Fraternity Part 47

He found Hilary in his study, reading a book on the civilisation of the Maccabees, in preparation for a review. He gave Stephen but a dubious welcome.

Stephen broke ground gently.

"We haven't seen you for an age. I hear our old friend at it. Is he working double tides to finish his magnum opus? I thought he observed the day of rest."

"He does as a rule," said Hilary.

"Well, he's got the girl there now dictating."

Hilary winced. Stephen continued with greater circ.u.mspection "You couldn't get the old boy to finish by Wednesday, I suppose? He must be quite near the end by now."

The notion of Mr. Stone's finishing his book by Wednesday procured a pale smile from Hilary.

"Could you get your Law Courts," he said, "to settle up the affairs of mankind for good and all by Wednesday?"

"By Jove! Is it as bad as that? I thought, at any rate, he must be meaning to finish some day."

"When men are brothers," said Hilary, "he will finish."

Stephen whistled.

"Look here, dear boy!" he said, "that ruffian comes out on Wednesday.

The whole thing will begin over again."

Hilary rose and paced the room. "I refuse," he said, "to consider Hughs a ruffian. What do we know about him, or any of them?"

"Precisely! What do we know of this girl?"

"I am not going to discuss that," Hilary said shortly.

For a moment the faces of the two brothers wore a hard, hostile look, as though the deep difference between their characters had at last got the better of their loyalty. They both seemed to recognise this, for they turned their heads away.

"I just wanted to remind you," Stephen said, "though you know your own business best, of course." And at Hilary's nod he thought:

'That's just exactly what he doesn't!'

He soon left, conscious of an unwonted awkwardness in his brother's presence. Hilary watched him out through the wicket gate, then sat down on the solitary garden bench.

Stephen's visit had merely awakened perverse desires in him. Strong sunlight was falling on that little London garden, disclosing its native shadowiness; streaks, and smudges such as Life smears over the faces of those who live too consciously. Hilary, beneath the acacia-tree not yet in bloom, marked an early b.u.t.terfly flitting over the geraniums blossoming round an old sundial. Blackbirds were holding evensong; the late perfume of the lilac came stealing forth into air faintly smeeched with chimney smoke. There was brightness, but no glory, in that little garden; scent, but no strong air blown across golden lakes of b.u.t.tercups, from seas of springing clover, or the wind-silver of young wheat; music, but no full choir of sound, no hum. Like the face and figure of its master, so was this little garden, whose sundial the sun seldom reached-refined, self-conscious, introspective, obviously a creature of the town. At that moment, however, Hilary was not looking quite himself; his face was flushed, his eyes angry, almost as if he had been a man of action.

The voice of Mr. Stone was still audible, fitfully quavering out into the air, and the old man himself could now and then be seen holding up his ma.n.u.script, his profile clear-cut against the darkness of the room.

A sentence travelled out across the garden:

"'Amidst the tur-bu-lent dis-cov-eries of those days, which, like cross-currented and multibillowed seas, lapped and hollowed every rock '"

A motor-car dashing past drowned the rest, and when the voice rose again it was evidently dictating another paragraph.

"'In those places, in those streets, the shadows swarmed, whispering and droning like a hive of dying bees, who, their honey eaten, wander through the winter day seeking flowers that are frozen and dead."'

A great bee which had been busy with the lilac began to circle, booming, round his hair. Suddenly Hilary saw Mr. Stone raise both his arms.

"'In huge congeries, crowded, devoid of light and air, they were a.s.sembled, these bloodless imprints from forms of higher caste. They lay, like the reflection of leaves which, fluttering free in the sweet winds, let fall to the earth wan resemblances. Imponderous, dark ghosts, wandering ones chained to the ground, they had no hope of any Lovely City, nor knew whence they had come. Men cast them on the pavements and marched on. They did not in Universal Brotherhood clasp their shadows to sleep within their hearts--for the sun was not then at noon, when no man has a shadow.'"

As those words of swan song died away he swayed and trembled, and suddenly disappeared below the sight-line, as if he had sat down. The little model took his place in the open window. She started at seeing Hilary; then, motionless, stood gazing at him. Out of the gloom of the opening her eyes were all pupil, two spots of the surrounding darkness imprisoned in a face as pale as any flower. Rigid as the girl herself, Hilary looked up at her.

A voice behind him said: "How are you? I thought I'd give my car a run."

Mr. Purcey was coming from the gate, his eyes fixed on the window where the girl stood. "How is your wife?" he added.

The bathos of this visit roused an acid fury in Hilary. He surveyed Mr.

Purcey's figure from his cloth-topped boots to his tall hat, and said: "Shall we go in and find her?"

As they went along Mr. Purcey said: "That's the young--the--er--model I met in your wife's studio, isn't it? Pretty girl!"

Hilary compressed his lips.

"Now, what sort of living do those girls make?" pursued Mr. Purcey. "I suppose they've most of them other resources. Eh, what?"

"They make the living G.o.d will let them, I suppose, as other people do."

Mr. Purcey gave him a sharp look. It was almost as if Dallison had meant to snub him.

"Oh, exactly! I should think this girl would have no difficulty." And suddenly he saw a curious change come over "that writing fellow," as he always afterwards described Hilary. Instead of a mild, pleasant-looking chap enough, he had become a regular cold devil.

"My wife appears to be out," Hilary said. "I also have an engagement."

In his surprise and anger Mr. Purcey said with great simplicity, "Sorry I'm 'de trop'!" and soon his car could be heard bearing him away with some unnecessary noise.

CHAPTER x.x.xII

BEHIND BIANCA'S VEIL

But Bianca was not out. She had been a witness of Hilary's long look at the little model. Coming from her studio through the gla.s.s pa.s.sage to the house, she could not, of course, see what he was gazing at, but she knew as well as if the girl had stood before her in the dark opening of the window. Hating herself for having seen, she went to her room, and lay on her bed with her hands pressed to her eyes. She was used to loneliness--that necessary lot of natures such as hers; but the bitter isolation of this hour was such as to drive even her lonely nature to despair.

She rose at last, and repaired the ravages made in her face and dress, lest anyone should see that she was suffering. Then, first making sure that Hilary had left the garden, she stole out.

She wandered towards Hyde Park. It was Whitsuntide, a time of fear to the cultivated Londoner. The town seemed all arid jollity and paper bags whirled on a dusty wind. People swarmed everywhere in clothes which did not suit them; desultory, dead-tired creatures who, in these few green hours of leisure out of the sandy eternity of their toil, were not suffered to rest, but were whipped on by starved instincts to hunt pleasures which they longed for too dreadfully to overtake.

Bianca pa.s.sed an old tramp asleep beneath a tree. His clothes had clung to him so long and lovingly that they were falling off, but his face was calm as though masked with the finest wax. Forgotten were his sores and sorrows; he was in the blessed fields of sleep.

Bianca hastened away from the sight of such utter peace. She wandered into a grove of trees which had almost eluded the notice of the crowd.

They were limes, guarding still within them their honey bloom. Their branches of light, broad leaves, near heart-shaped, were spread out like wide skirts. The tallest of these trees, a beautiful, gay creature, stood tremulous, like a mistress waiting for her tardy lover. What joy she seemed to promise, what delicate enticement, with every veined quivering leaf! And suddenly the sun caught hold of her, raised her up to him, kissed her all over; she gave forth a sigh of happiness, as though her very spirit had travelled through her lips up to her lover's heart.

A woman in a lilac frock came stealing through the trees towards Bianca, and sitting down not far off, kept looking quickly round under her sunshade.

Presently Bianca saw what she was looking for. A young man in black coat and shining hat came swiftly up and touched her shoulder. Half hidden by the foliage they sat, leaning forward, prodding gently at the ground with stick and parasol; the stealthy murmur of their talk, so soft and intimate that no word was audible, stole across the gra.s.s; and secretly he touched her hand and arm. They were not of the holiday crowd, and had evidently chosen out this vulgar afternoon for a stolen meeting.