Jaffery Part 56

"Magnificent," said I, "but bewildering. Did Jaffery really--?"

In a few words, she put me into possession of the bare facts.

"I'm not sorry," she added. "Sometimes I love Jaffery--because he's so lovable. Sometimes I hate him--because--oh, well--because of Adrian. You can't understand."

"I'm not altogether a fool," said I.

"Well, that's how it is. I would have worn myself to death to try to make him happy. You believe me?"

"I do indeed, my dear," I replied. And I replied with unshakable conviction. She was a woman who once having come under the domination of an idea would obey it blindly, ruthlessly, marching straight onwards, looking neither to right nor left. The very virtue that had made her overcruel to him in the past would have made her overkind to him in the future. Unwittingly she had used a phrase startlingly true. She would have worn herself to death in her determination to please. Incidentally she would have driven him mad with conscientious dutifulness.

"He would have found no fault with me that I could help," she said. "But we needn't speak of it any more. I'm not the woman for him. Liosha is.

It's all over. I'm glad. At any rate, I've made atonement--at least, I've tried--as far as things lay in my power."

I took both her hands, greatly moved by her courage.

"And what's going to happen to you, my dear?"

"Now that all this is straight," she replied, with a faint smile, "I can turn round and remake my life. You and Barbara will help."

"With all our hearts," said I.

"It won't be so hard for you, ever again, I promise. I shall be more reasonable. And the first favour I'll ask you, dear Hilary, is to let me go this afternoon. It would be a bit of a strain on me to stay."

"I know, my dear," I said. "The car is at your service."

"Oh, no! I'll go by train."

"You'll do as you're told, young woman, and go by car."

At this rubbishy speech, the tears, for the first time, came into her eyes. She pulled down my shoulders--I am rather lank and tall--and kissed me.

"You're a dear," she said, and went off in search of Barbara.

I returned to my library, rang the bell, and gave orders for the chauffeur to stand at Mrs. Boldero's disposal. Then I sat down at a loose end, very much like a young professional man, doctor or estate-agent, waiting for the next client. And like the young professional man at a loose end, I made a pretence of looking through papers. Presently I became aware that I only had to open a window in order to summon a couple of clients at once. For there in the gathering November dusk and in the rain--it had ceased pouring, but it was drizzling, and therefore it was rain--I saw our pair of delectable savages strolling across the wet, sodden lawn, in loverlike proximity, for all the world as though it were a flowery mead in May. I might have summoned them, but it would have been an unprofessional thing to do.

Instead, I drew my curtains and turned on the light, and continued to wait. I waited a long time. At last Barbara rushed in.

"Doria's ready."

"You've heard all about it?" She nodded. "I said there would be no marriage," I remarked blandly.

"You said she wouldn't marry him. I said she would. And so she would, if he had let her. I know you're prepared to argue," she said, rather excitedly, "but it's no use. I was right all the time."

I yielded.

"You're always right, my dear," said I.

That is practically all, up to the present, that I have to tell you about Jaffery. What words pa.s.sed between him and Liosha in the drawing-room I have never known. Jaffery, with conscience still sore, and childishly anxious that I should not account him a traitor and a scoundrel, and a brute too despicable for human touch, told me, as I have already stated, over and over again, until I yawned for weariness in the small hours of the morning, what had taken place in his staggering interview with Doria; but as regards Liosha, he was shyly evasive. After all, I fancy, it was a very simple affair. She had told me bluntly that when the two men, Jaffery and Prescott, rode into the scene of Balkan desolation in which she was the central figure, Jaffery was the one who caused her heart to throb. And in her chaste, proud way she had loved him ever since that extraordinary moment. And though Jaffery has never confessed it, I am absolutely certain that, just as Monsieur Jourdain spoke prose, _sans le savoir_, so, without knowing it, was Jaffery in love with Liosha when she drove away from Northlands in Mr. Ras Fendihook's car. Perhaps before. _Quien sabe?_ But he imagined himself to be in love with a moonbeam. And the moonbeam shot like a glamorous, enchanted sword between him and Liosha, and kept them apart until the moment of dazed revelation, when he saw that the moonbeam was merely a pale, earnest, anxious, suffering little human thing, alien to his every instinct, a firmament away, in every vital essential, from the G.o.ddess of his idolatry.

[Ill.u.s.tration: There is war going on in the Balkans. Jaffery is there as war correspondent. Liosha is there, too.]

That is how I explain--and I have puzzled my head into aching over any other possible explanation--the att.i.tude of Jaffery towards Liosha on the _Vesta_ voyage. Well, my conjectures are of not much value. I have done my best to put the facts, as I know them, before you; and if you are interested in the matter you can go on conjecturing to your heart's content. "Look here, my friend," said I, as soon as I could attune my mind to new conditions, "what about your new novel?"

He frowned portentously. "It can go to blazes!" "Aren't you going to finish it?"

"No."

"But you must. Don't you realise that you're a born novelist?"

"Don't you realise," he growled, "that you're a born fool?"

"I don't," said I.

He walked about the library in his s.p.a.ce--occupying way.

"I'm going to tear the d.a.m.ned thing up! I'm never going to write a novel again. I cut it out altogether. It's the least I can do for her."

"Isn't that rather quixotic?" I asked.

"Suppose it is. What have you to say against it?"

"Nothing," said I.

"Well, keep on saying it," replied Jaffery, with the steel flash in his eyes.

They were married. Our vicar performed the ceremony. I gave the bride away. Liosha revealed the feminine kink in her otherwise splendid character by insisting on the bridal panoply of white satin, veil and orange blossoms. I confess she looked superb. She looked like a Valkyr.

A leather-visaged war correspondent, named Burchester, whom I had never seen before, and have not seen since, acted as best man. Susan, tense with the responsibilities of office, was the only bridesmaid. Mrs. Jupp (late Considine) and her General were our only guests. Doria excused herself from attendance, but sent the bride a travelling-case fitted with a myriad dazzling gold-stoppered bottles and a phantasmagoria of gold-mounted toilette implements.

And then they went on their honeymoon. And where do you think they went?

They signed again on the steamship _Vesta_. And Captain Maturin gave them his cabin, which is more than I would have done, and slept, I presume, in the dog-hole. And they were as happy as the ship was abominable.

Now, as I write, there is a war going on in the Balkans. Jaffery is there as the correspondent of _The Daily Gazette_. Liosha is there, too, as the inseparable and peculiarly invaluable companion of Jaffery Chayne. They live impossible lives. But what has that got to do with you or me? They like it. They adore it. A more radiantly mated pair the earth cannot produce. Their two-year-old son is learning the practice of the heroic virtues at Cettinje, while his parents loaf about battlefields in full eruption.

"Poor little mite!" says Barbara.

But I say:

"Lucky little Pantagruel!"

THE END