
"That chap may have died of fever or smallpox, or goodness knows what,"
remarked Tony's voice by her ear. "With all these women trotting in to
have a last stare at the old boy--why, it's enough to infect the
neighbourhood, isn't it?"
To Evarne the Jealous the health of the whole countryside was as nothing
at that moment compared to the fact that when she had directly called
upon her lover to join her, Lucinda should have had the assurance to
promptly whisper a suggestion that he should remain where he was, and
that the wish of her rival should have sufficed to keep Morris from her
side.
She turned to Tony.
"Take my smelling-salts over to Mrs. Belmont," she said, opening her
hand-bag and producing the little crystal bottle with its jewelled
stopper. "Stay by her and look after her if she feels bad, won't you, so
that Mr. Kenyon may come here where it is easier to see?"
But a different remedy for overcoming the lady's attack of nausea had
already been prescribed. Supported by Morris's arm she had commenced to
descend from the height.
Evarne instinctively uttered a little exclamation.
"Let 'em go," suggested Tony. "We don't want to go down yet, do we, Miss
Stornway?"
Evarne glanced around at the remainder of her companions. Tom and
Justine were seated close together on a stone by her side, apparently as
rooted to the spot as ever Theseus and Pitheous could have been; the
others were grouped near at hand, all staring downwards with the keenest
interest.
Evarne was obliged to agree. Nature had been very neglectful in not
imbuing her with the art of scheming and contriving events to suit her
own purposes. True, she had now a daily object-lesson in the manoeuvres
of the adept Lucinda, and without being conscious thereof, her education
in this direction was in progress. However, she was still in the very
early stages, and could devise no method on the spur of the moment for
preventing this hateful division of the party.
She shook her head and pursed up her mouth discontentedly.
"It's very evident that no one else wishes to descend yet awhile," she
acknowledged. "Just ask Mr. Kenyon, then, where we shall find him when
we do return to earth."
Tony left her side, and as rapidly came back.
"It's arranged that we are to have tea at four o'clock on the same spot
where we lunched. Kenyon says let's meet there at that hour, and all
wander about anywhere we choose for the rest of the afternoon. If
there's anything particular we want to see again, Hassan knows the way
about. That's all right, isn't it?"
She nodded, but dared not trust herself to speak.
"Aren't we tired of this diversion?" cried Guiseppe, joining them a
couple of minutes later, his bright spirit having no inclination to
dwell long on aught connected with death.
"The others are not, but that is no reason why you should remain," she
answered rather eagerly. "Anyone who does not want another hour at least
up here is to go with Mr. Kenyon. Hurry up!"
She experienced a certain malicious delight in the idea that she had
thus counteracted Lucinda's trick, but her self-congratulation was but
short-lived. Guiseppe promptly returned to her side.
"Kenyon says Mrs. Belmont's head is too bad to stand my noisy chatter,"
he explained. "Noisy chatter, d'you hear, Tony, old boy? My noisy
chatter, forsooth! That to me, the most timid, retiring violet of the
whole lot of you," and he set to work to prove his words by causing the
very echoes to ring with his clear musical laughter.
Evarne clenched her hands, and a ferment of emotions tore her breast. Of
course she had known all along that Morris was perfectly capable of
procuring _solitude à deux_ in the face of any difficulties if such were
his wish. Now this proved it! It was his will, not his ingenuity, that
had failed, when subduing Tony's attentions to herself had been the
problem.
CHAPTER X
THE SHRINE OF SEKHET
At the hour appointed for tea they all headed their course towards the
site chosen for meals, and there, already seated on the rugs,
comfortably leaning against the wall, were Lucinda and her escort.
"Where have you been?" shouted Guiseppe. "You don't know what we've just
been learning, ignorant ones that you are. The columns in the great hall
are three thousand five hundred feet high, and----"
"No, no! three thousand five hundred years old," he was corrected.
"Oh, I retire crushed."
"You need a cup of tea to revive your failing mental powers. So do we
all." And ere long the spirit-stove boiled away merrily and the general
desire was gratified.
"You have indeed missed an interesting sight this afternoon," declared
Signora Varesio.
"My unfortunate giddiness!" sighed Lucinda plaintively.
"What have you seen to compensate for it?"
"Oh, we have been over to a little temple--most interesting. But I was
fated to receive shocks this afternoon. In it there is----"
"Don't tell," interposed Morris. "After tea we will take them all over
and let them make the discovery for themselves. It will delight you,
Evarne, I'm certain."
As he spoke he looked across at the girl with that tender smile that
always penetrated to her very heart. It could do much even now to heal
that dull ache that would make itself felt despite her belief in his
repeated assurances of the fixity of his affection towards her sweet
self, and her consequent faith that the affair with Lucinda was a mere
temporary flirtation. She tried hard to be reasonable, and so long as
she could think that Morris's earnest and serious love was still hers,
and that the attraction any other woman might have for him was merely
temporary, she felt that--although a degree of anxiety and apprehension
was inevitable--she ought to be able to look down from the superior
heights of constancy and make allowances for that dancing butterfly--a
man's fancy.
Still, this course of diplomacy--laid down by that most successful of
royal mistresses, Madame de Pompadour--is difficult and painful indeed
when the heart-happiness of the resident on the superior heights depends
wholly upon the vagaries of the butterfly. Moreover, Evarne's poor
little vanity was receiving a series of severe blows. For so long she
had been accustomed to being first and foremost in Morris's regard--to
seeing the society of all other women set aside, if at all possible, for
her own. Now, despite her combination of trust and philosophy, this new
state of affairs was a protracted anguish. She was resolutely brave
under it--perhaps too much so to be quite pleasing or flattering to
Morris. Even the deep-rooted hatred she bore Lucinda was almost entirely
hidden.
When the slight meal was ended and the moment came for once more setting
forth, Mrs. Belmont arose with a childishly pretty air of happy
importance. "Now I must be dragoman," she declared, and proceeded to
lead the way amid the ruined masses of stone and fallen columns. But she
was soon fain to confess that she could not remember the track, and
called upon Morris for aid.
Smiling, he took the lead. Poor Evarne! Life seemed to have become a
series of heart-squeezings. Her keen eye noted the smile that was
flashed upon Lucinda, and it appeared to her to be every whit as
indulgent and kindly--almost as caressing--as that which had hitherto
been reserved for herself alone.
It was necessary to cover quite a long distance over a plain besprinkled
not only with fallen stones, but with a long spiky growth that rendered
progress difficult.
"It is well worth this walk," declared Morris, joining her after a
while, "for what we are going to see is the most perfectly-preserved
temple in the whole of Karnak. It is very small, but one gets from it a
better idea of what these buildings must have looked like in their palmy
days than the larger ruins can show."
"Talking about 'perfectly preserved,' why didn't the old 'Gyps pickle
their 'corpsies' instead of bothering to stuff them?" demanded Tony.
"Don't be nasty," retorted Evarne curtly; and a few minutes later the
goal was reached.
"Now, go in one by one," suggested Morris, "and ladies, be prepared for
a shock."
Despite this warning, Evarne could hardly suppress a little cry as she,
in her turn, entered alone into the inner sanctuary of the tiny temple.
Its walls were completely decorated with richly coloured representations
of weird deities and worshipping mortals. There was no window, but the
rays of the sinking sun filtered in through a small opening in the roof.
The chamber was dim and gloomy, but the one square beam of light was
arranged to fall with concentrated force upon a solitary upstanding
statue in polished black basalt. It depicted a slender woman's form,
surmounted by a cat's head. So perfect was it in every detail, so
realistic, so full of quiet animation, that for a moment Evarne had
believed herself to be in the presence of something living and dreadful.
Almost immediately, of course, she realised her mistake, and knew it for
what it was--a representation of the ancient Egyptian goddess Sekhet.
Already that day the girl had stood in the middle of an open field--once
the site of a great temple, of which the ruins lay all about--and gazed
around the extensive circle of large, gleaming, black marble statues of
Sekhet that now alone remained to hint at the departed grandeur of this
vanished temple.
Evarne's brown eyes had grown graver, and all-unconsciously she had
sighed deeply as she stood amidst those numerous Sekhets seated beneath
the clear blue sky. They had struck strange awe to her heart, these
symbolic counterfeits of the goddess who presided over the most
powerful--the most eternal--forces in heaven and earth, Sekhet--goddess
both of Love and of Cruelty! Ah, they were a subtle people, those
ancient Egyptians, skilful in reading the heart of humanity, fearless of
the truth, defiant in stripping the gloss from life!
The light laughter and exclamations of her companions had jarred upon
Evarne's ear. She felt weighed down with an unreasoning reverence.
These solemn figures in the great ruined hall of the temple had
seemed instinct with a supernatural power. Battered by the passing of
much time, discredited for centuries as representing a great
divinity--objects but of curiosity and wonder to this age--they had yet
appealed to her as invested with the calm complacency of conscious
power. Serenely they sat, confidently awaiting at least the individual
recognition and homage of mankind. Strangely did they convey the idea
that theirs was the triumphant knowledge that, for so long as human
hearts can pulsate, for so long, too, Sekhet--the personification of
Love and Lust, and the suffering both bring--shall find her throne, her
shrine, her arena.
This figure that Evarne now stood before was not seated. Somewhat over
life-size it stood, stiffly erect, one foot advanced, the symbol of Life
held in its grasp. It was raised above the sand of the floor on a low
pedestal. Evarne stood motionless, gazing upwards. The battered figures
in the open had been impressive, but this one--uninjured, and with the
artificial advantage of its surroundings--was more than that! It was
terrible, awe-inspiring, with its inhuman head, the menacing feline
features bearing so clearly the impress of unpitying and vindictive
cruelty, malignant spite, merciless joy in the inflicting and witnessing
of the direst agonies that can rack tortured brain or flesh or spirit.
Evarne had been the last to enter, and as she rejoined her companions
outside, the party commenced to retrace its steps. Unperceived, she left
them and returned to the temple. She had something to say to Sekhet.
Alone she stood, facing the goddess--the lifeless marble into which the
hand of an artist, long since pulseless, had wrought this unhallowed
expression with such marvellous realism that it was difficult to
remember that no knowledge, no power, no fearsome intelligence, lay
behind those gleaming eyes, that low animal brow. Evarne stood
motionless, gazing intently up at the brutal face, trying to forget her
own individuality and all that was modern. It had been a little prayer
that was in her heart as she hastened back, but now she shook her head
slowly as the conception of the innate and unalterable cruelty of Sekhet
impressed itself with yet greater force upon her mind. This was a
goddess who surely had ever been more inclined to fulfil curses than to
answer prayers.
As she commenced her half-whispered appeal she recalled some of the
titles under which this cat-headed image had been invoked--doubtless
many a time and oft--in the dim and distant past. "Oh, Queen of the
Goddesses! Oh, Crusher of Hearts! If you can hear me and still wield
power, let just tribulation fall on all those who set forth to steal a
love that is not free for them--a love to which they have no right--a
love that is another's! May success but open the gates of sorrow; may
that which they desired and schemed to gain crush the heart, even in its
triumph, down to the very dust! Deal out stern justice, untempered by
all mercy, to the false, the scornful, the treacherous, the
hypocritical, to those who are unscrupulous and base in thy service, and
who cast aside all honour when in pursuit of that which thou dost
offer!"
Then she stood silent awhile, still gazing with fixed eyes at the
impassive countenance before her, monstrous, yet so strangely human. She
had not originally designed to send forth such a plea into the universe,
but it had arisen spontaneously from the depth of her soul, and she
would not have recalled one word.
Then she turned, and slowly, with strange reluctance proceeded to quit
this dim sanctuary. Still her mind was not relieved. Impulsively she
hastened back and stood close under the grim black statue.
"Sekhet," she whispered softly and rapidly, "help me--help me always.
Whatever be the price of your aid I will pay it ungrudgingly. Watch over
me; be ever near me. I cannot live without love. I do not shrink from
its suffering. Sekhet, at all costs, I am thy worshipper. Do not forsake
me. Do not forsake me ever."
At the throat of her gown were fastened a couple of crimson roses. They
drooped now after the long day, yet were still rich in perfume. These
she unclasped and laid on the yellow sand at the base of the statue.
Then, with a final glance around the little chamber--once well
accustomed to the sound of prayer, now but the relic of a dead
religion--she hurried away.
CHAPTER XI
A LOSING STRIFE
Evarne radiated with delight and relief when this Nile cruise came to an
end. She could not avoid the mortifying conviction that she had proved
herself very childish and incompetent in having allowed a state of
affairs so painful--let alone dangerous to herself and her future--to
have come to pass, and to continue. Lucinda, ignorant as a kitten on
Egyptology and all kindred subjects, had been wont to wax enthusiastic
over what she appeared to consider Evarne's quite superhuman fund of
knowledge and marvellous intelligence, as contrasted with her own
much-lamented but unconquerable silliness. Yet the girl guessed shrewdly
that had the situations been reversed, the frivolous, empty-headed
Lucinda, so given to harping on the topic of her own incompetence, would
have proved an infinitely more resourceful and successful tactician.
Delightful indeed was it to see the last of the Belmonts--both so
objectionable in their respective ways--and when she found herself once
again alone with Morris at "Mon Bijou," she was gay and light-hearted as
any child in her renewed happiness. Florelli's studio saw her not. She
devoted her whole time to Morris, as bright, appreciative and amusing a
little comrade as man could wish.
But, alack and alas! this sojourn in the oasis of contentment was
destined to be but brief. One morning, not long after their return, as
they sat at breakfast on the verandah, Bianca entered with the post. No
letters ever came for Evarne save bills, which she always passed
straight over to Morris; but this time her name appeared on the face of
a delicate pink envelope. On the back were the initials "L. B.,"
intertwined into a large and involved gold monogram.
The whole thing was highly perfumed, and its recipient sniffed with
exaggerated disdain even before she had opened the envelope and mastered
its contents. When she had done that she looked up in genuine
indignation as she murmured, "The impertinence of the woman!"
Morris, who had been watching her, now reached over for the letter, and
likewise perused the "impertinence." It apparently did not strike him in
the same light, for, as he laid it down, a meditative grunt of approval
accompanied the action.
"I think we will accept," he said.
"Oh no, no--impossible!" was Evarne's instantaneous and startled
response.
The letter that had created such emphatic difference of opinion ran as
follows:--
"DEAREST EVARNE (for so I always think of you),--Absence makes
the heart grow fonder, so they say, and I find it true that it
wasn't until the radiant time on 'The Radiant Isis' was over
that I realised how very attached I'd become to you, dear. I do
hope we shall mature our friendship begun under such delightful
auspices, so I am writing to ask you if you will become my guest
in Paris for some weeks. Do come, dear; I am so looking forward
to seeing you again.
"I'm well aware when I ask this that Mr. Kenyon is the fair
Evarne's devoted shadow, and I mustn't dare to enjoy the sweet
charm of the rose without its accompanying thorn (of course that
is quite between ourselves, dear); but Tony is writing to him,
for he has promised (dear fellow!) to take Mr. Kenyon off on
long masculine jaunts (and we won't inquire too deeply where
they go, will we, dear?) while you and I are enjoying the Paris
shops and other feminine frivolities in one another's society to
our heart's content.
"I am looking forward to a most enjoyable time, darling Evarne.
"Your affectionate friend,
"LUCINDA BELMONT.
"P.S.--We shall be both getting our new season's 'rigs-out,'
shan't we? I know of such a heavenly place for hats."
"Oh, indeed, I don't want to go! I should hate it. I can't bear either
Mr. or Mrs. Belmont," cried Evarne, after a silence long enough to show
only too plainly that Morris was not going to readily yield to her
desires in the matter.
On the contrary, he proceeded to argue. At her age she ought not to seek
to bury herself in the solitude of studios or a villa remote from the
centres of civilisation. She owed it to herself to be seen and admired.
She must go more amongst people, and the companionship of a
good-natured, clever woman of the world--such as was Mrs. Belmont--would
be of vast benefit to her in every way.
The girl retorted that she had no objection to the centres of
civilisation as such, nor to meeting as many of Morris's friends as he
wished, but that she would not visit Mrs. Belmont, with whom she had not
a taste or a thought in common; who was, in fact, a person entirely and
absolutely hateful in her eyes.
Her voice quite quivered with apprehensive distress, but when Morris
proceeded to speak on Lucinda's behalf, lauding her tact and worldly
knowledge, Evarne rose in indignant wrath.
If those were the qualities that were characteristic of Mrs. Belmont,
then, for her part, she hoped never to become tainted by their
possession. "But," she declared, "without being either as tactful, or as
wise, or as experienced as that middle-aged designing creature, I'm not
quite the abject fool she seems to take me for. She need not think that
her sickening show of affection towards me has ever deceived me one jot.
I put up with it and her in Egypt because I couldn't help myself, but
I'm not going to her house, and you can write and tell her so, for I
shan't even answer her hateful, hypocritical letter; so there!"
Having delivered herself of this ultimatum, she flung her serviette on
the table and swept away, heedlessly dragging over her chair with the
train of her morning gown. Morris gazed in amazement at her empty place.
It was the first serious clash of wills that had ever risen between the
girl and her lover. The dispute was ardent and protracted, but very soon
it became evident that both her coaxing and her resolutions were equally
vain when opposed to his wishes. While ostentatiously leaving her
perfect freedom of choice for herself, he was going to Paris!
So, with the utmost reluctance and a considerable sense of humiliation,
Evarne submitted as gracefully as might be. She could not bring herself
to so far cherish her dignity as to remain haughtily alone at "Mon
Bijou," knowing Morris to be once more within the range of the wiles and
allurements of a clever and unscrupulous _demi-mondaine_. Although she
believed that, up to the present, she still retained her sway upon his
affections, his own teachings led her not to place too confiding a
reliance upon the Joseph-like qualities of the most devoted of lovers.
Never before had she bade adieu to her beautiful brilliant room with
such a heavy heart. She stood in the doorway, gazing longingly around,
imprinting every corner, every contrast of colour, freshly upon her
memory. How happy she had been at "Mon Bijou"! How dear it all was to
her!
Both common-sense and diplomacy prompted her to greet Lucinda with
smiling, albeit somewhat stiff, cordiality, and she effectively
concealed her scorn when her hostess, gushingly embracing her, put her
face close up to hers and made a hasty little smacking sound into the
air, first on one side, then on the other--Lucinda's only conception of
how to kiss another woman.
Morris had given Evarne a cheque-book, and opened a generous account for
her at his bank, and for the first few days the programme promised in
the invitation was carried out to the letter. He and Tony did, in fact,
derive whatever satisfaction and benefit was to be gained from one
another's society, while their female belongings amused themselves
together by shopping and such-like diversions. The girl could not but
acknowledge that Lucinda's vivacity and bright flow of talk were far
from unamusing, yet to recognise the efficiency of the weapons of one
whom she felt to be her remorseless foe did not at all ease her mind or
soften her reciprocal feelings of enmity.
Very soon the foreseen change came to pass.
"It's absolutely stupid to have nice men on hand if one is to see
nothing of them. One might just as well be a miserable Egyptian woman
right away," announced Lucinda, and none could contradict her words.
"It's too mean of me to bore dear Evarne by keeping her all to my dull
self," was her next statement. And so the divided expeditions of the
party ceased, and then it was not long ere the old miserable state of
affairs that had ruined the cruise of "The Radiant Isis" was again in
full swing.
But even this was not enough. Next came the suggestion that
_tête-à-tête_ expeditions were, after all, better. Lucinda was sure
that, as Evarne was so clever, and an artist too, she, of course, must
want to go round the galleries and see the statues and such-like things.
Lucinda herself was so very silly she couldn't appreciate old masters
one bit. Then she got such dreadful headaches in the close atmosphere.
It must be lovely to be strong just like a man, as dear Evarne was, but
for her part she got utterly exhausted in half an hour. Really, she must
reluctantly relinquish these delightful expeditions to dear Tony. Tony
had quite gone off his head lately; he had actually taken to trying to
improve his mind. She couldn't imagine why! As if dear Tony wasn't quite
clever enough as it was for a silly, frivolous little woman like
herself, who only cared for chiffons. Perhaps it was the beneficial
result of Evarne's society on board "The Radiant Isis." She only wished
she was half as clever as dear Evarne; cultivated women acquired such a
good influence over men--so much more powerful and lasting than silly,
frivolous creatures like herself could ever hope to gain.
Evarne hated her! Hated her for her gibes, her scarce-concealed mockery,
and, above all, she loathed her for the sarcastic flattery and
never-failing show of affection under which thin veil she sought to
cover her intention of stealing the girl's rich lover, if she could
encompass that act. It was a method that made retort difficult; and,
moreover, Evarne was under the disadvantage of still retaining her
over-sensitive self-respect. It was revolting to her to openly admit
that she was engaged in a vulgar struggle with another woman--and a
woman so far beneath herself--for the possession of a man.
Now she said simply and frankly that her interest in museums had always
depended entirely upon Morris's society, and that without him such
things did not appeal to her much. But, far from pleased by this
statement, he frowned darkly, spoke of neglected opportunities, and
discourtesy to her host. Finally he acknowledged that--relying upon her
being otherwise pleasantly occupied--he had arranged to take Mrs.
Belmont for some expeditions in a certain swift motor-car that only
accommodated two. Thus, short of creating a scene, the girl found
herself faced by the alternatives of remaining alone in the flat,
obviously sulking, or endeavouring to cover her defeat by accepting
Tony's eager escort and pretending to enjoy visiting the antiquities and
art treasures in the Louvre.
She had already implored Morris to leave Paris, but he had turned a deaf
ear to her appeal. Now, although she managed to smile at Tony and to
declare, gaily enough, her willingness to further encourage him in
improving his mind together with her own, she was torn by agony of
spirit at this new proof of her beloved's rapidly maturing infatuation
for her rival.
Nevertheless, it all had the advantage of preventing the final blow from
falling as a bolt from the blue. Nor was the hour far off.
CHAPTER XII
SEKHET, CRUSHER OF HEARTS
One morning, weary and depressed after a wakeful night, her
determination had faltered at the very moment of setting out on an
expedition with Tony as sole escort. With her foot actually on the step
of the carriage she had suddenly informed him, somewhat curtly, that he
really must amuse himself that day, returning and shutting herself in
her room, deaf to all expostulations.
Tony, decidedly chagrined, had loitered for a while in the lonely
flat--teased the dog--flirted with one of the maid-servants--and had
finally taken his departure.
Evarne sat on in solitude, alternately striving to read a novel and
freely permitting her tortured imagination to dwell on the vision of
Morris and Lucinda being whirled happily together through the fresh
country lanes.
A few hours later, hearing a footstep and the sound of the opening front
door, and wishing now to make peace with Tony before the others returned
and troubled her with "whys" and "wherefores," she went to the
drawing-room, prepared to be very sweet and amiable. But the footsteps
had not been those of her host. It was the motoring couple who had
returned thus early.
Lucinda, vivacious as usual, had already removed her hat and veil, and
was drawing off her long gloves. She worked industriously at the fingers
of one hand until she had drawn a loose end of the white kid forward
over each finger-tip then suddenly called upon Morris.
"I'm impatient. I can't tear these things off. You had better come to
the rescue."
Gathering up the already loose ends between his thumb and finger, Morris
took hold of her other hand also, and suddenly jerked both her arms
forcibly over his shoulders. As she unavoidably fell forward on his
breast he encircled her waist and kissed the laughing face so near to
his own.
"There's none like you, you damned little witch," he declared.
Evarne had not desired to be an eavesdropper, and had no thought of
concealing her presence now. She still held in her hand the book she had
been reading, and, with a sharp indrawing of her breath, announced her
presence by violently flinging the volume to the ground with a loud
bang.
Seeing her, Lucinda uttered a scream and fled. Morris remained without
moving, gazing at the girl with the utmost nonchalance.
"You've precipitated matters, Evarne," he said calmly.
Her first outburst of anger was directed against Lucinda.
"There's nothing in all this world that is more utterly despicable and
hateful and detestable, more altogether vile, than to pretend a
friendship for a woman in order to get chances to steal her lover!" she
cried, with sufficient energy to suggest that she was directing her
opinion through the closed door that Lucinda had banged after her in her
hurried flight.
"All's fair in love and war," retorted Morris.
"That's a lie," was the startlingly frank answer.
"Is it? Then what about you and Tony?"
"Tony Belmont? Be careful, Morris! What about us? That creature, seeing
something more to her taste in you, has flung her cast-off lover at my
head. He has played into her hands readily enough, and you have stood by
and seen it being done. How dare you then ask such a question?"
"Well, you may choose to look at it in that light, but the fact remains
unaltered and undeniable that Tony practically deserted Lucinda from the
time he first saw you, and you didn't care one jot what suffering it
caused that poor little woman."
"Poor defenceless little darling!"
The words were spoken with bitter sarcasm, while the fiery indignation
already surging within the girl's breast increased tenfold beneath this
amazing accusation--this unscrupulous falsifying of the truth. There was
a moment's silence, then her words rang out with passionate force--
"Oh, the arch hypocrisy! Liars, both of you--abject liars--trying to
make excuses for your own foul treachery! It's sickening! I shan't stay
another night--no, not another hour--beneath her roof."
"It is Tony's roof, and you had better remain."
"I won't, I won't! How can you even suggest such a thing? I can't
breathe the same air that she does. It's poisonous--contaminated!"
"Gently, gently; you'll be overheard."
"Rubbish! I don't care! I won't be gentle. What do you mean by defending
her? What is she to you?"
And the verbal refusal to be gentle was confirmed by a violent blow on
the table.
Morris, albeit decidedly surprised, answered with unruffled suavity. He
was quite willing to make allowances for this natural anger and show of
indignation; at the same time the wondrous patience the girl had
exhibited hitherto had given him little cause to anticipate the
tempestuous quality of her aroused wrath.
"Is your philosophy all culled from antique authors, sweet student? Have
you never found time to peep into Darwin and assimilate the doctrine of
the Survival of the Fittest?"
"What's that to do----?" she cried in bewilderment, not seeing at first
any connection between her question and this answer. Yet even as she
spoke came a sudden mental illumination of his meaning.
"Morris, you can't mean to say you really do prefer that vulgar,
coarse-minded, spiteful, abandoned creature to--to----Oh Heaven!"
She brushed her hair roughly back from her forehead, and stared at him
fixedly, her big eyes still full of incredulity. Then she uttered a
brief laugh of mingled bitterness and disdain.
"But there! From a man's point of view, I suppose the Fittest always and
only implies the Newest. Despicable wretches, the whole lot of you."
Morris, amused at this sweeping statement, smiled as he answered--
"But it's a little weakness that is no ways confined to mere man. It
isn't only to us that constancy spells boredom. It's all very well for
middle-aged women, who feel their power of pleasing on the wane, to
cling like limpets. We expect it, and it's one reason why wise men avoid
'em. It always means beastly rows in the long run. But, thank goodness,
at your time of life, my child, variety is charming, even to the fair
sex."
The latter portion of these sentiments fell unheeded--practically
unheard. All the girl's thoughts and senses were concentrated upon her
own agony of spirit. Fully grasping now, for the very first time, that
Morris's defection was serious and deliberate, all indignation and
resentment were swamped by a wave of wild grief and horror before which
all else broke down. When she could speak it was only in disjointed
sentences, in a voice that quivered under stress of emotion and
struggled with choking sobs.
"Oh, oh! Can I only bore you now by loving you? You can't mean that. Not
really and truly. I can't have lost your love so utterly. What have I
ever done? Oh, Morris, what have I done? I've never altered to you, and
I never would. I would always be faithful to you--always. Is it a curse
to have a faithful heart? I can't stop caring for you, because you tell
me to; how--how can I? Are you really altogether tired of me? I knew men
did get tired, easily, cruelly easily, but somehow----Perhaps if I'd
been different? Oh, I did try! I did, always! I did! But there, I've
been so utterly miserable lately, it's better really to know the truth
straight out at once. Tell me the truth, Morris."
"But you know it, my dear."
"Tell me, tell me!"
"Now what is the good of upsetting yourself like this? Come, come!"
"You're going to give that--that woman--my place! Oh! you'll be sorry.
She's only selfish and mercenary. She doesn't love you, and I do.
You--you don't care for that, though. Oh, how can you?"
Morris was feeling awkwardly uncomfortable. He took a flower from a
vase, and put it in his buttonhole before he spoke.
"I'm perfectly aware," he confessed at length, "that in the abstract
Lucinda is neither so handsome, so brilliant, nor so really delightful
as you are, but still--still----" He paused. "There, I'm not worth
bothering about, so dry your eyes."
By a powerful effort of self-command she managed to regain some degree
of composure, and to steady her voice. Quite quietly she repeated his
words, "not worth bothering about," then, after an interval, "Ah, me!"
The tender yearning tone in which this little exclamation came was
fraught with significance. After another moment's thought she approached
quite close to him, and rested the tips of her fingers upon his chest.
"I'm afraid you _are_ worth bothering about, my dear," she went on,
making a rather pitiful little attempt to hide her sick anxiety by
pretending to smile. Then, after a somewhat protracted pause, she spoke
again.
"I--I--there, why should I be ashamed to say it again, even now? I love
you still--oh, so much! I'm sure I shall always love you. I can't help
it. We can't arrange our feelings so that they shall always be
convenient and suitable. It was never really right that we should care
for one another at all, because--because of your wife, and I would
never--no never--have taken her place if you had even so much as hinted
that you might one day come to look upon it as something merely
temporary; something that could be lightly set aside as soon as you met
another woman whom you--liked a bit.
"No, don't speak, Morris! I haven't done yet. You know full well that
though I loved you, oh! so dearly, I never wanted to lead any other than
what I thought was a perfectly honourable life. You know you didn't win
me easily, in spite of everything being in your favour. You told me that
because you had made a mistake in your marriage you were lonely and
unhappy, and that, though you couldn't make me really your wife, our
union should be as lasting and sacred as any legal bond. It was to be
your true marriage. You're not treating me fairly now, dear, you're not
really. You ought to feel really more tied to me by honour and loyalty
than you would do even if I were indeed your wife, and had not lost my
good name for your sake. I've never been troublesome and jealous, you
can't say that, and when you found you were getting--well, seriously
attached to another woman, it's not a bit unreasonable of me to think
you ought to have avoided seeing her again. You owed it to me to be true
always--you did, indeed. You knew I was not like Mrs. Belmont, who
treats these ties so lightly. Come away now, darling--come away from
Paris. She can't really have won your heart yet--only your fancy, only
your passing fancy, Morris. You would soon forget her. Come away with
me, and we will be so happy together again, and honest and upright and
without any cause to be ashamed, either of us. Do come, darling--do,
do."
Her arms were tightly clasped around his neck, and her wistful, eager
face--the piteous brown eyes moist and beseeching--were close to his.
But beauty that has palled no longer possesses power. Sentimental
appeals to honour and loyalty were very troublesome; while the reference
to an imaginary link that was to be held binding upon him for evermore
was merely vexing.
"You're a good, sweet little soul," he said, rather testily, unclasping
her arms--"no one knows that better than I do--and I should have
supposed, therefore, that you would be the last to suggest that we
should continue our life together without mutual love. On the contrary,
a woman of your moral excellence ought not to be willing to consent to
such a proceeding. And, what's more, you mustn't blame me, you know.
Remember your own wise words, 'We can't arrange our feelings, our
affections, according to what would be, perhaps, the most conducive to a
quiet life.' We may all be but the sport of the gods, but let's go on
strike against taking part in any tragedies for the entertainment of the
higher powers. Let's insist on being merely comedians. We will say
good-bye smilingly, and thus snap our fingers at Fate."
Evarne twisted her hands together helplessly. She had much to say, so
much, but further speech was beyond her power.
Her throat swelled, she bit the inside of her lower lip pitilessly to
stay its quivering, but was scarcely conscious of the tears that poured
down her cheeks unheeded. After a minute's futile struggle to retain
some show of self-command, she moved away a step or two, sank into an
armchair, buried her face in the cushions, and sobbed without restraint.
A tumultuous medley of wild impassioned ideas surged within her brain,
incomplete thoughts, disconnected and rapidly cast aside. But, amid them
all, were none urging calm submission, dignified resignation. On the
contrary, all alike were directed on evolving some method of warding off
this unendurable blow--or, at least, since it had fallen, of nullifying
its effects.
The thing seemed so incredible, unreal, impossible, the end of all life.
She resolutely declined to admit that there was nothing whatsoever to be
done; she could not consent to allow all hope to leave her. And
yet--yet--immovable and grim, the bedrock underlying these wild surgings
of despised and deserted love, was the conviction that her richest store
of eloquence, the whole of her most intense and protracted efforts,
would prove powerless to alter the inevitable. Distracted, tortured, she
gasped between her sobs--
"I shall kill myself."
Morris was just in the act of stealing softly from the room. Looking
rather foolish, he turned sharply, and crossed over to her side.
"Tut, tut! You don't know what you're saying now, you're talking
wildly," he declared soothingly. "You really mustn't take things so to
heart. You'll make yourself quite ill. Go and lie down quietly, and I'll
send Bianca in to you with a cup of tea."
"You think I don't know what I'm saying, but I know that I'm not saying
half I feel," she declared truthfully enough. Then, after a moment's
further reflection, her momentary composure again gave way. "Oh, how
could you make me love you, only to treat me like this? It was cruel,
brutal! How can I bear it?"
Morris patted her shoulder encouragingly, but remained silent. He had
been through a few tempestuous scenes ere this, and knowing that a man
did not shine on such occasions, was resigned to looking and feeling
foolish while it lasted, devoting his efforts chiefly to getting the
_mauvais_ _quart d'heure_ over as quietly as possible. For this, his one
theory lay in the proverb, "Least said, soonest mended."
Evarne put out her hand and pushed him away.
"Don't do that--don't! You know you hate me now."
Again Morris smiled; women always went to such extremes.
"Bless you, not a bit of it! Why, I hope we are going to part the best
of friends," was his lightly spoken disavowal of this accusation.
"To part!" murmured Evarne, after him, monotonously--"to part!"
Then suddenly an inward voice seemed to commence repeating over and over
again, "There is nothing so dead as a dead love. There is nothing so
dead as a dead love. Nothing so dead, nothing, nothing!" It was
maddening. The unhesitating certainty--the calm conviction animating the
phrase--brought final despair. In it she heard a call, inspired by the
wisdom of ages, the outcome of the most bitter experience of long
generations of mankind; a call to abandon efforts that were predestined
to be sterile. It was as if she were abruptly faced by the inscription
that Dante read over the gateways of hell. Sitting erect, she lifted her
voice in lamentation.
"Oh, Morris, darling, you can't change so utterly. You're the same man.
I'm still the same woman. How many times did you swear you would love me
always and ever--always and ever--and now I'm only just twenty!" she
wailed, catching at his arm and pressing her cheek to his coat-sleeve,
while her sobs grew louder and more convulsive.
Morris, already wearied, felt a tiny twinge of compunction, and was
thereupon easily moved to anger by her impassioned weeping.
"For goodness' sake, Evarne, do let us have an end to this ridiculous
scene," he said roughly, shaking himself free from her despairing hold.
"Do recognise the fact that not all the pleading in the world will have
any effect on me. If you don't pull yourself together you'll have
hysterics in a moment, and I've no patience with hysterical women."
The action, the cruel words themselves, and the tone in which they were
uttered, combined to goad the girl to sudden wrath. She sprang to her
feet, and without a moment's hesitation frantically struck him on the
chest with her clenched fist.
"Don't think I shall ask anything of you now--no, not so much as your
patience," she cried. "I don't intend to plead with any man for his
love, least of all with you--don't think it! I never want to see you
again, never! Go to Mrs. Belmont--go and make her your mistress."
Morris allowed himself to be thoroughly angered by the blow.
"Thanks for the permission," he said curtly; "but it happens to be quite
unnecessary, as we have not waited for it."
He now anticipated being deluged beneath a torrent of words, but though
her lips parted, Evarne stood quite speechless, only blinking her eyes a
little, as if bewildered and dazed. Then she slowly retreated backwards
across the room step by step, until she was brought to a standstill by
reaching the china cabinet. Leaning against it, she turned her head from
side to side for a minute or two, then, producing a flimsy, ineffectual
little handkerchief, proceeded, with strange, unlooked-for composure, to
wipe her eyes and tear-stained cheeks.
"So now you see you may just as well be sensible and resigned, eh?"
suggested Morris, with forced carelessness.
Evarne made no sign of having heard, but continued her touching little
occupation. The protracted silence became embarrassing. Morris was
haunted by the fear that this apparently delightful calm must be but
ominous and deceptive.
"I'll make different arrangements by to-morrow," he continued at length,
in a business-like tone. "I can understand you don't care to be in the
same place. I ought not to have allowed it. I apologise."
Still silence. He was just about to speak again, when Evarne announced
in tones of quiet conviction, seemingly to herself, "I must get away
from this house at once--at once!" and walked towards the door as if
about to suit the action to the words without any delay.
But Morris hurried over to prevent the fulfilment of this impulse.
"Believe me," he assured her, retaining his grasp of the door-handle,
"there is some one who would rather that all the rest of us should slip
over the fourth dimension than have you undertake the _rôle_ of
vanishing lady. Darwin applies all round, remember, and to Tony's way of
thinking you are the fittest in all the world."
A dangerous gleam darted into the girl's eyes, and she stamped her foot
passionately.
"How dare you offer me such an insult? Haven't you done enough yet to
make yourself hateful to me? Have you no shame whatsoever? Be silent, I
tell you--be silent!"
He made a gesture of despair.
"Of all the unreasonable people! Now, why should listening to a simple
statement of facts cause you to get into such a temper?"
"Why?--why, indeed! You can't see; oh dear no, it's quite beyond your
comprehension, isn't it? Learn this, then: though you have made me a
more degraded creature than I ever before realised, you haven't killed
all my soul, neither shall you."
"Souls at this moment! Good gracious, my dear girl, I only wish I had
made you a bit more practical. But there, I fear you're utterly
incorrigible. Poor old Tony mayn't be quite your ideal knight, but do
try to realise that while sugar-icing forms a charming coating for a
cake, the cake is just as sustaining without it. Are you positively so
blinded by silly sentimentality as to be really incapable of seeing any
cause for congratulation in the lucky chance that has led him to take a
fancy to you? A good-hearted fellow with plenty of money. What more can
you want?"
Anger had found small place in the girl's breast while she was being
made to realise the dread truth that her lover was finally weary of her
and of her affection; nor had even lasting indignation awoken until he
taunted her with the display of bitter grief that this very knowledge
had evoked. When he thus persisted in what she could but deem the last
of insults--this determination to regard her only as a light toy, to be
tossed from one man to another--then the capacity for wild wrath that
she derived from her violent low-born mother, and a long line of
fiery-tempered maternal ancestors, showed itself in all its power.
Up to the present her own personal gentleness of spirit, aided by the
trend of her education, and the affection by which she had always been
encircled, had sufficed to keep even the girl herself in ignorance of
the capacity that lay dormant in her blood for feeling and displaying
wild fury. Now, in circumstances provocative of wrath such as had never
yet occurred in the whole range of her limited experience, she became
entirely her mother's daughter.
"If ever again I touch a farthing of such money may I fall down dead!"
she cried wildly. "That's my only answer. Oh! It's the devil gives money
to men of your stamp, so that you may with more certainty work out your
own damnation."
"Do not be melodramatic," implored Morris, giving each word its full
value to render it more impressive, while he shook his head, and screwed
up his face in superior disdain. "Of course----"
"I don't want--I refuse, absolutely refuse to hear anything more you've
got to say; so you may as well hold your tongue," interrupted Evarne
fiercely. "Get out of the way; stand aside from the door; let me get out
of this room."
But Morris did not move.
"Not so, you're far too excited. There's no knowing what you might do."
He made a great mistake in preventing her from finding the solitude she
instinctively sought. His words and presence were unendurably
exasperating at this juncture.
She sat down on a couch, and tapped the floor impatiently with the toe
of her velvet slipper.
Morris tried again.
"If you could only persuade yourself to look at the matter clearly--"
But he broke off abruptly. Evarne had merely raised her head and looked
at him, but that was all-sufficient. "It's evidently no use talking
sense to anyone so beside herself as you are now," he concluded lamely.
"No use, so let me pass."
She sprang to her feet, and came close to him. Her face was flushed,
while her eyes seemed to fairly blaze with passion; every breath she
drew was distinctly audible. It really spoke something for Morris's
strength of mind that he stood his ground.
"Not until you're calmer," he insisted.
Her lips set themselves into a firm line, and for a moment she appeared
to be contemplating the employment of physical force to gain her will,
but apparently she thought better of it, for, quite suddenly sweeping
over to the opposite side of the room, she turned her back on Morris and
leant both elbows on the mantelpiece.
"You know that Tony----" he recommenced, somewhat unwisely; then changed
his sentence: "If you would but believe that I am only considering your
best advantage----"
"Believe you?--never again Liar! Abject liar!"
Morris was thoroughly aroused.
"Now, look here, what do you suppose it matters to me what you do now?"
he demanded fiercely. "I could more than discharge all my obligations to
you by a final cheque, and I don't want any further show of ingratitude
if I give you also the benefit of my advice. I tell you, a young woman
of your personal charms needs not only money but a protector. However,
please yourself."
Evarne turned sharply, and again broke in upon him before the words were
well out of his mouth.
"Do you want to drive me mad?" she shouted. "I hate you, I loathe you, I
despise you! Oh, if some one would only protect me now from you, you
coward!"
The veins stood up on the man's temples.
"It's difficult to see why you persist in going on like a fool, and
trying to deceive me. I'm perfectly convinced that, whatever the price
demanded you will no more be found living without luxuries in the future
than you have in the past, so why indulge in these absurd airs and
graces of outraged virtue?"
For a moment everything whirled before Evarne's eyes; then, incapable of
remaining without action, she commenced to pace up and down the room. A
little table on which stood photograph frames, a vase of lilac, and
various similar knick-knacks, stood in her path. Without a moment's
hesitation she flung it aside, scattering the dainty ornaments in all
directions.
"It's foolish to be angry with you," said Morris, suddenly calming
himself. "You are clearly not responsible for what you do or say. You
must go to your room and lie down. Do you hear? I insist. It would serve
you right if I did leave you to your own devices entirely, but you are
so young and silly that for your father's sake I'm going to see your
future settled somehow, whether you say 'thank you' or not. Now come."
"Don't you dare to touch me!" screamed the girl. "You've no right now to
interfere with my life, and you shan't do it. How dare you speak of my
father, when you've so brutally betrayed his trust? You've lied, and
tricked, and ruined me. I suppose you can't help being so ignoble and
contemptible that loyalty and faith are only objects of derision to you;
but that you should be willing--anxious--to pass me on to a despicable
rake--not so vile as yourself, but still vile--that I shall never forget
and never forgive, and, if I can help it, God likewise shall never
forgive."
"What a ridiculous position to take up! Do you really expect to be ever
anything more than one upon a string of beads? You knew you hadn't been
otherwise with me, and you never will be now with any other man--so you
may as well make up your mind to it, and think yourself lucky if----"
The girl, distracted and infuriated, waited for no more. Snatching up a
silver statuette she hurled it with all her force at her betrayer's
head. Then for a time she knew nothing; all was a blank--devoid of
memory--of thought--of consciousness of action. Quite suddenly she
seemed to regain her senses--to awake to find herself alone--the carpet
covered with fragments of broken glass, streams of water, disordered
flowers, books, scattered ornaments, while she herself was throwing
madly, fiercely, everything on which she could lay hands, smash against
the closed door by which Morris had been standing.
CHAPTER XIII
OUT OF THE GILDED CAGE
Instantly subdued by amazement, she stared aghast at the surrounding
destruction. At the dread realisation that she was beholding the work of
her own hands, a shrinking horror--a terrible fear of herself--filled
her breast. Why, in very sooth, this looked like the doings of a
madwoman, and she had known nothing of what she was about. What could it
portend? Trembling violently, she leant against the wall, scarcely able
to stand, her hands pressing her cheeks, her eyes dilated and glancing
around as if in apprehension.
How blessed just at that moment would have been the care of her
mother--or, indeed, of any tender woman. But she was quite alone--or
worse than that, surrounded only by those who had reduced her to this
state, and by servants filled with curiosity.
After an interval of quietness the door was cautiously opened a trifle,
a head was popped in and rapidly withdrawn. Evarne had not time to
notice to whom it belonged, but she immediately regained sufficient
strength to walk across the room. She could not endure to be thus made
into a spectacle, neither could she longer gaze upon this dire material
destruction that typified, only too cruelly, the fate that had befallen
her love, her happiness and her future.
As she opened the door and appeared on the threshold, there was a
general sense of rustling, of rapid footsteps, of stifled exclamations
in the corridor and the surrounding rooms, as various figures hastened
to efface themselves. But the girl, heeding nothing, made directly for
her own apartment and securely locked herself therein.
Then, after a moment's reflection on what had passed that hour, she
again collapsed beneath alternate transports of anger and heart-tearing
grief. Now she would be sweeping wildly to and fro, with clenched fists
and hurried strides, her body swaying and shaking as she walked; next,
exhausted, flinging herself upon bed or floor, torn with sobs, drowned
by tears, only to spring to her feet again as stress of anguish goaded
her to action.
Her feelings towards Morris were variable as the wind. At times the
memory of his brutal insults, his treachery and faithlessness, were
uppermost in her thoughts; then she felt for him only the most intense
and passionate hatred, bitterly grudging every hour of happiness to
which she had contributed in the past; praying wildly that the future
might hold for him agony of spirit equal to that into which he had so
ruthlessly plunged her. Then, again, a flood of her old devotion would
rise above all else. "Morris, Morris, come back to me! Oh, my darling,
my darling, how can I live without you?" was her sobbing appeal; but
there was none to answer.
For the most part she sorrowed in silence. She was aware that whispered
conversations were in progress outside her door, and more than once the
handle was turned cautiously. Later in the afternoon, Bianca, who was
genuinely attached to her beautiful young mistress, ventured to tap
again and again, at the same time imploring, in a tremulous voice, to be
allowed to do something--anything. But Evarne turned a deaf ear to all.
Time passed, and the first violence of her emotion burned itself out.
Then she became conscious that she felt sick and ill, and that her head
ached to distraction. Letting down her thick black hair, she threw
herself once again upon her tumbled bed, and made a first serious and
protracted effort to remain absolutely quiet and calm. Long she lay
there, staring at vacancy, sighing piteously at intervals, until as the
evening twilight crept into the room, the lids drooped over the wild
eyes and the exhausted girl sank into slumber.
When she awoke, it was night. The room was shrouded in darkness, and
perfect silence reigned. As recollection returned she despairingly
pressed her hands to her head, but firmly forbade any further lapse from
self-control. The determination she had arrived at during the weary time
she had lain passive before falling asleep was now to be put into
action. When the traitors who were beneath that roof awoke in the
morning, they should find their victim gone. She shrank from again
meeting either of the Belmonts; Morris it was better she should not see.
One of the trains that left Paris in the grey of the morning should bear
her away--far beyond the reach of these, her enemies.
Her thoughts turned towards London. She was not exactly a feminine Dick
Whittington; at the same time the great metropolis certainly seemed to
offer the greatest hope for one who had her own way to make.
Flashing on the light, she looked at her watch. It was a quarter-past
three. She rose up, and drawing the curtains over the windows, set about
packing the few things it was imperative she should take. At first she
seemed to possess neither bag nor box of a suitable size, and, gazing
helplessly around the room, realised how weak and nervous, and, above
all, how curiously dull and stupid, she was feeling. With an impatient
effort she pulled herself together, and concentrated all her wits upon
this question of a box. Finally, she thought of her dressing-bag. By
removing most of the fittings she was able to crush into it all she had
sorted out to pack.
Then, slipping off the embroidered muslin morning-gown she still wore,
she sought for her plainest and most serviceable outdoor costume.
Evarne's taste in dress in no ways inclined to simplicity. She gloried
in frills and furbelows, dainty details, falling lace and fashionably
cut skirts. Even her tailor-built gowns were not really severe. The fact
that a brown face-cloth was made with a short skirt prompted her choice.
It was elaborately stitched and strapped, but demure in tone, its only
contrasting colour being a touch of delicate rose-pink--chosen by Morris
himself to match the exquisite tint of her cheeks.
She took no ornaments, but drew from a corner in her jewel-box a small
enamel watch, the last gift of her father. With a stifled sigh she wound
it up, and, shaking it a little to make it recommence its long-abandoned
duties, pinned it on her dress, while she laid the yet tinier bejewelled
toy that had superseded it back into the case.
She would scornfully leave behind every ornament that had belonged to
brighter days; Morris would find them all and perhaps be a bit sorry!
But money she must have, and she looked anxiously into her purse. It
contained but a couple of napoleons and some silver. There were four
more gold pieces in her desk; her velvet bag with the turquoises
contained only two. The embroidered bag, bought to match her latest
green costume, contributed three, while a few stray francs lay on the
dressing-table. She gathered them all into her lap and counted them.
Only a little over twelve napoleons altogether. It was alarmingly
little, but it would have to suffice. This done, she again studied the
hour. It was not yet four. She had no idea when the earliest train set
out, but felt convinced that it could not start so matutinally.
It was nearly sixteen hours since she had last tasted food, but she was
not at all conscious of hunger. She was in a strangely numbed state of
mind. Beyond an impatience to be once fairly off, she seemed unable to
care for aught else. Nothing mattered! Nothing ever could matter now!
Still, the sight of a plate of fruit reminded her of her long fast, and
she half-peeled a banana, but even as she raised it to her lips, a
sudden repugnance at the idea of eating anything further beneath this
roof, caused her to put it down untasted.
Ready even to her hat and gloves, she sank into an armchair to wait an
hour or so before venturing forth. Not until she sat there, gazing with
half-unseeing eyes around the delicate room, did she begin to grasp the
full significance of the complete change that had so suddenly taken
place in her circumstances.
Not only was her path in life to lie apart from Morris Kenyon's for
evermore, but she was abruptly and unexpectedly plunged into the direst
poverty. She had no hope, even remotely, of a reconciliation with her
onetime lover, but she felt curiously calm and indifferent now. Then,
although she knew well enough that poverty, with all its shifts,
deprivations and unpleasantnesses would be hateful to her--she could not
feel really concerned at the prospect. Nothing mattered--nothing ever
could matter again! Everything was finished!
She was without the least idea of what she could possibly do to earn an
honest livelihood. As far as went that capacity, she was every whit as
ill-placed as when her father died. True, she had been studying art,
more or less seriously, for the last three years, but no one knew better
than herself how futile would be any attempt to earn money by this
means.
What then? The effort to think was painful. What had come over her?
Somehow she seemed incapable of even remembering trades or professions,
to see if she could not manage to fulfil the necessary qualifications.
What did other young women do? Oh! of course, they were governesses, or
children's nurses, or companions to invalids or old ladies, or--or--that
sort of thing! But posts such as these surely required some capacity,
and above all, a good reputation. She was, then, in truth, worse off
than when she had first left Heatherington with Morris, so confident, so
full of hopes for the future.
What were girls allowed to do without their miserable past existences
being scrutinised? How about telephone girls and those who served in
shops of one sort and another, those who were attendants in restaurants?
Those who--who--well! She couldn't think of anything else just then; but
there was clearly quite a choice of honest ways of grubbing up a
livelihood--if one must live at all! Without exception, all appeared
absolutely hateful. Viewed in anticipation, it seemed as if she might as
well be dead at once, as devote all the days of one week to earning just
enough to keep herself alive the next week, so that she might work
through that, in order to be able to live the next seven days, and so
on, and so on, with cheap clothes, poor food, scarce and low-class
diversions, until old age overtook her--and then--what?
She passed through a moment of positive fear and repulsion, and
instinctively her thoughts turned to Tony. After all, was she not
rushing into a battle in which she must fall conquered. She could please
men--that she knew well--but could she do anything else in life? She was
so accustomed to wealth and ease and comfort now. What could she do
without it? Would the time ever come when she would despairingly view
this hour, when she wilfully abandoned what certainly appeared the
flowery track through life, with its luxury, elegance, leisure for
higher pursuits, its surroundings of grace and beauty that she
appreciated so fully, and that only money--ill-gotten or otherwise--can
procure?
But the pride and purity of the spirit forbade any real faltering in her
resolve. Thousands of other girls lived--contentedly enough she hoped
and supposed--upon the market value of their poor little capacities.
Upon what grounds was she to be held different? Young and strong, why
should not she work as well as others? She felt she ought to be ashamed
of herself.
She shut her eyes so that she should no longer see the tempting wealth
and elegance she was abandoning. Coloured spirals seemed to whirl in the
darkness, and the ensuing giddiness reminded her of her smelling-salts.
She slipped the bottle into her hand-bag, then resolved not to sit down
again, but to go. She had never before taken a railway journey alone,
and must allow ample time for contingencies. It was getting on for five
o'clock. The time was ripe.
She crept from her room, and very softly, with many a pause to listen,
proceeded to unfasten all hindering chains and locks. But no sound was
heard within the sleeping flat, and undisturbed she gained the outer
air.
Morris lay wrapped in slumber, all unconscious that the child he had
received at her dying father's hands, innocent and wholly dependent on
his honour, was now stealing forth homeless into the chill morning,
broken-hearted, with a sullied story, and but a few pounds between
herself and utter destitution. Nor, had he known, would it have caused
him any serious pangs of remorse. The pride of spirit, the refinement of
sentiment, that forbade her to take away any of the valuable gifts he
had lavished upon her, was totally beyond his comprehension. He could
see that it was a pretty enough conceit in theory, perchance, but such a
piece of high-faluting foolishness put into practice was, to his mind,
quite sufficient to deprive her of the sympathy of all rational beings.
In some peculiar manner the fact that any immediate pecuniary
difficulties would be entirely of her own making, was in his mind
all-sufficient to absolve him from entire blame in the whole affair.
It was a quarter to six when Evarne arrived at the Gare St. Lazare, and
learned that the first train for Dieppe started in five minutes.
Hurrying to the booking-office, she ordered a first single, then
contradicted herself, asking for a second-class ticket. It was so
difficult to have to remember to economise.
The slow train, stopping at every station, took six hours to cover the
ground, but Evarne felt no impatience. The steamer did not leave until
half-past one, and until then one place was as satisfactory as any
other. Indeed, it was even restful to sit quietly in a corner, and not
have to force her numbed brain to think and plan.
About nine o'clock the train stopped at a station, where she bought a
cup of coffee and a roll. As she sipped and nibbled she reflected that
at a corresponding hour on the previous morning she had eaten just such
another little _premier déjeuner_. How remote then appeared the prospect
of her very next similar meal being taken thus--parted from Morris for
ever, dazed and broken-hearted, bound in solitude and fear for another
land. "After all, life ought to be somewhat interesting, for it is
certainly unexpected," she thought, with a grim, mirthless little smile.
The Channel being on its best behaviour, she escaped the additional
trials of illness, but none the less, on arriving at Newhaven, she felt
incapable of further effort, and resolved to put up there for the night.
The day being Sunday made a good excuse for this feebleness. It really
would be most undesirable to arrive in London on the Sabbath evening.
She turned with relief into the nearest hotel, and went straight to bed.
She slept; she lay awake; she trembled beneath evil dreams; she shed
tears again. The long weary night passed somehow, but left her
haggard-eyed and unrefreshed. A maid brought breakfast to her bedside,
but Evarne turned with repugnance from the stolid bacon and overdone
poached eggs, and it was after a mere pretence of a meal that she arose,
paid her bill, and took her seat in the Victoria train.
CHAPTER XIV
HELPING HANDS
It was a fresh and beautiful morning when she arrived in London town.
The sun shone, the sparrows chirruped merrily, violets and mimosa were
displayed at the street-corners; English spring was at its best. Evarne
changed the remainder of her French gold at the station, and then
wandered out of its main entrance--aimlessly--ignorant of where to
go--which way to turn.
In the station yard she narrowly escaped being run over by the numerous
'buses that were constantly either entering or leaving. Her first
impulse was to mount one of these and let it take her where it would,
but condemning this as a foolish fancy, she crossed the road, and
commenced to wander down the street directly facing the station. But the
wide grandeur of Victoria Street was oppressive. She was anxious to find
the cheaper parts of London, and get settled in a moderate-priced hotel
or boarding-house without delay. This feeling of absolute homelessness
was dreadful.
She was passing an attractive-looking refreshment-shop. It was now about
twenty to twelve, and at noon she was accustomed to her first serious
meal. She became aware that she was sinking for lack of food, and
entering, ordered something to eat.
The neighbouring establishment was devoted to the sale of religious
pictures, crucifixes and other church requisites, but taking advantage
of the great width of the pavement, the enterprising proprietor had
placed outside his window some tressels and a board, which was now
covered with numerous second-hand books, under the protection of a small
boy.
As Evarne ate her meal she distracted her thoughts by watching a girl
who was seemingly proposing to purchase a volume, for she was bestowing
upon them a protracted study. First one was picked up and glanced into,
then another, but Evarne soon saw that it was not the printed wisdom
that was filling her mind. Every few seconds her eyes cast anxious
glances in the direction of the station, and ere long she abandoned even
the pretence of book-gazing, and stood there, frankly waiting and
watching for somebody.
She had obviously made her toilette with great care and attention to
detail. She wore a long coat and a white hat with a black feather
drooping over towards her shoulder. She had on spotless white kid gloves
and smart shoes, and a little bunch of blossoms was fastened at her
throat by a small pearl brooch. Noticing all this, Evarne guessed at
once what it was that kept this girl loitering about thus long, gazing
so earnestly towards the station. "She is in love--I can see plainly.
Little fool! It will only bring her misery," was the verdict of this
young cynic, for suddenly the far-distant temple at Karnak had risen
again in her memory; she could see the cruel eye, the set lips, of the
Egyptian goddess of Love--of Sekhet--in her implacable silent power.
At length Evarne felt compelled to take her departure. But to where? Who
could advise her? She studied the countenance of the damsel by whom she
had been waited upon. It was not unpretty, but oh! so sadly shallow and
unsympathetic. No kindly aid would be forthcoming from that quarter.
Silently she quitted the shop.
Not far from the door stood the girl who had already attracted her
attention. She certainly did not look as if she could be much acquainted
with the shifts of poverty, but she did look as if she could be kind and
willing to be helpful. Yielding this time to an impulse, Evarne
approached, and without preamble asked where one could obtain cheap
lodgings in London.
To her relief the girl with the plume did not evince the least surprise.
She appeared to consider it quite natural to be asked such a question by
a daintily-clad stranger, and calmly proceeded to consider the matter.
"How cheap do you mean?" she inquired. "There are a great many
boarding-houses in Bloomsbury--near the British Museum, you know--where
you would be made quite comfortable for two pounds a week, or even less.
Still, there are much cheaper ways of living than that, if you prefer."
Evarne decided that Fate had guided her to one who was, seemingly, an
authority on precisely the class of knowledge she was seeking. Two
pounds a week was certainly very moderate, but when one is possessed of
less than eight pounds in the world--no, that was beyond her means. She
could not allow her whole fortune to be dissipated on a month's riotous
living!
"Please tell me about the cheaper ways. How--do you happen to know where
girls live who can only spare one pound a week?"
"Well, it chiefly depends on the girl. Some hire cubicles in clubs, or
homes, or places of that sort, and get most of their meals out. But it's
not nice--they treat you as if you were a child--I've never known any
one with any 'go' in them who liked it. Shall I tell you what I should
do myself?"
"Yes, please do."
"I should go to the stage-door of this music-hall just here"--and she
carelessly waved her hand in the direction of the edifice she mentioned.
"Then ask the doorkeeper for some addresses, and he will tell you where
the artistes stay when they are engaged at the hall."
Here she broke off, and took a short step sideways in order to see
between the people passing to and fro, but in a minute turned her
attention again to Evarne.
"You can get a room and attendance for ten shillings a week, or
thereabouts, and arrange what you'll eat according to the state of the
exchequer. I've done that myself, so I know it isn't half-bad. You do
your own marketing, you understand, and the landlady does the cooking."
Somewhat surprised at this confidence, Evarne thanked her gratefully.
"Am I not fortunate in having ventured to ask you?" she said in her
sweetest voice. "I should never have dreamed of such a nice way on my
own account."
The girl with the plume seemed pleased, and accompanied her the few
steps to the corner of the side-street in which the stage-entrance of
the music-hall was to be found; there they parted, and Evarne proceeded
on her exploring expedition alone. Sure enough, she soon beheld a very
narrow, red folding-door, over which "Stage Door" appeared enticingly in
white letters. The flaps were already slightly ajar, and, pushing them
wider open, she peered inside the sacred portals.
There was a commissionaire's box sure enough, but no official of any
description to grace it. Nothing daunted, Evarne climbed a winding
flight of stairs that was just ahead. This ended in a big, square
landing, on to which opened several doors. All were closed but one,
which, standing wide open, exposed to view a row of washing-basins on a
high table, a portion of uncarpeted floor on which lay a jester's cap
and a stuffed dog, a huge truss of hay propped up in a corner, together
with a couple of guns, and a chair covered with a pile of garments.
Since, save for these rooms, the landing was a blank alley, Evarne was
about to descend when a step was heard, and a very young man appeared in
the open doorway. Partly with a view to accounting for her trespassing,
the girl explained: "I want to find the hall-porter."
The youth's response was far from useful.
"Well, he isn't here now, and I don't know where he is, or when he will
be back."
The idea came to Evarne that possibly this stranger might serve as well
as the porter.
"I wanted to ask if he could tell me of any nice lodgings about here,"
she said.
The youth at once waxed quite enthusiastic.
"Well, I can jolly well tell you that! We are staying at the only decent
place in the neighbourhood. We go there about four times a year, and we
wouldn't go to anybody else than Mrs. Burling, not for toffee. When are
you coming in?"
"I want a room at once."
"Well, I can't say what she's got vacant. We've got--let me see--a
sitting-room, and one, two, three bedrooms."
"Would you mind telling me what you pay for that?"
"Well, we're charged a pound a week for our lot, and that's inclusive,
coals and light and everything. I'll give you the address. You can't
better it, I'll take my oath."
He scribbled an address, and Evarne again sought the outer air. At the
corner of the street was the girl with the plume, still waiting, who
inquired after her success.
Evarne showed her the slip of paper.
"It's the Vauxhall Bridge Road. Is that near by?" she asked.
"Oh yes; just cross over and go straight ahead, past that clock."
But to get across this crowded thoroughfare was an undertaking that
Evarne, with her shaken nerves, was scarcely capable of managing. Again
and again she set out only to return, startled and alarmed, to the
pavement. Undue timidity was so new to her that her pretty brow deepened
into wrinkles. It was dreadful that stress of mental suffering should
have reduced her to this foolishly weak and incapable condition of mind
and body.
The girl with the plume once more came to the rescue.
"You're not used to London, I can see. I'll take you across. And now
I'll just show you the right road," she continued, when they had reached
the opposite pavement in safety.
"I do hope," declared Evarne slyly, "that nobody specially interesting
will happen to come along over there while you are being so kind as to
see after me."
Her companion looked for a moment as if she had suddenly discovered
herself to be in the society of a clairvoyante. Then she answered
lightly enough--
"It doesn't matter much if she does."
But Evarne was not to be deceived by the feminine pronoun.
In a couple of minutes the girl with the plume stopped.
"Good-bye," she said, holding out her hand, "and good luck."
Evarne was sorry to have to say farewell. She clasped the hand that was
offered her.
"Good-bye," she said roguishly, "and I do hope that then he--um--I mean
she----"
The girl with the plume interrupted her by a little laugh of amusement.
Evarne laughed too, and thus they parted.
It was just a stray meeting--a momentary friendship never to be
renewed--but it put Evarne in a new frame of mind. Whether it was owing
to the meal, or to having so far forgotten her own woes as to indulge in
the fun of bantering another girl, or whether it was to the practical
kindness and help she had received in finding a _pied-à-terre_, she knew
not; but certainly she walked down Vauxhill Bridge Road with a
considerably brighter expression than heretofore.
The number found, her knock was answered by Mrs. Burling in person.
Evarne inquired after accommodation and terms.
"Are you a pro, miss?" inquired Mrs. Burling.
"A pro?"
"I mean, are you on the stage yourself? But there, I can see you ain't."
The girl acknowledged it.
"Does that matter?"
"Not a bit; come in, my dear."
Evarne entered, and trying to close her nostrils against the smell of
onions that was wafted along the passage, followed Mrs. Burling into a
sitting-room. This apartment was overcrowded by a suite of shiny black
furniture, and decorated lavishly with antimacassars, and objects of one
description and another under glass cases. The girl thought it hideous,
and almost unbearable to have to live amid such surroundings.
"Take a seat, miss. I've only got a 'combined' vacant now, but next
week----"
"I don't want to pay much," confessed Evarne frankly. "How much is the
'combined,' and may I see it?"
She hadn't the least idea of what a "combined" might happen to be, but
was not going to display her ignorance twice within the first three
minutes.
Mrs. Burling led the way up a couple of steep flights of stairs, into a
smallish room that she herself probably thought charmingly harmonious
and attractive. Its walls were covered with a dull yellowish paper
whereon was a design of pink poppies as big as one's head, with ramping
green leaves of a size to correspond. There were two cupboards painted
white, but picked out with green, while the threadbare carpet was
likewise of a verdant hue. By the window was a writing-table, covered
with an ink-stained emerald cloth, and the wicker arm-chair that stood
before it tried to render itself cosy and enticing by means of a couple
of thin cushions--both green, sure enough, but scarcely a happy
combination of the shades of that colour to be reposing cheek by jowl.
In the corner stood a spotlessly white fluffy-looking bed; there was a
wardrobe with a disfiguring mirror for the door; a washing-stand--with
china pink and green--altogether it was complete enough, but
oh!--Evarne's artistic soul shuddered.
However, she had made up her mind that the poor must be easily pleased,
and on learning that she could become mistress of this domain for ten
shillings weekly, inclusive, she accepted the position without demur.
"'Ave you got any more luggage at the station?" inquired the landlady,
"because my Tommy's got a 'and-cart that he can bring it along in."
Evarne said that the bag she had left in the hall downstairs was all she
owned in that direction.
"It's my custom to ask for part of the rent in advance, miss," promptly
announced Mrs. Burling.
Without comment, Evarne meekly opened her purse and produced
half-a-sovereign.
"Send up my bag, please," she said, and in another five minutes found
herself alone with all her worldly possessions in her first independent
home in London. Her new life had indeed started.
CHAPTER XV
THE PROBLEM OF EXISTENCE
By the time darkness fell solitude had become unendurable. She did not
know a single person in London whom she could visit, so resolved to go
forth into the open streets. Even to see strangers passing and repassing
would be better than the companionship of her own haunting memories.
She wandered around aimlessly, half-confused and somewhat entertained by
her first contact with busy London after nightfall. She had soon
strolled down Victoria Street, and crossed Westminster Bridge, and was
amid the activity of the populous and poor south side of the Thames.
After a while, the sight of a noisy flaring street-market in full swing,
reminded her that she must make some purchases if she wanted dinner on
the morrow. Accordingly--after commencing operations by buying a
capacious wicker marketing-basket, in emulation of the busy purchasers
who were evidently experienced housewives--she set about considering her
next day's _menu_.
Despite her quiet demeanour, she attracted a great deal of notice. Many
heads were turned to gaze after her; nudgings and whisperings heralded
her approach. She disliked this attention, and unaware that her face,
apart from its arresting beauty, still bore traces of the emotional
anguish she had so recently passed through, put it all down to her
attire. She could not fail to see that her costume--albeit the simplest
in her late wardrobe--was of an entirely different stamp to that worn by
her surrounding sister-women, and resolved on the morrow to get a really
cheap skirt and blouse for such occasions. That night, the purchase of
food required all her thought.
All went off well, save at the butcher's. There she considered she made
a fool of herself! Although it was Monday night, each shop of this
description was surrounded by a crowd of carnivorous humanity. "Buy,
buy, buy!" the salesman was shouting encouragingly. "Here's a lovely
little joint. Walk up and look--no call to buy. Prime beef. Buy, buy,
buy! Walk up, people, walk up!"
At length Evarne followed this advice, and did "walk up." The counter
outside the shop consisted of a series of divisions marked by numbers
ranging from four to ten, and each containing a mass of smallish
portions of meat.
Those in number ten partition looked less dried and utterly repulsive
than the rest, so, deciding on a tiny piece, the girl daintily touched
it with the tip of her finger and inquired its price.
"Tenpence," shouted the noisy butcher, darting away to attend to another
customer.
Evarne considered that was far too dear for such a wee portion. She
wasn't going to be cheated because she was nicely dressed; she just
wouldn't have that piece! Settling upon a thin chop, she once again made
business-like inquiries concerning its price. Strange! This was even
smaller than her first choice, yet it was tenpence likewise.
This was really puzzling. Ah! Perhaps it was tenpence a piece,
regardless of size. It didn't seem likely, but if so, she would see that
she got her money's worth, and lifting up the largest portion of all she
once more succeeded in attracting the butcher's attention.
"How much is this bit, then?" she inquired.
The unkind butcher man actually got rude. "Lor' love yer, can't yer 'ear
me a-telling yer it's _tenpence_, and ain't it printed plain enough?"
Evarne was affronted by this unaccustomed disrespect.
"I'll take this piece, then," she announced with the air of a duchess,
whereupon the man, in no ways abashed, promptly flung it out of sight
under a row of hanging joints, into the interior of the shop.
Evarne remained stationary.
"Walk inside, miss," cried the man, as the crowd jostled, and others
claimed his attention.
The girl obeyed. In its turn her choice was put on the scales.
"Thirteen ounces, sevenpence-halfpenny," cried the weigher, wrapping it
up with all speed in a bit of newspaper and handing it over.
Only then did it dawn on Evarne that this universal price of tenpence
meant nothing more nor less than tenpence a pound, and thus the mystery
was explained! Until recently she would have laughed merrily over such
an incident, but now all life was the colour of tragedy. She saw in this
absurd little incident only an allegory of her all-round practical
ignorance, her incapacity, her sordid position, and the general misery
and humiliation of her probable future. She returned home weary and
dejected, and that night likewise soaked her pillow with tears.
She breakfasted in bed, then dressed and went out to get a newspaper to
study the list of situations vacant. Buying two or three she inquired
the way to the nearest public gardens. The policeman directed her to
Hyde Park, and ere long she was seated facing the Row, idly watching the
equestrians as they cantered past.
How cheerful, how light-hearted, they all seemed!
People on foot, even though richly clad, often looked discontented and
ill-natured. Those driving in the finest of motors, or the most splendid
of carriages, with prancing horses and all outward tokens of luxury,
might appear dreadfully bored with existence; but one and all who were
mounted upon these well-groomed steeds on this fresh spring morning
appeared to radiate health and happiness as they passed.
It was scarcely a kind Fate that brought Evarne to this spot, with the
very papers in her hand in which she hoped to find the printed
announcement of some quiet little corner in the labour market into which
she might creep to earn mere bread and cheese. She looked with eyes that
were frankly envious upon the riders. How unfair it seemed that some
people should have so much money and others none at all unless they
either slaved or sinned.
Had she been plunged into poverty with Morris still true--still loving
her--she could have faced the turn of Fortune's wheel with a stout heart
and a cheery smile. But the stroke that had been dealt to her affections
seemed to have crushed her very spirit.
Nor had she any, save her own moral resources, upon which to lean for
support. This would have seemed a period when the glorious and elevating
influence of Socrates should have had power to lift her into lofty
realms of philosophical resignation. But for the greatest of her griefs,
the most gnawing, the most unendurable, the teacher was worse than
useless. Scant comfort does he give to those whose love is unhappy. On
the contrary, his words, his ideas, as they had been interpreted by
Evarne, merely served to gall the wound, and she dared not dwell upon
them.
She did not open her papers, but sat watching the passing throng. She
smiled as two little girls came galloping by at full speed. They rode
astride, and a groom led the pony of the youngest by a leading-rein. The
hats of both tiny maidens had blown back, their flying curls rose and
fell, their faces were flushed bright pink with excitement and delight.
Next a young woman rode past at a walking pace. By her side was a man.
She too looked radiantly happy, but it was not the exhilaration of
exercise that had brought that glad light into her eyes. Evarne looked
after them sympathetically. Although her own story had ended in
destruction and misery, she still found a pair of earnest young lovers
the most interesting--the most attractive--sight in the world.
Numbers of elderly rotund gentlemen trotted along. For them the morning
ride was but a doctor's prescription--still, they took it with a
cheerful countenance--this delightful recipe! Then passed two women,
both evidently over fifty; they still possessed elegant and slender
figures, shown off by immaculate habits. They were mounted on
magnificent horses--lithe, powerful, big--horses fit to carry heavy men,
and to whom the weight of these slight women must have been a mere
nothing. Evarne imagined that these two riders were wealthy maiden
sisters--the great ladies of some country district--who came to London
just for the season. She fancied they had lived side by side in state
and dignity from infancy upwards, and that there had never been a hero
in the story of either of their lives.
Immediately after them came a golden-haired damsel--gay, _débonnaire_,
handsome--but marred by an irrefutable touch of vulgarity. Her fine form
and shady morals had gone to make her a prosperous career! Her life had
never been without a hero. Next came a youthful and highborn mother,
cantering easily, looking down with smiling care and pride upon the
gallant little son and heir who rode so manfully beside her on a shaggy
white pony. Ah! there was life, happiness, health, wealth,
love--everything! But she must waste no more time. Moving to a less
prominent seat she opened her papers.
Doubtless if Evarne had been an artistic genius she would have declined
to abandon entirely the pursuit of art. As it was, knowing her own
incompetence, she at once hopelessly renounced all ideas of art as a
profession. What then offered itself? If she had happened to possess a
knowledge of shorthand there were many openings, but then she didn't
happen to, so that was no use! A smart girl about eighteen was wanted to
assist in a grill-room and make herself generally useful. A stifling
grill-room! Horrible! Some bakers required a young lady as bookkeeper
and to assist in shop. Arithmetic had never been her strong point. A
barmaid was wanted. Heaven forbid! Another lady was required to push the
boot trade. "Pushing" anything was also not her strong point.
The "C's" were all cashiers and clerks. Arithmetic and shorthand again.
Useless! Oh, there was also a demand for cooks. Well, she could boil
eggs and potatoes, and make toast, but that was hardly sufficient.
Drapery establishments required ladies for various departments. That was
decidedly the most promising so far. She would write to some of these.
Dressmakers wanted hands, assistants, improvers and apprentices. Oh
dear, dear! Several hotels wanted manageresses or housekeepers, and an
infirmary required a female lunatic attendant. It was terribly
disheartening work. Lady canvassers--that again required the gift of
being pushing. Laundry-managers--mantle-machinists--milliners--servants.
There ended the choice. Appalling!
However, she proceeded to answer a few of the advertisements, when the
idea came to consult Mrs. Burling. The landlady was a practical
working-woman, and therefore perhaps the very best possible adviser.
So Evarne to a certain extent became confidential. What did Mrs. Burling
think was the easiest way of earning a livelihood for a girl who had not
been taught any profession, and who, owing to deaths and unexpected
losses, found herself obliged to earn money right away?
Without a moment's hesitation, Mrs. Burling suggested the stage. This
was not unnatural, considering that the worthy matron spent her days
waiting hand and foot upon plain, commonplace women and inane men, who,
by that means, contrived to lead leisured lives. That was the one and
only trade, business or profession she knew of that seemed to call for
neither brains, industry, previous preparation, nor--in her opinion--any
particular talent or qualification whatsoever.
"I do assure you, miss," she went on, "I've 'ad ladies and gents 'ere
earning good money, who would 'ave been in the work'ouse if they wasn't
in the profession."
Evarne considered. She was blankly ignorant of everything connected with
life behind the scenes. True, she had met several so-called "actresses"
in the society of Morris's friends, but these ladies never seemed to be
acting, so she could not consider that they represented the genuine
article. She had a vague idea--gleaned from she scarce knew where--that
the men of the dramatic world were all vulgar and vain and familiar and
inclined to drink, unless, on the other hand, they were popular,
fascinating and romantic; while the women were jealous, rather rowdy,
and overdressed, until those upper ranks were reached wherein they
figured on picture postcards, when they were models of every public and
domestic virtue. Still, to the girl's imagination, a stage life
certainly seemed far more bearable than the vision of herself measuring
out lace and ribbon from morn to eve; or serving round grilled chops; or
fighting with lunatics.
"I really think I shall try that," she announced at length; "but I'm
dreadfully ignorant about how to get a post. Does one go to the
theatres, or write to the leading actors, or the managers, or what?"
"There's all sorts of ways," declared Mrs. Burling. "For one thing, you
must 'ave a good photo of yourself to send round. What 'ave you got?"
Evarne confessed that she had nothing.
"Then you must 'ave one took, and 'ave sticky-backs made from it."
"Sticky-backs?"
"Yes, fifty a shilling. Don't you know 'em? I've got some stuck in my
visitors' book. I'll get it, and let you see."
She returned in due course and presented the volume.
"I've got a message for you," she went on. "I jist mentioned to the
ladies and gents in the sitting-room, when I went in to git the book,
what I wanted it for, and when they 'eard you'd never bin on the stage
and was thinking of starting, they sent up an invite that if yo
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