If Only etc. by Francis Clement Philips and Augustus Harris

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He winced. "This is a mutual interest, surely, since we must occupy
it together."

"Must?" she echoed dreamily.

"What do you mean?" he asked sharply.

"Nothing, except that 'must' is the word I have banished from my
vocabulary," and she smiled at him--actually smiled, though she must
have known she was stabbing him to the very heart.

He said no more; and indeed, words seemed to be useless.

So he chose the house himself,--one that could not fail to please
Bella, he felt exultantly. She would be less than woman if she were
not glad to exchange the second-rate little dwelling in the
Camberwell New Road for the substantial residence, with its modern
improvements and embellishments in such a neighbourhood as Camelot
Square.

It was not perhaps a palace, but it was a very great deal more
imposing than anything they had dreamt of in the early days of their
married life, and yet John Chetwynd told himself with a sigh that he
would gladly give up fame and prosperity to win back the old
love-light in his wife's eyes.

And there are some among us who cannot love for so little--"Of man's
love a thing apart." Perhaps John Chetwynd would have been a happier
man had he been one of these.

Even the task of furnishing fell to the doctor's lot. Bella did not
refuse, nor did she object to accompany him on what he might have
naturally supposed would be a congenial task for her, but she showed
herself so indifferent throughout that, after an effort or two to
make her contented, he gave it up, and it ended in his carrying the
whole thing through himself.

And he was not sorry when at length it was completed. On the morrow
he would bring Bella to her new home.

He stood under the bright lighted chandelier and looked round him.
The carpet was thick and soft. Bella liked carpets her feet could
sink into, she had once said. There by the fireplace was the most
luxurious easy chair he could purchase, upholstered in her favourite
colour, pale blue. He pictured the dainty figure nestling in it, and
a little glow stirred at his heart. After all, she was his wife, his
fondly loved wife, and who could tell? Perhaps with the old life, old
feuds would die out and with the new, joy and happiness dawn for them
both once more.

John Chetwynd was not a religious man; he rarely went to church and
he never prayed; but now he covered his face with his hands, and his
lips moved inaudibly.

He was asking for a blessing on the new life, and there was something
like a tear in his eye and a suspicious huskiness in his voice as he
called out "Come in" in answer to a hurried knock at the door and
flung open the lid of a grand piano which was littered with music and
songs, running his hands over the keys and smiling a little.

The piano was to be a surprise: Bella knew nothing about it.

Perhaps it would keep her more at home, for she was very fond of
music.

It had cost more than he ought to have paid, but still it was for
her.

"Come in, Mrs. Brewer--what is it? I'm just off. You will have us
both here to-morrow at this time for good and all, I hope."

"Indeed, sir, and I'm glad to hear it. Things do look most beautiful,
and no mistake."

The good soul shambled across the floor and held out a letter wrapped
in the corner of her apron.

"A boy brought it, sir, half an hour ago, but I clean forgot it, and
that's a fact."

"Never mind. It is probably of no importance."

But it was. By-and-by his eyes fell on it as it lay where Mrs.
Brewer's hard-working fingers had placed it, on the edge of a little
gaily-lined work table destined to hold Bella Chetwynd's cotton and
needles, and to his astonishment he observed it was in his wife's
handwriting.

Ah! written just before she started for the----.He caught it up and
tore it open. The next instant it fluttered from his hold.

For fully ten seconds John Chetwynd sat spell-bound, and then he
broke into a laugh--mirthless, hollow.

"And I prayed to my God to send his blessing on--our--future," he
said in a dull, mechanical manner. "Well, the last act is played out
and they may ring the curtain down. From to-night I believe neither
in woman, Heaven, nor hell, save that which each man makes for
himself."

Bella had turned her shapely back on the apotheosis of respectability
for a life of excitement and the protection of another man. Nobody
was surprised but John himself.

Everybody had predicted it months ago. The only astonishing feature
of the scandal was, that it had not occurred before.

The one other thing people found surprising was the callousness with
which the injured husband took it.

It had always been believed that what love there was, was on his
side, but now--

Well, it is indeed an ill wind that blows us no good. If notoriety
was what John Chetwynd desired, he got it in full measure, well
pressed down and brimming over; his waiting room was besieged, for
many patients flocked there, wide eyed in scrutiny, martyrs to
symptoms discovered or invented for the occasion.

Of course he would divorce her. And he did.

In due course he obtained his decree _nisi_, which later on was made
absolute.

Bella's picture no longer stared him in the face from every hoarding,
and the newspaper advertisements knew her no more. She had gone back
to the States, and by-and-by was forgotten on this side the Atlantic.

Now and then he was disagreeably reminded of her existence.

Once in the Club a young fellow to whom Chetwynd was personally
unknown stretched himself behind a newspaper and muttered, "Bella
Blackall Wasn't that the name of Dr. Somebody's wife who ran away
with another fellow?"

"Yes, Bella Blackall was my wife," John Chetwynd answered with
unruffled equanimity, picking up the paper which the other had thrown
down. "She used to be rather a clever dancer, too."

And he calmly perused the line which included her name among some
well known American stars touring in the provinces.

"And he never turned a grizzled hair! I give you my word I felt more
over the thing than he did," remarked Captain Hetherington
afterwards; "without exception the most cold-blooded individual ever
met."

But John Chetwynd was far from being this. He had felt his wife's
desertion far too deeply to show his scars, nor was he a man to wear
his heart upon his sleeve; but as time went by and the utter
callousness of Bella's conduct came home to him, he realised to the
full that she was unworthy of a single pang, and he became reconciled
to the inevitable. His profession claimed every spare moment, and for
a man ill at ease there is no specific like hard work. By-and-by as
the years rolled on, another distraction presented itself. He became
interested in one of his patients, the only daughter of the Duke of
Huddersfield, Lady Ethel Claremont, and this interest blossomed into
something stronger and warmer--something that at last he dignified by
the name of love, though he was by no means without misgivings as to
whether it could ever really lay claim to the title.

Certain it was that there was no more of the old exultation about his
heart that had formed so large a part of his former courtship; there
were no extravagances, no quickened pulses--rapture's warmth had
yielded to the mildest of after-glows; but there was no reason that
it should not prove as satisfactory in the long run. It is an open
question whether the doctor, popular though he undoubtedly was, would
have been considered an eligible suitor from the maternal point of
view, had it not been that just about this time fortune elected to
bestow another favour upon him; his career had reached its apex, and
(again through sheer good luck, as John Chetwynd modestly declared)
he was offered a baronetcy.

Now, every man is flattered and gratified that his merits should be
recognised, and Chetwynd was no exception to the general rule, but
there were a good many bitters mingled with the sweets, and the
hidden thorn among the rose-leaves had a nasty trick of obtruding
itself. This step in social advancement materially helped his cause
with Lady Ethel, and the Duchess of Huddersfield deigned to smile
graciously upon her future son-in-law.

Ethel Claremont was an excellent girl, precisely the type he ought to
marry. Decorous, with an ease and repose about her manner that were
eminently patrician, she would be even more admirable as a wife than
as a _fiancee_, but he could have found it in him to wish that she
were just a little less faultless, a little more "human," he would
have said, only that the word has not a pleasant ring; yet it was not
easy to substitute another unless it were "womanly."

"Pshaw!" he cried angrily, "who am I that I should be exacting, with
such a past, such a history? and yet I am ready to quarrel with
perfection, I who can never be grateful enough! A little wealth and
the love of a charming woman--what more can I possibly desire? It is
strange how soon one becomes accustomed to changes in life, and how
quickly an emotion fades into a memory. If I could but feel as I felt
when I was struggling along battling with the hundred and one
difficulties which beset the path of a poor man, instead of having to
remind myself perpetually what my emotions were then, there would be
some excitement in the contrast. I--I wonder--what she is doing? Is
she alive or is she dead? What does it matter? But at times the doubt
will come whether--no, no; it is wicked--I was always good to her. I
loved her, and she dishonoured me. The book is closed for ever, and I
am weak when I reopen it."

CHAPTER V.

Since the thing was to be, there was nothing to be gained by
postponement. So decided the Duchess, and however fond of airing her
own sentiments and securing her own way Lady Ethel might be, on
ordinary occasions, for once she raised no objection. She was
perfectly willing that her marriage with Sir John Chetwynd should
take place at once. Perhaps in her home Lady Ethel was not quite the
plastic lay figure she was wont to appear in public, and the Duchess
had spoken to her most intimate and confidential friends of the
approaching nuptials with almost a sigh of relief, and a whispered
word.

"She has indeed been very difficult to manage, and really, though I
am speaking of my own daughter, I never can quite understand Ethel;
she is not like other girls. It will be a huge responsibility shifted
from my shoulders when she is married."

And everybody had wondered what the girl had seen in Sir John, that
he should have taken her fancy. To the outside world and to those who
had not come within the immediate charm of his manner and bearing, it
did offer food for speculation, and since his engagement he had grown
greyer and stiffer and more professionally precise than ever.

But he suited Lady Ethel, or she fancied he did; which answered the
purpose quite as well. She had always detested very young men; she
liked a man whom she could look up to and lean upon, and certainly
this she could do with perfect faith as regarded her _fiance_. Now
Duchesses are no more exempt from the weary ills which weak flesh is
heir to than their less favoured brothers and sisters, and in the
early summer the Duchess began to complain of certain aches and pains
and to bethink her that Sir John's advice might be worth following;
so she drove over to Camelot Square and was shown into the waiting
room with the rest of his patients. She had some little time to wait,
and while the Duchess sat tapping her foot impatiently at the delay,
Ethel looked round the spacious apartment and decided on certain
improvements she would effect when she should preside over John's
establishment.

And then the door was flung open, and Soames, the eminently correct
footman, ushered them into his master's presence.

The Duchess advanced gushing a little.

"So good of you to see us so soon! I was positively timid at coming
without an appointment, even with Ethel."

"It is you who are good, Duchess, to give me such an unexpected
pleasure."

Sir John touched Ethel's cheek lightly with his lips and motioned his
visitors to be seated.

"Now is not that a pretty speech from a professional man! Ah, you
lovers, you are all alike, and when you are married--Ah! then you are
all the same."

"What an accusation! I hope Ethel does not credit it, or I shall
never be permitted an opportunity of refuting such a calumny."

"I know too well how highly Mamma thinks of you, John," said Ethel,
prettily.

"Well, I admit it--I do admire you immensely--I admire your power,
your position, your ability to make an income--a large income,
sitting comfortably in an arm chair. And then there is such solidity
in a doctor's profession--people are always ill."

"Mamma is ill herself," broke in Lady Ethel, "and that is why we have
intruded to-day."

"I hope it is nothing serious, my dear Duchess."

"How sweet of you! Ah, I am a martyr! I have hay fever to such a
distressing extent that I am positively ashamed to go into society."

Her daughter laughed.

"We were at the Opera last night, and Mamma's sneezes were most
_mal-a-propos._ It was very embarrassing."

"Yes, I am convinced that Romeo glowered at me, and at church on
Sunday it was such a charming sermon, so encouraging and tactful, I
sneezed violently in the man's best moments. At my age I cannot
consent to become a public infliction, yet I feel I am a nuisance."

"Mamma said, as soon as we got home--'I shall go and consult Sir
John,'" cooed Ethel.

"And now you can cure me?" The Duchess looked anxiously into the
grave face opposite.

"I have not the slightest doubt you will be entirely recovered in a
few days at most," said Sir John reassuringly; "you have caught a
severe cold."

"Nothing of the sort, I assure you. I have had colds before, and I
know better."

"What, better than your doctor?" The stern face relaxed, and Sir John
laughed.

"Well, better than my future son-in-law. Now I beg you not to be
obstinate. Give me something potent--one of those drugs that work
such instantaneous wonders."

"I fear they are not in the Pharmacopoeia."

"I don't think it is kind of you to discourage me."

"But if I make you well in a week, will not that satisfy your Grace?"

"I shall be radiant."

"I will write you a prescription."

"Thanks! What an invaluable husband you will make with all that
knowledge at your finger ends! I need have no misgivings as to
Ethel's health, and she has always been so subject to chills. The
risk of entrusting one's daughter to an unobservant man is shocking,
but to a physician! To have for one's daily companion a great and
renowned doctor, what an advantage--what a security!"

"Really, mamma, to hear you talk one would suppose that I was an
invalid, and I never remember to have suffered from anything worse
than the measles."

"When Ethel comes to me she will be guarded as sacredly as a girl can
be."

Sir John smiled kindly at his betrothed.

"I have made but a few protestations of what I feel for her; perhaps
I am more reserved than I should be, but I am no longer a boy. I
doubt whether I ever was very romantic, even in my younger days, but
I think that she and I understand each other, and if we don't tiff
and 'make it up,' if we have been engaged three months and have never
had a quarrel, that does not mean that my affection is not most
sincere and deep."

"I should hope we like each other too well to quarrel," said Lady
Ethel haughtily.

Like! After all, was it love on either side? Sir John asked himself.

"My dear Sir John," broke in the Duchess pompously. "A few words from
such a man as yourself impress me more profoundly than rhapsodies
from another. Ethel, just look out of the window and see if the
carriage is waiting. We are going to take the Lancaster girls to the
Academy, and Payne has driven round to fetch them while we had our
consultation with you."

"Yes, mamma, it is there."

"I will follow you in a minute, Ethel; say good-bye to John--," and
when the door had closed upon her daughter, she began hurriedly:

"It is hardly the time and place perhaps, but you will pardon that.
I--really, it is very awkward. Can you not help me, Sir John? The
weeks are slipping by, and I should, I confess, like to make my
arrangements for leaving home, but until I know definitely what yours
are--."

"Mine?"

"Yes; yours and Ethel's."

A light broke in upon Sir John's somewhat obtuse mind. He had no
desire to expedite matters, but then he was not the principal person
to be consulted, and it certainly was not for him to raise any
objection, so he acted immediately on the hint given him.

"My dear Duchess, what can I say? The matter rests entirely in your
hands. Let it be when you please. In another month I shall be
comparatively free, and we can visit Switzerland if Ethel wishes."

The Duchess smiled. "That you must arrange with Ethel herself, and
perhaps you had better broach the subject yourself to her. Girls are
apt to be a little curious on these points."

"Then I will ask her to fix the day for our marriage." He bowed with
old-fashioned gallantry over the pearl-grey suede, held out in
farewell, and the Duchess rustled away with Soames, the deferential,
in close attendance.

Soames did not like the idea of a mistress, but these "accidents" he
was well aware, would happen in the best regulated families, so he
was now bent on making friends with the Mammon of Unrighteousness in
the shape of the Duchess of Huddersfield and the bride elect.

Left alone, Sir John stood upright, his hand on the back of his chair
and his brows tightly drawn together.

Well, why not? What possible excuse could he make to his own heart
for the delay?

None, none. And yet he felt a good deal as if a thunderbolt had
fallen from the skies at his feet, and it was more or less of a shock
to him.

Presently he rang his bell.

"Who comes next, Soames?"

"Lady Rutherven, Sir John, but--but a lady who has no appointment has
been waiting for more than an hour, and I thought perhaps you would
see her first. She seems very ill."

"Show her in!"

A second later the door swung open again and Soames announced:

"Miss Blackall!"

Sir John started, but recovered himself in the next instant.

"Take a seat, madam."

He waved her to a chair and for several minutes they looked at each
other without speaking. The woman was the first to break the silence.

"I have come back," she said with a nervous laugh. "I am ill; I
thought you might try to cure me."

She had seated herself, but he remained standing.

What a handsome woman she had become, he was thinking, and how
expensively dressed! There was something strange in the very
familiarity of the countenance presented to him. It had altered much
from what he remembered it, but curiously enough he remembered it the
more vividly because of that very alteration.

"What is your trouble?" he asked huskily--"Why have you
consulted--me?"

"It is my lungs. I don't know--let us call it a whim. I thought you
would do me good if anyone could." She paused a second: "You used to
be my husband once."

"Once! Well, I am willing to be your doctor."

"I suppose you would do your best for a dog if it were dying,
wouldn't you? though you might not care if it recovered."

"I have a very faithful dog," he said significantly.

Bella winced.

"Dogs ask so little for their love. Oh, I didn't come here without a
struggle. And I knew you would speak like this. But I have been
abroad so long, and on the voyage home I got worse, and women--women
of your sort who had taken no notice of me, suddenly grew kind. I
said to myself, 'Bella, it looks bad for you when ladies forget how
common you are,' and then the thought struck me, London meant you! As
a patient I might come to your house and be let in. You are clever
and you are great; if I had any self-respect I could not ask you; but
I have not, you know; I never had any and'--and--I am--frightened! It
keeps me awake at nights, the fear. I--I am not going to--die?"

"I have said I will do what I can for you."

"You will sound me?"

"Loosen your dress."

As he bent over her she raised her hand as if to smoothe his hair,
and the colour came into her face, but she did not touch him.

Her fingers, from which she had drawn her gloves, were laden with
rings--rings which he had not given her. His breath came a little
faster as he stooped over her neck.

"Don't be scared to tell me the truth," she said; "I guess I'm pretty
bad. You need not take the trouble to lie about it."

He examined her thoroughly and replaced the stethoscope before he
spoke.

"Your lungs are not right. They used to be."

"Oh," she replied bitterly, "I used to be. I have come too late--is
that what you mean?"

"I mean that you must exercise great care and avoid excitement. Don't
brood--don't worry yourself by misgivings, which will only do you
harm. Go away from England when the summer is over; go where the sun
shines and the air is mild. Lead a life of ease and indolence. I can
say no more."

"And then?"

"And then I see no reason why you should not live for years to come."

Bella flung her hands out with a sort of despair.

"Your prescription is impossible," she said dully.

"Impossible?"

"I have only just come over from the States. I have an engagement at
the Empire for six months. I have got to stay."

"You will be very unwise. The laws of health demand that you should
cancel any such contract."

"Beggars can't be choosers. I must sing to live. It is my trade now."

He sighed. "You do not look as if you were in pecuniary
difficulties."

"Well, I make money easily enough, but it melts like ice cream;
everything is so beastly dear."

"Are you not with--him?"

"Him? Oh no; he left me years ago. I am alone--very much alone. It
seems sometimes as if I had spent the best part of my life alone. I
am so dull I--I wonder why I dread to die. There! I can follow your
advice so far as this; I'll take the greatest care of myself--in
London. I am glad I came to you, though it does not seem to have
delighted you much. I suppose if--if I had run straight and stayed
with you, I might have been quite well, eh?"

"That is difficult to say. Bella, have you--it is a foolish question,
but--have you ever regretted?"

She laughed recklessly.

"Oh, as to that--what is the good of looking back, anyhow? I have and
I haven't--when I have been sick it has been awful lonesome. You
didn't grieve much, that's certain. And you got your title soon after
I went. It was lucky for you. Scot! I should have been Lady Chetwynd
if I had stopped with you, wouldn't I?"

"You would have been an honest woman."

"Ah!" She rose from her chair and looked curiously round the room. "I
remember those bronzes," she said; "they used to hang in your little
library in the old house. You are a good deal changed in the face;
your manner is just the same. You were always a good fellow, I will
say that. I know it better than I used to now I have had so--since I
have been--"

"Hush--the past is dead. I was not so patient and tender with you as
I should have been."

"You saw that--you had made a mistake, but you tried to hide how
sorry you were--I know you did that and I--well, I didn't marry you
to make you sorry. Do you know how we lived--he and I, when I left
you? He took me to Paris; and didn't we make the dollars spin, the
pair of us--rather; and then one fine morning we heard a beastly bank
had gone smash and he had lost pretty well all he had got."

"And you left him?"

A smile curled the corners of her mouth.

"No," she said, slowly; "I didn't. We took two little rooms over a
baker's shop in the High Street, Islington, and I stuck to him. I
used to go out in an evening and do the marketing with a hand basket,
to get it cheap. When we wanted a change we would take a bus to the
Park and look at the swells across the railings; and sometimes Saidie
gave us tickets for the theatres. Seems odd, don't it? but it's a
fact. I was livelier then than ever I've been in my life. While he
was fond of me--he showed me he was fond of me, you see."

"You were capable of love, then, after all?" he said bitterly.

"I don't know. I loved the freedom I think, anyway, and perhaps I
took him with it. I don't know! what does it matter? It was a release
for you and you are glad that it happened, eh? now that the shame of
it is forgotten? We were never suited to each other, were we?"

"Why speak of what is past?"

"You see, if I had remained with you I should have been no happier,"
said Bella, reflectively; "you expected too much from me."

"I did my best to make you happy."

"Yes, perhaps! then if I had been more grateful and different, would
you be glad if I was with you still?"

"I cannot answer that question. I loved you--I had no thought for any
human being outside yourself."

"But now," she persisted, "now that the wound is old, do you not say
to yourself, 'it was better so'? Suppose that you and I were still
what we were once to each other, would you be happy to know that I
was your wife to-day?"

"I beg you to be silent. It is impossible that we can discuss such a
question."

She came close to his chair.

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