The Ragged Edge Part 33

"It's something Ruth saw. She told me the tale the other night, and I've only elaborated it."

"Ah, I see." McClintock saw indeed--two things: that the boy had no conceit and that this odd girl would always be giving. "Well, it's a good story."

He offered cigars, and Ruth got up. She always left the table when they began to smoke. Spurlock had not coached her on this line of conduct. Somewhere she had read that it was the proper thing to do and that men liked to be alone with their tobacco. She hated to leave; for this hour would be the most interesting. Both Spurlock and McClintock stood by their chairs until she was gone.

"Yes, sir," said McClintock, as he sat down; "that's South Sea stuff, that yarn of yours. I like the way you shared it. I have read that authors are very selfish and self-centred."

"Oh, Ruth couldn't put it on paper, to be sure; but there was no reason to hide the source."

"Have you told her?"

"Told her? Told her what?" Spurlock sat straight in his chair.

"You know what I mean," said the trader, gravely. "In spots you are a thoroughbred; but here's a black mark on your ticket, lad. My friend the doctor suspected it, and so do I. You are not a tourist seeking adventure. You have all the earmarks of a fugitive from justice."

Spurlock grew limp in his chair. "If you thought that, why did you give me this job?"--his voice faint and thick.

"The doctor and I agreed to give you a chance--for her sake.

Without realizing what she has done, she's made a dreadful mess of it. A child--as innocent as a child! Nothing about life; bemused by the fairy stories you writers call novels! I don't know what you have done; I don't care. But you must tell her."

"I can't! I can't--not now!"

"Bat!--can't you see that she's the kind who would understand and forgive? She loves you."

The walls appeared to rock; bulging shadows reached out; the candle flames became mocking eyes; and the blood drummed thunderously in Spurlock's ears. The door to the apocalypse had opened!

"Loves me? . . . Ruth?"

"Why the devil not? Why do you suppose she married you if she didn't love you? While you read I watched her face. It was in her eyes--the big thing that comes but once. But you! Why the devil did _you_ marry _her_? That's the thing that confounds me."

"G.o.d help me, what a muddle!" The cigar crumbled in Spurlock's hand.

"All life is a muddle, and we are all muddlers, more or less. It is a matter of degree. Lord, I am sixty. For thirty years I have lived alone; but once upon a time I lived among men. I know life. I sit back now, letting life slip by and musing upon it; and I find my loneliness sweet. I have had my day; and there were women in it.

So, when I tell you she loves you, I know. Supposing they find you and take you away?--and she unprepared? Have you thought of that?

Why did you marry her?"

"G.o.d alone knows!"

"And you don't love her! What kind of a woman do you want, anyhow?"--with rising anger. He saw the tragedy on the boy's face; but he was merciless. "Are you a poltroon, after all?"

"That's it! I ought to have died that night!"

"Or is there a taint of insanity in your family history? Alone and practically penniless like yourself! You weren't even stirred by grat.i.tude. You just married her. Lad, that fuddles me!"

"Did you bring me down here to crucify me?" cried Spurlock, in pa.s.sionate rebellion.

"No, lad," said McClintock, his tone becoming kindly. "Only, what you have done is out of all human calculation. You did not marry her because you loved her; you did not marry because she might have had money; you did not marry her out of grat.i.tude; you did not marry her because you had to. You just married her! But there she is--'with her eyes full of sapphires and her mouth full of pearls'!" McClintock quoted with gentle irony. "What have you got there in your breast--a stone? Is there blood or water in your veins?"

The dam broke, but not with violence. A vast relief filled Spurlock's heart as he decided to tell this man everything which related to Ruth. This island was the one haven he had; he might be forced to remain here for several years--until the Hand had forgotten him. He must win this man's confidence, even at the risk of being called mad. So, in broken, rather breathless phrases, he told his story; and when he had done, he laid his arms upon the table and bent his head to them.

There followed a silence which endured several minutes; or, rather a tableau. The candles--for McClintock never used oil in his dining room--were burning low in the sconces. Occasionally the flames would bend, twist and writhe crazily as the punka-boy bestirred himself.

McClintock's astonishment merged into a state of mild hypnosis.

That any human being could conceive and execute such a thing! A Roundhead, here in these prosaic times!--and mad as a hatter!

Trying the role of St. Anthony, when G.o.d Himself had found only one man strong enough for that! McClintock shook his head violently, as if to dismiss this dream he was having. But the objects in his range of vision remained unchanged. Presently he reached out and laid his hand upon Spurlock's motionless shoulders.

"'Tis a cruel thing you've done, lad. Even if you were sick in the mind and did not understand what you were doing, it's a mighty cruel thing you have done. Probably she mistook you; probably she thought you cared. I'm neither an infidel nor an agnostic, so I'll content myself by saying that the hand of G.o.d is in this somewhere.

'He's a good fellow, and 'twill all end well'. You have set out to do something which is neither G.o.d's way nor man's. What'll you be doing?"

"What can I do?" asked Spurlock, raising his haggard face. "Can't you see? I can't hurt her, if ... if she cares! I can't tell her I'm a madman as well as a thief!... What a fool! What a fool!"

A thief. McClintock's initial revulsion was natural; he was an honest man. But this revulsion was engulfed by the succeeding waves of pity and understanding. One transgression; he was sure of that.

The boy was all conscience, and he suffered through this conscience to such lengths that the law would be impotent to add anything. All this muddle to placate his conscience!

"Here--quick!" McClintock thrust a cigar into Spurlock's hand. "Put it in your teeth and light it. I hear her coming."

Spurlock obeyed mechanically. The candle was shaking in his hand as Ruth appeared in the doorway.

"I thought we were going to have some music," she said.

Her husband stared at her over the candle flame. Flesh and blood, vivid, alluring; she was no longer the symbol, therefore she had become, as in the twinkling of an eye, an utter stranger. And this utter stranger ... loved him! He had no reason to doubt McClintock's statement; the Scot had solved the riddle why Ruth Enschede had married Howard Spurlock. All emotions laid hold of him, but none could he stay long enough to a.n.a.lyze it. For a s.p.a.ce he rode the whirligig.

"We were talking shop," said McClintock, rising. Observing Spurlock's spell-bound att.i.tude, he clapped the boy on the shoulder. "Come along! We'll start that concert right away."

In the living room Spurlock's glance was constantly drawn toward Ruth; but in fear that she might sense something wrong, he walked over to the piano and struck a few chords.

"You play?" asked McClintock, who was sorting the rolls.

"A little. This is a good piano."

"It ought to be; it cost enough to get it here," said the Scot, ruefully. "Ever play one of these machines?"

"Yes. I've always been more or less music-mad. But machinery will never approach the hand."

"I know a man.... But I'll tell you about him some other time. I'm crazy over music, too. I can't pump out all there is to these compositions. Try something."

Spurlock gratefully accepted the Grieg _concerto_, gratefully, because it was brilliant and thunderous. _Papillon_ would have broken him down; anything tender would have sapped his will; and like as not he would have left the stool and rushed into the night.

He played for an hour--Grieg, Chopin, Rubenstein, Liszt, crashing music. The action steadied him; and there was a phase of irony, too, that helped. He had been for months without music of the character he loved--and he dared not play any of it!

McClintock, after the music began, left the piano and sat in a corner just beyond the circle of light cast by the lamp. His interest was divided: while his ears drank in the sounds, his glance constantly roved from Ruth to the performer and back to Ruth. These amazing infants!

Suddenly he came upon the true solution: that the boy hadn't meant to steal whatever it was he had stolen. A victim of one of those mental typhoons that scatter irretrievably the barriers of instinct and breeding; and he had gone on the rocks all in a moment. Never any doubt of it. That handsome, finely drawn face belonged to a soul with clean ideals. All in a moment. McClintock's heart went out to Spurlock; he would always be the boy's friend, even though he had dragged this girl on to the rocks with him.

Love and lavender, he thought, perhaps wistfully. He could remember when women laid away their gowns in lavender--as this girl's mother had. He would always be her friend, too. That boy--blind as a bat!

Why, he hadn't seen the Woman until to-night!

From the first chord of the Grieg _concerto_ to the _finale_ of the Chopin _ballade_, Ruth had sat tensely on the edge of her chair.

She had dreaded the beginning of this hour. What would happen to her? Would her soul be shaken, twisted, hypnotized?--as it had been those other times? Music--that took out of her the sense of reality, whirled her into the clouds, that gave to her will the directless energy of a chip of wood on stormy waters. But before the Grieg _concerto_ was done, she knew that she was free. Free!