Jason: A Romance Page 25

  XXV

  MEDEA GOES OVER TO THE ENEMY

  They were near the east end of the rond point, in a space wherefir-trees stood and the ground underfoot was covered with dry needles.

  "I was just on my way to--our bench beyond the fountain," said she.

  And Ste. Marie nodded, looking upon her sombrely. It seemed to him thathe looked with new eyes, and after a little time, when he did not speak,but only gazed in that strange manner, the girl said:

  "What is it? Something has happened. Please tell me what it is."

  Something like the pale foreshadow of fear came over her beautiful faceand shrouded her golden voice as if it had been a veil.

  "Your father," said Ste. Marie, heavily, "has just been telling me--thatyou are to marry young Arthur Benham. He has been telling me."

  She drew a quick breath, looking at him, but after a moment she said:

  "Yes, it is true. You knew it before, though, didn't you? Do you meanthat you didn't know it before? I don't quite understand. You must haveknown that. What, in Heaven's name, _did_ you think?" she cried, as ifwith a sort of anger at his dulness.

  The man rubbed one hand wearily across his eyes.

  "I--don't quite know," said he. "Yes, I suppose I had thought of it. Idon't know. It came to me with such a--shock! Yes. Oh, I don't know. Iexpect I didn't think at all. I--just didn't think."

  Abruptly his eyes sharpened upon her, and he moved a step forward.

  "Tell me the truth!" he said. "Do you love this boy?"

  The girl's cheeks burned with a swift crimson and she set her lipstogether. She was on the verge of extreme anger just then, but after alittle the flush died down again and the dark fire went out of her eyes.She made an odd gesture with her two hands. It seemed to express fatigueas much as anything--a great weariness.

  "I like him," she said. "I like him--enough, I suppose. He is good--andkind--and gentle. He will be good to me. And I shall try very, veryhard, to make him happy."

  Quite suddenly and without warning the fire of her anger burned upagain. She flamed defiance in the man's face.

  "How dare you question me?" she cried. "What right have you to ask mequestions about such a thing? You--what you are!"

  Ste. Marie bent his head.

  "No right, Mademoiselle," said he, in a low voice. "I have no right toask you anything--not even forgiveness. I think I am a little madto-day. It--this news came to me suddenly. Yes, I think I am a littlemad."

  The girl stared at him and he looked back with sombre eyes. Once more hewas stabbed with intolerable pain to think what she was. Yet in aninexplicable fashion it pleased him that she should carry out hertrickery to the end with a high head. It was a little less base, doneproudly. He could not have borne it otherwise.

  "Who are you," the girl cried, in a bitter resentment, "that you shouldunderstand? What do you know of the sort of life I have led--we have ledtogether, my father and I? Oh, I don't mean that I'm ashamed of it! Wehave nothing to feel shame for, but you simply do not know what such alife is."

  Though he writhed with pain, the man nodded over her. He was so gladthat she could carry it through proudly, with a high hand, an erecthead.

  She spread out her arms before him, a splendid and tragic figure.

  "What chance have I ever had?" she demanded. "No, I am not blaming him.I am not blaming my father. I chose to follow him. I chose it. But whatchance have I had? Think of the people I have lived among. Would youhave me marry one of them--one of those men? I'd rather die. And yet Icannot go on--forever. I am twenty now. What if my father--You yourselfsaid yesterday--Oh, I am afraid! I tell you I have lain awake at night ahundred times and shivered with cold, terrible fear of what would becomeof me if--if anything should happen--to my father. And so," she said,"when I met Arthur Benham last winter, and he--began to--he said--whenhe begged me to marry him.... Ah, can't you see? It meantsafety--safety--safety! And I liked him. I like him now--very, verymuch. He is a sweet boy. I--shall be happy with him--in a peacefulfashion. And my father--Oh, I'll be honest with you," said she. "It wasmy father who decided me. He was--he is--so pathetically pleased withit. He so wants me to be safe. It's all he lives for now. I--couldn'tfight against them both, Arthur and my father, so I gave in. And thenwhen Arthur had to be hidden we came here with him--to wait."

  She became aware that the man was staring at her with something strangeand terrible in his gaze, and she broke off in wonder. The air of thatwarm summer morning turned all at once keen and sharp aboutthem--charged with moment.

  "Mademoiselle!" cried Ste. Marie. "Mademoiselle, are you telling me thetruth?"

  For some obscure reason she was not angry. Again she spread out herhands in that gesture of weariness. She said, "Oh, why should I lie toyou?" And the man began to tremble exceedingly. He stretched out anunsteady hand.

  "You--knew Arthur Benham last winter?" he said. "Long before his--beforehe left his home? Before that?"

  "He asked me to marry him last winter," said the girl. "For a long, longtime I--wouldn't. But he never let me alone. He followed me everywhere.And my father--"

  Ste. Marie clapped his two hands over his face, and a groan came to herthrough the straining fingers. He cried, in an agony: "Mademoiselle!Mademoiselle!"

  He fell upon his knees at her feet, his head bent in what seemed to bean intolerable anguish, his hands over his hidden face. The girl heardhard-wrung, stumbling, incoherent words wrenched each with an effort outof extreme pain.

  "Fool! Fool!" the man cried, groaning. "Oh, fool that I have been! Worm,animal! Oh, fool not to see--not to know! Madman, imbecile, thingwithout a name!"

  She stood white-faced, smitten with great fear over this abasement. Notthe least and faintest glimmer reached her of what it meant. Shestretched down a hand of protest, and it touched the man's head. As ifthe touch were a stroke of magic, he sprang upright before her.

  "Now at last, Mademoiselle," said he, "we two must speak plainlytogether. Now at last I think I see clear, but I must know beyond doubtor question. Oh, Mademoiselle, now I think I know you for what you are,and it seems to me that nothing in this world is of consequence besidethat. I have been blind, blind, blind!... Tell me one thing. Why didArthur Benham leave his home two months ago?"

  "He had to leave it," she said, wondering. She did not understand yet,but she was aware that her heart was beating in loud and fast throbs,and she knew that some great mystery was to be made plain before her.Her face was very white. "He had to leave it," she said again. "_You_know as well as I. Why do you ask me that? He quarrelled with hisgrandfather. They had often quarrelled before--over money--always overmoney. His grandfather is a miser, almost a madman. He tried to makeArthur sign a paper releasing his inheritance--the fortune he is toinherit from his father--and when Arthur wouldn't he drove him away.Arthur went to his uncle--Captain Stewart--and Captain Stewart helpedhim to hide. He didn't dare go back because they're all against him, allhis family. They'd make him give in."

  Ste. Marie gave a loud exclamation of amazement. The thing wasincredible--childish. It was beyond the maddest possibilities. But evenas he said the words to himself a face came before him--CaptainStewart's smiling and benignant face--and he understood everything. Asclearly as if he had been present, he saw the angry, bewildered boy,fresh from David Stewart's berating, mystified over some commonplacelegal matter requiring a signature. He saw him appeal for sympathy andcounsel to "old Charlie," and he heard "old Charlie's" reply. It waseasy enough to understand now. It must have been easy enough to bringabout. What absurdities could not such a man as Captain Stewart instilinto the already prejudiced mind of that foolish lad?

  His thoughts turned from Arthur Benham to the girl before him, and thatpart of the mystery was clear also. She would believe whatever she wastold in the absence of any reason to doubt. What did she know of oldDavid Stewart or of the Benham family? It seemed to Ste. Marie all atonce incredible that he could ever have believed ill of her--ever havedoubted her honesty. It seemed to him so inc
redible that he could havelaughed aloud in bitterness and self-disdain. But as he looked at thegirl's white face and her shadowy, wondering eyes, all laughter, allbitterness, all cruel misunderstandings were swallowed up in the goldenlight of his joy at knowing her, in the end, for what she was.

  "Coira! Coira!" he cried, and neither of the two knew that he called herfor the first time by her name. "Oh, child," said he, "how they havelied to you and tricked you! I might have known, I might have seen it,but I was a blind fool. I thought--intolerable things. I might haveknown. They have lied to you most damnably, Coira."

  She stared at him in a breathless silence without movement of any sort.Only her face seemed to have turned a little whiter and her great eyesdarker, so that they looked almost black and enormous in that stillface.

  He told her, briefly, the truth: how young Arthur had had frequentquarrels with his grandfather over his waste of money, how after one ofthem, not at all unlike the others, he had disappeared, and how CaptainStewart, in desperate need, had set afoot his plot to get the lad'sgreater inheritance for himself. He described for her old David Stewartand the man's bitter grief, and he told her about the will, about how hehad begun to suspect Captain Stewart, and of how he had traced the lostboy to La Lierre. He told her all that he knew of the whole matter, andhe knew almost all there was to know, and he did not spare himself evenhis misconception of the part she had played, though he softened that asbest he could.

  Midway of his story Mlle. O'Hara bent her head and covered her face withher hands. She did not cry out or protest or speak at all. She made nomore than that one movement, and after it she stood quite still, but thesight of her, bowed and shamed, stripped of pride, as it had been ofgarments, was more than the man could bear.

  He cried her name, "Coira!" And when she did not look up, he called oncemore upon her. He said: "Coira, I cannot bear to see you stand so. Lookat me. Ah, child, look at me! Can you realize," he cried--"can you evenbegin to think what a great joy it is to me to know at last that youhave had no part in all this? Can't you see what it means to me? I canthink of nothing else. Coira, look up!"

  She raised her white face, and there were no tears upon it, but a stillanguish too great to be told. It would seem never to have occurred toher to doubt the truth of his words. She said: "It is I who might haveknown. Knowing what you have told me now, it seems impossible that Icould have believed. And Captain Stewart--I always hated him--loathedhim--distrusted him. And yet," she cried, wringing her hands, "how couldI know? How could I know?"

  The girl's face writhed suddenly with her grief, and she stared up atSte. Marie with terror in her eyes. She whispered: "My father! Oh, Ste.Marie, my father! It is not possible. I will not believe--he cannot havedone this, knowing. My father, Ste. Marie!"

  The man turned his eyes away, and she gave a sobbing cry.

  "Has he," she said, slowly, "done even this for me? Has he given--hishonor, also--when everything else was--gone? Has he given me his honor,too? Oh," she said, "why could I not have died when I was a littlechild? Why could I not have done that? To think that I should have livedto--bring my father to this! I wish I had died. Ste. Marie," she said,pleading with him. "Ste. Marie, do you think--my father--knew?"

  "Let me think," said he. "Let me think! Is it possible that Stewart haslied to you all--to one as to another? Let me think!" His mind ran backover the matter, and he began to remember instances which had seemed tohim odd, but to which he had attached no importance. He rememberedO'Hara's puzzled and uncomprehending face when he, Ste. Marie, hadspoken of Stewart's villany. He remembered the man's indignation overthe affair of the poison, and his fairness in trying to make amends. Heremembered other things, and his face grew lighter and he drew a greatbreath of relief. He said: "Coira, I do not believe he knew. Stewart haslied equally to you all--tricked each one of you." And at that the girlgave a cry of gladness and began to weep.

  As long as men and women continue to stand upon opposite sides of agreat gulf--and that will be as long as they exist together in thisworld--just so long will men continue to be unhappy and ill at ease inthe face of women's tears, even though they know vaguely that tears maymean just anything at all, and by no means always grief.

  Ste. Marie stood first upon one foot and then upon the other. He lookedanxiously about him for succor. He said, "There! there!" or words tothat effect, and once he touched the shoulder of the girl who stoodweeping before him, and he was very miserable indeed.

  But quite suddenly, in the midst of his discomfort, she looked up tohim, and she was smiling and flushed, so that Ste. Marie stared at herin utter amazement.

  "So now at last," said she, "I have back my Bayard. And I think therest--doesn't matter very much."

  "Bayard?" said he, wondering. "I don't understand," he said.

  "Then," said she, "you must just go without understanding. For I shallnever, never explain." The bright flush went from her face and sheturned grave once more. "What is to be done?" she asked. "What must wedo now, Ste. Marie--I mean about Arthur Benham? I suppose he must betold."

  "Either he must be told," said the man, "or he must be taken back to hishome by force." He told her about the four letters which in four days hehad thrown over the wall into the Clamart road. "It was on the chance,"he said, "that some one would pick one of them up and post it, thinkingit had been dropped there by accident. What has become of them I don'tknow. I know only that they never reached Hartley."

  The girl nodded thoughtfully. "Yes," said she, "that was the best thingyou could have done. It ought to have succeeded. Of course--" She pauseda moment and then nodded again. "Of course," said she, "I can manage toget a letter in the post now. We'll send it to-day if you like. But Iwas wondering--would it be better or not to tell Arthur the truth? Itall depends upon how he may take it--whether or not he will believe you.He's very stubborn, and he's frightened about this break with hisfamily, and he is quite sure that he has been badly treated. Will hebelieve you? Of course, if he does believe he could escape from herequite easily at any time, and there'd be no necessity for a rescue. Whatdo you think?"

  "I think he ought to be told," said Ste. Marie. "If we try to carry himaway by force there'll be a fight, of course, and--who knows what mighthappen? That we must leave for a last resort--a last desperate resort.First we must tell the boy." Abruptly he gave a cry of dismay, and thegirl looked up to him, staring. "But--but _you_, Coira!" said he,stammering. "But _you_! I hadn't realized--I hadn't thought--it neveroccurred to me what this means to you." The full enormity of the thingcame upon him slowly. He was asking this girl to help him in robbing herof her lover.

  She shook her head with a little wry smile. "Do you think," said she,"that knowing what I know now I would go on with that until he has madehis peace with his family? Before, it was different. I thought him aloneand ill-treated and hunted down. I could help him then, comfort him. NowI should be--all you ever thought me if I did not send him to hisgrandfather." She smiled again a little mirthlessly. "If his love for meis worth anything," she said, "he will come back--but openly this time,not in hiding. Then I shall know that he is--what I would have him be.Otherwise--"

  Ste. Marie looked away.

  "But you must remember, Coira," said he, "that the lad is very young andthat his family--they may try--it may be hard for him. They may say thathe is too young to know--Ah, child, I should have thought of this!"

  "Ste. Marie," said the girl, and after a moment he turned to face her."What shall you say to Arthur's family, Ste. Marie," she demanded, verysoberly, "when they ask you if I--if Arthur should be allowed to--comeback to me?"

  A wave of color flooded the man's face and his eyes shone. He cried:

  "I shall tell them, Coira, that if that wretched, half-baked lad shouldsearch this wide world round, from Paris on to Paris again, and if heshould spend a lifetime searching, he would never find the beauty andthe sweetness and the tenderness and the true faith that he left behindat La Lierre--nor the hundredth part of them. I should say that you a
reso much above him that he ought to creep to you on his knees from therue de l'Universite to this garden, thanking God that you were here atthe journey's end, and kissing the ground that he dragged himself overfor sheer joy and gratitude. I should tell them--Oh, I have no words! Icould tell them so pitifully little of you! I think I should only say,'Go to her and see!' I think I should just say that."

  The girl turned her head away with a little sob. But afterward she facedhim once more, and she looked up to him with sweet, half-shut eyes for along time. At last she said:

  "For love of whom, Ste. Marie, did you undertake this quest--this searchfor Arthur Benham? It was not in idleness or by way of a whim. It wasfor love. For love of whom?"

  For some strange and inexplicable reason the words struck him like ablow and he stared whitely.

  "I came," he said, at last, and his voice was oddly flat, "for hissister's sake. For love of her."

  Coira O'Hara dropped her eyes. But presently she looked up again with asmile. She said, "God make you happy, my friend."

  And she turned and moved away from him up among the trees. At a littledistance she turned, saying:

  "Wait where you are. I will fetch Arthur or send him to you. He must betold at once."

  Then she went on and was lost to sight.

  Ste. Marie followed a few steps after her and halted. His face wasturned by chance toward the east wall, and suddenly he gave a great cryand smothered it with his hands over his mouth. His knees bent underhim, and he was weak and trembling. Then he began to run. He ran withawkward steps, for his leg was not yet entirely recovered, but he ranfast, and his heart beat within him until he thought it must burst.

  He was making for that spot which was overhung by the half-deadcedar-tree.

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