Satires of Circumstance Part 15

The chamber looked far over the sea From a white hotel on a white-stoned quay, And stepping a stride He parted the window-drapery.

Above the level horizon spread The sunrise, firing them foot to head From its smouldering lair, And painting their pillows with dyes of red.

"What strange disquiets have stirred you, dear, This dragging night, with starts in fear Of me, as it were, Or of something evil hovering near?"

"My husband, can I have fear of you?

What should one fear from a man whom few, Or none, had matched In that late long spell of delays undue!"

He watched her eyes in the heaving sun: "Then what has kept, O reticent one, Those lids unlatched - Anything promised I've not yet done?"

"O it's not a broken promise of yours (For what quite lightly your lip a.s.sures The due time brings) That has troubled my sleep, and no waking cures!" . . .

"I have shaped my will; 'tis at hand," said he; "I subscribe it to-day, that no risk there be In the hap of things Of my leaving you menaced by poverty."

"That a boon provision I'm safe to get, Signed, sealed by my lord as it were a debt, I cannot doubt, Or ever this peering sun be set."

"But you flung my arms away from your side, And faced the wall. No month-old bride Ere the tour be out In an air so loth can be justified?

"Ah--had you a male friend once loved well, Upon whose suit disaster fell And frustrance swift?

Honest you are, and may care to tell."

She lay impa.s.sive, and nothing broke The stillness other than, stroke by stroke, The lazy lift Of the tide below them; till she spoke:

"I once had a friend--a Love, if you will - Whose wife forsook him, and sank until She was made a thrall In a prison-cell for a deed of ill . . .

"He remained alone; and we met--to love, But barring legitimate joy thereof Stood a doorless wall, Though we prized each other all else above.

"And this was why, though I'd touched my prime, I put off suitors from time to time - Yourself with the rest - Till friends, who approved you, called it crime,

"And when misgivings weighed on me In my lover's absence, hurriedly, And much distrest, I took you . . . Ah, that such could be! . . .

"Now, saw you when crossing from yonder sh.o.r.e At yesternoon, that the packet bore On a white-wreathed bier A coffined body towards the fore?

"Well, while you stood at the other end, The loungers talked, and I could but lend A listening ear, For they named the dead. 'Twas the wife of my friend.

"He was there, but did not note me, veiled, Yet I saw that a joy, as of one unjailed, Now shone in his gaze; He knew not his hope of me just had failed!

"They had brought her home: she was born in this isle; And he will return to his domicile, And pa.s.s his days Alone, and not as he dreamt erstwhile!"

"--So you've lost a sprucer spouse than I!"

She held her peace, as if fain deny She would indeed For his pleasure's sake, but could lip no lie.

"One far less formal and plain and slow!"

She let the laconic a.s.sertion go As if of need She held the conviction that it was so.

"Regard me as his he always should, He had said, and wed me he vowed he would In his prime or sere Most verily do, if ever he could.

"And this fulfilment is now his aim, For a letter, addressed in my maiden name, Has dogged me here, Reminding me faithfully of his claim.

"And it started a hope like a lightning-streak That I might go to him--say for a week - And afford you right To put me away, and your vows unspeak.

"To be sure you have said, as of dim intent, That marriage is a plain event Of black and white, Without any ghost of sentiment,

"And my heart has quailed.--But deny it true That you will never this lock undo!

No G.o.d intends To thwart the yearning He's father to!"

The husband hemmed, then blandly bowed In the light of the angry morning cloud.

"So my idyll ends, And a drama opens!" he mused aloud;

And his features froze. "You may take it as true That I will never this lock undo For so depraved A pa.s.sion as that which kindles you."

Said she: "I am sorry you see it so; I had hoped you might have let me go, And thus been saved The pain of learning there's more to know."

"More? What may that be? Gad, I think You have told me enough to make me blink!

Yet if more remain Then own it to me. I will not shrink!"

"Well, it is this. As we could not see That a legal marriage could ever be, To end our pain We united ourselves informally;

"And vowed at a chancel-altar nigh, With book and ring, a lifelong tie; A contract vain To the world, but real to Him on High."

"And you became as his wife?"--"I did." - He stood as stiff as a caryatid, And said, "Indeed! . . .

No matter. You're mine, whatever you ye hid!"

"But is it right! When I only gave My hand to you in a sweat to save, Through desperate need (As I thought), my fame, for I was not brave!"

"To save your fame? Your meaning is dim, For n.o.body knew of your altar-whim?"

"I mean--I feared There might be fruit of my tie with him;

"And to cloak it by marriage I'm not the first, Though, maybe, morally most accurst Through your unpeered And strict uprightness. That's the worst!

"While yesterday his worn contours Convinced me that love like his endures, And that my troth-plight Had been his, in fact, and not truly yours."

"So, my lady, you raise the veil by degrees . . .

I own this last is enough to freeze The warmest wight!

Now hear the other side, if you please:

"I did say once, though without intent, That marriage is a plain event Of black and white, Whatever may be its sentiment.

"I'll act accordingly, none the less That you soiled the contract in time of stress, Thereto induced By the feared results of your wantonness.

"But the thing is over, and no one knows, And it's nought to the future what you disclose.

That you'll be loosed For such an episode, don't suppose!

"No: I'll not free you. And if it appear There was too good ground for your first fear From your amorous tricks, I'll father the child. Yes, by G.o.d, my dear.

"Even should you fly to his arms, I'll d.a.m.n Opinion, and fetch you; treat as sham Your mutinous kicks, And whip you home. That's the sort I am!"

She whitened. "Enough . . . Since you disapprove I'll yield in silence, and never move Till my last pulse ticks A footstep from the domestic groove."