The Firing Line by Robert W. Chambers

R >> Robert W. Chambers >> The Firing Line

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30

"I think he meant to be."

"You quarrelled--down there--in the South"--she made a vague gesture
toward the gray horizon. "Do you remember that night, Mr. Hamil?"

"Yes."

"Did you ever become friends again?"

"No.... I think he meant to be.... The fault was probably mine. I
misunderstood."

She said: "I know he cared a great deal for you."

The man was silent.

She turned directly toward him, pale, clear-eyed, and in the poise of
her head a faint touch of pride.

"Please do not misunderstand his friendship for me, then. If you were
his friend I would not need to say this. He was very kind to me, Mr.
Hamil."

"I do not doubt it," said Hamil gravely.

"And you do not mistake, what I say?"

He looked her in the eyes, curious--and, in a moment, convinced.

"No," he said gently.... And, offering his hand: "Men are very ignorant
concerning one another. Women are wiser, I think."

He took the slender black-gloved hand in his.

"Can I be of the least use to you?" he asked.

"You have been," she sighed, "if what I said has taught you to know him
a little better."

* * * * *

A week later when the curtain fell on the second act of the new musical
comedy, "The Inca," critics preparing to leave questioned each other
with considerable curiosity concerning this newcomer, Dorothy Wilming,
who had sung so intelligently and made so much out of a subordinate
part.

Nobody seemed to know very much about her; several nice-looking young
girls and exceedingly respectable young men sent her flowers. Afterward
they gathered at the stage entrance, evidently expecting to meet and
congratulate her; but she had slipped away. And while they hunted high
and low, and the last figurante had trotted off under the lamp-lights,
Dolly lay in her own dark room, face among the pillows, sobbing her
heart out for a dead man who had been kind to her for nothing.

* * * * *

And, at the same hour, across an ocean, another woman awoke to take up
the ravelled threadings of her life again and, through another day,
remember Louis Malcourt and all that he had left undone for kindness'
sake.

There were others, too, who were not likely to forget him, particularly
those who had received, with some astonishment, a legacy apiece of one
small Chinese gilded idol--images all of the _Pa-hsien_ or of
_Kwan-Yin_, who rescues souls from hell with the mystic lotus-prayer,
"_Om mane padme hum_."

But the true Catholicism, which perplexed the eighteen legatees lay in
the paradox of the Mohammedan inscriptions across each lotus written in
Malcourt's hand:

"I direct my face unto Him who hath created.

"Who maketh His messengers with two and three and four pairs of wings.

"And thou shall see them going in procession.

"This is what ye are promised: 'For the last hour will surely come;
there is no doubt thereof; but the greater part of men believe it not.'

"Thus, facing the stars, I go out among them into darkness.

"Say not for me the Sobhat with the ninety-nine; for the hundredth pearl
is the _Iman_--pearl beyond praise, pearl of the five-score names in
one, more precious than mercy, more priceless than compassion--Iman!
Iman! thy splendid name is Death!"

So lingered the living memory of Malcourt among men--a little
while--longer among women--then faded as shadows die at dusk when the
_mala_ is told for the soul that waits the Rosary of a Thousand Beads.

* * * * *

In January the _Ariani_ sailed with her owner aboard; but Hamil was not
with him.

In February Constance Palliser wrote Hamil from Palm Beach:

"It is too beautiful here and you must come.

"As for Shiela, I do not even pretend to understand her. I see
her every day; to-day I lunched with Mrs. Cardross, and Shiela
was there, apparently perfectly well and entirely her former
lovely self. Yet she has never yet spoken of you to me; and, I
learn from Mrs. Cardross, never to anybody as far as she knows.

"She seems to be in splendid health; I have seen her swimming,
galloping, playing tennis madly. The usual swarm of devoted youth
and smitten middle-age is in attendance. She wears neither black
nor colours; only white; nor does she go to any sort of
functions. At times, to me, she resembles a scarcely grown girl
just freed from school and playing hard every minute with every
atom of heart and soul in her play.

"Gray has an apology for a polo field and a string of ponies, and
Shiela plays with the men--a crazy, reckless, headlong game, in
which every minute my heart is in my mouth for fear somebody will
cannon into her, or some dreadful swing of a mallet will injure
her for life.

"But everybody is so sweet to her--and it is delightful to see
her with her own family--their pride and tenderness for her, and
her devotion to them.

"Mrs. Cardross asked me to-day what I thought might be the effect
on Shiela if you came. And, dear, I could not answer. Mr.
Cardross joined us, divining the subject of our furtive confab in
the _patio_, and he seemed to think that you ought to come.

"There is no reason to hesitate in saying that the family would
be very glad to count you as one of them. Even a little snob like
myself can see that there is, in this desire of theirs, no motive
except affection for you and for Shiela; and, in a way, it's
rather humiliating to recognise that they don't care a fig for
the social advantage that must, automatically, accrue to the
House of Cardross through such connections.

"I never thought that I should so earnestly hope for such an
alliance for you; but I do, Garry. They are such simple folk with
all their riches--simple as gentle folk--kind, sincere, utterly
without self-consciousness, untainted by the sordid social
ambitions which make so many of the wealthy abhorrent. There is
no pretence about them, nothing of that uncertainty of self
mingled with vanity which grows into arrogance or servility as
the social weather-vane veers with the breeze of fashion. Rather
flowery that, for an old-fashioned spinster.

"But, dear, there are other flowers than those of speech eloquent
in the soft Southern air--flowers everywhere outside my open
window where I sit writing you.

"I miss Virginia, but Shiela compensates when she can find time
from her breathless pleasure chase to give me an hour or two at
tea-time.

"And Cecile, too, is very charming, and I know she likes me. Such
a coquette! She has her own court among the younger set; and from
her very severe treatment of young Gatewood on all occasions I
fancy she may be kinder to him one day.

"Mrs. Carrick is not here this winter, her new baby keeping her
in town; and Acton, of course, is only too happy to remain with
her.

"As for Gray, he is a nice boy--a little slow, a trifle shy and
retiring and over-studious; but his devotion to Shiela makes me
love him. And he, too, ventured to ask me whether you were not
coming down this winter to hunt along the Everglades with him and
Little Tiger.

"So, dear, I think perhaps you had better come. It really
frightens me to give you this advice. I could not endure it if
anything went wrong--if your coming proved premature.

"For it is true, Garry, that I love our little Shiela with all my
aged, priggish, and prejudiced heart, and I should simply expire
if your happiness, which is bound up in her, were threatened by
any meddling of mine.

"Jim Wayward and I discuss the matter every day; I don't know
what he thinks--he's so obstinate some days--and sometimes he is
irritable when Gussie Vetchen and Cuyp talk _too_ inanely--bless
their hearts! I really don't know what I shall do with James
Wayward. What would you suggest?"

On the heels of this letter went another.

"Garry, dear, read this and then make up your mind whether to
come here or not.

"This morning I was sitting on the Cardrosses' terrace knitting a
red four-in-hand for Mr. Wayward--he is _too_ snuffy in his
browns and grays!--and Mrs. Cardross was knitting one for
Neville, and Cecile was knitting one for Heaven knows who, and
Shiela, swinging her polo-mallet, sat waiting for her pony--the
cunning little thing in her boots and breeches!--I mean the girl,
not the pony, dear--Oh, my, I'm getting involved and you're
hurrying through this scrawl perfectly furious, trying to find
out what I'm talking about.

"Well, then; I forgot for a moment that Shiela was there within
ear-shot; and eyes on my knitting, I began talking about you to
Mrs. Cardross; and I had been gossiping away quite innocently for
almost a minute when I chanced to look up and notice the peculiar
expressions of Mrs. Cardross and Cecile. They weren't looking at
me; they were watching Shiela, who had slipped down from the
parapet where she had been perched and now stood beside my chair
listening.

"I hesitated, faltered, but did not make the mistake of stopping
or changing the subject, but went on gaily telling about your
work on the new Long Island park system.

"And as long as I talked she remained motionless beside me. They
brought around her pony--a new one--but she did not stir.

"Her mother and sister continued their knitting, asking questions
about you now and then, apparently taking no notice of her. My
monologue in praise of you became a triangular discussion; and
all the while the pony was cutting up the marl drive with
impatience, and Shiela never stirred.

"Then Cecile said to me quite naturally: 'I wish Garry were
here.' And, looking up at Shiela, she added: 'Don't you?'

"For a second or two there was absolute silence; and then Shiela
said to me:

"'Does he know I have been ill?'

"'Of course,' I said, 'and he knows that you are now perfectly
well.'

"She turned slowly to her mother: 'Am I?' she asked.

"'What, dear?'

"'Perfectly well.'

"'Certainly,' replied her mother, laughing; 'well enough to break
your neck on that horrid, jigging, little pony. If Garry wants to
see you alive he'd better come pretty soon--'

"'Come _here?_'

"We all looked up at her. Oh, Garry! For a moment something came
into her eyes that I never want to see there again--and, please
God, never shall!--a momentary light like a pale afterglow of
terror.

"It went as it came; and the colour returned to her face.

"'Is he coming here?' she asked calmly.

"'Yes,' I made bold to say.

"'When?'

"'In a few days, I hope.'

"She said nothing more about you, nor did I. A moment later she
sent away her pony and went indoors.

"After luncheon I found her lying in the hammock in the _patio_,
eyes closed as though asleep. She lay there all the afternoon--an
unusual thing for her.

"Toward sundown, as I was entering my chair to go back to the
hotel, she came out and stood beside the chair looking at me as
though she was trying to say something. I don't know what it
might have been, for she never said it, but she bent down and
laid her cheek against mine for a moment, and drew my head
around, searching my eyes.

"I don't know whether I was right or wrong, but I said: 'There is
no one to compare with you, Shiela, in your new incarnation of
health and youth. I never before knew you; I don't think you ever
before knew yourself.'

"'Not entirely,' she said.

"'Do you now?'

"'I think so.... May I ask you something?'

"I nodded, smiling.

"'Then--there is only one thing I care for now--to'--she looked
up toward the house--'to make them contented--to make up to them
what I can for--for all that I failed in. Do you understand?'

"'Yes,' I said, 'you sweet thing.' And gave her a little hug,
adding: 'And that's why I'm going to write a letter to-night--at
your mother's desire--and my own.'

"She said nothing more; my chair rolled away; and here's the
letter that I told her I meant to write.

"'Now, dear, come if you think best. I don't know of any
reason why you should not come; if you know of any you must
act on your own responsibility.'

"Last winter, believing that she cared for you, I did an
extraordinary thing--in fact I intimated to her that it was
agreeable for me to believe you cared for each other. And she
told me very sweetly that I was in error.

"So I'm not going to place Constance Palliser in such a position
again. If there's any chance of her caring for you you ought to
know it and act accordingly. Personally I think there is and that
you should take that chance and take it now. But for goodness'
sake don't act on my advice. I'm a perfect fool to meddle this
way; besides I'm having troubles of my own which you know nothing
about.

"O Garry, dear, if you'll come down I may perhaps have something
very, very foolish to tell you.

"Truly there is no idiot like an old one, but--I'm close, I
think, to being happier than I ever was in all my life. God help
us both, my dear, dear boy.

"Your faithful
"CONSTANCE."

* * * * *

CHAPTER XXIX

CALYPSO'S GIFT

Two days later as his pretty aunt stood in her chamber shaking out the
chestnut masses of her hair before her mirror, an impatient rapping at
the living-room door sent her maid flying.

"That's Garry," said Constance calmly, belting in her chamber-robe of
silk and twisting up her hair into one heavy lustrous knot.

A moment later they had exchanged salutes and, holding both his hands in
hers, she stood looking at him, golden brown eyes very tender, cheeks
becomingly pink.

"That miserable train is early; it happens once in a century. I meant to
meet you, dear."

"Wayward met me at the station," he said.

There was a silence; under his curious and significant gaze she flushed,
then laughed.

"Wayward said that you had something to tell me," he added....
"Constance, is it--"

"Yes."

"You darling!" he whispered, taking her into his arms. And she laid her
face on his shoulder, crying a little, laughing a little.

"After all these years, Garry--all these years! It is a long time to--to
care for a man--a long, long time.... But there never was any other--not
even through that dreadful period--"

"I know."

"Yes, you know.... I have cared for him since I was a little girl."

They stood a while talking tenderly, intimately of her new happiness and
of the new man, Wayward.

Both knew that he must bear his scars for ever, that youth had died in
him. But they were very confident and happy standing there together in
the sunlight which poured into the room, transfiguring her. And she
truly seemed as lovely, radiant, and youthful as her own young heart,
unsullied, innocent, now, as when it yielded its first love so long ago
amid the rosewood and brocades of the old-time parlour where the sun
fell across the faded roses of the carpet.

"I knew it was so from the way he shook hands," said Hamil, smiling.
"How well he looks, Constance! And as for you--you are a real beauty!"

"You _don't_ think so! But say it, Garry.... And now I think I had
better retire and complete this unceremonious toilet.... And you may
stroll over to pay your respects to Mrs. Cardross in the meanwhile if
you choose."

He looked at her gravely. She nodded. "They all know you are due
to-day."

"Shiela?"

"Yes.... Be careful, Garry; she is very young after all.... I think--if
I were you--I would not even seem conscious that she had been ill--that
anything had happened to interrupt your friendship. She is very
sensitive, very deeply sensible of the dreadful mistake she made, and,
somehow, I think she is a little afraid of you, as though you might
possibly think less of her--Heaven knows what ideas the young conjure to
worry themselves and those they care for!"

She laughed, kissed him and bowed him out; and he went away to bathe and
change into cool clothing of white serge.

Later as he passed through the gardens, a white oleander blossom fell,
and he picked it up and drew it through his coat.

Shadows of palm and palmetto stretched westward across the white shell
road, striping his path; early sunlight crinkled the lagoon; the little
wild ducks steered fearlessly inshore, peering up at him with bright
golden-irised eyes; mullet jumped heavily, tumbling back into the water
with splashes that echoed through the morning stillness.

The stained bronze cannon still poked their ancient and flaring muzzles
out over the lake; farther along crimson hibiscus blossoms blazed from
every hedge; and above him the stately plumes of royal palms hung
motionless, tufting the trunks, which rose with the shaft-like dignity
of slender Egyptian pillars into a cloudless sky.

On he went, along endless hedges of azalea and oleander, past thickets
of Spanish-bayonet, under leaning cocoanut-palms; and at last the huge
banyan-tree rose sprawling across the sky-line, and he saw the white
facades and red-tiled roofs beyond.

All around him now, as the air grew sweet with the breath of orange
blossoms, a subtler scent, delicately persistent, came to him on the
sea-wind; and he remembered it!--the lilac perfume of China-berry in
bloom; Calypso's own immortal fragrance. And, in the brilliant sunshine,
there under green trees with the dome of blue above, unbidden, the
shadows of the past rose up; and once more lantern-lit faces crowded
through the aromatic dark; once more the fountains' haze drifted across
dim lawns; once more he caught the faint, uncertain rustle of her gown
close to him as she passed like a fresh breath through the dusk.

Overhead a little breeze became entangled in the palmetto fronds,
setting them softly clashing together as though a million unseen elfin
hands were welcoming his return; the big black-and-gold butterflies,
beating up against the sudden air current, flapped back to their honeyed
haven in the orange grove; bold, yellow-eyed grackle stared at him from
the grass; a bird like a winged streak of flame flashed through the
jungle and was gone.

And now every breath he drew was quickening his pulses with the sense of
home-coming; he saw the red-bellied woodpeckers sticking like shreds of
checked gingham to the trees, turning their pointed heads incuriously as
he passed; the welling notes of a wren bubbled upward through the
sun-shot azure; high in the vault above an eagle was passing seaward,
silver of tail and crest, winged with bronze; and everywhere on every
side glittered the gold-and-saffron dragon-flies of the South like the
play of sunbeams on a green lagoon.

Under the sapodilla-trees on the lawn two aged, white-clad negro
servants were gathering fruit forbidden them; and at sight of him two
wrinkled black hands furtively wiped two furrowed faces free from
incriminating evidence; two solemn pairs of eyes rolled piously in his
direction.

"Mohnin', suh, Mistuh Hamil."

"Good morning, Jonas; good morning, Archimedes. Mr. Cardross is in the
orange grove, I see."

And, smiling, passed the guilty ones with a humorously threatening shake
of his head.

A black boy, grinning, opened the gate; the quick-stepping figure in
white flannels glanced around at the click of the latch.

"Hamil! Good work! I am glad to see you!"--his firm, sun-burnt hands
closing over Hamil's--"glad all through!"

"Not as glad as I am, Mr. Cardross--"

"Yes, I am. Why didn't you come before? The weather has been heavenly;
everybody wanted you--"

"_Everybody_?"

"Yes--yes, of course!... Well, look here, Hamil, I've no authority to
discuss that matter; but her mother, I think, has made matters clear to
her--concerning our personal wishes--ah--hum--is that what you're
driving at?"

"Yes.... May I ask her? I came here to ask her."

"We all know that," said Cardross naively. "Your aunt is a very fine
woman, Hamil.... I don't see why you shouldn't tell Shiela anything you
want to. We all wish it."

"Thank you," said the younger man. Their hand grip tightened and parted;
shoulder to shoulder they swung into step across the lawn, Cardross
planting his white-shod feet with habitual precision.

His hair and moustache were very white in contrast to the ruddy
sun-burnt skin; and he spoke of his altered appearance with one of his
quick smiles.

"They nearly had me in the panic, Hamil. The Shoshone weathered the
scare by grace of God and my little daughter's generosity. And it came
fast when it came; we were under bare poles, too, and I didn't expect
any cordiality from the Clearing House; but, Hamil, they classed us with
the old-liners, and they acted most decently. As for my little
daughter--well--"

And to his own and Hamil's embarrassment his clear eyes suddenly grew
dim and he walked forward a step or two winking rapidly at the sky.

Gray, bare of arm to the shoulder, booted and bare-headed, loped across
the grass on his polo-pony, mallet at salute. Then he leaned down from
his saddle and greeted Hamil with unspoiled enthusiasm.

"Shiela is practising and wants you to come over when you can and see us
knock the ball about. It's a rotten field, but you can't help that down
here."

And clapping his spurless heels to his pony he saluted and wheeled away
through the hammock.

On the terrace Mrs. Cardross took his hands in her tremulous and pudgy
fingers.

"Are you sure you are perfectly well, Garry? Don't you think it safer to
begin at once with a mild dose of quinine and follow it every three
hours with a--"

"Amy, dear!" murmured her husband, "I am not dreaming of interfering,
but I, personally, never saw a finer specimen of physical health than
this boy you are preparing to--be good to--"

"Neville, you know absolutely nothing sometimes," observed his wife
serenely. Then looking up at the tall young man bending over her chair:

"You won't need as much as you required when you rode into the swamps
every day, but you don't mind my prescribing for you now and then, do
you, Garry?"

"I was going to ask you to do it," he said, looking at Cardross
unblushingly. And at such perfidy the older man turned away with an
unfeigned groan just as Cecile, tennis-bat in hand, came out from the
hall, saw him, dropped the bat, and walked straight into his arms.

"Cecile," observed her mother mildly.

"But I wish to hug him, mother, and he doesn't mind."

Her mother laughed; Hamil, a trifle red, received a straightforward
salute square on the mouth.

"That," she said with calm conviction, "is the most proper and fitting
thing you and I have ever done. Mother, you know it is." And passing her
arm through Hamil's:

"Last night," she said under her breath, "I went into Shiela's room to
say good-night, and--and we both began to cry a little. It was as though
I were giving up my controlling ownership in a dear and familiar
possession; we did not speak of you--I don't remember that we spoke at
all from the time I entered her room to the time I left--which was
fearfully late. But I knew that I was giving up some vague proprietary
right in her--that, to-day, that right would pass to another.... And, if
I kissed you, Garry, it was in recognition of the passing of that right
to you--and happy acquiescence in it, dear--believe me! happy, confident
renunciation and gratitude for what must be."

They had walked together to the southern end of the terrace; below
stretched the splendid forest vista set with pool and fountain; under
the parapet, in the new garden, red and white roses bloomed, and on the
surface of spray-dimmed basins the jagged crimson reflections of
goldfish dappled every unquiet pool.

"Where is the new polo field?" he asked.

She pointed out an unfamiliar path curving west from the tennis-courts,
nodded, smiled, returning the pressure of his hand, and stood watching
him from the parapet until he vanished in the shadow of the trees.

The path was a new one to him, cut during the summer. For a quarter of
a mile it wound through the virgin hammock, suddenly emerging into a
sunny clearing where an old orange grove grown up with tangles of brier
and vine had partly given place to the advance of the jungle.

Something glimmered over there among the trees--a girl, coated and
skirted in snowy white, sitting a pony, and leisurely picking and eating
the great black mulberries that weighted the branches so that they bent
almost to the breaking.

She saw him from a distance, turned in her saddle, lifting her
polo-mallet in recognition; and as he came, pushing his way across the
clearing, almost shoulder-deep through weeds, from which the
silver-spotted butterflies rose in clouds, she stripped off one stained
glove, and held out her hand to him.

"You were so long in coming," she managed to say, calmly, "I thought I'd
ride part way back to meet you; and fell a victim to these mulberries.
Tempted and fell, you see.... Are you well? It is nice to see you."

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30