The Heart of Denise and Other Tales Part 24

He went into the house his old brooding self, and in a week, finding life there insupportable, ran up to town. Here he took chambers close to his club, and plunged into dissipation. He was not naturally a man given that way, and he did not take to it kindly. But he held his course and broke the remains of his health, and wasted his substance in a vain effort to shake off the weight from his soul. But it was useless, and now a weariness of life fell upon him, and something seemed to be ever whispered in his ear to end all. The temptation came upon him one evening with an almost irresistible force. He was to dine out that evening, and had just finished dressing when his eye fell on a small plated Derringer that lay on the table before him. He took it up and held it in his hand. But a little touch on the trigger, and there would be an end of all things. It was so easy. Only a little touch! He placed the round muzzle to his temple, and stood thus for a second. He could hear the ticking of his watch, he could feel the pulse in his temple throbbing against the cold steel of the pistol, he could feel his very heart beating. His whole past rose up before him.

He closed his eyes, set his teeth, his finger was on the trigger, when he heard a low laugh, a mocking laugh of triumph, that, soft as it was, seemed to vibrate through the room. Sangster's hand dropped to his side, and he looked round with a scared face. At the time this occurred he was standing at his dressing-table, and the only light was that from two candles, one on each side of the gla.s.s. The bedroom was separated from the sitting-room by a folding door, overhung by a heavy crimson curtain, and this part of the room was in semidarkness. As Sangster turned his white face to the curtain he saw nothing, although the laugh was still ringing in his ears; but, as he looked, a pale blue mist rose before the curtain; a mist that seemed instinct with light, and in it floated the body of the devotee, the rigid arm extended towards him and a smile of infernal malice on the withered lips. For a moment Sangster stood as if spell-bound--a cold sweat on his forehead. Then, for he was no coward, he nerved himself, and advanced towards the vision. As he stepped up, mist and figure faded into nothing, and he was alone. But he could bear to be so no longer, and thrusting the pistol into the breast pocket of his coat, hurried outside. Once in the street, he hailed a hansom and was driven to his destination.

During his stay in town he had sought every cla.s.s of society, and chance had thrown him in the way of Madame Regine. Who she was is not material to this story, but she was the one person he had met who could for the moment make Sangster forget his gloom.

In her way, too, Regine was attracted by this man, so grave and silent, yet who was able to speak of things and scenes she had never heard of, and who looked so different from the other men she came across in her literary and artistic circle.

Of late, with a perversity which cannot be accounted for, he had avoided seeing her, and she was more than glad he was coming that night; and as for him, he almost had it in his heart to thank G.o.d he was to see Regine that evening.

Madame knew how to select her guests. There were but half a dozen people, and it was very gay. At first Sangster could not shake off his depression, but as the wine went round and the wit sparkled he pulled himself together, and in a half-hour had forgotten what had happened before he came to the house. They were late that evening; but the time came to go at last. Sangster, however, lingered--the latest of all to say good-bye.

As he went up to her she put aside his hand with a smile.

"I have not seen you for ages. You might stay for another ten minutes and talk to me."

"I shall be delighted."

"That is nice of you--and I will show you a present I have had from India. You can smoke if you like."

"I suppose it is little things like this that you do that make you so charming a hostess."

"Thank you," she laughed, a pink flush in her cheeks, "and now wait a moment and I will give you a surprise."

And Sangster heard the same sneering laugh that he had heard in his rooms. It came from nowhere; but it chilled him to ice, and the answer in his lips died to nothing. He alone heard it, loud as it was, for Madame looked for a moment at him as she spoke and then there was a swish of trailing garments, and she was gone. A little time pa.s.sed, and Sangster thought he would smoke. In an absent manner he put his hand in his breast pocket and pulled out--not his cigarette case, but the pistol. He smiled grimly to himself as he held it in his hand.

"Might as well do it here as anywhere else," he muttered.

On the instant he felt two soft furry arms round his neck, and something sprang lightly to his shoulders. He gave a quick cry and looked up to meet the grinning face of an entellus monkey leering into his eyes.

"My G.o.d!" he gasped, and the sharp report of the Derringer cut into Regine's peal of laughter, and changed its note to a scream of horror.

When the police came she was bending over the body of the madman, laughing in shrill hysterics, and the ape gibbered at them from his seat on the high back of a chair.

A SHADOW OF THE PAST

The sunbirds, hovering and twittering over the _neem_ trees, signalled to me the approach of the coming hot weather. The sky was a steel grey, and over the horizon of the wide plain before my bungalow, on which the short gra.s.s was already dry and crisp, hung a curtain of pale brown dust. Here and there on the expanse of faded green were small herds of lean kine, and, almost on the edge of the road bordering the plain, a line of water-buffaloes sluggishly headed for a shallow pool about a mile or so westward, where they would wallow till the sun went down, and then be driven home with unwilling steps to their byres. The herd bull came last of all, and on his back sat a little naked boy, a pellet bow in his hand, and a cotton bag full of mud pellets slung over his shoulder. He was singing in a high-pitched tuneless voice, and his song seemed to enrage the "brain-fever" bird in the mango tree, where he had hidden silent since the dawn. The bird objected in a shrill crescendo of ringing notes that brought the pellet bow into play, and then there was a whistle of grey-brown wings as he flew to a safer spot, and a silence broken only by the monotonous _tink_, _tink_, _tink_ of the little green barbet or coppersmith. There were times, when fever held me in its grip, that the maddening iteration of its cry was almost unbearable, and to this day I nurse a hatred to that little green-coated and red-throated plague--of a truth "the coppersmith hath done me much evil." I stood in my veranda watching the retreating figure of the Judge, as he drove away full of a project of spending a month in Burma--an enterprise he had been vainly tempting me to share; but I had other fish to fry: my way was westwards, not eastwards, and besides I had slaved for six long years in Burma, and knew it far too well. One glance at the Judge as he turned the elbow of the road, and was lost to view behind the siris trees, one look at the thirsty plain, and the shivering heat haze, through which glinted, now and again, the distant spear-heads of a squadron of Bengal Lancers trotting slowly back to their barracks, and I turned in to my study. I had determined to devote the day to the destruction of old papers, and set about my task in earnest. There was one drawer in particular that had not been touched for three years. I had forgotten what it contained, and opened it slowly, thinking it was possibly an Augean Stable; but nothing met my eyes except a small packet of papers. Yet with that one look came back to me the memory of a life's tragedy. The papers should have been destroyed long ago, and now--I hesitated no longer, but tore them up into the smallest fragments, glad to be rid, as I thought, of the miserable record of a man's folly, of his crime, and of his shame.

But an awakened memory is not easily set at rest, and, in the stillness of that Indian day, the whole thing returned with an insistent force, dead voices spoke to me once more, and bitter regrets hummed of the past, the past that can never be retrodden--and then there arose out of the shadows in vivid distinctness the memory of that supreme moment when John Mazarion cast his soul to h.e.l.l. It all came back like a picture: that lonely Himalayan mountain side, the black pines, the silent eternal snows, Mazarion with his pale white face, and Rani with her laughing eyes. An eagle screamed above us, I remember, and with a hissing of wings dropped over the abyss into the blue mists that clung to the mountain side.

John Mazarion and I had been friends at school, and we met again as young men with a common interest in our lives, for we had both adopted an Indian career. Mazarion had gone into the Indian Marine, and I--I wanted in those days to build empires as did Clive and Hastings, and so I sought honour in another service, and got sent to Burma for my pains and--the empires have yet to be built. There was yet another interest between John and myself, and that was Nelly. Being young men we did as young men do, and both fell in love; but unfortunately we both fell in love with the same woman, and Nelly took Mazarion. It was a bitter thing for me then; but now that I have come to an age when I can argue with myself, I can see it was but natural. John was a big handsome man with fair hair and limpid blue eyes, and Nelly--well, a man does not care to write about the woman he loves; she was Nelly and that is enough. Though I never spoke of it, I fancy Nelly must have known I loved her, for in that tender womanly way which good women alone have she gave me strength to endure, and for her sake I wished Mazarion good luck, and sailed for the East. John followed in a few weeks, and I understood they were to be married in three years, when Mazarion got his step--a long engagement; but the purse of an Indian officer is mostly a lean one, and Nelly's people were not rich. Well, as I said before, I began my Eastern career in Burma, and Mazarion's duties led him to the Bay of Bengal and to the Burman waters. We never met for close on four years; but occasionally I came to Rangoon, the capital of Burma, and there I heard much of him, and always in connection with some story of stupid folly. The best of men would shrink from daylight being thrown on all their actions; but what would have been wrong in any man's case became doubly so, and doubly dishonourable, in the case of John Mazarion--at least I thought and think so, for Nelly's face used to rise before me with a look of patient waiting in the sweet eyes.

At last we met in the club at Rangoon and lunched together. He incidentally let out that he had got his step in promotion nearly a year ago, and went on to answer the unspoken question in my look.

"Nelly will have to wait a year or so more, I'm afraid--I'm deuced hard up. But I suppose you're in the same street. Come and have a smoke."

I was not in the same street; but I went and had a smoke. We talked of many things, and when I left I knew that John had slipped down, but how far down I was yet to know. Before I left the club I accepted an invitation to supper with him in his rooms; he had received a port appointment, and was for the present stationed in Rangoon. I went to that supper. There were two or three others there, and a lady--G.o.d save the mark!--who did the honours of the house. I could have struck Mazarion where he sat brazening the whole thing out; but I held myself in somehow and saw it through. I was the first to go, and Mazarion followed me to the door--shame was not quite dead in him. "Look here, old man," he said, "you're off home, I know, and will see Nelly. You needn't--and--you know what I mean--" holding out his hand.

I drew back. "Yes, I know what you mean, and I will keep silent. But I would to G.o.d I hadn't accepted your cursed hospitality!"

And I turned and walked down the stairway, leaving him on the landing, white with rage. In a month from that day I was in England, and a week later I had seen Nelly. I well remember it was with a beating heart that I came to the door of the suburban villa with the May tree in bloom near the gate, and in a minute or so was in the little drawing-room I knew so well. In the place of honour was a large photograph of Mazarion in his naval uniform, and near it was a vase with a votive offering of fresh flowers. I felt who had placed them there, and swore bitterly under my breath. Then the door opened and Nelly came in with outstretched bands.

"I'm so glad to see you, Mr. Thring, after all these years."

"And it seems to me as if I had never been away. I shook off the East with the first grey sky I saw."

Then we sat and talked, but I carefully avoided the subject of Mazarion, and now and again parried a leading question because I did not know what to say, and felt miserable when I saw the eager light in Nelly's eyes fade into a look of disappointment. Finally Mrs.

Carstairs, Nelly's mother, came in, and it was a relief, for I had to go over my experiences again. But I struck on the rocks at last when Mrs. Carstairs said: "Well, I suppose you are lucky in getting back in four years--though that does seem such a long time."

"Yes, I suppose I am, Mrs. Carstairs. There are men who have been away ten years and more, and whose prospects of seeing home again are still far."

I thought I heard the faintest echo of a sigh, and grew hot all over.

My hand shook so that I could hear the teacup I held rattle on the saucer. I was a tactless fool.

"How hard!" said Mrs. Carstairs, "and there is poor John still out there, waiting for his step. I wonder when he will get it and be able to come home."

I looked at Nelly. Her eyes were ablaze and her cheeks flushed, and the words "waiting for his step" rang in my ears. Mazarion had got his step a year ago--he had told me so himself. I could say nothing.

"I suppose you have seen John," Mrs. Carstairs went on. "You and he used to be such friends. When did you last meet?"

"About six weeks ago, in Rangoon; he was looking very well."

"I am so glad. We--that is, Nelly has not heard for nearly two months, and when he last wrote he said he was very busy, and likely to go on a long cruise."

Now I knew Mazarion had held that port appointment for nearly six months, and would hold it for a year or so to come without any likelihood of going on a cruise, and I of course knew that he was lying--lying to the dear heart that loved him so well. To this day I know not whether I did right or wrong in holding my tongue, in saying nothing, and when I left them I left them still in that fool's paradise of trust and love and hope. I saw them once again before I left. I could not go back without one more look at Nelly. As I said good-bye she timidly slipped a small packet into my hands, and I promised it would reach John Mazarion in safety.

On the voyage back I thought of many things, and reproached myself for having parted with Mazarion as I had. For her sake I should have made some effort to pull him right, and as it were I had simply kicked him down a step lower, for I had made him feel his infamy, and that is not the way to help a man to recover his own self-respect. I had been hasty--for the moment my temper had got the better of me--with the usual result. And so I determined not to send him Nelly's gift, but, on reaching Rangoon, to deliver the packet with my own hands.

I found him in his office on the river face, and, as I expected, there was a coldness and constraint in his manner. Our eyes met--his still with anger in them--and then he dropped his look.

"I have brought this," I said, "from Miss Carstairs. I promised it should reach you safely."

He took the packet from me in silence, but I saw his hands shake and the crow's-feet gather about his eyes. He fumbled with the seals, then let the packet drop on the table, and looked at me again as I blurted out: "I have said nothing--not a word."

"I do not understand, sir."

"John Mazarion," I cut in, "you are still to her what you have ever been. Man! you know not what you are throwing away. See here, John!

You are my oldest friend, and I can't let you go like this. Pull up and turn round; give yourself a chance. If--if money is wanted--well, I've saved a bit----"

He simply leaned back in his chair and laughed. And such a laugh!

There was not a ring of mirth in it--a tuneless, mocking laugh such as might come from the throat of a devil. Then he stopped and looked at me, the hard lines still in the corners of his mouth and round his eyes.

"Thring, you're a meddlesome fool! Take my advice and let each man stir his own porridge. I want no interference and none of your d.a.m.ned advice. I mean to live my own life."

"It isn't of you alone I am thinking."