The Marriage of William Ashe Part 59

His voice was almost angry.

She shrugged her shoulders.

"What does it matter? You know very well it would be much better for you if--"

"If what?"

"If I followed Harry." The words were just breathed, and her eyes shrank from meeting his. Ashe, on the other hand, turned and looked at her steadily.

"Are you quite determined I sha'n't get _any_ joy out of my holiday?"

She shook her head uncertainly. Then, almost immediately, she began to chatter to Margaret French about the sights of the lagoon, with her natural trenchancy and fun. But her hand, hidden under the folds of her black cloak, still clung to William's.

"It is her illness," he said to himself, "and the loss of the child."

And at the remembrance of his little son, a wave of sore yearning filled his own heart. Deep under the occupations and interests of the mind lay this pa.s.sionate regret, and at any moment of pause or silence its "buried life" arose and seized him. But he was a busy politician, absorbed even in these days of holiday by the questions and problems of the hour. And Kitty was a delicate woman--with no defence against the torture of grief.

He thought of those first days after the child's death, when in spite of the urgency of the doctors it had been impossible to keep the news from Kitty; of the ghastly effect of it upon nerves and brain already imperilled by causes only half intelligible; of those sudden flights from her nurses, when the days of convalescence began, to the child's room, and, later, to his grave. There was stinging pain in these recollections. Nor was he, in truth, much rea.s.sured by his wife's more recent state. It was impossible, indeed, that he should give it the same constant thought as a woman might--or a man of another and more emotional type. At this moment, perhaps, he had literally no _time_ for the subtleties of introspective feeling, even had his temperament inclined him to them, which was, in truth, not the case. He knew that Kitty had suddenly and resolutely ceased to talk about the boy, had thrown herself with the old energy into new pursuits, and, since she came to Venice in particular, had shown a feverish desire to fill every hour with movement and sight-seeing.

But was she, in truth, much better--in body or soul?--poor child! The doctors had explained her illness as nervous collapse, pointing back to a long preceding period of overstrain and excitement. There had been suspicions of tubercular mischief, but no precise test was then at command; and as Kitty had improved with rest and feeding the idea had been abandoned. But Ashe was still haunted by it, though quite ready--being a natural optimist--to escape from it, and all other incurable anxieties, as soon as Kitty herself should give the signal.

As to the moral difficulties and worries of those months at Haggart, Ashe remembered them as little as might be. Kitty's illness, indeed, had shown itself in more directions than one, as an amending and appeasing fact. Even Lord Parham had been moved to compa.s.sion and kindness by the immediate results of that horrible scene on the terrace. His leave-taking from Ashe on the morning afterwards had been almost cordial--almost intimate. And as to Lady Tranmore, whenever she had been able to leave her paralyzed husband she had been with Kitty, nursing her with affectionate wisdom night and day. While on the other members of the Haggart party the sheer pity of Kitty's condition had worked with surprising force. Lord Grosville had actually made his wife offer Grosville Park for Kitty's convalescence--Kitty got her first laugh out of the proposal. The Dean had journeyed several times from his distant cathedral town, to see and sit with Kitty; Eddie Helston's flowers had been almost a nuisance; Mrs. Alcot had shown herself quite soft and human.

The effect, indeed, of this general sympathy on Lord Parham's relations to the chief member of his cabinet had been but small and pa.s.sing. Ashe disliked and distrusted him more than ever; and whatever might have happened to the Premier's resentment of a particular offence, there could be no doubt that a visit from which Ashe had hoped much had ended in complete failure, that Parham was disposed to cross his powerful henchman where he could, and that intrigue was busy in the cabinet itself against the reforming party of which Ashe was the head Ashe, indeed, felt his own official position, outwardly so strong, by no means secure. But the game of politics was none the less exhilarating for that.

As to Kitty's relation to himself--and life's most intimate and tender things--in these days, did he probe his own consciousness much concerning them? Probably not. Was he aware that, when all was said and done, in spite of her misdoings, in spite of his pa.s.sion of anxiety during her illness, in spite of the pity and affection of his daily att.i.tude, Kitty occupied, in truth, much less of his mind than she had ever yet occupied?--that a certain magic--primal, incommunicable--had ceased to clothe her image in his thoughts?

Again--probably not. For these slow changes in a man's inmost personality are like the ebb and flow of summer tides over estuary sands. Silent, the main creeps in, or out; and while we dream, the great basin fills, and the fishing-boats come in--or the gentle, pitiless waters draw back into the bosom of ocean, and the sea-birds run over the wide, untenanted flats.

They landed at the Piazzetta as the lamps were being lit. The soft October darkness was falling fast, and on the ledges of St. Mark's and the Ducal Palace the pigeons had begun to roost. An animated crowd was walking up and down in the Piazza where a band was playing; and on the golden horses of St. Mark's there shone a pale and mystical light, the last reflection from the western sky. Under the colonnades the jewellers and gla.s.s-shops blazed and sparkled, and the warm sea-wind fluttered the Italian flags on the great flag-staffs that but so recently had borne the Austrian eagle.

Ashe walked with his head thrown back, thinking absently, in this centre of Venice, of English politics, and of a phrase of Metternich's he had come across in a volume of memoirs he had been lately reading on the journey:

"Le jour qui court n'a aucune valeur pour moi, excepte comme la veille du lendemain. C'est toujours avec le lendemain que mon esprit lutte."

The phrase pleased him particularly.

He, too, was wrestling with the morrow, though in another sense than Metternich's. His mind was alive with projects; an exultant consciousness both of capacity and opportunity possessed him.

"Why, you've pa.s.sed the club, William!" said Kitty.

Ashe awoke with a start, smiled at her, and with a wave of the hand disappeared in a stairway to the right.

Margaret French lingered in a bead-shop to make some purchases. Kitty walked home alone, and Margaret, whose watchful affection never failed, knew that she preferred it, and let her go her way.

The Ashes had rooms on the first bend of the Grand Ca.n.a.l looking south.

To reach them by land from the Piazza, Kitty had to pa.s.s through a series of narrow streets, or _calles_, broken by _campos_, or small squares, in which stood churches. As she pa.s.sed one of these churches she was attracted by the sound of gay music and by the crowd about the entrance. Pushing aside the leathern curtain over the door, she found herself in a great rococo nave, which blazed with lights and decorations. Lines of huge wax candles were fixed in temporary holders along the floor. The pillars were swathed in rose-colored damask, and the choir was ablaze with flowers, and even more brilliantly lit, if possible, than the rest of the church.

Kitty's Catholic training told her that an exposition of the Blessed Sacrament was going on. Mechanically she dipped her fingers into the holy water, she made her genuflection to the altar, and knelt down in one of the back rows.

How rich and sparkling it was--the lights, the bright colors, the dancing music! "_Dolce Sacramento! Santo Sacramento!_" these words of an Italian hymn or litany recurred again and again, with endless iteration.

Kitty's sensuous, excitable nature was stirred with delight. Then, suddenly, she remembered her child, and the little face she had seen for the last time in the coffin. She began to cry softly, hiding her face in her black veil. An unbearable longing possessed her. "I shall never have another child," she thought. "_That's_ all over."

Then her thoughts wandered back to the party at Haggart, to the scene on the terrace, and to that rush of excitement which had mastered her, she scarcely knew how or why. She could still hear the Dean's voice--see the lamp wavering above her head. "What possessed me! I didn't care a straw whether the lamp set me on fire--whether I lived or died. I wanted to die."

Was it because of that short conversation with William in the afternoon?--because of the calmness with which he had taken that word "separation," which she had thrown at him merely as a child boasts and threatens, never expecting for one moment to be taken at its word? She had proposed it to him before, after the night at Hamel Weir; she had been serious then, it had been an impulse of remorse, and he had laughed at her. But at Haggart it had been an impulse of temper, and he had taken it seriously. How the wound had rankled, all the afternoon, while she was chattering to the Royalties! And as she jumped on the pedestal, and saw his face of horror, there was the typical womanish triumph that she had made him _feel_--would make him feel yet more.

How good, how tender he had been to her in her illness! And yet--yet?

"He cares for politics, for his plans--not for me. He will never trust me again--as he did once. He'll never ask me to help him--he'll find ways not to--though he'll be very sweet to me all the time."

And the thought of her nullity with him in the future, her insignificance in his life, tortured her.

Why had she treated Lord Parham so? "I can be a lady when I choose," she said, mockingly, to herself. "I wasn't even a lady."

Then suddenly there flashed on her memory a little picture of Lord Parham, standing spectacled and bewildered, peering into her slip of paper. She bent her head on her hands and laughed, a stifled, hysterical laugh, which scandalized the woman kneeling beside her.

But the laugh was soon quenched again in restless pain. William's affection had been her only refuge in those weeks of moral and physical misery she had just pa.s.sed through.

"But it's only because he's so terribly sorry for me. It's all quite different. And I can't ever make him love me again in the old way.... It wasn't my fault. It's something born in me--that catches me by the throat."

And she had the actual physical sense of some one strangled by a possessing force.

"_Dolce Sacramento! Santo Sacramento!_"... The music swayed and echoed through the church. Kitty uncovered her eyes and felt a sudden exhilaration in the blaze of light. It reminded her of the bending Christ in the picture of San Giorgio. Awe and beauty flowed in upon her, in spite of the poor music and the tawdry church. What if she tried religion?--recalled what she had been taught in the convent?--gave herself up to a director?

She shivered and recoiled. How would she ever maintain her faith against William--William, who knew so much more than she?

Then, into the emptiness of her heart there stole the inevitable temptations of memory. Where was Geoffrey? She knew well that he was a violent and selfish man; but he understood much in her that William would never understand. With a morbid eagerness she recalled the play of feeling between them, before that mad evening at Hamel Weir. What perpetual excitement--no time to think--or regret!

During her weeks of illness she had lost all count of his movements. Had he been still writing during the summer for the newspaper which had sent him out? Had there not been rumors of his being wounded--or attacked by fever? Her memory, still vague and weak, struggled painfully with memories it could not recapture.

The Italian paper of that morning--she had spelled it out for herself at breakfast--had spoken of a defeat of the insurrectionary forces, and of their withdrawal into the highlands of Bosnia. There would be a lull in the fighting. Would he come home? And all this time had he been the mere spectator and reporter, or fighting, himself? Her pulses leaped as she thought of him leading down-trodden peasants against the Turk.

But she knew nothing. Surely during the last few months he had purposely made a mystery of his doings and his whereabouts. The only sign of him which seemed to have reached England had been that volume of poems--with those hateful lines! Her lip quivered. She was like a weak child--unable to bear the thought of anything hostile and unkind.

If he had already turned homeward? Perhaps he would come through Venice!

Anyway, he was not far off. The day before she and Margaret had made their first visit to the Lido. And as Kitty stood fronting the Adriatic waves, she had dreamed that somewhere, beyond the farther coast, were those Bosnian mountains in which Geoffrey had pa.s.sed the winter.

Then she started at her own thoughts, rose--loathing herself--drew down her veil, and moved towards the door.

As she reached the leathern curtain which hung over the doorway, a lady in front who was pa.s.sing through held the curtain aside that Kitty might follow. Kitty stepped into the street and looked up to say a mechanical "Thank you."

But the word died on her lips. She gave a stifled cry, which was echoed by the woman before her.

Both stood motionless, staring at each other.