The Guests Of Hercules Part 24

"It is like a dream!" Mary broke in upon him, when he paused as if following a thought down some path in his mind. "As if we were dreaming now--to the music down there. Maybe we _are_ dreaming. What does it all mean?"

"It means that when the world was made we were made for each other. But what has happened to us since? How have we so drifted apart? I think I have been faithful to you in my heart always. But you? You've wandered a million miles away from me. Nothing told you to wait. You have not waited, or you would not live your life as you seem to be living it--among such men and such women. For G.o.d's sake, even if you don't care for me as things are now between us, let me take you away from all this, let me put you where you will be safe, where you can be what you were meant to be."

"I--I don't understand," Mary said, her breath coming so quickly that her words seemed stopped, and broken like water that tries to run past scattered stones.

"Don't you? Don't you understand that I love you desperately, that I can't bear my life because I love you so, and because I see you drowning? I'm telling you this in spite of myself. But I know now it had to be. I swear to you, if you'll trust me, if you'll come away with me, you shan't repent. Let me put you somewhere in a safe and beautiful place. That's all I ask. I want no more. I shall force myself to want no more."

"You--love me?" Mary repeated, still in the dream that was made of music and moonlight, the ripple of the sea and the stirring of something new in her nature of which all these sweet and beautiful things seemed part.

"Love! I never thought this could happen to me."

Suddenly he caught her hands and held them so that she was forced to turn and look at him, instead of gazing out at sea and moonlight.

"Does it mean anything to you?" he asked, almost fiercely.

"Oh, a great deal," she answered. "I hardly know how much yet. It is so wonderful--so new. Yet somehow not new. I must think about it. I must----"

It was on her lips to say "I must pray about it," but something stopped her. He was strange to her still, in spite of the miracle that was happening, and there were some thoughts which must be kept in the heart, in silence. Perhaps if she had not kept back those words, much of the future might have been different, for he must have guessed at once that, if she were sincere, his thoughts of her had been false thoughts.

"Don't stop to think. Promise me now," he cut her short.

The note of insistence in his voice frightened her, and seemed to break the music of the dream. "I can't promise!" she exclaimed. "I've never wanted to marry. It never seemed possible. I----"

Something like a groan was forced from him. She broke off, drawing in her breath sharply. "What is the matter?" she asked. "Are you suffering?"

"Yes," he said. "I am suffering. It's my fault, for not making you understand, and yours because you haven't let me believe in you, worship you as the angel you were meant to be. I don't know what you are, but whatever you are I love you with all there is of me. Only--what I asked was--that you'd let me take you out of this life to something better.

Now don't misunderstand in another way! I'd rather die a thousand deaths than wrong you. I ask nothing from you for myself. When I knew that you were safe I'd go, and not even see you again, unless--but how can I explain that I mean only good for you, with no evil or selfishness, yet not marriage?"

"Not marriage!"

Mary wrenched her hands away, and stepped back from him. There were men, she knew, who loved women but did not marry them. She had learned this thing through the tragedy of her schoolmate, her friend, whose life had been swallowed up in mystery and darkness because men could be vile and treacherous, taking everything and giving nothing. No one save himself could have made her believe that this deep-eyed Prince was such a man.

After all, the light in which she had seen their souls together in the beginning of things had been a false light. She had never known his soul, for what she thought she knew had been very n.o.ble and splendid, and the reality was bad. It was as if she had begun to open the door of her heart, to let in a white dove, and peeping out had seen instead a vulture. She slammed the door shut; and the sweet new thing that had stirred in the depths of her nature fell back asleep or dead.

"I'm going down now," she said, in a toneless voice. "Don't come with me. I never want to speak to you again."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'I CAN'T PROMISE!' SHE EXCLAIMED. 'I'VE NEVER WANTED TO MARRY'"]

She turned away with an abrupt mechanical movement like a doll wound up to walk, but he s.n.a.t.c.hed the lace scarf that was wrapped round her arm, and held her back for an instant.

"I implore you----" he begged. Her answer was to drop the scarf, and leave it in his hands. She seemed to melt from his grasp like a snow wreath; and not daring to follow then, he was left alone on the bridge with the black and horrible ghost of his own mistake.

XVII

Mary's one thought was to escape and hide herself from every one. She felt as fastidious women feel after a journey through miles of thick black dust, when they cannot bear to have their faces seen with the disfiguring stains of travel upon them. But she had to go back to the deck where people were dancing, before she could find her way to any hiding place; and even then she did not know how she should contrive to leave the yacht without answering questions and fighting objections.

She was thankful to find Captain Hannaford not dancing, and standing near the foot of the steps she had just descended. He was some one she knew, at least, some one whose calm manner made him seem dependable.

Then, too, the physical affliction which repelled her, in making him appear remote from the world of fortunate men, almost attracted her at this moment. Standing there as if waiting for her, very quiet, apparently quite unemotional, he was like a lifeboat in a merciless sea.

She s.n.a.t.c.hed at the help he silently offered.

"I feel ill," she said, chokingly. "Do you think I could get away without any one noticing? I want to go home."

Instinctively she was sure that she might count upon him to serve her, that he would rather do so than stay and watch the dancing, for he himself did not dance.

"Come along," he said, with the calmness which was never ruffled.

"People will think you're engaged to sit out this dance with me. Get your wraps, and I'll see that the launch is ready to take you across to the slip."

The ladies' dressing-room was below. One of the largest and finest of the staterooms had been set apart for that purpose; but there were so few cloaks that Mary had no difficulty in finding hers, half-dazed as she was. To her relief, Captain Hannaford was waiting for her not far from the door when she came out.

"I thought as you're seedy you mightn't be able to find the way alone,"

he said. "It's all right about the launch."

Five minutes later she was being carried toward the sh.o.r.e, the explosive throbbing of the engine sending stabs of pain through her temples.

Beside her sat Hannaford; silent, his arms folded, his black bandaged face turned away from her. He had a habit, when he could, of seating himself so that the unscarred side of his head was in sight of the person next him; but to-night he had not done this with Mary. He knew that she would be blind not only to his defects, but to his existence, if he did not irritate her by trying to attract attention.

Neither spoke a word during the few moments of transit, and Mary gazed always toward land, as if she did not wish to see the great lighted yacht which illuminated the whole harbour. It had not occurred to her that she ought to say, "Don't trouble to come with me. I shall do very well alone." She took it for granted not only that he would come, but that he would be glad to come; and there was no conceit in this tacit a.s.sumption. It was borne in upon her mind from his, as if by an a.s.surance.

When the motor launch had landed them upon the slip, and puffed fussily away again, Hannaford steadied Mary's steps with a hand on her arm. It was not until they were on the pavement, and facing up the hill that leads from the Condamine to higher Monte Carlo, that she spoke. "Oh, I ought to have left word for Lady Dauntrey!" she exclaimed.

"I thought of that," Hannaford quietly answered. "I wrote on a card that you had a headache and I was taking you home."

"Thank you," Mary said, mechanically. As soon as she had heard the words she forgot them, and let her thoughts rush back to the arena of their martyrdom. Hannaford took her hand and laid it on his arm. She allowed it to rest there, depending unconsciously on the support he gave. They did not speak again until they had reached the top of the hill, turned the corner, and arrived at the steps of the Hotel de Paris.

Because Lady Dauntrey had chosen to make a late entrance on the scene, it was after midnight now, though Mary and Hannaford had come away comparatively early from the dance. The Casino was shut, but Christmas eve festivities were going on in the restaurant, as well as in the brilliantly lit Moorish Cafe de Paris on the opposite side of the _Place_. Mary's longing for peace and quiet in "coming home" was jarred out of her mind by the gay music and lights, and sounds of distant laughter which seemed to have followed her mockingly from the yacht. But they brought her out of herself; and standing on the lowest step she thanked Hannaford for all that he had done.

"You know I've done nothing," he said. "I wish there were something I really could do for you. Isn't there? Wouldn't you like to have an English doctor prescribe for your headache? I know a splendid one. He'd cure you in an hour."

"I must try to cure myself," Mary said. "I shall be better soon. I must be! There's nothing more you can do, thank you very much. Unless----"

"Unless what?" He caught her up more quickly than he usually spoke.

"Now I've come back, I can hardly bear to go indoors after all. I feel as if I couldn't breathe in a warm room, with curtains over the windows.

Would you take me on the terrace? I think I should like just to sit on one of the seats there for a few minutes; and afterward maybe I shall be more ready to go in."

"Come, then," was the brief answer that was somehow comforting to Mary.

She began consciously to realize that this man's calm presence helped her. She was grateful, and at the same time smitten with remorse for the faint physical repulsion against him she had never until now quite lost.

At this moment she believed that it was entirely gone, and could never return; but she felt that she ought to atone in some way because it had once existed. She took his arm again, of her own accord, and leaned on it with a touch that expressed what she dimly meant to express--confidence in him.

They went down the flight of steps at the end of the Casino, and so to the terrace, which was completely deserted, as Mary had hoped it would be. Here, away from the golden lights of hotel and cafe windows, the moon had full power, a round white moon that flooded the night with silver.

They turned to walk along the terrace-front of the Casino, facing toward Italy, and away from the harbour half girdled by the Rock of Hercules.

They could not see the yacht, but the great illuminated shape rode in Mary's thoughts as it rode on the water. She knew that in coming back along this way she would have to see the harbour, and _White Lady_ blazing with light, pulsing with music. Just yet she could not bear that, and when they came near the eastern end of the terrace she said that she would sit down on one of the seats.

The moonlight had seemed exquisite as an angel's blessing when she looked out between the flags and rose branches, drinking in the words "I love you," as a flower drinks in dew. Now the pale radiance on the mountains was to Mary's eyes wicked, wicked as a white witch fallen from her broomstick. All the world was wicked in its weary pallor; and the dark windows of far-off, moon-bleached villas were like staring eyeb.a.l.l.s in gigantic skulls.

She had not meant to talk, but suddenly the fire within her flamed into words. "What have I done--what do I do--that could make people think I am--not good?--make them think they have a right to insult me?"