The Salamander Part 85

The door opened with a certain solemnity and Judge Ma.s.singale came in.

She acknowledged his coming with a half-forward gesture of her hand, her glance on the floor, afraid of the first recognition, saying rapidly:

"It was good of you to come, very good. Thank you."

He stood, without movement to lay aside his hat and stick, self-possessed and cynically amused.

"I have come, my dear lady," he said evenly. "Well, because--I was curious."

"I had to see you," she said in a low rapid voice, "I could not bear--I had to see you--I wanted you to understand."

"Understand? What a curious word. You'll be saying forgive next."

"Ah, yes, forgive me," she cried impulsively, looking at him for the first time. "Forgive me for all the harm I've done to you!"

"And I came to congratulate you." He laid his hat and cane mathematically on a table and came forward with the same controlled smile.

"Oh, let me explain," she said, revolting at his manner.

"Explain? There is nothing to explain, everything is quite clear--to me at least," he said, and against his intention a note of harshness came into his voice. "You played your game perfectly. You used me for just what you wanted: to bring another man to the point. Oh, don't apologize.

It's done a great deal nowadays in the best of families. You have made a splendid marriage, Mrs. Lindaberry. I _do_ congratulate you."

"You don't believe that," she said angrily.

"Pardon me, I do. I'm not reproaching you. I warned myself again and again. I said once if I ever was fool enough to believe you I would be lost. Well, I believed you. I blame only myself. You are a very clever woman, Mrs. Lindaberry."

She twisted her hands helplessly, staring out the window over worn roofs to storm-clouds piling against the sky, hurt and defenseless against his light irony.

"Yes, yes," she said tremulously. "You have a right--I deserve all that." She sat down weakly, her hands between her knees, staring out.

"Oh, please," he said, smiling at the dramatic a.s.sumption. "Don't let's take things too seriously. I was not so hard hit as all that. Honestly, now that it's all over I'm--well, rather relieved. It would have been rather a nasty mess. I like the ruts of life; I'm quite happy going on as I am. You see how frank I am--I won't play the injured hero. Now that I look back, critically, in my own sort of way, I a.s.sure you my only sentiment is one of admiration. Great heavens, what does it avail to have all the knowledge of the world against one little woman! Come," he added with a certain nervous intentness, which belied the simulated lightness of his tone, "be frank. You know you never meant to go."

She shook her head slowly, staring ahead of her as though painfully distinguishing that other volatile and breathless self.

"It seems an awful thing to say now," she said slowly. "I think I would have gone if I'd been sure of you."

"If!" he said scornfully.

"You never really wanted to go!" she said, rising and approaching him swiftly, speaking rapidly with quick breaths. "You only wanted the sensation of the forbidden--you, too! All you say now proves it! You were always thinking of society--of what your friends--and the newspapers would say--always afraid, always hesitating, always a gentleman!"

"True, but not at the last," he said doggedly, forgetting his pose.

"Yes, yes, even at the last. Just the same at the last," she said angrily. "No, no! I was to blame! I saw in you what you were not, what you could never be. I was wild--crazy; but I longed for something beautiful--a great romance. I thought you understood--you didn't! It was never anything but an infatuation with you--just that and nothing else--something pulling you down!"

"That is not true," he said roughly, stirred by her charge. "At the end it was I and not you who would have made the greater sacrifice. I was ready to throw over everything!"

"No, no!" she repeated blindly. "You weren't going of your own free will. There were times when you hated me more than you loved me. At the end you were going like a criminal!"

"What! When I had told my wife all--broken with her--put myself in her power--turned my back on everything--yes, and gladly!"

"I never believed it," she said standing in front of him, inciting him by word and look. "I don't believe it now. If you had cared as I wanted--"

"Cared! Great G.o.d," he broke in pa.s.sionately, "I was ready to exile myself, to throw my reputation to the dogs--to ruin my whole life.

Cared!"

"You cared!" she said in rapid scorn. "You loved! And now six months later you can come here calmly, brutally, cynically, and say, 'I came because I was curious.' You _cared_!"

A blind animal fury swept over him. He caught her in his arms, murder and abject yielding wrestling in his soul.

"Dodo!"

She had swept aside all the artifices of the man of the world. The man beneath the veneer, rage or pa.s.sion led, held her in a clasp that left its wounds upon her tender arms. Yet she did not move or cry out. He looked at her inertly thus, immobile as a statue and suddenly as though perceiving a strange woman, he released her roughly, amazed at himself.

"Good G.o.d," he said, striking his forehead, "haven't you done me enough harm already!"

She burst out weeping.

He turned, stirred to a guilty responsibility, trying to bl.u.s.ter into the better reason.

"Why did you bring me here?"

She made no answer.

"Dodo," he said angrily, wondering still at her motive with growing alarm, "I warn you; all is over between us. You yourself have done it.

You belong to another!"

She fell back in a chair, her sobs redoubling hysterically; a wild laugh suddenly breaking through.

"I'm sorry--I'm awfully sorry," he said, stirred from his anger and his righteousness.

"No, no," she said brokenly, "you've done nothing--nothing, but what I wished."

"What!" he said in a voice of thunder.

"I wanted you to forget yourself--to take me in your arms," she said almost incoherently.

He could not believe his ears. Astounded, he seized her by the wrist, saying angrily:

"You--you did this on purpose!"

"I did, and oh, it is the worst, the most awful thing I've done in all my life--I know it, I know it! But I had to do it, yes, I had to. Oh, forgive me, Your Honor. I had no right but I had to know."

"What do you mean?" he said, releasing her and staring at her to a.s.sure himself that she was in her right mind.

She rose, the tears at an end, facing him calmly, even with a new sense of power, which struck profoundly into his masculine vanity.

"I had to know that I was really free--that you had no more power over me--that I could go on with my life," she said simply.

It was too monstrous, he could not credit it.