Читать книгу Five People - Bowen Marjorie - Страница 5

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HELEN wanted to say: "I love you! I love you!" but she was taken by surprise and rather bewildered by his sudden intensity of feeling precisely when she had been, for the first time, slightly fearful of his perfect allegiance; so she was silent, and when he released her, clasped his arm, a little shaken.

And while she was framing some too-careful speech she saw that she had made a mistake by this silence, for he was instantly withdrawn into himself and became at once so coldly composed that it was impossible for her to refer to what he had just done—to his sudden clasp and impatient kiss.

Helen knew that she had allowed a notable moment to be rejected and a certain regret further quenched the lightness of her spirits; for a second she saw her long dalliance as a melancholy thing, and she had a queer consciousness of time, flowing away, steadily and swiftly, stealing with inexorable precision, day and night, all the joy of life and finally life itself.

"Come on to the balcony," said Louis. "It is so cool there, almost as if we were on the tree tops."

The bouquet of trees that sheltered Beaudesert did here encroach upon the bricks, and the green gold bunches of leaves of the maples and the erect red-stemmed leaves could be plucked from the end of the balcony, while from the other side was the view of the pond and the willows, the long trailing boughs now as still as the water beneath the summer stars.

Van Quellin stood so that the maple leaves brushed his shoulders and the luxuriant light of Cornelia's lamp was on him; the authoritative, aquiline face, slightly too narrow, looked neither kind nor gentle to-night, and the pale vivid eyes, that same clear uncommon crystal grey that Helen had actually seen in a captive hawk, were full of a haughty but none the less poignant loneliness, that both touched and frightened Helen. Leaning against the twisting iron scrolls of the balcony she told him what Cornelia had said about Mrs. Falaise.

Despite the sound advice of the experienced nurse, she finished:

"I think I should humour her, Louis, if I possibly could."

"I know," he answered, "that is what you do, humour people, isn't it?"

Helen felt a double meaning in his words, but would not notice this, nor did she look at him, but away into the chill peace of the night.

"I think Cornelia needs some—well, excitement—perhaps it is difficult to realize, Louis, the sheer boredom of her life—"

"Dr. Henriot thinks differently—he says that she is definitely stronger this summer and should be absolutely quiet."

"Very well for the body, Louis, but the mind!"

"Do you think that a woman like Mrs. Falaise could really do any good?"

Helen hesitated.

"I think if Cornelia believed—"

"It is impossible. I am really in the hands of Henriot. I couldn't of course suggest such a thing to him—and personally, I think it nonsense—"

"There seem to have been some wonderful cures," murmured Helen wistfully.

"Nervous and mental perhaps—but for organic disease! No, Helen, you must try to get the idea out of Cornelia's head. When," he added sharply, "does she see the papers? I try to keep them from her—"

"Oh, it was an article on faith healing in some very discreet periodical, and Mrs. Falaise was mentioned—"

"A pity," he remarked. "Anything of that kind is out of the question, Helen."

The words were like a courteous rebuke, and Helen felt herself put gently away from and forbidden to pursue the subject. She glanced up quickly at his face, the clean line of cheek and chin, the too firm set of the full lips and those clear intently gazing eyes; she had of course always known that force and power underlay this man's grace and careless accomplishment, but now, she thought, reluctantly, that he might be perilous, might dominate too utterly, taking her away from much that was dear, much that was essential to her life; even as now, when he was quietly intolerant of her aching desire to champion Cornelia's whims.

A breeze that seemed to have come from very far away, and leaped upon them suddenly, rustled the tree tops behind Van Quellin, and that was all the sound between them.

She was thinking:

"He is displeased with me—how often he will be displeased with me!"

And he:

"If she really only loved me! But she is in love with the whole world, not with me!"

It was easy, he was brooding, for people to laugh and sneer at love, to treat it as an episode or a diversion, but to love a woman like Helen was a tremendous thing, a thing you could hardly overvalue. Why, to love her was to have all the current of your days changed, it meant living deliciously, passing from one exquisite emotion to another, being tormented by her alluring absurdities, soothed by her delightful sympathy, stirred by the vivacity of her gaiety. Ah, you couldn't put it into words, she made music of the commonplace harmonies of every day, she gave to the most ordinary sky the colours of the rainbow; and she did not really love him, she was not really his; she might think she did and was, but he knew better—and this semblance of love was to him like a loaned treasure that might any moment be withdrawn.

Helen was speaking again:

"I've got something else to speak to you about, Louis—my own little bother this time; my cousin has written to me, rather a dismal sort of letter, and I don't quite know what to do about it."

"Your cousin? You were speaking of her the other day. And now she has written to you!"

"Yes, I suppose she must have been writing at the very time I was talking of her—a sort of telepathy, wasn't it? The night I tried to sacrifice the alabaster vase!"

Helen spoke rapidly, nervously, and Louis Van Quellin was moved to say (so well he knew her):

"Was there anything unpleasant in the letter?"

"Unpleasant? No, but it came as a slight shock—difficult to explain, but she was so vague to me, lost in the void, and then suddenly she was there."

"I know. What does she say?"

"Nothing really, it is just to bring herself to my notice; she must, poor thing, want us to be friends."

"How did she get at you?"

"Through a newspaper she saw, I suppose, some snapshot; anyhow they forwarded it to Paris—here it is."

She gave him the letter, taking it from the silk satchel on her arm, and he turned so that the rosy-toned light of Cornelia's lamp fell over the sheet.

When he had read it he handed it back to Helen and said:

"There is a great deal behind that letter."

"You mean?" Helen was puzzled, still a little anxious.

"I think the writer intends a very great deal more than she says—she wants you to do something for her, this letter is a kind of speculation on your character, she just risks on the chance that you are kind, generous."

Helen defended the unknown relative.

"I don't see why she shouldn't want to know me; that is quite natural, isn't it?"

"But why," asked Louis instantly, "did she keep silence so long?"

Helen had no suggestion to offer; the past was as shadowy to her as it was to Pauline Fermor, only when to one woman these shadows were dark and dreadful, to the other they were bright and lovely.

Louis Van Quellin answered his own question.

"I expect that it was the mother—some hostile influence there, holding the daughter back—"

"Hostile tome?" asked Helen, surprised. "But why? Father was very good to her mother—to all of them."

"There seems to have been some very decided estrangement—you don't know anything about it?"

"No—only what I told you. I really hardly knew of the existence of this cousin, certainly not that she was living in England—"

"And the mother blind, and evidently things going hard with them—there is something curious in the story."

He reflected a little; he was taking the matter more seriously than Helen had thought he would; she had rather hoped that he would make light of Pauline Fermor.

"What are you going to do?" he asked imperiously.

Thus directly challenged Helen fell into confusion, not because she did not know her own mind, but because she was afraid that Louis Van Quellin would not approve her decision.

"What would you suggest I did?" she asked with a pretty appeal in her voice.

"Have nothing to do with it," he answered promptly. "Don't answer that letter."

"That is impossible," said Helen quickly.

"Well then in the briefest way possible, and leave her alone; if you don't deliberately seek her out, you are not likely to meet."

"I don't know why you advise that, Louis."

"Just ordinary sense," he replied tolerantly. "This woman can have nothing in common with you. I don't like her letter nor her handwriting."

"You are very arrogant, Louis. She is, well, illiterate," replied Helen gently. "I suppose she was never educated and she must be very poor. I daresay she earns her living at some hard work—"

"I know, but I didn't mean that, only that letter is too simple, it isn't genuine—it's crafty; if she was absolutely sincere she wouldn't write like that. An ignorant person is usually very elaborate and long-winded—she would explain why she had never written before, go into the past—"

"Why should she know more of it than I do?" interrupted Helen.

"She knows some version of it—her mother has told her something, people who are fortunate don't trouble why they became so, those who aren't try to blame something—this woman born your equal, and sunk as she must have sunk, hasn't submitted without protest and rancour, Helen."

The gentle heart to whom he spoke resented this cold sagacity.

"Madame de Montmorin will be wondering what has become of us," she answered. "Let us go, Louis, while Cornelia sleeps."

But if she hoped to direct him from the subject of Pauline Fermor she was disappointed. As they crossed the park that sloped to the ornate gardens of Château Montmorin, he asked:

"What have you decided about your cousin, Helen?"

"When lam next in London I shall go and see her—"

"I think you make a great mistake."

"I'm sorry, but I cannot see anything else to do," murmured Helen.

"It will be painful for you—you don't know what the milieu is."

"I can guess from that letter."

"But you don't know it, Helen. You haven't really been near anything sordid in your life."

"That sounds like a reproach," said Helen, troubled. "I've been very selfish—"

"Don't," he answered roughly. "I didn't want you to say that; I don't want you to be bothered in the least by this; I don't," he added rather passionately, "want you to see this woman; if you do, you will be anxious to make amends.

"Why not?" asked Helen.

He took her arm to guide her lightly in between the tall chestnut trees that formed a scattered belt on the edge of the park; the stars glimmered low between the slender trunks, and here and there flashed between the thickly leaved boughs.

"Because it can't be done," he answered. "You can't make amends to anyone—if this cousin wanted help and you gave it her she would only detest you."

"Why should she detest me?"

"Because she isn't like you and never could be," he answered as if he was humouring a child; she replied to his tone more than to his words.

"You are very wise, Louis, and I can't argue with you, but all the same I am going to see my Cousin Pauline."

"At least let me go first."

"No." Helen was quite resolute now. She felt that to send Louis Van Quellin would be to expose this unknown Pauline to humiliation. "That is impossible, Louis, I must go myself."

"Then I will come with you."

Helen was doubtful even of that, but she made no further protest.

"Will you go to London in September?" she asked.

"Towards the end of September, yes. I must go to Paradys for a month or two, and then to Brussels. I will leave Cornelia here, if you are staying with the Montmorins—"

"Yes, I've promised Jeanne to remain till I go to London. I like Marli."

"Cornelia really loves the place—and Henriot can stay here—"

He spoke as if he hardly was thinking of what he said; the lights in the château windows now showed across the level sweep of grass and parterres and very distantly came the melody of the slow violin.

"When are you going to marry me?" added Van Quellin seriously.

Helen did not want to reply; she was still thinking of Pauline and Mrs. Falaise, both unpleasant difficulties that had yet to be faced, and the question of Louis reminded her, rather sharply, that her liberty of action was becoming jealously circumscribed; if she had been married to Louis she would probably have been actually forbidden to have anything to do with Pauline Fermor.

"What are you delaying for?" he urged. "Aren't you quite sure?"

"You know lam quite sure, Louis," she answered faintly. "It is Cornelia."

This was true, but there was something besides, and he knew it.

"You must not think of that," he answered harshly. "Henriot told me to-day that things will never be different for Cornelia—she may live for years, even to be old, and she may be, probably will be much stronger, but—"

His firm voice ceased, and Helen was grateful to the merciful veiling bloom of the summer dark that hid his passion and his pain.

"Louis," she said; and now she spoke entirely without reserve. "Does Cornelia really like me? I should have to go away for ever if she didn't really like me—"

"Cornelia loves you, Helen; everyone who knows you loves you."

They were walking across the garden now; the smell of the box hedges was like an aromatic in the air.

Helen could not altogether satisfy herself that her marriage would not hurt Cornelia; not so much for the reason, which one could speak of, that it would take her brother away from her, as for the reason, which one could not speak of, that it would be melancholy for the sick girl to be daily witness of that particular happiness that she must never know.

But Louis Van Quellin insisted on his own viewpoint; he would have no more hesitations nor refinements. "The alterations I am having at Paradys will be finished in the early spring—your rooms, your gardens; will you marry me then, Helen?"

She felt that it would be an unkindness, almost a meanness to dally any longer, perilous too with a man like this; and though she did not want wholly to surrender to him (and she guessed that marriage with him would mean a complete surrender) still less did she wish to lose his love or any tittle of his complete devotion.

"I will marry you in the spring," she said simply. "April—Louis, will that please you? I hope," she added wistfully, "that you will be kind to me and just sometimes let me do as I like—even if it is silly."

"I shall not thwart you in a single whim!" he conceded with a sudden rise of spirits.

"Ah, whims!" answered Helen. "It is one thing to indulge one's whims and another to let one really have one's own way."

Louis Van Quellin thought so too, but he did not care to enlarge on the subtle difference.

The supper was served on the terrace, lit by the saffron electric lamps cunningly contrived among the frail trails of jasmine that floated from the brick front of the château; this light ended with the terrace; below the garden was in darkness, and beyond were the darker park and dense hedges of blackness where the groves of trees were reared up against the pellucid night sky, where the stars flashed coloured rays with a cold intensity of radiance.

Helen was suddenly very tired and oppressed with her problems—the problem of how to soothe Cornelia on the question of Mrs. Falaise, and the problem of what quite to do with this unknown cousin; both these would have appeared trivial to many, perhaps most people, but Helen's life had been unclouded even by difficulties slight as these.

She noted the animation that Louis showed, the conquering look in those pale formidable eyes, and she dreaded the struggle there would be with him on the subject of Pauline Fermor.