Part 19

The thought brought back to him the longing for adventure, the lure of the sea. It had been in his blood from boyhood. If he had been born of poorer parents, he would have followed the sea--would perhaps have been a sailor before the mast. As it was, the very tang of salt in the air, the sound of the fog-horn, stirred his blood as a bugle-note stirs a soldier in his sleep.

He longed to go back, to follow the trail, to finish his work! The expedition was ready, and he had only to raise his finger to take the command; but he would not. For her sake he was still willing to give up; for her sake he was covering her husband’s cowardice with a cloak, giving him a share of the glory that his craven spirit had shamed.

His love for her was so strong and so deep that he was willing to pay the price, to pay any price to save her; but she had fled from him, fled from him after he had told her how deeply he loved her. He felt a kind of shame, now, that he had argued with her and tried to make her give up her husband. He remembered, oddly enough, some broken lines of Browning’s. He could not have placed them, but they came back to him like a message and steadied him:

Were it not worthier both than if she gave Herself--in treason to herself--to me?

He repeated the words persistently, and in a way they helped him to compose his thoughts, to recall his conviction that she was right, that she had done the one thing that a good woman--brought up as she had been in the close hedge of conventions--would have done. No matter how her heart might have misled her for a moment, she could do nothing else but return to the man she had married, whose sin--if it had been a sin at all--was not against herself, but against another man--a man who also loved her.

This feeling, this conviction--which was not new, but had all along been lurking in his heart--helped him to calm himself finally. He rose from his stone, which might well have been called a seat of repentance, and made his way back to the old lodgings that he always used on his visits to Mapleton.

The house was kept by a widow, a woman whom his mother had long ago befriended, and she always set his room in order and kept his belongings together. In a way it was like going home. It was the only home he had known for years, and was likely to be the only one he would ever know now, he reflected, as he approached it. As soon as this expedition was under way, as soon as he felt free of the necessity of shielding Faunce, he would find some way to set out himself, he would plunge again into the mist and the mirage of the polar seas.

It was reflections like these that made it almost startling to open the old gate, which had an annoying habit of coming off one hinge--a habit that had clung to it ever since his boyhood--and to feel that it was admitting him again into the commonplace existence that he had left behind him when he started out. There were the same old piazza, the same old dog still asleep on the door-mat, the two porcelain jardinières, with the same straggling begonias that he had seen there spring after spring. There, too, was the parrot that Overton had brought from South America.

He went in, and was half-way up-stairs when a messenger-boy’s sudden arrival on the front porch aroused the dog and the parrot. The boy had brought a telegram, and wanted fifteen cents for carrying it over from the station. Overton paid the money and tore open the yellow envelope. The message was from Faunce.

You are needed to see party about expedition. Can you come at once?

Overton stared at the telegram in some amazement. He had purposely concluded his own connection with the expedition to give Faunce a free hand; he could not imagine what had occurred to bring such a summons. He had arranged with Asher to silence all questions about his own rescue. The English accounts had been too vague, so far, to arouse active suspicions, and the very fact that he had given over the command to Faunce had silenced all rumors. What, then, was the necessity for his immediate presence--a necessity so great that Faunce had summoned him? Undoubtedly there was something unexpected.

He thrust the despatch into his pocket and looked at his watch. He could easily catch an evening train; but, if he did, he might have to see Faunce at his apartment, and he could scarcely hope to avoid seeing Diane also. It was more than he felt able to do at the moment. It would be better for both of them if they did not meet, he thought--at least not now.

He decided to wait until morning, and wrote a reply to the telegram, sending it back by the boy, after paying a further subsidy. Thus fate, playing strange havoc with the affairs of mice and men, held him back a moment when his very presence might have turned the scale, when the flame of that candle in the wind which has been likened unto the life of a man might have been shielded a little longer in the hollow of his hand.

XXXVII

EVERY time Diane tried to pour out a cup of coffee for Arthur Faunce she experienced a feeling of awkwardness. It seemed as if she had thrust herself back into a place that was closed to her. She could not recover the habitude of the _tête-à-tête_ breakfast-table. The man sitting opposite to her did not seem so much her husband as some specter of the man she had married.

Perhaps, she reflected, it was because she had never really known him, because his revelation of himself had destroyed the old order of things, and she had not yet had time to accustom herself to the new. She kept viewing him from a new standpoint all the time, as if she had discovered a stranger. No matter how hard she tried she could not get back to the old angle, the angle that had showed him as a hero and her lover. She was not even sure that he loved her any more, for she saw that the old confidence could not be reestablished.

He, in turn, regarded her as an outsider, a hostile critic at his own fireside, not his helpmeet and his best friend. As she realized this, she felt the shock of it--felt that he, too, had reason to complain. It was harder because they could not speak out and get it over, and find some common ground on which to build up their lives. It was always a relief when they could get away from each other. She felt it so, and she was sure that he did.

If it went on like this, either it would grow to be intolerable, or they would sink into the kind of apathy that she had seen so often--the apathy of a badly mated pair, when neither of them has the courage to find a way of escape. She tried to avoid it, she tried to throw into her manner something of her repentance, her will to do better; but he did not meet her half-way. After the first burst of feeling, the relief of getting her back, he had relapsed into a kind of sullen reserve. He had had a terrible experience in confessing to her, and she felt sure that he had determined never to risk it again; but she ventured, now and then, on commonplace questions, if only for the sake of keeping up conversation.

“I suppose you’re about ready now?” she asked politely, retiring behind the coffee-urn and pretending to be busy with her own cup. “I saw that you and Captain Asher seemed to be quite sure of your arrangements.”

He nodded without looking up from his plate.

“We’ve been ready almost a week. There are only one or two things to delay us now--some changes in the crew at the last minute.”

“You don’t have to see to that, surely?”

She spoke idly, for something to say, and she was surprised when he raised his eyes quickly to hers and she caught a look of furtive alarm in them.

“No, I don’t have to see to that; but some of the old men have been troublesome. They wanted their berths back with more pay; and then we’ve lost two we tried to get. It’s hard to get tried men to volunteer for the sort of trip we’re making.”

She assented to that, and tried to finish her breakfast. Having no appetite, the pretense of eating was difficult. She saw him looking again at his watch--the third time since they had sat down at their meal.

“Have you an appointment?” she asked gently. “You seem in a hurry.”

He thrust his watch back into his pocket. “I’m not in a hurry, I--can you remember what time the trains are due from Mapleton, Di?”

She was startled. Her thoughts leaped to her father, and she felt a queer tightening in her throat.

“There was one due at a quarter to eight, and”--she looked up at the clock on the mantel--“if that’s right, there’s one due now.”

“Perhaps he’s coming on that!” he exclaimed, rising from his seat and going to the window.

His tall figure and wide shoulders rather obscured the light as he stood there, and she viewed him with a return of the feeling that she did not know him.

“Are you expecting any one from home?” she asked weakly, laying down her fork.

He answered without looking around.

“I wired for Overton last night--he’s up there.”

She gasped, but the sound was so slight and so soft that he did not hear her. For a moment she was overwhelmed with a rush of feeling. It seemed impossible that he could have sent for Overton on any business that did not involve her, for her thoughts had been filled with Overton. She had struggled against it, but it had been too strong for her.

She kept contrasting the two, and always, in the end, she seemed to vision that moment of terrible cowardice, the flight of a strong man who was leaving an injured comrade to die. Now, as she looked at him, she saw it again, and it overwhelmed her. She clutched at the edge of the table and held herself erect in her place, but her face was ashen.

“What’s the matter?” she managed to ask at last. “I--I thought he’d given over the command long ago.”

“So he has.” Faunce swung around from the window suddenly and looked at her. He saw, at a glance, the struggle in her mind. “This is about something else--something I thought he’d like to do--for your sake.”

The color came back into her face; she blushed up to her hair.

“What do you mean?”

He continued to regard her, his haggard eyes seemed to cling to her face, but there was an expression of bitterness about his lips.

“Oh, you know! He’s been keeping this whole thing quiet to shelter you. There’s something new come up--I’ve tried to deal with it, and perhaps I’ve failed; I can’t tell yet. But I wasn’t willing to take any risk, so I wired for him.”

“Do you mean you’re asking him to do something more--to sacrifice something more for my sake?”

“My dear girl, don’t worry. He answered the telegram, but he hasn’t come.”

She had risen from her seat, but now she sank back into it again with a sigh of relief.

“I’m so glad!”

He began to walk about the room in his usual restless way.

“You won’t be later on!” he muttered.

She forced herself to speak then.

“If you mean it’s about that--about what happened down there--I think I’d rather it were known. I’d rather pay for it in some way, Arthur, than to feel that any one was protecting us, saving us as an act of mercy.”

“You didn’t do it!” he retorted dryly.

“But it’s mine now--don’t you see?” she went on courageously. “It’s mine, because I’ve taken it up. I’m your wife--I share it all.”

He gave her a strange look. She thought that he was going to break down the barrier at last and speak, that there might yet be hope for them, but he was interrupted. Some one rang the bell in the little outside vestibule, and he started at once to answer it, believing that Overton had come.

Diane thought so, too, and sprang from her chair, looking about for a way to escape without crossing the room where she was sure to come face to face with the visitor. As she reached the door that led into her bedroom, she saw that the caller was a rough-looking man dressed like a sailor, and that he and Faunce stood talking--apparently bargaining--near the hall entrance. It was simpler for her to return to her seat at the table and wait until the stranger was gone.

She went back with such a feeling of relief that she found courage to pour out another cup of coffee, and to drink it slowly, while she was trying to think. She was going to accompany Faunce on the expedition, and she had already packed. There was little or nothing left for her to do, except to write a last letter to her father, entreating him to think of her while she was away, and to try to forgive her for doing what she felt it was right for her to do--for returning to her husband.

She was thinking of this, trying to frame it in her mind, when Faunce suddenly returned. She looked up as he entered, and saw that his usually pale face was deeply flushed, and his eyes had the feverish look that she had noticed when she first came back. Something in his expression made her turn in her seat and exclaim:

“What is it? What’s the matter?”

He came over to the table and stood leaning on it with both hands, his expression heavy with some pent-up emotion.

“I want to borrow some money immediately,” he said slowly. “I’ve put about all my spare cash in--can you lend me anything, Diane?”

She saw his embarrassment and rose quickly.

“I’ll get my check-book. I haven’t got much, Arthur. You know papa’s angry, and he’ll give me nothing but my mother’s; but I can spare you five hundred dollars, I think.”

He hesitated.

“That’ll do,” he said after a moment.

She left him, and returned almost immediately with her check-book. There was a desk in the corner, and she went to it and sat down, looking hastily over her accounts. Her heart sank, for she had a sudden swift intuition that the man in the next room wanted it. Was it blackmail? She dared not ask, but she looked up.

“I can spare you six hundred.”

Faunce did not reply and she turned in her chair, looking back at him over her shoulder. He was standing erect beside the table, his arms folded on his breast and his head bent. She could not make out the expression of his face, and she thought that he had not heard her.

She repeated her statement. He roused himself and raised his head.

“Never mind about it now,” he said. “I’ve thought better of it. I’ve decided I can do without it.”

She turned completely around, facing him.

“Of course I should be glad to help you, Arthur.”

He thanked her, turning toward her with a look that suddenly softened her mood, for his smile was tender and sad.

“I don’t want it,” he repeated. “I--I’ve just made up my mind. I’m going out but I’ll be back as soon as I can. If Overton comes here, tell him to go down to the pier; he’ll probably find me on the ship.”

She tried to stop him, to tell him that she would not be there to see Overton, that she must go out on some errands; but apparently he did not hear her. He left the room, and she heard some sharp talk outside before he went out with his visitor and left her alone.

It was some time before she got control of herself and decided what to do. The thought that she must face Overton again so soon was almost intolerable; at the moment her sensation was one of sheer panic, and she determined to escape it at any cost.

There had been no time since her return to secure a maid, and she had been putting the apartment in order and setting aside the breakfast things before the caretaker came to wash the dishes; but she did not stop now even for such simple tasks as these. She hurried back to her room and put on an outdoor dress and hat. Having picked up her parasol and gloves, she was on her way to the outer door when it opened suddenly and Overton himself stood on the threshold.

They stood speechless for a moment, looking at each other. Strange as it seemed to her then, she was the first to recover her self-command.

“Arthur had to go out, but he wanted me to tell you that he’d gone to the ship, and you might find him by going at once to the pier.”

His face changed and flushed deeply.

“I’ll go there immediately. I understand that I’m wanted, though I don’t know why. But”--he hesitated--“before I go I want to ask--your forgiveness.”

She was aware of a strange sensation, as if the universe moved under her feet and the room was darkening before her eyes; but she rallied all her strength as she tried to answer him.

“There’s--there’s nothing to forgive.”

“There’s so much to forgive that I feel--and I want you to know that I feel--that the score between us, between your husband and myself, is wiped out--or, rather, that it’s against me. I did him an injury greater than his injury to me, and I was more cowardly--I tried to take you away from him!”

“When you say that, you accuse me, too!” she replied, her voice breaking a little. “I--it was worse for me than for you and----”

“No, no--not worse for you! I was the man, and I saw more plainly the consequences to you, the ruin of your high purpose, of that beautiful soul that I had worshiped in you. I tried”--he drew a long breath, his eyes dark with emotion--“I tried to drag you down to my level, to play upon your tenderness and your memories of our youth together. But when your father told me--after I’d got over some of the anguish of losing you, I--I thanked God that I’d done nothing worse, that I could come here still and beg your pardon!”

“Don’t speak to me like that!” she exclaimed. “Don’t bring it back. Let’s forget it, let’s forget there was ever a moment when we seemed so--so near to each other, because it couldn’t be! There’s nothing for me to forgive that I oughtn’t to ask you to forgive, too. And for me--it was worse than for you. Besides that, we, my husband and I, feel that we’re bound to you, that you’ve given up so much to shelter him. I suppose I ought to thank you for that, too, but I can’t--I can’t now!”

“There’s nothing to thank me for, nothing that I haven’t been glad to do for your sake.”

As she spoke, he turned back toward the door. The edge of emotion was worn so thin that a touch might break through, and he dared not stay longer. But to Diane the moment had come with a revelation; she felt her strength coming back to her with almost a feeling of relief. She had passed through a great crisis, and she had returned to her husband. It seemed to her that that bare fact suddenly armed her with a power of resistance which she had never suspected she possessed, and her voice was almost tranquil when she answered him.

“Whether it’s for my sake or for his, I do thank you! And there’s one thing more I want to ask you. You’ve seen my father--do you think he’ll ever be willing to forgive me?”

“I’m sure he will; he must. For the moment--you know how violently he feels at first; but you’re all he’s got!”

Her eyes filled with tears, and Overton saw them.

“I must go,” he said gently. “For the last time--Diane, good-by!”

She held out her hand, and he clasped it warmly. There was a moment of deep emotion, and she stood watching him as he turned and went slowly out of the room.

XXXVIII

IT was late in the afternoon before Diane returned to the apartment. After Overton’s departure she had found it impossible to stay there alone all through the hours that must pass while she waited her husband’s return. The crowd and hurry and noise in the streets had helped her to pass through that inward crisis which had meant so much to her. Silence and solitude would have beaten down upon her like rain and drenched her with misery; but out in the open air, with that upward glimpse of the sun which is all that the narrow streets permit to a New Yorker, she began to rouse herself to face the days and weeks that would lengthen out into years before her, if she lived, and would bring no material uplift, unless--the thought shot through her mind as a ray of sunshine sometimes penetrates a black forest--unless her husband suffered some change of heart.

Something in him, something vague and elusive, but still tantalizing her with a fleeting vista of change, had perplexed her. But his attitude had been the same; it had been the same up to the moment when he had decided that he would not use the loan.

The remembrance of that stung her with apprehension. Was there still to be something to hide, something to fear? It would be intolerable if it went on like that! She tried not to think of it, she tried to think only of Overton’s reassurance about her father, and of the one thing that gave her comfort--the fact that she had returned to her husband. Her duty in that was now so clear to her that she wondered that she had ever faltered, and the very fact that she had done so shamed her. Yet she had been strong enough at last to see the right way and return to it, and that was a reassurance.

It carried her through the day, and brought her back at last without the shiver of dread that had shaken her the first time she found her way to her husband’s quarters--a dread that she had never been able to shake off after his confession. But now she came quietly back, stopping for a moment where Overton had stood, and looking about her.

She was surprised that she felt none of the tumult and storm of the day when he had held her hands in the golden mist, the day when she had almost yielded, almost followed the call of her old love for him. She was aware of a new quietude, an aloofness of spirit, and a great throb of relief shot through her. She knew that her task would be easier, that the way was smoothing before her feet.