The Passion for Life Part 41

"Have you heard from Hugh lately?" I asked, after our first greetings.

"No," she replied. "My father has forbidden both my mother and me to receive any letters from him."

"Surely that is a foolish command on his part," I said. "He cannot stop Hugh from writing, neither can he forbid the postman from bringing letters to your house."

"No," she said, with a laugh, "but my father has the key to the letter bag, and he can decide as to what letters reach us." She spoke, as I thought, flippantly, and as one who did not care.

Perhaps it was the tone of her voice and the look in her eyes which caused me to say what I did.

"Have I to congratulate you, Miss Lethbridge?"

"Congratulate me on what?" she asked.

"On your engagement," I said.

"Engagement! To whom?"

"To Mr. Barcroft?"

She laughed as though I had perpetrated a joke.

"What made you think of such a thing?" she asked.

"The look in his eyes when I saw him at your house, and your evident liking for each other."

I felt how incongruous my words were, how utterly out of keeping with the scenes of sorrow I had witnessed that day; but, as I said, a spirit of madness was upon me.

"Men are such fools," was her reply.

"Yes, they are. But we cannot help that. Men were born to be fooled by women. But surely Mr. Barcroft is a happy man now if what rumor says is true."

"And what does rumor say?"

"That he is favored above all other men," I replied. "That Miss Lethbridge has consented to make him happy."

"Was it not Shakespeare who said that 'rumor was a lying jade'?" And again she laughed, as I thought, flippantly, heartlessly. "Poor man, I cannot help what he feels."

I felt that her words were those of a vulgar woman, and yet, as she stood there that day, with the early spring sunlight shining upon her, her face flushed with the hue of health, her eyes shining brightly, I had never seen any one so beautiful.

"And is rumor a lying jade in this instance?" I asked.

"Of course it is," was her reply. "Did I not tell you once, somewhere near here, that I did not believe there was such a thing as love?"

"And did you ever tell him so?" And I think there was an angry note in my voice as I asked her that question.

"Have I ever given you the right to ask that?"

"I don't know," I replied. "But I want to tell you something. I have no right to tell you, but I am in a strange humor to-day. I have been talking with Mr. Trelaske, whose son has been killed in the war. I have also been to the house of Mrs. Rosewarn, whose boy Tom is dead."

"Of course, that is very sad," she said; "but I don't see what that has to do with what you have to tell me. Come, I am impatient to hear."

Reflecting on it since, I cannot think why I yielded to the madness which possessed me, but I am setting down in this narrative what actually occurred. I suppose I acted like a boor, and I know that, judging by every canon of good taste, I am to be condemned.

"Miss Lethbridge, do you know that more than once since I came to Cornwall I have believed myself in love with you?"

She stared at me with wide-open eyes.

"I have sometimes thought," I went on, "that I would give worlds to possess your love. Had I not been a dying man, I would not have said this; but it does not matter now. Besides, I do not love you."

"Thank you," she replied. "But really----"

"No," I interrupted. "Do not retort by saying that you never wished for my love, and that if I offered it you would decline it with thanks. I am in a strange humor, or I should not say this. In a way I do love you, love you more than words can tell or imagination can fancy; at the same time, I know I do not love you at all. I love the woman you ought to be, the woman G.o.d meant you to be--if there be a G.o.d."

She looked at me like one startled.

"You have tried to play with my heart," I said to her, "I who am only a dying man. No, do not deny it, but you have. You have flashed looks of love at me. You have tried to make me think that you love me, and all the time you have not cared a straw about me. There have been times when I have been ready to worship you, but I could not do it, although, as I said, I have loved you--that is, I have loved the woman you ought to be, that you were meant to be; but it was not you. Do you know, Miss Lethbridge, that you have been a baleful influence in the lives of men?

It does not matter to me now, I am beyond that; but since I have been in Cornwall I have met three fellows whose lives you have blackened. You won their love, you made them think you cared for them. Why have you done it?"

Her face from rosy red became ashy pale, but her eyes gleamed with hot anger.

"Really, Mr. Erskine," she said quietly, "you mistook your profession. A burlesque actor is your role."

"Your retort is poor," I went on. "I am not acting, but am in sober earnest. Perhaps I have no right to think of such things, but there have been times when I became mad about you, would almost have sold my soul to possess you. Why, even now my heart cries out for you. I love you more than life or being, and yet it is not you I love at all; it is the woman you might have been."

She stood looking at me for some seconds, again with wide-open eyes.

Once or twice she seemed on the point of speaking, but she uttered no word. Then she turned and walked away. Her head was erect, and she carried herself proudly.

I knew I had wounded her deeply.

XX

THE VICAR'S SERMON

On the following Sunday I went to Chapel in the morning, and to the Parish Church in the evening. As I wended my way thitherwards, I reflected how strange it was that I should make it almost a habit to go to a place of worship on a Sunday. Prior to coming to Cornwall, I had not been inside a Church of any sort for years; indeed, such a thing was alien to my life. I had no interest in it, neither did I see its utility. Indeed, even then I could have given no explanation for my action. Neither Church nor Chapel had given me an answer to things I wanted to know.

As I tried to a.n.a.lyze my reason for going, it seemed that something in the atmosphere of Sunday in Cornwall made it natural. Besides, it gave a kind of mild interest to my life. I had but few friends, and living alone as I did, I grew tired of reading and thinking; thus, when Sunday came, the ringing of the Church bells seemed to call me to a house of prayer. I dare say that if I had been in a country where Mohammedanism or Buddhism was the established faith of the people, I should have gone to their mosques or temples just as I went to Church and Chapel in Cornwall.

To speak quite frankly, I had, up to the present, received no benefit from either. Mostly the pulpit at the Chapel was occupied by some layman, who spoke in a language different from my own. These laymen had read no books expressing the thought of the age, neither did they at all understand the att.i.tude of my mind. That they were simple, earnest men I did not doubt, and yet I often wondered at their daring to occupy the position of religious teachers. What distressed me, moreover, was the fact that most of them appeared very anxious to convince their congregation that they had prepared a fine discourse, rather than to help people. The note of deep experience was too often lacking; and yet almost Sunday by Sunday I found my way there, until my presence caused no remark whatever.

In spite of all this, however, I could not help reflecting that since I came to the little village of St. Issey a subtle change had come over the congregation. Not that the Chapel was very much more largely attended; but there seemed to me to be a spirit of yearning, a deep undertone of feeling among the worshippers. That morning especially did I realize this. The preacher was John Rosewarn, the father of the boy whose death had been recorded the previous week. I will not try to reproduce his sermon.

Intellectually, John Rosewarn had practically nothing to say to me, and yet my heart was moved strangely. The shadow of his loss was brooding over him, and although he had no great mental ac.u.men, he seemed to be feeling his way to the heart of things. There was a deep tenderness in his voice, a new light in his eyes. He made no mention of his son's death, but the fact was felt throughout the whole Church. Many wondered, I myself included, how he could have conducted the service that day, yet he did; and although his message from an intellectual standpoint was poor and unconvincing, there was a sense of reality which I had seldom felt in the homely little building.

The congregation felt this too, and especially was it manifest during the singing of the hymns. One hymn, I remember, the people sang with great fervor. I had never heard it before, and from the standpoint of poetry it had nothing to recommend it, but as these people sang it, it was weighted with meaning.