The Vision of Desire Part 52

"Then, when I thought I had suffered all that a man could be called upon to suffer, I met Tony--Tony over head and ears in love with quite another woman, as unlike you--oh, your very ant.i.thesis! He used to talk to me sometimes. G.o.d knows I didn't give him any encouragement! I hated the very sight of him. But he never guessed it. And one day he came and prattled out to me the story of an adventure he had had--at the Dents de Loup--how he got caught up there with a girl. And I knew, then, that it was _your_ adventure, too--though of course he never mentioned your name. But it was as clear as daylight to me. It was as though scales had fallen from my eyes.... I knew then what I'd done. I'd pulled down our house of happiness about our heads. For a time I think I went mad. I could think of nothing except the fact that I'd made it impossible for me ever to come to you again--even to ask your forgiveness."

He was silent a moment, leaning his arm on the chimney-piece and shading his face with his hand. When he again resumed it was with a palpable effort and his voice roughened.

"Afterwards, when I came to my senses, I saw that I _must_ come to you. I had destroyed my own life--all that was worth while in it. But I had no right to destroy yours. So I've come back--to ask your forgiveness, Ann--if you can give it. And by forgiveness"--he eyed her steadily--"I mean all that forgiveness can hold--not just a mere form of words. I want the love I threw away--the right you once gave me to call myself your lover. If you don't feel you can give it--I shan't complain. I've no right to complain. I shall just go quietly out of your life. But if you can--now you know all--"

He broke off. "Ann ... shall I go ... or stay?"

He made an involuntary movement towards her, then, checked himself abruptly and stood looking down at her in silence. From the ball-room there floated out the strains of the latest fox-trot, sounding curiously cheap and tawdry as they cut across the deep, almost solemn intensity that prevailed in the quiet room where a man had just stripped his soul naked to the eyes of the woman he loved and now stood as one awaiting judgment.

Ann remained silent. Speech seemed for a few moments a physical impossibility. She had been touched to the quick. Step by step she had gone with Eliot down into that place of torment where he had been wandering, suffering an agony of pain of which the keenest pang had taken birth in the bitter knowledge that it was of his own making, and in every fibre of her being she ached to give him back all that he had lost--all that he asked for. Ached to give it back to him complete, whole, unharmed--that love which had been his and which he had so piteously thrown away.

And she could not. By no mere shibboleth of words, no waving of a wand, could she restore the past, reconstruct what had been out of what was. Love she could give him in full measure, the same enduring love which would be his for ever, believing or unbelieving, living or dead. And his love she would take again--only she herself knew how gladly! But always their mutual love must lack something--that fine thread of utter faith and trust which he himself had cut asunder. It could be knotted together again, it was true. But one would always feel the knot--know it was there. He believed in her now--because she had been proved innocent. But she would never know if his belief in her would withstand the stress of another such test as the one under which it had gone down. To the end of life there would be a doubt, an unanswered question in her heart, as to whether he really had faith in her or no.

She looked up at last to meet his eyes still fixed intently upon her as he waited for her answer. Her own were rather sad. But her surrender was complete. She held out her hands.

"Stay!" she said.

Yet even as he gathered her into his arms she was vitally, cruelly conscious of the absence of the one thing needful to make perfect their reunion. Not even the swift pa.s.sion of his kisses could convince her of his faith in her. She was not sure--could never be sure, now.

It would be bound to come between them sometimes--that terrible uncertainty. The grey shadow of distrust which had divided them in the past still followed them from afar--a vague, intangible menace. Would it some day swing forward, like the dark, remorseless finger of an hour-dial, and lie once more impa.s.sably between them?

CHAPTER XXIX

A PATCH OF SUNLIGHT

The days which followed were very wonderful ones to Ann. She had come through darkness into light, out of infinite pain into infinite joy, and perhaps the very fact that in giving herself to Eliot she had forgiven much--forgiven what many women would have found it impossible to forgive--added something precious, some sacramental spikenard, to the gift which flowed back to the giver, deepening the profound sense of peace and happiness which encompa.s.sed her.

Eliot had known how to accept her gift--had taken it with simple thankfulness and a wondering reverence for the shining ways along which a woman's love can lead her, and the hour which they had pa.s.sed together after Ann had bidden him stay had been, in a sense, sacred--a mutual revelation to each of them of the secret depths in the other's nature. But afterwards, once that wonderful hour was past, Eliot strode masterfully back into his man's kingdom. He was not of the type to remain a penitent, on his knees indefinitely. Nor would Ann have had it otherwise. She would have hated a subservient lover.

Eliot was very far from being subservient. Almost before the neighbourhood's congratulations had ceased to rain about them both he was demanding that Ann should fix the date of their wedding.

"You impatient man!" she teased him. "Why, we're only just this minute engaged! We shan't be married for ages and ages yet."

"Oh, shan't we?" he retorted. "We'll be married in May, sweetheart. That's exactly as long as I'll consent to wait. And I'm only agreeing to that because a woman always seems to think it's part of the ceremony to buy a quant.i.ty of clothes when she's married--just as though she couldn't buy them afterwards quite as well as before!"

"In May? Oh, no, Eliot." Ann shook her head with decision. "That's the unlucky month for marriages."

"You don't mean to say you're superst.i.tious?"

"I don't know." She spoke uncertainly. "But--we've had so much ill-luck. I don't think I want to tempt Providence by getting married in May."

He shouted with laughter.

"Very well, you absurd baby, it shan't be May," he conceded, adding cheerfully: "We'll fix it for April then."

"No, no. That's too soon," she protested hastily. "Let's decide on--June."

"April," he repeated firmly.

"June"--with an effort to be equally firm.

"If you say that again," he returned coolly, "I shall make it March. I'd ever so much rather, too," he wound up boyishly.

"That would be quite impossible," replied Ann triumphantly. "I've promised to go and stay with the Brabazons in March."

He took her by the shoulders and pulled her towards him.

"Let it be April, then," he said, adding quickly, as he read dissent in her eyes: "We've wasted such a lot of time, beloved."

She yielded at that.

"Very well, then--April. But I'm afraid you're going to be a dreadfully self-willed husband, Eliot"--smiling as though the prospect were in no way distasteful.

"I think I am," he acknowledged, with all a man's supreme egotism. He laughed down at her, and, lifting her right off the ground into his arms, kissed her with swift pa.s.sion.

"You're much too thin," he grumbled discontentedly, as he set her down again. "You weigh next to nothing."

"And whose fault is that, pray?" she asked gaily.

She was horrified to see his face darken with sudden pain.

"Don't," he said abruptly, in a stifled voice.

"Oh, my dear--" She was back in his arms in an instant, soothing, comforting, and scolding him all in a breath. "You needn't worry over my boniness," she a.s.sured him cheerfully. "When we're married and settled down and I've no worries, I expect I shall get appallingly plump and have to take to one of those anti-fat cures."

"You--fat!" He laughed. "There's about as much danger of that as of Mrs.

Carberry becoming a philanthropist."

Eliot had been furiously angry when he heard of the gossip which had gathered for a time around Ann's name and of the part Mrs. Carberry had played in helping to disseminate it, but neither he nor Ann herself had been able to refrain from laughing at the complete _volte-face_ which that excellent lady performed when the announcement of their engagement was made public. She had been one of the first to offer her felicitations, and had paid a special call at the Cottage--this time accompanied by the modest Muriel--to offer them in person. "It will be so delightful to have a chatelaine at Heronsmere at last," she had gushed. Presumably, recognising that her daughter's chance of acquiring the coveted position was now reduced, to nil, she had decided--with the promptness of a good general--to accept the fact and adapt her tactics to the altered situation. With mathematical foresight she argued that when Coventry was married Heronsmere would undoubtedly become the centre of a considerable amount of entertaining, and from every point of view it would therefore be wise to be on friendly terms there. After all, there were as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it, and the prospective hospitality which she antic.i.p.ated would emanate from Heronsmere in the near future should provide excellent opportunities for fishing.

Apart from Mrs. Carberry, everybody seemed genuinely delighted at the engagement--even Miss Caroline. She confusedly mingled regrets "for any misunderstanding" with her congratulations, and Ann, too happy herself to wish any one else to be unhappy, forgave her whole-heartedly. Lady Susan was overflowingly pleased.

"Though, of course," as she characteristically informed Sir Philip just before he and Tony returned to London, "Eliot's been blessed far beyond his deserts--like most men. Anyhow, Philip, you may as well make up your mind to accept Doreen as a _pis otter_ for Tony--and do it gracefully, my dear man! Mark my words, marriage will be the making of the boy. Every man ought to be married."

"I wish you'd held that opinion thirty years ago, Susan," retorted Sir Philip. "I suppose"--he hesitated, his eyes curiously soft--"it's too late in the day now?"

"Much too late," replied Lady Susan promptly, though her eyes, too, were unwontedly soft. "Besides, I could never bear to be parted from the Tribes of Israel--and you know you can't stand a dog about the house."

"Drat the man!" she muttered crossly to herself, as the train bearing the Brabazons Londonwards steamed out of the station. She brushed her hand across her eyes as she hopped briskly into the car which had brought them to the station, giving the chauffeur the order "Home!" in a sharper voice than she usually employed towards her servants. "Drat the man! It looks as though a single engagement has demoralised the lot of us."

It was certainly destined to be followed by far-reaching consequences as regards two, at least, of the other people in the neighbourhood. Robin's notice to give up his post as Eliot's agent had, of course, been suitably buried, a brief understanding handshake between the two men its only tombstone, and Robin had gone straight from his interview with Eliot to the Priory. He found Cara, surrounded by a small army of vases, arranging flowers, of which a great sheaf, freshly sent in by the gardener from the hot-houses, lay on the table.

"Aren't they lovely?" she said, when she and Robin had exchanged greetings.

"Do you want a b.u.t.tonhole?"

He looked at the deep-red carnation which she held out to him and shook his head.