Chapter VI

Lorp BRASTED was finishing his cigar in the glazed verandah after breakfast. There was no sign of any tragedy about him. He was as pink and prosperous-looking as ever, sitting now in a tailed grey suit with one stout leg crossed over the other, and a well-laced boot, of the colour of a ripe horse-chestnut, cocked in the air.

He was reading the Standard newspaper, and thinking about something else; the cigar, clasped by a capable-looking finger, protruded from the edge of that journal.

Yesterday he had received the wire which he had half-expected, and had come down by the afternoon train. There had been a long interview with Mrs. Hamilton, and a short one with Miss Annie, both of which had tolerably satisfied him. Of course it was a hard thing that had to be done, but he was pleased to observe their resolution, and to recognise that the elder woman at any rate took a sane view of the situation.

There had been a scene in the morning, he understood—the kind of scene that he would have expected from that dramatic young man whom he had met on a previous visit, and there would probably be another one in a few minutes. He was perfectly willing to confront him under the circumstances; he did not propose to spare him, and he was quite satisfied with the state of his own nerves. He had not driven a Panhard for nothing during the last eighteen months.

A door opened, and a footman appeared. Lord Brasted stood up at once, laying his cigar-end at the foot of a small bay-tree that grew in a tub, followed the footman through the drawing-room, crossed the hall, and went into the morning-room, still carrying his newspaper.

“Tt is half-past,” said Mrs. Hamilton, without looking up.

She was sitting in an upright arm-chair by the fire, with her back turned towards most of the room. Her ringed fingers lay along the arms of her chair and clasped the knobs at the end.

Lord Brasted parted his tails, drew up his trousers slightly at the knees, and sat down on the other side of the hearth.

“Yes, dear lady; I was just coming.... It is all very unfortunate.”

She was quite silent for a moment, then she spoke suddenly, and with a curious hardness in her voice.

“T think it is disgraceful that he should ask for this interview.”

Lord Brasted cleared his throat.

“Tt is very natural,” he said. “I have the papers here. Do you think he will deny it?”

“Of course,” she said contemptuously.

“ And then?”

“T shall tell him what I think.”

They sat in complete silence then; once the 11— (2096)

newspaper rustled as Lord Brasted shifted his position; once a log shifted with a soothing murmur on the hearth, and a little firework display of sparks flew up in the column of grey smoke; but outside all was still. The rain and wind of last night had dropped, and the world waited, poised in silence, bathed in clear sunshine, as if for some great movement of the elements.

The little morning room was full of the wintry light that shone through the small square panes and the new coats painted on them, and fell upon the inlaid spinet, the deep blue-bordered carpet, and the delicate spindle-legged tables loaded with dainty silver. It was a setting perfectly appropriate for a graceful little love-scene, or the climax of a small comedy.

Lord Brasted rose at last, and went to the fire, lifting the tongs from the hearth to re-arrange the logs, and as he bent forward the other sat up suddenly.

“There!’’ she said.

There came from outside the clear, spanking trot of a horse, suddenly echoing in the fore-court, the hiss of wheels on gravel, and then silence.

Lord Brasted, still completely self-possessed, continued his movement, propped a log endwise, set back the tongs carefully so that they should not slip, and turned round, drawing an envelope from his breast-pocket as the door opened.

Even his nerves thrilled a little as he looked at the two men standing there.

Christopher Dell had the face of a dead man in which two black eyes alone showed signs of life. His lips showed like a straight gash in his face. He was perfectly dressed, and the contrast was horrible. Beside him stood Father Yolland, buttoned up to the neck in a clerical frock-coat, with a suppressed kind of defiance in his air. His chin was thrust out, his snub-nose resembled a bull-dog’s, and his sandy hair appeared stiffer than ever. It was he who spoke first.

“ Mr. Dell has sent for me,” he said. “‘ This is my business too, Mrs. Hamilton.”

His voice too rang hard and defiant, and as the woman stirred in her chair Lord Brasted saw that she was trembling a little. He hoped that she was not going to break down. But she said nothing, though her lips moved, and she made a little pre-concerted gesture. There were to be no formalities.

Lord Brasted cleared his throat, and glanced down at the envelope in his hand.

“Mrs. Hamilton has asked me to speak for her,” he began, ‘“‘and I understand that it is what Mr. Dell ” (he bowed slightly without raising his eyes) —“it is what Mr. Dell wishes. Of course I have no alternative, disagreeable as such a duty is! But—er —but I should be ashamed not to say—under these circumstances—what I have felt myself compelled to say—under other circumstances—in fact——’”

He broke off, drawing a long paper out of his envelope, and feeling a little dissatisfied with his exordium. He was also slightly disconcerted by the silence and motionlessness of the two figures opposite him. Christopher Dell was like a wax-work image.

He cleared his throat once more.

“Here are the facts,’ he said.

He lowered the paper and folded his two hands on it behind his back.

“J will not pretend that the news of Mr. Dell’s engagement to Miss Annie gave me any pleasure. iE told Mrs. Hamilton so at the time; she knew what I thought from the beginning. It did not seem to me suitable.... Well, I happen to be a member of the Club to which Mr. Dell used to belong—the ‘Doric’—It was there that I first heard what I suppose I must call gossip. 1 do not excuse it, But it was more than gossip to me. I may remind Mr. Dell that I had been a friend of Mr. Hamilton for several years, and, I think I may say, a friend of Mrs. Hamilton, too. I have been allowed to regard this house almost as my own home. Father Yolland knows that.

“When I heard this gossip then, I felt it my duty to ask questions. It was, I may almost say, as if an uncle, or even a father, heard talk about a stranger who was to be admitted to a—to the family—er— towards which he stood in—er—that relation. I am quite aware what Mr. Dell may think fit to call this action on my part, but I think if he will consider the circumstances

The priest’s voice suddenly broke in, harsh and brutal.

‘“Cannot you come to the point, Lord Brasted? We do not want to hear this kind of explanation.”

Lord Brasted lifted his eyes without raising his head.

‘Perhaps not, Mr. Yolland, but in justice to myself I felt bound to make this statement first.... Well, I said that I made these enquiries; I heard a good deal about Mr. Dell, and I wrote two, no, three days ago the result of my enquiries....” (He lifted the paper and smoothed the creases.) ‘‘ Here is a copy of the main facts. I will, for the present, reserve the names, but I am perfectly willing, if Mr. Dell desires it, to put this paper in his hands immediately, that he may see the names for himself. J have not shown Mrs. Hamilton the names, and I do not propose to do so, unless... unless it is necessary.’

He lifted the paper nearer his eyes, and fitted his gold. pince-nez carefully on his nose. The two figures before him, he perceived as he did so, were perfectly motionless still. Mrs. Hamilton was as she had been, in her chair, turned towards him, with her face away from the others, but it was downcast, and her hands lay together on her lap.

“IT beg your pardon,” he said, lowering the paper once more, “ but I must add that it is not by my wish that I am here. Mrs. Hamilton telegraphed for me yesterday morning, when she heard that Mr. Dell proposed coming here, and I understand that it is by his wish too that I am here.

“Well, here are the facts.”

The silence was intense in the sunlit room; the sputtering of the logs had ceased, and he perceived once more that the three figures had not stirred, nor was there even the sound of breathing.

“Four years ago Mr. Dell was in Italy. Here he made the acquaintance of—of two persons whom I will not name, but who are notorious for—for evil living. He was constantly in the houses of these persons. It was generally understood that he held with their—their peculiar views of morality, and identified himself with them.

“ This, I am aware, is perfectly vague; it is no more than an introduction to the story proper.

“One of these persons, a woman, divorced from her husband, and—and a Roman Catholic by profession, has a flat in—in a certain street in Paris. Her reputation, my informant tells me, is the worst conceivable. I may say that that reputation had reached even my ears more than five years ago, in connection with a certain trial, and she has been before the public twice again since that date.

“A little less than eighteen months ago—or to be more precise, about last August or September year, Mr. Dell came to Paris, and took up his quarters in this woman’s house. At this time Mr. Dell was believed to be penniless. He was constantly seen in Paris, in the same carriage with this woman. He was once seen in a box alone with her at the opera. (I can mention the name of the piece that was played that night, if necessary.) Twice he entertained, in the apparent position of master of the house, two persons in this lady’s flat, both of whose signatures I have upon this paper.

“ This state of things continued, it is believed, for not less than six weeks, and not more than two months, for towards the end of October Mr. Dell was once more in London. Since that time I have nothing more to relate.”

Lord Brasted paused, lowered the paper and glanced up for an instant.

“Now, Mrs. Hamilton wishes me to be her spokesman in this matter, so I will ask Mr. Dell to—to consider me in that light. Mrs. Hamilton desires me to say—she will correct me if I am wrong in any statement that I make—she desires me to say first that she does not consider a man who has lived in this way to be a proper husband for her daughter, and she wishes to know whether Mr. Dell admits or denies these statements that I have laid before him.”

He lifted his eyes as he ended, and looked straight at the two men.

For a moment he was astonished at their motionlessness.

Christopher Dell, in his long yellow coat, stood like an image, his hands invisible at his sides, his face cut, as it were, out of yellowish wax, with closed lips, and bright, hard eyes like those of a mummy-case, unwinking and unflinching, staring straight upon him. The priest at his side was as still, with his hands clenched, and his face alive with emotion. It was he who was the first to break the horrible silence. He moved an inch or two forward, and his voice shook a little.

“Lord Brasted, both my friend and I decline to deal with you. Ido not consider that you have acted properly. These things should have been laid first of all before Mr. Dell, if indeed you were justified in interfering at all. I say this to explain why Iam going to address myself to Mrs. Hamilton.”

“My dear sir——” began the other.

“ You will kindly allow me to deal with this in my own way.... Mrs. Hamilton, I have this to say

““T have known my friend here for many years. I know perfectly well—and he wishes me to say this that his life has been gravely irregular. This story which Lord Brasted has gathered up so carefully is sufficiently true. He does not wish to deny it 7

“Well, then ”” began the other once more.

The priest’s eyes blazed, and he advanced a step.

“Have the goodness not to interrupt me again. I am speaking to Mrs. Hamilton.... He does not wish to deny it; it is sufficiently true, but I wish to add this: Mr. Dell repents more bitterly than I Cano describe.. lc."

Lord Brasted turned away with a little gesture.

“You need not sneer, sir,” snapped the priest. “Mrs. Hamilton, I imagine, believes in repentance. I say that my friend repents bitterly, and as a proof that this is as I say, I will also ask leave to finish what Lord Brasted left unfinished. Mr. Dell left Paris without five pounds in his pocket. He deliberately, of his own free will, broke with the woman; there was no quarrel, but he left her and all that she had to offer; he made his way on foot to Calais, crossed over to England, walked up to London, and has been living there until last October earning his own bread. During this year he received more than a dozen letters from the woman in Paris begging him to return. He burned eleven of these letters unread. The first that she wrote I have brought with me to-day. Mr. Dell was often in want at this time. For eight days he was an inmate of the Marylebone Workhouse; this was in June last, and it can be verified by an application to the master. He was then paid for an article he had written, came out and took a room by himself. From this he was again turned out in October, and he came to me, after a night spent in the open—exactly as I should have come to him under similar circumstances,

“T do not know if Mrs. Hamilton desires, or can conceive, greater proofs of a sincere repentance than these. But I may add once more my own views. I thank God for the example of penitence that my friend has shown. Soon after his engagement was permitted I was with him, and he then professed himself willing to tell Miss Hamilton everything, if I thought it necessary. I told him there was no obligation to do so—that the past was past. It was by my advice, then—advice which I should certainly give again in the same case—that these facts were not made known six weeks ago.

“ AJso, for the last six weeks he has been living in my house, and I have nothing but good to relate of him.

“ And I will add this last word. If it was my own sister that was in question, I should give her to be my friend’s wife without an instant’s hesitation.”

His voice shook as he ended, and he fell back to his friend’s side, trembling all over.

Lord Brasted turned back again from the fire and cleared his throat, but before he could speak Mrs, Hamilton by a sudden movement was on her feet, and facing the two friends.

As Lord Brasted looked at her, he had no longer any fear of her yielding.

She stood as taut as a steel rod, her hands clenched by her sides, her grey head upraised, and her face rigid and hard.

“ Father Yolland,”’ she cried, and her voice was as hard as her face, ‘“‘ Father Yolland, it is astonishing to me that you should dare to speak like this. I can only suppose you are blinded by your friendship with this man. I have always supposed that, as a clergyman, you had as great a horror——’”

Dick sprang forward again and faced her.

“YT have as great a horror,” he cried back, “I loathe and detest it; but I have something else as well. Do you mean to say you understand nothing by forgiveness?”’

“ Forgiveness! I cannot understand you. If you mean God’s e

“T mean God’s. I mean the Divine Charity that forgives you and me——”

“Tf you mean God’s,” she cried again, “I pray with all my heart that he may find it. He needs it?

There was a sudden movement, and Chris was a yard nearer, his hands upraised, his face contorted by something so frightful that the man on the raised hearth sprang off it to the floor believing that he was on the point of a spring.

““God’s,” screamed the convulsed man. “ God’s! Who is God? God?”

Then he dropped on his face, and a dreadful moaning began.

It was all done in an instant.

Even Lord Brasted felt himself thrill from head to foot; it was so appallingly unexpected and dramatic. He stood for a moment, trembling slightly, completely bewildered.

From the yellow heap on the floor by which the priest was kneeling came unintelligible sobs and moans. Thin hands snatched and tore at the blue carpet, and feet scraped on the floor behind.

“Chris! for God’s sake. Chris! stand up. What is it? What is it? Get something—run—get something; he is dying—Brasted, you damned brute!”

Then the priest was down again, talking rapidly, trying to lift the struggling thing on the floor.

Lord Brasted put a hand on the woman’s arm, and tore at the bell with the other.

“Mrs. Hamilton, go away for five minutes. It’s not fit T’ll come too. Father Yolland, we shall be in the dining-room.”

Then the two were gone, leaving the priest and his friend.

The two stood by the dining-room fire without speaking for a full minute. Mrs. Hamilton was in front of the hearth, staring straight down into the red coals, her hands rising and falling mechanically from her skirt as if to catch the warmth. Lord Brasted leaned against the table, the paper still in his hand, wondering what on earth was the proper gambit. He was conscious that his hands were a little damp and slippery—no more.

She spoke suddenly, without turning round.

“Do you think we should send any one

He cleared his throat with a little effort.

“There is no need. I rang the bell. One of the men will be there.... You behaved magnificently, my dear lady.”

She said nothing to that, and after a pause he went on.

“It was very dramatic,” hesaid. ‘‘ We might have expected it.”

“Ts it a fit?”’ she asked in a low voice.

“Fit? No! He must have thought it out. He is a born actor. Didn’t you notice that he didn’t roll over? He was on his knees.”

She was silent again.

“And then what he said!” went on the other. “Tt is all in keeping.”

She turned a little, and glanced at him a moment: her lips moved, but she still said nothing. He was astonished by the pallor of her fine face, and the steady brightness of her eyes. Then she turned back, and so they stood.

Five minutes later the door opened suddenly, and

. is no need

Dick Yolland came in. He stood by the door, closing it behind him, but did not look at the two who turned to face him, and he spoke in an impersonal, passionless voice.

“He is better,” he said. “ He is sitting down. One of the men is with him.”

“We will wait here,” said Lord Brasted. ‘‘ There

The priest paid him no attention whatever.

“ He says he will not go till he has seen Miss Annie,” he went on, looking at Mrs. Hamilton.

“That is out of the question,’ she said sharply.

“Tam giving you his message,” went on the priest quietly. ‘‘ He says he will not go until she tells him to go. Then he promises he will go quietly. Of course you can drag him out, but he will resist, and he will come back. He means what he says. He is perfectly desperate.”

The woman turned to Lord Brasted.

“Well?” she said.

He laughed shortly.

“Tt is what I should have expected. You must not listen to him.”

“For my part,”’ went on the priest, “ I will undertake that there shall be no violence. He will ask her if she agrees, and if she says Yes, there will be an end. He will never trouble this house again. If not, it will be as I say.”

Mrs. Hamilton looked at him a moment.

“You undertake that?”

“TY undertake it.”

“Very well ”” she said, and put her hand on the bell.

Lord Brasted sprang forward

“T implore you

She rang the bell.

“JT cannot have a scene. You can trust Annie. You know what she thinks.”

They stood without speaking until the man came in.

“ Tell Jameson to ask Miss Annie to come down here—not to the morning-room. Father Yolland, will you be so kind as to go back to your friend until we come in?”

Chris was as the priest had left him. He was in the upright chair now wheeled about where Mrs. Hamilton had sat five minutes before, his head thrown back against the carving, and his hands clenched, as hers had been, upon the knobs at the ends of the arms. His face was almost expressionless, except for his eyes that looked out unwinking and fixed as the priest came towards him. Behind his chair, greatly embarrassed, stood a footman holding a glass and decanter.

“You can go,” said Dick briefly. ‘I will attend to Mr. Dell.”

When the door had closed he laid his hand on one of his friend’s, and spoke as if to a sick child, looking down compassionately on that mask of pain.

“She will be here presently. You must not frighten her. I have promised that you will not.”

There was not a flicker of expression in response, and even in that moment the priest wondered how far Chris was genuine. His face was exactly that of an actor simulating splendid despair. His whole attitude seemed screwed into rigidity by an intense physical effort. There was no doubt that he was in agony, but it was doubtful how far the expression of that agony was natural.

The priest stood back and waited, as the minutes began to pass.

Dick had no theory at all as to what would be best _to do when this last scene was over; he had not the smallest doubt as to what the answer would be. He only foresaw that he must get Chris out of the house and into the carriage; that they must drive home; that he must not leave his friend day or night till the crisis was past. Probably he would want watching for a long while.

So he stood, listening to the tick of the French clock over the mantelpiece, staring at the sunlight that lay on the blue-bordered carpet, conscious of little but of an intense desire that all this should be over quickly.

Then the door opened; Chris rose to his feet, and stood first swaying, then motionless.

The three were in the room, not half-a-dozen strides away.

On the left stood the mother, who had entered first, and shrinking against her, with a face as white as paper, and eyes full of horror and misery stood the girl, in her dark brown morning-dress, her two hands held firmly by her mother’s, and clasped by her other arm round the waist. Lord Brasted stood on the right, a little advanced before the others, a little pale too, but perfectly resolute and controlled; it seemed to the priest as if he were there for purposes of defence.

But Annie’s face left no doubt as to what her answer would be. She was terrified beyond question, but there was something more than terror in her eyes; there was the kind of loathing there with which a timid child would look at a crushed toad, or a horrible

_crime. She stared so at the rigid yellow figure a moment, and then hid her eyes against her mother’s shoulder.

So they stood in silence.

Then Chris’s figure before the chair began to sway again slightly, and the priest moved out a step. But there was a swift gesture from the clenched hand in front, and the next instant his voice rang out, with an hysterical crack in it, but strong and virile enough.;

“T will take my sentence from you. You are my only judge.”

There was no yielding now in that voice, and it struck a note that lifted the whole affair to a less sordid plane. Dick was amazed at the sudden transition, and he saw that the three opposite were startled too.

Lord Brasted moved forward a half-step and stood hesitating. Mrs. Hamilton lifted her head suddenly and stared, and Annie too was looking up now, with dilated eyes.

Chris straightened himself yet more, till his long coat hung in straight folds, and his head was up and defiant. There were half-a-dozen emotions in his voice, all at full stretch—passion, misery, fury, appeal, and a dramatic sense. Dick felt his hair tingle and the sweat prick his skin at the sound of it.

“You can save me or damn me,” he cried. ‘“‘ But understand what you are doing.”

“You blackguard,” cried Brasted, all flushed with anger in an instant.

“Understand what you are doing!” rose the voice, shrill and shaking ‘I am either saved or damned. I wait for you to tell me which. Either I am your lover, or, when I leave this house, I go to hell.”

Annie dropped her face again, and a long sobbing breath broke from her.

“Am I to go or stay?” he cried.

It was extraordinary how he dominated the room. To the priest’s perceptions the three opposite seemed to shrink, to lose their significance. They were like dummy figures when an actor comes amongst them. They lost their semblance of reality. The room itself appeared no more than a setting in which the passion of one man alone lived; the sunlight, the sparkle of silver, the glow of colour, were but accessories, stage-devices that had lost their point. He seemed to himself no more than a spectator.

“Am I to go or stay?”’ cried the hard voice once more.

A little movement broke out in the group opposite. The mother had dropped her head and was whispering in the girl’s ear. Dick could hear the hiss of the sibilants. But the girl was sobbing violently, her whole body shook, and she could not speak.

It was surely some ghastly play, some over-realistic rehearsal. It was impossible that all those things should be true. This stiff, tragic figure in front, for these few instants the master of them all, could not be Chris who had laughed and posed and pretended and laughed again with merry eyes a week ago.

Then the figure suddenly jerked in a spasm, as if it put out one more effort of energy, and as it did so, the girl, still with her face hidden, thrust out a thin repellent hand, and the moaning became intelligible.

“Go! go! go!” she sobbed, and sank into moaning again.

There was an instant, in spite of the low, piteous sound, when a hush seemed to envelop the priest. Then his ears sang and drummed, and a red mist blinded his eyes....

Chris was speaking, and it seemed as if he was standing by the door, his voice was deadly quiet, and every syllable cut like a whip.

“T go then, where I have said; and I leave you and your God together. I would kill myself if I believed in Him, and tell Him what I thought. You have done a great thing amongst you. You have damned a soul.... You, Father Yolland... I have no more to say to you... —You have lied to me about God, and there is no more forgiveness for that than for anything else in this world....”

The door was open now. Dick through a mist of tears could see a blur of light, and the yellow figure dark against it. He was aware that the other three had shrunk away to let the man past, but he could not move or speak.

... “I am thankful that I know the truth at last about God and man.”

Then he was gone.

PARTY IH