Part 12

"I delivered your message, Eva, and they're all coming, but you'll have to excuse me."

Eva had not moved from the window and her figure in its long, loose, white kimono reminded Rachel painfully of that other dreadful scene in that same room. But now she turned her head languidly. "And Jim?" she asked.

"Of course he'll come."

The room was very still again; neither of the sisters moved or spoke; the little clock on the mantel ticked tumultuously; it raced with Rachel's heart.

Eva's voice broke the unearthly stillness. "You've been a long time coming to see us."

"I've been busy."

"Johnstone's just told me--that Charter's come back."

Rachel moved nearer to the big winged chair and laid her hand on the back. "Yes," she said slowly, "he'll be on duty here all winter."

Eva turned from the window and faced her, clasping her hands tightly together. She was very pale and her long, beautiful hair fell about her face and shoulders like a cloud of gold.

"Oh, Rachel," her voice trembled, "how hard it will be for you!"

"Don't let us talk too much about it, Eva."

But Eva came over and sank into the chair, hiding her face in her hands. "Rachel, I--I asked Belhaven to let you go."

"You asked him--to let me go?" Rachel's heart seemed to stop beating. "Eva, you don't mean that you still care so much for him?"

"No--no, not that!"

Rachel stood thinking; a sudden horror had filled her soul with agony. "Eva, I meant to have told you before--I saw you and Belhaven that day in the wood."

Eva's hands fell in her lap; a deep blush dyed her worn face as she looked up. "And you thought?"

Rachel nodded, tears in her eyes. "Forgive me!"

Eva shook her head slowly. "It's natural--I--I--oh, Rachel, I was begging him to let you go; I can't bear it, I've ruined your life and his and Johnstone's--I can never be anything to him either!"

Rachel caught her hands in hers. "Eva, you're beginning to care what Johnstone thinks?"

Eva slipped from the chair to the floor at her sister's feet. "Rachel, I can't bear it any longer; I was false and cruel, I know it now! I've never done a noble thing in my life and you've always been an angel to me, Rachel," her head sank lower. "I was going away that night with Belhaven and--at the last--I was afraid; I made you save me from Astry's anger."

Rachel's heart seemed to stop beating; she could not speak. What had she done, what had she done? And Eva was guilty!

The golden head sank lower.

"Rachel, it's almost killed me. If any one thinks it's happiness to do such a thing, it isn't. The way--the way of the transgressor is hard; God only knows how hard is the way!"

Rachel raised her gently and put her in the chair, then she knelt down beside her and held her in her arms.

"I'd gladly die if I could undo it," Eva said brokenly, "but I can't. It's like a trap; I'm caught, I can't get away from my sins."

"Eva, do you--still love him?"

"You mean Belhaven?" Eva hid her face on Rachel's shoulder. "Never, never a moment after I saw he was afraid of Johnstone!"

"Thank God!"

"What does it matter?" Eva was in despair. "What does anything matter? I can't undo it! I don't think he'll let you get a divorce; he said it wouldn't do any good. Oh, Rachel, I'm so wretched! What can I do?"

"You can tell the truth to Johnstone now, Eva."

The culprit shrank. "Oh, no, no!"

Rachel took her hands again and held them steadily. "Eva, I think you love your husband."

Eva made no answer, but she turned her face away with a little, half-stifled sob. "It wouldn't make any difference now! I've no one but you left to love me, Rachel, and I've lied about you and ruined your life!"

"Not even that must keep you silent, Eva; the truth is God's, you'll have to speak it sooner or later."

"I'm not like you, Rachel, I'm not like that; I feel as if I'd been too wicked for God to have anything to do with me."

"You poor child!" Rachel forgot the misery that had made her recoil at first from the confession, and again her sister's weakness appealed to her strength. "You've got to go to God first, Eva, and afterwards you've got to tell Johnstone."

Eva sat staring at the wall, her face pale and small as a child's, her eyes wide with misery. "Rachel, I can't--I can't see the scorn grow in his eyes, I can't!"

"You'll never be happy until you do; it's just that--the falsehood--that hurts you."

"You mean against you?"

"Never mind me; I can bear it, I can even forgive you. I mean the falsehood against your husband."

Eva looked at her wildly. "Rachel, I'll do it if it will help you, if you can get a divorce."

Rachel shook her head. "I've always thought marriage too sacred to break so lightly. It hurt most to have taken the vows as I did, but it isn't only that. If I got it, Eva, all that I've done, all that I've suffered, would go for nothing, for it would publish the scandal; I couldn't save your good name."

Eva gazed at her with growing terror, her lips shaking. "Oh, Rachel, how awful! You're caught in a trap, and I did it!"

"I shan't feel that it's all in vain, I shan't even count the suffering too much, if it means that I've saved you, Eva, if I've brought you back to your husband."

Eva flung herself into her arms with a sob. "I'm not worth saving," she cried, "and I've ruined your life!"

XV

When Rachel finally got home she remembered with relief that Belhaven dined out that evening. She had forgotten it, forgotten everything but the misery of Eva's confession. But now she refused the dinner that the servants had prepared for her and asked, instead, for a cup of tea. She laid aside her furs mechanically and went into the old tap-room. Its aspect, with the fire on the hearth and the candles on the tea-table, gave her almost a shock. She had the dazed feeling of one who has been away a long time and come back to find material things unchanged.

She stood looking at the room, trying to recall its normal aspect, for its cheerfulness mocked her. Under her rule it had assumed an appearance so warm and homely and inviting that she had grown to love it, and it had touched her once when she found Belhaven there looking about him in a kind of despair.

"You've made it like home," he said to her, "and I wish you might come to be happy in it."

At the time she had found a gentle answer; now she felt that it would shrivel on her lips. He and Eva had sacrificed her to their sin and their cowardice; or was it only Eva's cowardice, her determination to escape the consequences of her own act? Yet, poor Eva! The thought of her, broken and penitent, touched the wellspring of her sister's sympathy. But the facts of life remained; how was she to meet them? How endure this tissue of falsehood? She, too, had helped deceive her brother-in-law, for however she tried to excuse herself, in the light of Eva's confession, she was party to a conspiracy to deceive the husband. She felt again the subtle, bonds of complicity in guilt against Astry, as if in the law she had compounded a felony; yet she was, for the first time, drawn toward him as her fellow sufferer. Astry and herself were the victims; they paid the piper. Then came again the pity for Eva, the sinner who so needed help and forgiveness, whom she could not betray, not even to escape the shackles that bound her.

Rachel walked to and fro across the room, and once she stopped and deftly arranged some flowers in a vase on the table; then her hand fell from them with a shudder. Belhaven had brought them to her the day before--and he loved her! It was an enormity, but it was true. She did not know that he only obeyed the instinct of self-preservation, that he sought to find his own soul.

Presently Bantry came in with the hot water for the teakettle, and some cake. She arranged the tea-table herself frequently in the absence of the footman. As she passed Rachel she stopped to touch the fold of her skirt.

"You're pale, Miss Rachel," she said reprovingly, "you ought to eat something more; you look all tired out."

"I'm well enough," smiled Rachel.

The woman shook her head; as she went out and closed the door behind her she muttered to herself. "She's wearing her heart out, poor lamb, and there's that little devil!" Bantry shook her fist fiercely in the direction of the Astrys'. Eva had never appealed to her. The Evas of this world rarely appeal to their servants.

Rachel continued her walk, absorbed in thought, the vital forces of her strong nature warring within her. She was rebelling against the circumstances of her existence, she was realizing that she had deliberately ruined her own life to shield a sister who ought to have borne her punishment. She had sacrificed Charter, too, and now John's love for her was the one comfort of her lot and its greatest misery; it was hers and she could not take it, it was hers and she must cast it off! She looked across her life and saw it desolate, sacrificed to Eva. She was caught in an inextricable tangle and she could not escape without betraying Eva. She stretched out her hands with an impotent gesture of despair. She was battling for life, for hope; her strong soul rose passionately within her and struggled for its own.

Her mind was so full of the thought of him that she was scarcely startled when Charter appeared at the threshold, unannounced.

"Bantry let me in," he explained; "she said you had just come from the Astrys' and I wanted to see you."

"I came back some time ago," said Rachel, with an effort to speak naturally.

But his calm was even more unnatural than hers. "I had to come; I don't intend to make my presence in the city an annoyance to you, but--"

"John!" she cried sharply.

"It must be an annoyance to feel that I can't behave like a rational being when I'm near you; I suppose I shan't behave like one to-day, although I came here determined to have a plain talk with you at last."

Rachel's face paled yet more. "Better not, John!"

"I must! I've tried to stop my ears but I can't; it's no use. Rachel, it's said that you married Belhaven to save your sister."

She was silent; her clasped hands quivered slightly.

Charter looked at her with love and reproach.

"I understand, I had no right to say it to you, but--Rachel, it's more than I can bear!"

His cry touched her heart as no agony of her own had ever touched it.

"You're very brave, John, I've always believed in you; you're good, you've got to help me bear it."

"Isn't that mocking me?" he asked bitterly.

"I never mocked you in my life; I've always honored you."

"I don't deserve it. I'm a scoundrel, for with every thought of my heart, with every breath I draw, I'm making love to another man's wife!"

"You mustn't do it!"

He laughed, and his laugh was so strange that it startled them both. "Your advice is good; I can't follow it, that's all. Rachel, for God's sake, tell me the truth: do you love Belhaven, did you marry him of your own free will?"

Rachel turned from him and went to the fireplace; she folded her arms and laid her head upon them. She did not remember that Belhaven had stood there on the day of their marriage. She was cruelly placed; her love for Charter seemed to be the only thing in the world. What real claim had Belhaven upon her? He had deceived her, he had traded upon her loyalty to her sister, he had accepted her sacrifice, he was only her husband in name. But what if she told Charter the truth? He was good, but if she told him the truth? She loved him with all her soul.

"I don't believe you love him," he argued; "you're wretched, I can see it. I believe these hideous stories. Rachel, I have a right to know the truth, only the truth!"

She shuddered. The truth? Oh, God, how she longed to tell him the truth; her heart leaped at the thought!

"I ask for nothing else; if you love him, if you married him of your own free choice, tell me; it will help me, it will drive me away. I'm asking for bread, Rachel, and you've given me a stone."

She was weeping now, for she dared not tell him the truth, she dared not.

"Only the truth, Rachel!"

Her tears dried, they seemed burned into her eyes, and she pressed her hands against her throat; she felt as if she must surely strangle to death.

"Did you marry Belhaven of your own choice?" John asked again and his voice cut her to the heart; it was not like him to force her into a corner, but he was battling for life himself and this vivid revelation of his love was an acute agony to her.

She raised her head; she did not look at him, and her voice was very low as she replied, "Of my own choice!"

Charter turned from her and hid his face a moment in his hands,--strong, muscular, expressive hands, they were like him.

There was an intense silence.

At last he went slowly to the door. "Forgive me, I've been a brute--good-by."

But the limit of her endurance had been reached. "John," she cried, "come back!"

He turned and faced her; he looked as he had looked at death in battle. "It's no use, Rachel; thank you for telling me the truth."

"I didn't; I lied to you."

He uttered an inarticulate sound.

"I lied to you," said Rachel steadily; "now I'm going to tell you the truth. It's wrong, but I shall do it; I shall tell you the whole truth. I married Belhaven to shield my sister from Astry's anger. Astry accused her and Belhaven, she begged me to save her from disgrace. I yielded, I married him; I never loved him, I'm only his wife in name."

"Good God, was there no one in the world to stop you? No one to save you from such madness? Rachel, did you have no thought of me?"

"I thought--" her voice broke a little; she steadied herself again, "John, let it go--I married him."

"I couldn't let it go--Rachel, you knew I loved you?"

She shook her head sadly.

"You knew it, you must have known it!"

"No woman knows it until she's told."

"Is it possible that you married him thinking I didn't? What a fool I was, what a dunce! If I had only written you! But, Rachel, there was the cholera in the camp and I was with the poor fellows all the time. I thought you knew I loved you, I only tormented myself because I wasn't sure of you!"

"We were neither of us sure, it seems; it's our poor, stupid, little tragedy, John; let it go--it's over."

"You love me?" he asked gravely.

"Yes."

They stood looking at each other. There was no light in either face, no triumphant recognition of mutual feeling; to both the situation was horrible. He understood perfectly her feelings; that the fact of her marriage was unchanged, that it constituted an insuperable barrier between them; but he could not be restrained.

"I can't stand this, Rachel. Your marriage is in fact no marriage. Belhaven has no right to hold you to it; it must be broken, you shall be free!"

"I can't; don't you see it?" She held out both hands with a pathetic gesture. "Can't you see it? It would undo all I've done to save her."

"Do you think for a moment that I'll give you up for Eva?"

Her face quivered pitifully. She longed to give up, to let him take the lead and sweep her on to liberty. Then her tortured soul rose again to the struggle. "I knew you wouldn't give up; that's why I lied to you just now. I never did before, John."

"Is it possible you want this to go on?"

"It must!"

"It can't and it shan't!" he cried hotly. "I'm human, I won't give you up; you shan't be bound by such a miserable tie--the man was a cowardly brute to let you shield him."

"I did it for Eva; I've betrayed her by telling you."

"Eva wasn't worth it," said John, in honest wrath. "No one is worth it. Rachel, I won't endure it."

"We've got to endure it; I can't publicly disgrace my sister."

"You needn't; Belhaven can make the way easy,--he can and he shall!"

She shook her head. "He won't."

"He must."

She still shook her head.

A light broke in on John. "He loves you!" he cried suddenly.

She blushed and her eyes filled with tears. "Yes."

He turned and walked to and fro, his white face set and hard. She watched him, reading him, trembling for him, with that intuitive knowledge of his strength and his weakness which is an instinct with a woman who loves much.

He swung around suddenly and faced her. "And you?" he asked, with great bitterness.

She met his eyes bravely; she tried to speak but it was too much.

John caught her in his arms. "You do love me still?" he cried passionately.

"With all my heart!" she said, for one blind moment swept away, and, yielding to her own grief and his rebellion, she clung to him. Then she recalled herself, her heart struggled back to meet fate again. "John, we must part now--I'd hoped to keep your friendship, but we've lost even that--there was, after all, no middle course."

"Do you think I'll give you up now? This marriage is a mockery; it's got to be annulled."

She looked up at him, struggling to be calm. "John, I've always believed in you, I've always trusted you; I trust you now to help me to do right. I'm weak; I'm broken down; you know it, you've felt it--help me to be myself!"

"I can't, and it isn't right, it's an outrage; who ever heard of such a thing? Eva has no right to your life, Belhaven has no right to you--you're mine!"

"I'm not yours while I'm his wife," she said steadily, and she slipped out of his arms and stood trembling.

"His wife!" John laughed bitterly. "You're not, you can't remain his wife, loving me. I can't think that of you, Rachel!"

"Don't think it. I couldn't."

"And you call it right to keep up this sham? It's a lie, Rachel, a living lie!"

She wrung her hands in a kind of agony. "John, I can't bear much more; you'll have to leave me now. Give me a little time, I--I can't bear it!"

"My darling, forgive me!"

"Don't, John," she sobbed, "don't kiss me again--I've got to give you up."

"I won't give you up."

"I've no right to disgrace poor Eva, to disgrace Astry; he's had enough to bear, and that's what it would cost. Can't you see it?"

"It needn't, but Belhaven must release you, I'll make him."

"John, I can't do it. I love you, let me believe in you."

"Have I got to suffer for Belhaven?"

She slipped down on her knees beside a chair, and burying her head on her arms, gave way to her grief. The spiritual agony had given birth to agony of the body and she wept bitterly. He tried to raise her in his arms but she resisted, still weeping.

"Rachel, you'll make me kill Belhaven."

She looked up at that, her eyes still full of tears.

"John, I did it of my own free will. The man has suffered too; it's cruel to him, I can't disgrace and ruin him now. I can't betray Eva, I can't simply think of my own happiness; I'm not like that! I did it myself. I thought you didn't care; I was angry, blind, and, yes, I did want to save my sister, but I've often thought that perhaps I wouldn't have done it but for my anger. I deserve to be punished, and I've got to bear it somehow. What would be the use of it all if, at the first temptation, I gave in and told the world the whole miserable story? When mother was dying she made me promise to be good to Eva; she said she might need all that I could give, she knew her! I can't disgrace her. She's heart-broken about it all, she's sorry; I think I can bring her back to her husband. It's worth trying, John. I've always believed in you, I've always trusted you; help me to be true to myself, help me--because you love me!"

"I can't give you up."

She turned away from him, struggling hard for more composure. "Give me a little time, John. I--I can't bear any more now!"

"You mean you want me to go now? I'll do your bidding, Rachel, but I'll never give you up; I can't."

"Oh, I know--I know, but go--please, John, I can't answer now--I can't do wrong."

"I'm going--you see I'm not trying to force it; I won't even touch you, but I won't give you up."

She did not answer, but stood with bowed head, the charm and grace of her figure outlined against the soft, warm glow of the room, her hands wrung together to hide their trembling. He turned at the door and looked back at her and she tried to smile. There is sometimes mortal agony behind a smile.

"Because I love you, John," she said, with a gesture of appeal.

He turned with a groan and went out into the night.

XVI

It was nearly an hour later when Charter made his way to the fashionable club that he knew Belhaven commonly frequented. He went deliberately, after a brief space of time given to what he would have called deliberation, but which did not deserve the name. He had left Rachel in a storm of feeling, so much more violent than anything usual to his equable nature that he had been unable at first to think with coherence. All smaller considerations, even the events of yesterday, seemed relegated to the limbo of eternal forgetfulness, and nothing was of consequence but this terrible fact, thrust so rudely into his life, this trapping of the woman he loved by a coward who was using her, so Charter felt, as a shield to save him from the punishment which he so richly deserved. Yet, even in his passion, he saw that Rachel's argument was true, that he could do nothing without exposing both sisters to an open scandal, but, in his present mood, even that seemed a small matter compared to Rachel's vindication, and he had no pity for Eva at all.