CHAPTER XXVI

STRANGERS YET

She looked upon him with an almost smile And held to him a hand that faltered not.... She did not sigh, she never said "Alas!" Although he was her friend. --JEAN INGELOW.

The town of Gretz stands upon a hill, and there was something very exhilarating in the wild way in which the "troika" (team of three horses) dashed down into the plains with all its harness bells merrily ringing.

The povosska was a curiously long carriage, quite long enough to lie down in at full length with comfort, and having a hood to shelter one from sun and rain. Felix, as an old traveler who knew the road, had all his arrangements, even to mosquito netting, to let down back and front at night. The luggage was secured behind, but the hand luggage was all stowed easily inside with the two passengers; and had she been in spirits for laughter, Rona would have laughed heartily at the number of provisions which Felix had procured. There was no danger of their starving!

The weather, which had been bad for the preceding two days, had now cleared up, and the sun poured down upon the wide expanse of steppe, heaving and undulating all around. By the time they had gone ten miles there was no sign of human habitation, except the road they followed. No house, no cultivation, no travelers, no cattle, nothing but widespreading desolation.

And there they sat together, in this remarkable vehicle, as once before they had sat together upon a canal barge. The past rolled back acutely upon the girl's mind. She recalled the breathless rush together through the mean streets, his upholding grasp about her. She remembered the relief of nestling down into his arms by the fire in the night-watchman's cabin, and the stupor of exhaustion in which she had sunk down upon her hay bed, while the smooth, gliding motion of the _Sarah Dawkes_ soothed her pain into unconsciousness.

Then she recalled the awakening in the dainty white bed of the Cottage Hospital, Denzil's visit, and Denzil's extraordinary kindness; and so her mind flitted on to the final scene in the old summer-house. She had vowed to be this man's wife!

Oh, no, it was a very different man to whom her promise had been given. Somebody who was humble and fervent, not cold and mocking. Somebody who loved her very much, not somebody who despised her. She turned and looked at Felix. Having made her as comfortable as he could, he was seated in his corner reading a Russian newspaper. He had asked her just such questions as seemed necessary, but no more. He had not, in so many words, asked her whether she were engaged to Denzil. Apparently he accepted as final the letter she had written to him. She began thinking, striving to remember exactly what she had said in that letter. And as she gazed at him, at the firm line between his lips, the squareness of his jaw, the breadth of his well-modeled forehead, she thought that had he come in person to claim her, instead of writing, she would hardly have found courage to say him nay.

In a sudden access of indignation she resolved not to let her mind dwell upon a person who, evidently, was not concerning himself with her at all. She turned her eyes upon the ribbon of road that wriggled like a snake before them, away into the unknown. She marked the glowing sun move downward toward the west. She watched the gesticulations of the uncouth driver, and the lines of the far horizon. How would she have been feeling had the evening been stealing down upon her all alone in the wild plain, with that man as her sole companion? She knew that she should not have dared to close her eyes.

She felt thankful that she had met Felix before seeing Denzil--before the brothers had met. Yet now that she saw her former lover, she found him so unlike her memory of him, that it was almost like beginning all over again with a stranger. Yet not quite. That glittering vein of vivid memory which danced before her eyes in the dull rock of the past--surely he shared it? How much--how little did he remember?

As the slow hours rolled by she began to wonder whether he meant to send her altogether to Coventry. He was now no longer reading his paper, but sat gazing upon the distance with fixed eyes, and lips so firmly folded that it seemed they could never unclose. She felt that at all costs she must break this weird silence. It was charged with too much feeling.

"David," she said, pitifully, "talk to me a little."

He turned slowly towards her. His eyes rested upon her face, severely critical, she thought. "My conversation can be of very little interest to you, Miss Leigh, I fear. We live quite out of the world at Savlinsky."

"But," said Rona, battling with a most unusual sensation of being snubbed, "the news we last heard of you was such as to cause us profound anxiety"--she snipped her sentence off short, because of the satirical curve of the young man's lips.

"That is surprising, though gratifying," he said, with irony. "But I have no adventures to recount to you. I have spent the last month and more in prison."

Rona was startled out of her attitude of reserve. "In prison!" she cried in horror.

"_Again_--you were about to add," he suggested with a sneer.

She quivered at the unjust taunt. But she dared not reproach him. She dare not trench upon any subject which would unlock the past. Her letter lay like an iron bar between them. She guessed that he felt it as strongly as she did.

"Do you wish not to tell me anything about it?" she asked with quiet pride, when she had swallowed her feeling.

"I am really more than sorry to have given poor Denzil another false scare," said Felix. "By the way, I hardly like to ask it--but do you object to my smoking?"

"Of course not," she said, impatiently.

"I was forgetting. Perhaps you will join me?" he went on, with elaborate politeness, offering a silver box of cigarettes.

She shook her head without a word, with nothing but a gesture of refusal. He lit up, tossed away his match, and leaning forward, remarked, with his eyes fixed upon the side of the road, "This is the second time he has thought that he has got rid of me--that I was safely and permanently out of his way. And once more I turn up! I assure you I pity him. And, really, I am not so much to blame as one might think, either this time or last time. In Deptford, you know how it was that I failed to eliminate myself. This time, I could not have ceased to exist without pretty well breaking up dear old Vronsky. But it's rough on Denzil, all the same."

Rona was filled with indignation. "You do your brother great injustice," she said, warmly.

"I always did, I fancy," was the cool response. "My opinion can, however, matter very little to him, who has so much besides."

There was a pause, the girl too much hurt to speak. Perhaps he felt that he had been cruel, for after a while, he went on--"But what is it that you wish to know?"--and his voice was more gentle. "About my disappearing? Well, to say the truth, that was a plot, arranged between the Governor and myself. Let me see--I believe I have mentioned to you a person called Cravatz?--Ah, of course, you already know that he was executed this morning. Well, we found out that Cravatz had a spy in Vronsky's service, and I disappeared in order to throw them off the scent. Everything depended upon Vronsky not being in the know. So I was waylaid upon the road, between the Governor's house and Savlinsky, and ostensibly kidnapped. But I was all the time at Nicolashof, within a few miles of the poor old chap. After a while, the Governor contrived to give him a hint, though too late, unfortunately, to prevent his stirring up Denzil about the matter. As soon as Cravatz was taken, the Governor sent down a party to Gretz, on Government business, and I went with them, disguised as one of the police. It was well managed. Nobody but Vronsky knows where I have been all the time. Quite a plot, was it not?"

"Most romantic," said Rona, copying the coldness of his tone. "I understand that the Governor's daughter is charming, so that, no doubt, relieved the dullness of your captivity. The anxiety of your brother and--and your other friends was a small matter."

He regarded her with some surprise before he replied.

"When I fell in with the Governor's plan, there was, to the best of my belief, no human creature but Vronsky who would feel the least concern about me. I had not then realized that I was supposed to stand between my brother and--his happiness." He paused a moment. "Perhaps, to avoid returning to an awkward subject, I had better say at once that I duly received your letter, though not until I emerged from my captivity; and that, of course, I resign all claim to--to something that is not mine, and never was."

She made no reply. She looked upon the broad, dusty back of the driver, who inquisitively glanced round every second minute, wondering what the foreigners were saying to one another. It was impossible to break through the wall that Felix had erected. She stared straight in front of her, and wondered how she could bear the long days of companionship which stretched before them.

He turned from her, to search in a bag, which he carried. "I have some English books here," he said, coolly. "Possibly you may not have read them all. Nadia Stepanovna has an English lady living with her, and they lent me some books to beguile the tedium of the journey."

"You are very kind. I will try to keep quiet for the future, and not annoy you with attempts to converse," said Rona, with slow, but fierce emphasis. He held out some English novels towards her, and she took them, without looking at them. Picking up one at random, she began to read it, the type dancing before her eyes, her brain absorbing no word of the sense. If this were his attitude, she could play at it too. She had been so steeped in compassion and compunction that she had yearned to tell him something of what she felt, of her difficulties, her anxieties. But since he bore her so bitter a grudge she would not try to explain, far less to apologize. How unlike he was to Denzil! How differently Denzil would have behaved, she told herself furiously. She did not look at him again until the first stage was over, and they were stopping at a post-house for a fresh team.

She saw, in the lovely, lingering northern twilight, the outline of a dark wooden house, surrounded by a somewhat filthy yard, the floor of which was formed of pine logs laid down side by side.

"We can get good tea here," said Felix, "but I think, as the house is pretty dirty, it would be pleasanter to eat our supper on the grass. If you think so, I will go and see about it, but if you prefer to go in, there is a guest-room."

She preferred to stay without. Never in all her life had she seen anything so beautiful as the starry sky which enveloped the Steppe from marge to marge.

The color ranged from rose tint upon the west, to deepest sapphire on the eastern side. The north was shot with pale amethyst, and the south was turquoise. She sat upon a rug whose under surface was mackintosh, her arms round her knees, reflecting bitterly how glorious this night, this adventure, this picnic would have been had she had a congenial companion.

Felix and the landlady of the little place brought out a delicious meal, and she was surprised to find how sharp her appetite was in the invigorating air.

"The man will go on as soon as we have done eating," said Felix. "They always drive all night. I shall make you comfortable, and you will sleep, I hope, with the protection of the mosquito net. Then, to-morrow morning, when you are rested, I will take possession, and have my sleep, though I daresay I shall get a nap sitting beside the driver."

She made some polite objections, but he did not seem to hear them. He went about, when he had finished his meal, arranging all for her comfort, and when the horses were ready they mounted into the povosska, and she lay down upon the soft rugs he had prepared. She thought at first that the motion would prevent her sleeping; but it was surprising how quickly she sank into profound slumber, though first she relieved her feelings by a flood of tears. When she awoke, it was only with the stopping of the carriage. It was early morning, and there greeted her the sight of a large village, with cottages and a tall church, and a delicious scent of coffee upon the air.

Here the woman was cleaner, and had plenty of hot water. Rona had brought her own soap and towels, so she retired into the guest-room by the advice of Felix, and made her toilet. They were off again, however, with but small delay, and Felix took her place and slept until about ten o'clock, when he woke, and produced an appetizing second _déjeuner_ of tongue, rolls and butter, with excellent wine from his stores.

The day was radiant. Through its hot hours Felix slept, and Rona admired the view, read her book, and amused herself by asking the driver the names of such things as horse, whip, road, knife, plate, etc., and trying to repeat them after him.

When again the sun set, Felix and she had hardly interchanged a word all day, except upon the subject of stoppages, meals, and so on.

The young man looked after her comfort in all possible ways, and showed her every consideration. But his idea of sleeping alternately left them but little of each other's society; and he was evidently determined not to address to her one unnecessary word.

When they made their evening stoppage she realized, with astonishment, that all day long her disturbed thoughts had been fixed upon the younger brother. Her anxiety about Denzil had faded from her mind: she had barely remembered him.

It occurred to her to picture her reflections as they would have been had she made the journey alone. The image of Denzil, ill, suffering, lonely, craving for her, would have been continually evoked, to give her courage to complete her enterprise. She would have arrived at Savlinsky with her whole heart full of the thought of him.

The presence of Felix, in his mood of disapproving criticism, changed all. It was he upon whom her consideration was fixed: he and his relation to herself.

He inspired her with a feeling of self-condemnation, which she angrily repudiated, but from which she could not escape. She argued the thing in and out to herself all day, with increasing perturbation. Argue as she might, she came to no conclusion. Exonerate herself as she might, she could not shake off her unreasonable sense of guilt.

Felix, who had perhaps not fallen asleep at once, nor easily, awoke only with the cessation of motion, and, hastily arising, stumbled into the rest-house to make his toilet.

Rona, left to herself, descended from the povosska, and strolled about to stretch her cramped limbs, gazing with interest upon the little village which here surrounded the post-house. There was a cluster of wooden chalets, and, upon a mound hardly to be called a hill, a small church, also of wood, lifted its unpretentious finger to Heaven, gilded by the evening sunbeams.

The girl walked up to it, and noticed that a flight of steps led up, outside the tower, to a wooden balcony surrounding the base of the spire, whence, probably, the bell was rung, as in many of the old churches in Brittany.

It occurred to Rona that there must be a fine view of the surrounding country from the balcony, and that it would be interesting to ascend, and gaze upon the rolling steppe from its not very considerable altitude. She did so, and stood there in the effulgent light, looking down upon the tiny cluster of human occupation, which seemed merely to punctuate, without breaking, the vast encompassing solitude.

Siberia!

There it lay outspread at her feet, the minute section of the huge land which her finite human vision could embrace.

How hard, when sitting upon the lawn at Normansgrave, to realize that Siberia existed all the time; that the sun was shining upon these strange places, illuminating the paths of these weird members of the great human family in their isolation!

The sounds that rose to her from below--the voices of children, the trampling of horses, the faint stir village life--had the effect of drops of water falling into an abyss of encircling silence, a measureless void. It was almost terrible.

In that wide setting, she and Felix!

And they were unwilling, uncongenial companions.

The whole meaning and value of human companionship seemed to be revealed by the touch of the infinite desolation. The inter-dependence of two human beings must be, in such a place, their sole refuge. How foolish, how petty, to let injuries rankle, in circumstances so profound, in spaces so immense!

She saw the sun-steeped champaign through a mist of unshed tears.

Two or three village children, filled with curiosity, had trotted after her to the church, and were at play below, with half their attention fixed upon the almost unparalleled sight of the foreign lady on the tower. Rona felt in her purse for some copper coins for them, and she descended the steps, purse in hand, looking at her money, and not where she placed her feet.

The children had been playing with a ball, which had fallen upon one of the steps. In the absorbing interest of watching the lady descend, they dare not advance to pick it up. Rona trod upon it, slipped, and, her hands being occupied, was unable to recover herself. She fell with some violence, and as the steps were not straight, but turned a corner, she was precipitated against the rail, and struck her side with such force as to take away her breath for a moment, and to render her unable to pick herself up from the place where she fell, or to do anything but gasp and struggle to keep back tears.

The pain was acute; so much so as to render her for a time unconscious of anything else. She sat doubled together in her agony, a cold sweat broke out upon her, she could only draw her breath with difficulty, and she was beset with a deadly fear. This was much the fashion of her fall of two years ago. Suppose she had set alight any lurking mischief that was there? Dread of having done so combined with the pain to make her sick and faint.

For some agonizing minutes there was no diminution of her suffering. The children, as children will do all the world over, stood solemnly staring at the course of events, as at things they had not power to alter.

Rona lay and sobbed and hugged herself, until by degrees the intolerable nature of the pain began to lessen. She could draw her breath more easily. The sick, trembling faintness slowly dissipated itself.

The beautiful breeze of the evening wandered by and fanned her white face. Presently she felt able to slip a hand into her pocket for her handkerchief and wipe her forehead and lips with it. She leaned her head against the rough wood of the upright of the balustrade and closed her eyes.

Thank God, the pain was subsiding, and she began, almost at once, to school herself, and resolve that nobody should know what had happened. Nobody! In all her world just then there was but one body, namely--Felix.

Holding by the rail, she very slowly raised herself to her feet.

There, below her on the ground, lay her purse, the scattered coins in it strewn in every direction. The children had not touched it.

She crept down the few remaining steps, and, still obliged to support herself, made signs that they should pick up the money and purse and restore it to her. But the wild things took fright the moment they saw her take notice of them. They fled, and she sat down despairingly, not liking to go away and leave her wealth upon the ground, yet feeling that if she stooped she would faint away.

At the moment she saw Felix approaching. He looked surprised to find her seated upon the dusty step. "Supper is ready," he said. "Will you come?" Then he saw that she was very white, and added hastily, "Are you ill?"

She shook her head without speaking. He came nearer. "Something is the matter," he said.

She spoke with difficulty. "I'm shaken. I fell down these stairs. I trod upon something that--rolled. I am so sorry. If you will excuse me, I will come--soon."

His expression changed, and grew concerned. "You have hurt yourself. You can hardly speak," he asserted.

"It's getting better, fast--only it was a shock," she said, bravely trying for a smile. "I wonder if you would be so very kind as to pick up my--purse for me."

"Shall I get you some water or something?" he asked, anxiously.

She shook her head. "I am getting better. I shall be able to walk directly."

"Where are you hurt?" he inquired, kneeling beside her. His face expressed more than concern.

She felt a troubling of the senses, a commotion of the heart as she replied, "Oh, nowhere in particular. I--fell--against the railing. Just bruised a little--and it took away my breath."

He knelt there, gazing upon her with an intensity which she felt she could hardly bear. In the stillness each of them, in fancy, was back in the Deptford lodging. She guessed something of the thoughts in his mind.

"I shall be all right--I'm quite, perfectly strong," she eagerly assured him.

It seemed that he was unable to speak. To hide his emotion he turned from her, and began to collect the coins and put them back in the pretty silver-mounted purse.

"I suppose," he asked presently, speaking with his back to her, "that you don't remember how much you had?"

"I remember there were four--no, five--pieces of gold, and about a pound's worth of silver."

"Then I think I have got most of it." Still kneeling with his back to her, he opened the central division of the purse to put the gold inside it. Something lay there, safely shut in. It was a slender silver chain with half a broken sixpence attached to it by a ring.

Feelings such as he could not name shook the young man from head to foot. In his male selfishness, or not realizing what the girl was suffering, he turned round upon her, swift and keen, an angry glitter in his eyes because of the tears in his heart.

"I had better throw this away, had I not?" said he.

"Throw what away?" faltered Rona in surprise, and then in an instant realized what he had found. And again she blushed--blushed furiously--the stain of her former emotion having hardly faded from her cheeks. She turned away her head to hide the mingled feeling in her face. She was desperately hurt, she was ashamed, she was indignant ... she was something else too. What was it?

She knew not. There was no name for the strange force which shook her, as she managed to reply.

"Certainly not. Put it back where you found it."

There was a suggestion of his having pried unwarrantably into her purse's secret compartment.

"Let me give it to one of the children in the village," he said, in a low voice, urgently. "As long as you keep it you are acting a lie; you are acknowledging my claim. If I throw it away you are free."

She managed to speak at last. "I do acknowledge your claim. It is you who have renounced me. Denzil said there could be nothing binding between us until you and he had met--face to face."

She spoke with difficulty, with anguish, with a curious intensity. "It is you who will not listen," she said, "who have settled that we are to be ... as we are. I am perfectly miserable."

She stopped abruptly. If she died for it, Felix should not see her cry.

He knelt before her, the broken coin in his hand. "I am a brute," he said. "Oh, what a brute I am! And you are in pain! Forgive me!"

He hastily replaced the little token, fastened her purse, and handed it to her.

"Let me help you up," he said, stooping over her, with a voice most different from the hard, flippant tones he had used hitherto.

She looked up bravely. "I am----" she began, but broke off. She was not feeling well enough to have things out with him. "Yes, I fear I must hold on to you," she admitted. She grasped his arm with both hands, and so drew herself slowly to her feet.

"I can walk," she said firmly, "if I may hold on tight."

"As tight as you like," he replied. "Shall I--might I--carry you?"

"I don't think I could bear it," she replied, and then, seeing a double meaning in her own words, "I mean"--hastily--"that I have hurt myself, and could not bear to be touched."

"I would touch you gently."

"Yes," she answered, low. "I know you would. I remember that you did. I remember--very well."

He answered absently, as they moved slowly along together. "How it all comes back!" He stopped, gazing round. "What is it, just here, that brings the wharf and the Thames, and everything, flashing back like a snap-shot on my mind?"

They were standing just beside a rick of newly-cut steppe grass. "The scent of the hay," she whispered.

With a touch of her hand she urged him on. He said no more. No further word passed his lips until they reached the rest-house.