Claire Part 36

Lawrence shrugged his shoulders.

"Romantic raving for effect!" he exclaimed. "But if he should happen to try that, well, I think my argument might be as effective as his."

"But how do you propose to stop him? I tell you, he is in earnest."

Claire was insistent.

"Why, in whatever way is necessary. If it is my life against his, I'll give him the best I've got."

She looked at Lawrence in wonder. He was as calm as if he had been making small talk at a theater-party.

"Can you plan it so--so carelessly, like that?" she asked.

"Why not? I could hardly allow him to take you by force. I wouldn't choose a fight as a diversion, but once in, I wouldn't stop short of his life. And I wouldn't feel any compunction afterward, either."

"Well," she said quickly, "it won't be necessary."

"I think not." He smiled. "We need say nothing about our plans. Once we get into town, all the world is ours, and we can quietly depart, leaving Philip Ortez a very pleasant memory."

They both laughed heartily.

Neither of them allowed for that vast portion of human character which lies beyond the knowledge of the most keen-visioned. Claire was more familiar with the distinctly male phases of Philip than Lawrence--perhaps a woman always is--but they were too happy to give the matter any real consideration, and, after the fashion of all lovers, they shut out the third person from their little self-bound universe.

The whole world seemed a friendly sphere whose entire action was merely to bring them together, and they were utterly oblivious to Philip and his new att.i.tude. It seemed so impossible that anything serious could arise to separate them from each other.

It was late when Philip returned, and he was instantly aware of the change in his guests. The old, serious silence was gone from Lawrence; he was not the speculative man to whom Philip was accustomed. His talk was light, pleasantly humorous, and very genial. He was, in short, the lover. Claire, too, shone with a new radiance.

Doubt rearose in Philip's heart, and grew rapidly into suspicion. He became less responsive to their chatter. His dark eyes grew somber with misgiving, and love swelled into longing that made him feel sure that Claire was necessary to his life. Without her there could be no living for him. He wondered if she and Lawrence had found love. "If they have,"

he argued, "there can be but one explanation. Claire is unreliable, vicious, and dangerous." His aching desire to possess her did not lessen, however. It became deeper, in fact, with each succeeding thought of her as a wanton at heart, and he set his teeth over his will, a.s.suring himself that all would be well when Lawrence was gone.

He took to avoiding absences, and to watching furtively for some confirmation of his suspicion. Claire was instinctively cautious, and he saw nothing that could actually be construed against her. He was of that type of man whose love, burning into jealousy, does battle with ideals which stand against his suspicions and demand actual physical proof before retiring and allowing the beast to run riot.

He knew no middle ground. Once he had seen that which would condemn Claire, he would be utterly savage. His soul anguished to bitterness at every thought against her purity and truth. He could not accept her as she was. His suspicion painted her black with the sticky ink of a morbid idealist, while his faith, rising from the same ideals, made her seem almost ethereal. His longing for her was an acute physical pain, and he never allowed his ideals to stop his romancing. He insisted that his desire be stated in masking phrases and deceiving glories of chivalrous prattle. He was so torn by his conflicting emotions and ideals that he was fast arriving at a state where his action would be that of a wounded beast at bay. He did not know and would not admit that his own distorted view of Claire was back of his own condition. True to his type, he carried this war in silence, and sought support for his fast-weakening ideals in argument. He was wise. Defend your faith if you would keep it glowing.

CHAPTER XIX.

THE LAST DISCUSSION.

The time of their departure was at hand. There had been two days of intense packing of the food and clothing necessary for their two-hundred-mile walk. Now that was behind them, and after a short trip which Philip must take the following morning, they would be off for the ten or fifteen miles they hoped to cover that day.

When night came they were overjubilant, and they sat before the cabin watching the lake as it shimmered in the moonlight. Claire was pensively silent, though her heart sang. She was dreaming out her days, painting them on the moonlit water, and she paid very little heed to the two men, though unconsciously her whole personality leaned toward Lawrence. What they were saying she did not at first know, but gradually her attention was caught and she listened earnestly with an ever-growing fear in her heart.

She saw the deep fire that burned in Philip's eyes, and she realized that Lawrence was unaware of how his provocative, half-humorous ironies were stirring the volcano within the man who sat beside him.

"No man has a right," Philip was saying, "to think of a woman in his house unless he can think of her as altogether trustworthy, pure, and beyond temptation. If he does think of her differently, he is a beast, and wants a mistress, not a wife."

Lawrence laughed carelessly. "The average man wants both in one," he said. "Personally, so far as your talk about suspicion goes, who needs to think either way? I'm sure I don't. I'm quite content to live with a woman, giving and taking what we can enjoy together, and not asking that she limit her time and devotion to me. She may have various outside interests of her own. In fact, I would prefer that life should hold a separate work for her."

"Oh, you do not care. You are too selfish to feel any responsibility for a woman's soul. I would feel depraved if I did not guard my wife's soul by my very faith in her."

"Why should you guard her soul? Isn't the average woman intelligent enough to look out for herself? What she does, she does because she wants to, and for Heaven's sake, man, let her have the right to freedom of being."

"But real freedom of being lies in her dependence on me as the head of the house," Philip protested.

"If you happen to be the head of the house," Lawrence added jestingly.

"But I would be the head of the house. It is my right and my duty."

"Poor Mrs. Ortez, if there ever is one," Lawrence continued, joking.

"She is to be guarded by a great, aggressive, possessing husband. What if she happens to want something you don't approve of?"

"She won't. A good woman doesn't."

"But suppose your woman isn't good, and does?"

"I should have to explain to her her mistake."

"And then when she says, 'But I don't regard it as a mistake, I think it was quite right,' what will you do?"

"I wouldn't have a woman who would hold such views."

"What is it you want for a wife, Philip? A brainless feminine body who is content to be your slave?"

"I should be ashamed to speak of any woman I cared for in those terms.

One doesn't marry a woman who can be thought of in terms of s.e.x."

"Perhaps 'one doesn't.' I would. I should want her to be very well aware of her exact physical potentialities, and to think enough about them to understand herself."

"Then you would want an unwholesome wife, my friend."

"Not at all. I want a natural one, that's all. Moreover," he added joyously, "I shall have one."

Philip glanced at him quickly. Into his mind flashed the memory of Claire's words in the room that fatal afternoon.

"I shall never marry such a woman," he declared, and added: "But I mean to have one whose devotion is so pure that even her talk to me of such things will be holy."

Lawrence laughed heartily.

"Philip," he said, still chuckling, "you seem to think we human beings are half supernatural and half stinking dirt. Why, in Heaven's name, don't you once see us as plain, healthy, intelligent animals?"

"Because we're half G.o.ds, half beasts."

"So I was once told by the son of an ancient mind whose farthest mental frontier reached A.D. 1123."

Philip rose and faced Lawrence, then looked shamefacedly at Claire, and sat down again.