A Whisper In The Dark Part 10

"It must seem very selfish and ungrateful in us to be so glad. Come, Felix, and amuse him as well as me," she said, in a tone meant for his ear alone. But Helwyze heard both question and answer.

"I have been court-fool long enough. 'Tis a thankless office, and I am tired of it," replied Canaris, in the tone of a prisoner asked to go back when the door of his cell stands open.

"I must go, for there is Jean with coffee. Follow, like a good boy, when you have put your posy into a song, which I will set to music by and by, as your reward," said Gladys, turning reluctantly away.

"You make goodness so beautiful, that it is easy to obey.

There is my posy set to music at once, for you are a song without words, caria;" and Canaris threw the vine about her neck, with a look and a laugh which made it hard for her to go.

Jean not only brought coffee, but the card of a friend for Felix, who went away, promising to return. Gladys carefully prepared the black and fragrant draught which Helwyze loved, and presented it, with a sweet friendliness of mien which would have made hemlock palatable, he thought.

"Shall I sing to you till Felix comes to give you something better?" she asked, offering her best, as if anxious to atone for the sin of being happy at the cost of pain to another.

"Talk a little first. There will be time for both before he remembers us again," answered Helwyze, motioning her to a seat beside him, with the half-imperative, half-courteous, look and gesture habitual to him.

"He will not forget: Felix always keeps his promises to me," said Gladys, with an air of gentle pride, taking her place, not beside, but opposite, Helwyze, on the couch where Elaine had laid not long ago.

This involuntary act of hers gave a tone to the conversation which followed; for Helwyze, being inwardly perturbed, was seized with a desire to hover about dangerous topics: and, seeing her sit there, so near and yet so far, so willing to serve, yet so completely mistress of herself, longed to ruffle that composure, if only to make her share the disquiet of which she was the cause.

"Always?" he said, lifting his brows with an incredulous expression, as he replied to her a.s.sertion.

"I seldom ask any promise of him, but when I do, he always keeps it. You doubt that?"

"I do."

"When you know him as well as I, you will believe it."

"I flatter myself that I know him better; and, judging from the past, should call him both fickle and, in some things, false, even to you."

Up sprung the color to Gladys's cheek, and her eyes shone with sudden fire, but her voice was low and quiet, as she answered quickly- "One is apt to look for what one wishes to find: I seek fidelity and truth, and I shall not be disappointed. Felix may wander, but he will come back to me: I have learned how to hold him now."

"Then you are wiser than I. Pray impart the secret;" and, putting down his cup, Helwyze regarded her intently, for he saw that the spirit of the woman was roused to defend her wifely rights.

"Nay, I owe it to you; and, since it has prevailed against your enchantress, I should thank you for it."

The delicate emphasis on the words, "your enchantress," enlightened him to the fact that Gladys divined, in part at least, the cause of Olivia's return. He did not deny, but simply answered, with a curious contrast between the carelessness of the first half of his reply, with the vivid interest of the latter- "Olivia has atoned for her sins handsomely. But what do you owe me? I have taught you nothing. I dare not try."

"I did not know my own power till you showed it to me; unintentionally, I believe, and unconsciously, I used it to such purpose that Felix felt pride in the wife whom he had thought a child before. I mean the night I sang and acted yonder, and did both well, thanks to you."

"I comprehend, and hope to be forgiven, since I gave you help or pleasure," he answered, with no sign of either confusion or regret, though the thought shot through his mind, "Can she remember what came after?"

"Questionable help, and painful pleasure, yet it was a memorable hour and a useful one; so I pardon you, since after the troubled delusion comes a happy reality."

There was a double meaning in her words, and a double reproach in the glance which went from the spot where she had played her part, to the garland still about her neck.

"Your yoke is a light one, and you wear it gracefully. Long may it be so."

Helwyze thought to slip away thus from the subject; for those accusing eyes were hard to meet. But Gladys seemed moved to speak with more than her usual candor, as if anxious to leave no doubts behind her; and, sitting in the self-same place, uttered words which moved him even more than those which she had whispered in her tormented sleep.

"No, my yoke is not light;" she said, in that grave, sweet voice of hers, looking down at the mystic purple blossom on her breast, with the symbols of a divine pa.s.sion at its heart. "I put it on too ignorantly, too confidingly, and at times the duties, the responsibilities, which I a.s.sumed with it weigh heavily. I am just learning how beautiful they are, how sacred they should be, and trying to prove worthy of them. I know that Felix did not love as I loved, when he married me-from pity, I believe. No one told me this: I felt, I guessed it, and would have given him back his liberty, if, after patient trial, I had found that I could not make him happy."

"Can you?"

"Yes, thank G.o.d! not only happy, but good; and henceforth duty is delight, for I can teach him to love as I love, and he is glad to learn of me."

Months before, when the girl Gladys had betrayed her maiden tenderness, she had glowed like the dawn, and found no language but her blushes; now the woman sat there steadfast and pa.s.sion-pale, owning her love with the eloquence of fervent speech; both pleading and commanding, in the name of wifehood and motherhood, for the right to claim the man she had won at such cost.

"And if you fail?"

"I shall not fail, unless you come between us. I have won Olivia's promise not to tempt Felix's errant fancy with her beauty. Can I not win yours to abstain from troubling his soul with still more harmful trials? It is to ask this that I speak now, and I believe I shall not speak in vain."

"Why?"

Helwyze bent and looked into her face as he uttered that one word below his breath. He dared do no more; for there was that about her, perilously frank and lovely though she was, which held in check his lawless spirit, and made it reverence, even while it rebelled against her power over him.

She neither shrank nor turned aside, but studied earnestly that unmoved countenance which hid a world of wild emotion so successfully, that even her eyes saw no token of it, except the deepening line between the brows.

"Because I am bold enough to think I know you better even than Olivia does; that you are not cold and cruel, and, having given me the right to live for Felix, you will not disturb our peace; that, if I look into your soul, as I looked into my husband's, I shall find there what I seek-justice as well as generosity."

"You shall!"

"I knew you would not disappoint me. For this promise I am more grateful than words can express, since it takes away all fear for Felix, and shows me that I was right in appealing to the heart which you try to kill. Ah! be your best self always, and so make life a blessing, not the curse you often call it," she added, giving him a smile like sunshine, a cordial glance which was more than he could bear.

"With you I am. Stay, and show me how to do it," he began, stretching both hands towards her with an almost desperate urgency in voice and gesture.

But Gladys neither saw nor heard; for at that moment Felix came through the hall singing one of the few perfect love songs in the world- "Che faro senza Eurydice."

"See, he does keep his promise to me: I knew he would come back!" she cried delightedly, and hurried to meet him, leaving Helwyze nothing but the pa.s.sion-flowers to fill his empty hands.

XV.

Back again, earlier than before. But not to stay long, thank Heaven! By another month we will be truly at home, my Gladys," whispered Canaris, as they went up the steps, in the mellow September sunshine.

"I hope so!" she answered, fervently, and paused an instant before entering the door; for, coming from the light and warmth without, it seemed as dark and chilly as the entrance to a tomb.

"You are tired, love? Come and rest before you see a soul."

With a new sort of tenderness, Canaris led her up to her own little bower, and lingered there to arrange the basket of fresh recruits she had brought for her winter garden: while Gladys lay contentedly on the couch where he placed her, looking about the room as if greeting old friends; but her eyes always came back to him, full of a reposeful happiness which proved that all was well with her.

"There! now the little fellows sit right comfortably in the moss, and will soon feel at home. I'll go find Mother Bland, and see what his Serene Highness is about," said the young man, rising from his work, warm and gay, but in no haste to go, as he had been before.

Gladys remembered that; and when, at last, he left her, she shut her eyes to re-live, in thought, the three blissful months she had spent in teaching him to love her with the love in which self bears no part. Before the happy reverie was half over, the old lady arrived; and, by the time the young one was ready, Canaris came to fetch her.

"My dearest, I am afraid we must give up our plan," he said, softly, as he led her away: "Helwyze is so changed, I come to tell you, lest it should shock you when you see him. I think it would be cruel to go at once. Can you wait a little longer?"

"If we ought. How is he changed?"

"Just worn away, as a rock is by the beating of the sea, till there seems little left of him except the big eyes and greater sharpness of both tongue and temper. Say nothing about it, and seem not to notice it; else he will freeze you with a look, as he did me when I exclaimed."

"Poor man! we will be very patient, very kind; for it must be awful to think of dying with no light beyond," sighed Gladys, touching the cross at her white throat.

"A Dante without a Beatrice: I am happier than he;" and Canaris laid his cheek against hers with the gesture of a boy, the look of a man who has found the solace which is also his salvation.

Helwyze received them quietly, a little coldly, even; and Gladys reproached herself with too long neglect of what she had a.s.sumed as a duty, when she saw how ill he looked, for his summer had not been a blissful one. He had spent it in wishing for her, and in persuading himself that the desire was permissible, since he asked nothing but what she had already given him-her presence and her friendship. It was her intellect he loved and wanted, not her heart; that she might give her husband wholly, since he understood and cared for affection only: her mind, with all its lovely possibilities, Helwyze coveted, and reasoned himself into the belief that he had a right to enjoy it, conscious all the while that his purpose was a delusion and a snare. Olivia had mourned over the moody taciturnity which made a lonely cranny of the cliffs his favorite resort, where he sat, day after day, watching, with an irresistible fascination, the ever-changing sea-beautiful and bitter as the hid den tide of thought and feeling in his own breast, where lay the image of Gladys, as placid, yet as powerful, as the moon which ruled the ebb and flow of that vaster ocean. Being a fatalist for want of a higher faith, he left all to chance, and came home simply resolved to enjoy what was left him as long and as un.o.btrusively as possible; since Felix owed him much, and Gladys need never know what she had prayed not to know.

Sitting at the table, as they sat almost a year ago, he watched the two young faces as he had done then, finding each, unlike his own, changed for the better. Gladys was a girl no longer; and the new womanliness which had come to her was of the highest type, for inward beauty lent its imperishable loveliness to features faulty in themselves, and character gave its indescribable charm to the simplest manners. Helwyze saw all this; and perceiving also how much heart had already quickened intellect, began to long for both, and to grudge his pupil to her new master.

Canaris seemed to have lost something of his boyish comeliness, and had taken on a manlier air of strength and stability, most becoming, and evidently a source of pardonable pride to him. At his age even three months could work a serious alteration in one so easily affected by all influences; and Helwyze felt a pang of envy as he saw the broad shoulders and vigorous limbs, the wholesome color in the cheeks, and best of all, the serene content of a happy heart.

"What have you been doing to yourself, Felix? Have you dis covered the Elixir of Life up there? If so, impart the secret, and let me have a sip," he said, as Canaris pushed away his plate after satisfying a hearty appet.i.te with the relish of a rustic.

"Gladys did," he answered, with a nod across the table, which said much. "She would not let me idle about while waiting for ideas: she just set me to work. I dug acres, it seemed to me, and amazed the gardener with my exploits. Liked it, too; for she was overseer, and would not let me off till I had done my task and earned my wages. A wonderfully pleasant life, and I am the better for it, in spite of my sunburn and blisters;" and Canaris stretched out a pair of sinewy brown hands with an air of satisfaction which made Gladys laugh so blithely it was evident that their summer had been full of the innocent jollity of youth, fine weather, and congenial pastime.

"Adam and Eve in Eden, with all the modern improvements. Not even a tree of knowledge or a serpent to disturb you!"

"Oh, yes, we had them both; but we only ate the good fruit, and the snake did not tempt me!" cried Gladys, anxious to defend her Paradise even from playful mockery.

"He did me. I longed to kill him, but my Eve owed him no grudge, and would not permit me to do it; so the old enemy sunned himself in peace, and went into winter quarters a reformed reptile, I am sure."

Canaris did not look up as he spoke, but Helwyze asked hastily- "I hope you harvested a few fresh ideas for winter work? We ought to have something to show after so laborious a summer."

"I have: I am going to write a novel or a play. I cannot decide which; but rather lean toward the latter, and, being particularly happy, feel inclined to write a tragedy;" and something beside the daring of an ambitious author sparkled in the eyes Canaris fixed upon his patron. It looked too much like the expression of a bondman about to become a freeman to suit Helwyze; but he replied, as imperturbably as ever- "Try the tragedy, by all means: the novel would be beyond you."

"Why, if you please?" demanded Canaris, loftily.

"Because you have neither patience nor experience enough to do it well. Goethe says: "In the novel it is sentiments and events that are exhibited; in the drama it is characters and deeds. The novel goes slowly forward, the drama must hasten. In the novel, some degree of scope may be allowed to chance; but it must be led and guided by the sentiments of the personages. Fate, on the other hand, which, by means of outward, unconnected circ.u.mstances, carries forward men, without their own concurrence, to an unforeseen catastrophe, can only have place in the drama. Chance may produce pathetic situations, but not tragic ones.'"

Helwyze paused there abruptly; for the memory which served him so well outran his tongue, and recalled the closing sentence of the quotation-words which he had no mind to utter then and there-"Fate ought always to be terrible; and it is in the highest sense tragic, when it brings into a ruinous concatenation the guilty man and the guiltless with him."

"Then you think I could write a play?" asked Canaris, with affected carelessness.

"I think you could act one, better than imagine or write it."

"What, I?"

"Yes, you; because you are dramatic by nature, and it is easier for you to express yourself in gesture and tone, than by written or spoken language. You were born for an actor, are fitted for it in every way, and I advise you to try it. It would pay better than poetry; and that stream may run dry."

Gladys looked indignant at what she thought bad advice and distasteful pleasantry; but Canaris seemed struck and charmed with the new idea, protesting that he would first write, then act, his play, and prove himself a universal genius.

No more was said just then; but long afterward the conversation came back to him like an inspiration, and was the seed of a purpose which, through patient effort, bore fruit in a brilliant and successful career: for Canaris, like many another man, did not know his own strength or weakness yet, neither the true gift nor the power of evil which lay unsuspected within him.

So the old life began again, at least in outward seeming; but it was impossible for it to last long. The air was too full of the electricity of suppressed and conflicting emotions to be wholesome; former relations could not be resumed, because sincerity had gone out of them; and the quiet, which reigned for a time, was only the lull before the storm.

Gladys soon felt this, but tried to think it was owing to the contrast between the free, happy days she had enjoyed so much, and uttered no complaint; for Felix was busy with his play, sanguine as ever, inspired now by a n.o.bler ambition than before, and happy in his work.

Helwyze had flattered himself that he could be content with the harmless shadow, since he could not possess the sweet substance of a love whose seeming purity was its most delusive danger. But he soon discovered "how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man's eyes;" and, even while he made no effort to rob Canaris of his treasure, he hated him for possessing it, finding the hatred all the more poignant, because it was his own hand which had forced Felix to seize and secure it. He had thought to hold and hide this new secret; but it held him, and would not be hidden, for it was stronger than even his strong will, and ruled him with a power which at times filled him with a sort of terror. Having allowed it to grow, and taken it to his bosom, he could not cast it out again, and it became a torment, not the comfort he had hoped to find it. His daily affliction was to see how much the young pair were to each other, to read in their faces a hundred happy hopes and confidences in which he had no part, and to remember the confession wrung from the lips dearest to him, that his death would bring to them their much-desired freedom.

At times he was minded to say "Go," but the thought of the utter blank her absence would leave behind daunted him. Often an almost uncontrollable desire to tell her that which would mar her trust in her husband tempted him; for, having yielded to a greater temptation, all lesser ones seemed innocent beside it; and, worse than all, the old morbid longing for some excitement, painful even, if it could not be pleasurable, goaded him to the utterance of half truths, which irritated Canaris and perplexed Gladys, till she could no longer doubt the cause of this strange mood. It seemed as if her innocent hand gave the touch which set the avalanche slipping swiftly but silently to its destructive fall.

One day when Helwyze was pacing to and fro in the library, driven by the inward storm which no outward sign betrayed, except his excessive pallor and unusual restlessness, she looked up from her book, asking compa.s.sionately- "Are you suffering, sir?"

"Torment."

"Can I do nothing?"

"Nothing!"

She went on reading, as if glad to be left in peace; for distrust, as well as pity, looked out from her frank eyes, and there was no longer any pleasure in the duties she performed for Canaris's sake.

But Helwyze, jealous even of the book which seemed to absorb her, soon paused again, to ask, in a calmer tone- "What interests you?"

"'The Scarlet Letter.'"

The hands loosely clasped behind him were locked more closely by an involuntary gesture, as if the words made him wince; otherwise unmoved, he asked again, with the curiosity he often showed about her opinions of all she read- "What do you think of Hester?"

"I admire her courage; for she repented, and did not hide her sin with a lie."

"Then you must despise Dimmesdale?"

"I ought, perhaps; but I cannot help pitying his weakness, while I detest his deceit: he loved so much."

"So did Roger;" and Helwyze drew nearer, with the peculiar flicker in his eyes, as of a light kindled suddenly behind a carefully drawn curtain.

"At first; then his love turned to hate, and he committed the unpardonable sin," answered Gladys, much moved by that weird and wonderful picture of guilt and its atonement.

"The unpardonable sin!" echoed Helwyze, struck by her words and manner.

"Hawthorne somewhere describes it as "the want of love and reverence for the human soul, which makes a man pry into its mysterious depths, not with a hope or purpose of making it better, but from a cold, philosophical curiosity. This would be the separation of the intellect from the heart: and this, perhaps, would be as unpardonable a sin as to doubt G.o.d, whom we cannot harm; for in doing this we must inevitably do great wrong both to ourselves and others.'"

As she spoke, fast and earnestly, Gladys felt herself upon the brink of a much-desired, but much-dreaded, explanation; for Canaris, while owning to her that there was a secret, would not tell it till Helwyze freed him from his promise. She thought that he delayed to ask this absolution till she was fitter to bear the truth, whatever it might be; and she had resolved to spare her husband the pain of an avowal, by demanding it herself of Helwyze. The moment seemed to have come, and both knew it; for he regarded her with the quick, piercing look which read her purpose before she could put it into words.

"You are right; yet Roger was the wronged one, and the others deserved to suffer."

"They did; but Hester's suffering enn.o.bled her, because n.o.bly borne; Dimmesdale's destroyed him, because he paltered weakly with his conscience. Roger let his wrong turn him from a man into a devil, and deserves the contempt and horror he rouses in us. The keeping of the secret makes the romance; the confession of it is the moral, showing how falsehood can ruin a life, and truth only save it at the last."

"Never have a secret, Gladys: they are hard masters, whom we hate, yet dare not rebel against."

His accent of sad sincerity seemed to clear the way for her, and she spoke out, briefly and bravely- "Sir, you dare any thing! Tell me what it is which makes Felix obey you against his will. He owns it, but will not speak till you consent. Tell me, I beseech you!"

"Could you bear it?" he asked, admiring her courage, yet doubtful of the wisdom of purchasing a moment's satisfaction at such a cost; for, though he could cast down her idol, he dared not set up another in its place.

"Try me!" she cried: "nothing can lessen my love, and doubt afflicts me more than the hardest truth."

"I fear not: with you love and respect go hand in hand, and some sins you would find very hard to pardon."

Involuntarily Gladys shrunk a little, and her eye questioned his inscrutable face, as she answered slowly, thinking only of her husband- "Something very mean and false would be hard to forgive; but not some youthful fault, some shame borne for others, or even a crime, if a very human emotion, a generous but mistaken motive, led to it."